miracle fan 9245: Thank you so much for your review! I'm glad you like the story. The idea was bouncing around in my head for a while, but I never thought I would be good enough to write it, but then I decided to, since it was so different of a storyline. Also, I think you couldn't review before because I didn't realize that anonymous reviews are automatically blocked unless you change your settings. I didn't know that was how it worked until a few chapters into the story. Oh well, at least you can review now! Thanks again. (Oh yeah, and if you have a preference on a baby name, let me know. The choices are in chapter 15, I think.)

Emador: Glad you liked it, thanks for reviewing. I'll try to get the chapters up as fast as I can. Unfortunately, probably only like once a week now though. And Maddie's ordeal...well, it's not exactly over yet. :)

Meadow567: Glad you liked her grandma and Rachel. They'll be in it a little more later on. And her parents, well, I wouldn't want to give anything away, but yeah, you can expect them to come around, lol. Thanks for the review!

Nelliebly413672: Yeah, Maddie finally told her parents, lol. I'm glad you liked the shower planning, cause this whole chapter is more planning! Thanks for the review. Oh yeah, and at least you were only 4 when you lite the toaster on fire! I was a lot older than 4, lmao.

A/N: Baby shower planning time! This is a really fun chapter with no drama. The whole thing is the guys getting ready for the shower. Hope you enjoy and please review!

Chapter 17

Early Friday morning Laura got up and took a shower. Once she was ready for the day, she woke up Mac.

"Hey, Robbie," she said, lightly shaking him. "Time to get up."

"What?" he said groggily.

"Time to get up." He looked at the clock.

"Laura, it's five a.m. Why would I get up this early? There's no practice today."

"Did you forget that we're shopping for the baby shower?"

"No," he answered flatly. "Stores aren't even open yet."

"Today they are."

"Well, it doesn't mean we're going right when they open. I'm going back to bed," he said, rolling over and closing his eyes.

"Come on. If we wait, the stores will be even more crowded than they already are."

"Laura, go back to sleep," he said, not opening his eyes.

"Fine, don't get up," she said. Laura decided to leave anyway. She would come back later for the other guys.

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At eleven that morning, Gail and Buzz arrived at the dorms, ready to make the cake. Rizzo and the coneheads were taking over the baking. They had decided on making Maddie's favorite, a chocolate cake with vanilla frosting.

"Do you have everything, Rizzo?" Buzz asked.

"Yeah I think so. We didn't need much. I have a recipe right here." Gail took a look at it, and her eyes went wide.

"You're making the cake from scratch?"

"Yeah," Bah responded. "How else would we make it?"

"From a box."

"What? You can make cake from a box. Rizzo! Why didn't you get a cake in a box?" Bah asked.

"Well, I thought Maddie would appreciate this more."

"As long as it's cake, what difference does it make?" Pav asked.

"Yeah, after all, we do want it to be edible," commented Bah.

"It will be edible. As a matter of fact, it will be really good. And if we have trouble, Gail can help us," Rizzo said, looking at Gail who was now sitting on the couch, watching a Brady Bunch rerun.

"I'm not helping you guys."

"Well, if we need it, you will," Rizzo started.

"Nope. And you can thank my husband for that."

"Buzz. What did you do?" Pav asked.

"Nothing!" he said innocently. "Well, okay. Maybe I told Gail that we didn't need help from a girl. I said that we were perfectly capable of doing everything ourselves."

"And . . . " Gail prompted. Buzz rolled his eyes.

"And I called her Betty Crocker." Pav and Bah started laughing.

"Why'd you do that?" Bah asked. He knew Gail pretty well, and although she was a great cook, he knew she wouldn't appreciate being called Betty Crocker.

"I thought we could do everything ourselves."

"We can," affirmed Rizzo.

"I'll believe it when I see it," said Gail, turning her attention back to the TV.

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Rammer, Mark, and Jimmy were all at Mac's dorm, waiting for Laura so they could go shopping. No one had any clue where she was. Mac was starting to worry because she was there earlier, and he didn't even know she ever left. A few minutes later, the door opened and Laura walked in with four shopping bags.

"Hey guys," she said, dropping the bags the second she got into the room. "Those were heavy."

