the.com/love triangle
Geometry proves two sides can't both win without the third collapsing.
means A romantic entanglement in which three people are bound together by desire, but the structure only has room for two to end up happy.
from A 20th-century figurative extension of the geometric term 'triangle' — three points connected by three lines, borrowed to describe three people connected by three overlapping romantic feelings. The math metaphor stuck because triangles are the simplest shape with more than two corners: add a third person to a couple and you get the smallest possible mess.
- math fail
- triangles need three equal sides to be stable
- narrative fuel
- drives half of young adult fiction sales
- real odds
- usually resolves by someone just leaving town
- root cause
- indecision wearing the costume of romance