120 Letters

By Dan Lee

Is white-collar crime victimless? Often, it becomes a very deadly game when the powerful become greedy.

This is the story of two young beginning reporters trying to survive in 1959. Together, they fight heroically, wade into the murky waters of widespread official fraud, corruption, murder, and engage in a new war against domestic abuse and violence!

On his 19th birthday, Toby Miller has already experienced a lifetime of tragedy. There are always consequences to actions, and destiny has a difficult road for this engineering hopeful turned journalist, and his beautiful partner.

Mob danger lurks around every corner, and professional challenges are a daily occurrence in a pressure-packed environment.

Steering through the daily pitfalls of a new career and the dangers created by a deadly criminal enterprise, make Danny Boy Stories--120 Letters an exciting romantic adventure also available in paperback.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dan Lee
• Release date: Mar 19, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301423095

Dan Lee

Devon C. “Dan” Lee is a native of Wabash, Indiana. He grew up during the 1940’s World War 2 era, and the 1950’s. He usually writes about young adults (18-30) drawing on his own experiences, and those of others around him. Although fictional, much of what he writes has real situations he has lived as the foundation. Mr. Lee is a retired former journalist and businessman. All “Danny Boy Stories” are available in E-Book formats and in Paperback. His novels are: "120 Letters", and "The Bamboo Murders" (part of the Cain and Able Mystery Series). "The Family Unrelated", and "Defining Heroes", are novella collections of five and four complete stories.. Search for “Danny Boy Stories”. Web site: http://www.dannyboystories.com

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D. C. 'Dan' Lee

120 Letters

By

Dan Lee

Fiction

[V 3.0]

COPYRIGHT NOTICE

© Copyright 2011-2012-2013-2014-2015-2016

by Devon C. Lee, aka D. C. ‘Dan’ Lee, Warsaw, IN 46582

All rights reserved.

V 3.0

SMASHWORDS EDITION

This E-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This E-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

The following is a work of fiction solely from the creative imagination of the author. While inspired by real events, any similarity to real persons, places or things is entirely coincidental and not intended. Nothing herein may be reproduced in any manner whatsoever, electronic or otherwise without the expressed written approval of the author. Take notice the Danny Boy Stories™ logotype is protected as a Trade Mark and cannot be copied or used in any form whatsoever without the expressed written permission by the holder of the Trade Mark. Likewise, the original design and artwork comprising the cover of this publication is also protected from use by anyone for any purpose whatsoever without the expressed written permission of DeVon C. Lee, Warsaw, IN 46582.

ISBN 9781301423095

INTRODUCTION

120 Letters"

Fiction

Is white-collar crime victimless? Often, it becomes a very deadly game when the powerful become greedy.

This is the story of two young beginning reporters trying to survive in 1959. Together, they fight heroically, wade into the murky waters of widespread official fraud, corruption, murder, and engage in a new war against domestic abuse and violence!

On his 19th birthday, Toby Miller has, compared with others his age, experienced a lifetime of tragedy. There are always consequences to actions, and destiny has a difficult road for this engineering hopeful turned journalist, and his beautiful partner.

Mob danger lurks around every corner, and professional challenges are a daily occurrence in a pressure-packed environment.

Steering through the daily pitfalls of a new career and the dangers created by a deadly criminal enterprise, make 120 Letters from Danny Boy Stories an exciting romantic adventure.

DEDICATION

To: Amanda Anne, my faithful proofreader, and much, much more, for over 56 years.

CHAPTER 1

April 1958

April in Indiana can be eccentric, snow one day, with warm, pleasant sunshine the next. Daytime temperature can swing wildly, warm pleasing 60's on Tuesday, two inches of snow on Thursday. There are, though, four distinct Mid-Western seasons--spring, summer, fall, and winter--each bringing its own natural, satisfying or obnoxious climate change to the countryside. In 1958, the Hoosier state was still largely farm country, rolling hills, wide valleys; neat rows of corn, soybeans, and fields of grain that will brown in summer.

We honor April, the first full month of spring, in music and song, by lyricists, by poets, by writers of every character. April is the month when tender shoots of crocus and tulip push their way through the struggling resistance that is winter. April is a month of revitalization, a time when living things refresh, prepare for the coming summer. It is a time of love.

Toby Miller settled his head onto his clasped hands as he gazed skyward. The late April sky was ablaze with stars on this unusually warm, clear, spring evening, a mild breeze rustling the trees lightly, new leaves merely trembling on tender new stems.

