Erica Orloff - The Golden Girl

In her dressing room, Maddie shed her work clothes, surveying herself in the three-way mirror. The bruises from both her attack and Jimmy Valentine’s training showed when she was naked. She had one bruise on her thigh that had turned an eggplant color. Still, Maddie was proud of her body—taut, busty yet athletic—she knew she looked good. Her abdomen was completely flat, her upper arms toned.

She dressed in a black Donna Karan bodysuit and black jeans. Then she donned a pair of black half boots, pulling the leg of her pants over them, creating a lean silhouette. She put on a black blazer, twisted her blond hair into a loose chignon and touched up her makeup. She added a green scarf around her neck that instantly emphasized her eyes. She scrutinized herself extra carefully.

Maddie tried to kid herself, but then again, she was a no-nonsense person. The truth was she was excited to see John Hernandez.

Exiting the office, she told her administrative assistant she’d be gone for the rest of the day.

“I have my cell phone, though. If Ryan Greene calls, have him call me. That jerk is trying to steal the Aberdeen building right out from under me.”

Her assistant, Carla, smiled. “I swear he does that just to get to you.”

Maddie smiled. “I think he does. But he knows damn well who he’s messing with.”

She left the office and then walked ten blocks to the train station, grabbing a subway car bound for Harlem. She could have had Charlie drive her but she always took the train, not wanting to call attention to herself among the children at the school. There, she wanted to be an ordinary volunteer.

The Harlem Charter School for Excellence was the charity she chose for her work with the Gotham Roses when she joined a year ago. She had raised considerable funds for it over the year or so of her time with the Roses. But it was the gift of her time that meant the most to her. Renee always insisted that the Roses spend time—not just money—with their chosen charities. “It’s only by pruning ourselves, tending to our inner qualities of compassion, that we can really bloom,” was one of her sayings.

At the charter school, which was also supported by very large donations from the Pruitt Family Trust, she went by Madison Taylor. Only the principal knew her true identity. So she was able to show up once a week on Mondays, cutting short her day even though she usually returned to the office to work until the wee hours, to be a homework tutor with John Hernandez’s students, and she was able to do so without everyone thinking of her as the spoiled heiress “slumming it.” That wasn’t who she was or what she was about, but she wanted to be taken at face value.

Unexpectedly, over time, her friendship with the dark-haired young teacher grew until she found herself uncharacteristically with sweaty palms as she walked into John’s class each week. This week was no different.

“Here’s our homework angel,” John said. “Class, say hi to Ms. Taylor.”

The classroom full of sixth-graders gave her big smiles and a chorus of hellos. John held her gaze for a few seconds and smiled. Her stomach flip-flopped.

“Hi, everyone,” Madison said. “Hello, Mr. Hernandez,” she added with a playful tone to her voice.

She left her blazer on but put her purse in his file cabinet and immediately went to the computer-lab area to start helping the kids who were gathered there. She knew all of their names and most of their stories. And her heart both broke and soared for each one.

To be accepted to the charter school, each student had to sign a contract swearing off gangs, drugs and alcohol. They had to commit to two-hour homework sessions four days a week, and to achieving a B average or better—or be put on academic probation. Ideally, John had told her, the parents and family—or grandparents or involved adults—would also commit to the charter school’s principles. But that wasn’t always the case. Still, these kids made Maddie proud every week.

She leaned over the shoulder of Anna Williams, a favorite student of hers, and checked over her work.

“Great job, sweetie.”

Anna beamed. She had high hopes to be a lawyer, and like all the kids in John Hernandez’s class, an “anonymous” donor had agreed to fund a college education at a state university for anyone who maintained a B average or better all through high school. Maddie was secretly thrilled to think that someday, perhaps Anna, who was being raised by a very elderly great-grandmother in a wheelchair, might find herself an attorney for Pruitt & Pruitt.

But it was John Hernandez himself who intrigued Madison the most. Little by little he had shared his story. A crack-addict mother, a father shot dead in a drive-by shooting, little John Hernandez was raised by a grandmother who adored him. Even so, he found himself in a gang at ten for protection. He was shot not once, but on two separate occasions, in drive-bys, and he was stabbed in the chest during a fight over turf, the blade narrowly missing his heart.

Lying in a hospital bed in intensive care after being stabbed, he had told Madison that he had been “visited” by the spirit of his father while in a morphine haze, lingering in a netherworld between life and death. John, the most honest person Madison had ever met, had told her his father informed him he would be dead soon if he didn’t change his path. Then his father’s spirit, John said, laid hands on him and cured him. When John came to hours later, he discovered he had “died” for a full two minutes, only to be paddled and brought back by the trauma team. His young heart had apparently stopped beating and the doctors found a clot they had missed.

John, nearly sixteen, returned to his grandmother’s apartment a changed young man. He left the gang, got a job sweeping a Harlem store for minimum wage and worked his ass off to graduate high school on time. Eventually, he started college, applied for grants and got better and better jobs, his disarming good looks and smile winning him fans wherever he went. He had jet-black hair that he wore just a touch long, letting it curl at his collar. His cocoa-colored skin was smooth, and his eyes were so dark you couldn’t see his pupils in the black sea of his irises. Full lips, a strong nose and high cheekbones completed his look. Then there was his body, which Maddie decided was perfect, right down to the cross tattoo on his huge left biceps, which she’d spied once when he wore a polo shirt.

Eventually, John Hernandez worked his way up from the mailroom to a clerical position at Wade and Gonzalez, Attorneys-at-Law. Hector Gonzalez, a partner there, was impressed at the drive John had and mentored him, helping to put John through college with a loan with generous payback terms. Gonzalez always assumed John would perhaps become an attorney, but when he instead went back into his community to make a difference, Gonzalez couldn’t argue with him—and admired his commitment.

All Maddie knew was when, at the end of each Monday, he climbed on his Harley and drove away, she felt something inside that Ryan Greene and the other men who could discuss the bull or bear market, the fluctuation of the dollar and the impact of the Pacific Rim’s downturned economy on the American economy just didn’t do for her. She’d return to the office to work—often until midnight—but uncharacteristically her mind would often wander and replay each word of their conversations.

Maddie and John spent all afternoon with the kids. Every once in a while, he would come over to her and lean over the same student, his shoulder touching hers or his hand leaning on hers as they both held on to the back of the student’s chair. The kids would occasionally exchange giggles. Mr. Hernandez’s crush on Ms. Taylor was getting harder and harder to hide.