Sitting drinking coffee in the morning Hot cup warming cold fingers. Taking a deep breath in letting the cares of yesterday still stay away. Mornings. The stillness before her day began was her favorite time of the day. The only time she could be just Chihiro. Not successful entrepreneur who launched a children's book series including merchandise, reading aids and now was in negotiations with a Hollywood studio to make a live action rendition of her most famous story. Nor was she the legal guardian of a small boy who was dealing with behavior/ developmental … issues... She was just Chihiro, an average woman in her late twenties who still remembered how much fun it was to wear dresses that twirled while running barefoot in the woods by her childhood home.
Taking one more sip of coffee, a habit she acquired while living in America, she left her cramped balcony and returned to the kitchen. A glance at the clock told her she had enough time to get a run in before she had to wake Aki up and get him ready for school.
Once out in the crisp outside she was once again thankful that she had found an apartment just a few blocks from a shinto shrine. She loved to run the loop around the Shine that was located near the bank of one of the local rivers. Tucking in her keys inside the mid-back pocket on her waistband of her running shorts, she took off at a brisk jog preparing her body for the full out run she would break into after her warm-up.
Her feet fall into their familiar rhythm. Her arms pumping as she increased her pace. By the time she made it to the river shore, her lungs were burning and she could not hide the smile on her face. She loved the feeling of strength in her powerful legs. She loved to run fast! At a familiar clearing by the river bank, she slowed down to a stop and started going through a series of shadow kick-boxing and dynamic stretches. Thanks to the endorphins pumping she felt so good. So alive. With one final perfectly executed roundhouse kick right block and left punch she defeat her shadow assailant. A joyful laugh escaped from her lips. If anyone else was around they would think she was crazy, but she didn't care. Right now in this moment everything was perfect.
A splash from the river below brought her back to present. Looking around, she saw no one...but she couldn't help feeling that someone was watching her. Shaking off the tingling sensation behind her neck, Chihiro returned to her run. Maybe a little faster than normal.
"Hey Aki," her hands played with his soft black hair. "Come on it's time to wake-up"
Groan… mumble and covers were pulled over his head.
"Come on Aki" now using a firmer voice. "You need to get up NOW or you will make us both late."
Rising off his bed, Chihiro made to move all the way towards the bedroom door. She looked back and saw that Aki had not yet made a move. Sighing, she returned, reached for his covers and with one strong swoop removed his blankets.
Aki groaned and moved into a tighter ball to stay warm.
Dropping the blankets by the door Chihiro glared at him. "You have until I am done with my shower to make it to the kitchen to eat and be ready to leave. "
Aki made no sign that he heard her, but Chihiro ignored his lack of response. This was becoming their morning ritual. She took it as a sign that Aki was becoming more comfortable around her. That he no longer tried to be the perfect little boy so that Chihiro wouldn't send him back into the system. Like Chihiro would ever do that. She loved Aki too much.
Washed, hair dried, simple streamlined soft knit navy dress with pink accent bows and light make-up on, she returned to the kitchen and saw Aki dressed in his uniform, almost falling asleep into his breakfast of cereal and fruit.
Hmmm… was Aki getting enough sleep at night? He was always sleepy and took a long time to wake up in the morning.. But this seemed more extreme than usual.
"Don't forget we have a meeting with Dr. Osaka after school today." Amber eyes gave Chihiro a familiar long suffering look.
"Hey mister if you keep looking at me like that you your face is going to stick like that!"
"Is not!"
"Is too!" she came around and tickled him on his sides. "Oh my gosh! Look it already happened!"
"Did not!" He squealed with laughter.
She grabbed his face once again in her hands in the guise to check it again.
"Did too!" she tickled him some more and his squeals grew louder. " Okay, okay let me see." She turned him again to face him, his beautiful smile taking over his whole face. He looked so happy and carefree like a normal ten year old boy. "Oh no it's too terrible to look at! You face your wonderful face! Ruined!"
She made a motion to continue her tickle assault.
"No! It's not Mom!"
Silence.
Aki realized what he had said and shamefully looked down back at his food. Eyes peered through his ridiculously long eyelashes and bangs trying to gauge Chihiro's response.
Externally Chihiro played it off like she hadn't heard Aki's mistake. Not knowing what to do she ignored it and instead began fussing with Aki to finish eating his breakfast.
