I ended up getting the job because as Lee Sooman put it, I was ‘too valuable of a resource to lose'.  Which meant that the only reason he was keeping me at SM was because I knew how to choreograph.  So in a way, I was good enough.  But at the same time, I really wasn’t.  But that doesn’t matter now, does it, Seoyoon-ah?  There’s no point on dwelling on your past failures because what really matters now is the present.

“Okay, guys.  Let’s go over the routine one more time before we add the music, alright?”  I said.

The handful of other trainees in the room shuffled back into position behind me, spreading themselves out.  I counted off the beats and began to dance, watching as the boys behind me copied my movements.

It was my first day as a Class C dance instructor.  I didn’t know why I was so attracted to the thought of it, but I really did want to become the upcoming project group’s choreographer.  Maybe it was because I knew that Hyukjae and Sungmin would probably be in it, or maybe it was because I wanted to be noticed.  Not by Hyukjae and Sungmin, since they already knew how good I was.  Well, I still wanted them to notice, but I also wanted others to notice as well.  Because if they really did end up debuting and I really did end up becoming their choreographer, I wanted the world to know whose brains had been behind their routines.  I didn’t really know how to explain it, not even to myself.  But the idea of it made me happy.

But of course I couldn’t start out that way because the members of the project group hadn’t even been finalized yet.  Furthermore, I had no real experience in teaching other people, and being a choreographer meant having to teach others well.  Lee Sooman and I had both decided that I would choreograph for and teach the new trainees before I started on the project group.  That way I could develop better leadership skills and whatnot.  I was scheduled for one class every day.  As of right now, there were two different groups of boys in Class C.  I had the class I was teaching right now Monday through Wednesday, another class Thursday through Saturday, and both classes on Sunday.

The boys and I finished the routine and I headed over to the music player, turning it on so they could try doing it by themselves to music.  But as the song began playing, a corner of my mouth turned down and I bit my lip.

The results were much different from what I had expected.  Two or three of them had gotten the routine down and they seemed to remember it, even though their movements were still awkward.  But the same couldn’t be said for the others.  One of was staring at one of the boys who actually knew it, unable to dance by himself and relying entirely on watching the others.  One of them became more offbeat as the seconds passed.  One of them forgot everything beyond the first twenty seconds and frantically tried to copy the others, but failing miserably.

I didn’t know what to do.  I had already gone over the two-minute hip hop routine a total of ten times before asking them to do it by themselves.  Surely that was enough, right?

“That was okay, but it could have been a lot better,” I said a little reluctantly after they had finished.  “Let’s try it one more time.”

The music played for the second time and I stood back and watched them more carefully.  There was no noticeable improvement.  I stopped the music halfway through and chewed on my lip.  What exactly was I doing wrong?
 

“Uh, do you guys actually know the routine?”  I asked, my voice wavering a bit as I became aware of how I wasn’t doing as good of a job as I thought I was.

I was met with a handful of reluctant nods and one or two yeses or nos.  My frown deepened.  Great, Lee Seoyoon.  Not only are you a bad teacher, they also don’t want to listen to you because you’re a girl and you’re younger than them.  Or maybe it’s something else.  Either way, you need to get with the program and pull yourself together.

“Are you sure you actually know the routine?”  I repeated a little more loudly.  I began to pick at the skin around my fingernails with my hands out of nervousness but forced myself to stop.  This time, the chorus of acknowledgements was louder.  But then I realized that half of the people didn’t know the routine.

“Those of you who don’t know the routine, pair up with someone who does know the routine and ask them to teach it to you.  That way, both of you will know it better.”

The boys slowly broke into pairs and I headed over to my bag in the corner, intending to take a short water break while they practiced by themselves.  But glancing in the mirror, I became aware that one boy didn’t have a partner.  He stood there by himself among the other pairs, his eyes on me.  I panicked as I realized too late that there was an odd number of trainees in the room.

“Oh, do you not have a partner?”  I asked, turning around and walking over to him.  I nearly facepalmed as the words left my mouth.  Of course he doesn’t have a partner.  Are you blind?

