Red Ribbon . . . Continued

RJ was an enigma to his family. He was the 'baby' in a white collar fiercely Italian clan. Where his siblings & parents were all in the legal profession, he lived to be onstage. He was so unlike them, he read plays and scores, learned dance moves and how move on a stage. Plus, he was gay. In a stereotypical Italian clan he would have been shunned or at least not talked about openly. Did I mention his family was not stereotypical? Instead they embraced this talented golden child and cherished him if he were a rare jewel. They paid for his actors union dues, they paid for his music & acting classes, he performed for their civic organizations and church functions, he lead the family in carols at Christmas, and at every performance they could his family was right there in front applauding and cheering as if he was Caruso or Barrymore reincarnated. They celebrated his achievements and gave support when he struggled. He hogged every spotlight, became the life of every party, fell in love 15 times a day for the length of time it took a traffic light to change, an elevator door to close, or to cross a room. He loved pretty boys, especially if they were in awe of him. He was feckless in every aspect of his life but one, his craft . . . he only truly lived when he was onstage. He fed off of the applause and the attention. Whether it came from a theatre critic, an ardent fan, or a star struck boy he ate it up like it was mannah from heaven. Did I happen to mention that our boy was a bit on the promiscuous side?

We were on our way back from a rehearsal one dreary afternoon when RJ pulled over to the side of the road and asked me to continue driving. When we walked around the car to change places I could see he looked a little green. I asked if he was ok and responded back that he'd been feeling under the weather for a while but put the blame on that on his schedule, rehearsals, and working on some new material for a solo show. He said he was just burning the candle at both ends. The first time I had heard that excuse from him was in  February, but by June you could see he had lost a lot of weight, his pallor was waxy, and he'd had that cough for months. This was more than bad schedule planning and junk food, this was getting serious and people were beginning to talk. Back in the car I kept asking if he was ok, what did his doctor say, what were they giving him, why was he losing weight? His response was that he had picked up a bug and combined with his allergies and performance schedule it had knocked him for a loop. I could see he wasn't well and that there was more to this than he was admitting to. This was the elephant in the room that he was trying to hide, pretend wasn't there, and creating as many distractions as possible to keep everyone looking anywhere but at the unasked question staring right at them. I turned to him and asked what was his HIV status, what was the result on his last test. He mumbled something vaguely sounding like "I don't know". I looked him right in the eye and asked if the reason he didn't know was because he didn't want to admit his status, or the fact he hadn't had one in a while. He again mumbled his response in a gargle of unintelligible sounds. I asked again, turning him to face me so I could understand what he was saying. "I don't know" he said again, "I don't know because I've never had an HIV test. I never wanted to know what the answer might be."

I was stunned. Here is a 25yo college educated man from a family of professionals, who's extended family also included medical practitioners, telling me he didn't want to take a test that might catch a life threatening disease early enough so that he could live a normal life, telling me he didn't want to know what the answer might be.
I exploded. I called him every variation on the words stupid, dangerous, reckless, and juvenile known to man. I railed on him for miles . . . screaming at him for his callousness against his sexual partners, for the idiocy he had been perpetrating for unknown months, for endangering himself and his medical practitioners. I made him cry . . . I had him sobbing and begging me to please stop . . . to try to see it from his side. He just made me angrier with his protestations. I didn't even want to be in the same car with him. I pulled into the BART station in Daly City and got ready to get out of the car. I turned to this sobbing mess and said I was leaving, that I'd find my own way home, and that he really needed to face reality. Make believe was all fine and good for the stage, but pretending didn't work out very well in real life when it came to life and death issues. He could bury his head in the sand as long as he wanted to, but he had better understand that they'd be coming to bury the rest of him too if he didn't face facts. He was very sick and there weren't enough cough drops in the world to cure what was going on with him. He needed to find out what really was going on and he needed to do it fast. I slammed the door to the car and walked away towards the BART station. It was not my finest hour and my compassion was left somewhere along the highway. I left him crying in the car and wrapped myself up in a cloak of righteousness and strode away. Of course, if I had been paying attention I should have covered myself in a rain jacket and an umbrella as the sky chose that moment to open up into a downpour. Fate is not only fickle but it shares the same warped sense of humour as karma.

By the time the bus dropped me off at the top of the hill, and left me to walk down to my house getting completely soaked to the skin, he was parked in front of the house waiting for me. I walked around his car and headed up the staircase to the front door. As I put the key into the lock I heard his voice over the sound of the rain. "Please help me . . . I don't know where to start." I turned and saw him standing there, looking like a wet puppy with that pity face and eyes. "Do you really want help or are you trying to placate me so I won't be mad at you", I asked. He looked down at the water rushing by and then looked me right in the eye and said "I don't want to feel this way anymore. I'm scared to find out but I'm more scared of dying. I can't do this alone." I pushed the door open and stepped over the threshold, I turned back to him and said "You're not alone you idiot, and you better come inside before you catch your death out there." Yes, my humour does have a dark and sarcastic side.

To Be Continued.