Upon hearing this, the entire dorm fell silent, so quiet you could hear a pin drop.
“Huh? What do you mean the key is missing? Does that mean you two will have to stay cuffed together until it’s found?” Xie Zhuran stared in surprise at his two roommates’ handcuffed hands.
What followed was quite a sight.
“Autumn Rain, don’t panic yet. Let’s look for it together first.” Lin An calmly washed his hands and, within Song Qiuyu’s view, walked towards the table with the props.
“Sometimes when people panic, what they’re looking for is right in front of them, and they can’t see it. So, when something like this happens, we must not panic.”
“Right! That makes sense, maybe we just didn’t see it!” Song Qiuyu clenched her hands and took a few deep breaths.
Everyone nodded in agreement.
After several minutes of everyone searching together, the key was still nowhere to be seen, and a silence fell over them.
Lin An sighed, glancing at Xie Zhuran, who was vigorously fiddling with the ears of a stuffed animal.
“Xie Zhuran, why are you so persistently playing with their ears? Is something on your mind?”
“The handcuff key is so small, don’t you think it’s entirely possible it fell in there?” Xie Zhuran said, sounding entirely justified.
He put down the squirrel plushie and picked up the crocodile one.
“…”
Song Qiuyu was about to lose it.
If they couldn’t find the handcuff key, she’d have to go to class with Jiang Xiao, still cuffed together! She bent down, picked up her phone, turned on the flashlight, and then squatted.
Her relatively petite body easily squeezed into the space under the table. However, illuminating all the corners with the light yielded no results. She emerged from under the table with a disappointed expression. “It’s almost time, Jiang Xiao. We should hurry and get ready.”
Jiang Xiao stopped searching and nodded, a bit helplessly.
Getting ready wasn’t so bad; the two handcuffed individuals were largely unaffected.
When it came to changing clothes, because there was still a gap between the handcuffs and their wrists, Jiang Xiao changed quite smoothly.
Song Qiuyu, however, gradually found it difficult to cope.
It wasn’t her first time seeing Jiang Xiao change, but this close proximity was a first, giving her a more direct view of his good physique.
Not to mention completely dominating bodybuilders, but among male stars, he was definitely in the top tier.
However, the most painful part was that she couldn’t change her clothes.
“Song Qiuyu, why aren’t you changing?” Someone did ask, though it was Xie Zhuran.
“I’m not changing! I’m going to class in my pajamas today!” Song Qiuyu adjusted the collar of her little yellow chicken pajamas.
“…”
The silence from the three was deafening.
“It’s almost 7:40!” Lin An checked the time.
“Almost, I’ll change my shoes… Never mind, I won’t change, just like this!” Pajamas plus outdoor shoes would be too mismatched.
“Are you really not changing?”
“One, it’s hard to change clothes while handcuffed, and two, there’s no time!”
Everyone was convinced.
So, they rushed against time, grabbed their textbooks, slung on their backpacks, and dashed out the door.
As they hurried along, Song Qiuyu simultaneously held her phone, contacting the head of the drama club using the contact information she’d added last night.
However, there was no activity in the club head’s chat window for a long time.
“How’s it going?” Xie Zhuran asked, looking back.
He and Lin An were walking one in front and one behind, shielding their two roommates’ handcuffed hands, selflessly dedicating themselves to their future four years of dating prospects.
Heaven knew what rumors would spread if they were seen in their current state.
It’s quite possible that by noon today, Song Qiuyu and Jiang Xiao would be featured on the university forum’s top trending post, with a title like “Shocking! Two Boys Go to Class Handcuffed with ‘Fun’ Handcuffs!”
“Looks like no reply,” Lin An noted, seeing Song Qiuyu’s face filled with a bleak future, and sighed.
“They’ll reply when they see it anyway, let’s hurry and buy breakfast first!” Song Qiuyu forced herself to cheer up.
Two steamed buns and a bottle of soy milk, and their already meager living expenses instantly dropped by another five yuan.
The only comforting thought was that they weren’t the only ones rushing to class; there was a huge crowd.
They quickly navigated through the throng.
Because they couldn’t let anyone see the handcuffs, Song Qiuyu and Jiang Xiao stayed very close, so close that their arms could touch at any moment.
“Student Song!”
A sudden shout reached their ears.
Song Qiuyu instinctively looked in the direction of the voice and saw Sang Tian, who had appeared not far from them.
Jiang Xiao naturally saw her too.
He also noticed that this sharp-eyed girl almost instantly detected their close proximity, and a hint of confusion was already evident on her face.
If she were to see the handcuffs binding them, it would probably be more than just confusion.
Sang Tian wasn’t confused.
She simply looked at Song Qiuyu and Jiang Xiao, standing close together, and was a little surprised.
Their relationship seemed to have gotten better than before!
“We’re rushing for our 8 AM class, let’s catch up later!” Song Qiuyu interrupted Sang Tian’s thoughts.
Sang Tian also had class, so she nodded, understandingly not wasting each other’s time, and proceeded to a teaching building according to her original plan.
A moment later, they arrived safely in the classroom, just in the nick of time.
However, regrettably, there were no four consecutive empty seats in the classroom.
They split into pairs, with Lin An and Xie Zhuran sitting in the second-to-last row by the aisle, and Song Qiuyu and Jiang Xiao sitting in the very last row.
“Ugh…”
With her left hand handcuffed, she couldn’t put it on the desk.
Song Qiuyu had to use her less-dominant right hand to place her textbook on the table.
Then, somewhat awkwardly, she opened the plastic bag containing her breakfast with one hand, took out a white steamed bun and took a bite, then held the bun in her mouth, freeing her hand to pick up a straw, and carefully poked through the plastic film on top of the soy milk.
This scene, in Jiang Xiao’s eyes and in the eyes of others, could be summed up in four words: fumbling and flustered.
“Do you need help?” Seeing her poke for a long time with no effect, Jiang Xiao frowned and asked, feeling a bit sorry for her.
“Yes!” Song Qiuyu accepted the help very readily.
Jiang Xiao’s dominant hand was also cuffed, but his dominant hand was his right.
He used his non-dominant left hand to pick up the straw.
With the soy milk held steady by her, and their cooperation, he applied force, and the sharp straw tip successfully pierced the plastic film, going deep into the soy milk.
Not a single drop of soy milk spilled out.
They both started eating their breakfast.
As the professor’s lecture began, they put away the empty plastic bags and temporarily placed them in the drawer.
They used their free hands to listen to the lecture and take notes.
However, writing with her right hand was incredibly difficult.
All the words Song Qiuyu wrote in her book were crooked, like scribbles, but she could only force herself to keep writing.
During class, she also didn’t forget to glance at her phone screen from time to time.
She anxiously awaited a reply from the head of the drama club.
After taking notes for a while longer, the professor’s lecture continued.
She suddenly felt the urge to use the restroom, so she put down her pen, her mind on going to the toilet, and her body naturally began to rise, ready to raise her hand to signal.
With a soft clink, the silver chain between the handcuffs lightly collided.
This sound alone made her rising motion freeze, and she dared not move.