Chapter 486: The Water Isn't Good

December 1. Business as usual at the firm.

She arrived at 8:40. The second-floor door was already open. Li Huilan sat at the desk near the back, several pages spread out, reading while tapping the tip of her pen beneath lines. The inner office light was on, the door pulled shut with only a crack open.

She pushed a window open a sliver. The old wooden chair beneath it sat empty, a pair of blue cloth sleeve covers draped across the seat—He Xiufen had taken them off before starting the stove that morning.

"Perfect timing." Li Huilan slid the papers half a foot toward her. "Read through this for me."

An arbitration award. Two pages of the original, with the proof of service attached behind. She sat down and read from the top.

A day laborer had worked for a foreman on a renovation crew in Chengnan—scraping putty, knocking down walls, hauling materials upstairs—for over half a year. The pay kept getting delayed, until he was too embarrassed to ask again. Li Huilan had written the application for him. Case filed in early November, and the foreman never showed on hearing day.

"How much was upheld?" She flipped to the operative provisions.

"Seven thousand four." Li Huilan said. "The overtime at night got denied. He didn't even have one slip of paper—who assigned the work, what hours, all just talk."

She read that line twice: 7,400 yuan. She checked the name, address, respondent, one by one against the parties' column up top. The date under the seal sat beneath the stamp, the red slightly faded in one spot. Then she looked at the proof of service: signed for on November 28.

"He went to sign for it himself?"

"I told him to." Li Huilan said. "The clerk put the paper in his hand, he signed, dated it that day."

"Counting from the 28th, if he's dissatisfied he can sue—fifteen days."

"And the foreman?"

"The foreman can't sue over this." She flipped the paper back over. "For a small claim like this, it's final at first arbitration against him. He can only go to the Intermediate Court with an application for annulment, and only on those specific grounds. Most likely he won't bother. If he does, it's just one more layer of paper."

Li Huilan took the document back and gave it a shake. "In my years at Chongzheng, this was what I dreaded most. The paper reads perfectly clean, but in a person's hands it's still empty."

"The money's a separate matter."

"Lao Kan's case—the award came in January. I didn't see him get the first payment until July."

At eleven, the day laborer came upstairs. Gray dust streaked his old jacket in lines, dried putty caked in his fingernail beds. He scraped his soles twice at the door before coming in.

"Lawyer Li." He spotted the paper on the desk, walked over, wiped his hands on his pant legs before picking it up.

He couldn't read it. He held it sideways, then turned it upright.

"Lawyer Shen, read me one line. What's this one say?"

"This line says he has to pay you by the date printed on this paper." She said. "Seven thousand four."

He leaned back, smiled, then caught himself. "What if he doesn't?"

"If he doesn't, come back to the firm." She said. "We'll draft an application and go to the court for enforcement. Money in his account, they'll transfer it. No savings, they check vehicles and property. If nothing turns up, the court puts him on a list—no high-speed rail, no loans."

"He can't ride the train, but I get my money?"

"Not necessarily." She said. "But if you don't go after it, you definitely won't."

He folded the paper in half, then again—crooked. He unfolded it and refolded, this time perfectly square, and clutched it in his hand.

"So this paper's mine to keep now?"

"Keep it." Li Huilan said. "Don't shove it under your e-scooter seat. Don't stick it in a pocket and wash it."

"I'll take a photo and send it to my wife." He pulled out his phone. "She's back in our hometown, doesn't believe I can get anything out of this."

"Send it." She said. "Just don't send it to the group chat."

He took the photo but stayed standing, like he still had something to say.

"Lawyer Shen." He asked suddenly. "Think he'll throw the money in my face?"

"No." She said. "He didn't even show up to the hearing. He can't throw anything."

He laughed once, then asked: "What do I do for the next two weeks?"

"Work." She said. "Find a new foreman. And starting today, keep your own notebook: what day you worked, who assigned it, what hours, the daily rate. Write line by line, by hand. Don't keep it on your phone."

"What for?"

"Next time, you'll have paper in your hands."

He nodded, stuffed the document into his jacket's inner pocket, pressed a hand over his chest once, then went downstairs.

