Page 5 of Prince Material (The Prince Pact #2)

FLORIS

I stared at my phone, willing the numbers to change.

Who in their right mind scheduled classes this early?

Back home, nothing started before nine, a perfectly civilized hour that didn’t require sacrificing sleep or sanity.

But here I was, two weeks into my American college experience, contemplating if showing up to class in pajamas would be too much of a cultural faux pas.

Then again, Americans didn’t really seem to care much about things like that. I’d seen people grab coffee while clearly still in their sleepwear. Maybe I was assimilating with more ease than I had thought?

Nah, I was still processing surprises every day, unexpected cultural customs and fascinating habits that baffled me.

Sure, I’d visited the States before, but those had been carefully orchestrated royal visits with reasonable schedules and minimal interaction with actual American daily life or, for lack of a better word, ordinary Americans.

TV shows and movies hadn’t prepared me for the reality of American college culture either. Where were the frat parties and the Greek life they had promised me? So far, the wildest thing I’d witnessed was someone double-fisting energy drinks during a late-night study session.

My theory was that Vernon Tech attracted a different crowd than those party schools I’d seen in films. These students actually seemed serious about their education—a fact that would probably shock the tabloids if they ever found me here.

It didn’t really match their image of me.

It was a major reason why I had picked VTC and not some easy party college.

What had surprised me most, though, was how friendly everyone was.

Complete strangers said, “Hi,” on campus, which would’ve earned you concerned looks at best and a few choice curse words at worst in Amsterdam.

The cashier at the campus store had asked how my day was going, and she’d actually seemed interested in the answer.

Back home, small talk was reserved for people you knew, and even then, it was more about complaining about the weather than genuine conversation.

Speaking of weather, the humidity here was doing ungodly things to my hair.

No wonder Americans were obsessed with air conditioning.

Without it, we’d all probably melt into puddles of sweat and regret.

The Dutch might complain about rain, but at least we didn’t have to deal with air that felt like breathing through a wet blanket.

Unable to avoid the inevitable any longer, I finally slid out of bed.

Orson was already up and had been for a while, judging by the pristine state of his side of the room.

Even his bed was made with those precise hospital corners that made my messily bundled sheets look like modern art gone wrong.

He was probably out to get some coffee or something, his one vice as far as I could tell.

Yawning and stumbling around in pre-coffee haze, I gathered my shower supplies, then grabbed my brand-new, bright red flip-flops.

I’d never been a flip-flop guy but they were a necessity here, so I found a pair for ten bucks at Target.

Four generations of ancestors were beaming with pride for being that frugal.

I stumbled to the bathroom, which was at the end of the hallway, hoping a shower stall would be available.

The shared facilities were another thing I was still getting used to.

Back home, I’d had my own bathroom, obviously…

and someone who had cleaned it for me. Here, I had to dodge half-naked guys in various states of wakefulness if I wanted to brush my teeth.

I kept my eyes firmly fixed ahead as I navigated the morning traffic of towel-clad students. Being openly gay meant I had to be extra careful. One wrong glance, one lingering look, and I’d be that creepy gay dude perving on straight guys in the bathroom.

And these guys might not know my royal status, but if they ever found out, I didn’t want any cause for rumors. The tabloids would have a field day with that one: Gay Prince Causes Scandal in American College Showers.

No, thanks. I’d learned my lesson about public spaces and unwanted attention. These days, I treated communal bathrooms like a museum of classical statues: appreciate the artistry in theory, but don’t touch and definitely don’t stare at their junk.

The bathroom was already steamy when I entered, the ancient pipes groaning like tortured souls.

Three of the four shower stalls were occupied, their occupants hidden behind thin, plastic curtains that had seen better days.

The fourth one—my target—had a puddle forming underneath it that suggested the drain was having an existential crisis.

Perfect. Just perfect.

I picked my way across the wet floor, trying not to think about what might be living in that puddle.

The shower curtain stuck to my arm as I stepped in, and I suppressed a shudder.

