Fed up

as possible. Dream on, Eileen! Adrianna could wear a chicken costume, and Owen would still find her the sexiest woman in the world.
    “I’m sure it will be beautiful on you when you lose all the weight you’ve put on, dear,” added Kitty, passive-aggressive as ever.
    I hurriedly put Kitty’s gift in front of Adrianna. “Now, your mother’s present.”
    When Adrianna had removed the wrapping paper, I could hardly believe my eyes. Or maybe I just didn’t want to believe what I was seeing. To Adrianna, to her own daughter at this wedding and baby shower, Kitty had presented a cheap-looking basket that held a small assortment of cheese balls and dried sausages. Bad? Bad enough if the basket had been new, but the terrible gift had already been opened: one of the sausages was obviously missing.
    “Thank you, Mom,” Ade croaked.
    My heart broke for her. Of all the stupid, meaningless, idiotic gifts to give to a daughter on any occasion! But now? Oh, I was furious. Goddamn it. Kitty soared to the top of my official shit list. So what if Adrianna was pregnant before her wedding? Couldn’t her own mother have the decency to fake understanding? Kindness, generosity... and even love? Evidently not!
    Robin reached out to push Nelson’s camera down. Amazingly, for all the cameraman’s greed for his notion of reality, he actually looked sympathetic.
    Adrianna’s eyes were glistening. Before she had time to shed tears, I put the presents from my mother in front of her. One was in a big box on the coffee table, the other in a long, wide package too bulky to lift off the floor. I knew what Mom was giving Ade and saw the lavish gifts not just as expressions of celebration but as tokens of the maternal devotion that Ade’s own mother withheld. Adrianna opened the Cuisinart food processor and then a fancy high chair with an adjustable seat, a dishwasher-safe tray, and all sorts of decorative doodads, baubles, and bells.
    Kitty leaned over for a better view of my mother’s gifts. “My, how extravagant.”
    Adrianna pulled herself up from the chair and gave my mother an enormous hug. Ade was not one to get sappy or weepy, but I saw her wipe her eyes.
    Naomi’s voice rang through the room as she happily leaped off her seat. “Hasn’t this just been a touching display of female bonding? Really, the power of a group of women coming together to celebrate the impending arrival of another life!” She placed her hands on her chest. “My heart is overwhelmed with the love in this room.”
    I smiled at Naomi, who was totally oblivious to the family drama that had just transpired. Although this couldn’t be the first baby or wedding shower that my supervisor had ever attended, I suspected that it was rare for her to find herself in a gathering of women not associated with some sort of political movement.
    Nelson was standing five or six yards from Naomi with his camera fixed on her. He briefly peered around the camera to gaze at her with such clear interest that I spotted an opportunity, pounced on it, and pushed him in her direction. As far as I knew, Naomi was still involved with her boyfriend, Eliot, who owned a gallery on Newbury Street right near Simmer. Still, it wouldn’t hurt to have Naomi see that other men noticed her.
    “Why don’t you go interview Naomi?” I suggested to Nelson. “I’ll bet she’d give you some really good material to include in the video.”
    Nelson responded immediately. He practically skipped across the room to position himself smack next to a surprised Naomi.
    I cleaned up wrapping paper, moved gifts into one area of the living room, and then helped my mother to replenish the supply of coffee and pastries. When I returned to the living room and took a seat, Nana Sally was narrating a tale about Owen’s brothers, Evan and Willie. From the look on Cousin Phoebe’s face, I gathered that this sort of recitation was a family ritual.
    “Hee hee!” Nana Sally shrieked. “And remember when those two set up that skateboard ramp for Owen?” She had a fit of laughter. “Owen was fifteen, but he still could barely stand on the skateboard without falling off. Love him! But athletic he is not. Well, Evan and Willie built a ramp and told him it would be easy as pie for him. They got poor Owen standing on the skateboard at the top of a hill, and then the pair of them sent him flying down onto this ramp contraption that they’d thrown together out of old plywood. I don’t know how Owen managed