The group chat messages quietly kept piling up without a sound.
“No, no, no, I think we can just borrow a rental place from some senior students who live off-campus. After all, we’re mostly in class, so it’s just during lunch breaks, evenings, and maybe weekends that we might go over,” Song Qiuyu objected for the fifth time, completely unaware.
Her voice was hoarse from talking to tourists all day at work, and with her period just starting, she felt uncomfortable and had forgotten to lower her voice.
“We won’t be there long each time.”
All they needed was a rental with a bed that had space underneath to hide someone, just to shoot some short videos.
“If it’s a short-term rent, it wouldn’t cost much at all. Maybe we could even ask the Class Counselor for help, renting a place from the Graduate Student and Faculty Housing area,” Jiang Xiao said softly, sensing her hesitation and gently shaking his head.
At this, Song Qiuyu paused thoughtfully, picking up a few strands of rice noodles with her chopsticks from the clay pot, then lowered her head slowly and puckered her lips to blow on them.
Carefully placing the soupy noodles into her mouth, she chewed as her cheeks moved, pulling out her phone and mumbling indistinctly, “Mm… since it’s not working out… maybe we should consider Lin An’s opinion…”
After speaking, she unlocked her phone.
Today had been exceptionally busy, and combined with her period starting, she barely touched her phone all day.
The message Jiang Xiao sent this afternoon would have to wait until she got back to the dorm to check.
Huh?
When did Sang Tian add her to a group?
What kind of group is this?
Song Qiuyu furrowed her brows slightly, opening the group chat with a puzzled expression.
There were four people in the group.
The very first message she saw after entering was:
“Jiang Xiao, that guy, is he really planning to ditch us brothers and rent a place off-campus with his girlfriend?”
Of course, this message was from Xie Zhuran.
Seeing this, Song Qiuyu’s mind slowly filled with question marks.
What the hell?
Since when did Jiang Xiao have a girlfriend? And off-campus rental with a girlfriend? How come she had no idea?
Curiosity and confusion urged her fingers to scroll up.
The chat between Xie Zhuran, Lin An, and Sang Tian gradually unfolded around the topic of Jiang Xiao and his Childhood Friend renting a place together.
Song Qiuyu read carefully for a while, then glanced curiously at Jiang Xiao sitting across from her.
Childhood Friend…
No, Jiang Xiao liked Shen Xi. Even if there was a Childhood Friend, there was no way they would be involved like this.
She didn’t believe Jiang Xiao, such a pure and innocent guy, could be two-timing.
Besides, Shen Xi was gone. If there had been anything like this, he would have naturally ended up with that person, not this mess.
Jiang Xiao stopped eating his rice noodles and looked at her confusedly.
Song Qiuyu quickly averted her gaze as if nothing had happened.
Jiang Xiao looked even more puzzled but didn’t ask further, instead continuing to eat his noodles.
Meanwhile, Song Qiuyu picked up her chopsticks again, eating as she scrolled up through the chat history.
Though the constant popping of new message alerts was tempting, she ignored them for now.
Scrolling up, she soon noticed inconsistencies.
This group seemed to have been created by Sang Tian, and the members were just Xie Zhuran, Lin An, Sang Tian, and herself.
Sang Tian was now at the Mifen Restaurant with Jiang Xiao and Jiang Xiao’s Childhood Friend, and they had started talking about renting a place together.
Uh…
Wait a second…
She had a bad feeling — could this Childhood Friend actually be herself in disguise?
Song Qiuyu’s heart skipped a beat.
She looked up at the tables ahead, then glanced sideways at nearby tables.
No one.
Sang Tian must be behind them.
She turned back to scan again.
There were quite a few customers around, but she had no idea where Sang Tian was hiding to livestream.
She kept scrolling through the chat for a while longer, and by the end, she felt completely uneasy.
Her appetite dropped sharply, and she could hardly eat her noodles anymore.
She was just an ordinary part-timer trying to earn some pocket money, so why was all this happening?
Was this forcing her to step up and clarify that she was not Jiang Xiao’s Childhood Friend, but actually Song Qiuyu in cosplay?
Moreover, from the chat history, Sang Tian had apparently seen her at the Scenic Area…
What was going on?
She paused, looked at Jiang Xiao, and then remembered…
Earlier, Sang Tian had called her to ask for her address.
At the time, she hadn’t thought much and just let Jiang Xiao give it to her…
So Sang Tian had come to the Scenic Area and actually saw her…
This was bad.
There was no place for her in this world anymore.
Annoyed.
Destroy it all.
But, putting that aside, Song Qiuyu realized she couldn’t blame anyone for today’s misunderstanding.
After all, everyone’s starting point was caring for Jiang Xiao.
That was a good thing.
With all the warmth everyone was giving him, Jiang Xiao would surely come out of his gloom faster.
It was just a pain for her…
Forget it.
Song Qiuyu put down her chopsticks.
To avoid being interrupted, she decided to write out her clarification all at once, emphasizing three times that her cross-dressing was out of necessity.
Hopefully, she could settle everything in one go.
Jiang Xiao’s eyes narrowed slightly as he studied her.
For some reason, Song Qiuyu’s expression was grave, as if preparing for a do-or-die battle.
What was she about to fight for?
Song Qiuyu rolled up the sleeves of her gray hoodie and picked up her phone.
Her clean fingers danced swiftly over the screen, typing out a message.
Jiang Xiao couldn’t see what she was writing, but he could clearly feel the heavy atmosphere weighing down, making a cold sweat break out on his face.
“Beep!” Sang Tian’s phone at the corner received a new group chat message.
Glancing at the notification, Sang Tian’s eyes lit up instantly — it was Song Qiuyu!
［Song Qiuyu］: “Stop for a moment, listen to me — this is all a misunderstanding, actually… (five hundred words omitted)”
［Xie Zhuran］: “Huh? The missing person is back?”
［Lin An］: “Qiuyu, it’s good to have you back. That junior high classmate of yours seems to have come to this city too, and now she’s with Jiang Xiao.”
［Sang Tian］: “Song, are you okay?”
［Song Qiuyu］: “No, just look at what I posted.”
［Xie Zhuran］: “Too long, didn’t read. Give us a summary.”
［Song Qiuyu］:
How could she forget this trick?
Song Qiuyu rubbed her forehead, sighed, and hovered her finger on the edge of the phone screen.
Two seconds later, she perked up and replied:
“Right now, the one who’s with Jiang Xiao is me.”
The chat fell suddenly silent.
Then, Xie Zhuran, Sang Tian, and Lin An all typed a “?” at the same time.
Each word made sense alone, but together it was so strange — could this really be human language?
If the person with Jiang Xiao now was Song Qiuyu, then that girl they had been talking about all afternoon was actually her!
Sang Tian was stunned.
She clearly remembered that Song didn’t have a chest, “but that female coser did, and she was on her period too…”
She poked her head out, staring in disbelief at the female coser whose back was turned to her, eyes widening.
But what reason would Song have to lie?
Come to think of it, that back really did look a bit like Song’s, and the voice was similar too — just much prettier…
Xie Zhuran, who had twice tried to tempt Song Qiuyu to cross-dress but failed, was also shocked.
He sent a message in the group: “So, you’re really a girl, Song?
And Jiang Xiao knows about this too?
So I and Lin An are the only ones in the dark?”