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Acquiring a driver's license is a right of passage for most young adults. Rick was no exception. Since he was a boy he dreamed of the day that he would be able to motor down the highway in a new car with "his girl" by his side.

Problem is, in the small town where he lived there was only one driving school. Unlike the automatic driving schools located in large towns they only offered lessons on a manual drive car.

That ordinarily would have been no problem, as the only car Rick would be able to drive at home once he got his license was his uncle's old beat-up Fiat. But, he knew that in order to pass the road test he would need to also demonstrate he was able to drive an automatic shift car and the only way he couldacquire that kind of experience was to enroll in one of the automatic driving schools.

The closest of the three automatic driving schools to Rick's home was Whelan's. They offered a special scheme where students with special needs could apply for a special scholarship program to attend one of their automatic driving schools.

So every day, Rick went to the library to work on his scholarship application. Never a greater speller or writer, he labored over the lengthy application struggling to find the right words and the right way to express the need for him to be selected one of the three students that would be chosen this year for this coveted scholarship.

Marian, the head librarian, noticed the polite, quiet boy right away. It wasn't often that young lads his age visited the library so often and worked so diligently on a project and she was curious about what had brought him there.

At first, Rick was embarassed by her attention and her inquiries. He thought perhaps she was going to tell him he couldn't spend so much time at the library and at the computer or that she would think he was some sort of "Nancy Boy," but instead she offered to read his application and offered suggestions on how he could make it more compelling.

Before long, both Rick and Marian looked forward to their daily "tutoring" sessions. Marian suggested that instead of telling her why he wanted to learn how to drive he write stories about why a driver's license was so important to him and what he would do once he had it.

Their unlikely "friendship" paid off. Rick won one of the coveted scholarships at the automatic driving school, passed his practical test, and the first person he took for a spin in his uncle's old beat-up Fiat was Marian, the librarian -- "his girl."