Chapter Text
“Pangi Pangi Pangi!” Zam hissed as he ran into the dress out room. Pangi turned around, surprised. Zam was not supposed to be here yet. Because if Pangi was reading the clock right then his modern class was still going.
“I’m skipping!” Zam grinning. “I’m skipping the last two minutes of class!” He scampered over to Pangi and reached past him to get to his cubby. He had to reach over Pangi because of where he was sitting and the proximity almost made Pangi combust .
“I forgot to ask for your number last class.” Zam explained while he fumbled with his phone. “Here!” He pushed his phone into Pangi’s hands eagerly. The smile on his face made Pangi’s heart flutter and he quickly looked down to keep Zam from seeing how his face flushed. He was so awkward. He needed to be detained and never let around cute boys ever again.
But to say Pangi was relieved that Zam did the whole asking for number thing would be an understatement. He happily typed his number into Zam’s phone and vowed to never tell Red that it wasn’t him who asked. (Again, too awkward. Should never be allowed around cute boys.)
Once he finished typing his number in Pangi sent a quick “hi” to himself so that he would have Zam’s number too. He wouldn’t put it past Zam to forget to text him. As adorable as he was, he was a little scatterbrained. And Pangi was determined to be texting with him.
With that done Pangi handed Zam his phone back and turned to get his ballet shoes out. He hadn’t even finished setting his stuff down when Zam got here. (A testament to how late Pangi was sometimes.) His boots weren’t even put away in the cubby yet.
“Oh my god.” Zam shook Pangi’s arm desperately. (Alarms! Alarms! Category five boy event!) “Please can I try on your boots?” He asked.
“They’ll probably be too small…” Pangi pointed out awkwardly. He was bravely ignoring how Zam was making his ears burn and he hoped Zam would too. Pangi genuinely didn’t know if he would survive if Zam ever pointed out how flustered he got around him. Forget crushes, Pangi would put himself in a hydraulic press . But Zam didn’t say anything so Pangi remained un-flattened and safe. For now.
On the matter of the boots though, Pangi would absolutely let Zam try them on. He had a weak fucking spine and by god did it get even weaker when he was around Zam. If you shook Pangi hard enough he would surely make a floppy disk noise with how easily he handed his boots over to Zam. It was worth it though to see Zam excitedly drop to the floor and put on Pangi’s boots as fast as he could.
They had just a few minutes until the rest of Zam’s modern class was let out and the dressing room would fill up. But for now Zam jumped to his feet excitedly and pranced around in Pangi’s boots.
“They make me tall!” He exclaimed while pointing at the platforms on the boots. “Pangi come over here.” Pangi obliged then stammered when Zam yanked him closer. They weren’t particularly close, just enough for Zam to judge how much taller the boots made him but Pangi was flustered anyway. Pretty boy in his personal space! Stuff like that.
“Okay wait.” Zam leaned this and way and that to see how tall he was now. “How tall do you think I was without these?”
Pangi jokingly bent his knees until he was considerably shorter than Zam. “Here!” He announced. Zam scoffed and pushed him away playfully. “I am not that short!” He exclaimed. Pangi laughed and stumbled away, trying to hide how red his face got at their banter. (Slash flirting? Were they flirting right now?)
“Try taking one shoe off.” Pangi suggested. “Then you’ll know how tall you normally are and how tall the boots make you.” Zam ohh’ed and leaned down to unzip one boot. He tossed one of the boots to the side and Pangi quickly grabbed it and put it on.
“So I’m normally this tall…” Zam stood on his leg without the boot on. “And with the boots I’m this tall!” He held onto Pangi’s shoulder for balance and stood up on the leg with the boot. He hovered his other foot above the ground and looked intently at it. “I’m about two inches taller?”
“Yup. Should be.” Pangi nodded then looked at Zam. “You come up to my eye level now. Instead of my chin!”
Zam stuck his tongue out and hopped away. “Stop being so tall man.”
“Oh you’re gonna hate this then…” Pangi stood up on his leg that had the boot on. “Now I’m two inches taller too!”
