Dance King

Quiet

To San, Seoul had fallen silent.

Since his comeback, he had proceeded to make the company more and more money while gaining more and more fame for himself. It wasn't like it was something San hated but sometimes, he wanted a bit of silence to himself.

Because he was working on more and more albums, he worked harder. Meaning he had less time to spend in the dance studio.

Over the next year, San saw less and less of Mingi and Yeosang. Jongho had all but vanished unless they were practicing. Wooyoung even started appearing less and less in San's life. He felt a hole in his life where they had been, a rather large hole.

Hongjoong had hired a half-decent manager (his words, not mine) to take care of San, so even the person that was legally bound to the same place of work as San barely appeared in his life.

They lived three doors away from each other in the apartment building.

They often used the same studio.

Yet Hongjoong had seemingly vanished into his own career.

So despite the population and the compaction of Seoul as a city, despite the people moving about that talked incessantly, despite the cars and the trains and the blaring music everywhere, San's life had essentially gone silent.

He stared at his phone, waiting for a message from his boyfriend to appear.

It had been several days since he last heard from Wooyoung and even then it was a simple, quick conversation about what Wooyoung had been up to and how he was.

Wooyoung, as the dance king he was, had more than enough offers from companies to come and work solely for them. He turned them down time and time again on that offer, yet he would still work as a choreographer for their idols for an album.

His name rose in fame along with San's, bringing Wooyoung and Mingi's dance studio more popularity.

This meant that Mingi was working less and less with idols and more with people that he enjoyed teaching how to dance.

Jongho centered an overwhelming majority of his time at his and Yeosang's studio, so much that it seemed even a simple text message or a phone call took too much time from his schedule. As for Yeosang, even Wooyoung couldn't explain where the hell Yeosang disappeared to.

Sighing, San tossed his phone to the side and climbed out of his bed.

He raked his fingers through his hair as his feet brought him to the window, staring out at the side of the building beside him. He could see his reflection in the darkness and he strained to look out to see the skyline, or to look up and see the stars.

His chest felt heavy with disappointment and slowly, he felt hot tears burn into his eyes he pressed his back against the wall and looked over the empty room.

Everything was sharply clean, put in a perfect place, yet there was something on the table across the room that stuck out. The burnt-out husks of wax that leaked onto a white frosting and the distinct smell of faded fire wafted through the air.

"Happy birthday, Wooyoung," San breathed, his head hanging low.

He couldn't help but let out a soft cry into his hand, his fingertips pressing hard into the skin of his face as he tried to force the sound back down his throat.

He shouldn't be crying.

Wooyoung had so many other people in his life, it was understandable that he hadn't texted San back. It was understandable that he had other things to be doing.