Stars Dancing [Dreams-To-Lovers Romance]

NAYTH

"Hey Peydran, what's up?"

"You on a starliner, Nayth?"

"Umm hmm. We'll be in Floria in an hour. Did you need something for the Shurwinn wedding?"

He shook his head, "No, I wanted to talk to you about Floria. We're going with your family this afternoon. I was gonna talk to your dad some more— he gave me a Floreno lesson, and I was going to teach him Bhangra, but he had to cancel."

My eyebrows rose, "You don't need Floreno lessons, Peydran."

"Thanks. Yeah, I've got it now. Just needed some pointers. But that's not what I mean. It's everything else."

I quirked on eyebrow in question.

Peydran rubbed the back of his neck with his metal hand. "It's well, I think I'm deciding that I'm stodgy and that's okay. Even if I have to get dressed in an uncomfortable suit and get spanked."

Chuckling, "You know you can't take Freya seriously—"

"I know, I know. I figured out she's 75% bluster." I nodded. He'd gotten my sister's number quickly.

"And I like Freya. I like dancing with Freya. She's probably the best dancer I've ever seen, but Nayth. I don't think I can handle it if your gramma or grampa—"

I roared with laughter. Right in his face. "Madrano, are you worried my grandparents are gonna get up on you when you go to their villa?"

Cackling, Peydran nodded. "What about the festivals? I don't really want a bunch of people I don't know knocking thighs with me unless it's like you or Freya."

I nodded and reigned in the hysterics. "Okay, what you have to understand is that Florians are really comfortable with things that off spheres aren't. And we also know what off spheres are like. We're experts at body language. Most Florians are great dancers and most Florians are musicians, even if it's a tone deaf person playing bongoes."

"Some Florians are exceptional Flauta Martial Artists. We have very honed body awareness which means we are aware of ourselves and our sensuality, and it means we read other people very easily. We know what people are comfortable with and what makes them uncomfortable."

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"Some of us, like Freya, use that to tease and push people past their limits. Some of us, like me, use that to further our careers. I use my sensuality and sex appeal to my benefit in business and politics. It's part of my public persona. I act like an uptight Sturm when I'm on Sturm, and everyone knows I'm half Florian. To those who find that side of me appealing, I turn up the sensuality. To those who prefer subtlety, I project the Sturm part of my personality."

"Criminy, Nayth, that sounds complicated!"

"Not when you've lived your whole life knowing nothing different. It's a blend of two very different cultures, and it's natural to me. Anyway, Florians are very good at reading people, so my grandparents aren't gonna slap thighs with you unless you look like you're into it, okay?" I chuckled a little at the thought.

"What you want to be wary of is the tourists, not the Florians. Because tourists go to Floria thinking they're gonna have a great time losing all their inhibitions. They just get drunk and act stupid like they do everywhere else in the Known Cosmos. They probably go home thinking that a Florian showed them a great time, but in actuality, they probably never even met a Florian. They probably got laid by another drunk tourist."

"Freya can show you where to go to enjoy the festivals like a Florian. We have business meetings and use the festivals for networking. It's not disgusting like the areas where the tourists are gettin' dirty in the streets pretending they are Florian. Does any of this make sense?"

He nodded, "Yeah, yeah, I think so. It still sounds really complicated, though. So, do you dance at business meetings like you did with Ren?" he asked incredulous.

I laughed, "Well, probably not to 'Before,' I mean, that's basically a foreplay song, but I could dance to a line dance in the street. That's a more likely scenario, but as often as not, we just have a drink, talk business, and then go our separate ways."

"So, don't people just hit on you all the time, Nayth? I mean, you're an amazing dancer, surely there's guys who want—"

"Yeah, so I go to festivals for business and Freya likes to go for fun, so we go. Not as much in recent years because I'm too busy. More when we were teenagers. And yeah, guys and girls. And I'll dance with a man who is into me, but he'd know I wasn't into him before he even approached me. He'd know he wasn't gonna take me home, right? So, as long as it's only about dancing, I'm cool with it."

"Same for girls, unless I was looking to go home with someone, but that only happened before I met Ryst, so years ago when I was a teenager. I'll dance with pretty much any Florian because they know how to have respect. I will not dance with tourists because they don't understand the rules. Does that help?"

"Yeah, yeah. Actually, I don't feel so stodgy anymore. But really, Nayth? Your gramma? You can dance like that with your grandparents?"

I shrugged. "It's just dancing. I've been doing it my whole life. It isn't sexy to us unless we are with someone we want to be sexy with. It probably looked really fucking hot for me to dance 'Before' with Ren. I'm sure if we put the video on stream, it would be promoted as a steamy gay dance song in a matter of hours across the galaxy. But—"

He cut me off, "I know, Carmidee. I've already figured you out too. You're just a sweetheart who wants to show Ren how much you love him, so you're gonna cuddle him and dance with him just because he asked you to."

"You're a perceptive bastard, Madrano. You're gonna be just fine in Floria."