Couple to wed in Clifton High hallway, at lockers where they met as freshmen

CLIFTON — In 1989, the same year "When Harry Met Sally" was released, Chris Gash met Jenn Sudol at Clifton High School. They were freshmen and were assigned lockers across the hall from each other in the North Wing.

In much the same way that the film characters played by Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan kept crossing paths over the years and became fast friends, Sudol and Gash kept in touch, sharing life's ups and downs.

And like most rom-coms, this story will end with a walk down the aisle.

It could even have that Hollywood ending Saturday, with Sudol and Gash taking their vows in front of the high school lockers where they met 28 years ago as freshmen. Neither remembers the exact locker numbers, but Gash said they are two or three lockers into the hallway.

"I feel when I get in there I will know," Gash said.

The plot is not without its last-minute suspense. They still need the formal blessing of the Clifton Board of Education, which was expected to vote on their request Wednesday night. On Tuesday, a looming storm seemed poised to disrupt their plans.

Long strange trip

Ask Sudol and she'll tell you that over the years "they couldn't stay away from each other."

Their romance began Jan. 1, 1990, recalls Gash, when he called her from his grandmother's house to ask her out.

It was, he said, a typical, messy teenage relationship.

"I didn't know how to have a girlfriend," he recalled, adding that's he learned a lot over the years. "I've done much better, thankfully."

Sudol said they dated for about a year. Gash said they broke up after they started to hate each other. After high school, they went their separate ways, more or less.

Gash, now a successful illustrator, attended community college and later what's now Montclair University, studying art. Sudol worked for Pearl Paint in Paramus, so their paths crossed repeatedly.

"It's not like we ever lost touch with each other," Sudol said.

After that, every six months or so, one would reach out to other with a message. Things like, "Did you hear about so and so?" Or "this is what's going with me."

"We've known each other in our best of times and worst of times," Gash said. "We've known each other when we were the coolest we'll every be and when we've stopped being cool."

The last vestiges of cool, as many a parent can attest, generally flame out when children come along. Both Gash and Sudol started families and both wound up in relationships that didn't work out.

Sudol said about four years ago they began to email each other regularly.

Sometime in the summer of 2016, when both were free from commitments, they began going to movies.

At one of the movies they kissed, Gash recalls.

"Once we got together, that was it," Gash said. "It's been like a runaway train ever since."

In fall 2016, they attended a Beach Slang concert in Brooklyn and Sudol recalls being told, "You are going to marry me."

That wasn't exactly a proposal, both admit.

"I laughed when he said it," she recalled, and while he never formally asked her to marry apparently they both agreed that it was a good idea.

On Dec. 26, 2016, they went to the Tiffany store in Short Hills Mall and bought wedding bands.

Up to a few weeks ago, they both wore them, but took them off in anticpation of donning them Saturday afternoon when Clifton's mayor, James Anzaldi, will marry them.

Anzaldi says he's largely stopped doing weddings but because the local judges will only marry couples at City Hall, he decided to come out of retirement for the high school ceremony.

It will be a small wedding: just the couple, their four kids, a cousin, Sudol's brother and his fiancée.

"I've done the big wedding," Sudol said. Now she says they just want to get married.

They will plan a party for friends and family in the fall. On Saturday, they will have dinner at Corso in Montclair.

Gash said that for the past 18 months or so they have been mostly together and finding that their children, who range from age 5 to early teens, get along.

"Our families blended really quickly," Sudol said. "We are very fortunate."

Email: fagan@northjersey.com