Off to Florida!

Xia Wei had just arrived in the United States as an exchange student. She didn't know her way around yet, and with her body clock still out of whack, she didn't want to go to an 8 a.m. class. So she laboriously typed up a help post on RedNote:

[Urgent: Can I skip 302, a university elective? Does the TA take attendance?]

She waited around for ages, but no one replied except for one lonely "?"

The question mark made no sense, and it annoyed Xia Wei. With a tap of her finger, she deleted the reply.

The next day in class, the professor introduced the TA, and her eyes went wide. Hey, he was pretty handsome: refined features, a deep, aloof gaze, and an irresistible air of intelligence.

Excited, Xia Wei immediately told her friend about him. But after class, just as she reached the door, the TA suddenly called out to her.

Chen Yueqing raised an eyebrow slightly, resting his chin on one hand as he watched the girl grow increasingly flustered with an amused smile. He drawled, "Urgent: Can I skip 302, a university elective? Does the TA take attendance?"

He paused, gazed at her scarlet cheeks, and twisted the knife. "I'm afraid I do take attendance, Xia Wei."

Urgent! What do I do if the TA caught me asking how to skip class? And I even deleted his reply!

Xia Wei's mind exploded in despair. She wanted to make another post.

To save her perilously low participation grade, she had no choice but to get closer to this PhD student in his third year and build a good relationship with him.

"Since we went to neighboring universities for undergrad, and spring break is coming up, could you recommend somewhere for me to go, Senior Chen?" Xia Wei asked one day, thinking they had gotten pretty close.

Chen Yueqing replied without hesitation: "Florida."

"You don't keep idle people around?" Xia Wei was surprised. She'd thought he'd say Los Angeles or New York. "What's fun in Florida?"

Chen Yueqing said, "The ocean, dolphin watching, sunsets at bars, and the biggest Disney park in the world."

Xia Wei immediately asked if he could show her around.

"No," Chen Yueqing said firmly without even lifting his eyelids. "I have plenty of experiments to run, and we aren't that close."

Later, on a white-sand beach in Florida at dusk on a spring day, the girl napped beneath a beach umbrella. Specks of sunlight fell through the trees, tinting the waves the orange-red of orange soda. By chance, she spotted the phone Chen Yueqing had left on a bench. Its WeChat screen was still lit.

[She's asleep. When she wakes up, I'll confess.]

Notes:

1. A lovely springtime encounter, an international-student fairy tale set in the US.

2. A short, sweet story that doubles as a not-too-detailed travel guide to Florida.

3. A romantic, adorable girl and a rational, aloof top student.

Next book: "When Night Falls," featuring a 190-cm-tall, lean, blue-eyed, blond hot nerd and a romantic, adorable girl.

Zhi Ning had worked hard to get a spot in a US holiday research program. But the very night she arrived, a thief robbed her of her passport, wallet, and phone, leaving her penniless in a foreign country.

The consulate couldn't help. An expedited passport could only be issued in person at the consulate-general, over 2,000 kilometers away in another state, with two states in between.

She couldn't stay at a hotel or take a plane or train. Registration closed in ten days, and she'd lose her place if she missed the deadline. In despair, she walked into a convenience store. A 1.9-meter-tall, fair-skinned man with blond hair and blue eyes passed by and saw the thinly dressed girl shivering in the cold. She took off her coat and pleaded with the cashier, asking if she could trade it for two rolls.

The cashier immediately threatened to call immigration and have her deported. The man overheard the girl frantically explain that she was headed to Washington.

A black, battered SUV stopped outside the convenience store for three seconds. The window rolled down. The wind ruffled the man's blond hair, and lean muscles showed faintly beneath his shirt. His expression was cool, and he spoke English with a German accent. "I'm going from Austin to Washington, so we're headed to the same place. Hide when we pass checkpoints. Don't ask about me. If anything goes wrong, I'll leave you by the roadside. Get in if you agree. We'll be there within eight days."

When the girl questioned him, he couldn't be bothered to explain. He pulled an ID card from the passenger-side visor and tossed it through the window.

A Princeton Physics Department doctoral ID, with "Clayser" printed in the name field.

Clayser. Zhi Ning instinctively read it aloud in Chinese.

Then she dropped it and ran.

Come on, you should never trust a stranger, especially a handsome foreign man.

Yet one night somewhere along Route 66, the orange sunset on the horizon vanished in an instant. Rain soaked her through, and Zhi Ning wrapped herself in his coat and asked him, "Why are you helping me? Why is someone besides immigration tracking me? Who are you, really?"

"Promise me one thing, and I'll tell you."

"What?"

"Don't ever get into a stranger's car again." He leaned toward her with a teasing smile, his breath brushing her cheek. "Unless it's mine."

Using an old computer at an inn, Zhi Ning secretly searched his surname.

The moment the webpage appeared, she held her breath.

The Clayser barons: a long-established European shipping and industrial powerhouse, with businesses spanning Europe and the Americas. The second son was named Silvi Clayser. A month ago, he had fled home for "personal reasons" and disappeared.

The man in the photo wore a tailored suit and was tall and imposing, with cold, sharp features. He looked exactly like the man beside her, driving a beat-up SUV and crouching on the ground with a wrench to repair it.

Reader's Guide:

1. Campus and road-trip story.

2. A romantic, foreign fairy tale.

3. A 190-cm-tall, lean, blond hot nerd and a Chinese girl who longs for romance.

Theme: You can have both your ideals and love.