We went to middle and high school together, played sports at the same schools -- I was even a cheerleader for the middle and high school basketball teams Brandon played on at Githens Middle School and Jordan -- yet we never said two words to each other. To be honest, I thought he had that "playa" look (whatever that meant to the fourteen year-old me in the 90s), but I lowkey liked cheering for him when he played basketball 'cause I thought he was a cutie. Fast forward almost twenty years later and a certain someone sent me a LinkedIn request. I remembered him! And he was still cutie -- the same as I remembered from high school, I recalled. I accepted and didn't think anything of it really. Until...about three months later, I was scouting out an online dating website (it's an embarrassing admission that actually turned out to be a blessing) and saw what looked to be a familiar face (at least what I could see under the low-brimmed fitted hat in the profile pic. He sent me a message and mentioned something about me cheerleading at Jordan back in the day and asked how I was doing. I thought, "This can't be Brandon Leach!" But I was too afraid to click on his profile page to find out for fear he would know I had viewed his profile and was sweatin' him. But I got up my nerve and messaged him back and after going back and forth through a couple of message exchanges, I figured out it was definitely him! Oh, the irony! He shared that it was his first time being on the dating site and he wasn't really interested in keeping his page open so he was wondering if we could talk over the phone instead. I liked it... Old school AF! Our first conversation lasted until about 4 in the morning and it felt like we had known each other for years! While I ghosted him for about 6 months and completely fell off the radar because I was adamant about finding love again (I know, I was so mean!), I randomly called him up one day, he set a first date, and we've been loving each other ever since!