Whitney in Charge (17 page)

“Since we’re all tearing up here, I might as well give you something Mom wanted each of us to have. A few days before she died, she gave me instructions not to give it right away. It’s bothered me waiting a month, so I want to give it to you now. She wrote journals to each of us.”

“I saw her writing a lot, but I didn’t realize it was something for us,” Shannon said. “I wish she’d mentioned it to me.”

Regan said in low voice, “I’m glad she didn’t tell me. I loved the last day she felt better…
right before she died and we chatted and laughed. I curled up next to her and she held me close to her.”

Whitney left them to talk while she went to their mother’s bedroom. She’d seen the jealousy in Shannon’s eyes. Mom giving her the journals hadn’t meant anything special.
I’d been with her the most, so of course, she’d given them to me.

She carried the three journals to the kitchen. “After she made three copies, she had me take them to Office Depot to get them bound and told me what colors to get for the covers.”

“They look so pretty.” Regan extended her hand and Whitney handed her the one with a red color. “She even thought about our favorite colors.”

“Mine must be the yellow one,” Shannon said.

“Yes and mine is blue.” She held Shannon’s bound book for a second before handing it to her. “Shannon, she gave me this job because I was with her so much, not because she loved me the best. She loved us all equally. She had no favorites. I just wanted to clear the air on that point.”

“I’m sorry,” Shannon said. “You two always were so close. Sometimes I felt left out.”

“Mom talked to me about you and Regan all the time when I lived in New York. I think Mom held on as long as she did because she loved us all a great deal.”

Regan glanced up from her book. “Did you read this yet?”

Whitney shook her head. “I wanted to wait until you had yours.”

Shannon sighed. “She instilled in us such a strong belief that we could do anything we wanted, but yet she didn’t believe in her writing. I told her many times to submit her manuscripts to an editor. She said they weren’t good enough but I loved the ones I read.”

“She said her writing wasn’t as great as Hemingway and Margaret Mitchell,” Regan said. “A mediocre writer like herself shouldn’t have dreams of becoming a published author.”

“She could be stubborn,” Whitney agreed. “She helped several of her students to become more than mediocre writers. Several have successful careers in the publishing world because of her influence.”

Shannon had a thoughtful look. “We should get her novels out and think about getting them published too.”

Regan frowned. “We might have a difficult time since she’s not alive but we can try.”

“I wish I’d thought of our TV show before she died. I bet Mom could’ve given us a great name for our program.” Whitney stared at her mother’s journal. “She was definitely a creative person when it came to writing.”

“I think you’ll come up with a great title,” Regan said. “You thought of
The Bold News
. I wish we could steal it.”

Whitney laughed. “I don’t think Molly would ever let us get away with that.”

Shannon rubbed her finger over her bottom lip. “We could use our maiden name and call it something like The Taylor Women or Sisters.”

“It sounds like a soap opera,” Whitney said.

“I think we need something with chicks in it. Like the Chicks’ News.” Regan shrugged. “I wish Mom could pop in like she used to when we were talking about stuff. Remember how she’d put her hands on her hips and attempted a stern look. Then she’d say, ‘Hey, I wasn’t invited. I see you three are having a gabfest without me’.”

Whitney thought for a moment. “That’s it,
Regan. We can call our program... The Chick Gabfest Show.”

On Monday morning, Whitney drank coffee from a red mug in Regan’s kitchen. “You make the best coffee.”

Shannon nodded. “It’s good. But I better not drink too much. I have a long class to teach this morning.”

“Give them a break so you can go pee,” Whitney said. She wondered if there was a class she could teach at the college on broadcasting. She definitely had time for it.

“I mix several types together and one has a cinnamon flavor.” Regan moved away from the coffeepot and carried her cup to join her sisters at the table. “I’m glad you two could come over. I have tons to tell you. Myra invited me over yesterday. It helped more than I ever thought it would. We’re going to get together here in a week.”