She flipped the desk calendar to December, stopped at the square for the 1st, pulled the pen cap off and clicked it back on.

At three in the afternoon, she opened the metal cabinet to get case jackets. The kraft paper bundle on the top shelf was still there, perfectly square—He Xiufen's copy of the judgment. She drew her hand back from the cabinet door, pulled out the jackets, and closed it.

December 2, noon. She went downstairs for noodles.

The dining room was packed. The line at the door curved out into the alley. She stood by the counter waiting. He Xiufen stood at the stove, spatula moving steadily, the exhaust fan loud enough that you had to raise your voice to talk.

"Sit first." He Xiufen said without turning around. "That table in back's open."

The table in back stood against the wall. On it sat the empty vinegar cruet, a corner of paper sticking out from beneath its base.

She sat for over ten minutes, and the crowd thinned. He Xiufen brought a bowl over, broth steaming, scallions resting unsprinkled in the spoon.

"Director He, sit."

He Xiufen sat across from her, smoothed her apron hem over her knees, wiped both hands on the apron, then reached into a pocket and pulled out a page. It had been folded several times, the creases sharp, the edges worn soft with fuzz.

"Page three." She set it on the table and pushed it across. "Didn't read it in court."

She picked the paper up but didn't open it right away. On the small exposed area there was a faint brownish dot, like a drop of soy sauce fallen from someone's chopsticks—oil soaked into the paper, bleeding out in a ring.

"That thing I said in October—you remember."

"I remember. You said you'd give it to me on whatever day you chose."

"I was going to give it on the 30th." He Xiufen pressed her hands onto her knees. "On the 30th I sat on the defense bench with an empty spot in my chest. Only after it was over did I remember it was in my pocket."

"So why today?"

"You didn't come down for noodles all afternoon yesterday." He Xiufen said. "I thought it over. Waited one more day."

She unfolded the paper and pressed it flat on the tabletop.

The handwriting was He Xiufen's—bold strokes, horizontal lines stretched wide, tight line spacing, and the characters shrinking as they went. In the upper right corner, written fine and small with a thin pen: "This page is not evidence."

The first line below: "Shen Qian ate noodles at my table for three years."

"He ate fast, never left when he finished, just sat watching me clear the tables."

"I asked him, how is it up the mountain."

"He said: The water isn't good."

"Just that one line. Whatever I asked, same answer."

"Only later did I learn that every visit, he had to transfer buses twice."

"I've sold noodles in Jiangzhou for over twenty years. I've never been to Baixi Village. I've never had a sip of that well water."

"That winter he came less often, and thinner each time."

A blank line below, then the last line, lighter than the rest above:

"Back then I thought he was grieving on someone else's behalf."

Her eyes stopped on the line "The water isn't good," moved down half a line, then came back to it.

Someone inside called for the bill. He Xiufen didn't move.

"Reading up to there, I'd have to stop." She said. "Stop in court for a moment, everyone looks at me. If my voice cracked, the rest of it would've been wasted."

"Is there more?"

"There is." He Xiufen nudged the vinegar cruet inward, letting it pin down the other end of the paper. "This page is what I heard with my own ears. To say something in court that no one else ever heard, someone has to be willing to stand up and vouch for it. No one to vouch, and one line—'the defense counsel's own words'—knocks it right back."

"So you held onto it for a month."

"Held it a month, thought about it a month." He Xiufen said. "Your father, all his life, the one thing he couldn't bear was having other people speak for him. I wrote this page for him, and after writing it, it didn't look right. Let it sit. Sat for a month, still doesn't look right. But it can't be changed anymore—change it again and it's not him."

"Then why give it to me."

"This isn't for him." He Xiufen said. "It's for you. What he looked like coming down from that mountain all those years—you were in school then, he never told you a word. What's on this page is the way he looked sitting at this table. That's something you don't have a single piece of."

She pulled the paper back half an inch, then stopped.

"Director He, when did you decide to write this page?"

"When I was drafting the third section in October, I knew—finish writing it and don't read it aloud, someone would ask what it was for." He Xiufen said. "I had the answer in my heart: I wanted to keep one line of what he looked like sitting here."

