Ship/Member: Soonyoung/Chan Major Tags: N/A Additional Tags: meeting again, seventeen never got to debut, chan owns a dance studio, hoshi is a choreographer at pledis, feeling alienated in your hometown, the desire to connect to something and someone you thought you lost Permission to remix: yes! WC: 1.7k
***
The music fades out and for a moment the only sound in the studio is Chan’s rapid breaths. Then the song loops again. His aching muscles jump, reacting to the beat on instinct, but he can’t get his legs to move. He sinks to the floor, slowly. The crooked clock on the wall tells him he’s been at it for almost three hours. Ten, if he counts the seven hours of dance classes he’s taught earlier.
Sweat drips into his eyes, and Chan pushes his hair back. He should go shower, eat something, go to sleep.
Chan gets up and walks over to his phone on shaky legs. The phone almost slips and falls when he tries to turn off the music. Not that it really matters. The screen is already cracked.
In his exhausted daze it takes a moment for Chan to realise that someone’s knocking at the door. It’s almost midnight. Chan hopes it’s not a noise complaint. He’d tried to keep the music down, but the walls of the studios are thin and old.
He looks around to see if there’s a fresh shirt or sweater he could pull over, but another impatient knock makes him hurry to the door.
“Hello?”
A young man stands in front of the studio, a beanie and mask covering his face. So not the police or the neighbours, Chan thinks. His heartbeat slows down a bit. It’s not one of his students either, but the eyes look oddly familiar.
It clicks the exact moment the man pulls down his mask. “Chan-ah, it really is you!”
“Soonyoung-hyung?”
They haven’t seen each other in seven years, but Soonyoung doesn’t waste a second before he wraps Chan in his arms. He smells good and warm while Chan’s all sticky and gross.
“Hyung, I’m so–” He swallows.
They haven’t seen each other in seven years, but wrapping his arms around Soonyoung’s waist still feels right. He can’t believe Soonyoung’s standing here, on the threshold of his shitty suburban dance studio, pressing his body close to Chan’s sweaty one. Soonyoung pulls away and takes another good look at Chan. For a moment Chan feels shy in his dancing clothes, his worn-out sweatpants low on his hips and his shirt plastered against his skin, but Soonyoung looks at him with a slow smile. The embarrassment in Chan’s stomach makes place for another kind of heat. Soonyoung looks appraising and getting praise from Soonyoung had always made Chan want – to try harder, to push himself more, to become better. Made him simply want, too. It seems like the years haven’t changed that.
“What are you doing–?” The here gets caught in Chan’s throat. Here in his small, little life he’s tried to build for himself with the shreds of his dreams. Here in the outskirts of Iksan, hours away from Seoul. Here in Chan’s life, again, after so many years.
It’s odd, this clash of two worlds. Chan’s not sure he likes it. He’s made a place in the past for his time in Seoul, his training days, and his failure to debut. Soonyoung belongs to this past. Chan has put all his feelings and memories of him into a box titled what if and locked it tightly away. He doesn’t try to touch it often, this tender part of his heart. It still hurts, occasionally, a dull and muted pain, a deep nostalgia for a future that hadn’t happened. And now Soonyoung’s here, real and in the flesh. Chan feels something inside of him rattle loose.
He realises that they’re still standing at the door. “Do you want to…come in?” Chan trails off. He looks over his shoulder at the studio. It’s small and in dire need of a new paint job. An uncomfortable-looking plastic chair is the only place to sit down. The mirrors are fogged up, the air in the room is probably damp and smelly.
Soonyoung moves to step inside but Chan blocks him. “You know what, I was just about to head off. How about we talk over a drink? I’ll just shower real quick.”
“Sure.” Soonyoung frowns, but he’s too polite to say anything.
***
Chan steps out, half expecting Soonyoung to have left. But he’s still here, a few steps away, talking to someone on the phone. In the yellow street light he looks older, grown-up. His shoes are nice and clean, his jacket looks expensive. He’s every bit the Seoul-boy they’d tried so hard to imitate when they were teenagers. Soonyoung says goodbye to the person on the phone, turns to Chan and smiles. For a blink, he’s a complete stranger.
(It would be easier if he were just a stranger. If they met at a bar, catching each other’s eye across the room. Then Chan could smile coyly and lean forward, drawing attention to his arms, to his chest. They’d talk and flirt and at the end of the night Chan would follow him home or to a hotel. If Soonyoung were a stranger, Chan could let himself be touched and lose himself in the feeling of skin against skin. If Soonyoung were a stranger, Chan could kiss him without regrets.)
