We have a group chat. Six gay guys. It's called The Gossip Express. Nobody remembers why anymore.

The app never goes quiet. Never. I was woken up at three-fifteen last night. By sixty messages. About a Beyoncé dress.

The usual cast of characters

Every group has its types. Ours does too.

Mark sends a good-morning gif every single day. Always the same one. A dancing cat with sunglasses. Three years running.

Tom only responds with memes. Ask him something serious, and you get a picture of Whitney Houston back. With the text And I-I-I.

Bas reads everything but never says a word. Until you're convinced he's dead. Then at eleven at night he'll send: haha. About a message from last week.

And then there's Patrick. Patrick sends voice messages. Four minutes long. About his groceries.

Making a plan

Sometimes we want to get together. It takes guts. It always starts the same way.

Someone suggests a date. Saturday the twelfth. Three people react with a thumbs up. Two say nothing. Patrick sends a voice message.

Then comes round two. Mark can't make it after all. Tom can, but not until nine. Bas reads the message and vanishes.

Three days later: new date. Same story. Except now Patrick can't make it, and Mark can.

After two weeks we give up. We agree to make plans to make plans. That doesn't work either.

The gossip

But one thing always comes through. The gossip.

Someone saw someone. With someone else. At a bar. Where they shouldn't have been.

Suddenly everyone responds. Within three minutes. Bas is alive. Patrick is typing. Mark has an opinion.

That plan from last week? Forgotten. Tom's birthday present? Not bought. But who went home with who after Sander's party? We've got all the details.

We even know things that never happened. We just made those up. For the drama.

The quiet week

Sometimes the chat goes silent. For an hour. Then I start to panic.

Did something happen? Did they start a new chat? Without me?

I secretly check if they're still online. Mark is. Tom too. Why aren't they typing?

Then, finally, a message. From Patrick. A voice message. Five minutes. About a deal at the Albert Heijn.

I've never been so happy listening to someone talk about chicken breast.

The verdict

We barely see each other anymore. But we message all day long.

Maybe this is what friendship is now. Six guys, six phones, one endless conversation about nothing.

And when we finally do see each other? We spend three minutes looking at our phones. At the group chat.