Brendon spends nearly half an hour helplessly swiping left or right, he's bored. He's texted a few people here and there, the men being a bit more abrupt than some of the women on here.

He tries not to dwell too much on why he's on the app. To him, dating apps were like the last resort; dating apps were for when you've completely given up on yourself. Yes, he knows it's not like that for everyone, but most. Brendon's sighing to himself every so often, thumb sliding to the right once he reads someone's poor excuse of their love for adventure.

"Damn," he suddenly mutters, a new profile on screen.

Brendon observes with hooded eyes. He sees dark brown hair and pale skin. He sees Josh and he sees 29.

Brendon's quick to click on his picture to explore more in depth. This guy was definitely a looker, he's nearly baffled he's even on the app.

"How has no one. . ."

Brendon goes through his pictures one by one. The first is Josh in the sun, eyes practically glistening hazel with his smile shining just the same. The second is him casually drinking coffee out of a mug with a pun on it, the third is one where he looks much more smug than the others. And the forth is a mirror picture. "What the fuck."

Josh wasn't alone in this one.

He's snuggling his nose into someone else's neck, one arm around them while the other takes the picture.

"Knew it was too good to be true," Brendon says to himself, about to click away until something catches his eye.

The description, something pops out fast.

Third member.

He furrows his brows, scrolling down farther to see what it was.

Hi, I'm Josh. I enjoy a lot of things that are probably too uninteresting for your liking - photography, coffee, sleep. But one thing I'm extremely interested in is you! My husband and I are looking for a third member to our happy party, and I'm sure that's interesting enough. Please, message me for questions, I'm happy to answer them.

Brendon blinks.

Tinder is weird.

He blinks again.

While the thoughts are processing, he looks back at the last picture to examine it once more. That person must be Josh's husband. Him and Josh are dissimilar. His head is buzzed and he's a golden shade of tan, unlike Josh. His frame is a lot smaller as well. Brendon clears his throat.

He's never the one to judge others, but he's not sure he understands.

Why get married if you haven't found your third person yet?

Why Tinder?

Brendon doesn't understand. Maybe that isn't his fault. There's room for confusion, and that's why he decides to send a message, he supposed.

It's a simple hello before he goes back and swipes right.

It's A Match!

His eyes become wider as it flashes across his phone screen. It came as a shock to him that Josh has ran past his account already, it came as an even bigger shock to him that he even said yes. What is there to Brendon that Josh finds valuable enough for that sort of commitment? Was Josh even the one running the account or was it the both of them?

Brendon really did have a lot of questions.

He exhales, hoping to be answered.

He continues swiping, coming to terms with the fact most people just used this app for sex. Unwanted messages roll in about how they were free tonight, even going as far as sending their addresses without any context. What was Brendon really expecting, though.

His eyes shift to the next one that pops up, but this one was different.

He presses it, surprised Josh had replied so quickly.

Hey. (:

Brendon shakes his head at the smiley face, pulling up his keyboard. His thumbs rush across as he types, eyes following, fidgeting.

I did not expect you to respond that fast, my god.

Brendon was about to go back to browsing but then another text comes through.

Hahaha, why?

He doesn't see why Josh doesn't understand. His profile description says it all, really. He doesn't give much information about himself, says he has a husband, is looking for another person for them, and then goes to ask him questions if needed. Everything about that was asking for a full inbox.

I mean, I'm sure you get a lot of people messaging you. You don't have the most... generic profile, I guess you could say. Hah.

Surprisingly, I don't get very many messages.

What?

How?

I think people are just scared of commitment.

Brendon chuckles. He finds it humorous, mostly because it's absolutely true. Commitment was a menacing thing, to everyone really. Intimidating, you don't know the outcome but you're praying for some certainty. There's not a lot of certainty about Josh's profile, Brendon is sure that's why people aren't being proactive.

You're not wrong.

Yeah. You must not be though.

He laughs dry and sarcastically as he writes his response.

I wish I could say I wasn't.

Well you texted me, that must be saying something.

Brendon supposes that's true in a sense. It wasn't that he lacked intimidation, it was only that curiosity got the best of him. He was alright with the decision to be so open minded; his motto was ease. He follows by that, and he didn't mind virgin subjects as much as others.

I'm just intrigued, or something like that. This situation is pretty anomalous, man.

He cringed at the last word. Calling someone you're possibly interested in a name you'd call an acquaintance probably isn't the best choice.

I get it. I'm guessing you have questions, yeah?

Definitely.

But I really don't want to come off as some ignorant prick.

Brendon hopes Josh is alright with swearing. He doesn't think about it when speaking, he sometimes even forgets people could be extremely bothered by the slightly offensive vocabulary.

Believe me, even if you did, I'm sure I could deal with it. Besides, I highly doubt you'd say anything that'd tick me off.

Brendon's not too sure what that's supposed to mean. He thinks it's a compliment but it sure doesn't come across blatantly. He shrugs his shoulders at the thought, deciding to move past it and ask the first thing on his list of many.

Well, I guess I'll just ask first off, are you and your husband in an open relationship or...

Brendon sighs, knowing that probably sounds so stupid.

I wouldn't call it that. I think we just enjoy extra company. It makes the both of us comfortable. We trust each other a lot, we wouldn't do anything that would make our relationship suffer.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that we aren't separately seeing people and coming back to one another, we just want someone to love as three.

I hope that makes sense.

It takes a bit longer than the other texts but that only makes sense. Josh seems to be comfortable talking about it, how could he not? Brendon reads through it, trying to think it over to a point where it doesn't seem so messy. He's never even really thought about being with more than one person, maybe many people don't. Josh and his significant other seem to be different from others, anyways.

