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kbandtrash · 1 year ago

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I Don't Dance (I Know You Can) (Hoshi x Reader)

~Rachel~

Masterlist

You're hopeless as a dance trainee, and dance teacher Hoshi isn't sure that teaching you will be worth it for either of you in the long run.

Content: dance teachers!Hoshi and Minghao, enemies to ?lovers?, Hoshi yells at you and apologizes, a general feeling of hopelessness about life, fluff

Word Count: 3.8k

“No. I’m done. I can’t stand her,” Hoshi huffed. “She makes no improvement and she can’t see what she’s doing wrong. I’m done, Minghao. If you want to keep her on, then you take her.”

Minghao smiled wryly. “If you can’t teach her, then no one can.”

“I don’t need to waste my time on a student that’s going nowhere.”

“But I do?”

“That’s why I’m saying we need to drop her!”

“Oh that’s very growth mindset of you,” Minghao drawled sarcastically. “I thought we believed in the potential of every student.”

“I did. I really did.” Hoshi sighed. “But there is something wrong with her.”

“I don’t know, when I sat in today, I noticed she’s actually pretty good at keeping with the beat. Her limbs are like tree branches in the wind, but they’re always in time.”

Hoshi cocked his head. “That is true,” he admitted.

“And her hands are very graceful.”

“Yes,” Hoshi agreed.

“Her facial expressions are pretty natural, too.”

“Yeah, she got that from vocal training.”

“She just got a late start,” Minghao said with a shrug. “If you keep working with her, she’ll be a pro in no time.”

“Yes!” Hoshi exclaimed, pounding his fist into his hand. “It’s not that she’s bad, she’s just inexperienced.”

It was that easy every week. However, the truth remained: you hadn’t a dancing bone in your body. Minghao just liked to watch from the sidelines, and if you ended up getting dropped, he wasn’t sure when he would find his next favorite source of entertainment.

—

“My favorite student!” Hoshi welcomed you warmly to your private lesson.

You glanced at Minghao in the back, who gave you a wink and an okay sign. “My favorite teacher?” you returned uncertainly.

“Did you review the steps we learned last week?”

You nodded energetically. “I made sure to practice every day in front of a mirror like you said.”

“Good, good!” He clapped his hands together. “Let’s start with our warm up moves.”

You moved almost like a mannequin, no fluidity in your joints. Hoshi kept his temper in check, and offered you some suggestions.

“Like this?” you asked, repeating the same clunky motion.

Hoshi smiled only because he had no other expressions left. He modeled the move. “Do it with me slowly.”

It was incredible how intently you watched him and how poorly you managed to perform on your own. If you did get it right once, it was usually pure luck. You apologized over and over, to which he responded through his teeth with a fake cheerfulness.

When it came time for you to leave again, Hoshi managed to keep his cool, even told you that you did well today! You both knew that was a lie, but you also both knew you were giving this your all. There was just nothing to show for it week after week. For you, it was disheartening, but for him, it was infuriating.

“You did well today,” Minghao complimented Hoshi. “You didn’t even raise your voice once.”

“I can’t do this anymore,” Hoshi whispered dangerously. “I’m going to snap.”

Minghao smiled and prepared his next lecture on positivity.

—

“Get out.”

“Hoshi, I told you—”

“I don’t want to hear it,” he said, looking you directly in the eyes. “You’ve wasted my time for too long.”

“I’m trying so hard!” you begged. “I promise I’ve been practicing every day and I felt like I had made improvement!”

“You’re just as miserable as the day you walked in here. We need to reconsider the future of your lessons with us.”

“Hoshi,” Minghao interjected. “I didn’t want to bring this up again, but we’re getting paid twice our usual rate from her company.”

“It’s not worth it anymore,” Hoshi said with a shake of his head. “I don’t know why you bothered trying to learn if you had no talent to back it up.”

“I don’t know either!” you fired back. “I just wanted to sing and play my instrument, but the president said I wasn’t worth anything if I couldn’t dance. Guess he was right.”

You stormed out of the room and grabbed your bag on your way out. Minghao could have sworn he heard you choke back a sob as the door closed.

Hoshi immediately felt hollow inside. He had never messed up like this, and there was no way to take back his words. It wasn’t that he really believed you weren’t worth the time, but he had never had a student learning this slowly, or this late in life, or…

…It was all excuses in the end. No matter how frustrated he got, he shouldn’t have snapped in your face.

He squatted on the floor with his head in his arms. “Why did I do that…?” he mumbled. “I’ve never…never talked to anyone like that before.”

“I don’t know, but you need to apologize immediately,” Minghao said, standing up and pointing at the door. “Go and find her now.”

Hoshi looked up at Minghao through his arms. “And what am I going to say, that what I said wasn’t true? I’m not going to keep lying to her about any potential she has.”

