Saving Seoul

By L.A. Frank

Joo Jae Wook is intent on destroying that hotbed of capitalistic meddling, the United States of America, and not afraid of doing anything and everything to make it happen. He figures eliminating Seoul, South Korea, is a small sacrifice to achieve his goal. If only that pesky K-pop band, G5, would stop interrupting his well-devised plan! As long as Joo Jae Wook can take out America, Seoul, and that annoying boy band, it will be a victory well worth all of his efforts. He will be elevated to the status of hero and he can go home with his head held high.

Two years ago Mac was accidentally thrown into the world of K-pop after winning a replacement slot in one of South Korea's hottest boy bands, G5. Today he only wants to survive his college spring break. Traveling halfway around the world to perform non-stop for a week, is not exactly his idea of a relaxing break, but after avoiding several attempts on his life, Mac and his K-pop band brothers must save Seoul to save the world.

• Language: English
• Publisher: L.A. Frank
• Release date: Aug 14, 2015
• ISBN: 9781310025037

Book preview

Chapter One: Mac at Day Ten of His Spring Break

Sitting on the closed lid of the toilet seat with his knees drawn up under his chin, his arms around his legs, Mac tried to settle his stomach. He was now ten days into his college spring break and halfway through the Saturday afternoon concert at the arena in Seoul. It was intermission. With fifteen minutes to get his insides calmed, he found it sometimes helped to sit quietly and wait for his system to settle.

Over the last two years, he had never quite been able to quell his queasy stomach during a concert. There was something about the combination of extreme exercise, hot lights on his head, piercing screams from the audience, and his own internal workings that didn’t mix. Nothing helped except what he’d figured out, himself. So, before he returned to the dressing room, during intermission, he positioned himself in a stall of the men’s room. If he needed to throw up, he had the toilet right there, but mostly it helped to sit in the quiet and let his mind go blank. It was cool in the room and he thought that aided, as well, to relieve his pounding head. Usually not occupied, those people that came into the room, did their business and left, leaving it empty and quiet. Someone would get him when it was time to go out on stage for the second half of the performance. All he needed, really, was to have his makeup touched up and change his costume. That took less than five minutes. He had roughly fifteen minutes to get his system back to normal and he worked diligently toward this goal.

About to claim victory over his insides and head to the dressing room, Mac heard two people enter the men’s room. One of them quickly checked under the stalls for feet and saw none.

Where is it? one man said.

In the large packing case by the stage entrance, said the other.

Mac’s ears perked up. The two men spoke to each other, not three feet away from him. He wondered what it was.

We better get out of here. How much time do we have?

We’ve got an hour. If we go now, we can get to the airport and be away by the time everything blows. I’ve got a plane on stand-by, waiting for us. I made sure to leave a few presents behind to keep it safe. These people here don’t have a clue that in one hour they will be saying hello to St. Peter at the pearly gates.

They both laughed.

We’ll see how those self-satisfied Americans react, after Seoul is nothing but a wasteland. Come on. Let’s get out of here!

The two left the men’s room.

What was that? Mac wondered, his imagination working overtime, taking his mind away from his stomach issues. It sounded like a threat. A bomb, maybe? A large packing case? There were only about three dozen of them backstage. Which one? Which case and which entrance?

He left the men’s room and walked toward the stage entrance, passing by few people coming and going, during the intermission. When he reached the most likely entrance, he looked around. There was only one possibility. A case about six feet long and four feet high caught his interest. Mac unsnapped the buckles and raised the cover, expecting to see an empty cavity where a speaker normally resided when not in use. A digital timer with various wires sprouting from it and leading down displayed 57:00, then 56:59. It was counting down. Below the timer was what Mac could only guess was a bomb.

Chapter Two: Min-Jun at Day One of Mac’s Spring Break

Min-Jun sighed as he watched his former band, G5, dancing and singing to one of their current works. At close to a million hits to the internet site since it was uploaded less than one week ago, Min-Jun’s viewing made it 999,011, exactly. Forced to appear in game shows and small shop openings to make a living, Min-Jun had become nearly forgotten from the G5 world. He was almost, but not quite, a has-been because his agent was still able to book him on what Min-Jun thought of as disgusting jobs. Yesterday, he humiliated himself in a pancake eating contest, providing his celebrity appearance for a daytime game show. Last week, he cut the ribbon on a newly opening dry cleaners, smiling nicely for the camera and shaking hands. The owners of that establishment were not thrilled with Min-Jun as their promised star for the grand opening. They protested enough that Min-Jun’s manager gave the business owner a deep discount and deducted it from Min-Jun’s paycheck.

