Swipe Right

by Tagan Shepard

  “Is there a single woman alive you don’t flirt with?” I asked, sliding onto the bench seat.

  Leaning forward in her chair, her eyes sparkling, Pen crooned, “I never flirt with you.”

  “You’ve flirted with me.” I decided to give her a taste of her own medicine and leaned in close, drawing a fingernail across her wrist and down her pointer finger. Her fingers were all wrapped in the fine filigree of her silver ring splints. The delicate bands, thinner than a normal ring, wrapped above and below her knuckle to prevent her fingers hyperextending when she typed. I tapped one and said, “You’re doing it right now.”

  “I flirt with you for the same reason I flirt with Rebecca.”

  “Because she knows we’re immune to her charms,” Rebecca said, returning with my drink.

  “If that’s true,” Pen said, turning her dazzling smile on Rebecca. “Then why are you so…extra attentive to us?”

  Rebecca bent over, her palm flat on the table so close to Pen’s chest that a deep breath would have her rubbing against Pen’s boobs. “Don’t be flattered. I like you for the big tip you’re gonna leave me.”

  “Just the tip?” Pen drawled, enunciating each word with teeth and tongue.

  Rebecca threw her head back and barked out a laugh. The movement exposed a lot of skin around the low scoop neck of her T-shirt. I’ll admit I stared, but just for a minute. I looked away quickly, feeling like a perv for checking out the waitress. Pen’s gaze lingered much longer than mine.

  “Just the tip, sweetie.”

  She patted Pen’s shoulder as she walked away, but I noticed how her fingertips lingered. She also put a little extra sway in her hips as she crossed to the kitchen. Pen didn’t turn to watch her go, but I might have. Just a little bit. I mean it had been a long time since I’d been with anyone.

  A really long time.

  I expected Pen to tease me for the lingering gaze, but she was busy with her phone. Her smile was still in place, her teeth on full display, but the wolfish glint had gone. She slid her thumb across the screen, preferring the dragging method of texting to the repeated taps that weren’t good for her joints. Somehow she always managed perfect messages without typos. Every time I’d tried it came out as alphabet soup. Her grin only widened as she finished her message and dropped the phone onto the table.

  “Why are you in such a good mood?” I asked. She looked like a kid with her first kitten.

  “You know that gorgeous row house in Georgetown I’ve been talking about? The rich divorcee who’s financially gutting her husband?”

  “Of course.” I waited, but she just grinned at me with that little-kid smile of hers, so I knew. “You got it!”

  “I got it!”

  If Penelope had been the type to scream with joy and wave her hands in the air, this would’ve been the time to do it. She’d been after the house for months, ever since she heard the owners would be listing it soon. The historic brick row house in the old-money section of DC was the sort of listing that could earn Pen a quarter-million-dollar commission. A career-changing listing. The fact that she landed it was amazing, considering those listings usually went to better established firms, but she’d worked her ass off to win it.

  “Five bed, six bath, five thousand square feet.” She was almost singing. She talked about houses how other people talked about lovers. “Built in 1800. Can you believe it, Kieran? Built before the White House but it has heated floors and a Wi-Fi-linked hot tub.”

  “Why would you want your hot tub linked to your Wi-Fi?”

  I never found out because Rebecca came back with my falafel platter and Pen’s fattoush. With a fork full of lettuce and spiced pita hanging forgotten in the air, Pen went back to fawning over her new project. “It’s on 28th Street. Really great location.”

  I’d done a title search for a nearby property last year. Twenty-eighth put it in Georgetown’s East Village, the neighborhood with the grandest homes, and it butted up against Rock Creek Park. My property had been smaller and had still sold for over two million. Pen’s could easily go for two or three times that.

  “Anyway, who cares about houses,” Pen said, a sly smile making her cheeks glow. “Have you gotten laid yet?”

  “Pen!” I looked around and, sure enough, Rebecca was wandering closer to us, studiously nonchalant. “My profile’s only been up since midnight. I’m not that good.”

  “You’re not that bad either.” She winked at me and I couldn’t help laughing into my falafel.

