• • •

            “Fine.” With that, her sister took her leave and left Regina with her memories and regrets which were numerous enough to fill the house. 

            The house phone rang loudly around the house and with it came far too many memories.  

            “I could meet with her later this week.”

            The water chilled her fingers as Regina washed her face. Her nightly routine completed with robotic efficiency. As she laid in bed and prayed for dreamless sleep, Regina turned fitfully on her left side. Her eyes were drawn immediately to the soiled emerald silk blouse hanging on the bathroom door. As sleep evaded her, she stared at it and no longer fought the memories that invaded her mind.

• • •

A small child stood in the middle of the yard staring at the empty sky. She seemed content to stay that way.            

As she approached, Regina spoke in a loud voice in order not to startle the child.               

“Günaydın.” Elif turned immediately and spotted Regina at the gate. She ran directly toward Regina and hugged her around the middle.                 

“Hoşgeldin!” She had never seen a child more excited to see another person in her life. A rather elderly lady approached them at a leisurely pace with a relieved expression.                              

“You must be Ms. Saint-Claire.” Her raspy voice bespoke of the singer she once was.                   

“I am. It is a pleasure to meet you, Mrs. Garfield. I thank you for making time to meet with me.” Elif had taken her hand and led her inside while the pair talked, but had since disappeared inside a room.                 

“Please sit.” Steaming tea with lemon cake was served. “I must say, I haven’t seen Elif this happy to see another person in a while. I was quite nervous when Mrs. Bacall said you were stopping by. Elif is quite a shy and special child. I worried not being familiar with you might make her uncomfortable.” Mrs. Garfield lifted the tea gently to her lips as she crossed her ankles.         

“I’m sure most children would be but I have heard that children are relieved when they hear their maternal tongue. It comforts them.” Elif appeared before them as quickly as she had left carrying a velvet sample of emerald fabric. She held it up to Regina as an offering with a smile and seemed to want to convey a message as she climbed into Regina’s lap.                 

“Well, it seems I should leave you two ladies to talk then. I’ll be outside in the garden if you need anything, Ms. Saint-Claire.” With that, Mrs. Garfield left with a kind and relieved smile.                 

Switching to Turkish, Regina set Elif down and faced her.                 

“This is a beautiful fabric Elif. Did you pick it out especially for me?” Elif looked at Regina’s shirt and tugged on it.                   “Why is it so soft?”                 

“It’s silk.”                 

“S—Silk. Is this silk,” Elif thrusted the velvet fabric into Regina’s face.                 

“No, it’s another special material called velvet. Silk is made from a special animal named silkworm. But my shirt and your fabric are the same color.” Elif twirled around the room holding the fabric close to her heart.                 

“My mommy’s a silkworm.”                 

“Why do you say that?” Regina was glad they had approached the topic of her mother. She worried about how to broach the topic of custody with a child who seemed fanciful.                 

“She makes things soft like silk.” Elif continued to twirl around the room as if dancing to a song only she could hear.                  “Do you know why you’re living with Mrs. Garfield and not your mommy,” asked Regina as she watched Elif stop and look to the ceiling. For a moment, Elif was silent and had a grave look on her face as if remembering something unpleasant.  

“Because… the colors wouldn’t stop singing and the numbers wouldn’t stop dancing.”                 

“Elif, do you remember how you got those bruises on your back?” Elif shook her head vigorously as she crushed the velvet in her hand.                 

“You know, I am a lawyer. And lawyers are really special people. Did you know that?” Regina whispered to Elif.                 

Elif responded with innocent enlarged eyes.                 

“We’re very special because everything we are told by others stays a secret. We can’t tell anyone. So if you tell me something, I can never ever, ever tell anyone.”                 

Elif responded by pointing to the books on the shelfs and answering, “that’s not so special, the letters can’t either.”                 

An hour later, Regina found Mrs. Garfield gathering roses in a wicker basket.                              

“Done already,” asked Mrs. Garfield as she turned away from her roses.                              

“Yes, Ma’am. I left Elif to a very interesting conversation with your vases. The debate is whether the books were speaking to the curtails about the butterflies on the ceiling.”                 

“Yes, she is rather an imaginative child…”                 

Regina interrupted, “I fear it’s more than that. I spoke to her for an hour and she didn’t seem to understand that she was being separated from her mother or that she had been abused at all.”                 