"Where the hell were you?" Mac asked.

"Shopping. I told you I wanted to get to the stores early. Since you didn't want to go, I did some shopping by myself."

"But you don't need anymore clothes. Your closet is full."

"I wasn't shopping for myself. I was Christmas shopping."

"Already?" Mark said, surprised.

"Yeah. There were a lot of sales today. I got most of the gifts I needed to."

"Did you get mine?" Mac asked, about to look in the bags.

"Yes! Don't look in there."

"Okay, okay. Sorry. I won't."

"Well, we better get going. It's really crowded out today."

"They can't be that crowded," said Rammer.

"Yeah, how crowded could the stores possibly be?" asked Jimmy.

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"We just put this in the bowl right?" Pav asked Rizzo, holding up the measured sugar.

"Yeah. Then we have to cream it with the butter." Pav dumped the sugar in the bowl and Bah got a spoon out.

"Don't you use the electric thing to mix it together?" asked Buzz.

"No I think you use a spoon. It doesn't say beat, it says cream," said Rizzo. Just then, Jack walked in the room.

"How are my Little Debbie's doing this lovely morning," Jack asked, really cheery, with some sarcasm.

"Watch it, OC," said Pav. "We are making this cake for your girlfriend." In the meantime, Bah was trying to cream the butter and sugar, but wasn't having much luck. Buzz was trying to help him, but was also struggling.

"Need some help there, Twinkies?" Jack joked.

"Not from you, thank you," replied Buzz. He turned to Gail. "Hey honey, can you please help us?"

"No thanks. I'm busy."

"The Brady Bunch is so not more important than helping us," whined Buzz.

"Maybe you should have thought about that before you called me Betty Crocker and said you didn't need my help."

"Ouch," commented Jack. "He called you Betty Crocker. That's almost like, derogatory."

"What the hell is wrong with Betty Crocker?" Buzz asked no one in particular.

"Nothing, but you shouldn't call your wife that. Especially when she cooks all your meals," Bah said, as everyone laughed.

"Are you done creaming that yet?" Rizzo asked Bah.

"No, the butter won't mix with the sugar. It's too hard."

"Let me see," said Rizzo, taking the spoon.

"Did you soften the butter before you put the sugar in?"

"No," answered Pav. "You didn't tell me to." Rizzo sighed.

"I didn't realize I had to tell you guys everything. Some things are common sense. Like, butter can't be creamed if it's rock hard."

"Well, it's not my fault I don't normally bake cakes."

"It's fine. I'll take care of it," Rizzo said.

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"It's so crowded. It's like a zoo in here," Rammer commented shortly after they arrived at the mall.

"I told you it would be busy today," Laura said.

"But the mall is never this crowded, " said Mac.

"I tired to warn you guys that this is the biggest shopping day of the year, but you didn't believe me. Maybe next time, you'll listen."

"Let's just get this over with," Jimmy said.

"Where are we going first?" Mark wondered.

"There's a baby store down this way," Laura said, starting to lead the group. The three guys followed.

"Remind me again why we're doing this?" Rammer whispered to Mac. Laura heard and answered for him.

"Because you guys need to do something nice for Maddie so she forgives you for being jerks."

"Hey look!" Mark said. "There's the food court. Let's stop and get something to eat. I'm hungry." Mark started to walk toward it, with the other guys soon following.

"Hey. Get back here," Laura said, scolding them. "We're here to shop, and it's not even lunchtime. You just ate breakfast an hour ago."

"We're hockey players. We need to eat," reasoned Mac.

"I don't think so," Laura said, grabbing Mac's arm and pulling him away. "I promise we'll get lunch after we shop for a little while."

"Come on. Please?" Mac said, begging for something now.

"Later."

"Oh, fine." The guys all followed Laura again and went into the baby store.

"This place looks huge," said Jimmy when they walked in.

"Yeah, don't get lost, Rammer," Mark said.

"That only happened once. And it was because someone insisted everyone went somewhere else."

"Sure blame it on Phil."

"The guy who's practically clueless about everything," joked Jimmy. They were talking about the time that Rammer got lost because Phil had told him that the guys had all gone somewhere else and in reality they were waiting for him right where they said they would be.

