You know what? I had an idea for another chapter and I'm not about to go to work and be a busy zoo on a Saturday night only to forget everything. So even if I can't finish it before then, I can at least start it. So I will keep this author's note short and let you guys get right to the reading. At this rate though, I might stop putting genres at the end of the chapter summaries. They'll all be family one way or another, I bet. -_-
Disclaimer: You know what I mentioned would be different about HSM if I did own it, right?
Chapter Four Summary: You know how much can change in a year. But how much can stay the same? Taylor still has a lot of work to catch up on but will it cost her her job? And now that Cheryl's not so much a baby anymore what will she do first, walk or talk? (Genre: Family)
Chapter Four: Family Day?
"Workin hard or hardly workin?" Chad joked as he stepped into the bedroom on a sunny Saturday morning.
Taylor picked her head up. Her eyes had been glued to the laptop since she woke up and, aside from switching her position on the bed once in a while, she hadn't moved. Not even to get breakfast.
"What do you think?" she asked sarcastically. "Come on, you know how long I've been behind. I was lucky to even go into the office for two weeks."
"Oh you went in longer than that and you know it." Chad teased with a smile as he sat down beside her. "What about last month? You were in every day except for when you had that stomach virus."
"You were the one who thought it was another pregnancy." Taylor pointed out.
"Ok, ok, I can take a hint." Chad sighed. "Look, all I'm saying is that for the past couple of months you were working like crazy. You need a break."
"No, what I need is to get all of these extra articles in before the deadline and not get fired." she corrected. "Look, they gave me a break when I said I couldn't go in for at least a month, but by the second month they started suggesting that I work from home. And if I hadn't put up the argument that I did they would have suggested a 'temporary leave'."
"Yeah well, you're still there." Chad said, putting an arm around her. "Just don't work your butt off, ok?"
Taylor sighed. She shook her head before looking away at the laptop and turned to him, her hands now completely away from the keypad. "I know. But the majority of the articles I have managed to get in for the past year were less than exceptional. And I have to turn that around. And what good what it do us if one of us is out of the job, especially when one of them is me?"
"I can put in more hours at the daycare center." Chad assured.
"You work enough as it is." she shook her head. "Besides sometimes I think you care more about those children than your own."
"Hey I was just saying-" Chad gasped.
"I was kidding." Taylor informed him.
Chad sighed with relief. "Don't ever say that about me, ok?"
Taylor nodded. "Sorry."
"Me, too." Chad replied.
Taylor raised an eyebrow at him. What did he need to apologize for?
Able to read her expression, Chad clarified. "Look we haven't had much time to ourselves lately. It's been crazy and you're starting to get buried in your work. I don't want you to become a workaholic, Tay. You spend enough time with that as it is, even after spending all this time staying home and looking after Cheryl. But you're still on the job, aren't you? Ok, so there's been a few snags this year and maybe a few threats to let you go. But has that stopped you from putting in your best effort? You've been juggling being a mom and working, not to mention keeping the house in order..."
"And you've been the family comedian only doing chores once a month." Taylor interrupted.
"Ok, so maybe that's kinda true and I'm sorry." Chad apologized. "But you can't worry about work forever. You're not losing the job, Tay. Not by a long shot. And if you do, then it's their loss. You'll find something better in a heartbeat."
Taylor nodded. "It's just that this is the best gig I've had in a long time. Oxford was one thing, but things are different now." she explained. "I'm running an OP-ED page column on the political stature, structure, etc on the United States, not to mention being at least somewhere on the editors list to look over everything...I mean, I know I'm not the chief editor or anything, but it's still good payment and it's still a respectful position compared to some newsboy."
"And you're still doing a great job." Chad assured her. "But you can't just work forever."
She cocked her head. "So what do you suggest?"
A smile came across Chad's face. "A family day."
Taylor couldn't help but sigh and roll her eyes. "Chad those days really don't do much..."
"Of course they do. I had em with my family all the time when my folks were still around. Look at where it got me." he shrugged. Then he saw Taylor's doubtful look and caved. "Ok, so it didn't do much for me and my sister but it got me closer to my mom and her to my dad. We did some goofy stuff, but it was always in the privacy of our own home. And if they ever said anything in public, we'd make a run for it and deal with the consequences when we got home."
Taylor couldn't help but giggle at the thought.
