*ೃ༄ ready, set, spin! ˚◞♡ ⃗
Pairing: Gwen Stacy x fem!Indian!Reader
Type: Oneshot - Fluff
Word count: 923
Warnings: Use of Y/N, use of nicknames (sweetheart, my love) and lots of culture infodumping but everything’s just fluffy stuff! :D
A/N: Wrote this while waiting for a ballet performance which I’m in to start so not proofread at all :’)
(also shoutout to @hobiebrownismygod for hyping my up tHAT WAS LITERALLY SO SWEET THANK U SO MUCH MY LOVE 💕)
“Gwen? Gwen! What-”
You cut yourself off with a soft grunt as the girl in front of you tackled you into a hug, squeezing you tight against her. You dropped your kathak bag onto the floor to hug her back. “Hi, Y/N. I had some free time and thought I’d come visit you. You just got back from kathak?”
You nodded and squeezed her hand as she pulled away to press a kiss to your lips and look at you, dressed in a ghagra choli and churidars covered from head-to-toe in mirror-like sequins stitched barely inches apart onto the midnight blue fabric.
“You look like a disco ball,” Gwen noted, giving you a smile. “Yeah, I noticed.” You linked pinkies with her, dragging her over to sit beside you on the couch while you caught your breath. “We had to do so many chakkars today, I’m absolutely exhausted.”
“Chakkars? What are- oh, are they those spins? Are you spotting enough?” Gwen pulled your legs over her lap, examining the ghungroo bells tied around your ankles with fascination. You held out your hand to her and she untied the strings of bells for you, dropping it into your palm and starting to massage small circles into your sore calf muscles.
“Yeah, I’m spotting enough. It’s just really tiring, y’know?”
Gwen smoothed down a wrinkle in your ghagra. “Yep, that happens. Same thing with pirouettes.”
“Noooo, pirouettes are so different! They’re all graceful and elegant and your legs are in weird positions and a chakkar is more speed than grace. I bet you can’t do a chakkar,” You grinned at her from across the couch, a friendly challenge in your tone at the last part.
“Oh, you are on. And I bet you can’t do a pirouette.”
“Deal. Prepare to lose, Gwendolyn Maxine Stacy.” You couldn’t help but giggle softly at the death-glare she gave you once you mentioned her full name. Fortunately, you knew her well enough to know you had to squirm out of range so she couldn’t tickle you ruthlessly.
“Okay, pirouettes, right? Is it like…” You placed your left foot a few inches behind your right one, angled out so your ankles were lined up. Gwen winced at how you were mercilessly butchering the fourth position in ballet.
“Shush, I’m trying my best. I’d like to see you try to do a chakkar on your first try.” You gave her a little glare, unable to squash the smile tugging at your mouth.
Gwen stuck her tongue out at you and joined you on the floor, standing a few feet away and joining her heels. “How do I do it again…?”
“Wait, you gotta use the ghungroo!” You grabbed the strings and tied them around her ankles, the bells jingling with every move she made. Gwen scrunched her nose as she looked down at it. “This is so different from ballet. Lemme guess, next you’re going to tell me to not point my toes.”
“Well… yeah, actually. See, you’re catching on already!” You gave her a kiss on the cheek before retaking your place and trying your best to figure out how you had aligned your heels. “Okay, you go first. Do a four-step chakkar. I’ll count tha, thei, thei, thut. On each syllable you move your feet into the turn.”
“Wait, wh-”
“Tha, thei, thei, thut” You watched Gwen fumble her way through the turn. Surprisingly, she was a natural at it, although her technique could be perfected a little. “Whoa, you’re actually really good at this. It took me weeks to learn how to do a chakkar.”
Gwen gave you a big smile and reached out to squeeze your hand in thanks before coming to stand beside you. “Okay, now do a pirouette. I know you can do it, sweetheart. C’mon, feel the fire, reach into your heart to find the answer or whatever those mentors in your serials say.”
You feigned a dramatic gasp. “Don’t insult Bollywood serials, they’re awesome!”
“I never said they weren’t. Now shush and focus on the turn or you might end up on the floor with a twisted ankle.” You angled your gaze at a point on the wall to spot through your turn, then brought your hands to curve and meet a little in front of your belly button. You pushed your back leg off the ground into the turn, but lost your spotting point somewhere along the way and ended up losing your balance.
Gwen lunged to catch you before you could hit the ground, steadying you and bringing you back onto your feet. “Yeah, I think that’s enough for today. Come on, let’s go get something to eat.”
“Pani puri,” You immediately suggested. Gwen’s eyes widened and she flushed a little as she remembered an incident that happened when you first tried to teach her to crack open the sphere part of the snack.
“You know I keep breaking those little sphere things,” She complained, giving you puppy eyes in hopes that they’d change your mind. “I spilled the pani part of it all over you last time too, remember? And I don’t wanna ruin your kathak clothes, they’re so pretty.”
“That’s fine, my love. I’ll go change and I’ll teach you how to do it again, properly this time. Besides, pani puri isn’t supposed to be eaten neatly, the whole point of it is that it’s messy and you need to somehow stuff the whole thing in your mouth before it leaks and makes too big of a mess to clean up.”
“Fine, I’ll do it. But only because you asked me to. And I’m going to hold the puri this time.”
I don’t do Kathak and I never have, so pls lmk if anything’s incorrect! <3
Kathak is a type of northern Indian classical dance, with alternate passages of mime and dancing.
A ghagra is a long full skirt, often decorated with embroidery, mirrors, or bells.
A choli is a blouse or a bodice-like upper garment that is commonly cut short leaving the midriff bare (but it’s not always cropped that short). It is usually worn along with a sari or ghagra in the Indian subcontinent.
A ghungroo, also known as ghunghru or ghungur or ghungura, is one of many small metallic bells strung together to form ghungroos, a musical anklet tied to the feet of classical Indian dancers.
Spotting is just a technique used by dancers when they’re spinning as a way to not lose their balance - basically you just focus on a point and every time you spin you have to look at that particular point as quickly as you can and for as long as you can.
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