Toby caught the light aroma of her perfume in his nostrils as she moved her face now above his.

I have to go, now, Marci said in her especially pleasant soft voice, to which Toby responds with a warm kiss directly on her lips. He put his right hand full on her left cheek and face, feeling the silken softness of her skin against his hand.

I love you Marci Anne, Toby said softly.

And, I love you, Toby, came her equally soft reply.

Come on, Sweetheart, she said, taking him by the upper arm, pulling him up into a sitting position.

Marci Anne Springer, an attractive young woman of 18 years with short, stylish hair possesses a trim physical appearance. Marci and Toby enjoyed the past several months an item in their senior class for the past two years. Minutes before, on this unusually warm evening, they promised themselves to one another as they faced four years of university study beginning in the fall at different colleges.

The two young lovebirds arose from the small blanket spread out on early spring grass and walked slowly to Toby’s sedan, parked in a cornfield implement path. Earlier, Toby carefully backed his car onto the path, hidden by roadside brush, and into the field. The tubular corn sprouts were only now springing to life in the newly planted ground, the field's musty aroma surrounding the couple. Toby opened the driver’s door, Marci slid over just enough for him to get in behind the wheel.

Toby turned the key, the eight cylinders fired, the low, soft, rumble from the steel-packed dual exhausts reported the engine running smoothly. Toby dropped the steering column gearshift into first gear; the car began its slow roll along the dirt path out of the field toward the graveled county road.

Suddenly, in a blinding flash of light the lovely evening turned to horror…

* * *

The white lights above were intense. Toby felt something around his face and head, limiting his facial movements. He cannot open his eyes. Something was wrapping part of his face and head, covering his nose and mouth. He cannot speak except to utter a low, muffled sound. He hears voices nearby.

Abruptly, Toby decided to scream as loudly as he could. His sound was an intense, muffled Ahuhhhhgh.

The voices come closer.

Toby, its Mom.

He recognizes the voice of his mother.

You’re going to be just fine, Toby’s mother reassures him as he struggles to see. Toby, paws at the cloth wrapped around his face and head.

No, no, Honey, the bandages are covering your wounds, it’s going to be okay in a week or so. Try to relax. Judith Miller did her best to comfort her son, knowing he would soon ask pointed questions.

Toby felt his right arm suddenly become warm with a stinging sensation traveling from inside the elbow, up to his bicep and throughout his shoulder. He began to lose consciousness.

Mrs. Miller I think it best he remain sedated for the next 24 hours, when we can uncover his mouth. This young man is going to face a lot of personal pain in addition to his physical injuries, Toby heard a male voice saying as he fell rapidly into a deep sleep.

* * *

Marci, Toby dreamed, was the catch of a lifetime. The young woman was mature, sensitive, a straight ‘A’ student, like her mother …just what he wanted. Although petite, her trim hips and long legs were quite attractive in a pair of shorts, a fact Toby reminds her frequently, and her figure was in nearly perfect proportion, at least in his eyes. Marci was very personally disciplined and usually unflappable under pressure.

A popular, boyishly good-looking young man, Toby spent the past two years of high school developing a strong bond with Marci, rather than carry on with his boyhood pals and friends. The couple studied together, walked to class together, attended sock hops together, and, during the latter part of their senior class year, were seldom absent the clutching hand of the other.

Marci and Toby’s parents came to the satisfied conclusion their children would marry one day, but insisted that will wait until graduation from college, four years hence. Their high school Class of 1958 was set to graduate in June…

* * *

It seemed merely an instant before the drug-induced darkness began to fade and Toby felt someone wrapping the left side of his head and face with what felt like cloth of some kind. Now, there was nothing hindering his mouth or right eye. Toby uttered a low groan trying to speak. He could only muster opening a small slit in his right eye through the matted eyelid.

Now fully awake, Toby whiffs an unmistakable medicinal odor. Adrenalin sent its electric pulses of dread through his body, settling in his chest. Something was terribly wrong.

Marci, Toby muttered in a nearly unintelligible sound.

Toby feels a woman’s hand. It suddenly, but gently, grips his left hand firmly.

Marci’s not here, son.

Again, he recognizes his mother’s voice. His hand lifts to the side of her cheek. Toby feels warm tears sliding down his mother’s face.

