[ recommended listening: all the boys by panic! at the disco ]

People can be petty. This was a fact of life that your mother had reiterated to you many, many times — people can be petty. You will meet people who will dislike you for the way you dress, judge you for how you speak, dismiss you based solely on shallow, meaningless qualities that had nothing to do with really anything at all.

After a point, accepting that fact was no longer comforting.

Trudging down the empty hall to the girls’ locker room, you breathed in and out through your nose, staring dead-eyed at the tiles. Your flats squeaked loudly as you walked, echoing off the walls, and you hardly felt the chill that seeped through your soaked clothes.

People could be petty to you.

In a good mood, you could appreciate the humor in it. It was a petty series of events that had led to your current situation; years ago, your dance teacher was caught doing some discriminatory things — such as cutting people from the team whose color she didn’t like, or shape, claiming they had other faults, naturally, but when you overheard her talking with the star members of the team about how beauty and form was worth more in the long run, well…

Well, you, did the right thing. You told the people in charge. And they took it very, very seriously.

Anyway, that was the story of how you got everyone’s favourite dance teacher fired and your team suspended from activities for the rest of the year. It’s not something easily forgotten, or let go — the girls that did stick around made sure of it. You had probably spent a small fortune in buying new clothes just from the sheer amount that went missing, amongst other things. You were disincluded from most activities, and conveniently left out of rescheduled practices.

But today was a new bad.

Your eyes were rimmed with glassy liquid, traitorous and threatening to spill at any moment. You pushed the locker door open, still clutching at the gaping tear in the front of your leotard and dripping with iced coffee. The humiliation was what did it — it was one thing to be ignored, but a completely different animal when it involved being belittled. You had almost held it together until they started laughing, pointing at your exposed s, and—

“Don’t,” you told yourself firmly, voice cracking. “Don’t you dare, don’t, don’t. Don’t think about it. Don’t think about it. Get dressed and go home. Everything will be okay.”

It kind of worked.

You only cried a little bit.

—

One t-shirt and a pair of yoga pants later, you were clean and your head was quieter.

You had waited long enough to make sure the others had left in order to return to the practice room and get the rest of your things — if they were even there. The first of good luck you had that day was that you were right: not a soul was inside.

The room felt so plain and harmless when you were the only one in it.

Wasn’t that cruel? Dancing had been one of your only real loves in life. You had gotten into school on a dance scholarship, won competitions sometimes, made your family proud, sort of. But this troupe was your troupe, and you knew you couldn’t afford to bus out to the other studio across town every single practice. This was it. Dance with them, or don’t dance at all.

Tip-toeing in, your eyes found your bag laying forgotten on the bench, intact. At least there was that. But as you reached the center of the room, alone, you turned and stared at your reflection.

A thick lump appeared in your throat at it.

Oh. You were very disappointing.

Feebly, you stretched out an arm and leg and spun, dipped, and posed neatly. The motions were fluid and lovely, objectively, but you saw all the reasons to be laughed at and ridiculed. Why couldn’t you be straighter? Where were the perfect lines? Maybe if your eyes were bigger, your hair silkier, your s—

The lump expanded and you quickly frowned, staring up with miserable frustration at the ceiling as not to cry. No, no, no.

“Oh, there you are!”

The sudden interruption scared you so badly that you yelped, flinching back from the source. Your heart went into overdrive, but your wild eyes focused and realized it was not one of your teammates — it was a light periwinkle-haired boy you hadn’t seen in at least a week.

“O-oh!” you choked out. “Hoshi. You startled me. I thought you were out of the country for the competition?”

But your words didn’t seem to reach him. His face, an open book, scanned your features, your posture, and slowly his brow furrowed and the corners of his mouth downturned.

His duffle bag dropped off his shoulder with a thump.

“Why were you crying?”

Damn it. You grimaced back at him, turning your head to wipe at your eyes quickly.

“Nothing crazy,” you hedged, blinking quickly to try to look more composed. “Just the usual dumb stuff. But what are you doing here?”

“It’s the other girls, isn’t it? You never wear that to practice in. Where’s your leotard? And the rest of them, for that matter? You told me they stopped messing with you—”

“Soonyoung, I’m fine!”

That came out much louder and much more sharply than you intended. Embarrassed, you flushed and felt your chest throb unpleasantly, less than happy at your behavior. Hoshi didn’t deserve this. He had always, always been a good friend, and one of the best dancers at the academy, and he absolutely didn’t even have to give you the time of day but, sometimes, he would sit with you for lunch, and would ask you about music, and talk to you. Just talk to you. Like a normal person.

Soonyoung made you feel very normal.

You were terrified you had just damaged one of the only good relationships you had in this place. When you heard him move, you expected to see him heading out the door. But a glance in the mirror showed him striding towards you with intense determination in his gaze, and even when he was a few feet away from you he didn’t stop. Soonyoung encroached on your personal space, and you had never realized how much taller than you he was, and forgot how solid he was despite his slender, boyish build, and…

“You’re not fine,” he demanded, but he looked almost excited. “You’re angry. You’re pissed and you hate this. Admit it.”

Indignance and panic welled up in you. There was no way in hell any of his accusations could sink in. Not after you had spent so… so long not letting them be true. You couldn’t.

