Some Kind of Soul

More often than not, he ended up on the floor with a pillow and the throw blanket he kept at the foot of the bed, which he’d lied to Nandor and insisted was purely decorative. 

Guillermo had gotten surprisingly good at making himself comfortable down there.

At least until Nandor woke up, noticed he was missing, and dragged him back into bed, wrapping himself around Guillermo like some six-foot-one octopus clinging to the rock it felt the most safe.

Hell, even after the fights, the silences, and the stilted conversations that followed—where they pretended they hadn’t just hurt each other—they always ended the night together in bed, completely wrapped up in one another.

Guillermo turned his head and stared at the empty space beside him, at Nandor’s perfectly fluffed pillow and the smooth, untouched sheets where he could have been if Guillermo hadn’t asked for them to take a break. Which, in hindsight, felt considerably less reasonable now that he was literally and figuratively lying in the bed he’d made. But what other choice did he have? 

Guillermo had debated with himself over and over again how much longer he… they… could have kept going with the way things were headed. 

Between the mood swings, the hospital stays, and the constant arguing that had slowly progressed to insults and belittling…

It had become too much.

Something had to change.

Or their marriage wouldn’t survive it.

Guillermo rolled onto Nandor’s side, breathing in the familiar scent of his husband’s stupidly expensive favourite shampoo, and closed his eyes.

He just hoped he had made the right decision. 

Guillermo’s cellphone rang on the nightstand. Nandor’s ringtone—the kalimba version of their wedding song, “Flightless Bird, American Mouth” by Iron & Wine—filled the room, startling Aspen awake beside the bed. 

He let out a loud, happy boof, nails skittering against the hardwood as he lifted his head. He looked toward Guillermo, his tail beginning to thump against the floor in that same slow, lazy rhythm it always did when Nandor called, before letting out another boof. 

“Have you ever heard the term don’t bite the hand that feeds you?” Guillermo sighed, swinging his legs over the side of the bed. “Because, technically, I’m the hand that feeds you.” 

Aspen let out a soft whine, nudging his head against Guillermo’s legs, his whole lower body wiggling, as his tail thumped faster against the floor. 

“You should be loyal to me,” Guillermo grumbled. “Even when I bring you food, you never wag your tail like that for me.” 

Which was admittedly a little hypocritical, considering he’d be doing the exact same thing if he had a tail.

But, to be fair, he’d been with Nandor for ten years. 

At this point, the reaction was practically pavlovian. 

It was all instinct.

A trick of sense memory.

A betrayal of mind, body, and every ounce of good sense he had left.

Which, when it came to Nandor, apparently amounted to none.

Ugh, he was really going to answer his phone, huh?

Guillermo reached for his phone.

He glanced down at the screen, his lips twitching despite himself at the familiar photo staring back at him. Nandor on their wedding day, taking a selfie with the photographer's camera, the flash going off. His head was tilted back in surprise, his eyes squeezed shut, his mouth slack, and his entire face was completely washed out.

It was Guillermo’s favourite picture.

Because it was the most Nandor picture ever taken. 

The version of him that his fans, his friends, and all the yes people in his life never got to see. 

And Guillermo was terrified of losing even more of him than he already had. 

He swiped a thumb to accept the call. 

“Guillermo?”

He sat up straighter, while Aspen’s tail slowed, slowed, and then stilled.

“Hey b—” Guillermo caught himself. “Nandor.” He tried to sound as nonchalant as possible, despite the anxiety already twisting his stomach into knots. He knew that tone. It usually meant things were either bad or worse. He hoped, desperately, that he was wrong. But given Nandor's history... “It’s really late. Is everything okay?” 

A sigh came through the receiver, followed by the soft rustle of blankets.

“No,” Nandor said, his voice cracking. “I’m not okay.”

“I’m on my way over,” Guillermo replied, already moving, phone wedged between his shoulder and ear as he began unbuttoning his pajama top. “Dr. Robinson should be on shift at the hospital tonight. We can call the office in the morning and schedule an emergency appointment with The Guide—” 

“Guillermo.”

