Chapter 25
Chapter twenty-five
“MAZEL TOV!”
As soon as Will smashed the hospital cup turned wedding glass, Naomi didn’t wait for permission.
She threw her arms around Will and kissed him.
Not the sweet, blushing bride version she had been coached to give by Nightly Global News.
She kissed her husband with abandon, her cool tears of happiness and relief mingling with the warmth of their mouths.
Then she remembered, they technically still had one thing to do before that was true.
She pulled back and dashed to the chair where she had dropped her purse, not missing the startled looks on everyone’s faces. “Quick!” she practically shouted, pulling out the marriage license Will had picked up from her apartment sometime in the middle of the night. “Everyone sign this!”
“Does that mean I can put my arms down?” Not waiting for an answer, Becca lowered her end of the sheet.
“We did make the most elegant four posts of a chuppah,” Riley told her, releasing the sheet and rubbing the back of their arm with their hand. “With a little extra delt time at the gym, I think we could have an excellent side gig. Assuming the podcast and alarm app don’t work out.”
Naomi stepped between them, pointing to the empty signature lines on the license. “Sign!”
She ushered everyone over to Abby, who tossed the rest of her lunch into the garbage can and then flipped the lunch tray over so everyone could add their signatures.
Once they were done, she held it up in the air and waved triumphantly. “That’s it! We’re married!”
Riley followed suit, only instead of waving around a marriage license, they waved a bottle of wine that they had procured from their bag. “Time to celebrate!”
Abby’s eyes went wide. “That’s not the wine that I used to—”
“God no. They took that away, CSI-style. You didn’t think I’d purchase one measly bottle of alcohol, did you?
” Riley said, reaching back into their bag and—as if it were completely normal to do so—pulled out several more bottles, along with a bottle opener, and placed them on Abby’s bed.
“I don’t do that on a boring average day, much less on a wedding day. ”
“Did I smash the only cup we had?” Will asked, looking at the flattened cup on the floor.
“There are some paper cups in that drawer over there.” Abby indicated a small cabinet on the other side of the room. “But we’d better hurry. I’m supposed to get released soon, and I don’t think they’ll be a fan of our little speakeasy setup.”
Will quickly walked over to the cabinet and investigated before pulling out a stack of cups and tossing them to Riley.
As the cups arced through the air, there was a knock on the door.
Everyone froze, except Riley, who deftly caught the cups, tossed them with the pile of wine bottles on the bed and then sat down on the bed and leaned backwards onto their elbows, shielding the illicit party items from view.
“Hi, Dr. Greenland,” Abby said as the door opened and a woman in scrubs entered.
“Hey, Abby, I was coming with—” She stopped, her eyes scanning the room, taking an extra second to examine the abandoned chuppah/bed sheet still on the floor.
“My friends were very … excited that I’m going to be okay,” Abby said.
Dr. Greenland looked like she was weighing whether she wanted to ask any further questions, but then decided it wasn’t worth it.
“Well then, they’ll be glad to hear that I’m coming with more good news.
We’ll be discharging you shortly. The nurse will be by with your papers, and then you’ll be free to go. ”
“That’s wonderful,” Abby replied, employing the same tone she’d used at their Jewish summer camp when she’d convinced the counselor that the late-night giggling and flashlight flickers from their cabin were part of a study group for the next day's Torah portion quiz and definitely not a potluck of stashed away snacks. “I appreciate everything.”
Like the camp counselor, Dr. Greenberg gave one more suspicious look around the room but then left. The minute the door closed, Riley, with a mischievous grin, immediately resumed their role as the unofficial sommelier, distributing the paper cups and beginning to pour the wine.
“L’chaim!” Abby said as she brought her cup forward. “To happy endings!”
“To happy endings,” everyone echoed, their cups making an unceremonious clunk as they tapped together.
As Naomi sipped her wine, she also drank in everything around her, her eyes roaming the room in an attempt to commit as much detail as possible to memory.
She wished she could slow down time and hold onto this fleeting moment a little longer because it was all she had ever wanted.
It was the wedding she would proudly tell her children about someday.
“Let’s get a picture before the nurse comes!” she said, suddenly realizing she didn’t only have to rely on her memory. She picked up her phone and, as everyone crowded around her, she grinned and pressed the shutter.
