It was September of 2011 when they met in the high school cafeteria. Christiana was introduced to Connor through a mutual friend that sat at Connor’s lunch table. Connor made the first move in their friendship as he would ask her questions and joke about how she would do her homework right after it was assigned. It wasn’t until the next year during their chemistry class that they started to get even closer. Connor would drive her to school, they would do their assignments together, play card games during study hall, sit in the hallway early in the morning to talk, and Connor walked Christiana to her classes. Connor also worked hard to be in an advanced French class just so that they would be in the same class—he even got a tutor. Christiana was his tutor. Unfortunately/fortunately, Connor was a very bad “tutoree” and he would just tease and talk to her during their lessons. Their favorite memory they had from high school together was the senior trip to Busch Gardens. It was sometime between senior year and college that they knew they were best friends. Once they found out they were both going to Virginia Tech, they promised to stay in touch. They went on long walks around campus and often went stargazing. Christiana’s friends would tease her about how Connor would eventually ask her out, but she didn’t believe them. He, however, knew he wanted to ask her out, but waited for the perfect time. He finally asked her out on October 31st, 2014, around midnight, and they have been inseparable ever since.

Connor knew since their third month of dating that he wanted to marry Christiana. However, it wasn’t until September 10, 2017, that he proposed. As far as Christiana knew, they were just visiting Connor’s close friend at CNU for the weekend. However, that Sunday, Connor and Christiana woke up at 3am to see the sunrise at Virginia Beach—one hour away. After taking a wrong turn on the highway, Connor was nervous that they would miss the sunrise. He was also worried that the sunrise wouldn’t be visible because of all the clouds that covered the sky (it was supposed to rain that day). Christiana didn’t help his nervousness. She didn’t know that this sunrise was very important to Connor so she unintentionally created obstacles for him. For instance, she told him that she had to brush her teeth first, then she had to find somewhere that was open at 5am to go to the bathroom, and finally she had to pack her towel and flip flops for the beach. All while Connor fidgeted nervously waiting for her to be ready. She noticed he was acting weird when he pressured her to not use the bathroom, not brush her teeth, and not pack her beach bag. But she didn’t think twice about it. After what seemed to be eternity, they made it to the beach and found a nice spot to watch the sunrise. It was nice because it was an early September morning, so almost nobody was on the beach. About 30 seconds after sitting down, Connor said in a peppy tone, “Okay time to get up!” before the sun finished rising. Christiana was confused. They had spent the entire morning getting ready to see the sunrise and he wanted to leave before it was over. But little did she know that he had something else in mind. They stood up, he got down on one knee, and he proposed. As you know, she said yes, and they spent the rest of the morning walking on the beach without a drop of rain touching the ground the rest of the day.