Dance of romance
For most people in the south, the idea of meeting at a dance floor must sound rather old-fashioned. However, it was still a perfectly normal way of the first steps into romance here in Formenos. After all, it was impossible to foretell if someone might be a future spouse.
"Alright, Curvo, go and invite one of the girls to dance instead of standing here like a fool."
No surprise in that Celegorm pushed him forwards, the two year older brother sometimes did so when he thought one of the younger brothers to take too long time to react on something.
"Why won't you do it as well?" Curufin wondered, wishing that Caranthir had been dragged along so the blond brother could be distracted. But no, the middle brother had shut himself into his room in the basement almost straight after dinner, threatening Curufin with a black eye if he was not left in peace this evening as Caranthir worked on a project which he hoped to turn into a real business in a few years.
"Mom and dad tasked me with watching you while the rest of the family stayed at home."
Babysitting, in a finer word. As if Curufin needed a babysitter, he was almost seventeen years old! Then again, he was the third youngest in the family and of course the dance evening happened the same weekend as his parents would be away on a private mini-vacation.
"Curufin, are you doing to stand there or join me in a dance?"
Oh Eru, his crush Astarë had seen it all, Curufin realized in horror at hearing her voice from behind. The problem with having so many brothers, was that everyone at school knew about their number of family members. Just last week Curufin had been sent to the headmaster office after a fist-fight where the other teenage boy made fun of his family by joking about his parents breeding like rabbits and that all the seven brothers would do the same as soon as they married.
"Eh...yes, I am coming!"
She smiled that glorious smile of hers, the one which had caught his attention there in the shared class for learning basic economics for adulthood. Perhaps not a stunning beauty like a few other girls in school, but she was known for her goal to become a nurse at the local hospital.
"Come on, two dances before a drink! I want to hear how it is in the training of becoming a blacksmith, since there is a possible chance of that I might end up taking care of you after a injury!"
And he just could not refuse that request for a dance.
~X~X~X~X~X~X
About twenty years later:
"Daaaaad! You can not just leave the barbecue without supervision! The food is getting ruined!" Celebrimbor cried at seeing all the smoke from the backyard, grabbing a bucket of cold water to pour it on the coals. His mother came out, looking like she really wanted to give her husband more than just another telling-off about this.
"Damn him and his endless focus on his work as a blacksmith! He is well into his mid-30s now and he still can not learn that cooking is not like a forge, where everything needs to be as glowing hot as possible!"
Celebrimbor had not expected anything else, he had known from infanthood that his dad was hopeless in the kitchen when it came to cooking outside making sandwiches. The burnt pieces of chicken, meat and vegetables was a sorry sight.
"Oi, nephew!" his uncle Celegorm called from over the hedge that separated the two smaller cottages, "I have half of a grounded meat pie with gravy and boiled vegetables left right now after my own dinner if you want to eat something before the school dance in a hour! Let your mom deal with the punishment for my brother today!"
"Oh, thank you! No need for my baby to go hungry and have that ruin a nice date with a sweet girl!" Astarë called back over the hedge before she went to find her husband whenever he now was and distracted to the point of indirectly ruining the planned family dinner, and Celebrimbor hurried over to the cottage next-door where his third-oldest uncle lived.
When Celebrimbor later arrived at the dance floor, Narvi was already there waiting for him, dressed in a green traditional dress from the Orocarni Mountains in the east of Middle-earth where her family had lived before moving to Formenos about 30 years ago due to a massive social unrest in a neighbor country.
"Wow, you look great."
He did not joke, she was always stunning with her green eyes and white-blonde hair contrasting with her dark skin color in his eyes, but given how rare it was to see Narvi in the clothes and belonging jewelry she might have worn if she had been born and raised in the Orocarni, it was a great surprise.
"Thank you, I thought that we could have some extra with my birth culture today since dancing is a very important part of life there. After all, dance plays a big role in different cultures across the world."
Offering her his hand like how they had done a few weeks before when they had been playing the main roles in a small school play, Celebrimbor invited Narvi to be his dance partner for the evening.