Since leaving G5, bad luck followed Min-Jun like a dark storm cloud, hovering overhead and raining all the time. He regretted posting those photos during Mac’s first summer with G5. K-entertainment, the group’s sponsoring company, was riding high on G5, at the time, and on Mac’s secret identity. Min-Jun vowed, back then, to split up the group so that he could move on to a solo career. He had candid shots of Mac taken and then posted them to the G5 fan site, telling the world what K-Entertainment tried to keep secret: Mac was not from South Korea and not even Asian. At first, the fans were outraged that K-Entertainment deliberately concealed the identity of Mac, and that he wasn’t from Seoul. However, by the end of the summer, Mac ended up becoming more popular than ever, with fans falling for his crystal blue eyes, outstanding looks, and smooth voice, and Min-Jun ended up out of a job.

Min-Jun might have been able to squeak by and remain in the group, with only a warning, but the police linked his gang to Jung-Ja’s motorcycle accident. The gang boss confessed that it was all Min-Jun’s idea to get rid of Jung-Ja, one of the most popular G5 band members. Jung-Ja nearly died in the accident, and today, was still not fully recovered. Even if it hadn’t been his idea, Min-Jun still went along with it, and that got him fired for good.

He repented about the posting, almost ending Jung-Ja’s life, and not trusting the guys in the band. If he had listened to them, then he might still be in G5, singing and dancing up there on stage, with his old band mates. He loved the band, and realized, too late, that gangs did not make good friends. His old gang was not to be trusted, was not his friend, and would not take care of him always, as he once fervently believed. As soon as he was fired and stopped making the big bucks, his gang dropped Min-Jun like a hot potato.

Out of a job after he confessed his doings to the management, Min-Jun tried to hook up with another entertainment company, but no one wanted to touch him. Shuffling from company to company looking for a sponsor, he finally took a job with an agent who promised him a spectacular comeback. That was not going to happen, Min-Jun realized. It was all a pipe dream. True, the agent found work for him, which kept him afloat, but there were no singing contracts and no chance of a single one in the near or distant future. Min-Jun knew that he was going to grow old scrambling for jobs like a dog begging for a bone. This was so tormenting to take when, as he saw on the internet, his old band members flew higher now than they ever had when he was in G5.

He seethed, but not from jealousy of the fame of his old band mates. He fumed because of himself. He knew, the minute he posted that picture of Mac, minus his makeup, on the fan site, spilling the beans that the management had tried so hard to keep secret, that he’d blown it for himself. He had always sensed that dark cloud floating somewhere behind his left shoulder, and when he posted that picture, the cloud moved from behind him to engulf his whole being. It stank.

Min-Jun saw the mistakes in his life flash before his eyes. He saw himself as a young teen, skipping school, getting his tattoo and proudly fighting with his gang. How stupid and naive he had been in those days. He remembered all those times his mother yelled at him while he slept off a hangover on the floor of their small apartment and his sister cried quietly in the corner of the room. On that last visit home, nearly two years ago, Min-Jun’s mother held his face in her hands and told him that she was proud that he made it out, away from the gang. She never knew that he hadn’t left the gang behind when he took the G5 job. He should have followed his mother’s advice, but he was certain, at the time, that his gang was his family, not his mother and sister. How wrong he had been.

It was his own fault that things were this way. He deserved the life that fate had dished him. How careless he had been, with everything going for him, two years ago. He could be touring the world, right now, singing and dancing. Instead, he was stuck begging, giving dry cleaners deep discounts so that he could pocket a meager paycheck. How low could he sink? Was there any hope for himself?

He noticed an email in his in-box and opened it. His agent booked a job at a celebrity party to be held this coming Saturday night. With duties to stand at the front door and greet guests as they came, taking their coats and checking them, he had sunk even lower. He was now a coat check boy. Oh well, the pay was better than he had earned in a while, so he would be there, faking a smile, greeting guests, and checking those coats. He had to eat and pay rent, after all, so he would do whatever it took to earn his money. The party was late, not starting until after ten at night. Held in a sleek Gangnam apartment that engulfed the whole of one floor of an expensive high rise, Min-Jun thought that maybe he might be able to wrangle decent food and drink at the event after most of the guests arrived and his job was complete. He had one suit that still might pass for posh as long as he remembered not to put anything near the hole in the left pocket.

