I Do!: Vanessa Costello and William Maldonado of Yaphank

William Maldonado was everything Vanessa Costello did not want in a man.

He volunteers as a firefighter and is on active duty with the U.S. Navy — “Everything that was dangerous and risky,” Costello, 35, said.

But when the two found themselves at the same house party in Yaphank on Aug. 22, 2016, both newly unattached, she found herself drawn to him.

“He got me to talk and laugh again,” she said.

Maldonado, for his part, had no hesitation about her. They have mutual friends and even before that night, he had liked her. “There was always that crush,” he said.

The two started dating, a time Maldonado remembers fondly. He said he would drive to her house and they would sit in his car, sun roof open, listening to country music. “We would actually sit there and sing. Those were good times,” he said.

There have been hard times as well: Costello was diagnosed with stage 4 Hodgkin’s lymphoma in 2021 and, shortly after she learned the news, her father died. (She is now in remission.)

“We’ve been through pretty much everything,” Costello said.

The couple have also become parents. They have two boys, ages 3 and 6, and have custody of Costello’s goddaughter, who is 10.

In September 2021, Maldonado proposed in front of the castle at Disney World. And on Oct. 7, the couple married at St. Patrick’s Roman Catholic Church in Smithtown.

“We have our happily ever after,” Costello said. “We have our family, the house and the pets. We can only go up from here.”