It all started in July of 2021 with a completely random FaceTime call from my longtime friend, Gracie. I answered expecting it to just be her, but instead, Cade was sitting beside her. I didn’t know a single thing about him, but by the end of the call, he had asked me on a date for the very next day. I had already decided I wasn’t going. A blind date with someone I had never met felt absolutely crazy, and I was convinced it would never work out. About twenty minutes before the date, Gracie called again insisting that I had to come. So I rushed out the door, showed up late, and honestly looked a complete mess. When I walked in, all of our friends were sitting there staring at me. I knew everyone except Cade. He barely spoke to me through dinner and mostly talked to Will, aside from teasing me about what I ordered. After that awkward and quiet dinner, I was fully prepared to head home when Cade suddenly asked if I wanted to hang out with them afterward. So I did — and that’s when everything changed. We spent the rest of the night talking and laughing nonstop. Around 2:30 in the morning, Cade decided he wanted Taco Bell. No one wanted to ride with him all the way from Louisville to Eufaula — especially not me — but after ten minutes of Will convincing me, I finally ran outside and got in the truck. When we got there, Taco Bell was closed, so we grabbed a bag of chips from a gas station and sang Koe Wetzel the entire drive back. Somewhere during that late-night drive, I realized I really liked him. Not long after that, Cade moved to Kansas. We went months without seeing each other, which was hard, but we made it work through daily FaceTimes that lasted for hours. When he came home for Christmas break, we were inseparable. That December, he asked me to be his girlfriend, and our love has only grown stronger since then. Over the years, we’ve grown up together, found our path side by side, and added our sweet fur babies, Mallie Mae and Reacher Man, to our little world. What started as a random blind date turned into the most unexpected and beautiful blessing. I cannot wait to spend forever with him.