style="font-size:15px;"> "Yeah, she's got someone new," said Jillian, using one hand to curl the ends of her straight, strawberry blonde, chin-length cut in towards her face. "Her skirt's on backwards." I snapped my neck down to check. "Made you look," said Jillian. "At least that answers the question."
Damned reporter's tricks. You'd think I'd know better.
Trust fund debutante Jillian Charles is the black sheep of her family. Because she actually has a job. With no desire to pitch Krugerrands with her Massachusetts Ivy League neighbors, Jillian actually went to a state school (such a scandal in the gated community!) and likes getting her hands dirty. She's an inch shorter than I am, but all legs and none of it fat. I think her age (thirty-seven) matches her inseam; meanwhile, not a wrinkle on her gently freckled face and no Botox receipts on her tax return. Beneath those soft blue eyes lurks an executioner who enjoys the sight of heads tumbling down the steps of the Mayan temple, which is a handy trait to have in a Chicago News Director.
"So, c'mon Syd. Y'all don't keep us waitin'. Dish." The whiskey two-packs-a-day Southern accent you just heard comes from Neely "Vodka" Collins, the former hard-boiled reporter from New Orleans who doesn't smoke but believes that Russian alcohol is to a liquor cabinet what WD-40 is to a toolbox. If you run out of either, you'll get rusty and won't be able to screw anything. She looks like Demi Moore, sounds like Demi Moore if Demi Moore had been cast in Gone with the Wind, and therefore logic dictates that she hangs out with younger men like Demi Moore while running our station in Dallas. Neely first went against the grain in the eighth grade, shoving a sixth grader into a coat closet and giving him a free tonsillectomy. Her long, dark hair and innocent emerald eyes might lead a guy to think she's the girl next door, but there's nothing but lust embedded in her vocal chords. Like a good Irish Catholic she goes to confession every week, the old-fashioned way, in a booth, and must take a legal pad with her. I can only imagine her saying, "Bless me… Father… for I have… sinned," giving sinned three syllables with that scratchy drawl and having some priest on the other side breaking into a sweat while she enjoys torturing one of the few men in the state of Texas who can't load his gun.
"I've got good news. Take a seat," I said, as I grabbed the burgundy leather chair at the head of the long, mahogany table. Floor to ceiling windows on an entire wall turned the room into a greenhouse, which had the air conditioning blowing full blast. The gals sat down, all away from the sunny side of the room, backs toward the dark green wall that was covered with colorful posters of network shows. I grabbed a remote, swung my chair around, and fired it at the flat-screen monitor that hung on the wall behind me.
"We want details about last night, not more newscast airchecks," said Jillian.
"You're getting both," I said. The picture cleared and the face of Scott Harry filled the fifty-inch plasma screen.
"Hot damn," said Neely, though damn came out "day-umm."
"Damn hot," said Jillian.
"Fuhgeddaboudit," said Rica. (Which, depending on your interpretation of the term, can mean either hot damn or damn hot in Brooklynese.)
The video cut to a two-shot as Scott shared the desk with Caroline Jensen, a veteran brunette anchor in her early forties with laser beam ice-blue eyes.
"This is what's getting you a ratings spike?" asked Jillian.
"Madonne," said Rica.
"I don't think I've ever seen a major market anchor team where the man is that much younger than the woman," said Neely. "How do the demos break out?"
"They're a hit with women 18-34," I said. "And 34-49 is off the charts. Check out our sweeps series on beach safety." I flicked the remote and the video cut to a shot of Scott Harry walking on the Jersey Shore in a bathing suit, talking about the importance of sunscreen.
"You don't need sunscreen if he's providing the shade," said Jillian. The other two still had their jaws hanging open like the mouth-breathing shoppers at Wal-Mart, as the shot tightened up for a high-def look at Scott's pecs.
"Are the guys watchin'?" asked Rica. "Not that it really matters."
"Incredibly, they're holding steady," I said. "They apparently don't miss the pageant fembots. And considering our network's prime-time lineup, it's nice to see people switching over to catch our news product."
"Yeah. Trailer Park True Confessions isn't exactly a great lead-in," said Jillian, cocking her head toward a poster that featured a rusted Camaro and a cheap blonde woman whose roots had been dyed brown.
"Enough with the ratings," said Neely, who was staring holes in the monitor. "Just how did you manage to hire this young buck for our fledgling network?"
I muted the sound and turned back to them. "His agent told me he couldn't get arrested by the big networks and he'd do anything to get to New York. So I appealed to his sense of ambition. Then I checked his… references."
Jillian cocked her head to the side. "Syd, are you saying—"
"That's part of my new hiring manual," I said.
"What made you pair him with Caroline Jensen?" asked Neely.
"Do you want to watch women who are younger and prettier?" I asked.
"If you could find women who are younger and prettier than us, no," said Neely, sticking her nose in the air.
"And what do women our age want?" I asked.
Slowly, all three began to nod.
"So, this is our new playbook?" asked Jillian. "Find our own versions of Scott Harry and partner them with a competent middle-aged woman?"
"Exactly. Your guys don't ever have to report, just read. I don't care if you find them at a modeling agency. Hey, the men have been hiring that way for years. If I had a nickel for every beauty queen anchoring on local television I'd be rich. And there are plenty of talented women out there who have been put out to pasture by the old boys club."
"Do we get the same… benefits package… as you?" asked Neely, playfully batting her eyes. "I mean, do we get to check… references… during our job search?"
"Of course," I said. "You don't want your audience buying a product you haven't tried yourself, do you?"
* * *
Nine months later our network, Consolidated Broadcasting, had raised several eyebrows in the industry.
The four top affiliates of a network best known by its programming for the sophistication challenged (a politically correct television term for rednecks) were showing remarkable ratings growth in local news.
Jillian had turned the Windy City on its ear with her hire (after what she calls an exhaustive search) of twenty-eight-year-old J. T. Farrell, a sandy-haired, blue-eyed anchor from East Deliverance, Arkansas who had put himself through college as a male stripper. When pictures of Farrell wearing nothing but a collar and cuffs were leaked to a local tabloid (amazing how that happens, huh?), photos of his perfect six-foot physique (with a discreetly added black bar) were splashed under the headline Chicago Bare. Overnight ratings jumped twenty percent that day, while "Farrell nude" became the top Google search in the metro area.
Jillian paired Farrell with forty-one-year-old Jennifer Lorton, a spunky brunette with devilish