This was something she would have to bring up with Dr, Osaka, the child psychologist they worked with, when they saw her later today. Chihiro didn't know what to do or how she felt about Aki calling her "Mom." Pouring herself another cup of coffee she leaned against the kitchen counter and watched as Aki began attacking his food with gusto. Sometimes he looked so much like Rei it hurt to look at him. He had her same golden amber eyes, triangular face, and thick black hair. He even pushed his lips together the same way Rei would when she trying to make sense of a complicated problem, usually in Rei's case it was a complicated algebraic and then later calculous equations.
Chihiro had only been Aki's legal guardian for the past year and a half. Frankly she didn't know what she was doing most of the time. But when she had returned to her hometown after her successful book launch and learned what had happened to her best friend's son, she couldn't sit by and do nothing. Do to Chihiro's growing fame and success, she had been able to hire the best lawyers, a small boutique law firm made up of a father and his two daughter lawyers who specialized in complicated juvenile legal matters to establish her as Aki's legal guardian and remove him from the foster care he had been in. She had wanted to adopt Aki at that time too, but due to complications regarding Aki's maternal grandmother, Mrs. Keiko Fujimoto, still having limited legal parenting rights, as well as a bunch of other legal mumbo jumbo, and wacky judge rulings….She had primary custody of Aki, while Mrs. Fujimoto had limited visitation and legal decision making authority. At the time, Chihiro had been so grateful to get Aki to live with her that she hadn't want to pursue full juvenile severance actions against Mrs. Fujimoto. Now, she wasn't sure that putting Aki in the middle of amother huge legal battle with high conflict was the best thing for him...
Shit. She just didn't know what to do. Whenever Aki called her "Mom" it was once again a reminder that Rei was dead and she and Mrs. Fujimoto shared legal parental authority of Aki. Mrs. Fujimoto freaked out the one and only time Aki had called Chihiro "Mom" in her presence...
So for right now she would ignore it and close her heart to cries of the little ten year old boy she loved who wanted nothing more than to be able to call the woman who took care of him "Mom".
Fuck. Sometimes she really hated herself.
The clock on the wall chimed breaking Chihiro out of her self- hatred.
"Come Aki, time to go grab your bag and put on your shoes, I will walk with you to school this morning."
Aki nodded. Grabbed another bite of fruit and ran from the table to finish gathering his school supplies.
And they were off.
Walking Aki to school was something Chihiro tried to do everyday. It was fun being with him and watch him take the world in. The fell into an easy pattern and she could tell that he was relaxed and comfortable near her.
"Hey Chihiro?"
"Hmm"
"Do you think dragons are all nice or are they evil?"
Raising an eyebrow, Chihiro glanced back down at Aki, he was making his squishy mouth face, so she knew that this was a serious question. "Well, I suppose that dragons are like people..." She started after contemplating what he was asking," you know, some are good and some are bad…. Some are a combination of good and bad. You will just have to be careful. Why do you ask?"
"Is Haku a good dragon?"
A smile graced her lips. She couldn't help herself. Haku was her creation. Maybe he had been her imaginary friend at one point in her life, but now he was a recurring character in her children's books. He was best friends with Sen. A little girl about Aki's age who traveled in the Spirit World having adventures. Haku was a small white river dragon, about the size of a house cat who would rest on Sen's shoulders. "Haku is well, a mischievous dragon who likes to play it cool, but deep down he is a good dragon. Why do you ask?"
"Oh, no reason…"
"Come on Aki, you can talk to me. I won't laugh."
"I had a dream last night and in it there was a huge black dragon."
"Were you scared?"
"No."
"Did the dragon speak?"
"No. Well maybe… He just looked at me. I got the feeling that he had been trying to find me." His concerned face made Chihiro know that his dream was still bothering him.
"Well, that makes sense to me." Chihiro ducked down, fixed Aki's wind ruffled hair. If only that motion could remove all lingering doubt and fears he still retained. Looking into his expressive amber eyes. She felt her mouth form the familiar smile it always took when she was looking at him. "You are a really cool kid. I searched for you too!"
The smile that beamed up at Chihiro made her heart skip a beat. In a rush Aki lean forward and gracelessly planted a sloppy kiss on her cheek. He whispered something and then raced off to join on of his friends who was calling for him at the school entrance.
