Okay, I’ll start with Grindr, because that was my introduction to all this. My first gay hook-up app, after a long career of picking up men the old-fashioned ways. Bars. The gym. Classified ads. I did them all. No more, though. Keyboards replaced the tubs on discount student nights and colored hankies at the Eagle years ago. Was Grindr the first? To make cruising so efficient from the comfort of your home? Weren’t there others before that? Manhunt. Gay4gay. No, that one was later. Twenty years ago there was Gaycom, I vaguely remember it. DList, too, but that crowd was a little young for me. Or should I say, I was a little too old for them. Daddies weren’t popular until later. Still waiting for granddaddies to make it big.
 
I was around when this started. Remember XY? No? I stopped calling those 900 numbers and switched to the computer around . . . When was that? A few years ago, I met a guy in Palm Springs who ran one of those phone exchanges in the 1980s. Safe sex had become a thing. Nothing more germ-free than talking. In hindsight, the lines were a holding-pattern until we figured out something better. They weren’t going to last forever. And they got expensive. Being gay used to be cheap, by the way. No more. Especially after they put you on these meds.
 
 

 
Profile. God, that photo is old, and my age was already a fib when I typed it in there years ago. So is everyone else’s. You factor that in. So let’s move on. HIV Status. Negative changed to positive. A moment to go down in history. Hope they don’t share this new information with the entire world, like I hear they did once. “In error.” Last Tested Date. Last time I saw the doctor, stupid. What, two weeks ago? Ten days. I gotta start keeping better records of these things. Anyway, that’s one test where your grade is never going to change. Only my T-cell numbers and viral load, lucky fucker that I am or will not be. Testing Reminders. Um, don’t need them. What’s done is done. Que sera, sera, like Doris says. Move on again. Grindr was kinda creepy anyway. Save.
 
Receiving the bad news I was HIV-positive was also good news. Then again, it wasn’t any kind of news at all. I said, “Wow.” I wasn’t particularly shocked, though later I was shocked that I wasn’t shocked. I guess I’d been living in my mind as an HIV-positive person for a long time. Most recently, I’d been sick for the better part of a year. No diagnosis from any of the clueless doctors I saw. No energy. Headaches. Weight loss. All I got at the hospital were shrugged shoulders from the specialists. Finally, a gay doctor knew what was wrong just by looking at me. He started me that day on The Meds, even before I’d left his office. He watched me take them. Two different pills for now, then down to one when my numbers improve. Do not miss a day. Okay, okay, got it, chrissakes, Doc. I took the free samples with me. I’m going to feel better, right? You said three months until symptoms subside, but maybe more for someone “your age.” At least a potentially fatal STD has the advantage of efficiency: Eros and Thanatos rolled into one.
 
I did web research on my new doctor. Seems he had his medical license suspended for a few months some years ago. The reason? “Substance abuse.” Hah hah. Am I worried? Did I lose faith in him? No, just the opposite. I want a doctor who makes mistakes, like his patients. It means I can look him straight in the eye when we meet.
 
 

 
Profile. Well, last physical, I learned I’d shrunk half an inch, but I’m keeping it “6 ft.” Round the good stuff up, never down. Preferences. At this point, anything, but probably not wise to say that. I have to live in this town! Safety Practices. I see I checked “condoms” when I signed up. Yeah, if only. Always assumed the other guy was on PrEP. HIV STATUS. Negative changed to positive. One index finger on the mouse and click. Hey, I’m getting good at this. Last Tested. I’m going to stop updating that particular info, thank-you-very-much. What’s the point once you’ve unchecked “Negative” and checked “Positive”? You tell me. Save.
 
I indulged in fantasies about my new doctor for a week after he delivered the news. Down-and-dirty ones. What’s up with that? He’s not my type. Does this happen to everyone? What, gratitude equals libido? Or was it this diagnosis, the consequence of the sex drive. I wanted to be all over him, like white on rice. I read on his work profile that he has a husband and two dogs at home. Hmm. Does he step out on his husband? Find me a gay guy who doesn’t. I’ll run into you at the Safeway one day and what will happen then. Okay, Doc, I heard you, one pill a day. Without fail. For the rest of my life. A week later, I found my doctor’s face grotesque. Luv yah.  
 

 
What the fuck was my screen name? What was my password? Skip it. Not searching for romance anymore. Was I ever? People are happier with their own kind when recruiting husband material, I suppose. I’ve never been much attracted to my “own kind.” Should be called OKStupid. Delete.
 
HIV now? At this age? When this foolishness should have been over long ago? Fuck, I’m on Social Security. My pecker hardly works anymore. It used to. Later, low sex drive combined with the antidepressants meant I didn’t want it that often anyway. But often isn’t never, is it? Old age didn’t spare me, did it? Was I surprised at the news? Yes and no. Still needed a good poke now and then. Started going to the baths again. I convinced myself I was being safe, what bullshit. When the doctor put me on the meds, he remarked that standard one-to-three months till untransmissible might be six months for me. “At your age, everything is a little slower.” Really, Doc? News flash. I kind of knew that already. Wait until you’re this age.
 
By the way, the little blue pills never worked much for me. Erectile dysfunction? Here’s some advice, guys. Learn to unleash your Inner Bottom.
 
