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The first word that comes to mind when Micchy saw the Beat Riders was “free”, and he thinks that ties into how he sees dance.
It’s a freedom, fluid motions and moving together as individuals and it’s why he chooses Gaim, because their smiles seem the biggest, their team uniform more of a style.
Every time he goes out to dance he feels alive and real and… free.
He thinks he feels stronger though, too. Physical strength that school uniforms or loose clothing hide, on the rare occasions his brother is even home to notice. But more than that.
This world is his.
He walks into the base one day and the only two there are Mai and Kouta. Mai is the only one dancing as Kouta watches and claps.
Kouta’s nice like that, a great dance but also a good cheerleader, and he’d offered his help when Micchy had joined the team and had trouble syncing with them.
The music continues but the dancing halts as both look up to him.
“Micchy, hi!” Mai says brightly. “We were waiting for you.”
“Most of the others had things to do today,” Kouta adds. “So practice was cancelled, and, since you like to be secretive about your phone number…”
“Oh,” Micchy says. “Sorry you guys had to stay.”
“I didn’t mind the extra time to dance,” Mai says with a shrug. “Even if an off day from the stages left me with an audience of one.”
“We both know you don’t dance for the audience though, Mai,” Kouta says. “It’s deeper than that, for you.”
It’s true. He’d asked her, once, why she danced.
Like himself, her dancing came from a deeper place. Kouta was here because it was fun, and he was kind and helpful and skilled at the dancing and the fighting, which was it’s own kind of beautiful, but Mai…
Well, either way, Micchy at least doesn’t want to go, yet. Especially when he had the chance to be with just the two of them.
“We could always dance outside,” he says. “Just the three of us.”
Mai smiles.
“That’d be great.”
“I’m game,” Kouta agrees.
Since it’s for fun, and not for practice, they don’t run through any particular set of choreography, just move together with the practiced skill of a team.
Micchy cares about every member of the team but Kouta, again, had been the one to help him sync, and Mai…
Mai had been his inspiration. Big smile, bouncing hair, perfect movement on the stage. The one who’d asked his name when he’d asked to join and scrambled his mouth that the best alias he could think of was just Micchy.
He’s a teenager, but he’s no fool. He doesn’t know if he’d call it love, but…
Well, being with Gaim makes him happy, but being with them just makes him feel right .
The track ends as Kouta does a neat flip, landing with a smile. He doesn’t get many chances to show off his skills of that sort but Micchy knows how much he enjoys it.
“Extra, much?” Mai asks. Kouta’s smile slips a bit into a smirk.
“If it’s fun, why not?” He asks. “That’s why I dance, at least.”
Mai hmms, grabbing her phone.
“We should probably go home soon, though,” she says.
“We could get something to eat first, though,” Micchy hurries to say, not wanting this to end just yet, and careful when adding “I have some money to pay for it.”
Luckily, they don’t question him. Not that he doesn’t know how to answer, but still.
“We could do with more stages.”
“Holding too many stages is just asking for trouble, though.”
“We can take them.”
“It really depends on who’s challenging us , as well,” Micchy points. “And what stages we want.”
Mai and Kouta pause the debate and turn to him.
“What do you think?” Kouta asks. Micchy… considers it.
Born and bred for the business world and with the knowledge of how people think, he’s found himself useful at this element of Beat Rider-ing, as well.
“Raid Wild’s south stage would complete our set the easiest, but we’d need to talk to Yuuya before trying anything, anyways,” he replies. “Gaim has a reputation to be skilled but defensive, after all, and reputations are important. But we can’t just be weak since we lost a stage a month ago.”
“He has a point,” Mai says.
Kouta laughs.
“Well, he is smart,” he replies.
Micchy smiles.
“Thanks, Kouta,” he says. “Mai.”
Kouta ends up going home first so it’s just Mai on the bridge with him, watching the sunset.
“Do you ever have a day so perfect you want it to last forever?” Micchy asks.
Mai hmms.
“Maybe,” she says. “But there are too many to count, as long as I’m dancing, as long as we’re all together, to pick just one.” She turns to him. “Even without half of the team, I gotta say, though… today would have to be put on the list.”
Micchy smiles.
“Yeah, for me, too,” he says.
But for him, if he could… he’d wrap this day in a box and keep it forever.
Dancing is freedom but being with the team, especially Kouta and Mai, is happiness. They’re his home away from a home that feels like no such thing.
If he could he would wrap this day up in a box and keep it forever, but Mai has a point. With them, there are so many days that feel like this.
Days and people and places that feel like where he can really belong.
Even if they don’t know who he really is, well, some secrets are better kept.
Sometimes it’s better to pretend he’s someone he’s not, just a bit, so he can have a place here. So he can see their smiles, dance with them, spend time with them.
(But maybe it’s more telling than anything else ever could be that he needed to find freedom and to lie to even find them, in the first place.)