Mike Rudulph (MR) and Neil Rafferty (NR)

MR: I logged into the internet one day, and I met you. We talked on the phone…

NR: All night long until the sun came up.

MR: By the end of the week, we were saying “I love you” over the phone.

NR: Right, and then the first time I actually got to see you…

MR: We kissed.

NR: Yeah, in your parents’ front driveway so they couldn’t see anything. (Laughs) And I just remember we drove to the woods.

MR: And we laid in the back of the truck and looked at the stars. I’d fallen in love with you; you had fallen in love with me. I mean, this is perfect. 

NR: But then, all of a sudden, you find out you have to get deployed again in a month. And I remember being like ‘Let’s just make the most of it.’ So we spent every single day together. 

MR: Yeah, and then it was that last night that we had together. And I was leaving that very next day and I packed my bags. And I remember sitting in the bed, crying in my mother’s arms, not able to tell her exactly why I’m crying. 

NR: That was the worst part; I couldn’t tell my mom. And then you are gone and you were in Iraq. I’d write you letters and sign them as Lisa, in case they were ever found. And you’d call me every once in a while.

But you did not call me for like three weeks, and I just remember one day finally crying in my mother’s arms. And I told her, ‘I haven’t heard from Mike in so long.’ She was like, ‘Why are you so worried about him?’ And I said, ‘Cause I love him.’ That was when I came out to my mother. And she just held me and said that she knew already. (Laughs) That we weren’t nearly as sneaky as we thought we were.

MR: (Laughs) And then I got back from Iraq and you told me, ‘Mike, I don’t ever want you to go to Iraq alone again.’ I said, ‘Well, I’m sorry. If I get the opportunity I’m going,’ and then you said, ‘I know, and I want to go with you.’ So you joined the Marines for me, man. 

NR: We were both in the infantry. We were both in the same unit.

MR: And we got through it with only a few people catching wind of it. 

NR: And then you left the Marine Corps after that.

MR: I was so sick of living a lie as a Marine. I was ready to bust out of the closet with rainbows and glitter, and that’s where we are now, man.

NR: Yeah, we are what we are because of our insistence on being with one another.

MR: Just two imperfect people refusing to give up on each other and I can’t wait to see where we go with this life.