My friend Kim told me the next time she heard of a karaoke event she would let me know. I was cool to meet some new friends in Annandale since it wasn’t far. I was so excited to just enjoy socializing. Got there and people slowly started filling up the room. It was becoming packed and Toure sat beside me. A little later he asked for someone to help sing backup for a Neyo song. Nobody volunteered so I decided to help him out. I remember he seemed like a nice, personable and outgoing guy because he participated and did not shy away from enjoying himself.

I asked a sister what was going on that weekend and she sent me an invite to a karaoke room. I asked my little brother to come with me since didn't want to go alone to Northern Virginia from Baltimore. After going to the wrong karaoke place, I found the correct one. But the work was soon to start. The place was dark so I had to quietly stick my head into each room until I found someone noticeable. After sticking my head in a 5th room, I finally found someone I knew. It was a cramped room, but Danielle made space for me next to her. People were passing the mic, I asked who wants to sing with me. After no one responded, Danielle nominated herself. At the end of the night I thought to myself, "I would like to know her, but not in the time and place for it".

After my father passed away I was in grief. One night while on instagram I saw that Toure had messaged me. I was surprised when he expressed interest in taking me out to dinner but at the time I was not mentally ready to date. I also didn’t feel comfortable going out during the pandemic. I told him it wasn’t a good time for me. I assumed he would just move on and never message me again. Surprisingly, in Spring 2021 he asked me out again. Since I was starting to feel like myself again I said to myself, “you better say yes this time”. We found out we actually had a lot in common. We didn’t want the date to end. From then on our love grew.

After leaving the one day assembly in February with Danielle, I felt like “I’m going to get a ring tomorrow”. When I went to the store I found a ring similar to what she wanted and bought it that day. I just was going to propose to her on April 23rd because it would have marked two years that we dated. When she said “I would like to go to your memorial this year, since you came to my memorial last year”. That’s when I was like “I’m going to propose April 1st so she can come to my memorial as my fiancé”. I asked her mom in the middle of March to throw a cookout April 1st, but don’t tell Danielle because I plan to propose to her. Mama bear said she wouldn’t say anything and the secret was safe with her. The cookout was her family and close friends of ours. It was getting dark so I had to push up the proposal sooner than wanted. But I had got myself together with a prayer to Jehovah and sat next to her. With everyone in anticipation because they were told what the cookout was for, I told her that “I love you and you’ve been there for me thick and thin, I got one last question for you…. Will you marry me?”. Her looking shocked (all week long she told me not to play no jokes at the cookout) she replied “Yes”.