Here we sit… just the two of us, around a small table on the patio of a beachside bungalow. The weather couldn’t be more perfect, sunny, warm… a slight breeze blowing off the ocean setting wind chimes hanging near the back door into whimsical action.

Late-day sun rays cast long shadows while spraying a rainbow of color across the horizon. We’re sharing a bottle of red wine – something a little too heavy for my taste, but it’s what she likes… and I really like her.

It’s early July in Southern California and I can’t imagine a more perfect place to be for our tenth anniversary.

I hold a sip of wine in my mouth, sliding my tongue through the rich flavor before allowing it to slide down my throat. While reveling in the flavor and sensation of the sweet liquid, I tilt my head just enough to allow myself a most spectacular view.

She’s casually reclined, staring out along the expanse of sand between us and the ocean. I note her eyes as they spot and track the path of a soaring seagull and wonder exactly when it happened. When did I fall in love with her? When did I decide I needed to give up all that I had all that I knew and all that I was comfortable with in order to spend my days and nights loving her and only her?

Had it been sudden or did it happen slowly over years? It’s funny how I can’t decide. I don’t seem to recall ever not loving her, yet I know with full certainty… or at least relative certainty that I’ve loved others before her, in fact, when I met her, I was in a relationship that I believed to be my ‘happily ever after’. But today, yesterday… last month for that matter, I don’t recall how that love felt… it seems such a distant and faint memory – maybe because it wasn’t a true love?

So how did I get here? When did I fall in love with one of the most beautiful women I’ve ever seen in my life?

I watch her in the late afternoon sun. Long dark curls lifting gently in the breeze, causing slim fingers to wrangle a few unruly strands behind her ear, her dark sun glasses perched upon the top of her head, and lightly painted lips sipping at her glass of wine.

Another swallow of wine slides down my throat while I wonder if she remembers when it happened, maybe she can enlighten me as to the exact events of our courtship… pin-point the moment when my heart became hers.

Just barely above a whisper I venture a feeble attempt to clarify, “When did it happen?”

Slow to acknowledge my interruption of our contented silence she gradually steers her eyes toward mine, “When did what happen baby?” she asks, tilting her head in amusement of my unclear question.

“Us,” I stare back at her, watching her brown eyes as they study my face, “When did we fall in love?” I clarify quietly.

Our eyes meet once again, locking for a long minute before a sexy grin crosses her soft lips. She leaves her seat to re-position herself between my legs on the cushioned chaise lounge “Why do you wonder, are you done falling in love with me already Tina?” She places a soft kiss to my nose and runs her index finger along my cheek, “Hmmm… I thought we were still falling in love.” Bette’s words drip slowly from her lips like warm sweet honey against my own.

My eyes close softly in response to her kiss and I realize as I drink in her softness, her scent, her taste… I’ll never know the answer to my wonderings, because she’s right, we’re still falling… at a steady and blissful pace.