Chad smiled at her laughter. "So what do you say? For one day?"
Taylor had to admit, the offer did sound tempting. And aside from dinner, when was the whole family really together most of the time? "I don't know." she admitted with a sigh. "I mean, I have to finish this page by Tuesday so it can be in the paper by Wednesday..."
Chad raised an eyebrow. "Why do people wanna read about political stuff on Wednesday instead of Monday?"
"Chad, that's not the point." she shook her head. "Better than them reading it on Monday as they're ready to fall asleep on their way back to work after a weekend." she muttered the answer. Taylor took notice of Chad's nod as an understanding and continued. "So tell me how I can possibly finish writing this in two days if not by today, when I have a few other columns to edit and possibly proofread?"
"Because you're my wife. You can do anything." Chad said calmly. "Except get me into a pink outfit or tux." he added jokingly.
Taylor rolled her eyes and hit him on the arm, a usual reaction when he opened his mouth and said something stupid.
Chad chuckled at her reaction and the continued. "So, if there's anything political in the news today then record it or look it up on youtube tomorrow. Take notes and then write your article. Then on Monday you can look over everything else you need to and have everything in by the exact deadline time on Tuesday. What do you say?"
Taylor thought about it for a minute. She kept quiet as she weighed the options in her mind and tried figuring out what to do. Finally, she turned her head back to Chad. "I'm in." she smiled.
Chad couldn't keep the smile off his face, but he still wanted to tease her. "I can't hear you."
"I said I'm in." she giggled.
"I still can't hear you." Chad laughed as he practically threw himself on top of her and moved the laptop out of the way. This is why they worked so well together. Chad was the funny laid back parent and Taylor was the serious verge-on-workaholic one. And then they would pull out those exact qualities from each other; Chad would be a little more serious at times and Taylor wouldn't worry about work so much. The pair smiled at each other as Chad's arms went around Taylor and her hands dug into his hair. They shared a simple kiss and then pulled apart.
"Ok, now go get some breakfast. I'll get everything set up." Chad smiled.
"Good." Taylor replied with a smile of her own. "I was getting hungry anyway." She got up off the bed and made her way downstairs.
The smile grew on Chad's face as he then rushed to the closet to pull out everything he needed. He had been planning this for a long time.
---
Dylan sat in the living room shortly after eating lunch, staring right at his sister. No, it wasn't at how she changed, how she had gotten a little taller or had grown more hair with a slight wave to it, or how it was so hard to believe she was over a year old already. Instead it was just a simple staring contest. Neither had blinked or anything and Dylan was not about to give in.
"You've gotta blink sometime." he told her.
But Cheryl hadn't learned to talk or walk yet and therefore couldn't give a response. All she really said were still just baby words, not actual words.
Still with neither blinking or anything of the sort, Dylan's look stiffened. He was keeping a close eye on her. And it almost looked like he was getting somewhere until....
"How are you doing down here?" Taylor interrupted as she gently rubbed Dylan's head, causing him to blink.
Dylan sighed as she sat down beside him. "You just made me lose the staring contest." he moaned. "I had Cherry on the run."
"I'm sorry." Taylor apologized. "Has she said anything?"
"Aside from words like goo, bla, or wah?" Dylan replied. "Nope."
Taylor sighed. She looked over at Cheryl on the other side of the couch. "Well you're going to have to talk sometime." she said.
Cheryl didn't say or do anything in response. Instead all she did was hold her arms out, signaling that she wanted to be held.
Taylor rolled her eyes and smiled. She walked over to that side of the couch and picked Cheryl up, than sat back down and put the toddler on her lap.
"Hey how was work going up there?" Dylan wondered.
"It's not." Taylor sighed. "Your father convinced me to take the day off for some kind of family fun day."
Dylan blinked. "You serious?"
"Yeah, he said he practically grew up on them." Taylor replied.
"So what did you grow up on?" Dylan wondered.
"A lot of books and two very different siblings." she sighed. "Family fun was not in my parents' vocabulary."
"But it's gonna be in ours." Chad smiled as he came downstairs with a big box. "I have everything together. We are gonna spend the entire Saturday together. So what do you think we do this every Saturday?"
"No!" Taylor and Dylan gasped in unison.
Chad blinked. "How about once a month?"
"We'll talk." Taylor held up a hand.
"So what's this about family fun?" Dylan wondered.
