Thread Roulette: James and Cobalt

[Event !]

In need of some legal advice.

[Dr. James Campbell]

This had gone on long enough.

It had started rather simply, when James had received a call that summer when they were down in New York, visiting his parents. Apparently, he hadn't properly informed the social worker on Niko's case that the boy would be missing his scheduled appointment because of a family vacation. Except James had sent an email two weeks ahead of time, received a confirmation that it was okay, and had reminded her the week earlier.

Then the checks from social services stopped coming. It wasn't a problem financially; they could easily support themselves and Nikki without it. But they had to note it on their taxes, and it bothered James that it was late. After a series of phone calls, trying to make sure that it didn't sound like they only were interested in the money--because they weren't--it was fixed.

But the last straw was when he'd been on the phone, trying to explain the problems to the social worker's superior, and she'd refused to refer to Chase as anything other than "Mr. Kilbourne" or "your boyfriend." James had grit his teeth and managed not to rant, though it had taken some effort. After taking a deep breath, he'd said, "Mr. Kilbourne and I are legally married, and have been so for a year. If you must, refer to him as my partner, but he is my husband and not my boyfriend."

Semantics? Yes. But it was important.

And now the check was late again.

So James had taken advantage of his day off to get some advice. The Blue and Gold offices weren't large, but they looked nice enough, and after all, they'd come with a recommendation from Sean. (So he had ranted after all, just during his weekly session with the psychiatrist.) The only one in the room was a man, probably a few years older than him, but not much. "Hello, I assume you're Mr. Weaver? Your assistant scheduled an appointment for me. I'm Dr. James Campbell."

[Cobalt Weaver]

Cobalt wasn’t used to having the whole office to himself anymore.

Which was a little ridiculous, as he’d only hired Leila about a year and a half ago, or something like that, and he’d spent more years working alone than with a partner. But still. The office was quieter when Leila was out on some fieldwork. Or something. He wasn’t really paying when she told him her plans yesterday (his mind had been a little scattered of late). Somehow, she always seemed to find something to do. So he’d made his coffee, settled down with a bagel, poked at their bills (which somehow managed to get paid. How, he’d never quite figure), and prepared for a slow, quiet day. Which was probably what his brain needed after all the stress he’d ran into lately.

However, the universe seemed to have other plans for him.

Which wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. Cobalt hadn’t had a case basically since he’d moved to Pilot Ridge, and although there was enough dramatics and yelling to fill twelve courtrooms, there was something soothing about actually doing the job he spent the better part of his life learning how to do. So when the younger man came into his office, he set aside his coffee cup and surreptitiously glanced at the yellow post-it note in Leila’s hand reading James Campbell, 11:00, be nice. –L. He wanted to roll his eyes at her admonishment to be nice, or snicker at how she would react to being Cobalt’s assistant, but he didn’t. Instead, he put on what Leila liked to call his “Professional Face” and stood up to shake Dr. Campbell’s hand.

“Dr. Campbell. Yes, I’m Cobalt Weaver, it’s nice to meet you.” He folded his hands on the desk. “What can I do for you today?” Dr. Campbell. He’d be surprised if the other man didn’t work for Hammel. Everyone he met lately worked for Hammel. Probably heard about him through Sean or the other staff members he’d met before. Which was nice of them, all things considered.

[Dr. James Campbell]

If he had realized it, James would have been mortified for mistaking Leila for Cobalt's assistant.

As James shook the lawyer's hand firmly, he gave him a quick "read" with his power. It was involuntary, and the only thing of significance he picked up was that the other man was also gay. (He'd already known that Cobalt was a Meta, again, thanks to Sean.) He sat down across from the other man and thought a moment before saying, "I understand that your specialty is not family law, but my husband and I are having difficulties with the social services office through which we are fostering our son. I have documented all of the incidents, as well as our attempts to have them addressed. We believe that this has something to do with us being in a same-sex marriage, or because we are both Meta-human, or possibly a combination of both."

It surprised him, honestly, that he was able to talk so calmly about it. Sure, he'd been exposed to prejudice before, but it had been relatively easy to brush off then. It hadn't been from the people whose continuing cooperation was necessary for Nikki to keep staying with them. "Sean Neville recommended you. Both Chase--that's my husband--and I work at Hammel, and our son, Nikolai, is a student there. We wanted to adopt him eventually. He's nine, has no living biological relatives and..." James ran one hand through his hair as he sighed in frustration. "And I have no clue what rights we have here."