“I’m fine,” you repeated, and your voice was not very convincing. Soonyoung stepped closer still, and you could feel the warmth he radiated from here.

“Get angry,” he coaxed. His voice was sweet and intense, so easy to listen to, to laugh along with. “Be mad. Tell me how much you hate this. Tell me that it’s unfair.”

“I-it’s not,” you insisted and your throat was weak this time, hands shaking. “I’m not. I don’t want—”

“Yes you do. Come on. If it’s true, then you can tell me how much you love it and look forward to it and how it’s the best part of your week and none of it bothers you a bit. But you don’t have to do that — you can tell me how you really feel. Scream and cry and hit me and tell me what’s wrong. Stop lying.”

“I DON’T!”

You didn’t know what you didn’t. But it was something. Hoshi jumped a little, startled by the volume of your shout, but his shock immediately turned into earnest satisfaction, anticipation. He didn’t back away; he eagerly waited, sensing the way your body seemed to bristle with too many dark, aching things cooped up for far too long.

“I don’t,” you screeched back at him, strangled. “You’re wrong, I don’t hate them! I don’t hate anybody! It’s just not fair, it’s just — not — ing fair! God damn it, I just, I just wanted to be pretty! I wanted to be loved! I just wanted to dance and I-I can’t, I can’t do a single one of those things r-right!”

“Of course you can! You do!” Hoshi shot back, eyes bright and practically burning holes through you. For some reason, he was incredibly tense from whatever you had told him, but he didn’t stop. He plowed on, still yelling, pleading with you, “You are pretty! You are loved! And I will always, always dance with you!”

The words all hung in the air, waiting. A calm quiet settled over the room after that. As his confessions sunk in, Hoshi gradually turned a fine shade of pink across his cheeks, but didn’t stop glowering at you, desperate to convince you of the truth.

He couldn’t sit still much longer. He was buzzing with pent-up nerves, and frowning, he muttered, “Fine, I’ll prove it. Watch me.” before shuffling off to the stereo and plugging in his phone.

A familiar voice came through the speakers, though you didn’t know the song. It was fast tempoed and urgent and very, very catchy, and your toes twitched despite the mess of emotions that destroyed your insides.

And then Hoshi was there, his hand effortlessly taking yours and pulling you into position to scoop you around the room.

At first, your body acted on reflex, muscle memory kicking in and following his fun, modified foxtrot. He could move quickly without losing his balance or his grip — he always kept form, always moved like it was nothing new to him at all. In fact, Kwon Soonyoung was so good, you even forgot to be upset, because you were too busy being impressed by how he was the most amazing dance partner you’d ever had.

Hoshi, unabashedly, was gazing right at you. The glint of determination still lingered in his sherry eyes, willing you to believe him. You stared back at him dumbly, mouth parted slightly and eyes wide and mesmerized.

The song picked up at the chorus, and your heart raced faster. Hoshi mouthed along with the words, crooning them at you under his breath and still leading you as if it were the most natural thing in the world. You almost gasped the first time you caught the hard muscles in his arms flexing as he lifted you, spun you once, and the rush of surprise had you laughing squeakily.

Just like that, Hoshi was grinning, yanking you closer and abruptly shifting you into a far more intimate waltz.

“All the boys and I, all the boys and I, love her madly,” he half-sang. “All the boys and I, all the girls and I, too…”

…Did he mean that?

Any thoughts of inadequacies and despair and self-loathing vanished. The whole world turned into Kwon Soonyoung, and the meager, smoldering space between your bodies. You moved with him like you were born to, and it didn’t matter if he picked up the pace or made a sudden change in movement — you followed him without stumbling or second-guessing yourself. 

And Hoshi seemed thrilled.

“Is-n’t she…” Instantly, you were twirled under his arms and then anchored in an elaborate, elegant twist with his arms around you, forcing you to face the wall of mirrors with your back tight to his chest as he sang oh-so softly, “…a dream come true?”

Gently, tenderly, he rocked you like that.

“Pretty pretty,” he murmured, resting his chin on the top of your head. “Pretty pretty pretty. Don’t you think so?”

Unexpectedly, the emotion all bubbled up and a rush of hot tears filled your vision. Your cheeks were flushed and your hair fluffed and you were almost glowing with happy, satisfying exertion, and nothing compared to the way Hoshi looked so attractive wound around you as he was.

“Hoshi,” your voice cracked. The song was reaching its , and he hadn’t stopped swaying you yet.

“Do you believe me yet?” he hummed into your hair. A shiver ran down your spine.

For the first time in a long time, you decided to tell the truth.

“I think,” you began, tentatively and blinking back the heat against your eyelashes, “I’d believe anything you told me as long as we were dancing.”

On cue, you were reversed and he finally caught you by surprise — the support vanished from underneath you and you gasped, off-balance, but he caught you perfectly in a curved, low dip, with his body craned snugly over yours.

Soonyoung’s smile was infectious, and he was breathing a little hard as the song came to an end. Your heart skipped a few beats, and you shut your eyes tight the moment you thought about kissing him.

As the next song started up, he didn’t let go. You peeked one eye open nervously, and saw him staring at you in the kind of way that could make a girl’s blood rush to her head and he grinned shamelessly.

“Then we just won’t stop dancing.”