Love Finds Its Time - Chapter 28

Usually, newcomers just entering this field are assigned to follow the lawyers at the firm and learn from them, while also using their time at the firm to review past case files. For beginners, these are invaluable lessons beyond what’s in the textbooks.

After straightening Fu Anran’s hair with a couple of quick remarks, Jian Yizhi raised her brows slightly and said, “From now on, you need to follow the rules and work properly. For the time being, you’ll follow me. When I go to court, you’ll sit in and observe. During the rest of your time, go to the archives and read through old cases. Any questions?”

“No problem.” Fu Anran nodded.

“Good. After you leave, turn right. Past the conference room is the archives. Go on.” Jian Yizhi smiled as she gave her instructions.

Following Jian Yizhi’s directions, Fu Anran smoothly found the archives. Inside, the shelves were filled with files from closed cases, each spine marked with a date. Tilting her head slightly, she let her fingertips brush over the dates, and began pulling out the oldest files, reading them one by one.

Meanwhile, on the first floor, the men and women had already begun whispering among themselves.

Chen Yi, refined in appearance but a gossip at heart, used a file to cover his face and exaggeratedly speculated in a low voice, “Hey, do you think Boss Jian might have had her heart stirred?”

Liu Yi glanced upstairs, then turned back, imitating Chen Yi’s tone. “This is the first time Boss Jian has personally taken on someone. That’s never happened before. And this girl wasn’t even on the interview list. It was Boss Jian who notified me separately.”

Meng Siqi rolled her eyes at the two and lowered her voice to add, “Are you two dumb? Don’t we all have experience here? That girl is clearly a newcomer. And I heard that during the interviews a few days ago, both Boss Wen and Boss Jian weren’t very satisfied. That girl also came to our firm’s third-anniversary party. I heard her call Boss Jian ‘senior’ back then. Obviously, they already know each other. What’s so strange about this?”

Perhaps because of what happened with Wen Qinghan, everyone had become overly jumpy, blowing a completely ordinary matter out of proportion, as if Jian Yizhi had secretly won someone’s heart and brought her in without a word.

After Meng Siqi’s explanation, everyone felt that made sense. After all, Jian Yizhi wasn’t like Wen Qinghan, who was so reserved. If there really were something going on, wouldn’t there be at least some trace of it?

“True.” Chen Yi nodded. Then, glancing upstairs again, he spotted Jian Yizhi walking out slowly with a cup of water. Clearing his throat, he quickly lowered his head and muttered, “Back to work, back to work. The boss is out.”

***

In the archives, Fu Anran spent the whole day reading through case files. When she grew tired, she stood by the window for a moment, gazing at the distant skyscrapers, her mind filled with the cases she had just read.

By the end of the day, she had seen quite a few cases handled by Jian Yizhi. Every time she came across one, even when she felt exhausted, she forced herself to stay alert and read it carefully.

Each trial transcript seemed to come alive before her eyes, recreating the scenes as if she were actually there. In that solemn courtroom, Jian Yizhi’s usual gentleness transformed—her every defense of the client was so persuasive and reassuring.

Knock, knock, knock.

The door to the archives resounded with a steady knock. Fu Anran looked up to see Jian Yizhi leaning against the doorframe, a ceramic cup in hand, smiling faintly at her.

“Senior…” Fu Anran stood up, but quickly realized she had used the wrong title, hastily correcting herself, “Lawyer Jian, what brings you here?”

Jian Yizhi stepped in, placed the cup on the table in front of Fu Anran, and patted her shoulder gently. “You can still call me ‘senior’ in private. No need to be so tense. The water’s for you. Carry on.”

Just moments ago, Jian Yizhi had been watching her from the doorway for quite a while. Fu Anran truly was diligent. During those few minutes, she never once looked up. When tired, she just rubbed her eyes and kept reading, finger tracing line by line through the dense transcripts with utmost focus.

“Thank you, senior.” Fu Anran smiled. Thinking Jian Yizhi had just come to fetch some documents, she didn’t say much more, sitting back down to continue reading. Before long, she lost track of time again, her eyes stinging so much she blinked several times, lifting her hand to rub them once more.

“Hey, don’t keep rubbing your eyes.”

