#swipe right

The first time you lied to Gerard wasn’t on purpose.

You were sitting cross-legged on your bed with your socks on, a camera battery charging on the floor, and three different dresses hanging from the curtain rod because you can’t decide to save your life and your body doesn’t look the same as it did when you were seventeen.

Your room was incredibly messy —but clean— and your friends were supporting you through your futile attempt at relationships. A stack of photography books towered on your nightstand, and your tote bag full of receipts and two disposable cameras you kept forgetting to develop was laying on your desk. A half-zipped duffel sat open near the door from the wedding shoot you had worked at the night before.

Your overheated laptop balanced on your thighs while your best friends Alessia and Ryan lay on their stomachs at the foot of the bed, stealing fries out of a takeout carton and judging strangers on Hinge, Tinder, Bumble and some other apps you were ashamed of having on your phone.

Needless to say, you were a woman who had not had a successful first date in eight months and all of your friends had run out of mutual people to introduce you to.

“This one looks promising—,” Alessia said, but quickly interrupted herself. “Nevermind, he has a picture of a fish. Left.” She kept swiping. “He’s a bassist. Left.”

“Let me read that one…” Ryan asked, grabbing the phone and reading through the profile. “‘If you’re a feminist, swipe left’ what the fuck, let me call the cops just in case. Left.” 

Your friends laughed at the guys and kept swiping. Most profiles blurred together after a while. Men with gym selfies, wearing expensive wristwatches they clearly did not own, whiskey, golf, and not wanting drama and zodiac signs.

You had been twenty-five for almost four months and was already tired of what that meant to other people.

Too young to be taken seriously by clients old enough to ask if she was “the intern.” Too young to date men over thirty unless they were specifically looking for a twenty-five-year-old, which was a category you had no desire to explore. Too young for landlords, for brand meetings looking for their head of photography and for gallery owners to show your work. Too young for every man on an app who saw your age and decided he already knew the rest of the story. Needless to say, guys your age just didn't have fully developed brains yet.

You stared at your profile for a couple seconds, thumb hovering over the little edit icon.

“Since I am not getting anything good out of a man who downloaded a dating app, I might as well lie too.”

You looked back down at your phone and changed the number to twenty-nine.

Ryan stared at you. “You don’t look twenty-nine.”

“I can always say I get botox…”

“You’re so smart sometimes. And such a fucking liar.”

You tossed the phone onto the bed between them and reached for a fry. “I’m not pretending to be forty. It’s just a couple years, no one will bat an eye.”

“It is still a falsehood.”

“It’s a dating app, Alessia. Everyone is a falsehood. Half of these men are in relationships, probably.”

Alessia snorted, taking a sip of her drink. “And what is your idea with this?”

“The logic is that if an older guy man sees twenty-something, he assumes I’m here to waste his time or just to fuck. If he sees almost thirty, maybe he talks to me long enough to realize I’m a person rather than just a pussy.”

“Are you looking for something serious?”

“I am looking for anything. Men on apps are usually after one thing only.”

Alessia considered your point while chewing. “You do attract a weird amount of age-gap situationships.”

“I know. It’s disgusting.”

“And what if you actually meet someone you like?”

“Then I’ll just tell him the truth. Easy, peasy.”

Alessia gave you the look that told you she had no faith in you whatsoever, but she was still supportive. You ignored it and refreshed the app.

For one hour absolutely nothing changed. A man named Matthew liked one of your photos and described himself as a “philosopher,” which you already disliked. A man named Harold had the phrase “sapiosexual, books and rainy days” and was therefore disqualified from your replies.

And you witnessed a series of boring, bland, empty, white, stupid men.

Until one specific man named Gerard appeared. His profile was bad enough to convince yourself that he was a decent man. This was convenient, because it meant that no woman had given him advice. As long as we leave out the detail that his hair was almost the same shade as the carrots rotting in your fridge, you liked his appearance. 

In the first photo he stood in front of a painting, what looked a high-quality, professional picture of him wearing a blue suit and a salmon-colored shirt. He wasn’t smiling, but still looked nice enough to soften the line of his mouth. The second one was a mirror selfie wearing, once again, a suit, which already gave him positive points. In the third photo he was painting on the floor of what looked like a studio, drawing an alien-like figure wearing a wool hat. And who could blame you? You liked artsy guys. And the last one hooked you: He was sitting next to two other men, sitting down with mics next to them, and you wanted to know more about the context of the picture.

His bio was brief and went straight to the point: Nerdy, artsy, divorced. Either he’s an asshole or he’s ready to get back to the single scene ready to get his world rocked by a younger girl.

Alessia leaned across the bed as soon as she saw the interest in your eyes. “You smiled, show me.”

You turned the phone around, and she swiped while you still held it in your hands

Alessia read the bio, then looked up sharply. “Oh, no. I don't like him.”

“Why not? He seems decent enough.”

“No, I hate this kind of man. The crisis dyed-hair, gorgeous face, probably likes comics and if he knows how to draw, he’s good with his hands, too.”

That caught Ryan’s interest, and he analyzed his profile too.

“Too bad there aren't any close ups of his hands.”

“What about the height? Is it there?”

You checked.

“Five foot nine.”

“It’s fine, it doesn’t really matter when you’re laying horizontally.”

You laughed again, but her attention stayed on the screen, the pictures in your laptop long ago forgotten. Thirty-nine, Los Angeles, illustrator and character designer.

He seemed interesting. It would be nice to talk to someone who does something completely different from what you usually do. And he was gorgeous.

 “Swipe right,” Ryan ordered.

“And you didn't want me to change my age...”

“I can tell he’s your type. Worst case scenario, it won’t be a match.”

He was definitely your type. And you matched with him approximately twelve minutes after, when you got distracted with removing some stray hairs from the bride’s hairstyle, which took you approximately eleven minutes to do.

While your friends were getting ready in your living room and you decided to make three different backups of your work, you opened the app again while it saved. And you had a message.

Gerard: I’m going to be honest, your photo with the disposable cameras won me over immediately.

You stared at the message for a second, looking for the hidden message in there. There wasn't.

It was simple, normal. He had not opened with a joke about your smile or asked if you were “up for a good time.” He had not said “hey mamas” or sent a fire emoji. You typed back, trying to find something that wouldn't scare him off, but would also show him that you were interested.

You: its nice to know there are still men of culture left in this country You: i own three cameras that make my life harder on purpose. disposables never do

The typing bubble appeared almost two minutes later.

Gerard: I have grown a heavily disdain for having my pictures taken lately. It seems that you’re exactly the kind of person I should avoid. You: nd yet here you are Gerard: My self-preservation skills have declined with time.

⇢ 𝐖𝐎𝐔𝐋𝐃 𝐘𝐎𝐔 𝐒𝐖𝐈𝐏𝐄 𝐑𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓?

this is a work of fiction. although it incorporates real public figures, all characterizations are fictionalized for storytelling purposes. i do not claim that the events depicted occurred in real life, nor are they intended to portray the private lives or opinions of any real individual. this story and audiovisual companion is written solely as a work of fiction for entertainment.