Woman Stumbles upon Old Address Book, Finds Her Future Husband's Name There

In 2019, many hearts melted when the story of a woman who fell in love with her estranged best friend after rediscovering his name in her mother's old address book hit the headlines. Here are the details.

In the summer of 2012, Natalie Crowe, a bored teenager, found her mom's old address book in a storage bin, and the first name she thought to look up was a boy's.

His name was Austin Tatman, and he had been her best friend while they were five-year-olds. Unfortunately, the two had lost contact when she moved away from Florida to Connecticut along with her mom and siblings.

"For whatever reason, the first person to come to my mind was Austin," she told TODAY. "Still to this day, I have no idea why I went to it."

It had been 12 years since they last saw each other, but when she found his name in the address book, it pushed her to track down his Facebook page, and he found it. She saw his profile and sent him a message because it looked active.

The pair met in 1999 while they were in prekindergarten in Ocala, Florida, and Crowe has since revealed that even then, their parents had marveled at the special bond they shared.

They can still recall holding hands while trick-or-treating and having fun together on her father's boat. "We would always hang out on the side kind of by ourselves," she said.

Such a bond did not die so quickly, and even after she departed from Florida, Crowe would often ask her mom if Tatman still remembered her, and the woman would tell her: "If you remember him, then he remembers you."

Imagine her delight when it turned out that her mom had been spot on and Tatman had truly not forgotten her. She described it as a crazy experience because it was just like reconnecting with a friend who went AWOL.

That friend request she sent led to a rekindling of their bond. After trading numbers, they realized that Crowe's father lived only ten minutes away from Tatman in Florida, which led them to reunite when she went for a visit.

According to Crowe, their parents were very supportive, and they seemed to be happier than the two best friends were. With such endorsement, it was not long before their old friendship escalated into a budding romance that remained unhindered even when she returned to Connecticut.

They kept their passion burning with a long-distance relationship while seniors in high school. Tatman schooled at the University of Florida in Gainesville, while Crowe was a student at the University of Central Florida in Orlando.

As years passed and the two got older, their love remained strong, leading to a proposal on a beach in Fort Lauderdale in 2017.

The marriage ceremony that declared them husband and wife took place on April 13, 2019. It was a romantic affair that saw them recreate an old photograph showing them standing shoulder to shoulder in a little red toy car.