Page 41 of I Fell for an Alien Popstar

“Ship tour?” she asked me. “Before more rehearsals eat my day.”

“Thought you’d never ask,” I said, grabbing my Nebula Cosmo.

She showed me the ship like someone giving me a tour of their house who was proud of it but also slightly embarrassed by the mess. It kind of felt like I was on some sort of reality TV show.

“This is the main rehearsal space,” she said, sliding open a door to reveal a wide room with a low stage, marks on the floor for camera positions, and rigs hanging from the ceiling. “We practice new arrangements here. Sometimes I come in here just to catch my breath. It feels like the whole world stops sometimes, and I am the only one here.”

“Well, I like it already.”

I reached out and brushed my fingers against her hand. She glanced down with a soft smile before pulling away.

“The viewing bubble,” she said, gesturing toward a short ladder leading to a glass-walled pod that jutted from the ship’s side. “Good for pretending we are small and the only ones in the universe.”

I climbed a few steps and poked my head up. The glass curved around in a full dome. Inside sat two comfortable-looking benches across from one another and a small side table bolted into the wall.

The entire roof was essentially just sky.

It was the kind of place where you could sit for hours and forget you had a body, a job, and a mother who was probably composing a very long text message right then.

I immediately knew I would be spending a lot of time up there.

“It is one of my favorite places to go to relax. When Sira has to rent these shuttles, I always make sure they have a viewing bubble,” she gushed.

I climbed back down, my feet hitting the deck with a soft thud. Zhari stepped back to give me room, then fell into step beside me without a word.

Together, we turned away from the ladder and headed down the hall.

We passed the bunk section—pods built into the walls on both sides, each with a privacy curtain in a different metallic shade and name panels glowing softly. I caught glimpses of fiber-optic star lights embedded in the ceilings above the beds.

Someone had stuck plushies everywhere, while another bunk had a string of tiny moon-shaped lights draped across the curtain rod.

“So,” I asked eagerly, “where’s mine?”

“Ah,” Zhari said. “About that.”

She kept walking. We passed the last of the bunks and a supply closet before reaching a door at the very back of the bus that required a palm scan.

The corridor here was quieter, the lighting warmer. Private, despite being just down the hall from everyone else.

We kept walking and stopped at the last door. Zhari pressed her hand to the panel, and a few seconds later, it slid open.

The suite was small by Zhari Lumis standards, but massive compared to the pods we’d passed in the corridor. It felt almost indulgent, like stepping into a secret meant for someone far more important than us.

A real room, not just a compartment. Walls that didn’t press in. A ceiling that didn’t hum quite so close overhead.

An actual bed was built into the far wall, wide enough to stretch out without brushing the edges, layered with a thick, cloud-soft duvet that looked too pristine to touch. Pillows were scattered across it in careless abundance, as if someone had tried to make the space feel lived-in and given up halfway through.

An extra-long pink throw blanket spilled over the edge. Its color was almost jarringly warm against the sterile metal and pale composite surfaces, like a defiant little piece of softness smuggled aboard.

The sitting area curved gently along one side, a bench molded to the wall with just enough give to suggest comfort rather than necessity. A narrow desk extended beside it, its surface clean except for a faint sheen where hands had rested, worked, or maybe lingered.

Storage compartments were seamlessly built into the walls, their outlines barely visible unless you knew where to look. Everything was designed to disappear and keep the illusion of space intact.

And then there was the viewport.

It dominated the far wall, a vast pane of reinforced glass that made the room feel as if it were floating rather than contained. Stars drifted past in a slow, endless slide—silent, distant, untouchable.

No planets. No stations. Nothing to anchor the view.