Falling in Love from Six Feet Apart

My name is Drake. I’m here to share with you an incredibly unlikely love story. This story shows how love grows during some of the most unexpected times. When everything starts crashing around you, and everything seems beyond repair, the one thing that gets you through is hope. This is the story of how my wife and I found hope during a crazy period of our lives and fell in love while the government kept our proximity no less than six feet apart.

           Now Shelby and I met about six years ago, in the year 2019. We were both 27 years old and I had just bought a small fixer upper next door to her house in a small suburb. Honestly, she really hated me when I moved in. According to her, I quote, “The place was a real dump! The yard always needed mowed and was full of weeds, the fence was falling apart, and the giant dog was barking at every leaf that blew past the window!” I was a young budding art teacher’s worst nightmare for a neighbor. That giant dog, by the way, was my steadfast Great Dane Millie, who is my first true love, and yes, still lives today to bark at leaves.

           I was working as an accountant, although I hated my day job and wished I could be doing so many more things instead. I did it for the money mostly. This led me to spend my free time mostly learning to play drums (another neighborhood nightmare) and building any kind of wood project I could imagine in my garage (possibly with some very loud equipment). I tried to be a cordial neighbor and greet Shelby whenever I saw her, but she would give me the general “I’m ignoring you” attitude and walk into the house intentionally not making eye contact. At the time, I thought she was pretty, but I was sure she already had somebody, and I wasn’t even concerned with finding anyone relationally. I was pretty happy with just me and Millie. Besides, I’m sure I was a pretty messed up bachelor and just didn’t want to admit it at the time.

           Sometimes I would see Shelby walking in and out of the house with huge boxes full of craft supplies. She would transport paints, brushes, sketchpads, pencils, canvases, and so many other things I didn’t even recognize into her car; guessing her occupation was fairly easy. There’s a pretty park across from the houses on our side of the road, and when the sun either came up or set it made a beautiful landscape. I would take Millie outside or glance out the window and see Shelby sitting in the front yard with an easel and a collection of colored paints. I never saw what she painted until many months down the road. And any time I would try to linger outside a little bit longer, she would suddenly happen to check her watch and decide it was time to pack up and go inside.

           Now this situation didn’t bother me at the time. I knew she was avoiding me but I figured she had a reason and I continued on with my life. Then one evening, late in the fall of 2019, I was returning from a brisk walk with Millie and as I came up to my drive, I heard what sounded like someone throwing objects against a wall, crying, and grunting with frustration.

           As I reached my neighbor’s house, I saw that Shelby was, in fact, throwing objects against a wall. She didn’t see me pass, so I walked a little slower to see if I could hear what she was screaming about. All I caught were little pieces of “Never again!” and “Horrible, awful!” and a few more words I’d better not repeat. My first inclination was to stay out of it, but then I thought I could try to be a good neighbor and see if I could help at all. I could at least offer to fix her garage siding, which was taking a few dents pretty badly.

           I dropped Millie off at the house and cautiously stepped up my neighbor’s driveway. When she finally turned around and noticed me, a wave of shock passed over her face. She quickly wiped her eyes and then glanced self-consciously at her hand, which was still holding a rock she was getting ready to launch.

           “Hi – sorry, I’m fine. I’ll stop making so much noise,” she stammered.

           “Oh, the noise doesn’t bother me,” I said. “I just was walking past, and it sounded like something was bothering you so I just wanted to see if I could help.”

           “No, no, it’s fine. You can’t. Thanks, though.” She clearly wanted me to leave. So naturally, I kept talking.

           “Well, it seems like something is really on your mind and it might help to talk about it. I’m willing to listen.”

           She was still silent. So I continued, “I know we don’t really talk much and all, but if you don’t have anyone else to talk to right now I just don’t want you to be alone.”

           Her eyes squinted at me a bit more, as if she was trying to decide if she could trust me or not. I waited patiently. Finally she said bitterly, “My dad just screwed over my entire family, that’s all. It’s not really anything you can help with.”

           It took a lot of convincing to get the rest of the story out of her. But finally I learned that her dad, who was an alcoholic (along with other issues), truly had caused a lot of harm to her family. His addiction and terrible spending habits got his family kicked out of their home and left with no money to survive on, and then he simply disappeared after the fact. She had two younger siblings at home that lived with her mom, and they were all going to be moving in with Shelby since they had nowhere else to go. I was shocked and sorry for her, and I stayed to talk as long as she kept venting. She eventually put the rock down, cried a bit more, thanked me for listening, and ended our conversation. I went home, and sure enough, three days later, I had three extra next-door neighbors.

           I didn’t speak with Shelby for five months straight after that.

           But never fear, for 2020 held many of its own surprises. A terrible virus had started breaking out in China in 2019 and at the turn of the century was rapidly spreading across the world. Quickly travel shut down, then schools, then businesses, as the world tried desperately to stop the spread of the new Corona virus strain, covid-19. Before I knew it, I was working from home, along with millions of other Americans, thrust into a world of social distancing. There was nothing going on anywhere and no one to do nothing with. Words and phrases like “pandemic” and “stay six feet apart” and “the coronapocalypse” became common amidst our daily lives. We all aimed to fill our lives with home projects, learning new talents, exercising at home, cooking new recipes, or spending quality time with kids or pets.