Finally, he placed the folder he'd been carrying on the desk between them. Inside was all of his documentation, arranged chronologically and neatly. (OCD actually did have its uses sometimes.) "I'm not sure of legal action is necessary, but he's our son."

[Cobalt Weaver]

Cobalt listened quietly while the other man talked about his troubles with the social services office. It was true, family law wasn’t exactly his forte (far too much emotional involvement for Cobalt), but he couldn’t very well send this man away, not when he was so desperate about keeping his family together. Even if the Social Services office was a nightmare to work with. He was mildly surprised to hear that Sean recommended him, since he and the other man were on… tense terms.

He took the folder with a nod of his head. He was grateful the family had taken it upon themselves to document the work; it made his job a lot easier and enabled him to get things rolling a lot quicker. He looked up at the other man and leaned forward, “I understand. You want to keep your family together. That’s incredibly admirable, and if there’s anything I can do to help that, I will.” He turned back to the folder, leafing through the folder. It told an interesting story. Late, then absent social services checks, rude behavior during telephone calls, what felt like general unwillingness to cooperate. It was interesting.

But too vague.

All of these incidences even together wouldn’t be enough to cry discrimination, even though that’s what Cobalt felt was going on here. He bit his lip, thinking. He looked up at James, “What I can see here sounds like discrimination, unfortunately, it’s not overt enough to stand up to any action I could take. Now,” He pushed his glasses up his face, “When were you planning on adopting your son? Because whenever you plan on taking that action, that will be when things start getting really obvious. My advice to you now would be to file a complaint with the head of the department, I can help you with that, if you want. The purpose here is to make sure they know you won’t take this kind of thing. If it continues, and becomes more overt, then you may need to take more… aggressive legal action.”

“As for what your rights are now,” Cobalt continued, “While foster parents look and act much like loco parentis, they actually share the parental responsibilities with a welfare agency. It is the welfare agency, however, who holds the legal custody of the child. However, I don’t know if you have yet, but if you haven’t applied for De Facto Parent Status, you should, because then you are legally allowed access to the report that the social worker will file with the courts and also gives you the right to hire an attorney if you try to adopt your son and you run into problems.” He looked at James, making sure the other man was keeping up. “This is a really tangled process, as I’m sure you’re familiar, but I need more information as to what your end goal is here before I can figure out what I need to do to help.”

[Dr. James Campbell]

James tried to sit still as the lawyer looked over the folder. When he was working, out in the field with potential students and their families, he managed to put on a calm façade. When he was working, he was often the only calm, reasonable voice in the room. But now, when it was his son and his family at risk, he couldn't quite manage it. Nervously, he fiddled with the buttons on the cuffs of his shirt as he waited. Unfortunately, the reply was the one he expected, but not the one he wanted.

He didn't hold back his sigh, though. "That's what I thought. Ideally, we'd like to start the process as soon as possible, but according to his previous foster family, Nikki was always resistant to the idea. He's happy now, with us, the way things are. And so much has happened to him in the past year, we don't want to push him." Or make him the center of aggressive legal action. Since March, the boy had developed his abilities, been uprooted and moved to a boarding school where he was the youngest by at least eighteen months. Then he'd moved again and started adjusting to having two fathers, just in time for one of them to go through a traumatic experience. The poor kid had been through enough.

Thankfully, Cobalt was able to provide him with an actual course of action. Even just applying for something would make it feel as though they were taking action, instead of just letting things happen. Sitting forward in the chair, he pulled a pen and a small notepad from the pocket of his suit. "He's been with us since June, would that be a long enough time to qualify for status?" James asked as he jotted something down. "We haven't applied, though it was mentioned when we first went through the process of being certified as foster parents." That seemed so long ago, now.

"Are you a father?" James asked, putting down his pen. The lawyer didn't look fatherly, but that was something even his perception could be wrong about. "Our end goal is to keep our family together. We'll apply for status, we'll jump through hoops... we'll even suffer the indignity of social services behaving as if the only reason Nikki should be with us is because we're best equipped to handle a nine-year-old who can control the weather." Again, he sighed, "I'm sorry that I'm even saying this, but so long as he can stay, being treated with respect is secondary."

He hadn't brought up Ginny yet on purpose. She was legally an adult now and didn't have anything to do with this, but she was the reason that James was so nervous about the possibility of Niko being moved to a different home. He didn't want Chase to have to go through that. "I am aware of the 'tangles' in the system. I've seen enough of it in my recruiting and.... Eighteen years ago I lost custody of my daughter after I was brought to Hammel for training. I didn't see her for almost three years. I can't go through that again."