"At least I found you eventually."

"After what? An hour?" asked Mac, laughing.

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"Time for the eggs," Rizzo announced.

"Can I crack one?" asked Bah, excitedly.

"I'll do the other," Buzz offered.

"Um, I don't know," said Rizzo hesitantly.

"Don't you trust us?"

"No, not really."

"At least you're honest," said Buzz. "But really, we won't mess up. I've cracked eggs before."

"Okay fine." Rizzo turned around to get the flour ready as Bah and Buzz cracked the eggs.

Jack was watching TV with Gail and turned around just as Bah got some of the shell from his egg in the bowl.

"Uh oh," he said quietly to Buzz.

"Get it out, hurry," Buzz whispered.

"Rizzo, it looks like they messed up after all," said Jack. Rizzo immediately turned to Buzz and Bah.

"Great. I knew I couldn't trust you. What'd you do, get some shell in there?"

"Sorry," apologized Bah.

"Yeah sure," said Rizzo, taking the egg shell out of the bowl. He handed Buzz the electric beater. "Beat this for two minutes, then add the vanilla and beat it again." Buzz did as he was told and started beating the cake batter. Pav got the vanilla out.

"Are you sure this is vanilla?" Pav asked before adding it to the batter.

"Yeah, it's vanilla," responded Buzz. "Even I know that."

"Well, it's brown. Is there something wrong with it?"

"I don't know," Buzz said, looking at it.

"I thought you knew what vanilla was."

"I do. It says pure vanilla extract right on the bottle," Buzz replied with a 'duh' expression, turning the bottle for Pav to read it. Pav rolled his eyes.

"Vanilla's supposed to be that color," Bah said.

"Okay. If you say so," Pav said, dumping it in.

"Now we add the flour mixture alternately with the milk and stir it," said Rizzo.

"What's the flour mixture?" Bah asked.

"The flour, baking soda, baking powder, and cocoa powder."

"How much do we add?"

"How am I supposed to know," responded Rizzo. "What do I look like, a cookbook?"

"Well, you knew everything else so far," Pav pointed out.

"That doesn't mean I'm an expert."

"Okay, so how much do we add at a time?"

"I told you. I don't know." Gail whispered something to Jack, and they both started laughing.

"What?" said Rizzo seriously. They continued laughing. After a minute, the guys were sick of it.

"Would you mind telling us what the hell is so funny?" Buzz said, a little irritated.

"You guys really are clueless, aren't you?" Gail said.

"Well, honey," Buzz said, stressing the honey, "maybe if you would help us out, we would know what to do."

"I thought you didn't need my help."

"Well, we do. Please help us. I'm really sorry for calling you Betty Crocker and I promise I'll never do it again."

"That's okay. I'll pass. It's much more entertaining watching the four little Pillsbury Doughboys try to make a cake."

"Hey, I take offense to that," said Bah, joking. "Rizzo here might be Pillsbury, but I'm not."

"Hey," said Rizzo pretending to be offended. Then he continued, joking, "Pillsbury's a pretty cool guy."

"Okay, fine. I have a better idea. Instead of Pillsbury or Little Debbie, you guys can be the four Hostess characters," said Gail.

"Yeah," agreed Jack. "Pav, you're the smallest, so you'll be Twinkie the Kid. Bah, you get to be Fruit Pie the Magician, Buzz, you're Happy Ho Ho, and Rizzo you have to be Captain Cupcake."

"OC, why am I Happy Ho Ho?" asked Buzz.

"Do I really need to answer that?" asked Jack. "Cause you are a happy ho ho."

"Captain Cupcake?" Rizzo questioned.

"Oh stop complaining. I could explain why each and every one of you are the character you are, but that would take all day and if I remember correctly, you all have something better to be doing," Jack said, looking at the bowl of cake batter.

"Well, for the record, I kinda like Fruit Pie the Magician," said Bah.

"You would," said Jack. Everyone laughed and the guys got back to baking the cake.

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Silky, Verchota, and Jannie were in charge of getting the decorations. The other guys that weren't shopping or baking were going to help them decorate once they bought the decorations.

"What should we get?" Silky wondered out loud.