 

 
Profile. Ancient membership. Mostly breeders, now some gay dudes too, I see. Like OKCupid, everyone’s looking for that LTR. Doesn’t ask for my HIV status, don’t think it ever did, and no mention of Monkey Pox, either. Is that still a thing? The profile does ask you about COVID vaccinations. I check the “yes” box. I’ve been real good about that shit, but I don’t expect to be logging on here again any time soon. Surprise: it has just this second matched me up with some bear two miles away. No face pic. Check if interested. Hard pass. Back to the home page. Save.
 
Are there any hookup sites solely for us poz dudes? I’ll look into that. There are websites just for Black people, BLK; Jewish people, JDate; plus who knows what for Asians, the intellectually challenged, the asexuals, you name it. I was not the right shade for Jack’d, but that’s cool. Like I say, everyone’s happier with their own kind, except for me. So why not us? Our own site. Hey, I’ve joined a new demographic now. The chronically positive. Who knows who I’ll meet, if I start attending that Newly Diagnosed Group they have. Face-to-face, like in the old days. Second thought, no. I’ll stick to the web.
 
The end of one journey is the start of the next, right? Hello, America is sure wonderful. You can constantly reinvent yourself anytime in this country. I was the Best Little Boy in the World. Boy Scout. Center Field. Altar Boy. Walked old ladies across the street, shoveled my neighbors’ driveways. Honor Roll in high school. Phi Beta Kappa in college. Always passed my tests. Until this one.
 
 

 
Profile. Ouch, this one hurts. I used Asspig the most. One’s tastes evolve. Location. Still the same. Was just on it this morning, in fact. Checking if any new tugs had come in. It’s true, old habits die hard. My height My weight My waist size My cock size: all unchanged if I fudge the truth a little. My last hook-ups—there haven’t been many—are thanks to this website. Uncut? Body type? Hand size? Same, same, same. I am also into what? I’ll have to come back to that one later.
 
Everyone on Asspig has been around the block. I used to swipe right on guys who were positive, and there’s a lot of them, but today is the first day of the rest of my life, right? You have to work up to this one. Few youngin’s round these parts. And I mean to get my money’s worth, goddamn it. I pay extra each month, Visa Mastercard Paypal, yeah! The only site I ever did that for. I want to see all your pics. Smoke No Alcohol No. There’s only one pic of me, a SFW head shot. No dick, no ass photos. I have a reputation in this city to uphold. Hah hah. Safe sex preference. Okay, some editing is required. On second thought, no, just leave it “No preference” for the moment. I am a fucking what? Well, that used to depend how big you were compared to me. Languages spoken Who the hell needs to talk? HIV+ I’ll check “Pos/Undetectable” because I won’t be back on this site until I am. Promises Promises. Hah hah. I see old tricks and friends on Asspig, and in the most scandalous of poses. No photo of me with my dog, either. I don’t have a dog. Can you believe it? Can’t host becomes Can host. I won’t be so picky anymore. Gentlemen callers, all aboard. Save.
 
I have my now indispensable bottle of one-every-day, yessir! meds next to my keyboard, where I can keep an eye on it. I carry it from room to room. It sleeps next to me. Sorry, I’m new at this. These aren’t just multivitamins, after all. No, I’m not worried that I’ll forget to take them.
 
But I imagine something terrible and beyond my control might happen. That the roof of my condo might cave in under the weight of snow. That a flood of biblical proportions might sweep the whole building away and take these pills along with it. So I keep them close. These babies are mine. I’m having weird dreams these days, even before I’m fully asleep. Some are wonderful but some are terrible. Side effect of the pills? Bring it on.
 
 

 
There are new websites for me to explore. Oh boy. (Yeah, right.). What exercises to do, what foods to avoid, what supplements to take, how to have the talk with your family. Half a year from now, if Clean and Sober Doctor Daddy’s prediction is correct, I’ll go back and re-edit my hook-up sites’ profiles. Maybe even undelete OKCupid, if I can ever recall my damned screen name. Undetectable and Untransmissible, or so Doc promises. Promises promises. I’ll check that box and uncheck the simply “positive” ones. And once I figure out exactly what I want to say, I’ll re-edit my profiles yet again and add the specifics of how I’ll play in this Brave New World. That’s if I play. I’ve lived long enough to see how your just desserts, whether a condemnation or a recompense, stretches from where you came from to where you’re headed. Put the fucking top back on your bottle of pills, you don’t want to spill them on the floor and scatter everywhere. Messy, messy boy. That’s what they’ll say, all them bitches.
 
 

JOHN WHITTIER TREAT has published numerous short stories, one of which won the Christopher Hewitt Prize for Fiction and another nominated for a Pushcart Prize. His first novel, The Rise and Fall of the Yellow House, was a finalist for the 2016 Lambda Literary Foundation for Best Gay Fiction. His opinion pieces have appeared in the New York Times, the Huffington Post, and Out magazine. His second novel, about a family of stutters set in Washington State and Alaska, First Consonants, was published in 2022 by Jaded Ibis Press. He is at work on his third novel, The Seventh City of Refuge, and is preparing a collection of new and previously published short stories on the theme of masculinity after HIV/AIDS.

 
The art that appears alongside this piece is “Wrap Around” by JONATHAN KENT ADAMS.