“Okay,” said Steve, “let’s brainstorm ideas on to how to get guys to test. Remember, this is brainstorming. Say the first thing that comes to your mind. No idea is too dumb or too outrageous.” Andie went to the whiteboard to write down the ideas.
Lionel raised his hand. “We could offer a free blow job with each test.”
Steve stared at him. “Now that’s a dumb idea. Any serious ideas?”
Lionel mumbled, “It was the first thing that came to my mind.”
Without their hearts in it, the team began tossing out ideas.
“We could pass out coupons so guys can test for free,” Leo offered.
“They’ve tried that,” said Steve. “It’s not a money issue. It’s a trust issue.”
Lionel tried again. “How about with every test, you get a free pass to the baths.”
“Isn’t that kind of like handing out matches and gasoline to prevent fires?” said Chad.
“Is that another metaphor?”
“So what’s your idea?” Steve asked Chad.
He thought. “Maybe you get a coupon for a free drink at Silverado with each test. The owner there supports our work.”
“Oh, sure,” said Andie. “Ply them with alcohol and further dull their powers of judgment.”
“Okay, okay,” said Steve. “More ideas.”
“Steve, face it,” said Chad. “It’s not going to work. No one wants to go to the health department where they have to admit they’re gay or may have had unsafe sex.”
Lionel agreed. “Being tested by the health department is like getting a physical exam from your mom.”
The team was collectively squirming at the thought when it suddenly came to me.
“So, we’ll do it.”
The others looked at me.
“Do what?”
“We’ll test gay men.”
“What do you mean?” asked Steve.
“We develop and train a team of volunteers, all gay men, and offer HIV counseling and testing here once a week in the evening. We’ll devise some ID system so guys can test anonymously. We’ll keep their names, and the health department gets the test results.”
“Neat idea,” said Chad, “but the county’ll never allow nonprofessionals to do the testing.”
“If they want test results badly enough, they might. Especially if they can oversee the testing.”
Steve was intrigued. “You might have something. Do you know any precedent for this? Anywhere testing is being done by volunteers? Bureaucrats love precedents.”
“I could do a lit search when I’m at school tomorrow,” offered Chad.
“Or maybe we pitch it differently,” I said. “We will be the precedent.”
“Yeah, like a pilot,” said Leo.
Andie jumped in. “We’d be pioneers. This is Oregon. Pioneers are part of our history.”
“What ‘our’ history?” said Lionel. “You’re from Ohio.”
The team became excited. It was an innovative concept— even daring for its time— to train and equip the target population to test their own people. We would provide a safe space for gay men where the counseling and testing would be done by their own “brothers.” Steve immediately left to call and propose the idea to the county’s HIV Program manager.
• • •
He came back to us the following day. I was right: bureaucrats are by nature timid. They don’t like to take risks. But they were also desperate to produce the results the feds wanted. And with his natural enthusiasm and Boy Scout wholesomeness, Steve was the perfect person to pitch the idea. If he believed in something, he could convince anyone. And he believed in this idea.
“They want to try it. They’ll build it into our contract and provide extra funding. We’ve got one year to show results. They’ve assigned their head epidemiologist to work with us. Arthur’s a gay man himself, and he supports the idea. He’ll handle the technical aspects of the training and the phlebotomy— ”
“The what?” asked Lionel.
“Blood draws. They’ll assign a phlebotomist to us who will also be a gay man. Our job is to recruit, screen and train a team of volunteers to handle the counseling part. They want this program up and running by Pride Weekend.”
Chad whistled. “That’s only three months from now.”
Steve turned to me. “I want you to coordinate this program. It was your idea.”
“I’ll get started immediately.”
But where to start? All I knew about HIV testing was from the wrong end of a needle. The next day I met with the epidemiologist to piece together how such a program could work. Arthur reminded me of a Swiss watchmaker: slightly stooped, pleasantly plump with a pink complexion, a walrus moustache, and gentle sleepy eyes. Though only in his mid-forties, he was already bald with a curly fringe of blond-white hair. Next, I placed an announcement in the newspaper, describing the project and calling for volunteers. Within two days forty men had applied, and we set up interviews for the following week. I decided we’d select twelve candidates so that, allowing for dropouts, we would end up with a team of ten. Those not selected could be held in reserve for the next training and a second team. I’d design the counseling curriculum and, along with Arthur, oversee the ten-week training.
Steve pulled me aside. “This is big. It’s not just the county. The state and feds are watching how it goes, too. Andie’s right: We’re going to be pioneers!”
• • •
Arthur and Steve joined me for the interviews the next week. Because of the tight timeline, we would conduct group interviews, roughly eight candidates each night. It would also give us an idea how they’d work in a team as they interacted with the other candidates and answered a series of questions: Why do you want to volunteer for this program? What experience have you had with HIV? Have you been tested?
Not surprising, a large number of helping professions were represented: gay men who were teachers, nurses, social workers, counselors. We could have staffed the team with only nurses, which Arthur favored. But Steve and I wanted the program to reflect the diversity of the gay community, with counselors who were African American, Latino and Asian, as well as the different “types” of gay men. “I want counselors guys can identify with,” Steve was saying as we watched the first group of candidates gather in the lobby, “from the super butch to the flaming queen.”
It was at that moment the elevator doors opened and Lukas flamed in. “Bonjour, everyone!” he announced with outspread arms. All heads turned. “I have arrived!” He was one of those people who doesn’t enter a room so much as invades it, bringing his own band, fanfare and spotlight with him. Mid-twenties, slender to the point of being skinny, dressed in slacks and a neon pink satin shirt, he was already going around greeting men there, half of whom he seemed to know.
I turned back to Steve. “I think we just filled the Flaming Queen slot.”
We began the interviews. I asked each applicant to introduce himself. Lukas immediately launched forth. He was a walking stereotype, worked in a fashionable hair salon on Broadway and performed as a drag queen at Darcelle’s