“We talked about investing in youth, the Jesuit tradition of giving back, and the loss of his older sister,” a few months earlier, she said.
He appreciated her empathy and “positivity” and could not wait to see her again.
They began hanging out, but Jan. 4, 2013 stood out the most — dinner at Georgia Brown’s followed by jazz at Blues Alley, and a first kiss on her doorstep after he drove her home.
They cheered each other on through career moves, and in 2018 they worked across the hall from one another. Ms. Weaver, while at Georgetown Law school, was a law clerk in the private office of President Obama and Michelle Obama. Mr. Holland, until earlier this year, was the deputy director of My Brother’s Keeper Alliance at the Obama Foundation, which oversees 250 community initiatives for boys and young men of color across the United States.
Mr. Holland proposed on July 27, 2018, the last day she was a summer associate at the Washington office of Reed Smith, where she is now a white collar criminal defense and investigations lawyer. She gave up a Beyoncé concert to join him for what she believed was a surprise trip to Miami. A car outside her apartment instead whisked her away to the District of Columbia War Memorial where he got down on one knee amid rose petals that formed a heart. She moved in with him the following March.
They planned to get married in September 2019 at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Cleveland Heights, Ohio, with 300 guests, but after her father fell ill they wanted to wait until he recovered, and moved the date to July 2020. Amid the Covid pandemic, they moved the date again.
On July 17, before 140 vaccinated guests, the Rev. Jessie Gutgsell Dodson officiated at the church, in a ceremony she led with the Rev. James M. Hairston, a college friend and mentor of the groom. Both are Episcopal priests. After the couple jumped the broom, an African-American tradition, guests waved pink ribbons in celebration. Later, at the Ritz-Carlton in Cleveland, her father, usually quite stoic, danced with her to “Word Up” by Cameo.