Travon and I met at a birthday dinner for his oldest brother HL. I accompanied my big sister Noel to the dinner at Chili's. During the dinner, Noel was the perfect wingwoman and started asking Travon questions unprompted. By way of their conversation, I learned that Travon and I both were born in March and that Travon was a donut aficionado. Noel asked me if I wanted to go get donuts with Travon for his birthday. I don't remember saying this, but both Travon and Noel have confirmed that I said, "NO!" At the time, Travon didn't say a word, but later on he told me that my answer lit a fire in him. At this point, he was going to have to ask me out. When it was time to leave, Travon gave me a hug and said, "I'm going to hit you up on your birthday." Then he walked away. I'm thinking, "how is he going to reach out to me if he doesn't have my phone number?" Apparently, I had fallen right into his trap. If I were bait, he hooked me. A week or so later we went on an official first date and have been inseparable ever since. - Jessica

One of our favorite activities as a couple is visiting different parks in the area. We like to ride our bikes, have picnics, or just go on walks. Parks would become a significant part of our relationship especially during the pandemic. The more parks we visited, the more I knew a park would be the perfect location to propose to Jessica. But, which park would I choose? Jessica mentioned quite a few times that she would like to go to Umstead Park at some point. I never took her. For this reason, I knew the answer to my question. The week before the proposal, I asked Jessica if she wanted to go to Umstead Park on Saturday. She said, "sure." So my plan was a GO! So Saturday comes, and I try to act normal even though I have so many thoughts in my head. We get to the park and I know I need to stall to wait for our families to arrive to surprise Jessica. We go for a quick walk that turned into a 45 minute hike. Jessica was over it. I was also getting nervous because Jessica kept asking me why do I keep checking my phone. Finally, she sternly told me to get off my phone. Luckily, I saw the last message to let me know that everyone was in place and that we could head to the proposal location. We get to the bridge by the water, and out pops our family. I say the quickest speech and get down on one knee to pop the question. A few tears flowed, but it was because she said yes!! -Travon