Chan puts his key into the door, pushing his shoulder against it when it refuses to close completely.
“Is the studio yours?”
“Yeah.” Chan puts his hands in his pockets and pulls up his shoulders.
“That’s so cool! I always dreamt about opening a studio of my own.”
Chan wants to scoff. Soonyoung has choreographed for multiple A-list K-pop groups. He’s friends with all the top dancers in the industry, regularly posting practice videos with them together. Hell, Soonyoung himself is a legend in the industry. For Chan, teaching pubescent teens how to do a simple Kick Ball Change was one of his only options. When he returned from Seoul he barely finished school; he never went to college. But he knows Soonyoung is genuine with his excitement, which almost feels worse.
He puts an arm around Chan’s shoulders and pulls him close. Soonyoung’s hand finds Chan’s ear almost naturally and playfully tugs at his lobe.
“Look at you, so young and already a business owner! The girls must be all over you, hm?”
It’s an old joke between them. Chan hadn’t expected Soonyoung to bring it up again, but he gives in and plays along. He presses closer, their bodies now flushed together. It almost makes Soonyoung stumble, his breath skittering hotly across Chan’s cheek.
“Hyung,” Chan says, voice pitched low.
Soonyoung stills and looks at him, really looks at him. His eyes are dark. He seems to understand it now. They’re no longer the people they were when they were young.
It surprises Chan when Soonyoung pulls away. He’s given an opening he thought Soonyoung would take, but Soonyoung hasn’t. Cold disappointment fills his body.
“I’m hungry. And thirsty. Let’s go where we can get both a drink and a snack, hm? Hyung’s paying for the first round,” Soonyoung says.
***
Chan ends up searching for nearby bars on his phone. He picks the first one that looks halfway decent and somewhat expensive. His phone tells him it’s seven minutes away. They walk in silence. It was bound to get awkward eventually, and Chan simply hopes that Soonyoung doesn’t regret agreeing to drinks with him.
He tries to see the streets through Soonyoung’s eyes. It’s quiet and empty this late, nothing of the restless energy of Seoul. Most of the neon signs on the buildings are switched off for the night. It’s boring, it has nothing to offer.
Chan wonders what Soonyoung sees in him – twenty-three and back in his home town, living with his parents again. Chan wonders if Soonyoung is glad he pushed through and stayed at the company by any means possible. Unlike Chan, who packed his bag and went home when it became clear that they would never debut. It had been so final, so detrimental. Everything he’s worked for in the last two years slipped through his fingers and crumbled in the dust. Chan suddenly found himself empty-handed. He didn’t have a choice but to return home, and even though he swore he’d work his way up again, swore to return to Seoul again, he’s still here. He’s still fucking here.
***
“Ah!” Soonyoung points excitedly into an alley. “Forget about the bar, let’s drink there!”
Tugged between the buildings is a lone cluster of pojangmacha. Soft, warm light glows from the tents. Chan has to admit it looks cosy and lets himself be pulled along by Soonyoung. A tiny part of him whispers that Soonyoung chose it so he could make an early exit after one drink, but Chan ignores that voice. He’s too tired to have any hopes for how the night will end; he’ll just go along and see how it plays out.
Like promised, Soonyoung gets them the first round. He returns with a bottle of soju and two gimbap. Chan pours them a round. They drink. Chan pours them another round.
“Hyung, what brought you here?” Chan finally asks.
“Ah, I met one of your students. She’s a trainee at the company and she mentioned her dance teacher, a handsome young man called Lee Chan. Told me how she learned everything from him.”
Soonyoung smiles at him over the rim of his glass. Even in the dim light, Chan can see that his cheeks are already flushed red.
“I couldn’t stop thinking about it. About you. It’s been so long. In the end, curiosity got the best of me,” Soonyoung continues. “I’m glad I came.”
Warmth pools in Chan’s stomach. Want and hunger and desperateness. He leans closer and smiles at Soonyoung, too. A little bit coy and cute. Soonyoung always liked it when he acted that way. If Chan plays his cards right, if he isn’t completely misreading Soonyoung, the night could go somewhere. And Chan wants a bit of Soonyoung, a bit of everything Soonyoung stands for so badly. He’s not proud of it. He’s not proud of a lot of things in his life, but if he could Soonyoung to want him, to desire him, it’d be validating. Proof that there’s still something worth wanting about him.
He reaches out for the soju bottle only to brush his fingertips against the back of Soonyoung's hand.
“I’m glad, too.”
***
a/n: sorry, this sort of got out of my hand… hope it still has some of the spirit of the original prompt and that you enjoyed reading!
