At the far end of Lexington Drive in Raleigh, NC, there sat two houses. They were long, narrow, and nearly identical. It was as if a single house had been split down the middle by a gravel driveway—two halves of a whole, not quite touching but aware of each other.

In the summer of 2018, Jordyn saw a moving truck squeeze down that rocky driveway and thought to herself, “New neighbors, I hope they aren’t as bad as the last ones!” Having been tormented by rowdy frat boys for the better part of a year, the ladies of 3925 Lexington Drive were ready for some peace and quiet.

Wil stepped out of that moving truck and hauled his boxes inside his new home, wondering about the neighbors and hoping for the best. Wil had two roommates, Sam and Connor, and throughout their year of living on Lexington Drive, they brought with them everything but peace and quiet.

There was an almost constant influx of people, and if it wasn’t for the new neighbors coming over to introduce themselves, Jordyn would never have known who was actually living next door. Along with the rotating cast of characters, these neighbors brought with them flaming couches, 6am tailgate pre-games in the backyard, questionable attempts at putting up a rope swing and throwing axes embedded in the tree out front. They were simultaneously the best and worst neighbors Jordyn had ever had.

Jordyn lived on the bottom floor of her home and Wil the bottom floor of his. For months, they heard the crunch of the gravel as cars came up and down the drive and saw each other’s comings and goings outside their respective windows.

Wil felt the crush forming early on and told his roommates about it, laughing with them about the trope of the girl next door. Wil noticed when his neighbors forgot to take their trashcan to the curb and on multiple occasions brought it down for them. He invited Jordyn to their Game of Thrones watch parties and taunted her through their open kitchen windows (Wil consequently found out that Jordyn's kitchen sprayer could reach across the driveway and into his window). When Hurricane Florence blew a massive tree down and into their houses, the first thing Wil did (after assessing that he was, in fact, not dead) was to run next door and check on the neighbors.

Slowly but surely, the two households became friendly, and suddenly Wil and Jordyn saw one another as more than a face outside the window. They spent many hours on Jordyn's porch sharing stories and learning about each other’s lives. On any given evening during the late spring of 2019, you could find Wil and Jordyn chatting and laughing on the side porch. They would stay out there for hours until either hunger from skipping dinner or the mosquitoes drove them inside. One evening in the early summer, they even shared a kiss.

But life bends like a river, and by July of 2019, leases were up, and both households moved on to new adventures. Wil and Jordyn lost touch, and it wasn’t until a year later in the summer of 2020 that the two were brought together again. Jordyn and her sister Kaleigh moved into the same apartment complex as Wil’s Lexington roommate, and friend to this day, Sam. The girls became close friends, and as proximity would have it, Wil and Jordyn were catching glimpses of each other again—neither having forgotten the warm evenings shared on the Lexington porch.

And so began a multi-month slow dance between Wil and Jordyn, culminating in a series of dates-in-all-but-name. It went from “Do you want to come help me decorate my apartment for Christmas?” to “let’s go on a walk,” which inevitably led to dinner and drinks at Wye Hill that then spilled into a three-hour nighttime car ride hunting for Christmas lights around the city. That was the straw that broke the camel’s back. Before that drive had ended, they scheduled their first date-that-was-actually-a-date, and so ensued a whirlwind of activities and fun and enough kitchen PDA to drive Wil’s roommate Cort insane. Sorry, Cort.

In December of 2021, they officially began dating. From festivals to theme parks, Charlotte to Elizabeth City, Savannah to Michigan, and the mountains to the beaches, Wil and Jordyn filled their lives with all kinds of joy and were content in the moments of calm, as their greatest joy was the love they had for each other.

Near the end of 2022, Wil had bought a house in Cary and Jordyn had moved in by January. Since then, they’ve built a home together. It is a home where Jordyn’s colorful and eclectic taste merges with Wil’s dark wood furniture. A home where Wil learned to tolerate and later love a cat that took to scratching that furniture. A home that Jordyn has filled with plants and light and books, one Wil has filled with music and art and more books. It is a home that, unlike the two they started in, is one whole.

Joined together across six feet of gravel, Wil and Jordyn have created a life that is representative of the love they share and of a union that expands to fill out the spaces in their lives.

On April 27th, 2024, Wil finally asked Jordyn that burning question he had been wanting to ask for a while. They are both so excited to celebrate their marriage with friends and family next October.