“Yeah,” he said informally.  I stopped in my place as I realized another thing.  This was the first time today that someone in the room had talked to me one-on-one, and he wasn’t using honorifics.  I was technically an instructor now, and even though he looked several years older than me and was a few inches taller and looked rather intimidating, I was at a higher rank.  Was he supposed to use informal speech or not?

“Uh…”  My voice trailed off as I pondered the question.  I personally didn't mind whether or not they used formal speech, but I felt like they were obliged to do so, despite how it didn't matter that much to me.  Then I remembered that he was waiting for me to do something.  I decided to use formal speech anyways.  Maybe he would switch over as well.  “Uh, you can pair up with me and I can go over it with you by myself.  We can go over to that corner of there.”

I walked over to the corner.  It wasn’t until I realized that he hadn’t been following me.  It was only after I motioned for him to come over before he actually did so.

“Okay, so can you show me what you have so far?”

“I don’t have anything.”  He shrugged his broad shoulders, his face blank.  Informal speech again.  I ignored it.

“But how can you not remember anything?”  I went over the routine several times already, you must remember something,” I said, completely puzzled.

“Well, I remember this part.”  The boy demonstrated a few awkward moves that barely looked like the original routine and I raised my eyebrows.  How did he not remember?

“I’m just gonna go over the entire routine entire step by step and you can follow along.  Would that help?”

He nodded and I began to show him the routine.  It wasn’t very difficult.  To be honest, it probably fell under the category of a Class B routine, not a Class C one.  But it couldn’t have been that hard, right?  It wasn’t hard for me.

After spending about five minutes going over the dance and making sure he had gotten the basic movements down-- he looked extremely awkward while dancing, but that could wait until later-- I left him alone to practice and went over to the other groups to check on their progress.  I came to two of the oldest boys and observed them for a few minutes.  One of them was one of the few who had gotten the routine down at the very beginning, and he was teaching the other boy.  I nodded slightly.  I was confident that he would teach the other well.  After watching the two for several seconds, I moved onto the next group.  I went around like this for about a minute, spending just a few seconds on each pair.  Then I glanced at the clock.  The practice session was scheduled to last for two hours, and time was running out.  There were only about fifteen minutes left.  I sighed a frustrated sigh and made a mental note to learn how to manage class time more efficiently.

“Okay everyone, let’s get back together and try it again.”

To my shock, however, there was still little to no sign of improvement.  True, the ones who had actually remembered the routine were getting a bit better with each round, but with the others, it was the exact opposite.  My mouth dropped open slightly as I realized that the most of the others were doing the routine incorrectly.  They either looked extremely awkward and uncomfortable with the dance, or they weren’t even doing the right movements.  I continued to stand there, blinking as I tried to comprehend what had happened.  What had I done wrong?

“I thought at least half of you knew the routine,” I said slowly.  “You were supposed to teach the others, weren’t you?”

I looked around at my eyes landed on the boy I had worked with earlier.

“What’s your name again?”  I wasn’t sure whether or not I was supposed to know their names, but knowing them would probably make things easier for me.

“Kim Youngwoon,” he said, giving me a strange look.

“I thought you knew the routine.  I went over it with you myself just a minute ago.”  I was met with a shrug and a confused expression.

“Okay, clearly this isn’t working.  What is it about the routine that’s making it so hard to learn?  Is it too hard?  Or am I going over it too quickly?”

No one responded and we all stood there for a few seconds in silence.  At that moment, I wanted to run out of the room in embarrassment.

“I’m trying to help all of you, but it’s not working.  What do I need to work on?”  I asked, rephrasing the question so it was more open-ended.  There was another long silence before the boy named Youngwoon turned to look at me.  He sighed and I winced visibly at the sound.  I began to pick at my fingers again.

“Seoyoon-ssi,” he said, staring me directly in the eye.  “It’s Seoyoon-ssi, right?”  I nodded, feeling extremely awkward and like the exact opposite of an authoritative figure.  I was standing in the middle of the room, surrounding by the people who I was supposed to be teaching.  I wasn’t supposed to be intimidated by them.  That wasn’t how things were supposed to work.

