Couple with a 12-year age gap were told they'd 'never last'

When Mike White, now 51, walked into the restaurant in 1995 where Nicola White, now 63, worked, it didn’t matter that there was a 12-year age difference between them: it was ‘love at first sight’.

Mike had headed to the Pilgrims bar and restaurant on the Barbican in Plymouth, Devon, for an interview for the chef position.

But he got a lot more than he expected when he met Nicola, 12 years his senior.

They hit it off immediately, and now working together, the pair built a flirtatious friendship.

‘Mike said as soon as he saw me, he knew he was going to marry me,’ Nicola said.

‘I fancied him straight away.

‘It soon became a flirtationship. I tried to arrange all of my shifts so I would be working at the same time as Mike.

‘Looking back now it must have been so obvious I liked him.

‘I would lean up against the kitchen door, chatting to him while he prepared all the food.

‘I used to help in the kitchen on the weekends, and we would have ice fights, flour fights, and sing Bohemian Rhapsody whilst preparing the Sunday roasts.

‘Our manager was probably annoyed at us, all we did was chatter.’

Mike finally plucked up the courage to ask Nicola out for a date and the pair went to bars in Plymouth, and he proposed on the spot.

Nicola said: ‘I was flabbergasted. How many people propose on their first date? I knew we were getting along well, but never thought he liked me that much.

‘I stuttered and didn’t know what to say, but I couldn’t help it… I wanted to say yes, I just need a bit of time to make sure I was making the right decision.’

After turning to friends, Nicola was surprised by their negative reaction.

‘They all thought I was crazy,’ she said.

Mike persisted, and asked Nicola to marry him again. Then one more time, on their third date, when he said it was her final chance to say yes. This time, she did.

Despite friends and family telling the couple they wouldn’t work out, the couple got married at Plymouth Register Office in 1995.

‘My dad met Mike for about ten minutes a few days before the wedding,’ Nicola said.

‘It was a complete whirlwind.’

And now, 27 years later, the pair have proved their doubters wrong – they’re still madly in love.

They moved into a house in Hucknall, Nottingham, together in May 2014, and had a child, Rachel, now 25.

‘Mike is an amazing dad and stepdad and we’ve proved everyone wrong now still being together,’ Nicola said.

‘We still get strangers staring and mistaking Mike for my son or our eldest daughter’s partner. But we just laugh it off.

‘We love to cook together and go on endless dog walks and do gardening together.

‘We bought a campervan last year and have taken trips to the peaks in it with our dogs.

‘We have a lovely family life and I’m so glad we listen to our hearts.

‘Something just clicked between us, and I knew we would work.

‘My friends thought I was crazy and my mum, Thelma May, who passed away at 73, thought it was a mistake.

‘But we’ve proved everyone wrong. We laugh every day. It’s been 27 years of fun.’

Mike, who works for an insurance company, added: ‘I knew as soon as I saw her at the bar that I was going to marry her.

‘I’d been working there a week when I asked to marry her. I asked three times before she accepted it.

‘We make each other laugh every day.

‘It was fate.’

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