"We are gonna spend all day doing stuff together." Chad explained. "Movies, games, eating..."
"And everything had better be suitable for all ages. We have a child who's less than three, you know." she pointed out.
"Yeah, and can we not do anything too kiddy-ish?" Dylan added. He loved his family but he was still fourteen and didn't want to do anything embarrassing.
"Consider it noted." Chad nodded. "So I thought we would start things off with a movie. We can each pick one every time." He reached into the box to search for a suitable DVD.
"Disney." Taylor said right away. It was one of the few companies she trusted to make movies suitable for children.
"Ok...Disney it is then." Chad said slowly.
"How about a comedy?" Dylan asked.
"I was thinking more like action." Chad said.
"No, it should be romance-oriented." Taylor replied.
"Everything about Disney has something romanced-based in it." Chad sighed.
"And it's to a low enough level for any ages to view. It doesn't take anything past kissing." Taylor defended.
"What comes after kissing?" Dylan wondered.
Taylor and Chad exchanged glances right away. Chad cleared his throat and rubbed the back of his head and Taylor continuously shifted her sitting position. "Um...when you're older son." Chad said in a manly voice, or an attempted manly voice. "You'll learn then."
"Yeah..." Taylor agreed. "You're too young to know about things that go further than that."
Dylan just blinked and raised an eyebrow. "I don't get it."
"Good, let's keep it that way." Chad said right away.
"So about that movie..." Taylor said, trying to change the subject.
---
"Ok why did we choose that movie? It wasn't exactly...fun." Dylan admitted two and a half hours later.
Chad raised an eyebrow and looked at him. "You didn't think it was funny?"
"I have to agree with Dylan, hun." Taylor said. "Let me direct your attention to the sleeping child on my lap."
Chad looked down to see Cheryl sound asleep. Had it really been that boring that it put a toddler to sleep?
"I can't believe it...if we watched a boring movie we'd always joke about how bad it was and how much we hated it." Chad said, moving some hair out of his face. "It really wasn't worthy of that?"
Dylan and Taylor exchanged glances. It was still early in the day, too early to give up hope yet. And Chad was really looking forward to it. The least they could do was keep trying.
"It's not the end of the world, Dad." Dylan shrugged. "There's still plenty of things left to do. Maybe we could move onto one of those games?"
"But not one with those tiny pieces that Cheryl could put in her mouth." Taylor pointed out.
"Then I've got the perfect game," a smile came on Chad's face. "Charades!"
"Chad you can't be..." Taylor started.
"Oh c'mon, everyone loves charades!" he encouraged.
"Everyone except people who stink at it." Dylan muttered.
"Excuse me?" Chad questioned.
"Well it's just that the last time we played charades you couldn't get anything right. And every time you had your turn everyone kept guessing something like 'kleptomaniac cowboy'."
Taylor couldn't help but giggle as she pictured the image. She covered her mouth to try and keep it unnoticed.
"It's not funny." Chad pointed at Taylor, hearing her. He turned back to Dill, "And I was really trying that whole time."
"Trying and failing." Dylan sang. "Mom and I would charade circles around you."
"That made no sense." Chad shook his head.
"Oh so we have a bet then?" Dylan inquired.
"Yeah we have a bet." Chad agreed right away.
Taylor took that as her cue. "Then prepare to have your butt whooped by the smartest minds in the household." she said simply.
---
That had been an understatement. Chad couldn't get a single thing right. Even when Cheryl clapped her hands to do something he didn't know what she was doing. It turned out the manner in which she was crawling was similar to the way in which a gorilla would move. Dylan and Taylor were close enough guessing monkey and Chad had guessed a swiss army man or something.
"Ok, next activity." Chad declared. "Video games."
"Right, because you desperately want to get over that crushing defeat from charades." Taylor rolled her eyes.
"Yeah Dad, face it." Dylan agreed. "You didn't exactly stand a chance."
"Hey that is not fair!" Chad gasped. He pointed at Taylor and then at Dylan, "You were salutatorian of our class and your grade point average is like a 4 point seven!"
"The highest a GPA can go is a four, Chad." Taylor informed him. "And Dylan's happens to be a three point seven."
"And there you go again, being all brilliant and acting like I'm the dumbest man on the planet." Chad started.
"You know I never said or thought that." Taylor retorted.
"Well you're sure not acting that way now." Chad said.