Shannon poured cream in her coffee. “I think it’s wonderful you can talk to your mother-in-law about being a firefighter’s wife.”

Whitney wondered what Myra thought of the whole Anna thing. “Did you tell her about Anna?”

“She’s livid about Anna going after Casey.” Regan leaned forward in her chair. “But we didn’t just talk about loose women and our hot guys. I bounced ideas off Myra about our business. She liked the TV show a lot. She watches
Cooking with Cora
and thinks we’ll give it new life if Cora’s agreeable about sharing her show with us.”

“Cora just had heart surgery recently so I won’t call her yet, but I’ll have Ben put a good word in for us,” Whitney said.

“If we ever want a comedian on the program, I’m your woman,” Regan said.

Whitney laughed. “Okay.”

Regan said, “See, I didn’t even make a joke and you laughed. I’m a natural.”

Whitney rubbed her lower lip. “We need to think about what we definitely want in our pilot.”

“Hey, before you go too deep into producer mode, how was your hot date on Saturday?” Regan bit into an oatmeal cookie. “I can’t believe you didn’t call me.”

Shannon nodded. “Did you two hit it off?”

“I had a great time with Jack.”

“Who’s the better kisser? Ben or Jack?” Regan asked.

She raised her eyebrows. “What makes you think we kissed?”

Regan shrugged. “You kissed Ben on the first date, and you seem to like Jack a lot so it seems like a probable deduction on my part.”

Did Regan have to be so nosy about her romantic life? What was she thinking? She didn’t have a romantic life, just because she’d gone out with Ben and Jack. She hadn’t forgotten Rob. “I definitely feel more of a physical attraction for Jack and—”

Regan frowned. “I thought you liked kissing Ben by the waterfall.”

“I did but I enjoy Jack’s kisses too. I have to admit that I like Jack a lot. I love looking into his gorgeous blue eyes.” She sighed. “And his smile makes my knees go weak.”

“You still need to see Ben since he knows Cora’s husband,” Shannon reminded her. “We need his connection.”

“No problem. I’m going out with Ben again.”

“Well, it’d be hard not to be attracted to Jack with him looking like Chris Pine.” Regan took a swallow of coffee.

“Jack’s taller too, ” Whitney said.

Regan raised her eyebrows. “I wonder if Jack had a vasectomy.”

With a puzzled look, Shannon said, “Why would you think such a thing? He’s young and single.”

“Matt Lauer on
Today
mentioned how some unmarried men are getting them because they don’t want to have children,” Regan explained. “
Ever
. I thought that was hard to believe, but Matt talked to this good-looking guy who had a vasectomy. He’s only twenty-eight years old. He wants to get married someday but doesn’t want any kids.”

“I hope that man tells his dates upfront how he definitely doesn’t want children.” Shannon rose and refilled her cup.

Regan grinned at Shannon. “I thought you didn’t want to drink too much so you don’t have to leave your college students to go pee.”

Shannon shrugged. “I decided I need the caffeine more than I need to worry about a potty break.”

She should relieve Regan’s mind on the vasectomy issue. “I’m sure Jack hasn’t been sterilized since it’s a pretty permanent procedure. He said he wants kids.”

Shannon gave Regan a thoughtful look. “Maybe you shouldn’t wait to have another baby. Tim and I wanted to have more children, but I never could get pregnant again.” Shannon became silent when her gaze shifted to Whitney.

“It’s okay. You can say it. Rob and I never got around to having children. That’s one of my biggest regrets.” Why had they waited? Putting it off had been a bad decision.

“Casey and I talked about having another baby now and not waiting any longer. I gave it my best shot and tried to convince Casey to continue being a paramedic and quit as a firefighter. I’m realistic enough to know he’s never going to quit putting out fires and rescuing people. He wants to be fire chief so much when his dad retires.”

“He’ll make a great chief,” Shannon said.