Jian Yizhi’s voice came from directly in front of her. Looking up, Fu Anran saw her seated across the table, holding a file, her expression slightly serious, as though carried over from what she was reading.

“If you’re tired, rest for a bit. It’s almost time to clock out anyway.” Jian Yizhi leaned back in her chair with her legs crossed, playing idly with a fountain pen in her hand, her posture relaxed.

“Alright.” Fu Anran glanced at her watch, giving up the idea of continuing with the files.

The sunlight spilling in from the window was orange-yellow—the glow of the setting sun. It lacked the dazzling brightness of morning or noon, leaving only a warm radiance.

Fu Anran’s gaze fell on Jian Yizhi, bathed in that golden light. It was soft, never glaring—like it radiated from her herself.

She realized that today, Jian Yizhi hadn’t once called her by name. In fact, not even before. Though she didn’t take it as impolite, there had to be some reason behind it.

Holding the file with both hands, she hesitated, then said softly, “Senior, you can call me by my name from now on.”

Jian Yizhi nodded slightly, her eyes still on the file, clearing her throat as she gave a quiet, “Mm.”

She looked so focused it didn’t feel right to interrupt. Seeing this, Fu Anran reached for the cup Jian Yizhi had given her, planning to stand by the window for a moment to relax her eyes. She had just started to rise when Jian Yizhi’s voice drifted over. 

“So… Anran, after reading files all day, what’s your impression?” she asked casually while scanning a trial transcript from an earlier case, though it was the first time she had addressed Fu Anran by name, which felt a little unfamiliar to her.

Hearing this, Fu Anran sat back down. She did have questions. She just hadn’t decided whether to ask. Now that Jian Yizhi had brought it up, her desire to ask swelled inside her.

“Of course I do.”

“Oh?” Jian Yizhi’s curiosity was piqued. It was her first time mentoring someone, after all. She set aside the file and said, “Go on, what are your impressions?”

Fu Anran pulled out a file from last year among the ones she had read. 

Lowering her eyes to it, Jian Yizhi smiled. “This one’s from last year. A high school teacher molested several female students. One student pressed charges, three others testified in court. After the first trial, the defendant didn’t appeal. What about it?”

Fu Anran’s brows knitted, a rare expression of complex emotion crossing her face. Flipping open the trial transcript, she scanned it quickly once more, then said, “Cases like this are usually very hard to gather both witnesses and evidence for. From what I know, many victims are unwilling to testify in court. Sometimes, they even change their statements at the last moment. Because they’re in a passive position—they fear retaliation, and some fear for their reputations even more.”

Jian Yizhi nodded. “And then?”

“So…” Fu Anran took a deep breath, “How did you persuade those girls to stand up and testify for the plaintiff?”

Indeed, the lead attorney on this case back then had been Jian Yizhi.

Fu Anran had heard bits of it at the time, though she had since forgotten. But seeing the file today brought memories and questions rushing back, her curiosity reignited. Not about the verdict itself, but about how Jian Yizhi had convinced those girls in the first place.

Jian Yizhi pulled the file closer, flipping to the trial transcript. As her eyes traced each line, memories from back then surfaced vividly in her mind.

“The student who first came to me said she wasn’t the only victim. Later, I gradually learned of the other three. At first, they truly didn’t want to cooperate with me.” Jian Yizhi’s voice deepened, her brows furrowed, the smile she’d worn earlier giving way to tight lips. Instead of answering, she asked back, “If it were you, what would you do?”

Fu Anran looked at her and replied, “I would work on them one by one, persuading them to realize that while their silence may seem like keeping the peace, in truth it is a form of condoning. If those who do wrong are never punished, they will keep doing the same thing.”

A faint smile flickered in Jian Yizhi’s deep eyes. She set down the fountain pen and case file in her hand, lifted her right index finger and gave it a small wave, then stood and walked over to the window, pulling it open to gaze at the slowly setting sun.

“Your method is the one most people would choose. In fact, that’s what I first thought too. But I realized I was wrong. I worked from morning to night, yet in the end, I couldn’t convince a single person. The moment they saw me, they already knew what I had come for.”

“And then?” Fu Anran also stood up, unconsciously softening her tone and slowing her pace, as though afraid to disturb Jian Yizhi’s memories.

