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The living room of Malcolm's apartment was ready for the party. The food was laid out and Paula's gifts were stacked in the corner. There was a good number of them. Malcolm may have gone overboard.
There were streamers and bows and paper flowers in every color decorating everything. Balloons floated from the ceiling, their ribbons trailing down with paper flowers tied to the end of them, courtesy of Candy.
While they were waiting for the guests to arrive, Malcolm picked up Paula so she could reach the balloon string, tug on them then let the balloons float back up. She loved doing that.
As Malcolm set Paula down, she showed off how her pink party dress twirled. Malcolm got that on video and took a lot of photos of her. "Am I dancing?" she asked after spinning around the room.
"You sure are. You're the cutest little dancer," Malcolm told her, and she beamed at him and went to her room to show her toys her new twirling dance.
Malcolm was going to check things over one more time when he got a text. It was Derrick asking if he could come up. He had only arrived back from his trip that day. "Of course," Malcolm told him.
Now he was nervous and way too excited to see him again. He opened the door to Derrick holding a large white box with an embossed logo of the pricey bakery.
"I wanted to deliver the cake myself," he said and for a minute Malcolm just stared at him. He felt like he hadn't seen Derrick for so long, but it had only been a few days.
In that time, Malcolm had been trying to keep his feelings for Derrick under control, but that wasn't working. Even whenMalcolm didn't see him, he felt like he was falling harder for him every day. And now Derrick was here, so serious looking and gorgeous and carrying a cake. How could anyone resist him?
"I remember you saying something about a small cake," Malcolm said since the box clearly didn't hold a small cake.
"It's only the next size up," Derrick claimed. Since Paula was still in her room, he lowered his voice and asked, "Should we show the cake to Paula now or wait?"
"Save the reveal for the party," Malcolm said. Then he realized he was assuming that Derrick would be there that long. He might have been just stopping by. "But if you have to go, we should show it to her now so you can see her reaction."
Derrick shook his head, "I'm definitely staying." He held Malcolm's gaze for what seemed like a long time, then Paula came out of her room.
Her little face lit up with a big smile when she saw Derrick. "You're here!" she said. Then she ran back inside her room.
Derrick gave Malcolm a questioning look. Malcolm shrugged and took the cake from him while Derrick took off his coat. Coming back from her room, Paula ran up to Derrick and gave him the invitation she drew for him. She hadn't had a chance to give it to him until now.
The invitation was a drawing of a birthday cake that kind of looked like one. "That's your invitation," Malcolm told him in case he couldn't tell since nothing was written on it. "Now you're official. We can let you into the party."
"And just in time," Derrick told Paula.
"Are you coming to my party?" she asked.
"That's why I'm here," Derrick told her with a smile and she was so happy.
Taking him by the hand, Paula showed Derrick all the special decorations for her party. Derrick was duly impressed, and Malcolm got tears in his eyes at how sweet and patient he waswith her, letting her lead him around the living room, pointing at paper flowers and saying, "And a red one and a purple one and a yellow one and another purple one. Do you like them?"
"I love them. The flowers are beautiful and you look lovely," Derrick told her.
When other guests started arriving, Paula got a little anxious, hiding behind Malcolm and saying hi shyly. But the guests were all people she knew, including some kids from their building, and that helped Paula relax and enjoy herself.
She was very happy with her party. She loved all her presents and Malcolm was overjoyed to see her so happy. She blew out the candles on the fancy cake that Derrick got her.
The beautiful cake amazed her. It had butterflies made of sugar on top of it, and Paula got served one of them, but couldn't bring herself to eat it. Everyone else was impressed too, both before they got to taste it and after. Once they started eating it, some of the guests were making very embarrassing noises over that cake.
Paula opened her gifts next. Books, drawing and coloring supplies, sweet new toys, a hat with floppy ears, cute cat slippers, she adored every one of them. Three of the biggest gifts were from Derrick. Malcolm whispered to him, "I thought the cake was supposed to be her gift."
"No. The cake is the cake," Derrick said.
Malcolm noticed that through the whole party Derrick stuck close to him, maybe because he felt out of place at a kid's party. Candy noticed too. "Are you two handcuffed together?" she whispered in Malcolm's ear and made him jump.
He didn't need her insinuating things about him and Derrick. Malcolm already felt weird when he had introduced him to the other guests. He would have sworn everyone gave them funny looks, like they suspected something was going on between them.
"Not really your kind of party, is it?" Malcolm said and wondered if he might leave any second.
"It's Paula's kind of party. It's wonderful to see her enjoying herself like this, and you too. When her eyes light up so do yours," Derrick said.