Mrs. Garfield hunched toward the wooden bench underneath the shade of an old oak tree. With a sigh, Mrs. Garfield sat down and placed the basket on the grass.                 

“I need to take her to a doctor, don’t I?”                

 “I think that would be best. Like this, I can’t imagine she could make her wishes known to anyone.”       

• • •

Schizophrenia in children was rare and hard to diagnose and yet, the psychiatrist had confirmed it a few weeks later. Elif would be put on a controlled medicinal treatment with regular appointments. In time, she became more functional and had been able to understand Regina’s role in all this. However, Elif continued to claim she didn’t understand why she could not go home with her mother.                   

Regina turned away from the green blouse and faced the ceiling. She closed her eyes and counted to ten while she focused on lowering her heart rate. When she opened her eyes once more, the memories kept coming. 

• • •                

“Elif, if you could choose anywhere to live, where would it be?” Regina believed it was the time to ask the question. She had a duty to Elif to convey her will to the court. She thought Elif had made enough progress to be able to answer the question. 

 “With my mommy.” Elif seemed to be able to hold eye contact.                 

“Does your mommy treat you well?” Elif didn’t seem to care for that description because she shrugged her shoulders and replied, “Mr. 5 and Mrs. 71 need me to take care of them and they live with mommy so I need to go live with mommy too.”                 

Regina grew worried, maybe the medication wasn’t working as well as she hoped.                 

“Do you still hear them often?”                 

“No, the food that tastes funny made them quiet but I know they’re there. I need to take care of them.” Elif seemed adamant about this point.                 

Regina needed to take a different approach. She needed to understand where Elif felt the most comfortable and where she wanted to live. “Elif, if I could bring Mr. 5 and Mrs. 71 to you, would you still want to live only with your mommy?”                  This seemed to stop Elif for a moment. With a scrunched face, very reminiscent of Churchill, Elif sat in thought.                 

“No. I want to live with anneanne.”                 

“Your grandmother? You want to live with your grandmother?”                 

Elif nodded enthusiastically, clapping her hands arrhythmically.                 

“She has many friends. More than I do.” Elif stared at the large old oak.                 

Regina finally understood. “Your grandmother is special like you. She can talk to numbers and dance with colors, can’t she?”  

Elif jumped from her chair and twirled around in the air with the freedom that finally someone had understood her.                 

“Elif, Elif, can you listen to me for a moment, please? I need to ask you something.” Elif stopped for a moment, only to turn suspiciously toward Regina. “Your grandmother is very far away from here. And if you couldn’t live with your grandmother and I could bring Mr. 5 and Mrs. 71 to you, would you like to stay here?”                 

Elif seemed to sense something she couldn’t name. For a moment she remained silent and stared at the old oak tree. Regina feared after a few moments of silence that she had pushed Elif too far.                 

“I guess it would be alright if I stayed here. Mrs. Garfield is very nice but she doesn’t know my friends like anneanne.” 

“I know she doesn’t, but it wouldn’t be so bad if you stayed here, right? You wouldn’t be sad or angry, would you?” Regina bit her lip anxiously as awaited a verdict.                 

“No, I wouldn’t be angry,” Elif answered sadly.                                

• • •

At the final court hearing deciding Elif’s primary custody, Judge Harman blatantly asked her client’s expressed preference.   

Regina paused.                 

Her fingers went immediately to the silver ring on her left hand and began twisting it. Regina recalled the pictures of Elif’s back when she had first been removed from her mother’s care, but Regina also couldn’t ignore Elif’s words ringing in her head and the more shameful thought prevalent in Regina’s mind.                   

But what is the point of me being here if not to protect Elif? If I choose to repeat what she told me, I would be sentencing her to a mother who believes you can beat the illness out of a child, she thought.                 

And yet, the more dominant thought came to the surface. If I did, I wouldn’t be doing it to serve my client’s right to choose, I would be doing it to avoid discipline.                 

“Councilor,” the judge interrupted Regina’s internal monologue.                 

“Elif wants to stay with Mrs. Garfield.” Regina chose the option she could live with, but that didn’t stop the knots forming in her stomach.                      

• • •

“May I help you,” inquired the administrator in a bored tone bringing Regina back to the present.                   

“Yes, I would like to know the room number of a patient. Elif Demir.” Regina turned the flat ring around her finger as she awaited an answer.                 

“Are you family?”                 