  “I wanted to ask you something actually.” I pulled my phone out with one hand while I scraped the last of my Garlic Whip out of the cup with my other. Rebecca put another at my elbow and I snatched it up greedily. Let her eavesdrop as long as the Garlic Whip kept coming.

  “What’s that?” Rebecca asked, peering over at my glowing phone. “Swingle? Kieran are you dating?”

  “I…uh…”

  I stared at the Garlic Whip like the blob of yumminess had asked me an important question. Pen filled in the awkward blanks of my stammering non-answer. “Kieran’s jumping back into the dating pool.”

  “Oooh. Do tell. How’s it working out?”

  Again, Pen answered Rebecca’s question, “She joined last night. It’s a new thing for her. All her previous relationships started the old-fashioned way.”

  “Sex in the backseat of a Camaro?”

  “Oh god,” I mumbled to the Garlic Whip. My face was so hot the stuff should be boiling.

  “In person,” Pen clarified. She didn’t laugh, which was sweet and a little unexpected. “She hasn’t used any of the apps before.”

  “Oh sweetie,” Rebecca said, dropping her tray on an empty table and looking at me like I’d announced that I had one week to live. “Those apps are trash. All the people on them are trash.”

  “Rebecca!” Pen gave her a wide-eyed, pleading look.

  “What? They are. Well, the men are. You might find some decent women on there, but if they’re decent why do they have to descend to using a dating app?” She patted me on the shoulder far less provocatively than she’d done with Pen earlier. “No offense, darling.”

  “None taken,” I replied automatically. Then I mentally kicked myself. Why had I said that? I was definitely offended.

  “It’s all married men looking to hook up. You be careful on those apps. No one tells the truth anymore.”

  “I’m keeping an eye out for her,” Pen jumped in. She gave me one of those soothing looks she used when her clients had to admit they didn’t have the money for the houses they wanted to view. “She’ll be fine. She isn’t only looking for men.”

  “Good for you,” Rebecca said, grabbing her tray. “But try going out, too. You’re much more likely to find someone good in the real world.”

  Sure, like I hadn’t already tried that. She scampered off and Pen scowled after her. For a minute I thought she might follow Rebecca to scold her. I wouldn’t have minded. I could’ve used the time alone to gather my dignity. I knew she wouldn’t budge though. Pen never let me wallow alone. She said it was the worst thing best friends could do to each other. It was pretty sweet of her. I had a tendency to wallow.

  “What was your question?”

  I shook off Rebecca’s words and pointed at the phone. “How do I use this thing?”

  “You hold it to your ear and talk.”

  “You know what? I’m gonna go ask Rebecca how to use this app. She’s way nicer.”

  I pretended to stand up, but Pen popped over onto the bench beside me before I could move. Taking the phone from my hand, she tapped on the Swingle app. “Your home screen will show you potential matches nearby.”

  I leaned over her shoulder as the loading screen faded away, dissolving into a pretty androgynous face with an equally androgynous name beneath it. Pen scrolled up casually and half dozen faces flashed by in a smear of color. “Wait a minute. Slow down.”

  “It’s easier if you tweak the interface a little. Hang on.” Her tongue poked between her lips a
s she tapped her thumb onto the gear icon at the bottom of the page.

  While she messed around in my settings, I asked, “I thought you said you didn’t use Swingle. How do you know how to change the settings?”

  “I said I don’t use Swingle anymore. Some uptight lesbians got mad I was doing the casual thing and reported me. It was easier to just bail rather than deal with all the haters.”

  I opened my mouth to ask more about what sounded like a fun story, but she handed my phone back. I had to admit, it was a lot easier to see the profile pictures now. Rather than a list of thumbnail photos, I saw just one person at a time.

  “Swipe right if you like them, left if you don’t. It’s as easy as that.”

  She’d grabbed her own phone, but I took her arm before she could get distracted. “Wait. What does that mean? Like swipe to the right or swipe from the right?”

  “What? How are you so bad at technology?”

  “It’s not clear!”