[Cobalt Weaver]

Cobalt could tell the other man was disappointed in his answer. In truth, Cobalt wished he could provide them with more supportive answers. This was the frustrating part of his job: the part where he had to tell people they couldn’t do anything but sit and wait for things to get worse before they could figure out something else to do. It was especially upsetting to Cobalt because this was a family, and this man was going to him asking for help keeping his family together. And he couldn’t do anything substantial to help them. Later, it would upset him. But right now, he wasn’t allowing his emotions to run all over him. That would be unprofessional and get in the way of him actually doing his job.

Cobalt listened intently to Dr. Campbell’s explanation of his son’s situation. He nodded, twiddling with a pen. “That’s understandable, god knows it’s not something you can rush into.” At the other man’s question about the de facto parent application, he hesitated, thinking back to the rules of child foster care and adoption in Vermont. If this were a case of the couple suing for adoption, Cobalt probably would have more time to remind himself of the rules, but since this was just a consultation, he hadn’t exactly known what to prepare for. “Since June, is that what you said?” He thought about it; six months he thought. “Scuse me a second, I need to check.” He spent a few seconds and a few well-chosen taps of the keyboard when he found the answer. “There isn’t a limit of time you have to wait before you can apply, so you should definitely get that started. At the very least, it’ll make things infinitely easier when you and your family decide to adopt your son.” Cobalt tapped on the computer keyboard again, “You have to fill out a couple of forms, but as far as I can tell, they’re all pretty basic, not as nightmarish as they could be. I could print those out for you.” As the printer under his desk whirred, he straightened up, looking at Dr. Campbell.

He was slightly taken aback at the other man’s question. Of all the things he’d been mistaken for in the past, he’d never been mistaken for a father. He decided to be honest with the man, “Oh. Uh. No, I’m not. But I would have liked to be.” He looked at Dr. Campbell, “But that means that I understand how important this is to you. Family is the most important thing, and you should be treated with respect for wanting to give a little boy a home.” Cobalt bent down to grab the forms from the mouth of the printer.

“Okay,” He straightened up, handing Dr. Campbell the papers, “These are the forms you need. JV 295, 296, 297 and 510.” He pushed the glasses up his nose. They’d gotten bent, but he couldn’t think of how, “If you want help, I’d be more than happy to assist you, just let me know.”

He listened with sympathy to Dr. Campell’s story about his daughter. “I’m so sorry. I can’t even imagine.” His face grew determined and serious, “This isn’t gonna happen here. I’ll help as much as you need me to.”

[Dr. James Campbell]

The weekend prior, when they had talked about the problems with the social workers, his husband had been 100% in favor of pressing charges against them. Actually, Chase's first suggestion had been more along the lines of stealing away with Nikki one night, moving to Canada, and employing polar bears as body guards for their family. Yes, he had been trying to get James to laugh, and it had worked.

What neither of them wanted to do, however, was sit and wait for it to get worse. If it got better, great. If it stayed the same, it would be a hassle, but they could live with that too.

"...God knows its not something you can rush into."

James managed a weak chuckle at that. Cobalt wasn't aware of how intimately he knew that fact. Ginny had been a surprise--he never referred to her as an accident, not even in his head--but even though he had always wanted to be a father, he wanted everything to be done right, in the proper order this time. "We're trying to make it as easy as possible for him; and he's happy with the way things are now." The atmosphere in their home was still subdued, but not as tense as it had been during the summer.

"Oh, thank you." He hadn't meant to put the other man on the spot like that. So he just waited for the forms to print as well, still nervously playing with the buttons on his cuffs. Finally though, he took the papers, looking them over himself. Everything looked pretty straightforward. Nothing more complicated than the paperwork he had to do every day when recruiting. "I'll need to go over all of these with Chase too, but we will call you if we have any questions."

When James had applied for a job as a recruiter, it had come as a surprise to everyone in that department other than Aristea. They had remembered quite well his frequent escape attempts and his insistence that they couldn't possibly keep him there. But once the divorce was final and he legally couldn't see his daughter unsupervised, he'd given up and thrown himself into his studies. But the training had helped, and he eventually had to admit that he was a better father when he knew how to manage his power, and the side-effects. So he just nodded quietly when Cobalt said he couldn't imagine it, James agreed.

It was less than six months since he'd been a victim from a psychic attack, but still nothing compared to being told that he he was unqualified to be a father.