Chapter Three: Mac the Night Before His Spring Break

Mac couldn’t believe it. The school newspaper? He had two mid-term exams tomorrow at his college, and now this! It was right before spring break, and he was booked solid during the vacation from school. G5 was scheduled for several performances in Seoul that week, to take advantage of Mac’s time while his classes were on hiatus. With not a single concert since after the turn of the new year, the band managers waited patiently until now, late March, to book them.

Mac had arranged with the professor of one of his classes to take his mid-term exam early so that he could be on a plane first thing Thursday morning. That put him in Seoul, barring no flight delays, on Friday night. Two G5 concerts were booked, already, for Saturday. There would be no time for jet lag. He was scheduled to return to the States a week from Sunday, taking advantage of the next weekend, again, to perform an additional three concerts, one on Friday night, and two on Saturday. With five performances in one week, plus, several appearances scheduled, it would be go, go, go from the moment Mac’s plane touched the ground in Seoul until the wheels lifted to come back to the U.S. Too bad he went to school at an east coast university. If he transferred to a west coast school, he could cut five hours off of his flight time. It was something he had considered seriously once, but he had completed more than three years at his current college. Transferring in his senior year was a ridiculous idea.

Over the last year and a half, through his junior year of college and then last fall, he worked with the band to be able to do performances when his time permitted. It was a brutal agenda, but performances were only booked during school breaks or perhaps over a long weekend. Mac met with all of his professors at the beginning of each semester, to request that he be given a little more flexibility during the times when the concerts were scheduled. Most professors were cooperative. Some were a bit inflexible, and Mac learned to tiptoe around those few.

So far, a year and a half into the job with the band, things had worked out and he had been able to swing both college and work without too much of an impact on his grades. Entering the final stretch for his senior year, he needed to finish out this semester to earn his undergraduate degree. He hadn’t told the band, yet, but he fully intended to keep on going and enroll in a PhD program. He had been accepted to another university not far away from his current one. The management at K-Entertainment was not pleased when he told them over the last holiday break. It meant four more years, probably the lifetime of the band’s popularity, for Mac to earn his PhD. Mac decided to back out of his contract if the management at K-Entertainment couldn’t deal with his desire to continue with college. While he would miss his band mates, he knew they would understand. Telling them would be easier than when he told the management. All of them had yearnings, now, of pursuing something else outside of the band and most took advantage of Mac’s schedule to do other things.

Now Mac had an added problem. The school newspaper finally put two and two together and discovered they had a K-pop star living on campus. Before this edition of the newspaper hit the stands, he lived in relative anonymity. Sure, a few girls occasionally waited for him outside the dorm, but those were usually of Asian dissent and part of the foreign student program that the school sponsored. He could put up with a couple girls, now and then, but larger groups of fans were harder for him to handle. They always had been. He remembered shortly after he started with G5 and was caught on the Namsan tower in Seoul, surrounded by hoards of fans. They practically ripped his clothes off wanting a piece of him, but his uncle rushed him to safety before anything horrible happened. Still, it was scary to have people pawing all over him, wanting to touch him, as if some magic might wear off on them. He didn’t want fans fawning over him here on campus. He only needed to get through the next couple of months and then he would be graduating, moving to a different campus and, he hoped, resumed anonymity.

Dan? His mother called his phone. Are you in coming home before you leave for spring break?

I’m going to be home on Wednesday night, Mom. I need the small bag that I left in my room.

He confirmed with her that he would be home after his last exam. His house was closer to another airport, anyway. It saved him about thirty minutes if he left for the airport from home as opposed to school. With flying time over twelve hours, any savings counted. K-Entertainment didn’t care whether he left from school or home, but only needed to know which one so that they had a limo for him at the appropriate time and location.

Remember, Dan, Wednesday is our night to host the cultural committee.

Mac’s mother chaired the Korean cultural committee. The group ran a community center near town that offered all sorts of classes about Korea. It also organized tours to South Korea, and hosted a huge cultural fair in the summer. The committee, Mac supposed, was busy gearing up for the fair. Totally immersed in the planning, his mother would hardly be seen for the next few months until after the fair had successfully completed. It required planning for everything from providing the entertainment of several traditional dancers and musicians, to all sorts of food vendors. The fair offered an opportunity for the local community and surrounding area to learn more about Korean culture and to have fun. It was an excellent activity for families and was usually packed with them, parents eager for something to entertain their out-of-school children.