"You're the one who started making a big deal over charades!" Taylor argued.
"Yeah well you could've let me win at least one round, but no." he said sarcastically.
"You know what, I'm done." Taylor decided. She placed Cheryl down and stood up from the couch. "I'm going back to my work. Something I should have been doing all day." She shook her head, "So much for family fun." She then turned and went back upstairs.
Chad just shook his head. "I'm going out." he decided as he got up from the couch and went out the front door.
Dylan looked back and forth between his parents and the direction they went in. He looked over at Cheryl, who had a depressed yet confused look on her face. Dylan just shook his head. "I can't believe they just fought over something so stupid." he said. "We have to do something Cherry."
All she did was cock her head and started sucking on her thumb.
"No, take that out of your mouth." he sighed, trying to pull her finger out. "It can't go in there forever."
---
A couple of hours later, Chad sighed as he walked back into the house a couple of hours later. He sighed as he pushed some hair out of his face. This was not how he wanted the day to go. He wanted to spend time with everyone but it had all gone down the drain. And a couple of hours being out around town on his own was not his idea of fun.
His head turned sharply as he heard footsteps. He stopped when he saw Taylor come down. He looked down and then back at her, as she imitated his actions. Neither said a word; they remained silent. Chad rubbed the back of his head, almost not sure for a minute if they were still arguing.
"So how was your walk?" Taylor finally asked, somewhat quietly.
"Long. Quiet. Boring." Chad answered in fragments. "How's your article?"
"It's not." she shook her head.
Chad raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean?"
"I got an e-mail from one of the editors. We had a little meeting via e-mail and I might have...snapped a little." Taylor admitted. "He told me to take a temporary leave so I can get my act together. And I told him he wouldn't need to worry about it because I quit."
"I'm sorry, Tay." he apologized.
"Don't be." she shook her head.
"Yeah but if I didn't even suggest we take this stupid day..." he started.
Taylor held a hand up. "Hold on, when did we say it was stupid?"
"Didn't you?" Chad asked, confused.
"I implied it." she answered simply. "I never really meant it. It was a good idea, Chad. It just didn't turn out the way we planned."
"So you really wanted to do it?" Chad asked.
"We had a reason to, didn't we?" she replied. "Besides, it was kind of nice while it lasted. Until we started arguing."
"Yeah, I shouldn't have just went off like that." Chad admitted.
"And I shouldn't have countered your argument with one of my own." Taylor nodded. "Especially not in front of the kids."
"Hey, how are they anyway?" he wondered.
"I don't know." Taylor shook her head. "I was in the bedroom the whole time."
"So you didn't tell them about the job?"
"I don't want to worry them."
"You're gonna have to tell them."
"So what do I tell them? That I'm going to be a stay-at-home mom or something? It's not happening."
"Of course not. You can't stay in a house for that long. So what are you going to do?"
"What any other woman would do. Spend about an hour drowning my sorrows in ice cream and then search for a new job first thing in the morning."
Chad chuckled and Taylor smiled. "Can I join you with the ice cream?" he asked.
"I'd like that." Taylor nodded.
They pointed at each other and decided the flavor in unison, "Chocolate chip cookie dough and cookies and cream." They then laughed at how they knew each other so well.
"I'll go check on the kids." Taylor offered.
"And I'll get one large bowl and ten large scoops of ice cream." Chad smiled.
As Taylor went upstairs, Chad walked over to the freezer to pull out the two tubs of ice cream. He grabbed a scooper and a large bowl and then took the two different flavors and put them into the bowl, one flavor on top of the other. Once that was done, he put the ice cream away and then took out two spoons. He almost started digging in until he saw Taylor come back down.
"How are they?" he wondered.
"Dylan is playing with Cheryl upstairs in his room." she answered. "They looked like they were enjoying themselves."
"Well then that means more ice cream for us." Chad shrugged. He sat up on one of the stools and started eating some of the ice cream. Taylor sat down beside him and began eating much smaller scoops. "So what are you gonna do about the job thing?" he finally asked.
"Well I did take notice of some of the wanted ads before," she admitted. "I'm sure I can find something in one of those places. I can start looking tomorrow."
"Maybe not first thing tomorrow..." Chad said hopefully as he just made dents in part of the ice cream with his spoon.
Taylor raised an eyebrow. "And why is that?"