“And then?” Jian Yizhi let out a quiet laugh and turned her head. The sunlight gilded her long hair with a golden-orange hue, even dyeing her white shirt with a soft glow. One arm folded across her chest, she tapped the window lightly with her other hand as she recalled. “Many times, we stick to familiar ways of handling things. Like how I went about it back then, persuading them one by one. But in reality, words alone won’t always succeed. So I thought, I’ll place the consequences of their silence right in front of them.”

Sometimes people clearly know what the outcome will be, but as long as they haven’t seen it with their own eyes, they still cling to wishful thinking.

“What did you do?” Fu Anran stepped closer, staring at Jian Yizhi without blinking.

Jian Yizhi stopped tapping the window, her expression turning solemn, tinged with pity. Her slender fingers gripped the aluminum window frame, the breeze carrying her voice straight to Fu Anran’s ears. “I gathered all the girls I knew had been molested and seated them in the firm’s conference room, arranged in order by the time of their experiences, from the first to the last. Then I told them, ‘Starting from the second person, look at the girl sitting to your left. If she had chosen to stand up back then, today you wouldn’t be sitting here. Do you think staying silent is protecting yourselves? It’s not. It only helps the perpetrator hurt the next victim. He will use your silence to harm more students. If you still refuse to stand up this time, you can imagine the seats behind you filling with more and more girls in the future.’”

As Jian Yizhi repeated those words, her tone was grave, as though reliving the moment all over again.

“That was too harsh. Looking at the girl before them, they might have felt resentment in their hearts.” Fu Anran shook her head. Even knowing the case was long over, she couldn’t help feeling a trace of melancholy hearing Jian Yizhi’s account.

Jian Yizhi closed the window, crossed her arms, and nodded at Fu Anran. “I know. But it was the most direct and effective method. And once I saw them start to waver, I reassured them—it wasn’t their fault. The fault lay with the criminal who refused to repent. They were simply afraid by instinct. But by this point, if they still chose silence, that would mean watching with their own eyes as the number of victims grew, as more girls filled those seats behind them.”

At her words, the archives suddenly fell into silence.

After a long pause, Fu Anran said, “It’s an extreme approach, but there’s no denying it worked—and it gave you exactly the result you wanted.”

Jian Yizhi shrugged, brushed past Fu Anran, and returned to the desk where she had been sitting. Leaning forward slightly, she began tidying the open case file while saying, “So, when the usual methods fail to solve a problem, sometimes it’s worth taking an unconventional approach…” She paused, set the file upright, tapped it lightly on the desk, then straightened up to look at Fu Anran. “After all, the worst possible outcome is nothing new. But if you try another way, who knows—you might actually succeed.”

Rigid adherence to convention had never been her style. What her mentors had passed down to her was always centered on adaptability.

People change day by day—some mature, some grow old. How could a fixed way of thinking ever be the sole solution to a situation?

With a meaningful smile at her lips, she thought—when it came to taking unorthodox paths, Wen Qinghan was no worse than her.

Fu Anran first nodded thoughtfully, then smiled at Jian Yizhi’s words. Taking two steps closer, she bent forward slightly and said, “Thank you for your guidance today, Lawyer Jian. I look forward to learning from you in the future. I’ll work hard.”

For a moment, Jian Yizhi was stunned by her smile. Then she smiled back, turned with the file in hand, and faced Fu Anran. “You’re welcome. It’s almost time to leave. Go home and rest well.”

At the door of the archives, several people quickly pulled their heads back in, tiptoeing downstairs to pack up their things.

“Wow, so it was that intense back then,” Chen Yi muttered in a low voice, once again sharing his thoughts.

“Exactly. No wonder those girls came in looking so unwilling, but walked out with completely different expressions. Turns out Boss Jian fought that hard…” Shao Qing sighed as she zipped up her briefcase. That case had been a sensation at the time, and everyone at the firm had been eager to see whether Jian Yizhi could persuade those students.

“Come on, let’s go. We can talk more on WeChat later,” Meng Siqi said as she lifted her briefcase, calling everyone to head out together.

“Off work, off work—hey, wait for me…” Liu Yi called out, quickly packing up her own case and hurrying after the group.