In his younger years, Mac assisted his mother with the fair, doing everything from setting up tables, to blowing hundreds of helium balloons, and playing the piano for different dance groups. He hadn’t minded helping. Now, though, he was glad not to be asked to be part of the entertainment. He had a sneaking suspicion that if he was free, his mother would book him in a heartbeat to sing at the fair. He was relieved that he was always away touring with the band all summer.

Later that day, as he walked to his dorm from class, girls waited outside the entrance. Rather than the usual one or two, though, several more surrounded the front door. They wanted to gawk, and Mac believed it was a direct result from the article in the campus newspaper. The paper always had a section that critiqued new music from various artists. It was a total surprise and it didn’t make Mac overjoyed to see an article on the latest G5 album. While the reporter praised the music, and gave a special nod for Mac’s solo piece, it brought an end to his anonymity with most of the campus community. Whomever wrote the article did their research and pointed out plainly, in black and white, and also in the headline, that the school had their very own pop star living on campus. Not only did they state Mac by his full name and not his stage name, they also printed a closeup picture of him. True, it was a picture of him in what he thought of as his working attire, and not his school clothes, but it was enough.

Yesterday, the paper hit delivery and he started getting stares from students. Mac, unaware of the article, wondered what happened when, upon leaving the dorm for class, at least ten girls swarmed outside, wanting to spot him. Another tell-tale sign that something was up was that less than a handful of the ten were Asian. He smiled politely, using his good manners, as he was taught, then ran to class, being behind a few minutes. He noticed, on the way, several people smiled at him and a few pointed. Something was up, he realized. When he got to class, entering at the last minute, breathing heavily from his dash, he plopped down in his usual seat. The professor walked over and stood in front of him tapping his foot.

Shoot! Am I late? Mac looked at the clock on the wall. No. Not late. Right on time. Whew!

He breathed a sigh of relief. This particular professor didn’t tolerate tardiness, nor anything else, for that matter. This was one of his professors that told him he could not rearrange anything on the schedule to accommodate his performances. Mac classified him as a P.I.A., Professor Pain-In-the-Ass, always by the book on everything, not wanting to hear any other opinions on the subject material. It was his way or no way. Mac considered dropping the class, but it was a required course for graduation, so he stuck it out. So far, he had been extremely careful, after getting a negative response from the professor, to try to blend in with the class. Mac remembered, the beginning of the semester, when he’d asked if he could take any exams early or late to accommodate his work schedule.

What kind of work is this, Mr. Young? the professor asked.

I have a job in South Korea, sir, Mac answered, wanting to be specifically vague. I fly there on long weekends or school holidays. While true most times, Mac also flew to Japan, Jakarta, or wherever the management booked the band during his school breaks.

What kind of job requires you to fly halfway around the world for a long weekend? Isn’t that a little tiring? How can you keep up with your classwork and jet set all over the place? You work in South Korea? No offense, but you don’t look Korean.

The professor was now more than a little curious, and skeptical that Mac would be able to do the work the course demanded.

Well, sir, so far I have managed to keep up with my classwork and I’ve been doing it for about a year and a half. I have usually gotten permission from past professors to take tests or turn in assignments a little early or late, if a situation comes up that presents a conflict.

Mac still wanted to stay away from mentioning that he was in a pop group.

And what kind of work is this? I might excuse you if you tell me you fly around the world working as a secret NATO intelligence officer or some such, but I doubt that, very much, since you haven’t graduated, yet, and they don’t take anyone without good grades and a degree. What is it, exactly, that you do, Mr. Young?

The professor wasn’t backing down.

Mac sighed. He’d have to tell.

Well, I sort of promote world peace through music. I’m in a K-pop group.

A K-pop what? That sounds like some breakfast food, to me.

The professor was looking more and more stern.

K-pop stands for Korean Pop, and it is music. I’m in a music group.

There, Mac had said it.

A pop group? The professor still had that stern look on his face. The answer is no, Mr. Young. You won’t get any special consideration just because you play in a band. Tell this band to postpone their concerts until after the semester so that you can devote yourself to your coursework.

I’d love to do that, but I have a contract to fulfill. Never mind, Professor, I’ll do my best to complete all the coursework on time, on your schedule.

Mac left disappointed. Most of his other professors were amused when he told them about his job, but sometimes he got the opposite reaction, like today. He’d work it out. He always did.

