@broadwaybaggins brought up a very fantastic point in a reply about toby remembering when his father was on trial and does he not want his children to go through that also
toby is scarred and angry at his own dad for committing murder, for hardly ever being around and emotionally available, leaving them all behind for years in prison. and here he is. tobias ziegler saying he is fully prepared to face prison time. but dont you dare mention his two children. don't dare mention what is going through his mind - thinking about repeating these same mistakes. missing more years of huck and molly's lives because he's not with them. he doesn't want them dragged into this.
Whatever you do don’t think about the meetings with the lawyer in the living room of the Brooklyn apartment, meetings that the girls skipped work for and Toby would press his ear against the bedroom door to listen in on, don’t think of the four of them sitting in a row in the courtroom in their best clothes, hair combed, shoes spit-shined, Toby putting his hand on David’s shoulder because he won’t stop fidgeting and Ma is too distracted to tell him to settle (and Toby can’t be more than, what, ten or twelve here? David is five or six maybe?). Don’t think of how the lawyer gestured to the children and reminded the court how they needed their father, can’t anyone see that, won’t anyone think of them? Don’t think about how Toby wanted to cry and scream and punch that lawyer in the face and how he couldn’t look his father in the eye.