"Well, Dill is off to one of his friends' houses tomorrow to work on a project and Troy's parents happen to be watching Timmy and Gina tomorrow while Troy and Gabriella take the twins out so I managed to get them to watch Cheryl..."
"And..." Taylor waited for him to drop the bomb.
"...And that could give us some alone time here." Chad finished with a tempting tone. "We can 'pick up where we left off'."
"Chad Danforth, can you get any more naughty?" Taylor scolded playfully.
"Is that a yes?" Chad wondered.
"Well...maybe we can work something out. Say after lunch?" she suggested.
"Noon." Chad corrected. "You can drop the kids off and I can set up here...."
"Just as long as you don't get any stains on the carpets." Taylor agreed.
Chad cheered. "Ok now I'm gonna celebrate by eating the biggest scoop of ice cream I can!" As he dug in, Taylor just giggled and rolled her eyes. Chad was just being his usual silly self. But her giggles turned into pure laughter when he picked his head up. His lips were completely covered in ice cream. "What? Am I that bad?" Chad asked, unable to see for himself.
"Better than your whole face, I can tell you that much." Taylor smiled as she gently wiped some away with her thumb.
Chad smiled back at Taylor and then they both filled the now small gap in between them with a soft kiss. They were just about to really get into it until....
"Mom, Dad! You gotta come see this!" Dylan called form upstairs.
Chad and Taylor sighed as they pulled apart. They just shook their heads and headed to the staircase hand in hand. But it didn't last long because the next thing they saw was Cheryl falling down the stairs. Chad sprung into action and caught her before she hit the last few steps.
"What the...?" he asked.
That's when Dylan came rushing downstairs. "You guys missed it! She was walking!" he exclaimed.
"Yeah, like we'd really miss her first steps." Chad said sarcastically.
"You did." Dylan insisted.
"Chad, put her down. We'll see for ourselves." Taylor said after checking Cheryl over to make sure there were no bruises or injuries.
"Alright but I'm telling you," Chad sighed as he put her down, "there's no way she's gonna walk."
"Then what's she doing now?" Dylan asked as he pointed to Cheryl.
Chad and Taylor looked down at the toddler and watched as she began walking - in an almost stumbling manner - around the living room. "No way.." Taylor realized.
"I don't believe it!" Chad gasped. "She's walking!" He raised an eyebrow as the little girl headed to the front door. "Hey wait a minute, where's she walking to?"
Dylan decided to use this as his opportunity. "She's telling you that she wants to go out to dinner."
"Yeah, sure she is." Chad said sarcastically as he went to pick up his daughter.
"Actually, going out to dinner sounds nice." Taylor said. "I could go for being waited on tonight."
"On second thought, dinner sounds great." Chad said right away.
Dylan blinked and looked at Taylor. "How did you...?"
"I've got my ways." Taylor winked with a smile. "You take Cheryl and go wait outside. We'll be right out."
"Ok." Dylan nodded. He took his sister from his father and headed outside to wait at the car.
Chad smiled as he walked over to Taylor. "We do need to celebrate the occasion don't we?" he asked. "We can watch her walk to the table all by herself."
"And it's only a matter of time before she starts talking. Wait for it, her first word's going to be 'mother'." Taylor grinned.
"You keep telling yourself that." Chad teased. "She's gonna say 'daddy' first and you know it."
"Maybe in your dreams." Taylor replied. She picked up the wallet from the coffee table and handed it to Chad. "Dinner's on you tonight, family man." she teased right back. She winked and then walked out with the car keys.
Chad blinked as she walked out. Then he smiled and nodded to himself. "I think family fun day's back on." he grinned. And with that, he put the remainder of the ice cream in the freezer for later and then went out to the car. They might as well enjoy the Saturday while they still could, because it was only going to get busier from there.
Ok so I started this last night and after I got home today I finished it up. Not my best chapter in my opinion, but I was trying to fight a slight writer's block as I typed it all up. Som I was out shopping with my mom, aunt, and cousin today and it's our little tradition for the third year going since mine and my cousin's birthday both happen to be in February. The only time I'm not bored when I'm clothes shopping. ^^ And we're supposed to get a lot of snow tonight so I am really hoping that means a snow day for tomorrow. Cause I do not wanna clean off the car and then drive to school even if there's a delayed opening. -_- So I'm going to get off for now and then I'll see what I update next and when.