“No, I’m her attorney.” The administrator’s gaze flitted toward Regina with a new rigor.                 

“Of course, Room 314. Please go ahead.” With an acknowledging nod, Regina continued down the hall with the only sound being her heeled boots clicking along the cheap vinyl hospital floor. Eventually, the hallway morphed from the ascetic white walls to watercolors and fingerpainting, announcing her arrival to the children’s ward.                              

She finally arrived to the closed door of room 314. While she reached for it, her hands shook. This would be the first time she saw Elif this way. From the moment the ambulance pulled away, she hadn’t visited. Regina simply imagined her in Mrs. Garfield’s garden, playing and dancing. It was easier to keep the knot in her chest contained that way.                 

As she turned the knob, the first thing Regina noticed was the smell. Elif wouldn’t like the smell. Elif loved flowers and mud. Regina stepped closer toward the bed as she laid the different fabric samples on the bedside table all in the same emerald shade. For a moment, she couldn’t stop staring at the child before her, this couldn’t be Elif. Elif was always dancing and singing and moving, but the child before Regina was still.                 

“They needed to shave her head to make the cut to relieve some of the pressure in her brain. She always had beautiful hair.”   

The Turkish brogue stopped Regina’s heart as the room suddenly became too small and too cold at the same time. Elif’s mother came toward the other side of the bed to lay her hand lovingly on her only daughter’s face.                 

“Mrs. Demir…” Regina began.                 

“Ms. Saint-Claire, is it?” Mrs. Demir interrupted her.                 

“Yes.” Every fiber in Regina’s body begged her to get out of there. The tell-tale sign of a panic attack quickly approaching appeared in waves as her hands became clammy and her heart began racing. Sweat made her dark wavy hair stick to the nape of her neck.                 

“I love Elif and I did the best I could dealing with her illness,” Mrs. Demir’s forest green eyes roved over Regina’s face as if searching for something in her.                 

“Do you have any children?” Mrs. Demir continued as she stroked Elif’s hand.                

 “No, I do not.”                 

Mrs. Demir nodded as if she sympathized with Regina’s situation.                 

“I hope you one day do. They are a gift. I pray you are granted a child.”                 

“Thank you…”                 

Mrs. Demir continued without hearing Regina. “And I hope someone takes her from you. I hope you rally your strength and fight harder for her than you fought for Elif and I hope they still take her away from you. I pray you watch as a stranger takes your child and tries to explain to you how she will be a better parent to her than you — who carried her in your body and dreamt about her for so long — could ever be. If God is fair, you will have no voice to answer them.” Mrs. Demir’s curse rang in the room as Regina stood there with her lower lip trembling.                 

“On that day, I believe then you will have the right to enter this room and look remorseful for lying to the judge about what my Elif wanted. Because I know in my heart, my Elif wanted to return to me. But until that day comes, you may not enter this room nor address me.” With that dismissal, Regina turned rapidly and left. She could hear the blood ringing in her ears as she became disoriented, turning and spinning in the road outside.                              

Horns and bright lights flashed before her startling her back onto the side walk.    

         • • •               

The moment she arrived home she couldn’t breathe evenly anymore. She ran toward the bathroom and bent over the cold marble vanity. She took deep breaths but nothing calmed her heart. When she finally looked up, Regina faced the mirror and she could no longer contain the overwhelmingly suffocating sorrow. The face in the mirror began to blur as she slid to the floor and cried.   

• • •

Regina had arrived a few minutes ago to deliver the goods news to Mrs. Garfield and Elif. And yet, Elif had remained silent for most of the exchange.                 

“When will I be able to see anneanne or mommy again if I live here?”                 

“One day in the future…”                 

Elif interrupted Regina, “But when in the future specifically?” Elif’s vocabulary had increased exponentially now that she had regularly taken her medication and attended school. It seemed she had an aptitude for learning.                 

“When you get better and you take all your medication, then you can visit them.” Regina answered compromisingly. Elif silently acknowledged Regina’s answer and moved toward the bathroom.                 

“She’s taken the news rather well. I had hoped she would be a little more excited but it’s only to be expected, dear. She misses her people and we all need a people,” explained Mrs. Garfield as she took Regina’s hand in her own. Regina could feel the soft wrinkles and squeezed her hand in return as she turned toward the bathroom door.                 

“I hope I did the right thing for her…” A large thud reached their ears as a glass shattered soon after.                 

