A little girl's heroes behind the heroes

Clancy's first observation was that his lively new charge – who begged him to play games with her instead of doing assignments – was in need of authority.

"Sometimes I would just have to tell her, 'Ali, sit down here and if you get up, I'm leaving,' " he recalls. "I had to be a bit of the drill sergeant."

Whatever work he and Alexia couldn't complete in the morning, Liebowitz would pick up with her in the afternoon.

At the same time, Liebowitz was offering a few lessons to Frank Torres as well. Despite his own long hours, Frank had been trying to do homework with Alexia at night. But between Frank's fatigue and Alexia's gift for avoiding work, most evenings ended with ice cream, extra TV, and Frank filling in the answers for Alexia.

"She had him conned. She'd tell him she just couldn't get things. He'd come to me and say, 'Maybe this is too abstract for Alexia,' " says Liebowitz. "I'd have to tell him, 'No, she can do this.' "

It took time and effort, says Liebowitz, but Frank learned not to melt every time Alexia rolled her big, dark eyes at him.

Meanwhile, Clancy and Alexia were plugging away at reading – and at lengthening Alexia's attention span. Although Clancy felt tremendous sympathy for the child whose life had been turned upside down so abruptly by the events of Sept. 11, he was too much a hero of the old-school to accept that as an excuse for poor work.

Then one November day, as they looked at a story-book about ants, Alexia suddenly began to read out loud on her own.

Clancy still remembers the way her face shone as the words finally began making sense to her.

"It was like I entered into a whole new world," beams Alexia, recalling the moment.

From there on, Alexia the student grew by leaps and bounds. "Once she got it, she really came on strong," says Clancy.

In May, Liebowitz named Alexia Student of the Month.

* * *

Today life is back to normal for Alexia and the adults who surround her – although "normal," of course, is different now. For one thing, Alexia, although a star student and effervescent as ever, is less able to have her way with adults around her. She'll have a new teacher this year, but Liebowitz vows to keep an eye on her former pupil.

Carol retired from the police force on April 30. She actually completed 20 years in November and could have retired then but hung on until she was no longer so desperately needed.

"My wife was the true hero in all this," says Frank. "Our daughter is the most important thing in our lives. To break away from her and go back to work took real strength."

But Carol sees Clancy and Liebowitz as the heroes – a support squad pitching in and taking over when she couldn't.

Liebowitz, for her part, insists Alexia's turnaround is really a story about great teamwork, the way that she and Clancy and Carol and Frank all pulled together.

"What I think we all learned," says Frank, "is that we can't just focus on our own family or our own daughter. It has to be our school, our community. We all have to give to one another."

It's a lesson that has shaped Carol's new schedule for the fall. In addition to a part-time nursing job, she'll devote one day a week to a new activity. Inspired both by Clancy's example and a deep sense of gratitude for what happened to Alexia, Carol now works alongside Clancy – who is thrilled to have her as a colleague – as a volunteer tutor at Alexia's school.

But for Alexia, the best thing about the "new" normal is actually the way in which it resembles the past. "Second grade will be great," she predicts with her trademark sunny smile. "I won't need a tutor, and Mommy will be able to pick me up every day."

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