A match made by persistent friends

Cameron Keady and Taylor Toth had resisted several attempts by their college friends to trick them, until they saw each other in person .

< p class="css-at9mc1 evys1bk0">How Cameron Girard Keady and Taylor John Toth finally found each other and fell in love lasted about a decade. And it probably wouldn't have happened without the help of their college friends.

Mr. Keady, 33, met Alexandra Burns at Skidmore College, where he earned a bachelor's degree in English literature in 2012. At the University of Delaware, Mr. Toth, 34, a fashion merchandising graduate in 2011, met Samantha Stern. Ms. Burns and Ms. Stern were friends who grew up in Mequon, Wisconsin.

In the summer of 2012, Mr. Toth met Ms. Burns in Mequon, while he was visiting Mrs. Stern. With one eye on the match, Ms Burns showed him photos of Mr Keady. But Mr. Toth said he quickly dismissed them, thinking the two would probably never meet, "and that was the end of that."

Except Mrs. Burns wasn't giving up. By early 2013, she and Mr. Keady had become roommates in Manhattan. At the same time, she kept in touch with Mr. Toth, who, as a professional pair figure skater, often visited the city to see friends. She would alert Mr. Keady to any planned visits, hoping they would run into each other.

"I'd be like that's weird, who is it?", Said Mr. Keady. "I was resistant."

Then, on August 17, 2013, Mr. Keady attended a concert at the Bowery Ballroom with a group of friends. Mr. Toth came in, also with friends. Mr. Keady did not recognize him. Mr. Toth recognized Mr. Keady from photos he had seen of him, but could not remember his name.

He immediately sent a text Mrs. Burns. "I was like 'What's the name of your gay roommate?' Mr. Toth said.

"Then he looks at me," Mr. Keady said, "and it's like, 'Are you the gay roommate? of Allie Burns, Cameron?' and I was like 'Yes, I am.'"

The evening progressed from there. The two ended up hanging out at the apartment that M Keady was sharing with Mrs. Burns, although they never met her that night or the next morning.

"I texted her like, 'Uh, I really like your apartment,'" Mr. Toth said.

In September, the couple had their first official date at the Lucky Strike, now-closed restaurant in the SoHo neighborhood of Manhattan. By then, Mr. Toth had retired from skating. (Three years earlier, he had won the junior title at the 2010 U.S. Championships.) He also left Boston to New York in November.

Just before Christmas they were at a warehouse rave in Bushwick, Brooklyn. At 2 a.m. sitting on what was formerly the backseat of a pickup truck, Mr. Toth asked Mr. Keady to be "real boyfriends".

ImageCredit. ..Landon Nordeman

In February 2015, they moved in together in the West Village. A year and a half later, they adopted Mary, a rescue dog who needed special care. "Very quickly we had to get together," Mr Keady said. "It definitely made us more committed to her, to each other, to our relationship."

Over the next four years, the couple changed twice more, finally landing in a new unit at Chelsea in May 2019. Through the moves, a proposal was on Mr Toth's mind.

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The time finally came at Christmas that year. Mr. Toth, who is originally from Kittanning, Pennsylvania, and is now a business consultant for various creative companies, had asked his mother to help him plan an elaborate proposal at UPMC Rink in...