Basic Trope: A character's Love Interest and friend fight over them.
- Straight: Bob is in a relationship with Alice, and is good friends with Charlie. However, Charlie and Alice believe Bob is wasting his time when he is with the other, so they do their best to sabotage each other.
- Exaggerated: Charlie decides to Murder the Hypotenuse to ensure that Alice will not be in the way. Unfortunately for him, Alice is also ready to resort to violence...
- Downplayed: Alice and Charlie don't mind it when Bob spends equal amounts of time with the other, but do get irritated if he starts favoring one over the other.
- Justified:
- Alice knows that Charlie is a Toxic Friend Influence, and doesn't want Bob to go down the wrong path because of him, but is worried that if she tells this to Bob, he won't trust her.
- A friend of Charlie's used to be in a relationship with Alice, and Alice was very manipulative. Charlie does not want Bob to suffer the same fate.
- Inverted: Alice and Charlie get along very well, and want Bob to spend as much time as he wants with the other, so that neither feels left out.
- Subverted:
- While Alice and Charlie don't get along well due to a lack of common interests, they have no problem if Bob spends more time with one of them than with the other. They just want him to have fun.
- Charlie turns out to have feelings for Bob, turning the situation into a Love Triangle instead.
- Double Subverted:
- However, once the three of them inadvertedly get into the same hobby, Alice and Charlie want Bob to do this hobby with one of them, but not both.
- Charlie gets into a happy relationship with someone else and makes it clear he won't pursue Bob romantically... But he (and possibly his partner) still grumble if Bob spends a lot more time with her than him.
- Parodied: The second Bob announces he has a girlfriend, everyone he knows start fighting over his attention with her, even distant acquaintances.
- Zig Zagged: Sometimes Alice will get jealous when Bob spends more time with Charlie, sometimes the other way around, but it's not a guarantee.
- Averted: Alice and Charlie don't fight over how Bob spends time with them.
- Enforced: ???
- Lampshaded: ???
- Invoked: ???
- Exploited: ???
- Defied:
- Bob goes out of his way to make sure that both Alice and Charlie get along with each other.
- Alice and Charlie meet one day when Bob isn't around, and agree that keeping Bob happy is the most important thing, so they split the time fairly.
- Bob makes sure that he includes Charlie in as much of his activities with Alice as possible, and vice-versa.
- Bob decides to add Charlie into the couple, and turn it into a trio.
- Discussed: ???
- Conversed: ???
- Deconstructed: Alice and Charlie's efforts to get Bob to spend more time with one of them ends up alienating Bob from them, and he spends less time with them.
- Reconstructed: Alice and Charlie both have a My God, What Have I Done? moment, and work together to get Bob to spend time with them. While they still get irritated when he spends more time with one of them over the other, they try to keep it under wraps.
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