Again in 2021, VIL was simply one other fan, working a small YouTube channel the place he shared his favourite VTuber moments. That is when he stumbled throughout Ava Lamp’s streams — and one thing clicked.
4 years later, he was on one knee on a balcony at TwitchCon 2025, asking Ava to marry him.
Like many fashionable romances, the love story between VTubers VIL and Ava Lamp began on-line. “I preferred her persona, content material, and mannequin,” VIL advised Mashable at TwitchCon 2025, including that he preferred “her approach of joking” and her “very slime-girl VTube mannequin.”
“So, I adopted her and began clipping her [streams], and she or he seen the clips,” he mentioned.
VIL proposes to Ava Lamp at TwitchCon 2025.
Credit score: Courtesy of Ava Lamp and VIL
From there, a web-based friendship started to develop. They talked extra, collaborated, and, ultimately, VIL grew to become a VTuber himself. Earlier than lengthy, the 2 had been inseparable on-line — “finest associates,” as he put it.
He began to fall for her, however Ava was clear: There was no likelihood of romance. She was a lesbian, and she or he would by no means date one other content material creator. “However then that modified,” she joked to Mashable.
Two years later, the buddies determined to attend TwitchCon 2023 along with a gaggle of mutuals. It will be their first time assembly in individual. They shared a lodge room with one other buddy and spent all three days aspect by aspect — laughing, exploring, and, apparently, complicated everybody round them.
Their associates stored asking in the event that they had been relationship. They’d giggle and deny it. In fact not! How ridiculous.
“We spent a lot of the weekend collectively, and just about did the whole lot collectively,” she mentioned. “You already know while you simply actually click on with somebody? You have got that spark? That is what I felt. And I used to be similar to, ‘I can not not let you know. As a result of if we go away right here, I am not going to be courageous sufficient to let you know this later.'”
On the final day of the conference, she typed out a observe on her cellphone within the backseat of an Uber and handed it to him. “Please do not hate me,” she mentioned.
The message, as they bear in mind it, went one thing like this: “I do know I’ve mentioned I would not date a person and I additionally would not date a content material creator, however after attending to know you and seeing you in individual, I really feel sparks.”
“It was so humorous as a result of she did not truly ask me out at any level within the observe,” VIL mentioned. “It was simply her blurting out her emotions on this observe. To my information, this was a zero % likelihood of taking place. And now, instantly, it was one hundred percent likelihood. So I used to be sort of blue-screened.”
Behind that Uber, they dove straight into the massive questions — marriage, children, shifting. They already knew one another as associates, however now they wanted to know in the event that they had been suitable. Seems? They had been.
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Sharing a kiss at TwitchCon.
Credit score: Courtesy of Ava Lamp and VIL
There was only one drawback: distance. They lived throughout the nation from one another. So, for the subsequent 12 months, they made it work long-distance. They traveled to see one another each different month, streamed collectively, and even wore these bracelets that buzz when the opposite individual touches theirs.
After TwitchCon 2024, they determined it was time. Ava packed her life right into a U-Haul, they usually made the cross-country drive collectively — between two hurricanes.
“Driving that U-Haul was terrifying,” VIL mentioned. “I had solely pushed that huge of a truck one or two different instances. In order that, plus all of my accomplice’s life belongings, are in a truck. And I am the one driving.”
“Nothing dangerous occurred, although,” Ava reassured him.
By the point they sat down with Mashable on the San Diego Conference Middle for TwitchCon 2025, the 2 had been fiddling with one another’s fingers, each carrying matching silver bracelets with crimson jewels — replacements for his or her long-distance ones. Shifting in collectively, Ava mentioned, was a “enormous reduction” as a result of “lastly we get to spend all of our time collectively.”
Because the main milestones of their relationship had all lined up with TwitchCon — they met in individual at TwitchCon 2023, and after TwitchCon 2024, they moved in collectively — they knew TwitchCon 2025 needed to be one thing particular.
VIL began a secret group chat with all their associates, everybody besides Ava. The morning of the primary day of the conference, Ava was taking her time preparing whereas he tried to remain calm.
“I attempted to play it tremendous cool,” he joked, however the engagement ring — a short lived one till the true ring, made with stones from her grandmother’s and great-grandmother’s rings, was prepared — was burning a gap in his pocket.
“I used to be obsessively checking it to ensure it did not fall out,” he mentioned.
“I noticed you examine your pocket a pair instances, however I did not clock what that was. I believed you had been simply apprehensive about dropping your cellphone or one thing,” she laughed.
They grabbed brunch with associates, however he was desirous to get to the conference middle. He had a plan: a balcony overlooking the ocean. Ava, nonetheless, wished to cease by the merch desk first.
“Final 12 months, she wished merch and it was bought out, and I knew I did not need that to occur once more,” he mentioned. “And so when she’s like, ‘Can we get this merch actual fast? I need to be sure that I get it earlier than something occurs.’ In my head, I am like, ‘No, we have to go!’ However I additionally did not need her to overlook out on the merch. So I’m going, ‘Sure, yeah, that is positive, however can we attempt to be a bit fast?'”
Lastly, they reached the balcony. Their associates, who had been all in on the plan, requested different con-goers to clear the realm. Then VIL advised Ava to examine one thing on Discord. She opened her cellphone — and noticed a commissioned piece of artwork of his VTuber persona proposing to hers. When she appeared up, he was on one knee.
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He does not bear in mind precisely what he mentioned. All she remembers is that she mentioned sure.
“[I love] how candy you’re and the way you put on your coronary heart in your sleeve,” Ava mentioned when requested what she beloved most about him. “And you are not afraid to be emotional. I like how candy you’re and the way form you’re.”
Then VIL made her cry.
“I like how unabashedly your self you’re,” he advised her. Up to now, individuals had tried to suppress her pleasure, he mentioned. “I’m so comfortable which you can be your entire self and you may simply embrace your self. You’re keen on trend. You’re very alt-goth. You like to dye your hair. You’re keen on constructing Gundams, you like Legos, you like Disney. I like you. I like you being you. And I am glad that we will be our greatest selves collectively. You at all times encourage me to be my finest self.”
They don’t have wedding ceremony plans but — but when Twitch CEO Dan Clancy needs to sponsor it, they’re not opposed.
