our next chapter

if you asked us what first had us falling, we'd probably tell you something along the lines of "a pair of scissors and a purple truck." How silly, simple it has been to love each other:) I was 15 at the time, he was 17. We met through people we knew mutually, they offered me to cut his hair for him, got eachothers info and planned on him driving us to our friends. I walk out of school with him for the first time going to his car, and the last car id expect to be his, was. A 97' purple ranger with fuzzy dice hanging from the rearview HAHA then of course I get inside and its stickshift (even better) first thing I thought was.. "oh my dad would love this" he rolled the windows all the way down, dad rock music loud, I couldn't help but smile and side eye him driving the whole way there. Normally Ive got a good way of reading people, with Zach I couldn't exactly pin it. But he felt so familiar, and I knew it felt like I was in the right place.

Id already liked her demeanor, I could tell we were cut from similar cloth. Id say the same as her about that first car ride with her, even in silence it felt right. This memory, we recall differently. She thought I hadn’t been paying attention then. It wasn't that I was ever nervous around her, if anything it always felt so easy. We talked all the time, went to lunch together almost everyday too. I just wasn't sure how I could tell her the way I was starting to feel. We were all sitting on the bed on our phones; I didn't see Taylor take the guitar off the wall, I didn't know she sung or could play. But when I heard, I thought I could sit and listen to her forever. I could fall asleep to her forever.

High school coming to an end for Zach, Taylor still having another couple years at the time; and Zach enlisting definitely created some walls for us. We wouldn’t be honest if we said we’d been together all the way through it. At times we were across the country, across the world, growing up and learning. A part of growing is understanding change, movement, and patience. But without a shadow of a doubt, you can believe I wondered everyday if there was a time wed hear from and see each other again. Id rack my brain for hours wondering how I could feel so deeply for someone but have to give them up so quickly. Being so young it tore me up trying to understand that. Everything had felt so right

A couple times throughout the years we’d tried reconnecting, which had sadly failed. But for 2 years, anytime we did connect, we had done nothing but grow verbal, emotional connection with each other. Being so far apart it was all we could do. We hadn’t talked for a while at this point, but id sit up every night wondering why she cared for me as much as she did, wondering why I couldn’t get her out of my head. Id added her again on socials, and after a bit she responded and sure did lay it to me for being stupid and not reaching out sooner, haha. But we both were, that’s part of growing up. We both knew we wanted to grow and make those stupid mistakes together. Since then weve done the long distance; all the facetimes, texts, tears, love, laughter. It hasn’t been a walk in the park, but doing it together has always felt simpler, better, than doing this walk otherwise. We invite you to celebrate with us what’s been a very long time in the making. What we hoped to preserve til we could allow it to flourish in all the ways we’ve wanted. We invite you, to us:) ❤️