“Nope. Nope!” Zam pushed Pangi playfully and he toppled over easily off his uneven feet. Pangi shouted and scrambled to get his feet back under him. “Bro! Oh my god!” He exclaimed. “I almost fell- you bitch!”
Zam cackled and squatted to the floor to pull Pangi’s boot off. He ended up falling over too but tucked into a neat backwards roll. This guy was crazy.
“Here!” He tossed Pangi’s boot across the room to him. Pangi barely caught it but managed to save it from loudly crashing to the floor. He placed it neatly back in his cubby along with the boot he had on.
Pangi was in the middle of looking up to ask Zam a question when the noise of a large group of people coming down the hallway made them both pause.
“Oh shit!” Zam laughed. “My class is out. I hope they didn’t miss me.”
“You have bright yellow hair.” Pangi pointed out. “They definitely noticed you were gone.”
“That’s the pain of being queer.” Zam shrugged. “Also wait for next week about my hair color.”
“What?” Pangi questioned. Zam had dropped many things in that sentence. One, he was gay. Two, he was out(?). And three, his hair was going to be a different color next week?
Pangi decided to focus on the most important thing. “You’re dying your hair?” Zam’s bleach-blonde with brown roots was pretty on him! Pangi didn’t want it to leave…
“You’ll see!” Zam pointed at him. He grabbed Pangi’s arm and pulled them out of the dressing room and down the hall. “No spoilers okay?” Zam laughed.
“ Ok so what r you doing w your hair ” was the text Zam randomly received as he sat in Bacon’s car. He gasped excitedly and immediately turned away from the conversation to reply. Sorry friends! This was important!
“Who are you texting?” Planet asked immediately. He was nosy as always but to be fair Zam had made a loud noise.
“Yeah that was a quick reaction…” Jaron pointed out.
Zam shushed both of them and texted back to Pangi “ it’s a secret ”. He giggled to himself as the message was sent and then the read receipt popped up under it. Teasing Pangi was just so fun!
“Zam, I will kick you out of this car,” Bacon’s loud voice came from the front seat. “Who are you texting?!”
“You guys are so nosy!” Zam complained loudly as he flailed his arms. He turned his phone off with a click and put it in his lap defiantly. He was not going to show them.
“And?” Planet asked.
“That’s not a bad thing,” Bacon said defensively at the same time. Classic Bacon-Planet one-two.
Zam rolled his eyes and brushed them both off. His sandwich was more important than answering them. Sure he would tell them eventually (Zam couldn’t hold a secret for long anyway), but he was going to enjoy keeping them in suspense for a bit longer. For fun.
Then the locks on the car doors clicked threateningly and Zam yelped in fear. Jaron cackled and shook Zam by the shoulders aggressively. “Get out!” He shouted. “Car privileges revoked!”
“Tell us or get out of the car!” Planet followed mock-aggressively.
All four of them devolved into yelling and shoving until Zam’s phone vibrated again and caught all of their attention. The noise startled them all into silence as they looked down at his phone. After glancing warningly at his friends Zam picked his phone up.
It was Pangi. Damnit.
“r you going bald ” he had asked. Zam barked out a laugh immediately. He couldn’t help it okay? That caught him off guard.
“Okayyy” Bacon sighed. “So you’re getting kicked out of the car.”
“Noo!” Zam complained. “I’ll show you okay? Look! His name’s Pangi and he’s from my ballet school.” He flipped his phone around so his friends could see the grand total of three messages he and Pangi had sent. See? Not that interesting. Definitely not worth the threats that went into getting to see it.
“Eww” Planet wrinkled his nose. “From that pretentious school? He better be nice.”
Zam’s friend group didn’t have the best impression of his ballet school. It was sort of his fault though because he complained about it more than he praised it. That was most people’s relationship with ballet though. Even if you loved the style you would never pass up the opportunity to complain.
“He is nice!” Zam argued. “He just transferred so he’s chill.”
Planet made a “if you say so” noise then asked “is he any good?”
“ Yes .” Zam replied seriously. He launched into a rant about ballet and dance training that his friends painfully endured for a while until Bacon interrupted with “wait. If he’s our age then where does he go to school?”
