Jessica and I first met in the lounge of the 4th floor of the Cypress residence hall over at the University of Florida (Go Gators). It’s a night I don’t really remember because I was just minding my business playing video games, but one that is burned into her mind as she was in the lounge seeking refuge with a mutual friend while in the middle of a really bad first date. You see, “unlucky in love” was a bit of a theme shared between the two of us, but that began to change once we started to get to know each other better. As the Fall 2019 semester went on, I found myself getting closer and closer to this friend of a friend until she was simply my friend. Of course, that was all she could ever be, because she was an RA (Resident Assistant) and was therefore not allowed to get involved with residents whose buildings she could access, like me. It’s a very sensible policy which was not a problem at all because, as I said, Jessica was just a friend. A friend who I happened to always be around, yes, and a friend who I happened to want to be around even more, yes, but just a friend. Not a problem at all. By the time the Spring 2020 semester started, this policy was becoming a very big problem. Little by little, I would whittle away at the logic behind it: “She’s not my RA, so it's not really a big deal, right?” “She’s not even in my building, so what’s the harm?” Eventually, I decided I would burn that bridge once I got to it. And so, I formulated a plan. I had just won a Starbucks gift card at a trivia event in Cypress and as a non-coffee-drinker, I “needed” a “coffee expert” to come with me and show me the ropes. Then, I “needed” someone, “just anyone really,” to help me take some pictures for a project of mine. Then, I “needed” to help her do some RA crafts because I was interested in becoming an RA next year. Until finally, we both confessed our feelings to our mutual friend, the same one she was visiting on the first night we met, and told her she “needed” to not tell anyone. Then in February 2020, we burned the bridge. We dated, or as we called it “mutually and exclusively liked each other,” for about two weeks before Spring Break. In our time apart, we called every night and did nerdy trivia games over the phone and just wanted to be back together. However, as some of you may remember, March 2020 was notoriously not a “being together” kind of time. So, though we got to see each other and say goodbye for a bit before I was sent back home to Texas, we didn’t really know what that would mean for us. A pandemic is typically not a very good omen, but though the timing seemed wrong, we both knew the person was right, so we kept on calling every night, playing our nerdy games and wishing we could be together again. Now, 5 years later, we’re happy to say we’ll be together forever.