Page 76 of You Are Not Me

Daniel studied me seriously before clapping a hand on my shoulder and pulling me in for a hug over the gear shift.

“That sucks.” He squeezed me. “I’m sorry.”

I let him hold me for a minute, breathing in his warm scent, and I risked rubbing my cheek against the soft cotton of his shirt. His arms were bigger than Adam’s, and the texture of his skin where my fingers gripped his biceps was softer, less coarse.

Pulling away, Daniel said, “C’mon, we gotta get back or Robert and Barry will start to argue, and no one likes it when the parents fight.” He winked and opened his door, his long legs spidering out of the car.

I followed him into the Fellini Kroger, and I didn’t know if I was relieved or not that the conversation was over. I had no idea what else to say on the subject, but it’d felt surprisingly good to say the words and get them out in the open like that. Daniel’s hug had been so kind and warm. He didn’t seem to think less of me, and for that I was grateful.

Back at Barry and Robert’s, I sat between Minty and Daniel at the kitchen table, stuffing my face with delicious tacos.

“Watch out,” Daniel murmured.

“What?” I asked around a bite.

“You might eat your fingers.”

I stuck my tongue out at him and took another large, crunchy bite, moaning as the tomatoes and salsa burst over my tongue.

Daniel’s face went pink, and his lips twisted up in a funny, smirking smile, like he was holding something back. Then he took his own large bite and moaned too, but his was exaggerated. I elbowed him in the ribs.

“Weren’t you at the University Center the other night handing out flyers for that AIDS thing?” Joe, one of Barry’s coworkers from the library asked. He was a big beefy guy with a thick neck.

“Yeah,” Daniel replied. “Did you take one?”

“Hell, no. Of course not.”

Daniel looked a little baffled. “Why ‘hell no?’”

“I don’t have it.” Joe shifted nervously. “You know, AIDS. So why would I need a flyer about it?”

Barry and Daniel just stared at Joe until his cheeks and the tips of his ears turned red. Finally, he admitted, “Also I was with my roommate. He doesn’t know I’m gay.”

“Ah.” Daniel wiped his mouth with his napkin. “Well, they were flyers about ARK—AIDS Response Knoxville. We’re looking for more volunteers. The number of HIV and AIDS cases in the area are fairly stable right now, but the number of people getting sick as the disease progresses is rising.”

“You work for them? Really? Aren’t you afraid?” asked Greg, a skinny guy with acne who’d told me he worked for Barry at the information desk.

“Yeah, the ARK office was firebombed, wasn’t it?” Joe added.

“It was.” Daniel frowned. “But people still need help, and the offices are relocated now. Besides, I mainly work out of clients’ homes.”

“That’s not what I meant,” Greg said. “Aren’t you scared you’ll catch it?”

Daniel went very still and then put his taco down on his plate.

Minty swung a tight, angry glance at Greg, and Antonio’s eyes narrowed like he wanted to put a fist in Greg’s face. Windy, Robert, and Barry all looked at their plates, and suddenly my stomach dropped.

He had it.

Danielhad it.

Dizziness swept over me, and I put my taco down too.

“Of course I’m afraid,” Daniel said, finally. “But not that I’ll get AIDS from the patients I work with.” He pressed his lips together. “I’m afraid of a lot of things about this disease. Like the man I eventually fall in love with might have it. And I’m afraid I’ll have to watch him die, like I’m watching these men and women die. I’m afraid I might have it too by then, and that I’ll be too sick to care for my lover. I’m afraid people will be so scared to help that there’ll be no one to care for either one of us.”

He looked Joe in the eye. “That’s what we should all be afraid of, whether we’re gay or straight, or infected or not. I want there to be a day when we aren’t afraid of AIDS. In the meantime, I’m going to be the kind of person who shows the sick and dying the concern and care I’d want given to the man I love if I couldn’t be there to take care of him myself.”

“But…you don’t have HIV? Right?” Joe looked a little pale, like the idea that he was eating with someone who was HIV positive might put him off his food.

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