Chihiro remained in her crouched position and continued to watch him walk with his friends. The faint echo of "I love you Mom." reverberated in her head and heart.
A soft knock on her office door broke Chihiro out of her mind funk. She had been mindlessly staring at her computer screen trying to read the same email for the past 30 minutes. She turned to face Dean, her assistant/ office manager/ right hand man. He stood at the doorway looking at her with a cheshire smile on his moon shaped face.
Chihiro felt her stomach drop when she registered his smile. It could only mean trouble.
"Your favorite person is here." his smug tone could not be ignored.
Chihiro groaned and dropped her head onto her keyboard. Shit. She did not want to have to deal with Ken right now.
Ken Watanabe, her middle-aged publisher turned agent with a paunch gut and thinning hair line, who in a previous life live in Pasadena, California as an agent for diva starlets, returned to Japan to run his family's established publishing firm to be her publisher. He was the real driving force behind a couple Hollywood studios bidding for film rights for her stories.
Chihiro was still on the fence about accepting any of the offers presented to her by several Hollywood studios and she knew that the sole purpose of Ken coming to see her today was to beat her down to accept one of the offers.
Dean's smile widen at Chihiro's obvious distress. "I placed him in the green room. I knew you wouldn't want him to bother you in here…. and I fixed you something special." Chihiro's eyes went from grateful to suspicion as she walked toward Dean and took the white ceramic mug from Ken's hands. Taking a hesitant sniff… was that…
Dean sent her a knowing smile. "Irish Coffee, oh, and there's hardly any coffee in that."
When the first sip reached her lips. Chihiro's toes curled with delight. "Dean, wow!" Taking another sip. "This is amazing! Just what I needed."
"Funny, that's what she said last night too."
"Dean!" screamed Chihiro in mock outrage and moved to hit him on his shoulder. Dean gave an unapologetic shrug as he went back to his desk. Smug smile still in place. After working for almost two years with Dean, she was used to his antics of dirty jokes and sexual innuendos. One day maybe she would stop leaving herself open to them. Chihiro blushed again as she realized how her that statement could be interpreted. Boys!
Returning to her desk to grab the two recent film right proposals, she went down the hall to the green room to meet with her publisher turned agent.
The meeting with Ken went longer than Chihiro had wanted. Neither offer felt right to her. Despite Ken telling her that her books turned to film could be the next Harry Potter series, she didn't quite believe it. Chihiro wasn't convinced that either studio could take her stories and create a beautiful film. She was realistic. Her stories were not epic master pieces, there was no deep character development nor ultimate battle between good and evil. All those things she felt were needed to make a Hollywood blockbuster.
Her stories were mainly sweet children's illustrations about a little girl about the age of Aki and her best friend a river spirit dragon who have adventures in the Spirit World. There was no villain to over through no battles to wage. Her stories focused on how magical and imaginative normal life could be. Now if someone else offered to buy the rights like Studio Ghibli, maybe she would reconsider...
As she left the green room finally leaving behind a very disgruntled Ken and unsigned contracts. She felt confident with her decision to not move forward selling her film rights.
Glancing at her watch she calculated that she would have just enough time to make it across town to meet with her attorneys.
"Chihiro, it's so nice to see you again! How are you?" A youthful girl still in high school greeted Chihiro with an infectious smile. Her school uniform was from one of the prep schools in the area. Her glossy brown hair was pulled back into a low pony tail.
"I am great Meg. How are you? How is your final year of Highschool?"
"I am wonderful. I got a scholarship to study in UC Irvine, Califonia! I am so excited! You studied there too right?"
"I did. You will love it! You will have a great time there. What are you planning on studying?"
"Well, dad wants me to study law." she made a face "But I got into the Henry Samueli school of engineering...I am thinking about focusing on environmental engineering."
"Meg! That's so amazing! Your dad must be so proud of you!"
"I am." came a voice from Mr. Takamatsu who was now standing in the hallway. He looked at his youngest daughter with great pride. Meg blushed, and a huge smile beamed on her face. Chihiro laughed good naturedly as Meg flashed her a sheepish grin before going back to working on the front office computer.
"Hello Ms. Origano. Please come this way."
