Chapter 475: Notice of Case Filing

At exactly ten o'clock, the landline in the outer office rang twice.

Li Huilan, sitting closest, picked it up, listened for a second, and held the receiver out. "Branch bureau. For you."

She got up and took it. On the other end, a printer was feeding paper. The man speaking had the phone wedged between ear and shoulder. "Shen Zhixia? Branch bureau. That complaint you filed on November first—we've reviewed it. We've determined there are facts of a crime and criminal liability needs to be pursued. We've decided to file the case for investigation. The written notice will be delivered to your office this afternoon."

"Which charges did you file on?"

"The notice says." There was the sound of flipping paper. "Someone will bring it over this afternoon. Just be at the office."

"Alright."

She set the receiver down.

"It's filed?" Li Huilan asked.

"It's filed."

He Xiufen looked up from the old wooden chair by the window, red pen still in hand. "Who called?"

"The investigating officer."

"Accepting a case means they took it in." He Xiufen said. "Filing a case means they're acknowledging it as an actual matter. Two different things."

"I know."

"Then sit back down." She lowered her head, red pen back on the paper. "Until the paper's in your hand, you don't know any more today than you did yesterday."

She sat back down at her own desk. Spread across it was a statement of defense Li Huilan had passed over that morning—a wage dispute for three plasterers. Their side had filed suit on behalf of the workers; the labor contractor's defense statement said the money wasn't his responsibility, that the men had "worked under Lao Zhao." She pulled the cap off her pen, held it over the paper for a moment, but it didn't come down.

"Those four pages you submitted—how many copies did you make." He Xiufen asked from under the window.

"One. The branch office has that one; the original notes are with me."

"Keep the notes safe." He Xiufen said. "The copy that went into their file and the one in your hand—they'll need to match word for word someday."

She flipped the notebook to the November page. The header read November 1st. Below it were two lines added on the 4th. She added another: November 8th, 10 a.m., branch office called. Case filed. After writing it, she read it over once, then added one more line: Paper arrives this afternoon.

She turned past the following pages and pulled out the case acceptance receipt from November 1st, folded once in half. The corners had gone soft, the fold was fuzzed, and there was a fine layer of lint over the round stamp. She smoothed the paper flat, looked at it, folded it back the way it had been, and tucked it away.

"Seven days." Li Huilan said from her end of the table.

"Seven days." she said.

Her phone lit up beside her hand. A push notification. She picked it up, scrolled her contacts to Pang Chunlai's name, thumb resting over the call button without pressing. That name glowed on the screen. She looked at it, then turned the phone face down.

"Calling with good news this early," He Xiufen said from under the window, without raising her head, "would only keep him up at night."

She didn't answer. She pulled the defense statement back in front of her and started reading from page one.

Three dates in the defense statement didn't match the work-day records. One plastering job was listed as starting in March and finishing in May, but the work-day log ran into mid-June. She circled all three dates, copied them line by line onto a sticky note, and pressed it under Li Huilan's enamel mug.

At noon she went downstairs for noodles. He Xiufen asked if half a bowl was enough. She said it was. At 2:30 in the afternoon, she finished the intake registration for Li Huilan's legal aid case. The last box she filled in read "assignee pending." She set her pen down, glanced at the alley outside the window, then picked it back up.

At 3:05, footsteps came up the stairs—not light ones. They stopped at the door.

A man in a dark blue jacket stood half a step inside the doorway, holding a plastic folder. "Shen Zhixia?"

"That's me."

"Branch office." He opened the folder. "Here to deliver this." One sheet of paper and a small return receipt were handed over together. "Sign here, write the date."

On the receipt, the "server" column was already filled in. The "recipient" box was blank. She bent over the table by the door, signed her name, wrote November 8th, and then traced over the numbers once more. The man took the receipt back, glanced at it, and clamped it into the folder.

"Who's handling the case going forward?" He Xiufen asked from under the window.

"Our office." He nodded. "We'll be in touch." He turned and went downstairs, footsteps descending step by step.

The sheet of paper reached her hands first. The letterhead carried the branch office's name. Below it was a line for the case type, two lines of body text, and at the bottom a square seal—red, darkening toward maroon. Her eyes moved from the top down and stopped at "Regarding Shen Zhixia's complaint against Han Chongli for alleged perjury and other offenses." She froze there: her name and his name on the same line, separated by the word "complaint." She read the two names again.

The paper passed to He Xiufen, who read it aloud from the beginning. When she reached that line, her voice didn't change. When she finished, she turned the paper over. The back was blank, nothing printed. She laid the paper on the table and pressed her palm over it.

"It's filed." she said. Her hand stayed on the paper. "From here on, it's their work."

Li Huilan came over, bent down to read it through, and tapped a finger on "and other offenses." "That 'and other'—they're leaving room."

"Leaving room is standard." He Xiufen said.

"Getting them to say what's in it—that's the skill."

"Getting it out of them is their skill too." He Xiufen pulled her hand back. "Which charges are actually in there, they don't write on this paper."

