The Boss

Chapter 2

Sorry it's short, but It's kinda an introduction to Maddy. It'll get better next chappie.

Chapter 2    

Maddy pulled her long red hair up, twisting it around and pinning it with the help of a simple crocodile clip. Then turning on the warm water, she splashed her sleepy face, rubbing away all the sleep.  

She had crashed late last night. All the marking and grading had kept her up. As much as she loved teaching, marking books was one of the worst things. But hey, every dream came with a condition, and she was not complaining.   What a lie. She probably would complain the as soon as she was in the school staff room. It was a part of having a job.  

Brushing her teeth, she looked up at herself in the mirror, cringing at the state of her reflection. She looked hideous. Her red hair was all over the place, her long side fringe sticking in every direction around her small face. The eyeliner she had been wearing yesterday had smudged all around her green eyes and made her look all emo gothic.  

Groaning, Maddy glared at herself, then dragged her heavy feet, with the rest of her on top, she left the breezy cold bathroom.  

Blinking away the blurriness in her eyes, she glanced around her bedroom. Everything was in place. The balcony door was firmly shut, the wardrobe was where it was supposed to e, in its spot near the room door, which was also shut, and her dresser was still next to the wardrobe, opposite her bed.   There were no dirty foot prints on the cream rug, spread across the laminated floor and the flat screen TV, hanging above the dresser was still there. The only thing that needed to be done was fixing the bed. Other than that all was normal.  

Breathing a sigh of relief, Maddy relaxed her stiff posture. She could not help feeling paranoid all he time. It was because of her father and even though it had been over two years since she had left him and moved out, she was still affected by the consequences of his life that had ruined her childhood. It did not help that every morning when she woke, her scar, running diagonal, across the length of her back, throbbed in reminder that she was a soiled person.  

Shaking her head of all the negativity, Maddy went over to her bed and worked on fixing the plump duvet over it. Her back throbbed again when she leaned over, and she cursed silently. The doctor had warned her never to put pressure on her back but she had always been the type to sleep on her back, a habit she picked from her father, and it was difficult to sleep on her sides.  

Done with the bed, she made her way over to her dresser, snatched up the wooden comb lying on top and let her hair loose. All the red spilled down her back and shoulders in a waterfall of tangles. It was going to be painful work to get all of the knots out. It did not help that she had only twenty minutes to do that, plus throw on some decent clothes, grab a taxi and get to school. If she was lucky, Martha would pick her up in her minivan; if she wasn’t then her friend would forget.  

Mondays were the worst days. After two days of chilling and taking a break, Mondays rolled along and just complicated things up. Even teachers, who loved their jobs, could not care much for Mondays? And she, Maddy, was the worst of the lot.  

Pulling on a sweater dress, she placed a black wide belt around her waist, clasping it at the front. Then grabbing a pair of leggings from her drawer, she put them on. Lastly she zipped up boots that concealed most of her leg from the bottom. Feeling a lot more presentable, Maddy took a hair stick from her dresser and twisted her hair up, keeping her fringe brushed at the side so it would notcome in the way of her eyes. Eyesight was necessary as a teacher. Especially when your students were a loud crazy bunch.  

Then she inspected her face in the mirror. Her eyes were still smudged. Wetting a napkin, she dabbed her eyes, cleaning all the black away. Clean and ready to go, Maddy applied a bit of gloss to her lips and took her bag, heavy with books, and legged it out her apartment, stopping only to glance the clock, realizing that she was five minutes late. No way on Earth was she getting to school on time. It was ten minutes away. Not that she expected to anyway.  

Huffing and puffing under the weight, she trudged to the lift, feeling a little frustrated that she could not go any faster. Going fast was not the easiest thing to do while carrying a bag weighing half a ton. Seemed as if she had not grown up.

Why? Well because this was so not the first time this was happening. It was her routine. She did this every darn week.  

Praying mentally, that Martha would be waiting for her, Maddy got into the lift, sighing when she was inside the box and leaning against the cool wall in relief.  

It was only when the door slid shut did she realize that she as not alone. A young man, late in his twenties, was standing on the other side of the lift, wearing a suit, a briefcase in one hand, and his daughter’s and in the other. Both; father and child were eying her curiously, like she was some circus freak one wrong.  

Maddy flushed easily, embarrassed. She had no idea why, so she looked away, keeping her gaze down like a good modest woman and wondered why she had never seen the duo before. The people in these apartments were pretty tight and the two years she had spent here had been full of friendship. So naturally, after going through the same routine, she knew who would be entering the lift at this time in the morning, and so far nobody had.  

At least the man was polite.

 “Hello, I’m Eric, and this is my daughter Hailey. We’re new here.”  

Maddy looked up, surprised that the gentleman was speaking to her. Smiling shyly, she gave a nervous wave, aware that the man had not offered his hand to her. No doubt he thought she was weird.  

“I’m Madeline Middleton, Maddy for short. Pleased to meet you.”  

Eric nodded politely and turned to speak to his daughter. Maddy sighed again and wondered why she always made the worst of impressions. It was just her luck that she always ended up doing something weird or was always found in a very distraught state when some stranger walked in.  

Luckily, she only lived on the second floor so the journey down did not take too long. As soon as the doors opened, she made a swift dash, managing not to trip over, under all the weight.  No one was around, and she was glad for it. People usually stopped to greet her if they ever caught her, and she was in a hurry.  

Too much in a hurry. Somehow, she managed to run straight into a pillar, missing the swinging doors, and blacked out. The last thing she heard was gruff noises and the thunk of her bag hitting the tiled floor.Some rough hands took hold of her arms and then she was out, gone to the world of black...where ever that was.  

How can my day get any better, she thought to herself as she slipped under.