The moment I knew: I woke up and couldn’t see out of my right eye. Hours later, she helped me record an album

Rebecca ‘Darl’ Ritchie ticked all the boxes for musician Jack Ceriani. Then one morning his eye ruptured – and she was a calming force Find more stories from the moment I knew series About eight years ago some mutual friends put Darl and me in touch, thinking we’d be a good match. We’d talked on the phone a bit, but hadn’t found the time to meet in person. I lived in Busselton, Western Australia, and she lived about a 30-minute drive away. Then on St Paddy’s Day my mates and I invited some friends around to the Star hotel, which was what we called our share house at the time. It was a bit of a bachelor pad with a bar set-up, and I made some really bad mojitos. But when Darl arrived, they improved a lot – she knew what she was doing behind the bar. Darl ticked all the boxes, but what I liked about her most was her honesty. She was easy to talk to and she was capable too, the sort of person who would get in and do things rather than stand around talking about them. Bec is her real name but I’ve called her “Darl” ever since we met. It was just a pet name, but then all my mates started calling her that too. Now it’s stuck. We were clearly attracted to each other