Let's go back to the beginning, almost four months before the infamous St Paddy Day Pic. In an interview with Awards Watch, Paul Mescal not only expresses his interest in working on a romantic comedy - but explicitly mentions Ayo as his ideal leading woman.
"Comedy scares me deeply because I think I saw Bottoms recently and I was in awe of how they do that," he explained. "That's one of those I leave the cinema and I'm incredibly jealous and brightened of everybody's talents involved with that film."
"But I think in the next five years I'm going to set myself a challenge to do maybe a rom-com with Ayo [Edebiri] or something like that would be cool."
Whilst the quotes were exciting, things really ramped up when fans connected the dots with an announcement made in March 2023, when best-selling author Emily Henry confirmed her novel Book Lovers would be adapted for the screen.
Fans quickly connected the up-and-coming book-to-screen adaption with the producers of Aftersun - and you guessed it, Paul Mescal was the leading man of that 2022 film.
The fact that a production company that had previously worked with Paul was now working on a rom-com, and Paul himself had publicly declared his interest in making a rom-com, left fans very optimistic.
But how does Ayo join the conversation? Well, by early 2023, fans were divided. For some, the small tidbits of information from the year prior were solid enough proof to run with the idea that 2024 would be the year Paul delved into the world of Romantic Comedies. For others, they were waiting on more solid evidence.
By March 2024, it appears Emily Henry delivered some answers - but not in the way we expected.
Emily took to Instagram to re-share the St Paddy's Day picture of Ayo and Paul, leading many fans to question if the author was soft-launching the cast for the Book Lovers adaptation.
Sure, it's a far cry from an actual casting announcement - but you have to admit the pair would make a perfect Charlie and Nora.
With no official confirmation, it's safe to say this dream casting is still firmly in the fan-theory space, but we'll keep you updated if anything more emerges.