Where’s Marci? What happened to Marci? Toby demands weakly, his voice as loud and strong as he can manage. The aching pain over the left side of his head and face continue unabated. He struggles to remember anything of the past.

Try to relax, son, his mother said, avoiding his question.

You need to stay calm, Toby, he hears the firm male voice speaking again just to his right side.

You’ve been injured and need to relax as much as possible, so your wounds will heal quickly, the voice said.

Mom!, Where’s Marci? Toby demands, his voice hoarse and throat made sore by a breathing tube removed earlier.

I want to talk to Marci, Toby tried to shout, with little success.

Oh, Lord, Toby, Marci won’t be here today, his mother tried to calm him.

The flash of light and images of the shattering windshield in front of him faded from total black into blinding reality in his memory. He can see glass shards flying toward him, smashing into the left side of his face like a thousand small bullets. Instinctively, Toby raises his arm off the pillow and tries to dodge the glass shrapnel, the memory now coming clearly into view. He remembers another flash and the center of the windshield directly in front of Marci crashing into her face just as he lost consciousness sitting behind the wheel of his automobile.

Toby summoned all of his self-control, Mom, is Marci okay? he asked.

I have to know, he insists.

There was a long pause of perhaps two minutes. His mother squeezed his hand more tightly, stroking his arm with her other hand.

Toby, she choked, Marci is gone. The shotgun blast was just too much, Mrs. Miller said, crying softly, her head now on her son’s left shoulder.

Toby began to weep, the stinging tears burning his facial wounds. An aching pain began in his belly and worked its throbbing way into his chest. He remembers, now, the face of farmer Carl White pointing a shotgun at the windshield of Toby’s car. He heard the loud report and saw the flash of the gun, first toward the driver's side, and then directly toward Marci, seated against him.

POW! POW!

In rapid succession, the blasts destroyed the windshield, tore across the left side of Toby’s head, and instantly killed Marci, smashing directly into her face and head. He remembers the shards of broken glass slicing into his skin, most of the blast ripping into the car doorpost on his left.

Oh, God! Oh, my God. I took Marci to that field! I killed her! I killed Marci! It’s my fault, Toby screamed weakly.

No, no, no, no, Toby. It was not your fault. Officers have arrested Mr. White, Mrs. Miller tried unsuccessfully to console her son.

CHAPTER 2

The Pullman car leaned slightly as the locomotive lumbered around a bend; the steel rails glistened with the orange reflection of the mid-summer sunset and become two tracers racing into a single strand and infinity in the distance. Although comfortable inside, the August 1 weather outside the compartment window is typical Mid-West dog days of summer, the air heavy with humidity. The sounds of the gently swaying train car over the tracks were at once both soothing and irritating. The clickety clack of the wheels measured the increasing distance from home.

The past several weeks for Toby Miller have been a difficult path for such a young man. Marci's death left him barren of his usual cheery character. He now has little regard for others.

Toby sat quietly, listening to the clunk-clickety-clack of the Pullman car wheels over the steel rails pointing to St. Louis, Missouri, where the young man will board a military bus early tomorrow morning. The bus will transport him to the Fifth Army’s massive Fort Leonard Wood training center.

Scheduled for six months active duty training--60 days in Missouri, and 120 days in Texas--the young man committed eight-years of his young life to a tour in the United States Army Reserve. Once his basic and advanced training was out of the way, he will return home, attending regular drills and two weeks training each summer with his local unit. Reservists follow about the same schedule as a National Guard volunteer.

Toby looked forward to his six-month deployment away from home and away from the questions and sympathetic, well-intentioned, comments from friends and strangers. Yes, he looks forward to what he knows will be strenuous physical training, aching muscle fatigue, and mental stress. He hopes the intensive training and resulting daily exhaustion will help him forget the sorrow of the recent past still gnawing at his aching heart.

His right hand still feels the firm grip of his father at the train station, the shoulder of his shirt still damp from his mother's tears.

God speed, son, his father said, his jaw firmly set, managing not to shed tears like his wife.

Toby recalled, too, the lengthy discussion with his parents when he informed them he has enlisted in the reserves. He will not seek an engineering degree as they expected. Although disappointed, his parents respect Toby's decision with understanding for his need to pave a new pathway.

