How we met: "I was a newspaper boy and she was the Saturday girl at the newsagents - she looked so cool!"

In 2004, when Claire was a teenager, she found a Saturday job at her local newsagents. She was soon spotted by one of the newspaper boys, Curtis. “A couple of my friends went around the newspaper with me and they knew Claire worked in the shop,” he says. "It was obvious I liked him, so they suggested I buy something so I could talk to him." His plan to impress her didn't go well. “Went for a Snickers and when I tried to pay she slammed it on the counter so quickly there was no time to talk. I ended up with a chocolate bar that I didn't want,” he laughs.

“We grew up in the same neighborhood, so I saw it, but we never hung out,” Claire said. "I don't remember being distant, but it was probably a bit awkward." Curtis admits he was a little intimidated by her. "There was a hierarchy in the store and the Saturday girl was definitely a level above the paperboys," he says. “She looked so cool and looked immaculate. We were soaked in rain and mud, after falling with our bikes.”

Assuming that 'she wasn't interested, he gave up talking to her. Two years later, they met in high school, but they didn't develop a friendship. "She was dating someone else and I thought it was a lost cause," he says.

Claire thought he was unreachable. "We used to get off the bus at the same stop and going different paths. But I always felt like he didn't like me. I felt like he was staring at me,” she recalled.

When Curtis came home from college in 2010, he found a job at the Coop, while Claire became an optician.When friends of Curtis added Claire on Facebook, she saw her name and sent him a friend request. They quickly started chatting. er and realized that they got along "very well". After exchanging their phone numbers, the couple started texting each other. "I hadn't seen him for so long but I liked him a lot," Claire says. “He was a lot easier to talk to and seemed like a really cool person. He was DJing a lot in Manchester.

In February 2011, they met at a party. "I couldn't believe how friendly she was," Curtis says. “She seemed engaging and interested in me. It was a little too good to be true. Claire admits she "deliberately took" her beanie so she would have to see it again.

The following week, they arranged to go out for a drink. "It was Valentine's Day and Curtis made me a card," Claire explains. "We've been pretty much inseparable ever since."

They started dating exclusively, going out regularly, going to movies and spending time at each other's homes. In January 2014 they bought their own flat in North Manchester. They married three years later and live...