20 years ago, in 1988, I was a 15-year old adolescent living in Fayetteville, North Carolina with my parents and older sister. Our family was attempting to heal in the aftermath of explosive revelations about my sexuality. The confirmation of my same-sex attraction was the death-blow for any healthy relationship I’d thought I’d ever experience with my father. The tension in our home was thick; we were a fractured family, only meeting in the dining/living room for meals together, after which we’d all make a hasty retreat to the solitude of our individual rooms. Weekends were the worst; with no classes and only one driver in the family who cared less about anyone else’s mobility except his own, I recall isolating in my room with music and books in half-hearted attempts to entertain and relieve myself from the terrible angst I was experiencing about my sexuality, social status and what additional despair my future would heap upon me.

There was a nascent public transportation system in Fayetteville; a small, underfunded bus line. A new public library had recently opened downtown and one typically boring and dismal Saturday, I asked for and was granted permission to navigate the bus line to check it out. I had so much fun getting out of the house that day, I made it a weekly trip that I began to look forward too.

After three or four Saturdays, I grew bored with the entertainment offerings in the library and decided to wander the streets of downtown. I happened upon a park and was sitting on a bench, enjoying a warm spring afternoon when I saw someone else enter the park. My eyes followed his path through the park and just before he exited, he looked back. When he saw that I was watching him, he circled back through the park. Before long, he neared the bench where I was and struck up a conversation with me. He was clearly in his 30′s, and something about the way he spoke to me had me hoping that he wanted to have sex with me. As the conversation continued, I realized that I was praying that he would let me have sex with him. Well I got my wish. It was my first same sex experience after months and months of fantasizing. It was so intense that i could not wait to get back there the next weekend to do it again. And so I did. And that’s when I contracted HIV.

to be continued