Tomorrow, August 2, is Toby’s 19th birthday, an event he expects to keep secret from his fellow recruits. Toby is a strapping five feet eleven inches, his sandy hair and bright blue, piercing eyes, inherited from his German ancestors. They came to America in the late 1700’s, following on the heels of the American Revolutionary War. Toby’s muscled frame is the result of four years tough varsity football training in high school, not unlike what he anticipates will be regular activity in the Army.

Christened Tobias Jamison Miller, named for a great-grandfather he never knew, Toby was the son of drug store owner and pharmacist John R. and Judith A. Miller, a bookkeeper. At five feet eleven inches, Toby always wished he were another inch or so taller so he might have played on the varsity basketball team with his friends and close buddies. As it turned out, other than football, he did not make the junior varsity squad and settled for intramural physical education (PE) games. At 185 pounds, he was an average, husky framed, young man, a perfect specimen to play starting 'T' formation halfback on his school’s football team, a position at which he excelled.

Toby’s scholastic scores were above average and good enough to gain admission acceptance into Purdue university's engineering school, but his ranking settled in the lower half of the top 15-percent of the Class of 1958, not good enough for a college like MIT. The disappointment, caused by poor study habits during his first high school year, still cut raw at his stomach. He has the ability to do well, but applied little effort those first two semesters. Now, he lamented repeatedly, he will pay a heavy price.

Little more than two months ago, Toby accepted his high school diploma. He walked across the stage, while classmates applauded, still wearing small, square, white bandages on his left cheek, a stark contrast to his burgundy graduation gown. Lying in a hospital bed for six days, Toby did not attend all of his last month of classes. Frequent, knife-like, pains in his healing wounds were a constant reminder what caused his injuries in that sudden and violent shotgun explosion. The anger still courses through his body like a painfully advancing cancer.

Capt. Frank Lee, the stocky, slightly overweight, local Army Reserve unit commander, somehow managed to obtain a private Pullman compartment for Toby’s overnight ride to St. Louis. There were another 100 or so fresh Reservists and National Guard trainees on board the train, riding overnight in regular day passenger seating. They were in two forward cars between Toby and the dining car. He does not care his accommodations were better than the others were, but it was reason enough for Toby to choose not to make use of his meal tickets this evening and again at breakfast. Why should he face all the others now, he rationalized, when they would all disembark together in St. Louis soon enough?

Toby lifted his left hand to his mostly healed left cheek and face, still splotched red, pocked, and scarred from the shotgun and broken glass wounds suffered three months earlier. He could not understand why the blast that hit him was confined to the left and none of the pellets that killed Marci struck him. His scars resembled those of several of his classmates who suffered severe bouts of acne. Doctors said the pockmarks would eventually disappear.

Toby closed his eyes and let the sounds of the train car encourage his daydreaming…

* * *

Clunk-clickety-clack.

Clunk-clickety-clack.

The train’s wheels made their incessant clatter while Toby sat motionless peering out the train car window.

It was dark, now. The Porter came, made up the berth, and left the compartment. Toby sat on the small bed, leaning against the bulkhead. Staring out the window, he wished the train would quickly arrive in St. Louis.

Following June graduation, Toby, his heart still hurting from the loss of his only love, enlisted in the local Army Anti-Aircraft Artillery Reserve unit and asked for immediate orders to his six-month active duty basic and advanced basic training. His actions were also in direct opposition to pleadings from Marci’s parents to continue a planned future, albeit without Marci. At age 18, Toby did not need parental permission to enlist.

Clunk-clickety-clack.

Clunk-clickety-clack.

Street and red railroad crossing lights flashed eerily into the dark compartment as the Pullman coach passes. Often, a crossing bell, the sound fading quickly in and out, come out of the distance ahead, zipping into the landscape behind. Occasionally, there was the bright flash of white light from a vehicle waiting at a crossing. Again, Toby wished for a quick arrival in St. Louis, still some six hours away. The burning emptiness again started in his belly and traveled upward into his chest.

He avoided closing his eyes, lest he again see the blinding flash of light and felt the shards of glass penetrating the skin on his face and the left side of his head. He would again feel the warm splash of Marci's blood mixing with his own before he fell unconscious.

Marci was gone.

Toby recalled the all-too-brief moment of silence during graduation when his classmates and well-wishers remembered Marci. It was not enough. He remembered his face grew hot from anger there was not more of an outpouring for Marci, his hands trembled as he took his diploma. He refused to shake the hand of the school board member who was the shooter's defense attorney.