[FILL] maybe it's too soon
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: meeting again, seventeen never got to debut, chan owns a dance studio, hoshi is a choreographer at pledis, feeling alienated in your hometown, the desire to connect to something and someone you thought you lost
Permission to remix: yes!
WC: 1.7k
***
The music fades out and for a moment the only sound in the studio is Chan’s rapid breaths. Then the song loops again. His aching muscles jump, reacting to the beat on instinct, but he can’t get his legs to move. He sinks to the floor, slowly. The crooked clock on the wall tells him he’s been at it for almost three hours. Ten, if he counts the seven hours of dance classes he’s taught earlier.
Sweat drips into his eyes, and Chan pushes his hair back. He should go shower, eat something, go to sleep.
Chan gets up and walks over to his phone on shaky legs. The phone almost slips and falls when he tries to turn off the music. Not that it really matters. The screen is already cracked.
In his exhausted daze it takes a moment for Chan to realise that someone’s knocking at the door. It’s almost midnight. Chan hopes it’s not a noise complaint. He’d tried to keep the music down, but the walls of the studios are thin and old.
He looks around to see if there’s a fresh shirt or sweater he could pull over, but another impatient knock makes him hurry to the door.
“Hello?”
A young man stands in front of the studio, a beanie and mask covering his face. So not the police or the neighbours, Chan thinks. His heartbeat slows down a bit. It’s not one of his students either, but the eyes look oddly familiar.
It clicks the exact moment the man pulls down his mask. “Chan-ah, it really is you!”
“Soonyoung-hyung?”
They haven’t seen each other in seven years, but Soonyoung doesn’t waste a second before he wraps Chan in his arms. He smells good and warm while Chan’s all sticky and gross.
“Hyung, I’m so–” He swallows.
They haven’t seen each other in seven years, but wrapping his arms around Soonyoung’s waist still feels right. He can’t believe Soonyoung’s standing here, on the threshold of his shitty suburban dance studio, pressing his body close to Chan’s sweaty one. Soonyoung pulls away and takes another good look at Chan. For a moment Chan feels shy in his dancing clothes, his worn-out sweatpants low on his hips and his shirt plastered against his skin, but Soonyoung looks at him with a slow smile. The embarrassment in Chan’s stomach makes place for another kind of heat. Soonyoung looks appraising and getting praise from Soonyoung had always made Chan want – to try harder, to push himself more, to become better. Made him simply want, too. It seems like the years haven’t changed that.
“What are you doing–?” The here gets caught in Chan’s throat. Here in his small, little life he’s tried to build for himself with the shreds of his dreams. Here in the outskirts of Iksan, hours away from Seoul. Here in Chan’s life, again, after so many years.
It’s odd, this clash of two worlds. Chan’s not sure he likes it. He’s made a place in the past for his time in Seoul, his training days, and his failure to debut. Soonyoung belongs to this past. Chan has put all his feelings and memories of him into a box titled what if and locked it tightly away. He doesn’t try to touch it often, this tender part of his heart. It still hurts, occasionally, a dull and muted pain, a deep nostalgia for a future that hadn’t happened. And now Soonyoung’s here, real and in the flesh. Chan feels something inside of him rattle loose.
He realises that they’re still standing at the door. “Do you want to…come in?” Chan trails off. He looks over his shoulder at the studio. It’s small and in dire need of a new paint job. An uncomfortable-looking plastic chair is the only place to sit down. The mirrors are fogged up, the air in the room is probably damp and smelly.
Soonyoung moves to step inside but Chan blocks him. “You know what, I was just about to head off. How about we talk over a drink? I’ll just shower real quick.”
“Sure.” Soonyoung frowns, but he’s too polite to say anything.
***
Chan steps out, half expecting Soonyoung to have left. But he’s still here, a few steps away, talking to someone on the phone. In the yellow street light he looks older, grown-up. His shoes are nice and clean, his jacket looks expensive. He’s every bit the Seoul-boy they’d tried so hard to imitate when they were teenagers. Soonyoung says goodbye to the person on the phone, turns to Chan and smiles. For a blink, he’s a complete stranger.
(It would be easier if he were just a stranger. If they met at a bar, catching each other’s eye across the room. Then Chan could smile coyly and lean forward, drawing attention to his arms, to his chest. They’d talk and flirt and at the end of the night Chan would follow him home or to a hotel. If Soonyoung were a stranger, Chan could let himself be touched and lose himself in the feeling of skin against skin. If Soonyoung were a stranger, Chan could kiss him without regrets.)
