His eyes narrowed. “Let me guess, you need to go?”
“No, I…” What did I even say to someone who I’dforgottenthe damn condom with?Oops, sorry, teehee? “Did you want me to go?” is what came out of my mouth.Ok Hen, that wasn’thelpful. You can’t just go. Time to be a responsible adult.“No, wait,” I added before he could answer. “I can’t…how much do you remember about last night?”
If anything, his eyes narrowed further. They were now little slits in his face, and he looked anything but happy. Shit, I was fucking this up. “I wasn’t that drunk,” he protested archly. “I mean…wait.” His eyes widened. “Were you? Shit, I didn’t think you werethat-”
I waved a hand, cutting him off before he could really get going. “No, no. I mean, I was drunk, but I wasn’t that drunk. I just, um. Do you remember having sex?”
Those eyes - hazel, I noted absently, with flecks of green - narrowed again. “Yes,” he snapped. “I remember having sex. With you, in case that wasn’t clear either.”
“And we didn’t…” How did I even broach this, seriously? I was mortified. I’d been doing the penetration, it wasmyresponsibility to put on the condom, and I just…hadn’t. I’d been so focused on getting into his body that it completely slipped my mind. Whodidthat? What kind of gay man in this day and age didn’t fucking at least have The Safety Talk any time he so much as got his dick near another man? “We didn’t…” I tried again. “There wasn’t…” I gestured at my crotch. Yeah, becausethatwas clear. Great, Hen. There wasn’t what, a dick?
He blinked at me. “I feel like I’m playing charades and I don’t know the category. There wasn’twhat?” A pause. His eyes went distant, and I hoped he was searching his memories so I didn’t have to play another round of charades. “There…oh,shit.”
There it was. I bit my lip. “Yeah. Oh, shit.”
“We didn’t use…”
“Nope.”
“Fuck.”
I nodded and drew in a slow breath. “I’m really, really sorry. I don’t know why…I mean I was just…it was -” I tipped my headback and forced myself to breathe again. “I didn’t mean to forget the condom. I swear I’m negative.”
Silence reigned for a long moment, and then he inclined his head slightly. “Ok.” He closed his eyes. “Ok. This is fine. This will be fine. I’m negative too. So we don’t need to…it will be ok.” His hand crept off the bed to his nightstand, where he felt around until he found his glasses. The hand, now clutching the frames, retreated and he plopped them onto his face tiredly.
My mind raced, thinking through what needed to happen. Unprotected sex wasn’t the end of the world. Even exposure to HIV if one of us turned out to be positive wasn’t the end of the world. Hell,contractingHIV wasn’t the end of the world these days. Ok so…we needed to exchange names, for one thing, and contact information. We both needed to get to our doctors and get PEP prescriptions. We needed to test. How soon could we test? How soon did we have to re-test? I knew there was a rule of thumb, but hell if I could remember jack shit right now.
“Hey.” A hand reached out and touched my arm. “You ok?”
Abruptly broken out of my spiraling thoughts, I couldn’t stop myself from jumping. “Sorry. Sorry. Yeah, I’m ok. I was just…thinking.” About everything, all at once.
He nodded understandingly. "Yeah. This is… not the greatest thing. I get it. So um… " He paused. "I guess we need to be adults about this. Shit happens, and all." A slow breath. "I don't have a copy of my latest test results handy, but they're about two months old at this point. I've had sex since then. Protected," he added hastily, as if I was in a position to judge him. "And I’m on PREP. But yeah. So… " He rubbed his eyes under his glasses.
I nodded, trying to project calm adulthood and not the frenzied panic my lizard brain was trying to make happen. "My last test was three months ago. I haven't been with anyone since, but I did have sex the day before the test so I guess it's possibleit might have missed an infection. I, um." I sighed. "My ex. He cheated on me, as it turned out. So I got tested."
"Ouch." He winced in commiseration. "That sucks. Okay.” He paused and muttered something that sounded likeadulting.“So it sounds like I'm maybe more of a risk than you, but there's a possibility either of us could be carrying an infection and not know it. So um, I guess we test? I mean, you don’t know me from Adam; for all you know I could be lying."
"Definitely testing. I don't know…" I sighed and reached over the side of the bed to my pants, which were thankfully close by, digging my phone out. "I don't know what the rule is for how soon you're supposed to test after exposure, or how quickly you re-test." Unlocking my screen, I opened a new browser tab to start a search.Hey Google, how much do I need to panic right now?A few seconds and a couple of taps on the screen got me what seemed to be reliable information. "Looks like the earliest a test can detect a new infection is about ten days later. Shit, we have to wait ten days?" I shook my head. "That feels like forever." I’d managed the testing anxiety ok after Ramsey cheated on me, but I wasn’t sure I could do this a second time and stay sane.
My companion - whose name Istillcouldn't remember, for those of you playing along at home - shook his head. "To check whether either of us transmitted it to the other, yes. But we could go get tested today and at least find out whether either of us is likely to be carrying HIV such that wecouldhave given it to the other. Like, whether your ex gave it to you or something."
"Oh." I nodded. "That makes sense. And… and PEP, right? We need that? Do you know how it works?" I'd never had to use it, and he seemed like he knew what he was talking about with testing, so maybe he knew this too?
"Are you on PrEP?" he asked instead of answering my question. "Like me?"
I shook my head. "No. I'm not… I don't… " I cut myself off before I finished that sentence withsleep around. Not only had I patently done that last night, but the last thing I wanted was to make this poor guy I'd screwed over think I was judging him. "No," I said again, instead.
He looked away thoughtfully. “So we need to make appointments with our doctors, you for PEP and a test and me for a test." He sighed. "I feel weird telling you to treat this like I came at you with full-on AIDS when I'm pretty sure I'm negative, but, you know." He shrugged. "Better safe than sorry?"
"Definitely.” I ran a search on my phone. It took a bit of sifting through information but finally I looked up at him. "Different sites say different things but Planned Parenthood says we have to test again in 4 to 6 weeks, then after three months. So at least three separate tests, possibly four if we want to be overzealous and do a six-month check as well."
He shook his head and whistled low. "Ok, what else goes on the post-'oh, shit' list to do? We covered PEP and PrEP and testing but I know there's gotta be more."
I thought about that for a moment, scratching my beard idly. What else? Well, we needed to be able to exchange test results, which meant it was time to get awkward. More awkward? Awkwarder? My fingers tightened on my beard until I was tugging at it. "Um, we need to be able to contact each other."
"Oh, right, yeah, that'd be good," he agreed with a self-deprecating laugh. "Let me find my phone." He rolled out of the bed, displaying a luscious, pale ass as he bent over and started hunting through the pile of clothes we'd left on the floor last night. “Where the hell…” he muttered to himself as he dug. “I swear I was wearing pants last night.” He held up a tiny pair of blue underwear, then tossed them to the side. “How do I have these but not my pants?!”
Trying not to laugh at his mumblings, I looked around the room hoping to spot a pair of pants. “Is that them?” I asked, pointing toward the corner of the room opposite where he was looking, where a heap of what looked like denim was laying.
