The next week was too short.
It seemed like hardly any time had passed when Collins was finally released from the hospital that Monday.
Mark and Roger went to pick him up, while Mimi, Maureen, Benny, and I decorated the loft.
"Mimi, could you grab those red balloons?" I asked as I precariously perched on the chair.
"Joanne, let Mimi do it," Benny said.
"I can stand on a freakin chair," I protested.
"And you could fall. I can take over," Mimi insisted as she helped me down and taped a balloon in the corner.
"What are you doing?" I asked Maureen, as I went into the kitchen to help with food.
"Decorating the cake," she said as she squeezed icing out of a fancy looking tube.
"When did you learn how to decorate cakes?" I asked. Moreover I wanted to ask where she had learned to bake. When Maureen and I were together she could hardly make toast without burning it or ruining it.
"In California," she said quickly. "Could you fix the lemonade?" she asked distractedly.
"Sure," I said, "weren't you going to California to be an actress?"
"A girl has to earn a living," she replied breezily.
I let the subject drop as I unwrapped the punch bowl I had brought from my place. We were having lemonade that night because Collins wasn't supposed to touch alcohol for at least a week. I didn't mind. It would be nice to be drinking the same beverage as everyone else again.
"Ohhh, calm down," I said as I leaned against the counter, rubbing my stomach.
"I am calm," Maureen said testily.
"Not you, him," I corrected her. The baby was kicking and wasn't watching which vital organs he was hitting.
"Are you okay?" she asked.
"Yeah, so is the baby now."
It seemed almost natural to stop and rub my stomach. It usually was enough to lull him, or her back to sleep. We still didn't know what we were having.
"Benjamin, you behave," we heard Mimi squeal. I looked up and saw they were fighting each other with balloons.
"Help me," she giggled as she tried to defend herself.
"You don't need help," I scolded playfully as I threw back a balloon at Benny that had landed on the counter.
"Hey two against one. Maureen, help me," he said as he dove toward her. She simply pointed a frosting tube at him and squeezed.
She didn't mean to hit him, but somehow a glob of red was right in the middle of his polo shirt.
Frosting flew everywhere as we forgot what we had been doing, forgot that we had spent at least an hour cleaning the apartment. The door opened.
"Get 'em," Mimi screeched as she ran toward Roger.
I kissed Mark first smearing frosting on his face, then hugged Collins while Maureen hugged him from the other side, covering the top of him with a rainbow of surgary goop.
The fight ended with everyone in a giggling heap on the floor.
"Oh, by the way Collins - " Benny said.
"Yeah -" he replied, catching his breath.
"Suprise," Benny joked.
We fell into laughter again.
After we cleaned up as best we could, I reheated the spaghetti I had made at my place.
"Thanks you guys," Collins said as we took seats around the table.
"Are these balls meatless?" Benny asked as he took a bite.
"It reallly does taste the same," Mimi said.
"I told you," he said.
"Mark, put down that camera and come eat," I said.
"Are you kidding? His other wife?" Roger asked in mock horror.
"She'll learn to share," I told him as Mark slid in his seat next to me.
"This loft is going to be different without you here," Collins said.
After the wedding, Mark was moving to my apartment.
"I'll still hang out with you guys," Mark promised.
"It won't be the same," Roger agreed.
"Yeah, you and Mimi can quit playing your music," Mark roasted them.
"We'll miss you man," Colins smiled.
Wednesday was my last day of work before the wedding. My firm had a huge cake brought in, and ordered pizzas that I couldnt' eat. My pregnancy had made me sick at the sight of pepperoni. The day was too long as it progreesed and too short as it got closer to the end.
"This deposition needs to get done," I paniced.
"We'll get it done, go home," my coworker Lyle insisted.
"What about - "
"Joanne, I've got it," my paralegal Sarah soothed. "Go home. Think of it as practice."
Thursday night, my aunt Denise hosted a bridal/baby shower for me. My last night as a single woman. Meanwhile Mark was out celebrating his last night of bachelorhood with poker. "I don't need strippers," he assured me.
The first game we played was where everyone cut a piece of yarn guessing how big I was around the middle.
"She's too skinny as it is," Mark's grandma Rose said.
"She has to be carrying a boy," Mark's aunt Sarah remarked.
"Mmmm, Mmmmm, that chile' has to be a girl chile', look how's she's carryin' it, " my Grandma Mable insisted.
"In our family the boys have always been smallah," Grandma Rose proclaimed.
I felt better when the string that came the closest was the smallest. It was Mimi's.
When we opened gifts, Maureen begged me to open hers first. It was a harmless white bag from the outside. Inside was full of sexual enhancements.
"Mark really likes the almond oil," she said when I took out a package of massage oils. The only two that didn't look shocked were my mother, and Mimi. Mark's mom looked like she would faint again.
"Maureen," Mimi nudged her laughing.
"He does," she murmured under her breath.
Luckily my other gifts were more tame. The massage oil was okay, but the "WonderWand," also in the bag, was more than a bit embarassing.