Zam hmm’d for a minute. Pangi had never actually told him where he went to school since the recording from the day after Zam asked was the video Zam took of Pangi in the dress out room.
“I think the smart kid school?” Zam guessed. “They have a good dance program and he said he dances at school too but-” Zam had a quick realization and hit a one eighty- “actually I can just ask.” As Zam pulled his phone out Jaron nodded sagely and said “glad you’re using your resources.”
“Shut up man” Zam snickered, still looking at his phone. There was a typing bubble from Pangi that quickly popped into a text.
“I was right!” Zam shouted. “He goes to the smart kid school! Our natural enemies…” Planet chucked a little at Zam’s connection. Since the school they went to was in the same zoning as “the smart kid school” the two were up against each other in most competitions. Sports, academics, pretty much everything. Hence “natural enemies”.
“Oh um!” Bacon suddenly turned to Jaron and grabbed him. “Who do we know that-?”
“Ash!” Jaron exclaimed. “Ash goes to that school!”
“Right!” Planet pointed. “And his boyfriend Red is a dancer and-“ all three of them started loudly speaking at the same time. Zam sat in confused silence as the other three in the car made connections and nodded and pointed until they all abruptly stopped and turned to Zam.
“He’s good.” Planet nodded quickly.
“We approve of your new friend.” Jaron clarified.
“And by that we mean we’re gonna grill Red about him.” Bacon snickered from the front seat.
“Hey!!”
Finally. Finally Pangi was back at the ballet school. It had been a long and excruciating weekend of Zam teasing him about his hair and Pangi literally begging him for answers. (An interesting way to start off texting the guy Pangi maybe-liked but okay.) At this point Pangi was in so much suspense that Zam could walk in with the exact same hair and he would be amazed.
Lucky for him, that’s not what happened.
It was raining when Pangi arrived at the studio so he ran inside as fast as he could. His hair and hoodie still got a little wet but that was okay. When he got inside Zam’s class still had about ten minutes left so Pangi went to drop his stuff off in the dress out room. (He already knew he would inevitably end up staring at Zam while he danced. It couldn't be helped at this point.)
After he dropped his things off Pangi made his way back to the lobby. There wasn’t a barrage of toddlers and parents quite yet so he was able to walk over to the studio that Zam was in pretty easily. Finding Zam in the studio was harder. But once Pangi spotted him he quickly realized why. Zam said he was changing his hair for a concert so Pangi assumed that meant it would be just one color. He was right about that. He definitely wasn’t right about the color though.
Zam’s hair was a rich brown color that showed up shiny in the harsh studio lights. It was pulled back into a tiny ponytail on the back of his head and Pangi felt himself go weak . He was down so bad if Zam’s hair being different did this to him but he really couldn’t be blamed in this situation. It was a good look on Zam! For someone with normally light colored hair he looked surprisingly good with dark hair! Pangi was just… admiring that.
The class wasn’t over yet so Pangi stayed where he was and did his best not to look like a stalker while he watched. Zam was still a painfully Horton dancer in a Graham class but he didn’t look bad. Pangi had to admit though that the face he made when he was working on a move that he struggled with was adorable. He opened his mouth a little and made his doe eyes wider than they already were in concentration. Pangi abruptly realized he was smiling and quickly put a stop to that. Whoops! Blatant homosexuality in the studio lobby!
After a good five minutes of Pangi feeling incredibly gay the class ended and Zam came bounding out of the studio. As he skipped over he pulled his hair tie out and his hair swung forward. It framed his face the same but when it was brown it looked so different. Pangi hoped to any god out there that he wasn’t blushing. Please, for his own sanity.
“Surprise!” Zam cheered as he bounced to a stop at Pangi’s side. He tipped his head forward and shook his hair in Pangi’s face. “I’m not blonde anymore!”
“You’re not!” Pangi laughed as he stood up. “It looks good man!”
“Thanks!” Zam smiled. “I had it done professionally so it didn’t get fucked up.” As he spoke he bumped his shoulder with Pangi’s and then urged them both towards the water fountain. (Pangi did not blush at the contact. Noo he did not!)