“Okay, let’s get you out of here.” They turned in a pack to see a nurse walking into the room, head down as he examined a stack of papers. He looked up. “I’ve got your discharge papers and a wheelchair.”
“I’ll take those.” Becca shoved her cup into Naomi’s hand and bounded towards the nurse, taking the papers in one hand and his bicep in the other as she started to guide him back towards the door.
“Abby’s getting changed right now, so let’s give her a minute.
While we’re waiting, I’d love to pick your brain. See my husband and I role—”
The door shut and the group dispersed, clearing away any signs of their impromptu celebration while Abby changed into an outfit her mom had brought her. When Naomi opened the door, Becca was standing beside a new nurse.
“What happened to—” Naomi started to ask.
“I guess my questions were NSFW,” Becca said, crossing her arms with a huff. “I thought medical professionals were supposed to be comfortable with the human body.”
“We’d better go before Becca gets us kicked out,” Abby said.
“Be forewarned,” the nurse said as she wheeled the chair to Abby’s bed and helped her in. “There’s a little bit of a crowd outside the hospital.”
Abby leaned over the side of the wheelchair to look back at everyone behind her as she was pushed into the hallway. “A crowd?” she repeated.
“Yeah, news media,” the nurse nodded. “They’ve been parked outside for the last few hours now.”
Riley practically knocked Naomi over trying to get their phone out of their pocket and Naomi sped up slightly to avoid their aggressive swiping. “Literally, what is happening right now? It’s all over the interwebs! Simon’s attack, the arrest, Abby’s hospitalization. How did I miss this?”
“We were a little busy talking to the police and worrying about Abby,” Naomi said, although given what she had seen on the news this morning, she wasn’t entirely shocked.
“If you can’t multi-task in the twenty-first century, you might as well be dead,” came Riley’s distraught reply.
Now it was Becca’s turn. She dove into her purse so zealously that Naomi adjusted her pace again, this time to get out of the way of the rogue items spilling out of Becca’s bag.
“We’re going to need lip gloss,” Becca said, coming up for air with three tubes of varying shades.
“Especially you, Abby. Although I’m not sure how much it’s going to help. You’re a mess.”
“Thanks,” Abby said, clearly feeling no real appreciation.
Riley began tweaking everything adjustable on their body. “You’re the newsman, Will; what are we supposed to do? I am so not ready for an on-camera appearance.”
“I guess we keep it simple?” Will said, his words accompanied by a shrug. “Thank them for their concern and say we’re ready to move past everything. Or we find out if there’s a secret back entrance.”
Naomi, weary of the relentless eye of the camera, was teetering on the edge of suggesting they find a back door option when Abby spoke up.
“Still,” she said, as if she were finishing a conversation she had been having with herself.
“There’s something about closure. Like it or not, the public has been on this wild ride with us.
It might help us in the long run if we let them know we’re fine and moving on. ”
Naomi smiled as Abby, once again, helped her see things in a different light. “See, this is why being friends with a therapist is helpful. She’s got a point. I know we said we wanted to leave the audience behind, but maybe this is how we make that happen.”
They were nearing the glass sliding doors of the entrance. The short path leading to the sidewalk was lined on both sides with an indistinguishable mass of faces, arms, microphones, and cameras all pointed at the door.
“Then we’re agreed?” Abby asked.
Naomi slipped her hand into Will’s and looked up at him. He looked back and squeezed her hand tightly. “Agreed,” he said to her.
The doors opened and instantly, a blast of questions enveloped them like a tsunami, the throng of reporters' voices merging into an overwhelming roar. The air was thick with the flash of cameras and the jostle of microphones being thrust toward them.
Naomi held tightly to Will as they followed Abby and the nurse out into the sunny spring day.
The nurse stopped and helped Abby out of the chair, then whispered something and pattered her on the back before turning around and bringing the wheelchair back inside, leaving the group of friends to navigate the tidal wave of questions.
The uproar blended into an indistinct hum, making it almost impossible to hear individual questions. But she didn’t need to hear them to know what they were asking. Feeling a sense of peace and strength, she released Will’s hand and stepped forward.