Here in the last few years this whole notion of the office spouse has taken on significant steam.  From stories on CNN to articles on GQ, we have heard and read about offices wives and husbands.  Having never really heard the term until a few years ago, I now easily recognize these couples without expending any effort.  The brazenness with which some of these office couples flaunt their relationships borders on the obnoxious and is usually prime fodder for co-worker gossip.  I actually have some co-workers that are jealous of other co-workers’ office relationships and rumors are constantly floating that certain office spouses are taking their relationship to the next level.  But I’m not here to talk about the office spouse — those tales have been told and the concept itself has been trivialized by its now-commonplace nature. 

No, I’m here to ask the question as to whether it’s gay for a guy to have an office domestic partner.  I need to know this answer because, yes, I have an office domestic partner.  The ironic thing about my relationship with my significant office other is that we didn’t even really like each other that much when we first met.  It wasn’t so much that we disliked each other, as it was a case of there just not being any real spark or connection between us (wow, maybe we are gay). In fact, it took our wives becoming the best of friends for us to form a friendship.  As they became thick as thieves, we too were forced to become friends.  And just like combat soldiers that become brothers in battle, our brotherhood was formed over the wildly dangerous, often deadly, spending sprees that our respective wives would inflict on us. 

Looking back at our time together at job #1, it was inevitable that we would become office domestic partners.  We were 2 employees out of a very small group that were the initial hires of a new Dallas venture.  Like many businesses that went bust in the dot.com bubble, our company suffered that same fate.  However, whether due to sheer dumb luck, twisted fate or divine intervention, the two of us rode the ship all the way to the bottom, surviving three layoffs in the process, and were fortunate to land intact at another company that took aboard the few of us that remained at the end.  Surviving something so traumatic can do one of two things – either pull you apart or push you together.  Factoring in our wives’ friendship on top of that dynamic, we had no chance. 

It was several months into job #2 (where we still reside today) though, before I think the twisted nature of our work relationship began to rear it’s ugly head and let it’s freak-flag fly.  Our new co-workers immediately began to think of us as a package deal.  They constantly referred to us as the “X Guys” (X being our prior company).   Subordinated co-workers (the little shits) began to make constant little wise cracks.  Of course, it probably didn’t help our cause that we ate lunch together practically every day and even shared rooms on out-of-town business trips in order to save the extra money (I swear, that’s the reason!). 

But it was one particular situation, one defining moment, where I knew the situation had gotten to me and I was letting it get into my head.  Sitting in a breakfast meeting with an old business acquaintance that we hadn’t seen in a couple of years, we spent the first few minutes shooting the bull back and forth.  Then it happened.  The guy asked one simple question that caused my stomach to drop and my panic to crest:  “Are you guys married?”  Only somebody knee- deep in an office relationship with another dude would immediately let his mind race to the illogical conclusion that this guy was asking whether we were in fact married to each other.  Before I could muster my composure, before my common sense could kick in, I blurted it out.  The sentence that still haunts me to this day.  “Yes”, “but not to each other!!”.  You can only imagine the horrified look on the other guy’s face.  However, it was nothing compared to the sheer terror on the face of my buddy.  It was equal parts “what the hell is wrong with you?!” and “God, I really hope that wasn’t what he meant!” 

Several years later, the two of us still get a good laugh when that breakfast comes up.  Not surprisingly, however, we rarely hear from that guy anymore and we never got any business out of him.  

Today, we still go to lunch most every day together and yes, we spend our fair share of the day screwing around in each other’s offices talking fantasy football or sports (we don’t really have much else).  But we have managed to move our offices to opposite sides of the floor, we actually have friends at work besides each other (though they will always think of us as the “X Guys”) and many a day go by where the only interaction I will have with him is laughing at the stupid shit I can hear him saying across the hall (usually some rant directed at some unsuspecting junior colleague or even worse, the poor secretary that we both share).  And I’m fine with that.  Of course, if one of us were ever to decide to change jobs again, the new employer would have to understand that they were getting a package deal!

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