"Thank you, for helping us." James said again, sincerely. He looked over the papers again, then put them down on the desk. (If he didn't, he risked playing with them in his hands and winding up with dog-eared pages before he even got home.) "I suppose now would be an appropriate time to inquire about your rates?"

[Cobalt Weaver]

James looked tired. And more like a desperate father than an instructor or someone with a doctorate. It was times like these that Cobalt wished there was more he could do. ‘Wait until it gets worse’ was not the advice he wanted to give; he wanted to help them, not give them pieces of paper. But still, age and a lot of sleepless nights have taught him that sometimes that’s all you can do for now, and just be there if things get bad. He nodded at James’ comment. “Right. The kid always comes first.” Cobalt smiled. He may not be a father, but he understood that cardinal rule of parenthood: the child always came first. “And maybe with time things will smooth over on their own,” He offered with a light shrug. He wasn’t one for optimism, but he really hoped that would be true for this family.

Cobalt nodded as he handed over the papers, “No problem. Just let me know if you need anything. I’ll brief my partner Leila on the situation, so on the off chance you miss me, she’ll be able to answer your questions. She’s one of the best, so she’ll be able to give you just as good advice.” And Cobalt wasn’t exaggerating. In casual situations when he could tease and grouse, Leila was “the intern”, but during work hours, Leila was a partner, and needed to be able to assist him and have equal responsibility. He trusted her to do that.

Cobalt blinked at James’ last question, having forgotten (as he often did) about the business portion of his job. “For today’s consultation? There isn’t one. Consultations are free. If you find you need actual legal action taken somewhere down the line, then we can talk.” That was the philosophy Cobalt had decided on when he first started out on his own, and it had worked. It made the most sense anyways. “I’m glad I can help you and your family in any capacity.”

[Dr. James Campbell]

Evidently, actually being a father made little difference, because he'd been a father for almost half his life now, and he had the same philosophy. He'd given up his rights to see Ginny because he didn't want her earliest memories to be of Lucy and him fighting, and because it had been agreed that it was just temporary. The kid always comes first. James managed half a smile at Cobalt's misplaced optimism, but at least it was better than a smirk. "And in your professional, expert opinion...should I hold my breath?" His voice was light and conversational, but there was still an edge of sarcasm and bitterness there.

James never had been good at waiting.

"You can keep the folder, if that will help. I have copies of everything in it." As well as the originals of all of his documentation saved on his computer. Again, there were times when his OCD was downright useful. "Leila? I believe she was the person I spoke to earlier, to set up this appointment." And he'd thought she was his assistant, from the way she'd handled the man's calendar without consulting him. Oops.

And honestly, he was also surprised when he was told that the consultation was free. He didn't have much experience with lawyers other than Tabitha, and he never had to pay her for her services. That was the school's job. "I didn't realize. Thank you." He stood, and offered his hand to the other man to shake. He didn't know what was going to happen next with this mess, but it was reassuring to know that someone who knew what the hell he was doing on their side.

After a deep breath, "Thank you," He said again, slightly more evenly this time. It wasn't Cobalt's fault that their one option was waiting for things to get worse. "You will hear from us again if the situation changes."

[Cobalt Weaver]

Cobalt gave James a look that shared the other man’s skepticism and sarcasm. “In my professional opinion? No.” He shook his head, “You can hope, and don’t go looking for trouble—which isn’t something I expect from you and your family—but it’s better to be prepared for the worst, unfortunately. Still.” He shrugged a little hopelessly, “It doesn’t hurt to hope for the best, I suppose.” He ran a hand through his hair, “I just wish I had more substantial directions to give you and your family.” He confessed honestly, “The situation is a tricky one, and waiting for something to change is never easy. Especially when your family is in question.”

He nodded his thanks at James’ offer that Cobalt keep the folder. “Thank you, I’ll let you know if I find something else that may be useful.” He’d file it away later, after making a copy of everything for Leila to look over. He’d like her opinion on all this. A small smile crept on his face at mention of the younger woman, “Yes, you probably did. She… likes to be in charge of scheduling things.” He’d tease her about that later.

Cobalt shook the other man’s hand firmly, “If you have any other questions, don’t hesitate to call us.” He nodded at James’ comment, “If the situation changes, we will be there for your family. That’s… something that’s important here.” Family was important to Cobalt, even if he didn’t have one to speak of. “Have a good day, Dr. Campbell.” He said as a farewell, “Hang in there.” He added as words of encouragement. He figured that the other man could use some. God knows he’d want support if he were in James’ situation.

[Event !]

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