Dear Justin

Dear Justin,

Did you know I got through yesterday without breaking down?

I didn't have a massive freakout.

I didn't break down in the middle of my therapy session and rage at the heavens that my best friend had been taken away from me because of AIDS and stupidity.

But today....the day after the 1year anniversary of your death....today I feel like I'm walking through a cloud. A haze.

I just realized that you were probably behind that nightmare that I had last night. You never were subtle about reminding me of what my true purpose is on this earth: Honey, you were created to clean up all the bullshit that everyone else puts out there. You're going to save the world. That's why you're here. It's your main purpose.


Thank you for reminding me. Thank you for loving me when you were alive. Thank you for loving me from beyond the grave. Thank you for leading me to Daniel, because I totally think that you and Christopher had something to do with that.

Thank you for being my friend. For being the unrequited love of my life (See? If you had only waited, I would have figured it out and been the gay man you always wanted me to be. But then I wouldn't have Daniel...does it make me selfish that I'm glad to have him?).

Thank you for telling me to make sure that I tell your story. Your story has changed lives. Saved lives. People are getting tested after reading about you. People are staying healthy. And because of you, I'll never stop talking about the horror of AIDS, of not being safe, of not being tested.

Because of you, I remembered why I'm here.

I'm going to save the world. Thank you my friend. I miss you and love you every day, but I know that you're looking down on me from above.

Save me a seat? Preferably next to Frank Sinatra....


Love You Always and Forever,

Vicktor Alesandr B.

In Honor of Justin: My Soul Mate

I still remember the first time that I saw him. He was beautiful. Tall, black hair, tanned skin, broad, muscled, with a gorgeous smile. I remember blinking repeatedly to make sure that I wasn't dreaming and I wasn't. I turned to my new "best friend" Angel and asked in a harsh whisper "Who is that?"

Angel rolled his eyes. "That's just Justin. He a friend of mine. C'mon I'll introduce you."

I remember how I hesitated to step forward, how my palms started to sweat. I just knew that I was going to make a fool out of myself. I wasn't "Smooth Vicktor" like I am now. I was a freshman in high school, still running from my truth. I was just "Dorky Veronica" back then.

Angel turned and looked at me, "It ain't like you got a chance. He's gay anyway."

I remember, even now, how Angel saying those words didn't bring me relief but only made me feel like I had MORE of a chance than ever.

I understand more now and I wish that Justin was still alive so that he could see me become the man that he always saw inside. Justin was the first person to call me "Vic" because he said I just didn't look like a "Ronnie" which is what I had people calling me senior year.

Justin was beautiful and talented. Fun. Justin could have been a Tony Award winner he was so fantastic. But Justin had a serious problem.

Ian.

Ian was Justin's unfaithful partner. Ian slept with everyone and everything. Never used a condom and never got checked.

Neither did Justin.

Despite my constant harping of him. Despite me always dragging him with me whenever I got tested in high school or in college. Despite the flood of text messages, emails and voicemails from me, Ryan and Angel, Justin never got tested.

By the time he did, it was too late. He didn't have HIV, he had full-blown AIDS.

They put him on medication and while having HIV and AIDS is not the death sentence today that it used to be, for Justin, it was.

And the absolute tragic irony is, Ian is still alive, though Justin contracted the disease from him.

I was at work when I got the phone call from a furiously angry Puerto Rican. Angel was going off in Spanish, his mouth forming rapid words and spewing them forth in a rage, most of which I didn't catch. And then I heard it:

Then Justin told me that the doctors said it was AIDS, not HIV...full blown AIDS.

I didn't hear anything else that Angel said. My heart was shattered, all I heard was white noise. It couldn't be possible. Not my Justin. Justin and I were supposed to eventually get married one day, we were supposed to have kids. Even back then I'd told him that all he had to do was wait for me to become a gay man and we'd be set.

I remember when I called his cell phone. That conversation and the last one I ever had with him are locked in my brain and plays in a continuous loop in my mind, just like my first and last conversation with Christopher. I'm amazed at how my mind works and horrified that it would remember things that I'd rather forget as well.