“Is that because you were going from blonde to your natural color?” Pangi asked as he followed Zam. When Zam paused at the water fountain he leaned against the wall next to it to wait. This part of Zam getting out of class was practically routine to them and Pangi loved it. He just liked talking with Zam! No ulterior motives, definitely!
“Yeah” Zam nodded. “They had to strip the bleach from my hair which can go very badly if it's not done right.” He laughed a little in a way that implied he’d seen the process go badly and Pangi couldn’t help laughing too.
When Zam’s water bottle was full they both went to the dress out room to grab their ballet shoes. Most of the dancers in their class were girls so they basically had the dress out room to themselves. And they still chose to keep their stuff in neighboring cubbies. Pangi snorted at that. As they sat down to put their shoes on Zam hummed like he was about to say something and Pangi looked over.
“Dude we’ve gotta hang out after class sometime.” Zam dropped his head to the side to look at Pangi. The action made his now brown hair swing and Pangi internally grappled with the urge to reach out and tuck it behind Zam’s ear. Be still his aching heart!
“When?” Pangi asked. “Don’t you have rehearsal like- every single day?” Hanging out would kill him. Pangi would pass out. He wasn’t even sure he’d be able to be in the same car as Zam. He’d die on the spot! That being said though, there wasn’t anything Pangi wanted more than to hang out with Zam. (It was almost a date!)
Zam’s squeaky little giggle filled the air and Pangi automatically smiled even though he didn’t know what Zam was laughing about. This was how he knew he was too far gone. Zam was happy so he was happy. Come on, that was so gay.
“My show for that company is in two weeks!” Zam said cheerfully. “After that I won’t have rehearsal after class!”
“Can I come to your show?” Pangi blurted without thinking. Ahh why did he do that?! What if Zam didn’t want him to be there because it would be weird? What if Zam didn’t want him to see him dance? What if-
“Dude yes!” Zam exclaimed. “That would be awesome!” Pangi may have lost years off of his life in relief when Zam said that. Genuinely. “I’ll send you the link to tickets! And I’ll send you the code they gave me so you can get in for free.” He cheerfully winked at Pangi with his sentence and Pangi was now losing years off of his life in a completely different way! Cool!
“I’ll absolutely be there.” Pangi promised because he was calm and collected and not at all about to jump up and down and cheer over being invited to Zam’s show. (For free!) These were normal events in his life that he could totally respond reasonably and respectively to. Deep breaths.
While Pangi was trying not to blow steam out of his ears in embarrassment Zam had been rambling about his show and how excited he was for it. Now that he had the heat levels in his body back under control Pangi tuned back in to his favorite radio station and listened fondly. He could seriously listen to Zam talk for hours. There was something about the way he told stories that was just so entertaining.
“Oh my god!” Zam interrupted his own sentence as his expression lit up. “Since I won’t have rehearsals after my show you can help me redye my hair after class one day!” He looked so happy and Pangi having his hands in Zam’s hair would be actual heaven but-
“Don't you use bleach?” Pangi asked hesitantly. “I don’t trust myself with bleach. And I don’t wanna mess your hair up…”
“Don’t even worry about it man.” Zam scoffed. “You can’t do anything worse to my hair than I’ve already done to it myself. And I can help you!” This time his sweet smile was too much for Pangi to resist.
“Okay, sure then.” Pangi found himself saying. He was painfully unaware when it came to hair but for Zam… he would definitely try,
“Yes!” Zam bounced where he was sitting in excitement. “It’s gonna be so fun- I promise!” Then he went still and a little hesitant. “Can I hug you?” Oh Pangi was going to die.
“Sure!” Pangi squeaked and was immediately bowled over by an excited Zam. His hair was in Pangi’s face and his arms were around Pangi’s body and Pangi was actually ascending. Right! That’s it! He was never feeling closer to euphoria ever again in his life!
Truthfully though… it did feel like something clicked into place. As Zam rocked him back and forth giddily it finally hit Pangi. God-fucking-damnit
.
He was in too deep. He had developed a life shattering, heart wrenching, soul smashing, crush.