We met at college orientation in 2014 at the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore. Our college has a tradition called "Extreme Bingo" in which new students play bingo to loud music and panicked announcements, and we both were in attendance. In a single moment, our lives were cosmically intertwined as we pronounced "BINGO!" at the same time. Much to Jacob's horror, however, ties require tiebreakers, and tiebreakers in Extreme Bingo are dance-offs. As a hundred new acquaintances witnessed, Jacob attempted some adorable combination of arm flails and feet taps. Ella dropped to the ground and ran in circles, Homer Simpson/Curly Howard-style. You can guess who won the memory foam mattress pad.

Through mutual friends and our involvement in the college a-capella and haunted house clubs, we became more like friends than rivals. Jacob, admiring Ella's kindness, joy, intellect, and gleeful spontaneity, developed a crush in junior year. Ella developed a crush on Jacob at the top of senior year, admiring his sense of humor, musicality, ingenuity, and charm. By the time this internal alignment occurred, we had moved in to apartments with each others' exes. Tragically, Ella viewed Jacob as off-limits, but Jacob saw the match as a no-brainer. The fire marshal cancelled our thoroughly-advertised haunted house, and in its wake, there was a party at Ella's apartment. Jacob, ready to impress Ella, tried to climb to the top of her rickety garage. Ella did not let him. He asked why, and Ella spilled the beans about her true feelings. The rest is history.