Justin: Hello.
Me: Hey.
Justin: (pause) Oh, hey Vic.
Me: So....
Justin: So I guess Angel told you.
Me: (silence)
Justin: I don't need you lecturing me Vic. Seriously.
Me: (softly) Why didn't YOU tell me?
Justin: What?
Me: Why the hell did I have to find out from fucking Angel of all people?
Justin: But you love Angel!
Me: Yeah. But I love you more! Why the FUCK didn't YOU TELL ME JUSTIN?!
Justin: I COULDN'T!
Me: Why?
Justin: Because I can't stand to hurt you Vic! I can't bear the disappointment. And because I didn't want to hear you cry.
Me: Well too fucking bad for you then huh? (sniffs) Why couldn't you have just gotten tested when I told you? How dare you do this to me. To us. Our group can't stand to lose any more people. You can't do this Justin. You can't have AIDS okay? (sobs) You just can't.


What followed after that was a lot of crying on my part and a lot of apologizing on Justin's. I'd been angry with him before, this wasn't the first time and it wouldn't be the last.

I read up on everything that I could find about AIDS, I signed every petition, marched, wrote about and started to pray, for the first time in years, that the same God that had let my fiance pass away from brain cancer wasn't a complete bastard and would save my friend instead. I started going back to church, thinking that if I did, maybe, just maybe, God, Allah, YHVH (Jehovah), would take pity on me and save my best friend, my soul mate, and he'd be completely cured.

Because I'd read stories about people suddenly not having it any more. I knew that Magic Johnson had had HIV for like over a decade or more and he was still around and working and to my mind, Justin was a much better person than Magic.

Then I got the phone call, Justin had gotten pneumonia from his sister's girlfriend and he was in the hospital and if I wanted to see my friend, I need to get an emergency passport and get over to England as quick as I could.

I remember my brain shutting down. I remember scrambling for money, for identification, trying to pack in a hurry, trying against all hope to pray and believe for a miracle. I remember being told that since Justin wasn't a family member I couldn't get the emergency passport, but I could get an express one in a week and pay an extra couple hundred dollars. I remember telling them money was no object and Skyping with the boys that night.

The cry that ripped out of me when I saw Justin, model beautiful Justin looking frail and helpless still echoes in my brain sometimes. I hadn't seen him for over a year by that point and his mother told me that not all of it was because of the "inconvenient diagnosis." She said Justin hadn't been eating, that he'd been stressing and that he'd started dating Link, another guy who had HIV. She was fairly certain that they'd used condoms but "couldn't be sure."

Our last conversation with each other was two days later, because three days after Justin went in the hospital he stopped fighting and passed away. It was short and I never would have thought that my friend would stop fighting, but our last conversation, while it rips my heart to ribbons of despair and agonizing loneliness many times, also makes me smile.

Me: So he's totally gay and just won't admit it.
Justin: And you're going to make him?
Me: Me and Little Big Vic, you know I take him with me everywhere I go.
Justin: That guy is dangerous, he almost brought me to my knees when I saw him
Me: That's his job, to bring sexy gay men to their knees.
(we both laugh)
Justin: So when I get to Heaven I'll look out for Vivianna and Christopher okay?
Me: Oh Justin, please, you're going to be fine.
Justin: Vee, seriously, I'm going to die soon-
Me: Shut the fuck up Justin!
Justin: Grow the hell up Veronica!
(silence)
Justin: (sigh) Look, Vee, Vic, shit...I don't want to die, but I'm being realistic here, everyone's already said their goodbyes to me, everyone except you and honestly, I don't want to be another Christopher for you. I want you to say goodbye to me. I need you to say goodbye to me.
Me: Fuck you asshole.
Justin: That works too.
(we both laugh)
Me: Goddammit Justin, I'm going to miss you. What the hell am I supposed to do without you?
Justin: Well, you'll be a whole lot less fashionable. You'll fall back into utter dreariness and be completely boring.
Me: Smart ass.
Justin: Seriously Vic. You're going to be fine. I think you're going to finally start living for yourself and stop living through me. You're going to fall in love again, get married, have kids, get the hell away from your awful family. Laugh, because you love to laugh. You'll start singing again, you'll get the goddamn surgery so you can dance again and knowing you, you'll create some amazing charity to raise money for AIDS in my memory and add it to your list of ways to save the world.
Me: You make me sound like Wonder Woman.
Justin: Wonder Woman was a wimp. You're totally Superman.
Me: I love you.
Justin: Not half as much as I love you.
Me: Wait for me?
Justin: On the other side baby.


I lost my friend last year.

It was heartbreaking and I thought about joining him. He was with Christopher, my fiance', and Vivianna our daughter. They were probably in Heaven having fun. Dancing and singing and eating lots of inappropriate foods. I wanted to be with them.