Yesterday the professor stood over Mac, in front of his seat, holding a copy of the student newspaper and tapping his foot. He wasn’t smiling, a bad sign to start the day. Mac looked up at him, questioningly.

See that this doesn’t interfere with your classwork, Mr. Young.

The professor threw the newspaper on top of Mac’s desk. Mac picked it up and scanned the headline then slumped back down in his seat.

Student Big Star in K-pop Group!

It was in bold letters, plastered across the front of the paper, along with a picture of Mac in his costume. Inside, there was an article that told all about G5, Mac, and the band’s latest release.

Hey! Is that you?

The student next to him in class leaned over to look at the newspaper.

All Mac could do was shrug. He wondered how this was going to affect him at school. He’d been pretty obscure on campus, up to now. It was refreshing compared to other places where the band was popular, like Seoul, and all the hoards of fans.

Returning to the dorm, after class, Mac again endured several stares and people pointing.

Oh well, he thought, it still isn’t as bad as a normal day in Seoul.

If it were like Seoul, he wouldn’t be able to walk anywhere without being surrounded by fans. He looked up from his cell phone, checking his messages as he approached the dorm entrance. Gads! There were several girls, again, all waiting at the door. He felt himself blush when he realized they were all staring at him. Maybe he’d talk to the R.A. to see if he could enter through one of the back doors. Currently, though, this was the only entrance. All the other doors were exit only. Thank goodness only a couple of hours remained before he caught the bus and headed for home.

He endured the extra scrutiny from the campus co-eds during the next few classes, then squeezed through the girls to get into the dorm, again, later. He threw his computer, iPod, and notebook into a backpack and, after threading his way through the same bunch of girls, ran to catch the bus. It pulled in ten minutes ago, according to the app he brought up on his phone, and he had about five minutes to board before it left. Being in shape and able to run just about anywhere, he made it and, breathing a sigh of relief, climbed on before it pulled out. He found a seat, popped in his ear buds and closed his eyes, shutting out the world until the bus pulled into his stop for home. He hopped off and hiked the two miles to his house.

If he asked, K-Entertainment would have easily provided curb-to-curb car service for him everywhere, but he still didn’t view himself as a celebrity, needing all that special treatment. None of the other guys in the band used K-Entertainment’s transportation on their off hours, either. They all drove their own vehicles. The management didn’t approve, and had told them as much several times, but all of them preferred their own. It gave them the flexibility they desired, to go anywhere at any time. They all dealt with the fans in their own ways, and avoided places where they knew they would have trouble.

K-Entertainment never bothered Mac much about using company cars. Because he was still fairly unknown in the U.S., Mac preferred to take his own transportation. While he could have kept a car on campus, it would have sat unused, in a remote parking lot for most of the time he resided on campus. He thought it was easier to catch the bus. He also didn’t mind walking home from the bus stop. One of his parents could pick him up and drive him home, and did if it was raining or cold, but Mac preferred the walk when it was nice weather. It gave him a chance to enjoy the outdoors and the downtime, something he didn’t get much of, otherwise.

It was still light enough that he could see several cars parked in the driveway and on the street when he approached the house.

Right, the cultural committee, he remembered.

To avoid interrupting his mother and her group, he went around to the back door and let himself into the kitchen. He threw his pack on the table and immediately stuck his head in the refrigerator, inspecting anything that looked edible. He was hungry, having missed dinner while on the bus. There was a large dish of rice and another of pork and vegetables with a note on the digital display on the refrigerator, Dan, eat the bibimbap if you are hungry.

He smiled. He loved his mother’s Korean dishes. It was one of the best things about coming home. He pulled the dish out and popped it into the microwave. Grabbing a beer from the side of the fridge, as well, he downed it in three or four large gulps. He heard the refrigerator record the changes with three small beeps.

He carried his second brew, a pair of chopsticks, and the hot leftovers and went outside, on the end of the deck to eat, sitting in a chair under the window of his father’s study. It was cool on the deck, dark, and quiet. The house had been warm, almost hot, so the colder air refreshed him. He happily munched his dinner and listened to the night sounds as the sky darkened. This kind of quiet would never happen at school. Music blared, people yelled, or traffic interrupted at all times of the day and night. Mac drank in the silence then heard voices from inside his father’s study. He noticed the window cracked slightly, letting the sound of his father's voice filter outside to the deck.

