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Easy Love (1/1)

As Danny walked from the gravel parking lot situated just in front of Kamekona's shrimp truck, towards the picnic table where Steve and Catherine were just wrapping up lunch, he overheard a conversation between two women sitting a few tables away.

"They can't really be as happy as they look, can they?" the first woman asked.

"My sister Reimi works for HPD and she sees them around a lot," the second woman said. "She swears they're that happy."

The first woman sighed. "I sure wouldn't mind waking up next to him every morning. A face and a body like that would be easy to love."

Danny chuckled to himself. He'd heard Steve described many different ways over the years since they met, but easy to love was a new one.

He looked at his best friends two tables over, sharing a laugh and clearly enjoying each other's company, and a million thoughts ran through his mind.

'Soulmates,' he thought to himself.

He'd known that before he ever even met Catherine.

Or at least he'd hoped the mysterious woman in his new partner's life felt the same way about him as he clearly felt about her.

Danny hadn't known Steve well enough in those early days to definitively rule out the possibility that he might be delusional. For all Danny knew he was completely in love with, and devoted to, a woman who barely knew he existed.

Those fears were quickly put to rest after his first meeting with Catherine. She was clearly as in love with Steve as he was with her.

Even if the two of them refused to define their relationship as love.

Or, for that matter, define it at all.

That was something new for Danny and it took some time to get used to. He grew up in a big, Italian family that expressed their love verbally every chance they got. Over the course of his childhood the only phrase he heard more often than 'I love you' was 'Have you eaten yet?'. He had a hard time understanding how two people who obviously felt the feelings couldn't, or more accurately wouldn't, say the words out loud.

The first time a girl ever told him she loved him was in the eighth grade. After a complicated few days of notes and messages passed through intermediaries, and hushed conversations in the lunchroom, it was confirmed that Anne Marie DiBenidetto did, in fact, "like-like" him and it was decided by all the best friends, both his and hers, that they should officially become boyfriend and girlfriend.

All that was required now was for Danny to say the words that would seal the deal.

That afternoon, while they were waiting in front of the school for their buses to arrive, with all their friends looking on from nearby, Danny got up the courage to do just that. To this very day, thinking about that moment instantly brought back the memory of his suddenly dry mouth, which stood in stark contrast to his extremely sweaty palms.

When he saw that Anne Marie's bus was the next one in line to be loaded he knew he had to make his move. It was now or never.

"Do you … you know … wanna be my girlfriend?"

He could still hear the sound of the unexpected squeak in his voice when he said the words.

Anne Marie didn't seem to notice. Or if she did she didn't seem to mind. It definitely wasn't a deal breaker.

"Yes." He remembered her bright smile. "I'll meet you here in front of the school tomorrow morning and we can walk in together."

Two weeks later, on the eve of the class picnic, she passed him a note that said 'I love you'.

Even at his young age, he'd been acutely aware that he didn't really have any idea what it meant to be in love with someone. He knew his parents were in love. And his grandparents. And he'd reached an age where he understood that the love couples had for each other was something very different than the kind of love they had for him. But that was as far as he'd gotten in terms of figuring things out.

Even though he wasn't sure exactly what it meant, he did know what he was expected to say in return.

He walked up to her after their next class and said, 'I love you too'.

The minute he said those words everything about his budding relationship with Anne Marie changed. Her list of expectations for him, as not just her boyfriend but also the man she loved, grew daily. There were more rules than before, and they felt stricter.

He had to meet her bus every morning and carry her books into school. He had to read all the poems she wrote, mostly love poems, and gush over them effusively. He could no longer talk to other girls. He had to get her lunch and bring it back to the table for her even if it meant that making a second trip back for his own, and waiting in line a second time, meant he didn't have time to eat before the bell for the next class sounded.

Suddenly everything about their relationship felt forced. He wasn't happy to see her anymore and even looked forward to the weekends where he wouldn't be at her constant beck and call like he felt he was at school.

He remembered asking Nonna her opinion on the whole situation one Sunday afternoon when he was helping her knead the dough to make pasta. She listened to everything he had to say then uttered the words he had thought about many, many times since.

"Love, nipote," she said, "The kind that's real and that lasts and that feeds your soul like a lasagna feeds your stomach…feels easy. It takes a lot of work, but it feels like the easiest, most natural thing in the world."

The next day he knew what he had to do.

He told Anne Marie their relationship was over.

She retaliated by telling everyone he was a really bad boyfriend.

Three weeks later Joey Manetti cornered him after gym class and said Anne Marie was his girlfriend now and they were in love so Danny better stay away from her.

It was years until he finally understood what Nonna meant above love feeling easy.

As he got close to the table where his friends were eating Steve looked up and saw him.

"Tell her, Danny," his partner said with a smile. "There was no way I could have known that guy had a pet skunk."

As Catherine threw her head back and laughed, Danny smiled.

These two were, without a doubt, the very definition of easy love. The day to day relationship stuff took a lot of effort. And Steve and Catherine both worked diligently at it to help maintain the strength of their relationship.

But the love part…that was easy.

He sat down next to Steve and looked at Catherine with mock seriousness. "Your husband was very brave. He faced down that attack skunk like a real hero."

THE END

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