Empty.

That's the only word to describe Kim Jongin. They call him Kai, the other people. He doesn't really mind them at all. For what he knows, they don't even matter. He lights up a cigarette and leaves it in the glass ash-tray in front of him. It's this habit of his – inhaling the gluey, somewhat sweet smoke and intoxicating himself with it, but he never tastes it. Not even once, because he is in charge, and for what that matters, Jongin always knows when to stop. Only a glance at the big french window, inlaid with symmetric squiggles is enough to see how windy and stormy the weather is today, even though it's the middle of may. His lips move slightly upward in a grimace with undefined emotion at the poetic reference of his own excuse of life he senses in the weather and somehow, he manages to look graceful even then. Rather mentally than physically exhausted, Jongin rests in the hand-made, first rate couch that Sehun always mocks him about. The boy can not simply understand why his friend spent a crazy amount of money for something just as superficial, instead investing them in the studio or his own house or food, for even the last seems a lot more reasonable to Sehun, that is. Jongin snorts at the unpleasant memory, reconsidering if he should or should not just end their either ways weird friendship, thus he won't have to deal with the brat's inconvenient nagging. Before he even has the time to seriously think on the matter a not so tall, pale figure catches his attention with it's pathetic attempts to open a big glass door. Jongin sighs, torn by annoyance and the urge to laugh uncontrollably at the comic view before him. But what is this, he doesn't remember having any lessons today, besides he usually works with women and as far as he's able to distinguish – broad shoulders, slender waist, short cut hair – yeah, the newcomer is definitely a man. The door finally opens and a confused looking boy enters the studio with faltering steps.

“Hello, my name is Zhang Yixing. My Korean friends call me Lay” - he says as he approaches Kai, bowing respectfully. A light Chinese accent is to be heard in his voice, words coming a bit tottered out. Kai casts an estimating glance at him - from his right-winged fringe, purple backpack and checkered blue-gray blouse to the dark black jeans and worn out sneakers. He doesn't look like much of a dancer.

“Kim Jongin, but I prefer being called Kai” - he finally answers. - “ Also known as the owner of this studio. And in my capacity of such, how can I possibly help you?”

“Um, I was actually hoping I could have a talk with you.. it's kind of conflicted.”- Kai wrinkles his forehead at the weird choice of words until he realizes what Yixing is trying to say.

“You mean complicated” - he voices, and it's not much of a question, but more of a statement, really.

Kai lights another cigarette that he doesn't smoke and holds it between his thumb and forefinger before he decides that it has already been long enough and this time it might be interesting. This time it might mean more than a few tears shed with the sound of goodbye. So he nods.

Their first conversation is about vague silence, smoke-scented fear and awkward glances. Sitting across of Kai, Yixing nervously thumps with his fingers on the wooden table whilst the tanned boy examines his CV. Apparently, Yixing is two years older than him and comes from Hunan, China, the Changsha province. The latter means nothing to Kai and he leaves the pile of paper sidewards, far more interested in what the boy has to say than what his documents can show.

“I'm a dancer”- Lay finally stutters, cursing himself inwardly.

“Really now?” The tanned boy's mocking grin says more about him than any recommendation and makes Lay wonder of coming here was the right decision after all.

“Yes. I freestyle. I do some jazz and popping too” - Lay answers, looking so determined that he kind of resembles a little kid, fighting over a sand castle with the sea and it's infinite waves. Beautifully naive.

“What about ballet?”

“Excuse me?”

“You are excused. Retire devant, Sur le cou-de-pied? Doesn't that ring a bell?”

Rather confused with Kim Jongin's outstanding french accent, than with the terms, the fair-skinned boy blinks at him, blank expression on his face.

“For what that matters, I like watching ballet. But no, I have never personally danced.”

“You like watching ballet” - Jongin parrots, contempt in his voice, a lop-sided half smile decorating his face. There is something about that guy, something obscurely crude. Lay shakes the irrational feeling off his head, for judging people by only his first impression for them is not exactly his style. “You do realize this is a ballet studio, right?”