But I know that Justin was right. Because I did get an idea for a charity to help find a cure for AIDS that's in his memory. I did get away from my horrible biological family and found a new family that loves and supports me. I did fall in love again. Then fell out of love and then found someone who makes my heart soar just thinking about him. Someone who makes me a better me and accepts me warts and all, and actually loves my possessive and sometimes jealous personality, someone that I feel like Justin handpicked for me with the help of Christopher, my dear friend Mores, my cousins Valerie and Tabitha, and my daughter Vivianna.

I'm laughing again and just recently started to sing again.

Getting married and having kids is definitely on my horizon.

And saving the world? That wonderful list that Justin teased me about. Well, it actually exists.

The HIV virus and the AIDS disease is a horrible bastard that I am determined to fight and win against, just like that stupid cancer disease. Cancer is a horrible luck of the draw.

HIV and AIDS can be avoided however.

Use a condom.

Wrap it up. Always, always, use a condom. Even if you trust the person, until you get that piece of paper that says you're both negative and there's a commitment in place, use a condom.

Because I want to cut AIDS down at its knees. I want to take the bastard out. And if I can get you and others to be safe, we can starve that horrible disease where it is and not give it another person, another family, another friend, another brother, another son, another daughter, another sister or grandson or granddaughter or cousin or niece or nephew...if you're safe and I'm safe and everyone's safe, then one day, and hopefully one day soon, World AIDS Day will be a day of remembering those we lost before and also celebrating that there are no new cases and that there is a cure for those who had it before.

I promised my friend I'd save the world, so I'm starting with you.

-Vicktor Aleksandr B.

GET INVOLVED:

http://www.aidscommunityservices.com/

http://www.aidscommunityresources.com/

http://aids.gov/awareness-days/

http://www.worldaidsday.org/

http://www.avert.org/world-aids-day.htm

http://www.helpfightaids.com/

http://www.joinred.com/2015quilt/2015quilt-post.html

http://one.org/us/actnow/splash_2015quilt.html

Book Review of Amy Lane's "Living Promises"

Okay, I'm going to see if I can get through this book review without sobbing my eyes out, but seeing as how I'm already crying, I have no hopes for that.

By the end of the Prologue I was already identifying with the MC of Collin, having lost two cousins in a car accident on the same night I lost my favorite cousin (the first person I told when I started having sex who went and got me tested and told me about condoms, HIV and STDs) to cancer.  Soon after that I became fearless and reckless until I met Christopher a year later.  He gave me something to live for and helped me to heal.

This is when I begin to identify with the MC of Jeff (who I fell in love with in Book One) who lost someone he loved in the military, very unexpectedly.  That sense of grief and feeling as if you don't want to live if that person isn't alive to be with you.  I cried when I read that Jeff's lover, Kevin, died while serving overseas and he found out that he had contracted HIV (readers will remember that we found out he had this from the first two books).  Having served in the Army and having lost friends overseas, my best friend to AIDS and my fiance to brain cancer, I felt as if Mrs. Lane had gripped my heart and was crushing the life out of it.  I actually had to walk away from the book for a while to compose myself, the description of the haze Jeff went through was so wonderfully written.

However, the story is not all sadness and grief and "Oh-My-God-Somebody-Just-Put-Me-Out-Of-My-Misery" heartache.  Mrs. Lane mixes in a wonderful blend of laughter, surprise, love, realistic life situations, disappointments and heart-stopping, breath-stealing sex as to make this book my favorite one of this year (and that says a lot because I LOVED "Viking Lore" by Stormy Glenn).  By the time I got to the end of this book I'd gone through an entire box of Kleenex, two bottles of water and felt so emotionally drained that all I could do was lay on my bed trying to get my head together.

Collin and Jeff are so beautiful together, both helping each other to heal, to become better, to believe and hope again, loving so deeply and strongly as to be almost supernatural.  This is one of the greatest stories of love lost, love found and life rediscovered.

Thank you [author:Amy Lane|151973] for writing such an amazing story and for your dedication at the beginning of the book.