“You have to use formal speech with me because I’m an instructor,” I plucked up the courage to finally say.  Youngwoon raised a thick eyebrow.  I glanced around and saw a few of the others were giving me similar looks.  Very doubtful looks.

“Seoyoon-ssi, you can’t teach us the way you teach us and expect us to process all that information.  Who learns like that?  You can’t expect us to practice that routine for such a short amount of time and do it perfectly.”

He had used formal speech this time, but his words caused something to flare up in me.  Maybe it was the embarrassment the situation was causing me, maybe it was the frustration.  I knew I wasn’t doing very well right now, to put it mildly, but I didn’t know what to do about it and there was no one to help me.

“But isn’t that how people are supposed to learn?”  I asked, the irritation obvious in my voice.  “I’m supposed to show you the routine and you’re supposed to learn it correctly.  It’s not even that hard or long of a routine and all of you should be able to get it down after I go over it two or three times and--”

I stopped as I realized that everyone in the room was looking at me with a look I couldn’t place a name to.  But it certainly wasn’t a very pleasant look.

I heard another trainee sigh softly and shake his head before walking away from the throng of people.  He picked up his bag from the corner and started towards the door.

“Wait, where are you going?”  I asked, annoyed.  “You can’t just leave like that when I’m in the middle of talking.”

“Class is already over.  You’re five minutes overtime,” he replied shortly before disappearing down the hall.  The room was silent after the door closed behind him.  Then one by one, the other boys began walking over to the corners of the room, picking up their bags as well.  They slowly left the room.  Youngwoon was the last to leave and gave me a wordless glance before stepping out the door and leaving me alone in the practice room.

I suppressed a groan and closed my eyes, taking a deep breath to try to calm myself down.  It didn’t work.

What happened, Lee Seoyoon?  Explain to me exactly how you managed to completely things up.  I took a rattling, angry breath and stalked out of the practice room, too frustrated to continue.

What happened?  What did you do wrong now?  I swear, it seems like you can’t do anything right these days.  First, you mess up your chances of debut and now there’s no chance of you becoming an idol.  And now you’re messing up your chances of being a choreographer as well.  These words swam around in my head for the rest of the day.  I was sitting at the kitchen counter, doing my homework.  I wasn’t a trainee anymore and I had terminated my trainee contract with Lee Sooman, but we had agreed that I would continue to live at the dorms for the time being until I could find a better place.  I would be moving out soon.  And if I continued to run dance practices like this, I would be moving out a lot sooner than what I expected

Some instructor you are.  I snorted loudly.

“Seoyoon unni?”  I suddenly heard.  I looked up to see Jessica looking over my shoulder, an apple in her hand.

“What is it?”  I rubbed my forehead, not really wanting to talk to her at the moment but unable to refuse.

“I’m not the best at math either, but I’m pretty sure there’s 180 degrees in a triangle, not 150,” she commented, a small smile spreading across her face.  I looked down at the worksheet I was doing and took a closer look.

“Oh,” I muttered.  “I knew that.  It was just a stupid mistake.”  I began erasing the problem.

“Actually, half of these problems are wrong.  For one thing, the polynomial 5x squared minus 6x plus 5 can’t be factored.  And if a function has a hole, that doesn’t mean it’s continuous.”

“I knew that too,” I scowled at the paper even more fiercely.

“What’s wrong, unni?  Do you need to talk about anything?  Are you on your period?  Do you have cramps or--”

“No,” I frowned.  “Why would I be on my period?”

“Well, I get really cranky when I’m on my period and--”

“You can’t just assume I’m on my period just because I’m cranky, Jessica,” I said, the bite evident in my voice.

“Sorry,” she said meekly, shrinking back a little.  I instantly regretted sounding so harsh and my tone softened.

“No, it’s fine,” I said.  “I’m just a bit tired right now, that’s all.”

“What happened?”

I didn’t really want to talk about it.  I realized too late that I should have just said I was fine.

“Nothing much.  You don’t need to ask me about it or anything.  It’s something I can figure out by myself.”

“So you do have something on your mind.  Do you need help?”

“Who needs help?”  Jiyeong called from her room.  She came out a few seconds afterwards and I sighed out loud as she took a seat at the counter and Jessica copied her.