This time Lay doesn't let Kim Jongin counter him.

“I've been told it's a dance studio. Nothing about any specific genre.”

“Okay. Even so, what is your purpose?”

“There is a competition in July for professional dancers, it's a huge annual event and a lot of critics will attend it.”

“I have heard so too. You are not an amateur then?”

Lay smiles gently at Kai.

“No. That's why I'm here - I don't want you to teach me dance. I want you to help me dance better.”

The controversy in the Chinese boy's words confuses Kai and frankly, he finds the whole conversation ridiculous. Maybe it's because other than anorexic washed-out ballerinas and wanna be little princesses, he doesn't get to work with many people who actually dance for a living and his communication abilities have gotten a bit rusty.

“I have heard about your distinctive dancing technique that people admire so much. They say it looks like you have no bones in your body even though you do modern ballet which doesn't require as much fluidity and grace as classical ballet does. The choreography I am preparing now... it's the best I have done in my life, but I think I kind of overdid myself – the last sentence Lay utters out like an excuse to himself or to Kai, the latter is not really sure.

“You can't master your own choreography?”

“You can put it this way, yes.”

It's hard for Kai not to laugh but he somehow manages to and agrees to help Yixing. They discuss the formal side of the question before anything else and shake hands in the end. Kai is surprised to find that Yixing is a true professional once he overcomes his nervousness and asks himself if he's the same in other aspects of his life, in dance for example.

It's raining in buckets as Lay leaves the studio – no umbrella and no jacket to keep him dry in this weather, but looking overall satisfied with himself as though he's overcome an outstanding obstacle. Kai still pities him enough not to tell him the obstacles have not even come across his way just yet.

~

There are five basic positions of the feet in ballet. In all positions the legs are 'turned out', rotated outwards in the hip socket. In first position the dancer stands with the heels together, toes outward, creating as close to a straight line with the two feet as possible. In second position the dancer stands as in first position, but with heels approximately one foot length apart. In third position the dancer stands with the feet crossed, so the heel of the front foot is touching the arch of the back foot. In fourth position the front foot is approximately one foot length away from the back foot. If the heel of the front foot is in line with the heel of the back foot, it is called an "open" fourth position and if the heel of the front foot is in line with the toes of the back foot it is called a "closed" fourth position. In fifth position the feet are fully crossed, with the toes of the front foot aligned with the big toe of the back foot.

“Do I really need to know all of this?” - Lay asks when Jongin gives him a folder with information to learn. He goes on about how he isn't even here for ballet, but the tanned dancer cuts him off with an annoyed grunt.

“In order to move like a ballet dancer, you have to understand ballet. You have to feel it.”

“All right then” - Yixing says, suppressing his wish to act childish and point out how he, in all honesty, doesn't want to move like a ballet dancer, not at all, just more like himself.

“Mind showing me your choreography first? I need to know what I am working with.”

Yixing nods and gives a CD to Kai that only has the word “dance” scrabbled on it, nothing else. It's kind of funny, actually. Kai plays it on the recorder as Yixing prepares and his whole expression changes – from soft to determined, like he's having some schizophrenic attack and it's nothing but amazing to observe. He starts off smooth, a ballad song with measured steps and fragile sounds, which is why Kai is stunned when in the matter of seconds it all changes to rapid spins, back bends and Graham technique and it blends professionally with much thought put into it, despite how improvised it appears to be. It's probably what Yixing was aiming for from the start, he figures out, because talented freestyle dancers are always appreciated on competitions. Clever, indeed.

“I see where you're coming from with the problem you said you have. You're lucky it's a minor issue because removing a bad habit or correcting false learned techniques would be impossible for the short time span we are ought to work with” - Kai reasons once they take a sit on the couch to discuss details for the training program and such. - “It's a good choreography, either ways.”

It's only when he voices it that he realizes they will be competing against each other and they aren't even supposed to know what the other has prepared, what's left for helping each other. Maybe the thought has never came across Yixing's mind if he's willing to do it anyway. As for Kai – that competition doesn't mean to him. An older Chinese dancer coming to learn from him, though, is more intriguing. Far more intriguing.