"Let's get balloons," said Phil.

"I'm not blowing up tons and tons of balloons," protested Silky.

"They'd be Helium filled of course," Phil added.

"Yeah. Helium is the way to go," Jannie agreed. "I'll take 'em down."

"I think everyone will want to help with that," Phil said.

"Well, we bought them. We get first dibs."

"Pink or blue?" asked Silky.

"Well, both. We don't know whether she's having a boy or girl," said Jannie.

"What about getting a neutral color?" said Phil.

"I think pink and blue is better. Then we can have everything pink and blue," said Silky.

"Okay," Phil agreed.

"What else do we need?" asked Jannie.

"Streamers, and maybe a big congratulations balloon."

"Phil, is there something you're not telling us?" Silky said, laughing. Phil just looked confused. Silky continued, "I mean, are you a party planner on the side or something? You know way too much about throwing baby showers."

"My mom and sister planned a shower for my aunt a few years ago. They made me help buy decorations, prizes for games, and party favors."

"That's what we need!" exclaimed Silky. "Prizes."

"Let's get those candy cigars," said Jannie.

"How about real ones?" said Silky. "They're better."

"No way. It'll cost us a fortune. The candy ones are way cheaper."

"Yeah, I guess. But I still think real cigars would be a hit." Walking down the aisle with plates and napkins, Jannie found party hats and picked them up. He tried one on and looked at Phil and Silky.

"No way," said Silky. "No way in hell am I wearing ones of those. I don't care how much you pay me or how drunk I am."

"Speaking of which . . . we need beer," said Jannie.

"We're throwing a baby shower, not a keggar!" said Phil. "Even I realize that. We can't have beer. Besides, Maddie can't even drink it."

"We can," said Silky.

"We're not getting beer," said Phil.

"Since when did you become Mormon?" joked Jannie.

"Like I said before, this is a baby shower! We can't bring alcohol."

"So guess if we can't have beer, a stripper is out of the question," said Silky.

"Yeah, let's save the stripper for the Bachelor party," said Phil.

"I knew there was a good side of Jack getting married," joked Silky. "Now let's get the rest of the stuff."

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"This is a really cute game. Maybe the baby would like that," Mac said to Mark holding up a block game.

"Yeah. And it doesn't even matter whether the baby's a boy or girl."

"You can't get that," said Laura. "A toddler would have trouble playing with it, let alone a baby. Look for clothes or a baby mobile for a crib or something."

"You're no fun," said Mac. "When we have a kid, you're not going to stop me from spoiling the squirt with toys, even if it is a newborn." Right after Mac said this, he realized what he had said, and immediately looked away. Laura noticed it too, and wondered what he meant by it. Luckily, Mark broke the awkward silence.

"What about this?" he asked, holding up a soft yellow teddy bear.

"That's adorable," said Laura, rubbing it. "And it's so soft. Let's get that."

"This is cute," said Mac, who had wandered across the aisle to the clothes, and was now holding up a blue pajama set with a sports theme on the front.

"Yeah, but it would be too big for a newborn. Is there a smaller size?" asked Laura.

"Yeah," said Mac, pulling out a smaller one.

"It's definitely for a boy though," commented Mark.

"Let's get it anyway. OC will appreciate it and if they have a girl, Maddie can always exchange it for the pink one with rabbits."

"Bunnies," corrected Laura.

"What?"

"Sweetie, those are bunnies, not rabbits."

"Whatever." They picked out a few more outfits and some little baby toys.

"Okay, we've got quite a bit," said Laura. "Why don't we pay for this stuff and go eat lunch. We can finish shopping later."

"Sounds good to me," said Mark. "I'm starving."

"Speaking of food, where are Jimmy and Rammer?" wondered Mac.

"I don't know, I haven't seen them almost since we got here," said Laura.

"I think they went to look for wrapping paper," offered Mark.

"Let's go look for them. I don't know what could be taking so long," said Mac.

They walked over to the wrapping paper section, and then heard loud guys in the next aisle. There were two loud guys, none other than Jimmy and Rammer. They saw the two fake sword fighting with wrapping paper tubes.

"What are you two doing?" asked Mark.

"You're acting like children," said Laura.

