pairing: ChenLay
length: 1588 words

Darkness had fallen and most of the employees at SM Entertainment had retired home for the evening, excluding those who stayed to practice longer and those who had night schedules. It was a cool spring night, but the air conditioner was still on full blast in the brightly lit dance practice rooms for the dancers who were working up a sweat, performing their choreography over and over again.

Chen was feeling particularly frustrated tonight. No matter how much he tried, he just couldn’t perfect the dance for their newest comeback, Call Me Baby. It was infuriating, to say the least. His only solace was that Chanyeol and D.O were also having trouble picking up the steps, although in D.O’s case, it was more out of laziness than inability. Chen didn’t know how Baekhyun managed to keep up with the dancers of the group, especially since the vocalist wasn’t naturally gifted at dance. Even Suho was doing better than Chen, but then again, the leader had spent years training and had his own system of learning, which he utilized when he was practicing on his own.

Chen was alone in the practice room since the other EXO members had returned home to rest for the night before their hectic schedules began the following day. The vocalist had refused to go back, saying he needed to nail the chorus part of the dance before he would return to the dorm. Baekhyun had whined for him to resume practice the next day, but Chen had just flicked the older male’s forehead and told him that he wasn’t a slacker like Baekhyun was, causing the offended male to yelp in pain and disbelief.

Sweat dripped down his face and neck, splashing onto the wooden floor. Chen toppled down in exhaustion before forcefully kicking his legs in the air, irritated that he was still making mistakes even after hours of practice. It never took him this long to record a verse. He was usually the one who took the least amount of time to record his parts, even if Baekhyun claimed otherwise, but it took him forever to learn one measly dance. Grasping his nearby water bottle with his right hand, he lightly sprayed the cool liquid onto his face and chest, feeling the heat of exertion slowly dissipate.

Chen closed his eyes as he laid on his back, shielding them from the bright overhead lights shining down on him. Darkness and silence enveloped him, calming his nerves and placing him in a more tranquil state of mind. And then, as his senses sharpened, Chen felt the room rumble around him. Although all of the practice rooms were soundproof, with the absence of music playing in his room, Chen could feel the vibrations of loud music blaring from a close-by practice room.

As he sat up, he wondered who else would be practicing this late at night. He wasn’t particularly close to any of the trainees, so he didn’t know if any of them were practice maniacs like Kai had been during EXO’s trainee days. Heaving himself up from the floor, Chen staggered out of the room and walked around, trying to find the source of the noise.

Two doors down, he peered through the small glass window of the practice room that was shaking from the vibrating bass and saw two males fluidly moving in harmony. The vocalist was captivated by their movements and noiselessly opened the door to get a better look. The two dancers were too engrossed in moving to the music, so they didn’t see Chen slip inside and sit cross-legged at the far wall. He noticed that they were dancing the choreography for Call Me Baby, but it looked so different when they danced to the song, compared to the awkward manner in which he did.

After a closer look, Chen realized that the two dancers were one of his group members, Lay, and one of EXO’s dance teachers, Kasper. They were perfectly in sync as they body-rolled, cross-stepped, and their pelvises in time to the music. Chen stared in awe as they performed as one, seamlessly moving from step to step without a moment’s hesitation. It was like they were exact copies of each other. Chen wanted to dance just like that.

Once the song finished playing, the two dancers turned around, wiping away the perspiration from their glistening foreheads, before jumping back in surprise when they spotted Chen watching them with wide eyes. “Whoa, since when did you get here, Chen?” Lay asked, a dumbfounded expression on his sweaty face.

“Uh, like a few minutes ago,” Chen answered with a sheepish laugh, nervously scratching his neck as he stood up from the floor.

“And you were just silently watching us like a creeper?” Kasper teased, laughing brightly as Chen lightly punched him while blushing in embarrassment.

“But why are you guys here so late? You didn’t go back with the others, Lay?” Chen asked as he handed clean towels to the two tired dancers so they could wipe away their sweat.

“Lay wanted to go over the dance a couple more times, so he asked if I could stay back with him,” Kasper answered for the Chinese male, who was busily gulping down the stream of water falling from his water bottle into his parched mouth. “We didn’t realize it had gotten this late though.”

Kasper soon headed out, not wanting to miss the next bus since it was already past midnight. Lay and Chen waved him off, the former thanking the dance teacher for practicing with him for so long. “Shall we go home too?” Lay asked the younger male, now that it was just the two of them in the practice room. The used towel was slung around his neck and his bangs were roughly brushed back, save for a few strands of hair falling forward onto his forehead.

Chen took a deep breath before grabbing Lay’s hands and saying without a pause, “Do you think you could teach me the Call Me Baby dance again?” He cringed at how frantic he sounded, but desperate times called for desperate measures. This was the best chance to get some one-on-one teaching from one of the best dancers in the group and Chen was not about to let this golden opportunity slip through his fingers.

Lay scratched his head in confusion, unsure of why the younger male was asking to practice such a strenuous activity when he knew that the group had a jam-packed schedule the next day. Honestly, Lay was exhausted and wanted to crawl in bed right away. His limbs and joints were aching, and he had no energy left in his body. But Chen was looking at him with such an anxious, beseeching stare that Lay finally relented and pushed away his exhaustion like it had never existed in the first place.

The two spent the next hour slowly going over the dance, with Lay demonstrating the moves first and Chen copying his movements right after. Once Chen felt that he was comfortable enough to go through the dance by himself, Lay stood to the side and carefully watched for any mistakes. If Chen was off-rhythm or stepped on the wrong foot, Lay immediately paused the music to correct the younger male.

The practice was long and grueling as the talented dancer drilled the inept one into perfection. Chen resolutely kept up with the strict teaching, knowing that he had brought this upon himself. Even when his muscles burned from the lack of oxygen and sweat coated every inch of his body, the vocalist pushed himself to achieve that image of flawlessness he had witnessed earlier.

It was almost three in the morning when the two finally decided to quit. They were sprawled across the floor, limbs feeling heavy as lead. Lay struggled to reach for his phone, which was on the floor a foot away from him, but he could not physically bring himself to stretch that far and slumped into the ground even more with his empty fingers still outstretched in his phone’s direction. Chen felt like he had died a thousand times over, his lungs working at double speed as he let out labored breaths. But despite his winded state, he smiled triumphantly as he pumped a fist into the air.

He had finally mastered the Call Me Baby dance. He still wasn’t as clean or sharp as Lay and Kasper were when they had performed the dance earlier, but Chen was satisfied with his progress as of now. He could successfully run through the dance without any mistakes several times in a row and he managed to look somewhat alluring as he did, instead of being stiff and awkward as he usually felt. He twisted his neck to face Lay and beamed at the older male, thankful that he had sacrificed his precious sleep to aid the incompetent dancer. “Thanks a lot, Lay. I really appreciate you staying so late to help me out. I know you’re worn out right now. I know I am.”

Lay held out a thumbs-up, the ends of his eyes crinkling as he grinned back at his group member. “No problem. Any time, buddy.”

And the two of them fell fast asleep where they were, limbs splayed out on the floor, for the rest of the night.

Only to be woken up the next morning by a screeching Baekhyun, who thought there were two corpses lying in the middle of the practice room.

♈♈♈