~

Oh Sehun always shows up uninvited. Kai wouldn't let him in if he knew his blond-dyed prick of a best friend was coming and that kind of excuses the boy, actually. Having spent twelve years in the same school, they had cultivated such a relationship in which Kai desperately wanted to never hear from Sehun ever again, yet the latter was involved enough to still bother him a few times a week and not complain about his ignorance and apparent disdain.

Today, while drinking coffee with Sehun in his break, Kai didn't hate him all that much.

“Hyojin told me there was a new boy you are tutoring?”

Thus far with not hating Sehun.

“Your sources of information in concern of my existence are extremely disturbing and efficient” - Kai points out.

“Cut the crap, Jongin.”

“He is called Yixing, a Chinese pro dancer” - the tanned boy answers with a defeated sigh.

Sehun rises his eyebrow in disbelief for he knows his friend a lot better than most people do. Even if there isn't a lot underneath the surface of a person like Kim Jongin.

“I thought you didn't tutor guys. Furthermore, professionals.”

“I don't.”

Sehun's face wrinkles as he does the math, a trace of worry spreading across his features. It's looks like the kind of story he's already heard before, multiple times, like his friend's words only bring him back to times he doesn't want to recall. Eyes that have stopped smiling, hands that are afraid to touch, lips sullen out of misery, it's too familiar.

“I thought you gave up with this since last time.”

Kai would say he is sorry for what had happened, except he really isn't. That's why he only shrugs his shoulders.

“It was nothing personal.”

“Is it, ever?”

“Maybe now it is.”

Yet Sehun knows in the end it won't matter if it's different. You can't fill something that is bottomless, even when you try sincerely to do so, it's just not worth the candle.

“A boy though? Does that make you queer or som...?”

“You of all people should know it has nothing to do with , Sehun” - Kai cuts him off and Sehun nods notwithstanding his impossibility to even start unriddle his best friend. It's not like he hasn't tried, but it only leads to the way Kai is right now - all so magnetizing, you just want to be around him for the sake of the thrill it brings, nothing more that that.. If you ask him, Sehun wouldn't be able to tell where admiration developed in a friendship to last. Hell, he doesn't even get his own willingness to befriend such a destructive creature that Kai is, but he's became attached and it's how it is and he doesn't question it anymore.

“Okay, but what's so fascinating about him?”

“He interests me” - the word lingers in Kai's mouth like candy, so tasty and precious, he doesn't want to waste it. But the truth is he doesn't really fancy sweets as he finds them too mainstream for his personal preferences. He has the same attitude towards people. Only if they knew how lucky they were he didn't care about them, they wouldn't feel half as offended as they often felt after meeting him. Because, you see, Kai is one of those who come in your life and sound perfectly reasonable. You let them in, maybe set a place for them on the couch and cook for them gladly. Long afternoons filled with laughter, nights of sacred silence and accident touches. Fingers brushing through fingers as they try to grab onto something simultaneously, that unexpected friction. People like Kai happen naturally. And then at some point, they can just as easily burn your house down and rip your soul and if that's not enough to break you, they crush all your dreams or passions for the one simple reason that they can.

“A dancer? To keep your attention, he must be good.” - Sehun states, taking a sip of his latte coffee. In the seldom moments when Kai talks about himself he mostly bashes dancers he knows and dancers in general as if they are lower than grass and Sehun thinks it's ironical – Kai is also one of them. As of late, he has come to the conclusion that maybe Kai hates them exactly because he can relate to them. How silly.

“He is the best I have ever seen” - unwillingly admits Jongin, as though he hasn't expected there could be something more than himself out there.

“I can only imagine how that affects you.”

Kai doesn't answer, for he himself isn't quite sure either.

A/N: Wow, first chapter is done! Things might seem like they develop faster than they are supposed to, but please do keep in mind, that this is an one-shot and not each and every insegnificant thought will be dissected. 
Okay, see you later guys and until then - here is an extremely adorable Yixing for you all: