By mid-month the invitations and thank-you notes had been ordered (thermography); a calligrapher hired; rooms at the Tabard Inn for our out-of-town guests secured. By the end of December, Donald’s custom-ordered black suit (Armani) had come in and was awaiting alterations, and the hotel room for the wedding night had been reserved (a junior suite at the Hay-Adams, overlooking Lafayette Square, with a view of the White House).

By New Year’s Day, after a quiet celebration the night before at home together; a pre-midnight phone call from Adrienne (“This is going to be a great year for all of us. I just know it!”), and an hour or so of frantic late-night spying provoked by her phone call (Donald’s cell phone, date book, wallet; the pockets of two coats and three pairs of pants; the desktop documents of his computer, which he’d left on), I took stock of our situation. Our wedding plans were in good shape. Considering the fact that I’d been simmering on a low boil for weeks, ready to self-sabotage at any moment.

My to-do list had certainly shrunk, and I felt deserving of a special treat to reward my Herculean efforts.

Jealousy, envy, and obsession returned (not that they’d ever really left).

I welcomed them with open arms.

There was still a great deal to do, though.

There was the menu. And the cake. And the flowers. And the ring. And, of course, there was the little matter of the dress.

But with every pending decision, I couldn’t help obsessing about what Adrienne would have selected were this her wedding. Staring at the caterer’s eighteen-page fax of menu options (which came in addition to the endless list of options contained in the thick packet of information they’d sent to me in the mail), for instance, I couldn’t help wondering:

Would Adrienne serve lobster thermidor? Leg of lamb? A chateaubriand? Or a grilled salmon? Dover sole? Trout almandine?

Would her cake be multitiered? Buttercream? Chocolate? Yellow? Or mocha-raspberry-mousse-filled? Or would she instead have the traditional French wedding cake, a croquembouche?

My curiosity expanded like a mushroom cloud; other questions arose.

Looking at the lists of flowers and gemstones to choose from and their Victorian-era ascribed meanings, I compared and contrasted. Adrienne was a Scorpio; I’d extracted that out of Donald, a Libra, long ago. So I, a Leo, could look up their general compatibility—fiery, fierce, forever passionate—in Linda Good-man’s Love Signs, a fact-checking reference tool I’d used when I was editing an unauthorized biography of former Dynasty star Linda Evans and her composer-boyfriend, Yanni, and perpetually read her horoscope when I checked my own). Armed with this most fundamental bit of astrological knowledge, I first found our flowers and their meanings. Mine were gladiolus (temperance, trust) and larkspur (laughter); Adrienne’s were narcissus (naturally) and chrysanthemum (abundance—ref.: her bust line). Our comparative gemstones proved equally disquieting: mine were ruby (clarity of heart) and sardonyx (marital happiness); Adrienne’s were turquoise (prosperity, success) and lapis lazuli (power). I even checked the month we—Donald and I now; Donald and Adrienne then—planned on having the wedding. Marry in April if you can, joy for maiden and for man, was how the saying went.