“Elif, Elif!” Regina ran to the door and opened it. She stood stunned as Elif convulsed in a puddle of her own vomit and blood. 

“Oh, Elif. What did you do? Oh.” Mrs. Garfield stooped down to Elif.                 

“We…We need to turn her on her side so she doesn’t choke on her own vomit.” Regina was separated from her feelings in that moment. While she held Elif as vomit spewed onto her emerald green blouse she had worn for Elif and kept pressure on Elif’s head wound, Regina’s heart remained in the doorway observing the ten-year old girl clutching her now empty medicine bottle while she convulsed.                 

Elif had taken all her medication.                   

• • •

Regina could not pin point at what moment Ben had arrived and carried her to the couch in the office, but he had. He sat there next to her as she cried and now sat silently staring at nothing but the fire burning in the chimney.                  

“I don’t know what it is about this profession that attracts people like us. People reaching for perfection and yet unable to obtain it. We want the best for our clients and we try our best efforts for them and yet sometimes, it’s not enough. We’re not enough.” Ben talked while Regina refused to utter a word.                 

“You know I come from a long line of lawyers. My grandfather specifically he’s infamous on some of the ethical rules he broke. I would go so far as to say the model rules included a few rules because of him. I idolized him when I was a child and that led me in my earlier years to display that same disrespect toward the ethics board. In the end, I was never disbarred. I think I have my mother to thank for that.” Ben seemed to just want to talk, never expecting Regina to contribute to the conversation. His large pale hands ran through his silken raven hair as he blew out a sigh.                  

“In my earlier years, I would have never assumed or even thought I would end up before any disciplinary committee defending someone other than myself. But that’s life, I guess.” Ben snorted in his deep masculine voice.                 

They stayed in silence for a bit while he used the large metal edge of a poker to stoke the fire.                  

Regina’s voice was low and harsh from the screaming. “I broke the cardinal rule of ethics. I ignored my client’s wishes and substituted my own judgement.” She took a deep breath.                 

“I could have had a guardian ad litem appointed. I could have told the judge the whole truth.” Regina looked Ben in the eye for the first time.                 

He nodded to her and said the one thing she wanted to hear, “You f**ked up.”                 

She nodded back to him while staring him in the eye while he stared right back at her.                 

“But now, it’s over so accept it. Because right now, you need you. You have a disciplinary hearing in a little over a month and you and I need to convince them you did what’s best for her and what she wanted you to do.”                              

“I don’t deserve…” interrupted Regina.                 

“Kicking the shit out of yourself won’t change anything.”                 

“So, I should stop punishing myself, because what? I should just accept that things are the way they are. So no matter what I decided, she was destined to either be beaten or lie in a coma!” Regina’s voice wavered as she paused to bite her lip and swallow.                  

“You want to know the real f**ked up thing in all this. Either choice was for me. If I chose to tell the judge, it would be to avoid this and if I chose to help her, it was so I could sleep at night. And she’s the one paying the price either way.”                      

“The very fact that the kid misunderstood you and drank the whole bottle of pills, lets you know Elif couldn’t make these important decisions. You had to. More importantly, will getting disbarred or publicly reprimanded change anything that happened,” asked Ben, taking hold of her chin.                 

She shook her head no as her eyes watered.                 

“I need you to say it.”                 

“No.”                 

“Will it lessen your guilt in any way,” he continued to hold her chin forcing her to admit to him and to herself the truth.   

“No,” she answered as she stared into his deep brown eyes with tears running.                 

“Then stop drowning yourself in it.”     

 • • •

In a little over a month, Regina had made some progress in therapy. She still didn’t feel completely comfortable with Dr. Greyson, but she couldn’t deny it helped.                 

What helped more was Ben. He seemed to understand the damage the guilt had done better than anyone. She had a feeling he understood her for a reason but she knew he would share his own experiences with her when he was ready.                        

Ben seemed at ease as he silently greeted her with a nod toward her shirt. She responded with a tug to the green fabric.   

Her phone rang as they walked up the steps and halted her ascent when she realized who it was. Ben turned toward her with a cocked eyebrow.                              

“It’s the hospital.”                              

He looked at her expectantly.                 

As the low drawl of the caller filled the quiet hallway, Regina’s knees hit the cold floor. Elif had passed away in the night. Yet, Ben didn’t let go of Regina’s hand.