It might be cliché but when you know, you know.
At least, that's how it was for Jesse Williams when he first laid eyes on Zola actress Taylour Paige in September 2018. Their chemistry was so off-the-charts that the Grey's Anatomy actor described their meet-cute as "this rom-com effect" in a rare joint interview with GQ about their romance.
While the couple has kept their relationship out of the spotlight, they are finally giving fans a glimpse into their love story. However, they both have different memories of the night they met at the 39-year-old actor's Emmys party.
During the event, Jesse recalled being captivated by the 30-year-old actress, who caught his eye with her fiery crimson-colored dress. The actor also admitted he had no idea who Taylour was prior to seeing her at the party.
"I was in the middle of a conversation with a very close friend, and she walked by," Jesse remembered. "Everything got quiet. I stopped that conversation and said, 'I'll be right back.' I just zoomed in on her."
"The rest of the night," he continued, "we were this close to each other, talking, laughing, dancing and ended up together in conversation until six in the morning."
"I parted the red seas in my red dress," Taylour quipped, "I looked like the emoji."
According to the Hit the Floor actress, she noticed Jesse long before he glanced over to her. "Little did he know," she shared, "I had spotted him first."
Looking back, it was always written in the cards for Taylour to be with Jesse. In the months before the Emmys party, Taylour was told by her healer that a mysterious "J" figure, who worked in her industry, would "approach her in a dark, crowded space."
Even though months went by before they would meet, Taylour recalled the vision she had.
"I had a dream that I was sleeping next to him," she shared, to which Jesse clarified that her dream happened, "the night before we met."
Of course, when the stars eventually aligned, it was truly magical. "It was just like, 'There he is,'" Taylour shared. "Almost like, ‘Where have you been?' "
According to the Ma Rainey's Black Bottom star, she's a lot more in touch with her spiritual side, whereas Jesse "can be very literal—facts, facts, facts."
"We came from very different worlds," the ABC star added. "She's very feminine and into spiritual planes, astrology. I'm very practical, fact-based, and masculine."
Although this was an "unfamiliar" territory for Jesse, he couldn't deny their connection and unbelievable meet-cute.
"I was having a wild, unfamiliar, uncomfortable experience because it was all just happening in a very spiritual way—a way that's not how I usually arrange things in my life," he admitted. "But I'd been going through a lot of transitions in life, and I had deliberately positioned myself to be open to saying yes, to be available to whatever, more than I had in the past."
He continued, "I don't often let things happen to me. But because I had decided I was going to be open, I didn't pull the brake like I normally would. I didn't try to control, or position or take a breath, and I just went along for the ride, as scary as that was and has been. She blew in."
Fast forward three years and the couple is closer than ever after making their red carpet debut in May 2019.
Before finding love with Taylour, Jesse dated SportsNet anchor Taylor Rooks and Minka Kelly. In 2017, he filed for divorce from Aryn Drake-Lee after five years of marriage. The exes share two kids, Maceo, 5, and Sadie, 7.
Read Taylour and Jesse's full GQ interview here.