She spread her palm flat on the table, fingers loosening one by one.

"In nine years, I never once pressed him on it." She said. "Every time he said the water wasn't good, I brought him a bowl of noodles. Three years of noodles, and I never asked—what's not good about it."

She raised her eyes. "Asking wouldn't have stopped him. But in these nine years, I need to have at least one line that I really thought about."

The water on the stove came to a boil, white steam surging up beneath the exhaust fan.

"This page—what happens to it now?" She asked.

"You keep it." He Xiufen stood, pulling her sleeves down. "From now on, if anyone asks me what kind of man Shen Qian was, I won't have to think. I'll read them this page."

She folded the page back along its creases, the folds landing exactly.

"Don't read it out loud here." He Xiufen picked up the empty bowl and started toward the stove. "The noodles'll go gummy if they get cold."

She tucked the page into the innermost compartment of her bag, pressed it flat against the bottom, and zipped it shut.

December 3, 5 p.m. The sky was already dark.

One lamp burned in the outer office on the second floor. Li Huilan was cleaning up her desk, stacking case files into her bag, the zipper taking two tries to close.

"Zhixia." She asked. "Ten days—until what date?"

"The 10th."

Li Huilan turned and looked at her. "Today's the 3rd."

"Yeah."

"I had a case at Chongzheng where, on the afternoon of the final day of the period, the other side filed their notice of appeal with the postmark pressed onto the last day." She said. "We waited another thirty days, and got a ruling back—remanded for retrial."

She slung the bag strap over her shoulder. "I'm not rushing you. I'm saying, don't spend these ten days just staring at it."

The inner office door stood half open. The light inside, and the voice inside.

"Midnight on the 10th."

She raised her head, looking at that half-open door.

"I know." She said.

"After midnight, no matter who files, the court won't accept it." He said. His voice wasn't loud—like he was talking to the desk.

Li Huilan stopped at her desk, her gaze traveling once between that half-open door and her, and asked nothing.

"I'll head out first." Li Huilan said. "Locking up's on you two."

"Sure."

Footsteps descended the stairs. Downstairs someone greeted He Xiufen; the door opened and shut once.

She packed her things into her bag. That page still pressed against the bottom. At the door, she paused and said, "I'll take the door."

"Alright." The voice answered from inside.

Seven stops by bus. The heat ran high inside, fogging the windows. She drew a line through the mist with her finger. The streetlights outside passed by, row after row.

Nineteen fifty, she walked through her door. Zhi'an was doing homework in the inner room, the door left a crack open, lamplight spilling through.

She washed her hands, brought her bag to the desk, and from the innermost compartment took out that page, unfolded it, and pressed it flat beneath the desk lamp.

She read it once. Her voice low, meant only for this room.

At "He said: The water isn't good," she paused. No one in the room picked up the line. The kettle in the kitchen clicked once, then fell silent.

When she finished, she folded the paper back the way it had been and stood, walking to the stack of notebooks at the corner of the desk.

Nine volumes, stacked. The first still wrapped in those two sheets of old newspaper. She counted down from the top to Volume Eight, pulled it out, and flipped to March 22.

She'd read this page many times: a date at the top, the first word "pump house," below it "that night," then a question and answer, and the last line—she could recite it with her eyes closed.

She turned the page over to its back. The back was blank, not a single character.

She slid the paper in along the page root, all the way down. He Xiufen's manuscript paper ran slightly longer than the notebook's trimmed pages. Close the notebook, and a sliver of paper edge would show.

She flipped back to look: the left side was blank; the right side held He Xiufen's writing, the first line "Shen Qian ate noodles at my table for three years."

Turn back one page, and there was her father's page: "Pump house. Watchman. One man. Never asked his name."

She looked at the two sides for a while, her hand resting on the paper edge—not pressing down.

"Sis, still up?" Zhi'an asked from the inner room.

"Going to bed."

She closed Volume Eight, set it back on the stack, the edge of the paper showing between two pages—a thin line of white. She pressed her palm on it; it wouldn't go in, so she let it show.

She turned the desk lamp to its lowest setting. That line of white still there. She reached out and switched the light off.