  Rebecca shot us a curious look and the kitchen door swayed ominously. Pen scooted closer. “Okay. Don’t get us kicked out.” She placed my finger on the center of the screen, which had locked in the time we were chatting. “Now watch me.”

  It felt so ridiculous, sitting here in the corner of a bustling restaurant, Pen holding my finger against my phone screen. I looked over at her and grinned, barely controlling my giggle. I could tell from the twitch of her lips that she was holding back laughter as well.

  Pen glanced up at me and rolled her eyes, jerking her chin toward our joined hands. “No, I mean watch what I’m doing.” I gave an exaggerated sigh and turned back to the blank screen. “If you see someone you like…”

  “Wait a minute,” I said, nudging her with my elbow. “Now you’re looking at me. I thought you said to look at the phone?”

  “Kieran,” she growled. When I giggled she took a deep, long-suffering breath. I loved making her do that. “Okay. I’m looking at the phone, too. So imagine you see someone you like on the screen.”

  “That’s gonna be hard,” I said, stretching my neck to look around our fingers. “All I see is my reflection.”

  Pen twisted the phone, angling it so it showed a reflection of her profile. She jutted out her chin and raised a provocative eyebrow. “Better?”

  I finally released my laugh and nudged her again. “Perfect.”

  “You’re such a tease.” She scooted closer and adjusted her grip on my hand. “Okay. You see someone you like on the screen. You swipe your finger from the center of the screen to the right. Like this.”

  Her movement was as exaggerated as her speech, guiding my finger slowly across the screen until it slid off the right side. It was condescending, but also helpful, so I didn’t give her too hard a time.

  “All the way off the screen like that? Or should I stop at the edge?”

  “Oh no. All the way off.” She scrunched her eyebrows together and said in a serious tone, “The further you swipe right, the sooner they respond.”

  “You’re a jerk.”

  “I’m also hot. That’s how I make the jerk part work.”

  “You think so, huh?”

  “I know so.” She put my finger back on the center of the screen. “So now imagine you see someone you don’t like.”

  “I can’t.” I tapped her reflection. “You’re still there.”

  Pen shook her head and her mouth lifted in a half smile. She tilted the phone until it showed a reflection of the ceiling tiles. “There. All that blank whiteness. It’s like Arty the Party’s forehead. Picture him.”

  “I like Arthur.”

  “Then ask him out.”

  “Not like that. He’s, like, your dad’s age.”

  “Exactly. Someone you’d never date.” She slid my finger the opposite way, forcing it off the left side of the screen. “Then you swipe your finger to the left. Get it?”

  “Yeah, that makes sense.”

  Pen released my hand and leaned back into the booth, spreading her arms out over the top. It had been nice to have her hold my hand like that, and I almost asked her to show me again, just to annoy her, when my phone buzzed. It was the same notification I’d been getting all morning, but when I opened the app again, I saw another one of those weird messages.

  “I have another question about Swingle.”

  Pen had let her head roll onto the padded back rest and she murmured, “Okay. Shoot.”

  “Is there something wrong with my app? Look at all these error messages.”

  I didn’t even finish the sentence before she doubled over laughing.

  “What?”

  Pen hooted so loud the owner stuck his head out of the kitchen to glare at us.

  “Why is that funny?”

  “Maybe Rebecca wasn’t entirely wrong.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Didn’t you read any of the Swingle guidelines?”

  “What guidelines?”

  “The ones regulating the messages users can send to each other.”

  I shrugged as Rebecca collected our empty plates, leaving the checks behind.

  “These are all blocked messages from others who didn’t read the guidelines.” When I didn’t respond, she rolled her eyes. “Unsolicited dick pics, Kieran.”

  “Ew! What? I like men and I still don’t want to see that! Why would ten guys,” My phone buzzed with another, familiar message. “Eleven guys send me that?”

  “Don’t ask me. I don’t get down with that nonsense.” She took my phone back and tapped around. “You can turn off the blocked message notifications so they go straight to trash. There. Now you’ll never know how many gross guys are out there.”

