On my way out, I caught a glimpse of myself in the full-length mirror hanging on my bedroom door. What I saw would have made even Arnold Schwarzenegger cry like a little girl. Bags under red puffy eyes. Crusty mouth. Boxlike body. The shoulder pads made me look like an actual house. Walking gave the appearance of a mobile home. Hey, all you women, children, and drug-addicted prostitutes, beware: “CAUTION: WIDE LOAD!”

I was too embarrassed to come face-to-face with my Dunkin’ Donuts friends and proceeded directly to the courthouse. The metal detector went nuts when I went through. This came as no surprise. There was lots of junk in this trunk. After the third beep, a large male guard with a bushy mustache and a uniform at least three sizes too small approached me with a thick black instrument. He practically vacuumed Ann Taylor, and I kept beeping like a bomb, which I wished I had, for obvious reasons.

“You got a belt on under there?” he asked, disgust dripping from his ’stache, pointing to my stomach. Frankly, he had no right to be grossed out. He was vile. “Nope. Just the suit. No belt.” He didn’t believe me, and before I could stop him, he’d yanked the bottom of my jacket and shirt up, exposing my bare—and growing—stomach, rolled over wrinkled pleats. Sweet Jesus! Then he lifted them higher so that the other security guards and everyone else passing through could see my peach Victoria’s Secret bra that was even older than the suit. Not to mention, my ragged underwear was sticking out of the pants. He was thoroughly grossed out now. “Go on,” he muttered angrily, pushing me toward the elevators. Rolling ahead in my mobile home, I actually felt sort of bad for having given the guy a third-rate peep show.

I headed straight for my cubicle, bypassing the secretaries altogether. I couldn’t deal with Medieval Roy and Janet. Just as I tried to parallel-park myself, the darnedest thing happened. “Hey, what’s up?” Matthew asked nonchalantly, breezing in as if he’d never left. He sauntered into the clerks’ cave, looking like a Brooks Brothers ad in a snappy gray suit and pink-and-white-striped tie.

It turned out that Allison, Matthew’s sister-in-law, was going to pull through, and aside from a nasty scar on her right forearm and a lifetime aversion to cabs, she’d be fine. She’d been crossing Fifth Avenue during morning rush hour when a taxi came flying around 34th Street and pegged her. It also turned out that Matthew had yet to speak with the judge and wasn’t sure whether he was still welcome in her torture chamber.

“I wouldn’t worry about it,” I explained. “The judge doesn’t seem to have noticed you even left in the first place.”