"Between my sorority sisters, the four girls I lived with during med school, and my friends from back home, I think I've been in a dozen weddings and attended a dozen more."
He peered at me, a small smile twisting across his lips. "Wouldn't have guessed sorority girl, but now that you say it"—he dragged a knowing gaze over my body and back up—"yeah, I see it."
"Don't look at me like that. You would've demolished the twenty-year-old version of me."
He barked out a laugh. "Probably not. Let's just say I didn't know what to do with pretty sorority girls when I was in college."
"Really? You didn't hit the ladies with your scowl-and-growl routine?"
He ran his knuckles along his scruffy jaw. "It didn't work as well before the beard."
"Shocking," I murmured. "I wouldn't want to have the whole traditional wedding thing on a beach."
"Why not?"
"If I'm getting married on a beach, it has to be simple. No huge dresses, no rose petals, no perfect little white folding chairs."
"Then you want to get married?" he asked.
"Maybe. I think so. If it works out." I peered at the ceremony site as it took shape. "What about you? You'd really spice up the Acevedo-Hartshorn double date circuit."
He shook his head. "I don't think so. My parents didn't sell me on the institution if you know what I mean."
"Neither did mine," I replied. "They're probably the worst possible models for a healthy marriage. They are textbook examples of people who should get divorced."
"And here you are, planning your non-traditional island wedding."
"I am not planning my wedding. I just know I wouldn't want it like that." I gestured toward the arbor. "I hate being the center of attention, so I'd never want a big wedding with walking down the aisle and a first dance. Cutting the cake? I'd disappear. I'm not kidding. I couldn't handle that."
He tapped his beer bottle against my water. "Call me if you ever need a getaway."
"Yeah, Stremmel, I'll do that," I said with a laugh. "I love all my friends and I've loved being part of their weddings, but there have been a few occasions where I've seriously wondered whether they were getting married because they wanted to be together forever or because they wanted to have a really big party. And I feel terrible saying that, but a few of those marriages have already ended and a few others are headed that direction. There was one that didn't last a year and I just felt like 'Why are we doing this?'"
"Because they need something to do after finishing school and getting a job," he said. "People look at life like it's a series of checkboxes. Graduate, go to work, get married, get a house, have a kid, get a dog, have another kid, go to Disney World, send the kids off to school, retire, spoil the grandkids. There's always something to do next. Always another checkbox. It keeps you busy, keeps you from looking around and wondering 'What's the point of all this?'"
I glanced at him. "No checkboxes for you?"
He shook his head. "I don't know. I could see myself having a kid someday."
"You'd have kids, but not get married?"
"Maybe? I don't know what I'm talking about," he said. "But I don't think the two have to go hand in hand. People can create a family without getting married, without having kids. A family is a bunch of people who love and care for each other unconditionally, people who show up for each other unconditionally. It doesn't have to be legal. Doesn't have to be blood. But it does have to be unconditional. Family can't blow each other off. Does that make sense?"
"It makes a lot of sense," I said. "I don't think kids are for me. My body works too hard taking care of me. It really doesn't want to grow someone else. Sure, there's always adoption, fostering, surrogacy. But I don't think I'm right for that. Like you said that day at bubble suit jousting—"
"Don't," he groaned. "I was a douche that day because I was jealous about the professor."
"I'm not willing to cut my on-call hours," I continued, "so I'd be looking at full-time help for these fictional children of mine because there is no work-life balance to be found in this career. I know right now I'd shame and guilt myself over it every day, even if plenty of other people do it. I know I'd try to be the most perfect wife-mother-surgeon-everything until I ran myself into the ground. I'd rather not do that again."
"I was a douche that day," he repeated.
"I heard you the first time," I said.
"I'm sorry I said it."
I shrugged. "It was true."
"Doesn't mean I should've said it."
I nodded, silent a long moment as we continued watching the staff hang bouquets from every chair along the aisle. Eventually, I asked, "Do you go home to Florida for the holidays? Are you heading back there next month?"
"I usually cover the ER on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day," he said. "I didn't do it last year because I was fucking exhausted, but Hartshorn started me picking up shifts on holidays. It gives other docs a chance to be with their people, and aside from the fact I get a lot of long weekends out of those returned favors, it's not a bad day to be there. Everyone brings in food, the cases aren't too bad, and Acevedo insists I stop by afterward so he's not drinking whiskey by the fire alone. No complaints from me."
"You don't go home?"
"Home isn't home. Acevedo's house is more home to me than the place where my mother lives now. My sister Vivi is there in Gainesville and she's amazing, but the holidays are her busiest time with bowl games. Besides, my mother and her husband like to travel a lot. I think they have a condo in Aruba. They go there for the holidays if they're not on a cruise or off somewhere else."
"Your mother's husband. So, your stepfather?"
"Mother's husband is fine," he murmured.
"Right."
"What about you? Where do you go, who do you see?"
I belted out a dry laugh. "You have to ask that after last night? I don't go anywhere. I hate holiday season travel. It stresses me out. Everyone is so frantic and hostile. I'd rather wait until January or February and take two weeks off to do this." I gestured to the beach around us. "I might do this again in the new year."
"I like that idea. I might be the one to surprise the hell out of you."
"I'd like to see you try," I teased. "I'm not nearly as good as you, seeing as I don't cover any services over holidays, but I usually get picked up by some extrovert to join their holiday events. Last year, Emmerling brought me along to Thanksgiving at her husband's family's place. That was wild. She also convinced me to join them for a multi-holiday thing at her sister-in-law's penthouse in the North End."
"I've been to that party," he said. "I hit on that sister-in-law. In front of her fiancé too."
"Of course you did," I said, this laugh far less salty than the last.
"You have siblings, right? What about them? You said one of them is in Arizona."