  “Why don’t they do that automatically?” I asked, grabbing my purse and following her out into the sweltering afternoon.

  “So you know how many gross guys are out there, duh.” She leaned against her car but jumped back again as the hot metal scalded her skin. “You sure you’re up for going back to that?”

  I was pretty sure I wanted to date a woman right now, but I wasn’t going to give her the satisfaction of knowing that. “It’s not every man’s fault that Nick cheated on me.”

  It wasn’t. I knew it wasn’t, but that didn’t mean my heart believed it.

  “No,” Pen replied in a hard voice. “That was all his fault.”

  The drive back to the office through Woodbridge’s stop-and-go traffic was deflating. It gave me that much longer to think. And to cry. It wasn’t only what Rebecca had said. The mention of Nick after lunch and Alex the night before reminded me of my terrifically bad romantic history. I was thirty-seven years old and I had been divorced once and recently dumped by someone I’d lived with for five years. I’d only ever had sex with two people. No wonder all I was getting was cheap solicitation from disgusting guys. What did I have to offer in a relationship anyway?

  What with the worse-than-usual traffic and the diminishing romantic prospects, I wasn’t in the best mood when I pulled into the lot to start the second half of my workday. I sat in my car for a few minutes, trying to pump myself up with the two good things I had going for me. First, I hadn’t cried enough to ruin my makeup. More importantly, Pen had gone straight from lunch to show a client a rental unit, so she wasn’t here to see me sad.

  I had known it would be like this. Trying to date at my age wasn’t easy. Trying to use a dating app wasn’t easy. I’d heard the horror stories of being ghosted or never finding anyone after years of trying. Why was I putting myself through this?

  I picked up my phone to delete the app but saw that I had a missed text message. I must’ve been crying more loudly than I thought. It was from Penelope and the moment I read it, I knew I wouldn’t be deleting the app.

  Don’t get discouraged—the right person will find you. You had a message from a cute redhead in there. Maybe give her a shot? xxx

  Chapter Four

  She wasn’t a cute redhead. She was a drop-dead gorgeous, make-you-drool-onto-your-keyboard bombshell. Her
pic was a full-body shot in a bikini she filled out indecently well, so I waited to look at her profile until I was home alone.

  With the curtains drawn.

  It wasn’t just the pics that got my motor running. Her message was flirty and funny at the same time. After cooking dinner and washing up, I settled into the couch and read the message again.

  I’m sure you’ve heard this a dozen times today, but you look amazing in that suit. So amazing I’ll let you buy me dinner.

  I guess the headshot was a good decision for my profile pic after all. I’d have to admit that to Pen eventually. If I didn’t give her the chance to gloat over her knowledge of women at least once a month she got surly. Still, the redhead’s compliments and the joke about buying her dinner were enough to make me look deeper.

  I hadn’t been poking around her interests for more than a minute or so when she sent a chat request. Considering that her sun-kissed body was filling my tablet screen and making my palms sweat, I leapt at the chance to chat with her. Between messages, I checked out the dozen photos on her page. There was only one picture where her midriff wasn’t visible. That one showed her painted into a little black dress that left nothing more to the imagination than her bikini did. Not that I was complaining. She had a killer body.

  Still, there wasn’t much there. Our chat was surface to say the least. There was a lot of flirting from her end and a lot of awkward attempts to keep my cool from my end. Her profile said she wanted a long-term relationship, but she wasn’t building one with this chat. She hadn’t asked me any questions beyond the superficial. I tried to listen to the alarm bells going off in my head, but they were drowned out by a ticking clock counting down the long years of my celibacy.

  So what if she was interested in me for my body? I was really interested in hers. Also I didn’t know any of the clothing designers she gushed about in her interests list. I kept trying to find something to build a relationship on, but there would be time for that.

  My phone rang while Redhead was describing her perfect trip to Paris. That was a little past first date material, so I felt fine splitting my focus with Pen’s call. There was a lot of crowd noise and the heavy thump of a bass line in the background. It was Wednesday, Pen’s hookup night, and she was obviously already on the prowl.