The Longer The Fall by Aviva Gat (best new books to read txt) 📗

all. The youngest had gotten stuck in the crossfire between a gang fight and had been killed when he was 12.

Like Madeline, Hunter was also someone focused on his ambitions. He was also someone who believed he was going somewhere in life. But that somewhere was very different for Hunter, as was his path to success. Instead of reaching the top through private school, an expensive education, and associations with networking clubs meant to breed success, Hunter had to claw his way up through obstacles and his community who didn’t understand him. They didn’t understand why he read books by white authors. They didn’t understand why he worked for a white man like Bill Smith. They didn’t understand why he tried to follow a legal and political system that was built to suppress them. But Hunter understood things differently. Where he was going, he also needed to be a part of the system. The system that needed to be changed from the inside out.

Chapter 16

The love story of Madeline and Hunter was thrilling as any young love is. The two of them fell hard and deep together, despite their differences. While Madeline was finishing her senior year at Columbia and figuring out what to do next, Hunter was working hard at his two jobs and volunteering at a local youth center to mentor young children. They welcomed each other into their different worlds.

Madeline brought him to her events for the College Republican National Club. Hunter hadn’t been much interested in politics at the time, but he came to support Madeline and often found himself at the center of debates with Madeline and her friends. The college republicans enjoyed having Hunter there, he brought new perspectives, challenged them, and helped them finetune their debate talking points. He himself also discovered his own ability for oratory and often planned his own tactics for upcoming CRNC debates.

Hunter also brought Madeline to the local youth center, where she helped elementary school children with their homework and tried to instill in them dreams that they never could have come up with on their own. “Do your math homework, and you could become a doctor or an astronaut!” she would say to children who had never before been told that they could aspire to such professions. When kids called Hunter for help when they got in trouble, Madeline would sometimes come along, hugging the boys who moments before thought they were too old for mothering but soon realized they needed it. Madeline would never forget one time a 16-year-old girl had called Hunter and asked to speak with Madeline. She had been raped and found out she was pregnant. Not knowing who else to call, she figured the white lady would know what to do. Madeline took her to a Planned Parenthood for an abortion and then to a Tasti D-Lite for ice cream. Madeline had felt honored that the girl had trusted her enough to let her help.

They loved crossing over into each other’s worlds, but even more than that, they loved being alone together. They could spend hours talking about their aspirations—Madeline was going to be a politician, the first female president if she dared to dream. She wanted to help women advance, with fair pay, control over their bodies, and less fear of sexual harassment when thriving in a man’s world. In fact, she hated that it was a man’s world and she hoped she could change that too. “You don’t sound like a republican,” Hunter would tell her. “Fiscally, I am,” she’d respond and then she would talk about how she believed in smaller government and less involvement in people’s lives. “Libertarianism,” she called it.

Hunter also had dreams. He wanted to be a community organizer in Harlem and help turn around the neighborhood. He wanted it to be a place where everyone felt safe and 16-year-old girls didn’t get raped on their way home from school because the boys were also busy doing productive things, having jobs and supporting their families.

Of course their relationship was more than just about dreams. When Hunter touched Madeline, she felt shock waves move through her body. Just his fingertips on the small of her back could make her tremble. When he kissed her, with his thick lips, she wanted to melt inside him. His arms, strong from hours of landscaping work six days a week, made her feel small and protected in a way no one else had. There was a fire between them that was hard to put out. Madeline wanted to always be touching him, whether holding his hand, brushing their knees or wrapped around each other in bed, it was never enough.

Unfortunately, their touch was not always a welcomed sight in public. While their peers said they accepted Madeline’s and Hunter’s relationship, their eyes said differently. When Hunter held Madeline’s hand at university functions, eyes often drifted and stuck at their intertwined fingers instead of focusing on the couple’s faces during conversations. At the community center, girls and women tsked their teeth when Hunter snuck a kiss on Madeline’s cheek. The couple tried to ignore these instances. Other people didn’t matter, they didn’t understand their love. They were primitive in their beliefs and one day in the future, skin color and background wouldn’t matter. People would see others for their brains, their personality, not their skin tone. It was only a matter of time.

When Madeline graduated, Hunter attended all the ceremonies and sat politely with Madeline’s parents while she walked across the stage to receive her diploma. He took pictures of her and her parents and posed in pictures with Madeline in her teal cap and gown. When the weekend of festivities was over, Madeline’s mother hugged Hunter and then pulled Madeline close and whispered in her ear, “It’s time to grow up now, honey. You’re entering the real world now.” Madeline thanked her mother for the advice and said