Toby was angry, too, because the farmer, Carl White, received a light sentence for voluntary manslaughter in Marci’s death. Use of deadly force, was dismissed in a plea agreement with the county’s prosecuting attorney. The farmer served no time in the case, his defense attorney successfully arguing White believed the occupants in the car were stealing cattle.

As the burning, empty pain, thumped in his chest, Toby fought back unmanly tears as he sat gazing out the Pullman car window. More anger replaces the hurt. He dug his fingernails into the compartment wall. St. Louis could not come soon enough.

Clunk-clickety-clack.

Clunk-clickety-clack.

Night slowly turned to early morning daybreak; it would be clear, hot, and muggy today. The clunk and clack of the spinning train wheels began to slow. Toby sat nearly motionless on the small, single, bed, peering out of the Pullman window, as he has throughout the night, only occasionally dropping off to sleep. Now, the train was pulling closer to the St. Louis depot. It will arrive at the railroad station promptly at 6:00 A.M.

Toby continued to watch from his compartment window as the train slowed on the trestle over the Mississippi River, and inched through the multiple ribbons of track nearing the depot. There were a dozen or more sets of railroad tracks spread across the massive depot rail yard, the rails gleaming in the early morning light, each pointing to what seemed an inevitable collision in the distance. The dingy, dreary, railroad yard entrance to the city, considered the gateway to the western United States, saddened Toby. It should be more attractive, he thought to himself.

Soon, the passenger train began screeching, and lumbered to a halt alongside a platform opening into the huge train depot.

St. Louis. Exit right side. St. Louis. Exit right side, the conductor called as he moved slowly through the train cars. Toby slowly placed his fingers around the handle on his overnight bag and headed for the Pullman doorway and steps.

The humid August morning air, already 71 degrees heading for 88, slapped Toby in the face as he stepped from the train car. It seemed he has only just put his feet on the platform when a uniformed Army sergeant pushed a clipboard toward Toby, the sergeant’s finger resting on a page of names.

The sergeant brashly commanded of Toby: Full name, last name first, the sergeant bellowed while Toby attempted to comprehend how the military man could possibly have known he was a recruit.

Ah …Miller, Toby, Toby replied.

Learn to do it right the first time, the sergeant commanded.

Your full name like on your birth certificate and your service number, too, he glared at Toby.

Yes, sergeant, Toby said loudly, obediently bringing himself to attention. Miller, Tobias J., ER16545351, he rattled off his name and service number in rapid succession.

Fall-in over there, next to the buses, recruit, the sergeant said, pointing to small, growing, columns of men appearing rather rag-tag and surprisingly disorganized in civilian garb of every kind and character.

Toby expected most recruits would have had at least some minimal training in their hometown Reserve or National Guard unit before reporting for basic training. They should have put it to use assembling properly in ranks, Toby thought. It was Toby’s first, introduction to full-time military life, and a clear disappointment.

Walking toward the men, the number of baggage carts nearby was amazing to Toby—one, two, and three in all—stacked with military duffle bags.

There must be more than a hundred of us, Toby thought.

As he stood with the less than organized columns of recruits near the dark olive green painted buses, Toby remembered the admonition of the First Sergeant in his unit back home, Keep your mouth shut, do exactly as you are told, and you’ll be just fine, Toby. Toby made the conscious decision right then he would concentrate and focus exactly on that good advice. As a result, he was one of few recruits actually standing in a proper at ease position in the assemblage, but, slowly, it caught on with the other men.

A sergeant climbed on a duffle bag and began calling the names of recruits, designating who would be on which of the several military buses. Toby stepped up smartly into the vehicle as his name was called. He took the first empty seat, mid-way back.

CHAPTER 3

Toby’s body writhed as if in pain, his arms occasionally moving from side to side as his dream threaded its way through his subconscious…

Every seat was full, the high school booster bus lumbering down the highway, leaning a bit on every curve. The interior of the bus, illuminated by two green lights, cast an eerie glow over the bobbing heads. Toby realized the occupants were unusually quiet as he shifed to a more comfortable position in the upright school bus seat.

Lights from oncoming passing cars illuminated Marci’s sleeping face her head nestled comfortably on Toby’s right chest. His arm was around her shoulders. Toby studied Marci's soft cheeks, full lips and long eyelashes. From the time of their second real date together, the week before the Junior Class Prom, there was no doubt in Toby's mind he loved this girl. Although they knew one another throughout high school, a chance double date early their junior year brought both to the startling realization they were very compatible and thought so much alike. It was as if they were long, lost friends, finally reunited.

