Sophia Bush Celebrates Her First Pride Month With Girlfriend Ashlyn Harris (2024)

Sophia Bush and Ashlyn Harris’s relationship is still quite fresh, but it’s clear the foundation of their love has been in place for quite some time.

The actor and the retired soccer pro have been friends since all the way back in 2019, when they had a chance encounter at a conference. However, it wasn’t until years later, fresh off divorces from their respective partners, that the two realized their feelings for one another.

“It really took other people in our safe support bubble pointing out to me how we’d finish each other’s sentences or be deeply affected by the same things,” Bush told Glamour in April 2024.“When you’re so in the trenches of hardship—plus you have the added weight of having to go through it on a public stage—it can be hard to see anything but what’s right in front of you.”

Now, the two are happily enjoying their romantic bliss—getting cuddly on red carpets and sharing kisses on their international trips. Ahead, we break down Sophia Bush and Ashlyn Harris’s entire relationship timeline.

June 2024: Ashlyn celebrates her first Pride with Sophia.

As Pride Month 2024 kicks off, Harris celebrates by sharing a romantic video compilation to Instagram, which sees her and Bush engaging in all kinds of PDA during various trips across Europe.

“Chasing sunsets with you is my favorite,” the soccer star writes in her caption. Throughout the video, the two are seen taking strolls and shopping in Paris, posing in front of the Eiffel Tower, kissing with a seaside sunset as the backdrop, and more.

In the background of the clip, a cover version of Childish Gambino’s “Redbone” plays, with the video ending on the word “Pride”—a fitting choice, given that Harris posted this video on June 1. Bush responds in the comments by simply writing: “You 🥹.”

April 2024: The two make their red-carpet debut as a couple.

A mere two days after Bush confirms their relationship, she and Harris make their red-carpet debut (in matching colors, mind you) at the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner. On the red carpet, the two are all smiles and can’t seem to leave each other’s arms in their corresponding Harbison Studio ensembles.

For the event, Bush wears a strapless black dress decorated with large metal ornaments in the shape of flowers—which act as buttons. Harris stuns in a shiny black suit jacket and matching slacks, both of which are adorned with golden studs.

April 2024: Sophia comes out as queer, publicly confirms her relationship with Ashlyn.

In an April 2024 cover story for Glamour, Bush opens about finding herself and digging deeper into her sexuality, revealing her new relationship with Harris in the process.

“I didn’t see it until I saw it,” the One Tree Hill alum writes. “And I think it’s very easy not to see something that’s been in front of your face for a long time when you’d never looked at it as an option and you had never been looked at as an option. What I saw was a friend with her big, happy life. And now I know she thought the same thing about me.”

Bush continues: “It took me confronting a lot of things, what felt like countless sessions of therapy, and some prodding from loved ones, but eventually I asked Ashlyn to have a non-friend-group hang to talk about it. And that meal was four and a half hours long and truly one of the most surreal experiences of my life thus far. In hindsight, maybe it all had to happen slowly and then suddenly all at once. Maybe it was all fated. Maybe it really is a version of invisible string theory. I don’t really know. But I do know that for a sparkly moment I felt like maybe the universe had been conspiring for me. And that feeling that I have in my bones is one I’ll hold on to no matter where things go from here.”

Later on in the essay, the actor clarifies how she would define her sexuality, saying, “I think I’ve always known that my sexuality exists on a spectrum. Right now I think the word that best defines it is queer. I can’t say it without smiling, actually. And that feels pretty great.”

March 2024: The pair attend Elton John’s AIDS Foundation Oscars viewing party.

After months of rumored dating, Bush and Harris make their first appearance together at Elton John’s 32nd annual Oscars viewing party, hosted by his AIDS Foundation. The pair pose for photos with friends like Eric McCormack, Bobby Berk, and Stephanie Nguyen.

For the party, Bush sports a wine-colored strapless dress with a high leg slit, while Harris chooses a black suit over a sheer white button-up.

October 2023: Sophia and Ashlyn go on their first date.

Weeks after both Bush and Harris make their divorces public, an inside source reveals to People that they are exploring a new romantic chapter together.

“After being friends for years, and running in the same social circles, Sophia and Ashlyn went out on their first dinner date a couple of weeks ago,” the source teases. “This is so recent, and they are both beginning new chapters.”

September 2023: Ashlyn files for divorce from Ali Krieger.

Only a month after Bush files to terminate her marriage, Harris makes a similar move when she files for divorce from fellow athlete Ali Krieger.

Later, when news of her and Bush’s relationship goes public, Harris gets candid on Instagram, setting the record straight about how their romance started. “Let me be clear: I did not step out on my marriage.” Harris writes. “I was always faithful in my marriage, if not always totally happy. Like in many partnerships, there was work and therapy and processing done. None of this happened on a whim. We spent the entire summer working to tackle the separation and divorce steps outlined for us by our therapists, lawyers, and our shared agency.”

August 2023: Sophia files for divorce from Grant Hughes.

Beginning in 2020, Bush was in a relationship with businessman Grant Hughes, whom she was friends with for years before things turned romantic.

It was during the pandemic that the two started texting more frequently and enjoying long FaceTime calls. Before she knew it, Bush had fallen for her friend.

After a couple years of dating, the pair were married in June 2022 at the Philbrook Museum of Art in Oklahoma. But 13 months later, Bush would file for divorce from Hughes, a choice she recalls as terribly difficult. “The idea that I left my marriage based on some hysterical rendezvous—that, to be crystal-clear, never happened—rather than having taken over a year to do the most soul-crushing work of my life? Rather than realizing I had to be the most vulnerable I’ve ever been, on a public stage, despite being terrified to my core? It feels brutal,” she tells Glamour in 2024.

July 2023: The two attend a World Cup watch party together.

As the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup kicks off, Harris and Bush are seen together at a watch party hosted by Peaco*ck. For the event, Bush wears a black top tucked into light-wash jeans, and accessorizes with a yellow bandanna around her neck. Harris opts for a black button-up with a large smiley-face patch on the front.

August 2019: Sophia and Ashlyn first cross paths at a conference.

Turns out, Bush and Harris were simply at the right place at the right time. In a 2024 Glamour profile, Bush reveals that she and Harris first connected at a conference in 2019. She doesn’t provide any further details about the meet-cute, but says the two quickly became friends. At the time, Harris was engaged to her now ex-wife, Ali Krieger.

“She’d been such a kind ear for those of us who opened up about our problems during a shared weekend of speaking engagements at a fancy conference in Cannes, and soon it became clear that she needed our ears too,” Bush writes.