“Are you stupid?” Minghao said exasperatedly. “She thinks she’s worthless because she can’t dance. She can’t dance, that much is obvious, but she’s not worthless. You get your butt out that door and tell her that.”

Hoshi stood up again and started pacing. “If you know what to say, then why can’t you go and say it?”

“I’m not the one that just told her she wasn’t worth my time.”

Smashing his head into the floor seemed like it would be a better option. Hoshi felt terribly guilty, but apologizing to your face felt like lying to you. Agreeing to keep you on also felt like lying to you. He felt more guilty about lying to you about your dance potential than about hurting your feelings.

He still stomped out the door to try and follow you anyway. His head swirled with words that he was supposed to say, but still felt like lies meant to satisfy you temporarily. Wouldn’t it be best for you in the long run if you quit?

You really hadn’t gone far—you hadn’t even left the building. He should have known that you would have to wait for one of the trainee managers to come pick you up, and the lesson wasn’t supposed to be done for another ten minutes. You were sat on the floor in a hallway to the side of the main route to the entrance.

The light of your phone screen, too close to your face, gave you away. He could see you were staring at a message you hadn’t quite sent yet, and he could also see the drying tear tracks down your cheeks.

“You’re not worthless,” he said, and you flinched as he sat down next to you. He noticed you quickly lock your phone and hide it away from him. “I’m the worthless one if I say something like that to one of my students.”

“No, I’m just deluding myself,” you said dejectedly. “I’m not sure why I thought I could make it in this industry if I couldn’t dance.”

Hoshi scrunched his mouth as he tried to think of something to say that both made you feel better and didn’t make him feel dishonest. He kind of agreed with what you said, but he couldn’t say that. “Dancing isn’t everything,” he shrugged. “Half the trainees these days only know how to dance, and they can’t hardly hold a pitch.”

“At least they can learn to rap. There’s no replacement for dancing.”

You needed to stop saying things that were true, or Hoshi was going to have to leave you in your misery. He gulped. “You have your visual going for you, at least, right?” he tried.

That was a weird thing to say, apparently. You looked at him like he had said that summer wasn’t hot enough. “I’m not supposed to be a visual.”

He cleared his throat awkwardly. “Could have fooled me,” he said as nonchalantly as he could.

That was weird. He definitely thought you were supposed to be a visual, maybe even above vocals. Now that he tried to remember why he thought that, he realized no one had told him—he’d just assumed. It wasn’t personal bias, was it?

“Maybe you should just switch companies,” he suggested. “But you shouldn’t give up on your dream.”

“No one’s going to debut a girl band,” you said. “Or a soloist who can’t dance.”

“So why are you trying if you don’t think anyone will debut you?”

You looked away from him, in the direction he thought your phone might be. “That’s what I’m asking myself, too.” He didn’t say anything, and you waited long enough to feel awkward if you didn’t keep talking. “Why can’t I just give up and move on?”

—

“It’s too tragic, Minghao,” Hoshi lamented from the floor of the studio. “Who ever said you had to dance to be a good musician?”

“Public opinion,” Minghao answered succinctly, scrolling through his phone from the chair in the corner.

“And that’s the only thing that matters?”

“Uh, yeah.” Minghao blew a stray hair out of his face, not looking up from his phone. “That’s kind of the whole point of the entertainment industry.”

Hoshi turned onto his back, now spread-eagle. “That’s dumb.”

“And? What are you going to do about it?”

What was Hoshi going to do about it? He couldn’t do anything about public opinion, he couldn’t do anything about your dancing skill, and he probably couldn’t do anything about your company’s opinion, either. There wasn’t really anything he could do.

Hoshi took too long to answer, so Minghao finally glanced up from his phone to see him staring at the ceiling thoughtfully. “Are we dropping her? Are we keeping her on? Are we going to try and convince her people to let her go in a different direction?”

“Have you ever thought about teaching a ballroom dance class?”

Minghao actually set his phone down out of sheer confusion. He blinked and shook his head, sure he hadn’t just heard what he thought he’d heard. “Excuse me?”

“I mean, it’s not like it’s going to actually help, but it might be a fun way to pass the time until she makes her decision.” He paused. “Or the company makes it for her.”

“I’m still stuck on the last thing you said—ballroom?” Minghao asked incredulously, sitting forward. “You’re not actually thinking about ballroom.”

Hoshi shrugged and looked at Minghao from the floor, upside-down. “It’s more fun than trying not to pop a blood vessel every week.”

“We’re a K-pop dance studio,” Minghao said. “What is her company going to say when they find out you’ve been teaching her ballroom?”

“At least it’s something,” Hoshi replied, flipping back onto his stomach. “And at least I can lead.”

