“What a relief,” I murmured. “Anything else I should know about my fictional wedding? Aside from the fact it’ll be held in San Diego, of all the random places?”
“San Diego is delightful. You’d be lucky to get married in this town.”
“Yeah, of course, sure.” I took the curling iron from her because this conversation was getting a little chippy and one accidental burn was enough for today. “Fantastic on all fronts. Hate to mention this, but there’s a slight hiccup in the plans because I’m not getting married.”
“Not yet, but if you think your best man is going to wait much longer, you’re nuttier than I am.”
I reached for my makeup bag and started setting out my products and brushes in the order that I’d use them. I needed a bit of structure. “One thing at a time.”
“You’ve been living together for months,” she said, still making no progress on her hair or face. “The fact that he’s moving in when we get back from this trip is more of a formality than anything.”
I started with the concealer, leaning close to the mirror as I worked around my eyes. She was right about the move. By the time Brie headed out to wander the country in January, Henry and I had stopped dancing around whether we’d be spending the night together. The default assumption was yes and it didn’t matter whether one of us was on-call or in surgery until three in the morning. Before the end of February, I’d made space for him in my closet and the fridge was filled with his protein shakes.
But it felt like more than a formality. We weren’t just sleeping together, just hanging out, just dating, just seeing where it went. Adding someone’s name to the utility bills wasn’t sexy, but it was a statement. We were doing this and there weren’t any questions about it.
Not that I had questions. I didn’t. But I did feel like I was holding my breath a bit. Waiting, perhaps, for something to go wrong. I was working hard at not catastrophizing—and I didn’t really have any reason to look for worst-case scenarios—though I’d been aware of a slight and growing tension between us for the past few weeks.
I assumed it was the pressure of his first year coming to an end and grappling with all the things that would change when the second year started next week. Add to that exams and final presentations and everything else, and of course he was stressed. It had nothing to do with me.
“I’m not talking to you until you’re dressed,” I said. “We’re not going to be late to this one.”
“I am never late,” she drawled as she swept into the bathroom. “Everyone else is just too damn early.”
Meri grabbed my arm,digging her little talons into my skin as she said, “They’re just so beautiful and I’m so happy for them.”
We watched as Tori and Jenelle exchanged rings in front of their families, friends, and most of the surgical residents in the hospital. “Me too.” I edged forward to get a better view of Jenelle’s dress. “I love that she went for a full, badass ball gown. She looks gorgeous.”
“That suit could kill.” She tipped her chin toward Tori. “Absolute perfection, though I do hope she’s wearing some boob tape because it’s breezy here and that blazer is cut down to her belly button.”
“Not that far,” I said, though I did support boob tape since she’d skipped the shirt. Sequins and crystals ran the length of Tori’s trousers and along her lapels, and she had a small boutonniere and blood-red bow tie pinned there. “They’re going to make it. I know they will.”
Meri nodded. “I think so.”
I covered her hand with mine. “We’re going to make it too. You know that, right?”
“I really hope that we do.” It took a moment for her smile to come together. “I was expecting your best man to catch another case of the giggles, but he’s keeping it together today.”
Henry stood between Cami and Reza on Tori’s side of the altar, looking woodsy and wonderful as always in his tux. Even better, he’d only laughed at the appropriate moments and there hadn’t been a snort all day. I’d worried when Tori’s old familydog decided to wander between the brides during one of the readings and then proceeded to scratch like he’d rolled in fire ants while Reza read an Adrienne Rich poem, but Henry had made it through with a hand to his face and a stern elbow to the ribs from Cami. “I don’t think he has a problem with this union.”
“Who would? Those two are obsessed with each other. I can actually see the pheromones wafting off them.” She smoothed the skirt of her dark green dress. It made her eyes look incredible, like huge, mossy moons. “Who knew transplant surgery had such a hot hookup scene?”
“I wouldn’t need another gift as long as I lived if we stopped referring to my service as a hookup scene.”
The hospital gossip channels feasted on me and Henry for some time and there was a bit of snarky chatter about the ethics of all, though I invited myself into plenty of conversations to correct those assumptions. It kicked into high gear all over again when Tori and Jenelle went public with their relationship. That they got engaged only a month later kept it going even longer and gave me a few more opportunities to set everyone straight.
As Henry liked to say, it provided me with a chance to practice lighting people on fire with my eyes. Even if Hartshorn had stepped in as the heavyweight, I didn’t mind going a few rounds.
“Does it feel weird to you that we actually know this couple?” Meri watched while her favorite new fetal-neonatal resident dipped my favorite new transplant fellow for a scorching kiss. “I can’t decide if it’s weird.”
“It is weird,” I said, thinking back on all the weddings that came before this one. All the couples we’d celebrated, the families we’d wedged our way into. The vows and first kisses, the toasts and the first dances. “But I think I like it even more this way.”
“Do you think they’ll change for the reception?” Meri asked as we stood to cheer Tori and Jenelle on their way up the aisle. “I know it would be incredible, but I kind of want to obsess over these fits a little longer.”
Henry winked as he filed past, Cami on his arm. I pressed a hand to my chest because, even though love didn’t live there, it was where I felt it right now. “Me too.”
Long after sunsetand long after the costume changes, the toasts, and the cakes—one for each bride—Henry pried me away from Meri with some grumbles about this being his week and her getting me next week, and he led me to a far corner of the dance floor. The band was playing something loud and fast that had everyone bouncing along, but we fell into each other, swaying like always.
“I’m going to miss the hell out of you next week,” he said, his lips on my temple and a hand low on my back.
