Joong just held onto me tightly, and though I was stunned, I found my arms going around him.
We stayed like that for a bit before he finally pulled away, face blushing red. I was no better than him, and we both turned away, not saying a word about it. He didn't explain, and I didn't call him out on it either. I felt like we didn't have to.
I had lunch with him before I went off, and to be honest, for the rest of the week, I didn't get to see him as our schedules didn't collide. I only saw him the following Monday, but Joong seemed much better and completely recovered.
He was practising his dance when I walked in and nodded at me. I waved back and sat down with Santa to work on our song while I watched him discreetly. A little while later, Aou told us to practice too.
We all got together, and Santa and Joong led the dance practice. There were some partner moves, so Aou partnered Santa while I was with Joong.
One of the moves had him holding me by my waist before spinning me. As he placed his hands on my waist and got up close, bloody hell, I felt my heart beat 5 times faster. He was supposed to hold, spin me, and then we did a back flip together.
It worked out almost perfectly except for the spin. He had let go a little too late, so the routine was off by a few seconds. We tried it again and again, but for some reason, Joong always let go too late.
Santa offered to switch partners to see if it worked better, and it was done perfectly this time as Joong let go of Aou on time.
Santa just laughed, asking Joong if he had a soft spot for me, holding me for so long. Joong just groaned at him but did not say anything. Aou said we would switch partners then. I just looked at Joong briefly who seemed reluctant, but since he didn't say anything, I kept quiet, too. We just agreed and swapped partners, with Aou being his and Santa being my partner. But since Santa was shorter, I was the one holding onto his waist. I could feel Joong looking at me as we did the move.
Once practice was over, I just flopped onto the ground tired. We had been at it for the last 4 hours already. Santa had long run off as he had filming too. Aou was going to meet his boyfriend so he took his leave. I didn't realize Joong was still around and just continued resting on the floor.
"Aren't you going to head home?"
I opened my eyes to see Joong looking at me standing up. I just nodded saying I would leave soon but needed a breather. He didn't say anything and just flopped onto the ground next to me. I looked over at him.
"What happened earlier? Thought you couldn't do the step but you did it perfectly with Aou."
Joong looked at me but didn't say a word. He just turned his eyes back to the ceiling as he muttered, ""Well Aou isn't you. The steps came out timed well because I didn't want to hold onto him longer than necessary."
I almost stopped breathing when I heard that. I turned to look at Joong but he didn't look at me at all.
"Joong.."
"Yea?"
"We will always have these kind of steps during our performances."
"And?"
"You can't keep messing it up with me."
"If not?"
"We can't partner together then. And I.. I really want to be your partner. Don't you?"
Joong kept quiet. I could see him gripping his fists in response instead. He turned to look at me.
"Do you realize what you are saying?"
"Didn't you realize what you were doing?"
We both kept quiet, the silence drawing us in subconsciously. We got closer and closer and at one point, we had just turned to face each other head on. Joong's hands reached out to touch my face when our phones rang and it broke up the moment.
We both broke apart, and answered our respective phones. Phuwin had called me asking where I was while Dunk had called him, asking on where he was.
We both stood up, speaking to our respective onscreen partners as we walked away from each other.
But I think we couldn't deny that our eyes kept looking for each other.