"I take winner," called Mac. Laura and Mark looked at him. "What?" he asked, like nothing was wrong.

"Men," Laura said with a sigh, rolling her eyes. "Actually, let me rephrase that. Boys."

A few minutes later, the five were all in line. Laura was in front and turned around to ask Mac something, when she noticed all four guys were gone. She finally saw them. Typical, she thought. They were throwing plastic air filled kick balls at one another. Laura got out of line and walked over to them.

"Do you need constant supervision?" The guys ignored her. "I feel like I'm your mother or something. Stop playing dodge ball in the store!" Mac threw another ball at Rammer, but missed and hit Laura in the head instead.

"All right. That's it!" Laura picked up the ball and threw it at Mac, hitting him dead on.

"Wow. You've got a pretty good arm," Mac said surprised.

"Come on let's go. If we leave, we can get lunch," Laura bribed them.

"Okay, let's go," they said, putting the balls back in the bin.

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"Can I make a suggestion?" Gail asked when the guys started to make the frosting.

"We know that the cake needs to cool before we frost it. Rizzo already told us," Buzz explained.

"Not that."

"Well, we don't need your suggestions. You wouldn't help us before, and we managed without your help. We can finish by ourselves."

"Okay, fine."

The guys made the frosting and then proceeded to frost the cake. When they were almost done, Rizzo realized there wasn't enough frosting.

"Guys, there's not enough frosting."

"That's not good," said Bah, his mouth full of vanilla frosting.

"Maybe if you guys wouldn't have eaten it all, we'd have enough."

"Don't blame it all on us. You had some too," Buzz said.

"One small spoonful."

"I tried to warn you guys, but you didn't want to listen. I knew you wouldn't have enough," said Gail. "I was going to tell you to make extra, but my suggestion wasn't good enough."

"You're always right aren't you," Buzz said, walking over to her.

"Yeah, I am."

"Well, what am I going to do right now, miss smarty pants?" Gail didn't answer, but just looked at him. Buzz brought out his hand form behind his back and put a dab of frosting on her nose.

"Hey!" Gail got up and ran over to the bowl, which was empty. She saw the confectionary sugar on the counter and picked up that. Gail rubbed it on her hands and ran over to her husband, putting her hands on his face. He laughed.

"Hey!" After fooling around with the sugar for a few more minutes, and everyone making a mess, they were finally done.

"Hey Gail," Buzz said, grabbing her arm. "You got something right there," he said, pointing to her nose. The frosting was gone, but now she had sugar on it. Buzz wiped it off and gave her a quick kiss. "And I am sorry about calling you Betty Crocker."

"Don't worry about it. We were just having fun. Plus, now I have something to hold against you at a later date," she said, laughing. They shared a kiss before Buzz went back to finish frosting the cake.

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That night, the boys took care of decorating and wrapping the presents, and Laura and Gail got the shower games ready. The guys didn't know much about any of them, and the girls wanted to keep it that way. They were both afraid that if the guys knew what some of the games entailed, they wouldn't play.

After most of the guys left, Gail and Laura were still working. They wanted everything to be ready for the next day. Other than the cake, the two girls also took care of the other food. Keeping things simple, they decided on pizza, pop, and chicken wings. Once everything was ready, Laura left and Gail went to bed.

In the meantime, Jack was by himself. The guys didn't want Jack to see the presents, because some of them were as much for him as Maddie and the baby. The decorations and prizes were also sort of secret. Since he wasn't allowed to go to Buzz's to help set up for the party, he decided to get party favors instead.

Jack had absolutely no idea what to get. After an hour of walking around the store looking for something, he found chocolate "It's a boy" and "It's a girl" suckers. He figured everyone would like candy, so he got those. He also got little thank you cards to attach to them.

It was late, so Jack headed back to his room and called Maddie. She seemed happy to talk to him, and she couldn't wait to see him. He found out that Maddie was staying in a hotel because she didn't want to be near her family and she couldn't get a flight back any earlier than her scheduled one the next morning. Jack was a little thankful for that because of the surprise shower. They both said goodnight and hung up, both excited for the next day, but for different reasons.

A/N: Hope you liked it. The next chapter will be the shower!