Crisis Counselor

She was a coat of arms seasoned for the job -- tough and polished like tortoise shell. When the women were tougher, she'd tuck her advice-giving head back against the executive chair, let them try to fluff bent feathers, watch them falling to their feet. Then, her little turtle arms would stretch out across the desk; try to float a form -- a restraining order, maybe a list of early warning signs -- but they'd keep on sleeping, sleep hard through the sessions she'd spend blowing on plastic ships, paper sails rarely reaching port, and they would cry like little children watching helpless, dazed as she sunk their dreamboats, sat on them, no coming up for air. And perhaps she'd think of the little turtles we'd kept confined to bathtubs as kids, or of the public safety commercials telling mother how, if she turned her back, we could fall to sleep, slide and drown in barely an inch of sitting water.