—

You were used to Hoshi touching you to correct your position, but not like this. It wasn’t even that he was too close because there was actually a considerable amount of space between the two of you and he had probably been closer before. This just felt so…intimate.

His hand was on your waist, your hand was on his shoulder, and your other hand was held in the air by his. You had only seen this stuff in western period dramas and cartoons. Only when you did it, you didn’t really feel like high society in your sweatpants.

“Feet together,” he instructed, modeling for you. “I’m going to teach you a box step.”

You put your feet together, tapping the rubber sides of your shoes together. “Like a jazz square?”

“No. Well, maybe. Yes, but not really.” He let go of your hand momentarily to fix his hair. “Don’t worry about it. First, you’re going to step back when I step forward.”

He picked your hand back up from where you let it drop to your side. He moved his left foot forward, so you moved your left foot backward.

“Nope, try again. Like a mirror,” he said. “My left foot, your right foot.

You reset to try again. He stepped forward with his left foot, and you moved your right foot back. He froze, so you didn’t make another move.

“Good! Next, move your left foot down so it’s level with your right foot, but shoulder-width apart.”

“Huh?”

He swept his right foot up in an arc to its next place. “Like that, but back. Make your feet mirror mine.”

You tried to follow his fancy arc, but you must have curved it the wrong way. It felt awkward, even though your feet ended up in the right place. “That can’t be right,” you worried.

“Hmm, not quite,” he agreed. He let go of your hand and your waist, so you took your hand off his shoulder. He stood next to you, his hands still up as if you were across from him. “Copy me.” He stepped his right foot back. “One.”

You left your arms down and stepped your right foot back. “One.”

“No, no, keep your arms up. One,” he said, demonstrating the first step again.

Fighting back a sigh, you held your arms up as instructed and took another step back. “One.”

“Good, now two,” he said, sweeping his left foot back and across.

This time, the curve of the path felt much more natural. “Two.”

“See? Not so hard,” he encouraged. He picked up his right foot and placed it down next to his left foot. “Three.”

You copied him once more. “Three.”

“Okay, great! That was the first half,” he explained. “The second half is the same, but forward.”

You scrunched your eyebrows, watching both your feet and his. “Right foot forward?”

“Mirrored and forward,” he corrected himself. “It’s called a box step because we make a box with our steps. Left foot forward—one.”

“One,” you repeated, setting your left foot in front of you heavily.

“Keep your arms up,” he reminded you, pushing your elbow back up.

“What’s the point if you’re not even there?”

“To keep proper form. Now right foot up and shoulder length apart for two.”

You stomped your right foot up. “Two.”

“Stay light on your feet; it’ll help you move. Then feet together again for three.”

Much lighter, you brought your left foot back over. “Three.”

“And that’s the other half. Easy, right?” He looked at you expectantly.

You returned his smile with a grimace. “Simple and easy are different.”

To your surprise, he laughed at that. As in, it seemed genuine and not forced. “Alright, touché. Let’s try it a couple more times side by side and then we can try it together?” he suggested.

It was hard not to accept with his enthusiasm back up like the first few times he had taught you. Maybe he was like this because he had to care much less about your performance and more about making sure you had fun.

You mirrored him a few more times through the steps, with less separation between the steps every time. Just when you felt like you had it, he decided it was time for you to dance together again. You could already feel the six steps shuffling their order in your mind.

Once again, his right hand was on your waist, your left hand was on his shoulder, and your other hands were intertwined. There was a respectable distance between the two of you, still, but it felt like this was the closest you had ever been. Your heart was pounding in your ears, and you sure hoped he couldn’t hear it.

“Go ahead and watch your feet if you have to, but just for now,” he warned you. “You’re going to have to look up sooner or later.”

You snapped your head up faster than you could think. “At what?”

“At me.”

The actual distance between you might not have changed, but boy, oh boy, did it feel like it shrank to almost nothing.

He must have felt it, too, by the way his ears started to flush pink. “I mean, traditionally, you look at your partner in ballroom dance,” he clarified unconvincingly.

You nodded, deciding to believe him rather than make this any worse than it was for you.

“Ready?” he asked. You nodded again. “Okay, I start forward with my left foot, and you…” He picked up his left foot and froze, waiting for your move.

If he was going to step forward, you would have to move if you didn’t want him to step on your toes. “I step back with my right foot.” You took the step, and he followed through with his.

“Next?”

“I move my left foot to the other corner?” You weren’t guessing, but you still marked uncertainty in your tone.

“Good—let’s try it.” His foot followed yours up to the next point. “Excellent. And then?”

“Feet together.” You didn’t wait for him to confirm this time, but he still moved in time with you. “And then…left foot forward.” It was like his foot moving backward pulled yours forward into place. “Right foot up…and feet together again.”