           Often, I would see Shelby’s siblings playing outside. They were about eight and ten years old, and they would spend time riding bikes, kicking a soccer ball around, and playing different games. I had no idea how Shelby’s teacher income was going to hold them all together through this crazy time, although it wasn’t really my place to ask. But I could sense the tension at their house. Sometimes I could even hear Shelby and her mom arguing inside, and the kids would run outside to escape. Other times, the kids would enter a screaming match with their mom. Then they would take it out on each other outdoors. With some extra time on my hands, I decided to build the kids a few things to play with. I made them a giant sized Jenga game, some cornhole boards, and a tire swing I hung up with Shelby’s permission. It seemed to keep the kids occupied more outside, and I could see the gratitude in Shelby’s eyes when she thanked me. Sometimes I would even play with them in the front yard, them keeping to their half of the yard and me to mine, but we could easily play some modified soccer and other things without breaking the six feet apart rule.

           Now, listen, I promise I wasn’t trying to get Shelby to like me; I was just trying to help, and honestly, spending time with the kids was a good distraction for me during that time. But we did slowly start talking at that point. We stayed our respected six feet apart and the conversations were mostly small talk at first. But then, we kept talking for longer and longer periods of time. I’m sure you know how this goes, how a friendship just naturally builds over time. The crazy part is, I don’t think she ever would have talked to me again without the quarantine in place. We hardly had anything in common, and remember she hated me as a neighbor, but we both were stuck at home, I had no family nearby, and she had family way too close to her she couldn’t get away from. So our chats every day soon turned into a social escape for both of us. They progressively stretched further and further into the evening until I had the courage to ask her out on a social distanced, six feet apart, quarantine date. She accepted. And before I knew it, we were enjoying front porch dates with a beautiful landscape across the street.

           Almost every night I would leave a beer or a glass of wine out on her front porch and when she came out to join me we would sit and talk for hours about our dreams, our fears, and our life plans. Always six feet apart. But there was always something so serene about our dates. We were simply two young humans getting to know each other through conversation. There was no drama of other friends involved, no dropping tons of money in order to try to impress each other, no wasting time and energy dressing up and getting ready to go out among the crowds of people perhaps also wasting time and money. It was simple. It was real.

           One conversation I remember so distinctly, as if it had just occurred last night. Shelby sat in her front yard wrapped in a warm, green afghan, her blonde hair falling from her face. I remember her brown leather moccasins poking out from beneath the blanket. We both just paused, staring at the last of the sun setting across the road. It was quiet and peaceful. Then out of nowhere, she said to me, “You know, Drake, I think I really misjudged you.”

           “Oh, really?” I asked, trying to sound surprised.

           “Yeah. I’m sorry,” she said. Then she paused for a bit longer before saying, “I really just thought that since your house is always kind of a mess, the owner must be too. I’ve had too many bad run-ins with messed up guys so I didn’t want to give any other guy a chance, let alone you.”

           “Well, I’m glad you did,” I replied. “You were social distancing from me before it became such a normal thing! What made you change your mind?”

           She chuckled at my jab. It was a joke between us now that Shelby really had been desperately trying to avoid me before we began our relationship. “You’ve proved me wrong. That first day we talked so many months ago, I really didn’t know what you wanted and I didn’t want to trust you at all, but I got to vent and that’s exactly what I needed in that moment. And everything you started doing for my siblings to keep them entertained, it’s been really great. And I’ve really needed the support with having my family move in here and everything. I just never expected such a huge blessing to come from a stranger. I never would have guessed it would be someone who lived just next door.”

           Our trust for each other simply kept building. During the quarantine, we were able to work on our relationship on a conversational level where we figured out how to communicate, which I think is what makes our relationship so strong today. We learned to celebrate a kind of intimacy that takes years to build, just because we were forced to stay distant from each other and the majority of our other friendships. We had nothing but time to invest in getting to know each other. Once the threat of the virus was low enough to lift the social distancing rules and things returned to normal around us, our dating life grew better and better until we got to the point that we decided on forever together.

And that is how a very messy bachelor came to marry a beautiful, inspiring art teacher. While the world was pausing relationships, ours was blossoming. While the hysteria was overwhelming people’s senses, we found a calm and stability in each other’s presence. The pandemic that threatened to kill, to separate friends and family, and to fill people’s minds with fear was thwarted every evening we spent together, all the while six feet apart. The reality of the situation sunk in every day we heard the statistics, the testing rates, the number of people put at risk to suffer by this virus. But we were writing another story at the time. No pandemic destroyed our future because through, and in fact, because of social distancing, we were brought closer together than ever. And this is why the world, including myself, may see this love story as a most unexpected but incredible outcome.