Lemuel: It goes in waves. Experimentation, then periods of more activity or dry spells. One of us will get frustrated with something and then we would discuss it, which leads to more comfort in doing . . . well, certain things. During a month, it is like every single day and for another period, it's not for two weeks. It is not like "every Friday night after watching Matlock."
Diego: Sex definitely changed, but for physical reasons. My wife had an episiotomy when she gave birth that's when you cut open the perineum so the baby can come out and she was in physical pain and that prohibited sex for a very long time. But even when it healed, she didn't feel up to sex for a long time. Psychologically, she felt odd and I wasn't in a place to say "come on." In some ways, it's not as exciting or spontaneous as it used to be, although sometimes it is but there is more intimacy.
Malachi: I had fantastic sex after we were married. Although there were periods of foul that were kind of freaky. We got ourselves out of it, and that was early on . . . It was always triggered by something, like a vacation, moving, something weird or exotic. A high-stress situation or a low-stress situation. It was hard to figure out the pattern. There was one point where we didn't have sex at all for two months.
Is the stereotype true, about women seeing a wedding ring as an aphrodisiac?
Malachi: I've found you never get hit on more than when you are married. You know it and they know it: nothing is going to happen. I think that frees women to be more crazily flirtatious than they would ever be because it's essentially a no-risk activity.
Lemuel: It's also that you don't have that desperate quality you once had. You aren't angling in the same way, so even if you're not an easy charmer, you can find yourself unintentionally leading people on.
Have you ever covered for another guy, the way these guys do for their cheating friend?
Bartlett: Sure, yeah. My friend bought a hooker. At his bachelor party.
Was he comfortable about that?
Bartlett: I think he was very comfortable with that. He buried it with all his other lies. I felt pretty awful about it though. I still feel pretty awful about it. Especially since I saw what the hooker looked like. It was odd because I thought that out of the eight people in the room, only two of us had a conscience about the thing.
Do you worry about guys hitting on your spouses?
Bartlett: My wife is the kind of woman where men will aggressively hit on her. I've been in situations at parties where men have hit on my wife in front of me and said, "Let's go in there," or "Let's go fool around." Knowing full well she is my wife, but because she is friendly and attractive, people think that is an open door! I don't take pride in that.
Samson: I've had situations when people have known me a while and then they meet my husband and say, "Oh, he's really good-looking." I find myself saying thank you, but I don't know what I'm saying thank you to.
Bartlett: It's, like, congratulations that you were able to land that person.
Samson: Yeah, I guess. I used every little lie I could to snap him up.
Lemuel: You used big dick mentality.
Does monogamy feel like a natural thing or a discipline?
Malachi: I think very early on, it felt like a choice, but one that I liked. I didn't like sex when I was single. I didn't like the creepy, weird shallowness of it, and the high ability to wound other people, including myself. Monogamy felt like something I wanted badly at the time.
Diego: I was actually lucky in terms of my relationship, because it started in college and broke up, and then we got back together. So I slept with other people in between. Later after we were getting back together, I felt more comfortable with her sexually and emotionally and in every other way.
Samson: For a long time, for me, monogamy was a state of mind and not a state of body. Not who you're having sex with, but who is in your life. I think that the idea of an open relationship is a much bigger deal for gay men especially, who don't want to be tied down. So sexual fidelity is not the same as relationship fidelity. Monogamy is enforced in so many different ways, like through the church. It's the idea that we're playing by our own rules now so we can create whatever we want. But we had to really struggle with these issues early on; we were in couples therapy for a while to keep that communication open.
Lemuel: It sounds sappy but I think the key is if you can look at your partner sitting in the breakfast nook in the morning, no makeup and all mussed up, and still find that appealing. I can imagine looking at that scene at twenty-two and going, "Ew" but I can look at that scene now and go, "Yeah."
Do you think there are many quietly desperate married people who are not admitting it? That seems to be the message of this show.
Diego: You mean that they settled?
Bartlett: (sarcastically) Oh, yeah, that is what the ring stands for, "I will not tell."
Lemuel: You know, I don't think it is a married vs. single thing. There are people in denial everywhere. There are people who you have no sense of their relationship until one day they announce they are getting a divorce and you realize they must have been unhappy for years and never let you know. Then there are the people who come in every day and say, "I had a fight with my wife" and you know they won't break up, because they have something better than that.