"Or who they're going to question first." Li Huilan said.

"No." He Xiufen said. "Write too much and you're showing them where you're going. With this kind of paper, the thinner it is, the more by-the-book it is." She tilted her chin toward the stair landing. "Turn the machine on. Make two copies. Keep one here."

The photocopier sat on the low cabinet at the top of the stairs. It hummed as it warmed up. Li Huilan made two copies; the paper came out warm. He Xiufen took them, gave them a shake, and handed the original back to her. "That one goes in your notebook. Don't fold it."

She slid the original between the blank pages at the back of her notebook, right next to the case acceptance receipt. This was the second document she'd tucked in there this month.

He Xiufen folded one copy in half, slipped it into her apron pocket, and carried the other toward the inner office. The door was half open. She pushed it wider and went in. She was only in there a short while. When she came out, her hands were empty. She pulled the door back the way it had been, leaving that palm-width gap.

No sound came from the inner office. After a while, a chair scraped once on the floor, and then nothing.

She swallowed the question she'd been about to ask and bent back over the defense statement. At 5:30, Li Huilan packed up and left, closing one of the windows in the outer office on her way out. When she finished the last page, she looked up toward that half-open door. The light was still on inside. No one came out.

"They'll call you in again in the next few days." He Xiufen said, squaring the stack of materials on the desk. "To supplement your statement. They'll want to draw a diagram of who was standing where on February 24th."

"Everything I remember is in my notebook."

"Then bring the notebook." He Xiufen said. "Don't rely on memory."

At 7 p.m., the noodle shop was filling up.

She went downstairs. He Xiufen made her a bowl of noodles and brought it to the table near the back, two stalks of bok choy tucked along the rim. The plastic curtain at the door flapped in the wind. A delivery rider came in, helmet under his arm, and called toward the stove: "Auntie He, the usual, extra chili." He Xiufen called back: "Five minutes." The man went to wait by the door, jiggling his leg and checking orders on his phone.

He Xiufen didn't sit. She stood beside the table in her apron, reached into the apron pocket, and pulled out the other copy—folded, with a crease along one edge—and slid it under the vinegar cruet.

"Read it over yourself one more time."

She moved the cruet half an inch and pulled the paper out. This time she read slowly. At "decided to file the case for investigation," her eyes stopped. Below that: the date, the seal.

"Your father's case—in the indictment, it was one sentence." He Xiufen said. "Provided a falsified water sample test report. Obstructed testimony."

"One sentence."

"One sentence. We spent nine years taking it apart." He Xiufen nudged the cruet toward her. "This case is different. They'll have to investigate it item by item. Investigate one item, record one item. The ones that don't hold up—they don't write."

"I won't rush it."

"Don't you rush it." He Xiufen said. "Rushing never makes anything faster. It only makes a mess."

Someone at the next table called for more soup. He Xiufen answered, carried the pot over and topped them up, then came back and stood at this table again.

"Pang Chunlai—did you call him or not?"

"I didn't."

"Don't." He Xiufen said. "The man's living out in the village. When he hears 'case filed,' the first thing he'll think about is whether they'll come knocking at his door."

"What he'd want to know is whether those few sentences he said that day still count."

"Whether they count—that waits for a judgment."

"And if there's no judgment?"

"Then the court writes on paper that there's no judgment." He Xiufen wiped her hands on her apron. "Those four pages of yours—you've done everything you could. From here, you don't have that authority. They do."

She laid her chopsticks across the rim of the bowl and straightened the vinegar cruet. "I thought I'd be happier."

He Xiufen looked at her. "Happy about what?"

"I don't know."

"They haven't questioned anyone yet." He Xiufen said. "If you're happy today, then on the day they can't get anything out of him, you'll have to hurt all over again."

"How long did you wait the first time you filed a complaint for someone?"

"Over three months." He Xiufen said. "The day it got filed, I stood outside the courthouse not knowing what to do with myself."

"And then?"

"Then I came back and made noodles." He Xiufen slung her dishcloth over her shoulder. "Noodles still have to be eaten."

The rider by the door called out "Auntie He." He Xiufen carried two bowls over, took the money, and tossed it into the cash drawer.

She finished the noodles in her bowl but left half the soup. He Xiufen came to collect the bowl, glanced inside, and said nothing.

"Your bag's upstairs."

"Don't forget the light."

She went up. The small light in the hallway was still on. The outer office was dark. The door to the inner office was still open that half width, the light on inside. She walked to her desk to get her bag, and as she turned, she saw through the gap in the door the desk in the inner office.

Her copy of the case-filing notice—the one He Xiufen had made for the firm—lay spread on the desk, held down by a white porcelain teacup. The paper was back-side up, not a single character showing. The bottom of the cup had left a ring of damp on the paper. The edges were still wet, that wet ring a shade darker. Draped over the back of the chair was his coat.

She stood at the doorway, one hand resting on the doorframe.

She didn't go in.