…Joo Jae Wook, he heard his father say, I’m not sure what name he goes by in the U.S., but it will be something common and American, like Smith or Jones. Remember, he speaks American English like a native. Be on the lookout for him. You’ve got his picture. He might be arriving sometime within the next few days in Korea.

His father must be talking with someone on the phone, Mac surmised. He heard long pauses, then his father would say something, then more pauses.

Right, his father answered. He tends to blend in. There’s nothing outstanding about his appearance when he is disguised. That is probably one reason why he was chosen….Uh huh, right. Yes, you heard correct. If we find him, we have instructions to take him out, if necessary.

What? Mac must not be hearing his father correctly. Did he tell someone that they were going to kill a man? He relaxed. Take him out, probably meant exactly that. Whomever he was talking to had to find the man and take him out to dinner or something. Mac wondered with whom his father conversed, and concluded it was probably a colleague at a college in Seoul. His father spoke Korean over the phone, not English.

Mac’s father, Sam Young, taught as a professor at another nearby college. At sixty years old, his father looked forward to being able to retire soon and write, or so he claimed. His mother predicted that his father would never quit until they kicked him out. Since the school didn’t have a mandatory retirement age, Mac knew his father might still be teaching in his seventies.

Of course, writing, to his father, didn’t mean composing the next great novel. It meant writing software. His father was a professor of software engineering. Mac didn’t know anyone more up-to-date with today’s technology than his father, even though he was an older man. He was constantly upgrading all his hardware and software at home. Their house had so many gadgets, it wasn’t funny. His father wrote and installed the house’s own security system, as well as an application that monitored and constantly adjusted the ambient air temperature inside the house. Another program tracked all the household appliances, basically anything that was plugged into an outlet, and kept statistics on their usage. Yet another program monitored all the food in the refrigerator and pantry and noted when a particular item needed replacing, automatically adding it to a running shopping list on his mother’s phone. Mac could go on and on about the programs that his father created and that managed the house and their lives, all hooked together and accessible from any computer at home, or remotely.

Over the years, Mac had been educated on the programs and even learned how to fool them. After all, they were only as good as the man that programmed them. Mac learned the blind areas of the security cameras and used those spaces when he didn’t want either parent to know what he was doing. He also figured out how to replace beer bottles in the refrigerator with ones filled with water to fool the program into thinking that a full six pack was still available for consumption. That came in handy until he was caught and punished. Mac learned several other secrets and back doors to his father’s programs and was more than a little proud that he had outsmarted the person he viewed as the wisest computer whiz on the planet.

What Mac didn’t know was that his father was also very proud of him. His father knew of every secret Mac discovered, and welcomed him to break his programs. By now, Mac was adding little tweaks and changes to the household system and thought his father didn’t know about those small lines of code. His father knew all about them, all right, and loved it that his son had not only learned everything, but was smart enough to make educated changes without bringing down the system.

Keep me posted. I’ll expect another report tomorrow. If you see him arrive at the airport, let me know immediately.

His father concluded the conversation. A few minutes later, the kitchen door opened and he came out onto the deck.

Dan! You’re home. I see you’ve helped yourself to dinner. His father greeted him by squeezing Mac’s shoulder, and sat down in one of the other chairs on the deck. I’d just as soon stay away from your mother’s committee. I might get roped into something embarrassing, like last year.

Mac laughed. Last year his mother made his father dress up as a historical emperor for the fair.

Well, last year was better than the year before, when you had to wear the panda costume.

At least, in the bear costume, I could be anonymous. For weeks after I wore the emperor costume, everyone I knew called me jeonha and bowed to me. Mac’s father used the word in Korean referring to royalty. So, you are here for the night, huh? Got a busy week ahead of you?

Yeah. I have an eight o’clock flight tomorrow morning. I’ve got a concert on Saturday, and we’re booked for appearances every day after that, until another performance on Friday and two more on that Saturday. I’ll be flying home on Sunday.

No rest for the weary, I guess. It sounds like you’ll be extremely busy, and probably exhausted by that Sunday when you fly home. Don’t slack off on your school work.

His father couldn’t resist the reminder that school was important. Mac knew education was paramount to him. He had earned his PhD and now was a full professor. He wanted his son to take his education seriously, and he didn’t doubt that Mac did. He was proud of how well his son juggled school, the job with the band, and that Mac had elected to continue on to graduate school.

Sam frowned. Looking behind Mac, he noticed the study window, open a few inches. Surprised that the security system hadn’t complained, he mentally made a