Tinder date
Josh Avsec and Michelle Arendas (L)Twitter/JoshAvsec/MichelleArendas

Patience and a sense of humour are said to be two of the many things that keep a relationship going. And by relationship we do not only mean on the lines of a love interest, it could even be a virtual equation on dating app Tinder. And that aforementioned patience and sense of humour are exactly what's keeping the spark alive for these two strangers, who have been texting back and forth for about three years now.

Yes, you read it right! Just texting and for three years. Josh Avsec and Michelle Arendas have a great virtual equation but have never met. And the funniest part that has kicked up a social media frenzy is that they take weeks, even months, to reply to each other's texts. Confused? Here's how it all began.

Avsec stumbled upon Arendas' profile on Tinder and sent her a message as she seemed "different" from the other girls. "Tinder was super new at the time for my whole friend group. At the time I had matched with a whole bunch of girls and I took it as a joke," Buzzfeed quoted him as saying. "I sent [them] some pretty humorous lines. And then I bumped into Michelle. She seemed a little different, so I sent her something different."

"Hey Michelle," he wrote. And proving that she was different, she replied to his message two months later and said: "Hey sorry my phone died." In her defence, Arendas told the website that she wasn't serious about messaging and hence would often delete and redownload the app, due to which she would either miss messages or see them late.

"I wasn't too serious about messaging — that's why I messaged him something funny," she said. Surprisingly, Avsec added to the fun when he replied almost two months later saying: "Hey, sorry was in the shower." And the replies only get funnier.

What started as "something funny" has now become a full-blown series of messages; just that they are exchanged after months. Talking about the messages that the two have exchanged over the last three years, Arendas said: "I was not really expecting he would message me back and play along with it. I thought my message to him would be the end of it," while Avsec added: "I didn't think she was interested. I just took it as a joke, so every couple of months I'd check Tinder and I'd get a message."

The duo has become extremely popular on Twitter after Avsec posted a screengrab of their messages and now social media users are urging them to get together. While Avsec and Arendas are yet to meet in real life, they have exchanged numbers and have been talking about how funny the whole thing has become.

Dating trends
What attracts a woman to a manCreativeCommons/Christian Gonzalez

Meanwhile, not just Twitter, it looks like even Tinder is shipping this duo. The dating app asked Avsec and Arendas to pick a city in 24 hours and promised to send them there for their first date. They picked the Hawaiian island of Maui and Tinder promptly confirmed their trip, but with a hilarious twist. 

Take a look at the funny text messages Avsec and Arendas have been exchanging.