“—and if she can’t get you in, I still have the number for the crisis team somewhere, I just have to—”

“Guillermo!” Nandor snapped.

Guillermo froze. 

“Could you fucking stop playing the martyr caretaker for one fucking moment and listen to me like you’re my husband for once!” 

Guillermo went slack, like a puppet whose strings had been cut, his hands falling from the buttons of his shirt to hang uselessly at his sides as he struggled to swallow around the lump forming in his throat. 

“I—” Guillermo tried, but the word caught. He swallowed. Tried again. “I—I was just trying to help.”

Nandor let out an ugly, bitter laugh. One Guillermo had become all too familiar with these past few months. Then he sighed. “I know.”

A tear escaped Guillermo’s overfilled eyes and rolled hot down his cheek.

“You’re always trying to help.”

“Excuse me?” Guillermo scoffed, angrily wiping at the tears that followed, now falling freely down his cheeks. “You called me!”

“Yes, because I wanted to talk to you!” 

“Then fucking talk!” 

“I’m trying to!” Nandor snapped. “But you are getting angry at me.”

Guillermo stared at the phone in disbelief. 

The absolute fucking nerve of this guy.

“I’m getting angry at you? You just yelled at me for trying to help you!”

“Because you weren’t listening!”

“You said you weren’t okay!”

“I’m not!”

“Then what the fuck do you want me to do?”

“Nothing!”

Guillermo recoiled.

A pause. Then, “Fine.”

“No, Guillermo—”

“No, you want nothing from me? Fine.”

“I miss you,” Nandor said, all the fight suddenly gone from his voice. “I miss you so much, and I—” He paused, letting out a shaky exhale, followed by a wet sniff. “I can’t imagine a future where you’re not in it.”

Guillermo’s mouth opened.

Closed.

Well, fuck.

What the hell was he supposed to do with that?

He was still angry. He was still hurt. And a small, particularly stubborn part of him wanted to keep arguing, because being angry felt easier than admitting that, underneath it all, he missed him too. 

“Guillermo,” Nandor murmured, his voice thick now with tears. “Please say something.”

“Yeah,” Guillermo exhaled shakily. “I don’t want that either.” 

A wrecked sob. A wet sniffle. More rustling of blankets.

“Then why, if neither of us wants a life without the other, can’t we just be together?”

“I don’t know,” Guillermo sighed, closing his eyes, and running a hand through his bed-mussed curls. “B-but that’s why we’re going to counselling.” He sat on the edge of the bed. “So we can be together.” 

“I-I know things have been…” Nandor trailed off, hiccuping around another quiet sob. “I know I have been…” 

Guillermo’s fingers curled into the duvet, bunching up the fabric between his fists, and squeezed, to stop himself from rushing to comfort and fix the way he had in the past. 

“I’m sorry, okay?” Nandor choked out between gasps. “I just want to come home.”

Guillermo’s fingers tightened on the duvet and a broken sound escaped his throat before he could stop it. 

“Oh, my love,” Nandor sniffled. “I didn’t mean to make you cry.” 

Guillermo broke down in tears, his hands slowly loosening their grip on the duvet, fingers aching from how tightly he’d been holding on. 

“I-” Guillermo started. Stopped. Took off his glasses, brushing uselessly at the onslaught of tears with his sleeve, before he tried again. “I-I want you home.” He sniffled. “I want us. But I don’t know h-how I can keep doing this.” 

“Doing what?” Nandor asked softly.

Guillermo snorted and gave a sad, wet laugh. “Don’t act like you don’t know.”

“I don’t know!” Nandor snapped. “Because you never fucking tell me. You just—”

“I just what?” Guillermo cut in, tears still slipping down his face. “What do I do?”

“This!” Nandor shot back. “You’re fucking doing it right now?”

