In the summer of 2017, both David and Shanell accepted positions with the education based non-profit, City Year Detroit. Not long into their first few weeks of being full-time mentors and tutors serving youth in Detroit Public Schools, they met during a work training. A few weeks later, on a friday evening Shanell went out with her City Year team and decided to slide into David's DMs. David did not respond back immediately, however when he did, they texted briefly before David arranged the first date at Mike's Pizza Bar in downtown Detroit. From that night on, it was history.