Marci planned to pursue a business education perhaps working toward a master’s degree. Toby’s focus centered in the physical sciences hoping for a design engineering degree. His second choice was a love of writing--he earned straight A’s in every high school English class. Already, the two spoke about the possibility of operating a business some day in the future, once college was out of the way. The two were constant companions the past six months and chattered incessantly about a business partnership.

In the semi-darkness, Toby could not look away from the lovely face of his sleeping girl. A wool scarf wrapped loosely around her ears protected them from the early January 22-degree cold on the booster bus full of teenagers traveling home from a school basketball game. The scarf partially revealed Marci’s short, auburn, nearly straight, hair except for waves on each side. She was a petite five feet four, and, Toby thought, could not weigh more than 110 pounds dripping wet. Marci was very well rounded despite her small stature, always carrying herself in a straight, dignified walk not unlike that of a trained model.

As the booster bus rolled along toward a final destination at the high school, Toby wondered how he could have possibly found a young woman who was already so devoted to him despite his sometimes impulsiveness and impatience. He said a silent prayer their situation would never change.

Suddenly, Marci opened her eyes and gazed directly into Toby’s eyes. I wasn’t snoring, was I, she asked, are you okay?

"Nope. I’m fine," Toby replied.

"I just can’t get over how lovely my girl is," he continued.

"Fiddle sticks," she whispered softly.

"I love you, Toby Miller, she said so softly it was barely audible, we’re going to have such a wonderful life together, once college is out of the way."

"God, I really want that for us," Toby whispered in her ear.

"I was thinking, Toby, Marci continued quietly, trying not to arouse others on the bus, what if I transfer to your college after the first semester so we can be together. I won’t lose any credits, and they’ll surely be glad to have me. I just don’t know what I’ll do without you around", her eyes began to fill with tears.

"Hey, now, Toby began comfortingly, we've talked about this. Your folks want you to go to an up-scale university for the finest education you can get, and I respect that. Things will be fine as long as we remember who we are."

"Ohhhhh. I know, but can’t we just get the folks together and talk with them about the possibilities?" Marci whispered in an almost demanding tone.

"I don’t want to be away from you now that I’ve found you," she said.

The old bus suddenly jerked to the right as it pulled into the school’s horseshoe driveway, the snow on the ground helping to illuminate the area, and cars of parents waiting to take their children home. Marci’s father, Harold Springer, was one of those waiting to deliver Toby and Marci home.

Marci climbed in front next to her father in the late model Pontiac. Toby took the passenger seat next to the door.

"Hi, guys, Marci’s father greeted the two cheerfully. I hear you shouted your lungs out and we won the game in the last minute." Mr. Springer, driving the car out of the driveway, slid a bit to his left to give Marci more room on the front seat, but she sat even more closely to Toby.

"Dad, we have to talk," Marci began almost immediately in a firm but pleasantly calm voice.

Toby squirmed a bit uncomfortably in his seat, fearing the subject Marci was about to tackle again with her father. This was the first time Marci was discussing with her father where she will attend college with Toby present.

"Dad, you know I love you and have the greatest respect for you and your wishes, but I really don’t think you or Mom have any real understanding of the relationship Toby and I have with one another," Marci continued, this time sliding forward in her seat and turning slightly to look directly at her father.

"Well, like it or not, I guess we’re going to have this talk right now." Mr. Springer slowed the car and stopped next to the curbing.

"I think it’s good Toby is here with us. Now, Young Lady, let me have it," his tone was pleasantly soft and not at all commanding.

"Look, Marci’s eyes pierced directly into her father’s eyes, Toby and I are not at all like most of the other 18-year-old olds in our class. We’re not doing our thinking below the waist, and we don’t paw at and climb all over one another all the time, either. Our relationship is solid, caring and loving. We think so much alike and our goals are so similar; we have long planning discussions about the future," Marci continued looking directly at her father, her tone, like his, soft and caring. She knew this discussion has to be a mature discourse.

"I know you want me to go to your alma mater, but consider this…a degree is a piece of paper worth nothing more than the person who earns it, Marci declared to her father. In addition, if Toby and I are at the same school, we can better do what we’ve already been doing—planning and preparing for our future."

The elder Springer addressed Toby, And, just what do you think about all of this, Toby?

"Sir", Toby hesitated only a brief moment,