“That’s it! Keep going.”

You could start to see what he meant by leading and following. You were moving at the same time, but it was a bit like your feet were attached with strings and dowel rods. As you stopped narrating each step, he began to count softly and bounce into each step.

“One, two, three, one, two, three—see how you can shift your weight and make it smoother?” he interrupted himself. “Try to keep the weight on the balls of your feet.”

You were taken aback at how simple the change was, but how much more elegant it made you feel. He kept counting softly, and it felt natural when he started leading you to turn a bit with each step.

He did stop you after a few more rounds, but for once, it wasn’t to point out a mistake in frustration. It was instead to congratulate you on your success.

“Shall we try with some music?”

“Is it going to be fast?”

“Not much faster than we’ve already been doing,” he reassured you. “It’s not a hard dance to speed up, though.”

“That’s easy for you to say,” you snickered. “You literally dance for a living.”

“No, I teach dance for a living. Big difference,” he emphasized jokingly. He pulled his phone out of his pocket and a few moments later, some music came over the speakers. “Which means that I know you won’t have a hard time with this. Ready?”

Tuning into the music, you started to count in your head. Hoshi was right—it wasn’t that much faster than you had already practiced. It might have even been a little slower.

“For once, I think I might be.” You straightened your back, but you kept your eyes on your feet.

“Excellent! I’ll count us off. Which foot first?” he quizzed you.

“Um…” You went over it in your head. “My right, your left.”

“And you didn’t even phrase it as a question this time,” he said, genuinely praising you. “Ready? One, two, three, ready, set, go!”

It felt like magic. Really, it did. For the first time in your life, you were moving in rhythm with the music, and combined with the music, you were understanding how the two worked together for the first time, too. Eyes on your feet, it really almost felt effortless.

It felt even more like a period drama now, and you felt a little more like you belonged.

“It’s fun, isn’t it?” Hoshi commented.

“I can’t believe I’m actually doing it,” you agreed.

“What if you try to look up now?”

You hesitated. “I don’t know. I think the only reason this is working is because I can see my feet.”

“Just try,” he encouraged you. “Trust your feet for a second.”

You glanced up and back down, and then raised your head. Earlier he said you were supposed to look up at him, right? You could try.

So you looked up and found his face right in front of yours.

Funnily enough, he was right in telling you to trust your feet; they kept moving in the correct pattern even though your brain was totally short-circuiting. You felt close enough to count all his eyelashes, which was easier with his eyes widened like that.

He was surprised, too—he wasn’t expecting your proximity to shrink like that. However, he kept moving just as you did, too stunned to break eye contact or try to widen the gap.

Minghao dropped something on the floor in his corner, snapping you out of your trance. Hoshi glanced over your shoulder to see what was up, but his eyes were back on you in record time.

You cleared your throat as your senses were returned to you. “I’ll just…look at the wall or something,” you mumbled, trying to look like you were absentmindedly staring over his shoulder rather than fixating your gaze purposefully away from him.

“No, you don’t have to do that,” he tried to brush you off casually. “That was my fault. I promise it’s not as awkward if we’re talking.”

So he was admitting that just happened, and it was awkward. Cool.

Your eyes flickered back over to meet his, which were now much more relaxed, but you ultimately stayed looking away from him. “Are you sure?”

He nodded in one fluid, dramatic motion. “Promise.”

Once again, he was right. He didn’t make you look at him right away, but once he started talking to you, asking about your instrument, what you liked about making music, how your grades were in high school, the makeup products you used, even the color of your toothbrush (what?), it was natural to look at him. The distance didn’t grow back, really, but it became comfortable.

After a while, and probably more than a couple songs worth of talking, he stopped you. “One more thing we’ll practice today,” he introduced.

“Why do I have a bad feeling about this?” you asked suspiciously.

Minghao snorted from the corner. “Why do I have a bad feeling about this?” he asked himself in a voice that he only meant for himself to hear.

“No more bad feelings!” Hoshi demanded. “You already learned to waltz, so let’s just add a little trick. I’ll teach you how to spin.”

Minghao narrowed his eyes at the two of you. He glanced at the clock and decided that while, sure, there was enough time to teach you this, it wasn’t part of the original lesson plan. He was right about the bad feeling. Hoshi didn’t look at just anyone like that.

#headcanon (i say as it's my story that i wrote) but i like to think she debuts as a soloist with a specialty in ballroom-style choreography #or hoshi starts a social media something and has a series called teaching my girlfriend how to dance and they just giggle the whole time #seventeen #hoshi #svt #hoshi x reader #svt x reader #seventeen x reader #kwon soonyoung #svt hoshi #seventeen hoshi #hoshi seventeen #hoshi svt #svt soonyoung #soonyoung x reader

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