We're getting married!

Sophie Duncan, brand new to St. Louis, was excited to celebrate the holiday around new friends. Matthew Wilson was dressed in his patriotic best. Maybe it was the loudness of the stripes, the pizzaz of the stars, or his general charm, but Sophie knew she was interested. Witnesses of the day say they spent hours talking to each other in between rounds of True American, but neither one of them knew how much time had really passed. And neither one of them asked for the others' number either, so things ended as abruptly as they had begun... for a while.

By the time August rolled around, Matt and Sophie had been largely out of touch, until they reconnected on one of those dating apps. Matt was gearing up for a move to China, but Sophie wasn't exactly ready to let him go. After sending him an email in response to a particularly funny post on his travel blog, the correspondence just... didn't stop. 300 emails and four months later, Matthew was back stateside, and the two finally went on their first date, on a snowy night in late December.

After recovering from COVID19, Matt told Sophie to prepare for "quarantinis" at Planter's House, the cocktail bar they had gone to for their first date way back when. Sophie, none the wiser, changed out of her sweatpants for the first time in days (okay, weeks), and they enjoyed the lovely, late summer evening, and a surprise Wednesday date night. When Sophie started to complain about being hungry, Matt closed their tab, and they walked towards the car as Sophie listed off what was in the fridge that could be for dinner (it wasn't much). The rest is a bit of a blur, but the facts that remain include Matthew stopping her on the corner where they had their first kiss, pulling out a ring, and asking her to be his, forever. Of course, she said yes.