“I want to talk to Myra what it’s like to be a fire chief’s wife and my fears,” Regan said. “So far we only talked about aggressive Anna. Myra’s had to deal with a husband and two sons being firefighters.”

“Myra’s had a lot of stress with three men she loves having dangerous careers.” Shannon picked up a cookie from the plate. “I better grab a cookie before Regan eats all of them.”

“Remember how we’ve talked about our secret desires. I just had a thought.” Regan paused for a moment. “After we’re doing well on TV, we could offer to grant a secret desire to someone. Nothing kinky, of course. We can even tell our secret desires to get the ball rolling.”

Whitney giggled, remembering Regan’s desire. “Our ratings should go up when you mention wanting more sex. You better be sure to say with your husband or you might be flooded with offers.”

Shannon looked unhappy. “Let’s keep our show PG rated.”

“I’ll give becoming a comedian as my desire,” Regan said. “Although the sex response might make Casey jealous.”

“We’ll have to put a limit on how expensive it can be,” Shannon said.

Whitney said, “We might be able to get a company to provide some monetary assistance since they’d get free advertising.”

Regan looked at her. “You should start taking your drum lessons, and you can share what you learned during your beginning lessons.”

“I love it,” Whitney said. “I can have my instructor on to talk about playing drums. You might have to be our segment producer. I like your ideas.”

Shannon sipped her coffee. “By the way, I’m getting my cycle for Mother’s Day instead of waiting for my birthday.”

“Cool. I’m glad you decided to get it now.” Whitney wondered if they could do something with the cycle desire. “How about we have you give safety tips? I don’t mean just telling how you should wear a helmet, but how to prevent cycle and car collisions.”

Shannon laughed. “Mom would love how we’re doing a show and coming up with new ideas for it.”

They hadn’t mentioned getting together on Mother’s Day, Whitney realized. It’d be hard on her with Mom gone. She wasn’t a mother so didn’t have children to spend the day with. But she could visit the cemetery. And there was something else she wanted to do. She hadn’t read her mother’s journal she’d written for her. Mother’s Day might be a good day to read it.

“Do you think we should go swimming on Mother’s Day or skip it this year?” Regan asked.

“It’s going to be hard either way. We’re going to miss her if we swim in her pool, but if we ignore her tradition, the day won’t feel right.” Shannon turned to look at Whitney. “What do you think?”

Whitney thought for a moment. “Let’s go ahead and plan on swimming. If you want to eat out with your families first, that’s fine. I’m going to visit the cemetery some time on Mother’s Day.”

“Maybe we can go together to visit Mom and Dad’s plot,” Regan said.

Shannon rose and walked to the dishwasher. “Don’t forget Mom always went on Memorial Day weekend to take wreaths for her parents’ plots. We could go to Mom’s and Dad’s when we visit our grandparents’ plots.”

“I like going to the cemetery one time instead of twice. My emotions can’t take going two times in one month,” Regan said. “But how about we do all of it on Mother’s Day this year?”

Shannon looked up after placing her cup on the top rack. “That sounds better to go on Mother’s Day. I’ll get the wreaths sometime.”

Whitney opened a blue folder and removed papers. “Since I was hoping we’d decide to go on with our TV show, I did a written treatment of our show last week. I didn’t do any budget yet.” She glanced at Shannon. “You and I can work on the budget sometime soon because we want to demonstrate we can think both creatively and practically.”

Regan squealed when she saw the top paper with her picture. “Whit, I love the cover sheet.”

Whitney grinned. “I thought you might.” Underneath the heading “The Chick Gabfest Show” she’d put starring, then pictures of them with their names.

Regan turned to the second page. “I like your points you emphasized here.”

Shannon nodded and read out loud, “Intelligent, appealing personalities with chemistry. Relationship between the three hosts as sisters and good friends.”

“This is called a
leave behind
because if the executive is unsure whether he likes my pitch, he may read this treatment and like it better on paper. And hopefully this will help seal the deal.”