✄ ───

If there's one thing Chan hates, it's routine.

He's been to most of the clubs in this city, but each time he finds a decent scene, it doesn't take long for him to get bored of it. Same old music. Same old drinks. Same old faces. Especially when it gets to the point that he's already fucked half of the regulars. By that point, he spends most of his night looking for someone he hasn't gotten his hands on yet.

Tonight, he needs something— someone new.

Purple neon floods the inside and bathes the dancers crowding the floor from above while smoke shrouds their feet below. The wide room pulses with a rapid EDM beat— its heartbeat.
It's so very alive. The energy is fresh, and Chan likes that very much. It's the dead of winter, yet he suspects that the owners of this club hardly pay a dollar for their heating.

From the sidelines, girls with bold lipstick and black stilettos eye him up from the very first step he takes inside. One or two saunter forward to intercept his clear path in— attempting to be conveniently 'in his way'—but he simply winks as he shoulders his way through.

Geez, let me take off my coat first, at least.

Like any good club-goer, he starts at the bar with his buddy, where the lighting is brighter and warmer, inviting the outsider to come right in.

Like the seasoned pro he is, once he has a Rum and Coke in his hand, he's surveying the scene. Sizing it up.

Especially around the edges, the floor is packed with throngs of people, with small spaces separating each individual, tightly-packed group. Ninety percent do barely anything more than jumping up and down with their hands in the air or two-stepping. (Some even add some shoulder movement!) A for effort. But it's simply too predictable. So boring.

However, Chan's eyes are drawn, as if by a magnet, to the very center of the floor, where there's a large circle of space with only one figure inhabiting it. Somehow this one guy fills it far better than any of the groups of ten–twenty surrounding him. Chan's eyes lock onto him.

While the rest of the room might as well be NPCs (on account of their repetitive movements) he uses every part of his body, rolling, undulating, popping, extending, and flowing. Hardly ever doing the same move twice. It makes him impossible to ignore.

Chan's only able to glance away long enough to gather that even many of the people dancing in their divided groups are watching him. But the space around him remains clear. No one approaches.

"Chan," Changbin starts.

"Hm?" Chan answers, absent-mindedly. His head doesn't move; his eyes don't blink.

"Do you want to— Oh."

Changbin must recognize the look on Chan's face— he's been to clubs with Chan before, after all. Right now, all that's going on in Chan's brain is:

That one. I want that one.

"Don't even bother with him. I tried, but all he does is flirt. You can't get anywhere with him."

A grin creeps onto Chan's face. "That so?" His eyes never leave the dancer's body, even as he sends a teasing retort back to Changbin. "Maybe you're just not his type."

Ordinarily he'd be watching Changbin's eyes roll at a moment like this, but right now, he's more interested in watching a pretty thing's hips sway from across the room. Well. Actually. He's most interested in watching them up close.

When his eyes move back up to survey the dancer's face, Chan finds that he's been caught. They lock eyes; he sends a coy little grin Chan's  way. That's all the invitation Chan needs.

   "What's his name?" Chan demands.

    "Minho," Changbin sighs. "And don't come crying to me when your ego gets hurt 'cause you forgot what it's like to be rejected. You'd be lucky just to get him off the floor."

   "Oh please, rejection? That's a thing of the past. No one can resist me."

   "Only because you go for the easy ones..." Changbin grumbles.

(Oh, Changbin. He must still be sour over the fact that Chan gets at least three times as much action as he does. Poor guy.)

  Well, Chan can never back down from a challenge. He's up and out of his seat, shoving his drink at Changbin, wading through the sea of bodies, without sparing another glance at Changbin. He can go fuck a chair or something. Chan doesn't care. In fact, he doesn't care about anything but—

   "Hey."

   For a man with such sharp and striking features, this Minho sure does have a soft voice. Soft, smooth, and velvety. Rich. Like cocoa butter. It's airy; breathy, too. Barely makes it over the blare of percussive music. It catches Chan off-guard, but not so much so that Chan can't still nail that first impression.

   He sets up with a classic 'look up and slowly down, then back up', a smirk spreading gradually as his eyes return to the dancer's. It's more for show— a flirtatious signal of his interest and attraction— than anything, but Chan does quite like what he sees. Fishnets hug the curves of muscular thighs, then disappear under ripped, black jeans shorts that Chan can see himself unzipping rather soon. The silky long-sleeved shirt he wears is a sexy shade of purple, and it flows attractively around his top half.

   "Hi there," Chan tosses back, with well-practiced projection, exactly loud enough for Minho, and only Minho to catch.

   They don't share any more words; chitchat's a bit difficult in the middle of the dance floor, after all. But boy, do they talk to each other. The glint in Minho's eyes says everything Chan needs to know: the interest is reciprocal. And the way Chan traps his lip under his teeth says: take it away.

   Before Chan even realizes what's happening, there's a hand firmly gripping his shoulder and a whoosh in the music as Minho bends away from him and throws his head back and around at the perfect time. Pointed up to the high ceiling, his face is bathed in flashing colored light; as his neck rolls back to its normal position, his sultry expression is replaced by a devilish grin.

Holy.

Fuck.

Yes, please.

Chan's record is forty-five seconds. That's how quickly he's gotten someone to leave the crowd with him. But he could tell Minho wasn't gonna be quite so easy. He'd have to work a little harder.

Minho's hand slips away from Chan's shoulder. He chuckles. Takes a step back and keeps it moving.

   Damn. Chan just got caught with his mouth hanging open.

He recovers quickly though. He may not be on Minho's level, no, but he's certainly not helpless on the dance floor. And he may not be as smooth, but he can still roll his body and pop the right parts of it at the right times. It's good enough to have Minho stepping closer after a full song's worth of showing off.

The next time Chan body rolls back, Minho snakes into his personal space and rolls forward. Their chests come so close to touching.

Next to Chan's ear, Minho remarks, "You keep up pretty good."

Chan's only response is to grin smugly and offer his hand. He watches the corner of Minho's lips twitch up.

The hand Minho places in his is small and delicate. But it holds tight— considerably tighter than Chan's loose grip. Now, the groove of Minho's body flows through a direct line into Chan's. It's a buzzing energy. His hips move so fluidly, and Chan wants them a lot closer to his.

He lifts his arm to spin Minho. He knows just how to do it— to spin him inward and stops him halfway, before he can complete a whole circle, so that his back is caught in a controlled collision with Chan's chest, and so that he's kept in place there by the arm Chan will bring down over the front of his hips. It's very smooth.

It goes just as planned. Minho is charmed. He circles his hips once. And then he slips out of the hold gracefully.

Three minutes of this. One, and only one, of Minho's hands remains in his for the entire time, but Minho continuously slips away before Chan can get a good hold on him. Every time Chan's arms begin to close around him, Minho slips away. While never getting more than an arm's length away from each other, they barely even touch.

All of Chan's attempts to meld Minho's body to his are shot down with perfect aim. And then the song ends. Minho's tight grip releases, and the sensation of his meager touch fades away with the music. Unlike the music, it does not immediately come back.

"Thanks for the dance." Puckering plush lips, Minho blows a kiss with a prettily tilted head. Then he turns away, and leaves Chan a sweaty mess standing still in a mass of moving bodies.

...Damn.

♡︎ ───

hi! :>  i really got so cooked by writer's block with only human that i had to go make a whole other book. ugh.