“Doing what?” Guillermo asked, hating how his voice cracked.

Nandor sighed. “Forget it.”

“No,” Guillermo sniffled. “I want to know what it is that you think that I’m doing.”

A long pause. Then, “You act like I’m supposed to know everything,” Nandor replied shakily. “Every little thing you’re feeling. Every little thing you want. Every little thing you need. I’m not a mind reader, Guillermo.” 

Guillermo scoffed. “What about you?” He said thankfully more steadily. “You do the exact same thing.” 

“I don’t…” Nandor started, then stopped. His voice softened. “I didn’t realize…”

Guillermo’s bottom lip wobbled. 

“I’m sorry.”

Guillermo shook his head. “No, I’m sorry.”

“You don’t have to apologize,” Nandor let out a shaky breath, shifting in bed, if the rustling of sheets was any indication. “I know you’re only reacting to me and my…” He trailed off. “Whatever.”

Guillermo huffed a wet laugh, laying back on the bed. “Your whatever?”

Nandor rumbled a laugh. “I don’t know how to describe it.”

“Mhmm.” Guillermo smiled. “Whatever is very descriptive.”

“It is,” Nandor quipped. “It is a very useful word. It could mean anything.” 

They both laughed.

And then they went quiet.

Guillermo shifted in bed, turning onto his side and resting his cheek against Nandor’s pillow. “I-I miss you too.”

“Yeah?” Nandor asked softly. 

“Yeah,” Guillermo said, swallowing around the lump in his throat. “But, that doesn’t mean I’m not still hurt. O-or that we don’t need counselling.” He stretched out a leg. “We have a lot of…whatever to work through.”

“I know,” Nandor paused, exhaling a shuddery breath. “I know we do.”

They both went quiet again.

“O-our bed is too big,” Guillermo admitted quietly. “I was stretched out like a starfish earlier and there was still room on both sides of me.” 

“Oh?” Nandor hummed. “That’s funny, because I could’ve sworn you spent years telling me it was too small.” 

“Yeah, well…” Guillermo rolled his eyes, nuzzling his cheek further into the pillow. “I was wrong. It’s too big.” 

Nandor huffed out a laugh. “At least you have room. The bed here is entirely too small.” He grunted, rustling more sheets. “I don’t remember it being this small.”

Guillermo snorted. “I remember.”

He didn’t know how they managed to have sex in that tiny bed, let alone how they’d shared it afterward, only to have water thrown on them in the morning and get scolded about waiting until marriage. 

Back then they’d been young, reckless, and completely convinced they were invincible.

They were lucky they’d never had a reason to stop believing they were invincible. 

“You would remember, wouldn’t you,” Nandor chuckled. “Your back certainly would.” 

“Funny. I remember doing most of the work,” Guillermo replied with a sleepy smile. “Your back should remember that.” 

“Maybe,” Nandor lowered his voice, making it go all husky, in that way that always made Guillermo absolutely feral. “You could come over and remind me.”

Guillermo’s breath hitched, his brain reacting before his body could catch up, concern overriding his body’s pavlovian would-be-overly-enthusiastic response to Nandor, because of the fact that this was the first time in how many months he’d tried to initiate sex. Had it been almost a year? Yeah. The last time was on Nandor’s birthday… So, that had to mean…

“Are you off your meds?” Guillermo blurted the question out before he could stop himself.

Fuck.

There was a small pause and then a sharp, “are you fucking serious right now?”

“I’m sorry,” Guillermo said, his words tripping over themselves in his rush to get them out. “I regretted asking it as soon as I asked it.”

“Do you ever just stop?” Nandor snapped. “The checking. The watching. The trying to figure out if I’m okay before I’ve even said anything.” His voice cracked. “Do you ever just let me be your husband?”

“That’s not fair.”

Nandor scoffed. “I just tried to use my no longer broken dick, and rekindle our sex life, but instead of letting me, you jumped into the caretaker role again.” The bed springs squeaked. “How is that not fair?” 