It does.

If it's both of your guy's decision then do the both of you run this account or does he have one of his own?

Having two profiles seems complex.

Tyler did have their own but people were really creepy so they deleted it. We kinda run this one together. It's mostly me but I get their opinion on people, obviously.

Also Tyler's non-binary, please respect that.

Brendon purses his lips.

He's only heard a few things about being non-binary, and he could easily say he's extremely uneducated when it comes to the subject.

Oh god, no disrespect of course but I don't know anything at all about being non-binary, so I guess that's my next question to you. Could you tell me a little bit more about it? I'd really appreciate it.

He doesn't want to sound rude. He's big on respecting people, whether it's something he understands or not.

Yeah, of course. It's pretty simple.

Tyler uses they/them/their pronouns. They don't feel comfortable going by he and definitely not she, so they're kind of in the middle, or even on the outskirts of the "spectrum", or whatever you'd like to call it.

It makes a lot more sense now, even though he still has some uncertainty. Brendon was completely gone from that description.

Is non-binary a term for transgender?

Brendon feels like biting his fucking nails. He forgets how anxious he is talking to new people.

It's really up to the person. Some non-binary people aren't fond of being called transgender at all, but others identify as trans.

What does your husband identify as?

Tyler should probably answer that. They're not home right now, though.

Brendon wants to ask why Josh couldn't just tell him. If they're married shouldn't he know? Does he not know? Or does he not feel accountable to answer that because it isn't himself? Brendon exhales, it is Tyler's body after all, they probably feel better disclosing that kind of information themself.

Well, I can wait.

Alright. They'll be home soon enough anyways.

I'm sure you've heard enough about my life for one sitting, tell me about yours, hmm?

What's there to say; he's miserable. He lives in an apartment all alone, works until he's a walking zombie, and takes care of his mother like a babysitter on the weekends. He's pretty much a slave to this world, tortured by a clouded mind and loneliness, although he'd never admit that.

I'm not very interesting.

I'd beg to differ.

What's that supposed to mean?

You messaged me. That's a start. Nothing about me is uninteresting.

Brendon chuckles. He doesn't think about it that way, but really he's just desperate. For what? He doesn't even know himself. He'd say love but that's too cliché, even for him.

Hey, Tyler's home. I'll be back.

Brendon doesn't respond, instead he spends this time looking throughout people's accounts and trying to ignore the burn beyond his abdomen. He can confidently say that speaking to new people through text is a lot less stressful than up front, but he's still a mess.

He doesn't get a notification. He sighs once again.

The man looks at the time. It's halfway past ten, it's getting late.

Brendon walks out of his small bedroom and into the kitchen which was even smaller. He grabs a Bud light out of the refrigerator, taking a sip to start off.

The sun has set by now and the moon is making itself known. What's also making itself known is the decently loud sound of a headboard getting hit repeadedtly against the wall to his right. He rolls his eyes, walking back into his bedroom after taking a piss.

He walks over to to the corner of his room where his record player was, slipping Nice 'N' Easy by Frank Sinatra out of its cover and watching the needle fall onto it once it was placed down. He messes with the sound dial until the volume was good enough for him.

Brendon's back onto the bed after that, checking his phone again.

Nothing from Josh, only the others that were making jejune talk.

Brendon's eyes roll again. He starts to swipe left or right once more in the meantime.

He hums along to the music, then singing when he feels like it, one hand holding beer while the other goes through people's profiles pathetically.

Finally, after about twenty minutes of this, a message from Josh pops up at the top of his screen. Brendon doesn't waste time to press it, slightly upset that it took so long.

Hey.

Hey. Is your husband there?

This is them.

Brendon gulps, he doesn't know why his palms are becoming clammy so fast.

Oh, hi. I'm Brendon. I was just asking a few questions and Josh told me there's one you should probably answer yourself.

Yeah, he told me pretty much everything.

He wonders if that's why it took longer than usual for a response. Josh was probably filling Tyler in on everything that happened, probably showing them the texts and sharing his thoughts about him. God, that makes Brendon's heart thump so loud.

And honestly, I haven't thought about it. I guess that sounds kind of weird because it's such a big thing but I just know who I am, and being non-binary allows me to be comfortable in my own skin, and confident even. I guess I prefer being referred to just as non-binary, but I don't think I'd be that upset if someone thought I was transgender.

Brendon smiles. He's actually smiling at his phone like an idiot. Maybe he's feeling a slight buzz but he's only happy by how honest Tyler and Josh both were. They were happy to inform people and comfortable with themselves, which you don't see very often.

Okay. I get it. I'm glad you can be happy with yourself, that's really important.

He sounds so stupid.

Yeah, I agree, and thank you.

Anyways, I'll hand you back to Josh. It's been a long day and I'm going to pass out.

Nice meeting you. You seem nice. A lot nicer than most people on here.

Brendon already knows he's going to dwell on that more than he should. Like he said, most people on here only want sex, they only want sex and if things are too complicated or they don't understand, they're going to get upset. Brendon's not that way at all, though. He can't barely remember the last time he had been intimate with someone.

His life is sad.

Brendon?

Josh?

Yeah. It's me.

I haven't really seen Tyler much today, they've been working all day, so I'm just going to head to bed with them.

Oh, okay.

It was nice talking to you, really.

I'll message you tomorrow.

The same goes for you two.

And alright, goodnight.

Goodnight.

Brendon bites down on his lip, eyes shifting to his bed stand. The beer bottle is nearly empty, he's definitely not going to finish it anymore. He plugs in his phone charger and and sets it down, making sure to turn off the record player before he lays down himself.

Tonight was good, he'd say.