Chihiro sent another smile to Meg and traveled with Mr. Takamatsu down the hall to his office. Jin Takamatsu was the founding member of the small boutique law firm that handled her legal guardianship of Aki.
After taking a seat on one of the comfy leather chairs placed a comfortable distance next to each other positioned in the bay window left of center in Mr. Takamatsu's office, Mr. Takamatsu came and sat in the other chair next to her. This was one of things Chihiro liked about this law firm. Mr. Takamatsu and two of his older daughters were the lawyers in the firm. His wife and youngest daughter would manage the front desk. They were unpretentious, excelled at their work and truly cared for their clients. Mr. Takamatsu and his daughters made a point to make sure that all clients felt comfortable. Neither he nor his daughters did the typical attorney thing and stay protected behind their large executive wooden desks and have clients meet with them sitting in smaller chairs across. No,they put their clients at ease and made sure that any perceived power imbalances were a minimum.
After the pleasantries, Mr. Takamatsu got down to business.
"As you know, Mrs. Fujimoto has requested another hearing to determine the best interest for Aki to try and change the status of your guardianship."
Chihiro felt her body turn cold. Hearing the words come from her lawyer's mouth made the situation more real and dire.
"I do not think she has a strong enough case….but If this does go to trial, are you willing tell the truth about Aki's parentage? Tell who his biological father was? The situation surrounding his conception?"
Chihiro ignored her lawyer's questions and instead asked her own. "Are Aki and I still supposed to see Mrs. Fujimoto this weekend? Do you think it is a good idea that I speak to her about this? Don't you think this could just be her retaliation for us not seeing her last month? Aki was sick, I just don't think that she believed me. "
Mr. Takamatsu took Chihiro's evasion in stride, he knew better than to push her regarding Aki's biological father, well, really anything to do with Rei Fujimoto, Aki's biological mother.
"I always recommend speaking if it can be done in a respectful and safe manner. And you are correct, this filing may just her way of retaliating against not being able to see her grandson." His steel grey eyes never wavered nor lost their intensity. Chihiro knew that he was letting her evade his questions now, but later he would demand an answer.
Chihiro felt her eyes break away from his thankful that he was not pushing her right now. She pressed her her lips together to kept her sarcastic thought to herself. She and Mrs. Keiko Fujimoto could keep a civil veneer around Aki and others…. But alone? That was the question.
"How can that woman still have legal rights to Aki after everything that she did? She gave him up and she was a horrible mother to Rei! Why can't I just adopt him and sever her completely out of his life?!"
Mr. Takamatsu said nothing, but kept his steady gaze on her with a slight softening around the eyes. He knew Chihiro needed to talk it out. They had been down this road before. Each time was still painful for her.
"Will it make a difference? I don't want Aki to know about his biological father. Not yet at least."
"Juvenile records are sealed and Aki will not be in the courtroom. Plus, I am not sure her case will even make it to trial. She is not alleging any substantial facts nor providing supporting evidence. The judge should deny her petition. But I need you to start to prepare yourself in case the petition is granted and the case moves toward trial. Our best argument to keep Aki out of Mrs. Fujimoto's control is to show what happened to her own daughter while she was under the care of Mrs. Fujimoto."
Chihiro stopped listening after that. Lost in her own memories.
"Chihiro."
Chihiro snapped back to present and flashed Mr. Takamatsu a sheepish grin. "Sorry. I am just think about a lot… "
"You do not have to make a decision today. If you can, talk to Mrs. Fujimoto this weekend and see what exactly she we can settle this case without any more court involvement."
Chihiro nodded
"Are you seeing Dr. Osaka soon?"
"Yes. We have a meeting with her today actually once Aki gets out of school."
"Please let her know about the recent court filing. Worse case scenario and we do have to prepare for trial, I will call her as an expert witness and have her file a report with the court."
Chihiro nodded. She couldn't help feeling that something really bad was going to happen.
The feeling of unease never quite left Chihiro.
Right now she was seating in Dr. Osaka office with Aki squirming in the seat next to her. Dr. Osaka was a child psychiatrist who focused on helping children who had come from difficult home lives. She was beautiful, elegant, older women with her white hair pulled back into sophisticated chignons, who wore beautiful handcrafted modern and feminine suits. Today she was wearing a rose pink tweed jacket and mid-length A-line skirt with a matching undershirt shell. Her outfit was accented with simple diamond teardrop earrings. Chihiro loved Dr. Osaka's style and hope to one day be able to emulate it.