“You didn't have a broken d—” 

“I did,” Nandor interrupted. “We haven’t had sex for 8 months because of it.”

“Okay,” Guillermo conceded, rolling his eyes. “You had a broken dick. But it’s not fair because, like you said, it’s been eight months.”

“Yes, which is exactly why I tried to fix it by getting my medication adjusted,” Nandor sighed. “You would know that if you bothered to ask instead of rushing to conclusions.”

“I did ask!” Guillermo protested. “I asked if you were off your meds!” 

“That was a shit question to ask me, and you already admitted it, so you can’t use it against me.”

“Oh my God,” Guillermo groaned. “You’re unbelievable.”

“I’m unbelievable?” Nandor scoffed. “You’re the one who doesn’t know when you’re caretaking me and when you’re being my husband. The lines have become so blurred. I never know which version of you I’m going to get!” 

Guillermo let out a sharp, disbelieving laugh. “Oh, okay. So me loving and caring about you is a problem?”

“That is not what I said.”

“It’s what you meant,” Guillermo shot back. “God forbid I know my own husband well enough to notice when something’s wrong. God forbid I care about you and your well-being.” He pushed up onto his elbows. “You told me you’re not a mind reader and guess what, I’m not one either. You never communicate with me. Everything I know, I have to learn secondhand. Either from your mom, Dr. Robinson, or your assistant—” He stopped, his voice cracking. “I shouldn't have to piece together what's happening with my own husband.” 

“Because I don’t want you in this position,” Nandor shouted. “You don’t think I feel bad that it’s me who has put you here?”

"I don't mind." Guillermo shook his head, tasting the salt of his own tears on his lips. “I love you—”

“I know that,” Nandor interrupted softly. “I love you too.” He let out a shaky breath. “But maybe you’re right about us needing counselling. Maybe after some time and space we can—”

What the fuck? 

“W-what?” Guillermo’s head snapped up. “I didn’t say we needed time or space.”

“No, but you asked for a break, and my new counsellor thought that it would—”

Guillermo went still. Wait. What?

“You have a new counsellor?”

“Erm... Yes.”

“Since when?” 

“A few weeks.”

“And you didn't tell me.”

“I didn't think—”

“Right.” Guillermo swallowed. “Of course you didn’t.”

“Guillermo—”

“It’s late,” Guillermo said, his voice flat and detached. “I should get some sleep.”

“Guillermo, wait. Let’s talk about th—”

“Goodnight.”

Guillermo ended the call, put his phone on silent, and set it facedown on the nightstand.

Aspen stared up at him.

“What?” Guillermo muttered. “Don’t look at me like that.”

Aspen tilted his head.

“Ugh. Come on, judgey-mcjudge-face,” Guillermo said, climbing out of bed and reaching for the throw blanket and his pillow. “I don’t want to sleep in here tonight.”

Aspen followed as Guillermo padded toward the guest room. 

“Can you believe that?” He scoffed, setting down the pillow and throw blanket, before turning down the duvet.

Behind him, Aspen’s nails clicked softly against the floor, and stopped.

“I mean, I thought we were going to work on our marriage together, but I guess I got that wrong. The way I do everything else.” 

Guillermo sniffled. 

“Well, if he wants time and space, I can give him time and space.” He wiped at his face with the back of his sleeve. Yuck. He really should’ve grabbed another pair of pajamas. “Maybe I’ll finally get something right. Unless he complains to his new counsellor about that too.” 

He got into bed and pulled the duvet and throw blanket over himself while Aspen whined at the foot of the bed. 

“What?” Guillermo asked. “You know the rules. You can’t sleep in the bed with me, Aspen.” 

Aspen whined again, louder this time.

“I said n—.”

Another whine.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake.”

Guillermo lifted the duvet. “Come here.”

Aspen let out a happy boof and scrambled into bed with Guillermo, licking his face as his whole body wiggled before he curled against his side.