Shaylah Leslie Nichols was less than impressed by Jordan Chikara Lee when they met at Margaritas, a Mexican restaurant in Honolulu, in May 2021.
She was working there as a server and waited on Mr. Lee, who recently moved back to the city after a decade on the mainland, where he attended and graduated from West Point and was commissioned as an officer in the Army. He had stopped in to see his close friend Larry Ho, the restaurant’s owner.
Ms. Nichols, an upstate New York native, was in Honolulu working while earning a master’s degree online.
“The first thing that caught my attention was her eyes,” Mr. Lee said. “Later, I was attracted to her smile and laugh.”
He tried to strike up a friendly conversation by asking her where she was from and her background, but she kept her distance. “I can be pretty laser-focused when I’m working, so I wanted to remain professional,” Ms. Nichols said. “He was also wearing a golf shirt, and I’ve not historically been into golfers.”
The evening didn’t go anywhere, though Mr. Ho, her boss, did ask her permission to share her phone number with Mr. Lee as he had requested. Hesitantly, she agreed.
Ms. Nichols and Mr. Lee largely forgot about each other until that August, when they crossed paths on University Avenue in Honolulu, as Ms. Nichols was heading to a Starbucks.
“A very attractive shirtless man with a six-pack ran by me and yelled ‘Shaylah!’ but he didn’t stop,” she said. She recognized him. “I waited all day for him to text me, but he didn’t, so I asked Larry for his number and texted him first.”
“I wanted to play it cool, given that she hadn’t shown interest in me at the restaurant,” Mr. Lee said.
Neither was looking for a relationship. “I had never dated anyone seriously and wasn’t thinking of marriage or love,” said Ms. Nichols, who was 25 at the time.
“I was just looking for a fun time,” Mr. Lee said. “But I had a feeling I would find my soul mate once I moved back home.”
After some texts, Mr. Lee invited her to hang out in the Honolulu home he shared with two friends. Ms. Nichols, who lived a five-minute walk away, was uneasy at first. “I was unsure about going to his house,” she said. “But I was intrigued by Jordan, so ultimately, I gave in.”
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She arrived around midnight, after going out with friends, expecting a short visit. They ended up talking until 7 a.m. In that stretch, they discovered they were both Geminis with Korean backgrounds who loved coffee. They also realized they shared core values, including keeping family and friends close and giving back to their communities.
Before leaving, Mr. Lee asked permission to kiss her, and she agreed. “The moment was pure fireworks,” he said.
They had their first official date a few days later at Yakiniku Korea House in Honolulu. Over short ribs and brisket, they told jokes, laughed endlessly, and said they “fell in love.”
Ms. Nichols, 29, grew up in Pulaski, N.Y. She is a health coordination manager in the Honolulu office of AlohaCare, a Medicaid health plan for low-income and disabled individuals. She also works as a social worker at the Catalyst Group, a psychotherapy practice in Honolulu. She has a bachelor’s in human development and family science from Syracuse University and a master’s in social work from Columbia.
Mr. Lee, 32, was born and raised in Kailua, Hawaii. He is a captain in the U.S. Army and stationed at Camp H.M. Smith in the Oahu suburb of Halawa. He has a bachelor’s in engineering management from West Point, also known as the United States Military Academy.
After their first date, they were inseparable. And by December, when Ms. Nichols’s apartment lease ended, she moved in with Mr. Lee and his roommates. Mr. Lee, an avid surfer, taught Ms. Nichols how to balance on a surfboard, while she, an Uno fanatic, introduced him to her favorite card game.
They bought a home together in Moanalua, near Honolulu, which they moved into in January 2024, and became engaged there last Christmas Eve.
The pair wed on Nov. 8 before 110 guests at Moanalua Gardens in Honolulu. Heidi Anne Gagnon, who was certified by the Hawaii State Department of Health on behalf of the Baha’i Faith (which Ms. Nichols practices), officiated. Ms. Nichols made her entrance to Vitamin String Quartet’s version of “Motion Picture Soundtrack” by Radiohead. They recited the Baha’i vow, “We will all, verily, abide by the will of God,” as they exchanged rings.
The pair hosted a reception at Mid-Pacific Country Club in Kailua, where they shared a first dance to “The Rest of Your Life” by the Hawaiian band Na Leo Pilimehana. Guests sipped cocktails named for the couple’s dogs: the Lucy, a Rottweiler, was a spicy margarita, and the Baymax, a Labrador retriever, a whiskey ginger.
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