September 2021
Dating secretly at this point; Chase helping me in excel probably

Sooo, we met at work

… AND at a close-knit company with 24 people, so naturally we dated secretly for 4 months so if it didn’t work out at least we also didn’t have to tell our co-workers.

But after those “trial” 4 months, we determined what we had was pretty good and was worth the nerve-wracking decision to tell our boss. Leading up to that moment, I (Bailey) didn’t eat for 24 hours and Chase had thought through a back up plan if he was going to get fired (the drama).

Turns out it couldn’t have been less of a big deal and the “secret” relationship we thought we had was maybe not so secretive and people at work were a little on to us, oops.

But before all the secrecy there was a friendship and longing to know each other. 4.5 years later we are so thankful for the beginning stages of that friendship because it’s provided a firm foundation and so much joy in our everyday.

After we “came out” at work, our day-to-day got a whole lot less stressful and we finally felt like we could step outside of the house together. Because in true Kansas City-fashion, if we were going to go out to dinner, of course we would be sat next to someone from work.

The following years were formative ones and we grew up a lot together. The year we started dating (2021) Chase had just started working in the commercial real estate industry and was finding his footing. I moved out of a house with my best friends from college into my first place on my own — a very sketchy and centipede infested apartment — and then we finally moved into an apartment together on the Plaza in 2023.

A lot of our life together has revolved around the Plaza area and we’ll always look back at this time in our life with a lot of love and fondness.

We love Kansas City, the community we have here, and that our stories led us to each other.