Guardianship That’s Temporary

By Adam Kaz

He recognizes me, I can tell as soon as I walk in, as soon as I recognize him. 

Try as I might to remain anonymous in public, these goddamn kindred spirits never forget the old nerd who years ago talked Brit. lit. at them three times a week. And of all the places to find a former student, and of all former students to find, it just had to be this one captaining this public aid office. I’m inside “The Champaign County Courthouse Legal Information Room,” which the zombified clerk dismissively promised would contain answers to all my legal questions.

We lock eyes for a moment. I’m on a children’s chair near the door while the 20-something-year-old business casual kid (Daniel?) sits at his desk. He’s talking to a 30-year-old babbling ball of nerves some poor soul calls mom.

“Did you go to court for it?” he asks with the same interrogative shrill voice I remember from class, only now just a tinge more condescending. “Did you get served? Was a guardian ad litem appointed? Did you file a petition?”

“No-no-no no one told me I had to do any of that!” She sounds helpless, a deer v. headlights type deal, and I take solace in knowing I won’t be half as bad when my turn comes next. “I just made my sister sign the form. Should I have filed something?”

“You would have had to file a petition if you were going for full guardianship.” He fingers his baggy eyes, which already have more bags than I remember. “Or, wait, sorry, I guess your sister would have filed for it, you would have been served. But if you two just signed a form, you must have given her temporary guardianship, OK?”

“What’s that?”

“It’s guardianship that’s temporary.” I swear to God he’s smiling.

“Does that matter?”

“Maybe.” Shrug. “But keep going. You gave your sister temporary guardianship, you went to prison, you got out, and now why are you concerned about it?”

“My sister gave my baby to my ex.”

“That’s right, that’s right, you said the kid is in Arkansas? Now we’re talking competing jurisdictions, which is kind of interesting, kind of messy.”

I pick a pamphlet from the wall, “Advice for Newlyweds,” with Abraham Lincoln’s face on the front. But I’m mostly just eavesdropping, which isn’t much of a challenge when the room is probably the size of my office, and just as cluttered. 

“OK, so first off: you don’t have custody, you have what’s called parentage.” The B+ student leans back in his swivel chair and slides a pen between his fingers. “If you were never married and there’s no custody order, that means no one has custody—not you, not dad. But so long as you have parentage, and you do, and he didn’t sign the birth certificate, which you say is the situation, you don’t need a custody case to get the kid back, just need to talk to the cops in Arkansas about kidnapping—that is if we can figure out which county they’re in. I wonder, though, if you give someone temporary guardianship, can they give the kid to whoever they want? Can a mother without custody even give temporary guardianship?”

“Can they?” She leans in, conspiring. “I did, I guess.”

“I don’t know. I mean you are the mom, so . . . I don’t know. It’s a good question, though.” He scratches his well-scratched hair. “People in your position would pose that question to a lawyer. If I were to tell you the answer that would involve legal research on my part, which would make this legal advice.”

“Isn’t that what you do?” And here mom leans away from him, maybe just realizing she has a right to be angry. “The sign on the door says ‘Legal Advice.’”

“No, no, no, no, legal advice is a whole other thing. I give legal information,” he says. “Since I’m not a lawyer it would be illegal for me to give legal advice. The legal advice sign is for our Legal Advice Clinic, which is on the second and third Tuesday of every month. I know people in your position sometimes come to that clinic, by the way.”

“But I want my baby back now! You’re not a lawyer?”

“No, I just left undergrad last year.” He looks at his hands. “But maybe someday.” Looks back at her. “Maybe.” He grins. “What’s your full name? What’s the father’s? I wanna check a thing.”

He click-clacks the names into his laptop, which is coated with the University of Illinois, the Boy Scouts of America, and other such elitist stickers.

“Oh, OK, so what I’m seeing here is you guys were in a child support case in 2016, which, I don’t know, that could change things. Let me look at the details.” He scans silently. “Oh, jeez, so here it says you got him served, you showed up to court, he didn’t, and you told the judge he was the father; so, well, that makes him the father by ex parte.”

“What does that mean? He never even paid child support.”

Shaking his head, “It means maybe, on second thought, he maybe has the parental right to take the kid to Arkansas.”

“Oh god, oh god, oh god.” She presses her fingers into her eyes. “What should I do?”

“Now I can’t give you legal advice, but I can tell you I’ve met people in your position who do  talk to lawyers about this stuff.”

And with that mom bursts out of the room, followed by a snide voice telling her people like her often come back on the second and third Tuesday of each month. Then he turns to me.

“Hello, Professor Jenkins.” He puts on a customer facing face. “I’m not sure if you remember me, but you were my British Novel teacher.”

I lumber over to his corner, take my seat, gulp. “Hello, of course I remember you, Daniel?”

“David,” he says, “but close enough. How’ve you been?”

No use lying. “Well, not great, I’m getting a divorce. But things are amicable, no kids, so it should be simple.”

“Should be.” David nods. “I’m sorry to hear that.”

“Well, you know.” I clench the pamphlet in my fist. “How are things with you?”

David strokes his chin. “Things are weird.” He sighs.

“Welcome to adult life.”

“Huh, well, what would you like to know about divorce?”