CH 63

Initially, Gu Yan didn’t move. Yan Suizhi followed his gaze and looked at his own fingers.

“What are you looking at? Did I touch some dust?” His fingers curled, and he pulled his hand back. 

Hearing this, Gu Yan’s gaze jolted. He looked away, starting the car and turning it to autopilot mode. Whilst setting the destination, he said, “I was just looking at how long a hand needs to be to spend money so frivolously.”

Yan Suizhi, “…”

Even though Gu Yan didn’t stare at them because he had touched dust, Yan Suizhi still briefly rubbed his fingertips together. He took an antibacterial tissue from the cleaning box supplied in the car, leisurely wiping his fingers.

He always did this motion very absently, as if merely out of boredom, and was finding a little something to while the time away. 

He used to be this way too, back in the dean’s office. After finishing a load of work, he would push aside his photon computer and look out the window at the greenery, relaxing his eyes for a moment. Every now and then, he would lean back in his wide office chair, elegantly and slowly cleaning his fingers.

He didn’t know when this had turned into a habit.

Truth be told, many students who had unwittingly come across this scene thought that such a pose was very pleasing to the eye, giving the impression that the dean was clean, well-mannered, and refined.

Only Gu Yan had asked him, once. “Why do you keep wiping your fingers?”

At that time, Yan Suizhi hadn’t taken off the fatigue-relieving glasses he wore when reading electronic documents. His attractive eyes curved behind the clear lenses as he replied, “I got tired of reading, so I just use this as a distraction.”

And now, many years later, Gu Yan glanced at him through the rearview mirror. His brows creased minutely, then smoothed out again. “You…”

“Hm?” Yan Suizhi gave a start. He looked up and met his eyes in the rearview mirror, then folded the two sheets of antibacterial tissues he used, throwing them into the small disposal bin in the car.

“Mbgufa la. Pa’r cbatlcu.” 

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At the back of the car, Yan Suizhi’s smart device dinged. A small notification popped up, alerting him to the change in his asset card balance, quickly disappearing after.

Yan Suizhi looked over from the back. Perhaps the angle where he was seated was just right; the privacy screen setting on Gu Yan’s smart device didn’t work on him. The contents of the screen were clearly engraved into Yan Suizhi’s eyes.

The interface that Gu Yan had open was the internship manual. 

Yan Suizhi shifted his gaze to look at Gu Yan’s slightly turned profile. “Although this is a bit impolite, I still want to say that I accidentally saw your screen.”

“…”

Gu Yan’s finger stopped. His gaze raised marginally, but fell back down without looking over. That finger looked a little like it was hesitating whether or not to immediately close the interface.

“This guess might be a little vain,” Yan Suizhi contemplated before saying, “are you trying to find a plausible reason in the internship manual to save your… destitute teacher?” 

When the word ‘destitute’ came out, he involuntarily smiled, as if feeling a subtle sense of absurdity in using the word on himself, but not so much that he felt chagrined. It was as if he was watching an play irrelevant to him, and even found it quite amusing.

Gu Yan finally lifted his eyes.

He didn’t turn his head all the way over, only turning his face slightly. To be specific, his gaze was actually cast on the back of a seat, or perhaps on a corner of the window.

But Yan Suizhi could feel that his peripheral gaze was cast on him. 

He seemed to be deliberating how to answer Yan Suizhi’s question. Maybe, he wanted to throw a barbed comment, but due to some reason or other, hesitated.

Yan Suizhi was very familiar with this expression. Gu Yan was this way, too, many years ago back in school. It appeared frequently on this ice block, Student Gu, and every time the shameless Professor Yan saw it, he instinctively had the urge to tease him a litte.

So he immediately added, “Just like that previous workplace injury compensation of 10,000 xi? I went digging around after that in my spare time; my leg is probably only worth 6,000.”

“…” 

Once these words came out, Lawyer Gu didn’t hesitate to put away the hologram, as if reading one more word of the internship manual would blind him.

Seeing Gu Yan turn off the screen, Yan Suizhi instead gave a faint smile.

“If you really have nothing better to do, I suggest you reflect on yourself.” Gu Yan’s apathetic face was reflected on the rearview mirror. “At the rate you’re going, that measly balance isn’t enough for you to survive to see a tomorrow.”

“It’s fine, Ms Fizz said that the commission money for this case will arrive tomorrow.” Yan Suizhi remained very optimistic. 

Gu Yan, “…”

This ‘zero safety net, I’ll probably starve to death if the money mistakenly comes in a day late’ life philosophy really made him speechless.

Autopilot mode relied on its own sensory and navigation systems, unlike manual driving where it was necessary to check the road through the rearview mirror and the windows on both sides of the car. Under the heavy downpour, the windows were obscured by streaming rainwater, cocooning the space within the car from everything outside.

Evenings in this type of weather were always dark as night. From time to time, light from the outside shone on the window, swiftly streaking past. 

His chin resting on a hand, Yan Suizhi quietly looked out of the window. It was hard to discern from his expression whether he was simply daydreaming, thinking about Chen Zhang’s case, or simply watching the fuzzy flares of light in the dusk.

“Gu Yan.” After looking at the nightscape for a while, he suddenly spoke.

In front, Gu Yan was leaning back into his seat, resting his eyes. The back-to-back travelling in the past two days had given him little opportunity for rest. Perhaps due to the enclosed space, when set in the backdrop of rain quietly drumming outside the car, the silence inexplicably caused fatigue to diffuse. He didn’t open his eyes, only responding in a low voice. “Speak.”

“I’m actually very glad I entered Southcross Law Firm.” Yan Suizhi said gently. “Of course, there were many elements at play, whether by chance or by fate, that led me here.” 

Gu Yan seemed caught by the wisps of drowsiness, only making a sound of acknowledgement after a long time. But because it was overly short, it conversely sounded slightly skeptical of Yan Suizhi saying so.

“But I’m glad that I met you, not anyone else.” Yan Suizhi said. “Because you have a very soft heart…”

He gave a quiet laugh and, as if jokingly, said, “Even if it’s someone you don’t like or can’t tolerate, you can’t bear to see them in trouble and would always help where you can.”

This time, the person seated in front stayed silent for very long, so long that Yan Suizhi thought Gu Yan had already fallen asleep, until he spoke. His voice was low-pitched, doused in hazy tiredness. “That’s not quite right.”