RYAN'S VERSION: Preface: After a night of free drinks and celebration at a medical society event with my campus dean, he calls me at 11pm to ask if I can give a lecture for the third-year medical students the next day. “The notes are in the slides, I’m sure you’ll do great. Thanks!” I show up early, visibly stressed. Anyone who knows me knows I love public speaking, but only when I’m prepared enough to do a good job. So, I’m sitting down reviewing slides and the big conference room is eerily empty. After staring at the 70 slides for roughly 30 minutes a stranger walks in the room… looks around… “Why is it so quiet around here? Did you scare everyone off?” I glance up for a second then look back down. “Yeah, I don’t know… I kind of have that effect on people” I reflexively said in my sarcastic/dismissive tone, going back to my slides. “Uhhh okay” She says as the stranger walks off out of the room. I paused for a moment. That threw me off focus, who was that stranger? Why were they so bold to say that? Why was she kinda cute? Whatever, back to the grind I went. Everyone piles into the room for the lecture. My dean gasses me up on quite the introduction… “Soldier for this great country, excellent student, Emergency Medicine bound, basically captain America”. (Thanks Doc). And while I give this presentation I can’t help but realize that this stranger who borderline made fun of me before the lecture just wouldn’t stop making eye contact (never mind that I’m literally giving a presentation, but in the moment, it felt more lol). After I finish and my dean is talking, the feeling of this girl being really cute keeps setting in, and I decide I need to strike up some conversation. But as soon as everyone is released, she DARTS out of the room, and I get held up by some people asking questions. But luckily everyone has to sit at a table with name tags in front of them, so I did what any reasonable person would do in this situation… slide into their Instagram DMs. After a phenomenal first date at a dive bar playing pool, a nose surgery, and multiple begging attempts to be my girlfriend just a couple weeks into knowing each other, I met my favorite person, Amber! AMBER'S VERSION: After walking into what I thought was a normal weekly lecture during my third year of medical school, I noticed a handsome man sitting off to the side of the classroom. I had no idea who he was, but I assumed he must be a resident or attending there to give the lecture. After he finished speaking, I remember thinking he was not only really cute, but also a great speaker. Still, I figured he was probably already in a relationship like many of the men I knew in medical school, so I didn’t think much would come of it. On my way home, I did what any girl would do and tried to find his Instagram… just to confirm whether he was single. Unfortunately, I came up empty-handed (thanks to his mysterious military antics and lack of a last name on his profile), so I let it go. Until I got a follow request from none other than Ryan P. Even then, I assumed he was just following everyone in my class since he didn’t really know us yet. However, the next morning, I woke up to a DM from him that said, “Thanks for not booing me off the stage.” He proceeded to ask me about my clinicals and some other boring (very friend zone) conversations, but FINALLY asked for my number. A few days later, we went on our first date at a pretty dingy (but very beloved!) dive bar. The very next day, he had nose surgery… not exactly his best look (I still have the photos). And yet, somehow, he had a way of making me feel like the luckiest girl and continues to do so every day!