My health

I suppose I'm okay. That's what they're all saying, but I just don't feel okay. But what'll happen if I've got it? The afternoon fatigue, the night sweats, the tender glands on my neck, the touchy nerves on my arm. They can only mean one thing. And that one thing goes back to those four wild nights with Paul. Paul, who's been around the block one too many times. Paul, who's done porno and hustled. Paul, so sexy that I couldn't stop myself. And now ... now, I must've got it.

And what about David? This'll mean the end of us. Twelve years, gone in a swoop, and there I'll be -- forty, single, sick, and on the street. No home and no one to share life with ... the price for sex, I suppose.

But then again, what if it isn't what I think it is? All the doctors I've seen on the quiet these last six weeks, all the clinics where I've been tested, they all say I'm not sick like I think I am; they say it's just the flu. I'm being neurotic, perhaps, but I don't think so! I know my body better than they do. Surely they're missing something. Surely the incubation period is longer than they think it is. But they say, "You've been safe, you don't have to worry." But I do worry ... I'm gonna be punished for my mistakes with Paul and I deserve to be punished. I deserve to lose my home, my partner, and eventually ... my life.