Aki had been seeing Dr. Osaka since Chihiro had become Aki's legal guardian and they had made some major improvements. Dr. Osaka on other occasions had privately explained that Aki was going through a phase common to many foster children. At first they would act perfect so that they would not be sent away and then later they would test all boundaries to see if you would really love them and hold on to them. Also, Aki had been dealing with stress and uncertain for the majority of his life and no one really knew what had happened to him in his multiple foster homes.
About two weeks ago, Aki had gotten into another fight in school. This time though both boys had been especially vicious. By the time Chihiro had made it to the school, she was shocked to see Aki and Chad covered in blood and ripped-up uniforms. Miraculously neither was seriously injured. Both boys were deemed at fault, and by silent agreement between herself and Chad's parents, Chad was another resident troublemaker, they agreed not to press charges.
On my levels what Dr. Osaka had said made sense, but that did not explain the color change Aki's eyes would have and how almost animalistic he would become when he lost his self-control. For so such a sweet, cute kid, he could be a hellion at times. Some of his teachers would complain that he would constantly disrupt their classes. When Chihiro would talk to Aki about his behavior, Aki would just look away embarrassed and mumble something about how he could smell that the teacher didn't like him, or another excuse was how he didn't like the way another student would touch his stuff or something else like that. The latest fight had been because Chad had said something sexually derogative about Chihiro. Chihiro had raised her eyebrows when Aki had told he what the older boy had said. How did they learn about this type of stuff at such a young age? By Aki's squish face, Chihiro knew that Aki did not understand the full context of what was said, but he correctly inferred the intent.
Thank God for small blessings. She didn't want to have that type of detailed conversation with Aki just yet.
Instead, the day after the incident, Chihiro took Aki to her kickboxing gym ( another carry over from her time in America, she preferred the action of kickboxing to the traditional discipline traditional Japanese martial arts ) she set up several dummies and blocks and in the following two minutes proceeded to decimate all of her targets in a series of controlled kicks, strikes and punches. The look of pure adoration in Aki's face almost made Chihiro laugh out loud. She told him in a firm voice that she was the protector in their family that until he could do what she did, she would be the one to defend both of their honors. Aki had reverently agreed. Since then, he hadn't been in another fight in school. Granted that had only taken place two weeks ago. But she was holding out hope.
Dr. Osaka had raised an eyebrow when Chihiro had explained how she handled the latest of Aki's incidents. Chihiro was undeterred. Aki felt that he had to protect her, but she felt that she had to show him that she could could protect not only herself but him as well. Dr. Osaka chuckled lightly made notes in her patient chart and asked Chihiro to keep her updated with the progress her tactic took.
This afternoon's meeting was just a quick follow to see how Aki was doing in school and to get the results of the latest of some test Dr. Osaka had recommended trying to determine if Aki would benefit from medication. The test again came back with abnormalities; again. This was the third time. Chihiro was glad that Dr. Osaka was such a professional and running comprehensive blood/ hormonal panel before making her recommendations, but Chihiro wasn't sure she wanted Aki medicated and considering how long it was taking to get these results, she wondered if maybe it was a sign.
Her own experience with depression and anxiety medications, was that the medications had greatly helped her until she had begun using them too much.. She honestly felt that she had lost at least three years of her life because she had been trapped in an addictive cycle before she went to rehab and finally got her life back together. Those three years had been the years Aki had needed her most and through her inability to cope, she had been absent. It wasn't until five years later, after she had become a successful author, that she had been emotionally able to seek Aki out.
The guilt she still carried.
After making the appropriate responses to Dr. Osaka's questions, she and Aki left with another appoint in the near future to see if another comprehensive test panel would present readable results. Aki was disgruntled to have to submit to more needles but Chihiro was not paying attention. The feeling of eyes upon them filled her uncontrollable fear. She bundled Aki up against the chill in the air and grabbed him to go home. They still had to pack and leave for her parent's house tonight.
Looking over her shoulder, she was unsure if she saw the flickering of red eyes staring out them from the darkness outside.