(No partners were consulted in the writing of these stories) In the fall of 2016, I moved to New Haven and started my master's. After I got an internship at Yale University Press, a friendly fellow Morning Prayer attendee with trendy glasses started offering me rides to work. Turned out we also had a poetry class, and every week, he somehow forgot his book and relied on me to share. In October, I got invited to two birthday parties on the same night, and in a major faux pas that Armando will never let me forget, I RSVP'd no to him and went to the other guy's party. Late November, I got a tentative text: "Hey. Would you be free to grab dinner next week?" We went on our first date the first week of December and ended up talking for three and a half hours at an Indian restaurant. Armando was so taken by my sparkling wit that he forgot to put money in his meter and got a parking ticket. A second date followed at the unmatchable Ordinary bar, and then Christmas break. A rare North Carolina snowstorm ended up delaying Armando's drive from Texas back to New Haven and depositing him at my mom's house for several days. And the rest, as they say, is history.

A quizzical look. A furrowed brow. A daring question from our friend's twin sister: "Do y'all date?" In that moment during Thanksgiving dinner, a week before Abbie and I went on our first date, I didn't dare look over to see Abbie's reaction as I blushed and hoped she wouldn't say more than a polite no. Abbie and I first met a few months earlier at a housewarming party for different friends of ours. I milled about, looking for cheese and wine since I knew few people there. Abbie, ever the social butterfly, came up and introduced herself. We talked about everything from music to religion to literature for an hour. Every conversation we had throughout the semester--after morning prayer, after class, when I drove her to work--went the same way. I knew two things: I loved spending time with her, and I couldn't get enough. On our first date, I figured we would hit it off and that we might talk for a while, so I put an hour and a half in the parking meter. Four hours later, we came back to the happiest parking ticket I've ever gotten. I worked up the nerve to tell her how I felt a few days later, after much prodding and cajoling from her. I don't remember much from that conversation outside on a cold December evening other than sitting across from her a wooden bench, holding her hands, and thinking to myself, "this feels right." Thank God for courage.