”Great, Jessica.  Look what you’ve started now.”

“What did I do?”  Now she was the one who looked irritated.  “I just think that if someone here has a problem, we should all talk it out and try to help.  What’s wrong with that?  It’s also a good bonding experience.”

“Jessica, you know perfectly well that I’m leaving soon.  It could be next month, it could be tomorrow for all I know.”

“All the more reason to talk to each other while we can.  Well, we’re still planning on keeping in touch, but still.  Right, unni?”  She turned to Jiyeong and the older girl nodded.  I sighed before relenting and telling them what had happened during the practice session.  By the time I was finished, the two of them were looking at me with surprised expressions.

“What?”  I tilted my head to the side.  “Don’t you think I’m right?”

“Don’t you think you might be going a bit too hard on them on your first day?”

“No?”  I said, confused.  “What makes you think that?”

“Seoyoon-ah, you can’t show someone a full two-minute routine only a few times and expect them to get it down perfectly.  Why didn’t you teach them the dance in smaller chunks?  Isn’t that how all instructors do it?  Isn’t that how we’ve all learned it?  Who shows someone a two-minute routine in one go?”

“Well, but I can do that and still get it down--”

“Just because you can do that doesn’t mean everyone else can,” Jessica said simply.  She shrugged and folded her arms across her chest.

I started to say something else, feeling more annoyed than ever for no apparent reason.  Okay, maybe she was right.  Oh please, Lee Seoyoon, you know she’s right.  It’s your own fault for being stupid and not having thought of that point earlier.  But that didn’t mean I was particularly happy about her rubbing it in.

“What does the routine look like anyways?”

“It’s just a typical hip hop routine that I made a few days ago.  Why?”

“Show me.”  Jiyeong motioned her head towards me and I raised my eyebrows.

“Now?  Here?”

“Yes, now and here.”  I reluctantly got up from my stool and began doing the routine for the two of them, but not putting in all my effort because I knew the floor wasn’t made for dancing and because there wasn’t a lot of room in the small kitchen.

“What class are you teaching again?”  Jiyeong’s eyes were wide after I finished and sat back down.

“Class C.”

“That’s a Class C routine?”  Jessica butted in.  “I beg to differ, that’s not a Class C routine.  It’s not even a Class B routine.  Maybe the Class B people would learn this as a challenge, but I would say this is a Class A routine.  Of course they didn’t get how to do it.  You tried to teach a Class A routine to a group of Class C people, and you didn’t exactly do a very good job because you barely gave them enough time to learn and you didn’t manage them very well.  So of course they would be frustrated and of course they would be less reluctant to listen to you and respect you because you weren’t acting like the best teacher out there and it was clear that you had no experience at all.”

“But--”

“But what?  Just admit it.  You need to drastically change your teaching methods.  It doesn’t matter if you’re a good dancer if you’re a y teacher.”

Her blunt words triggered something in me and my face contorted into a glare.

“Jessica Jung, you little--” I said angrily.  I knew she was a very straightforward person and that she was absolutely right in this case, but that didn’t meant I liked it.  I hadn’t wanted this conversation in the first place.  Why did she have to meddle like that when I could have figured it out myself?

“I’m only telling the truth, unni,” she said.  Her voice had gone cold.  “If you can’t handle the truth then that’s your problem and--”

All the frustration that had built over over the day spilled over.  I slammed my palm on the table and stood up abruptly, nearly knocking over my chair.  I opened my mouth to snarl a retort, but stopped as I realized that Jiyeong was giving me a hard look.  Jessica looked frightened as she took in the sight of me towering over her.  As far as I remembered, I had never lost my temper in front of them like the before.  For a few seconds, I hovered there, torn between screaming at both of them and trying to find the strength to control myself.  Then I spun on my heel and strode out of the dorm without looking back.

Stop being so sensitive, Lee Seoyoon.  You know what you’re doing is wrong.  What reason do you have to be upset at Jessica and Jiyeong?  They’re only trying to help. and you know that.  But all those thoughts didn’t help me find the sense to go back to them and apologize.  Instead, I continued to storm out the building, down the street, and into the depths of downtown Seoul.