Chapter Text
Hoseok had to dance. He couldn’t help himself. His friends teased him for always dancing and never paying attention, but they couldn’t have had it more wrong. He danced because his attention was completely stolen, absorbed, intertwined with any element of music. It could have been the notes of someone’s voice changing as they spoke, or the accidental drumming of books hitting the table. All of these sounds spoke to him- he felt them- and he had no choice but to move his shoulders, tilt his hips, tap his foot- speak back.
Jin noticed this as they were in the kitchen, cooking dinner together. Hoseok was already swaying his hips to the rhythmic chopping of vegetables, only looking up when Jin giggled.
“What’s so funny?” he asked, a smile already on his face because he knew that he was likely the answer.
“Why do you dance?” Jin asked, tossing the vegetables in the pan.
Hoseok scrunched his nose in thought. He’d always done it, and by now it came so naturally that he barely thought about the “why” anymore. It was already ingrained in him.
But there had been a time when he was young and hadn’t known of technique and finesse- he wanted to dance because he had fallen in love. He asked his mother, begged, wept, and pleaded for her consent.
She agreed.
At that time, Hoseok wasn’t aware of the way the world worked. How much money classes would cost, how difficult they would be, or how easy it was to give up. All of this was foreign to him, and he didn’t begin to see this new world until he got home late from a particularly difficult practice. Tears were still in his eyes as as he planned to shout his announcement to the world, “I QUIT!” but his parents hadn’t heard him open the door.
They were already too busy shouting at each other.
His father was talking about his grades, the money, and the hours away from home, and this hurt Hoseok because he could see the loss that he had caused.
But his mother was talking about her love for her son, and how she would knowingly sacrifice it all, again and again, to see him happy. This hurt Hoseok even more, because up until that night, he hadn’t even known it was there.
That was the night things changed.
He woke up early to help around the house, and stopped buying stupid toys and snacks with his allowance. He promised to study at school a little bit harder; never the best, but never ashamedly low again.
Dance was different.
He practiced all the time, whenever he could. From the small things like tapping his foot or tilting his head, to calypsos whenever there was enough space. He danced and practiced until he hurt. After that, he kept going until he couldn’t feel anything.
Then he danced until he felt again, the most beautiful feeling in the world. He was skilled, and intuitive. He could feel the dance in every sound and pattern. He had become the best dancer in his class, in his school, in his city, in the world.
“Hoseok?” Jin asked.
He realized he had been swaying in the silence, and stopped. “I dance because I love.”