Amanda A. Augustine and Michael R. Mayer had maintained a long-distance relationship for years when, in 2017, they finally settled in the same city.
They began dating in 2010, when both lived in Washington. In 2012, she moved to Barcelona for graduate school; he stayed in Washington. In 2014, she flew to Birmingham, Ala., for a job; he moved to Columbus, Ohio, for law school. Now, finally, in 2017, they would each be in the same place — New York City — a long-distance couple no more.
Well, sort of: She had moved to Astoria, Queens; he was moving to Manhattan.
“We were still kind of long distance,” Ms. Augustine said, echoing countless love-struck New Yorkers who have sweated on a subway platform in the wee hours, an overnight bag slung over their shoulder. “Still,” she added, “compared to before, this was a piece of cake.”
The couple met near the end of their freshman years at American University. They were in the same friend group for the better part of their college years, but it wasn’t until after they graduated, in 2010, that they were ever really alone with each other.
“We just ended up living in the same neighborhood,” Mr. Mayer said. “We spent a lot of time commuting together to see our friends up in Northwest D.C.”
There wasn’t one moment when they began dating — their friendship took a different shape gradually.
“We didn’t need a first date,” Ms. Augustine said. “I already knew him.”
In early 2012, Ms. Augustine decided to pursue the master’s degree in Spain. If the relationship was to survive, it was going to have to become trans-Atlantic. That prospect “wasn’t something that either of us was super excited for,” Ms. Augustine said.
So they made a decision: They split up. This is around the time when a broken arm saves the relationship.
Later that year, after the couple had split up but before Ms. Augustine left for Spain, Mr. Mayer was playing in an dodge ball league and a bone in his arm snapped. Ms. Augustine, who had remained friends with Mr. Mayer, stepped in to help him navigate life in a sweaty sling.
“I know the broken arm — it’s a very minor thing in the scheme of things,” Mr. Mayer said. “But it really was this feeling of not being fully able to function.”
“It was kind of the first time I ever really thought about what I wanted for the rest of my life,” he added, “and that I didn’t want to be alone.”
Right before Ms. Augustine left for Spain, the couple revisited the idea of a long-distance relationship. They agreed to give it a shot, with a caveat: If at any point either of them felt the setup wasn’t working, they would say so immediately.
“There was no pressure on it, there weren’t expectations,” Mr. Mayer said.
After they got through their five-year period of distance and after they had both been living in New York for a couple of years, Mr. Mayer proposed to Ms. Augustine in August 2019, on a quiet path on the west side of Central Park. The couple planned to have a large wedding Aug. 29 but the pandemic forced them to delay the reception to Aug. 28, 2021. They decided they would still get married on their original date, albeit in a smaller ceremony, by Msgr. John Dietzenbach at the Church of the Resurrection in Ellicott City, Md.
The wedding wasn’t the only part of their lives reshaped by the coronavirus pandemic. Ms. Augustine, 32, a structured finance associate at S & P Global Ratings, and Mr. Mayer, also 32, a judicial law clerk for a Federal District Court judge in Brooklyn, have spent recent months working from home.
“We’ve gone from the extreme of seeing each other once every few months to literally spending 24/7 together,” Mr. Mayer said. “It has been a good test.”