Chan puts his key into the door, pushing his shoulder against it when it refuses to close completely.
“Is the studio yours?”
“Yeah.” Chan puts his hands in his pockets and pulls up his shoulders.
“That’s so cool! I always dreamt about opening a studio of my own.”
Chan wants to scoff. Soonyoung has choreographed for multiple A-list K-pop groups. He’s friends with all the top dancers in the industry, regularly posting practice videos with them together. Hell, Soonyoung himself is a legend in the industry. For Chan, teaching pubescent teens how to do a simple Kick Ball Change was one of his only options. When he returned from Seoul he barely finished school; he never went to college. But he knows Soonyoung is genuine with his excitement, which almost feels worse.
He puts an arm around Chan’s shoulders and pulls him close. Soonyoung’s hand finds Chan’s ear almost naturally and playfully tugs at his lobe.
“Look at you, so young and already a business owner! The girls must be all over you, hm?”
It’s an old joke between them. Chan hadn’t expected Soonyoung to bring it up again, but he gives in and plays along. He presses closer, their bodies now flushed together. It almost makes Soonyoung stumble, his breath skittering hotly across Chan’s cheek.
“Hyung,” Chan says, voice pitched low.
Soonyoung stills and looks at him, really looks at him. His eyes are dark. He seems to understand it now. They’re no longer the people they were when they were young.
It surprises Chan when Soonyoung pulls away. He’s given an opening he thought Soonyoung would take, but Soonyoung hasn’t. Cold disappointment fills his body.
“I’m hungry. And thirsty. Let’s go where we can get both a drink and a snack, hm? Hyung’s paying for the first round,” Soonyoung says.
***
Chan ends up searching for nearby bars on his phone. He picks the first one that looks halfway decent and somewhat expensive. His phone tells him it’s seven minutes away. They walk in silence. It was bound to get awkward eventually, and Chan simply hopes that Soonyoung doesn’t regret agreeing to drinks with him.
He tries to see the streets through Soonyoung’s eyes. It’s quiet and empty this late, nothing of the restless energy of Seoul. Most of the neon signs on the buildings are switched off for the night. It’s boring, it has nothing to offer.
Chan wonders what Soonyoung sees in him – twenty-three and back in his home town, living with his parents again. Chan wonders if Soonyoung is glad he pushed through and stayed at the company by any means possible. Unlike Chan, who packed his bag and went home when it became clear that they would never debut. It had been so final, so detrimental. Everything he’s worked for in the last two years slipped through his fingers and crumbled in the dust. Chan suddenly found himself empty-handed. He didn’t have a choice but to return home, and even though he swore he’d work his way up again, swore to return to Seoul again, he’s still here. He’s still fucking here.
***
“Ah!” Soonyoung points excitedly into an alley. “Forget about the bar, let’s drink there!”
Tugged between the buildings is a lone cluster of pojangmacha. Soft, warm light glows from the tents. Chan has to admit it looks cosy and lets himself be pulled along by Soonyoung. A tiny part of him whispers that Soonyoung chose it so he could make an early exit after one drink, but Chan ignores that voice. He’s too tired to have any hopes for how the night will end; he’ll just go along and see how it plays out.
Like promised, Soonyoung gets them the first round. He returns with a bottle of soju and two gimbap. Chan pours them a round. They drink. Chan pours them another round.
“Hyung, what brought you here?” Chan finally asks.
“Ah, I met one of your students. She’s a trainee at the company and she mentioned her dance teacher, a handsome young man called Lee Chan. Told me how she learned everything from him.”
Soonyoung smiles at him over the rim of his glass. Even in the dim light, Chan can see that his cheeks are already flushed red.
“I couldn’t stop thinking about it. About you. It’s been so long. In the end, curiosity got the best of me,” Soonyoung continues. “I’m glad I came.”
Warmth pools in Chan’s stomach. Want and hunger and desperateness. He leans closer and smiles at Soonyoung, too. A little bit coy and cute. Soonyoung always liked it when he acted that way. If Chan plays his cards right, if he isn’t completely misreading Soonyoung, the night could go somewhere. And Chan wants a bit of Soonyoung, a bit of everything Soonyoung stands for so badly. He’s not proud of it. He’s not proud of a lot of things in his life, but if he could Soonyoung to want him, to desire him, it’d be validating. Proof that there’s still something worth wanting about him.
He reaches out for the soju bottle only to brush his fingertips against the back of Soonyoung's hand.
“I’m glad, too.”
***
a/n: sorry, this sort of got out of my hand… hope it still has some of the spirit of the original prompt and that you enjoyed reading!