Back home, I’d never appreciated the luxury of a clean, private bathroom.

Now? I’d trade my favorite pair of shoes for one shower without wearing flip-flops.

The water pressure was its usual pathetic self, more of a suggestion than an actual stream. I tilted my head back, letting the lukewarm spray hit my face while trying to ignore the off-key butchering of a Taylor Swift song coming from two stalls down. At least someone was having a good morning.

The water suddenly turned ice cold, yanking me from my thoughts with a yelp that was entirely undignified for someone of my station.

Another charming quirk of ancient plumbing.

In the summer, it wasn’t that bad, but in the winter, an involuntary ice bath like that would be a nasty shock to my system.

When I got back to our room, Orson was at his desk, studying, his posture perfect even as he sat at his desk. How did he do that? I always ended up slouching like a melting snowman. A cup of steaming coffee was right next to him, and my mouth watered as the smell hit me. I swallowed.

“Morning.”

“Morning.” Orson looked up from his textbook. “I brought you coffee too.”

“Oh my god, thank you. You’re amazing.” I eagerly reached for the cup he’d put on my desk.

He swallowed, his eyes traveling lower. “Don’t you want to get dressed first? The coffee will be too hot to drink anyway.”

I looked down at myself. Right. I was wearing only boxer briefs. “Good thinking.”

With regret, I put the coffee back down, then rummaged through my closet until I’d found a pair of clean shorts. Hmm, I also needed a shirt. Had I put away my laundry yesterday? No. The clean pile was… somewhere.

“Your clean clothes are on your chair,” Orson said .

I turned around and found him staring at me. Was he annoyed with me? He looked a bit… tense. “Huh?”

“The ones you left in the dryer last night? I brought them up when I got mine.”

“You’re a saint.” I dug through the pile, trying not to scatter socks everywhere. “Though I swear I meant to get them myself.”

“Before or after they became communal property?” His tone was dry but not unkind. “You left them there for three hours.”

“Sorry.” I winced, finally locating an acceptable shirt. “I got caught up watching a documentary about the Dutch Delta Works and lost track of time. Completely forgot about them.”

“The what works?”

“Delta Works. It’s this massive system of dams, sluices, locks, dikes, levees, and storm surge barriers.

” I pulled the shirt over my head. “They started building it after this huge flood in 1953 that killed almost two thousand people. It’s why I want to be a civil engineer, actually.

Water management is kind of our thing in the Netherlands. ”

When I emerged from the shirt, Orson was watching me with an odd expression. “I didn’t know it had a name. The Dutch system, I mean. I knew you guys had a way of keeping the water out, but not that it had a name. Or that it was built after a flooding.”

“Yeah, it’s pretty impressive. The American Society of Civil Engineers named it one of the Seven Wonders of the Modern World.

” I started gathering my books, trying to remember if I’d done the reading for today’s class.

“We have this saying in Dutch: ‘God created the world, but the Dutch created the Netherlands.’ About a third of our country is below sea level, you know.”

“Really?” Now I had his full attention. “How does that even work?”

“Lots of pumps. And dikes. And constant maintenance.” I grinned, warming to the topic despite my morning fog. “We’ve been fighting the water for centuries. It’s basically our national hobby at this point, right after complaining about the weather.”

“But how do you keep the water from seeping in?” Orson’s brow furrowed in that way it did when he was working through a complex problem. “The pressure must be immense.”

“That’s where the engineering comes in. We’ve got these things called polders.

They’re basically reclaimed land surrounded by dikes.

Inside each polder, there’s a complex network of canals and pumping stations that constantly remove water.

” I put my backpack down and grabbed my phone, pulling up some pictures I’d taken back home.

“See these windmills? They weren’t for show.

Originally, they powered the pumps that kept the land dry. ”

Orson leaned in. “And now?”

“Electric pumps, mostly. Though we keep the windmills maintained. They’re our back-up system if the power fails.” I swiped to another picture. “This is the Oosterscheldekering. It’s my favorite part of the Delta Works.”

“Why’s that?”