ANDREW J. BAILEY: Good Father, Good
Listener
Miosotys
Fernandez decided to go out with Andrew J. Bailey to stop
his best friend from pestering her about it. He is a
really nice guy, the friend would say, but Ms. Fernandez
only saw a low-key, calm guy -- "very tranquilo," she
remembered -- not really her type. "I was used to the
thugs and the cuties," she said.
Mr. Bailey, a 29-year-old who was born in England of
Jamaican parents and had come to the states as a
teenager, was no thug but he did look a little like
Michael Jordan. He and Ms. Fernandez had jobs at the
World Trade Center -- he was an Advantage Security
supervisor for Marsh & McLennan and she was an
administrative assistant with the Port Authority -- and
after their first lunch date they became inseparable.
They worked out in the morning, had lunch somewhere in
the towers every day and went home to Queens, where Mr.
Bailey helped raise Ms. Fernandez's three young
daughters. He also had an 8-year-old daughter, Veronica.
Ms. Fernandez said he was a devoted father, a good
basketball player and an even better listener.
On Sept. 11, Ms. Fernandez was coming out of the
subway and dialing Mr. Bailey on the 93rd floor of 1
World Trade Center to tell him she was getting breakfast
for the two of them when the first plane hit. She
lingered in the area, calling and calling his number,
until the first tower collapsed.
Ms. Fernandez, 29, keeps calling and leaving messages
on his voice mail. "I like hearing his voice," she said.
"I tell him that I love him."
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