Пара из Дефайанса вышла в топ-5 конкурса «Любимая пара Америки» и борется за приз в $20 000

The story of David Spiller and his wife of 23 years, Melissa Tisi-Spiller, has three distinct chapters. There’s the story of high school sweethearts, a story of separation and loss, and one of rediscovery and happiness. And now, the two from Defiance could become America’s Favorite Couple, in a competition by the same name. It’s a contest where people vote online for the participants. Money raised by the competition benefits charities. They entered the competition in groups, and David and Melissa have moved into the top five of their group. If they win their group, they move on to the finals. A second-place finish could put them in a wildcard slot. The winners share their story with Variety Magazine, enjoy a dinner with actor Jeff Goldblum and his wife, Emilie, and receive a $20,000 prize. To voted for David and Melissa, go to https://americasfavcouple.org/2026/m-amp-d-together-as-one. Voting is set to end tonight at 10 p.m. Their story starts as sophomores at Tinora High School. Both were on the track team. David spotted Melissa, “and I thought she was just the hottest thing running … and I’m like, ‘I gotta know her name.’” That lead to a note, passed from David’s younger brother to Melissa’s younger sister. The sister delivered the note, “right before history class, asking me out,” Melissa said. “Because I couldn’t do it,” David said. They dated for about a year and a half in high school. They broke up because, “I thought she was better off without me,” David said. “He broke my heart, because he thought that he didn’t want to hold me back from pursing what I was meant to do in my life,” she said. Graduating in 1990, Melissa went on to the University of Toledo, graduating in 1994 with a double major in Spanish and Communications. She moved to Ann Arbor, Mich., and took a job with Eastern Michigan University. David went into blue collar work; years at Sauder Woodworking in Archbold, then at Lear Corporation in Wauseon. Then came Sunday, April 8, 2001. Melissa explained she had been home for a couple of days, but went back to Ann Arbor Sunday, to her weekend job waiting tables. She had a shift that night. That day was her parents’ 34th wedding anniversary. It was also the day they died in a car crash. “I went back home, to the house that I grew up in. I came back to a house that was filled with love and memories, but I was never going to see them again. That was really hard,” she said. “But during that unexpected loss, David, this amazing man and his family came back into my life because they came to pay their respects at my parents’ wake, their funeral. That was the first time we had reconnected in 12 years.” David had married, then divorced; he gave Melissa a photo of his son with his phone number on the back. The two reconnected a few weeks later, but Melissa explained, “it just wasn’t the right time.” In November of 2001, Melissa knew, “I needed a complete change in my life, and I actually moved to Austin, Texas.” She and David reconnected a second time in August 2002. “I left a voicemail for him, he left a voicemail for me, and that’s kind of where it started,” she explained. “We started dating long distance, just talking on the phone.” That led to trips back and forth between Ohio and the Lone Star State. “It was like getting to know each other all over again, which was really, really special,” she said. In May 2003, David proposed. He moved to Texas, and the couple married in November. “I had to make a choice of living a new life, or staying in the same life with getting my son every other weekend and just pounding the pavement over and over and over again. So I chose to be with her,” he said. David and Melissa’s son, Caleb, was born in 2004; he’s 22 now. Caleb was followed by Eric, 19, born in 2007 in Texas. The couple returned to Ohio, where their youngest, James, was born in 2010. He’ll be 16 in November. Melissa said there was always a part of her that loved David. David said a few years after graduation, he went to a fortune teller, who had a place on East Second Street. He said the woman told him, “Melissa would come back to me. She didn’t know when, but she knew that she was going to be there down the road.” Going their separate ways, losing her parents, changing her life completely, then reconnecting, “It was like just part of our story. It was meant to be,” she said.