His Story

He was born Justin. Half French, half Italian, he was gorgeous. He IS gorgeous, atleast he was the last time I saw him. Now his body is being covered with black sores, his body, usually a hard mass of muscle and physical perfection is losing its definition as he loses weight during this hard time of his life. We met in high school, he was just another addition to my ragtag bunch of friends, all of us different, gay, transgendered, straight, bisexual, Wiccans, Atheists, Christians, Buddhists, Agnostics, Spiritual, Hermaphrodite, Cripple, we were a bunch of people who became friends because of our love for the theater, drama, music, sex, alcohol, and amazingly enough our mutual love for Brad Pitt.
Justin, Ryan, Angel, and I naturally gravitated towards each other. We were far and away the most dramatic and flamboyant of our little makeshift "family" of 15. We were all outcasts, the black sheep, who just happened to be the most popular people around. All for different reasons. Angel, the gorgeous Puerto Rican boy who women desperately wanted to turn straight and for whom men were willing to turn gay, was always known as being the life of the party, with his flair for fashion, he was Lady Gaga before Gaga existed. I was the chameleon, able to blend in with my surroundings yet staying true to who I really was. I was popular because of my talent, my ability to accomplish whatever I truly set my mind to and because while I wasn't considered "beautiful," guys were still drawn to me. Ryan, the hermaphrodite of our "family" was popular because of how smart he was, his sarcastic wit, and because he was one of the few open-minded, TRULY loving Christians that existed. Justin, however, was a force to be reckoned with. A hulking mass of sexiness, he was popular because he was beautiful, his smile could stop traffic, he was the biggest sweetheart in the world and while girls were often brokenhearted when he told them he was "a flaming homosexual" they were only too happy to consider him a friend.
Justin was free-spirited. Then again, we all were. Spending our days skipping class or daydreaming about moving to Los Angeles and becoming "Super-Celebrities" in our own ways. Justin wanted to be the highest paid porn star in the world and be President of the United States....simultaneously. He dreamed big and often. He was also one of my biggest supporters/fans. Justin could never understand it if a guy didn't find me attractive, or if someone told me "no," or if I got turned down for anything. He always seemed truly shocked. That was Justin's thing though, he believed that all of his friends were the best thing walking and could never believe it when someone disagreed with him.
Justin grew up in a family where his parents were just as free-spirited and flighty as he was. They changed ideals, beliefs, religions, and values about as much as they changed the furniture in their house. Perhaps that attributed to Justin's restless spirit, or perhaps it was always there, regardless, Justin was not one for committing to anything, not a job, not a place, and especially not a relationship. So it was to the shock of all of us when he told us that he had not only been in a committed relationship with the same guy for a year but that he was in love with him. Being the type of friends that we are, we immediately teased and berated him for it before asking to meet the guy in question, Isaac.
Isaac was your typical rich boy, spoiled, entitled, arrogant, thinking he was God's gift to men AND women and I of course had a problem with him dating my best friend, especially when he hit on me one night and told me not to tell (which of course I did). Isaac and Justin's relationship was fraught with violent arguments and fighting, excessive drinking and drug usage, and other addictive behavior. Isaac also cheated on Justin....repeatedly. Justin always took Isaac back, much to the chagrin of the rest of us.
So I wasn't too shocked when Justin called to tell me that Isaac had confessed to having an affair for four months, not even when he told me that Isaac had been cheating on him with a woman, I wouldn't have put it past Isaac to cheat on him with a dog if giiven the right motivation and circumstances (gross I know, but hey, I'm being honest). However, I was shocked when he told me that Isaac had gotten this other woman pregnant and the two of them had decided to keep the baby and to try to be together.
Justin was devastated and rightly so. So, being the family that we are, we all pitched in and helped to fly Justin from New York over to London, England where Angel and James lived with their own house, thinking to help Justin heal over his harsh breakup by indulging in the life of a British man. It seemed to work for a while, Justin began laughing and smiling again, returning to a glimpse of his former, vivacious self.
So I was shocked when he called to inform me that he'd had to go to the doctor....again, to get bloodwork done. Then when he told me why, my heart stopped.
You see, our family started off with 15 in 1997, and now in 2010, we are just 5. Losing the other 10 to drugs, jail, and AIDS. So when Justin told me that he was having another "outbreak" of sores, weakness, and feeling sick, I felt the air in my world being sucked out.
Justin is a big, huge, important part of my life. The results of his test came in and when he called me, sobbing openly on the phone, my heart broke. I am so afraid of losing him and so angry that he didn't get tested sooner, earlier, yearly. He knew his partner was unfaithful and yet chose to remain in denial rather than face reality and get tested. His partner put his life on the line by sleeping around and yet Justin is not completely innocent because he didn't use protection and he didn't get tested.
Now, our days will be filled with nostalgic memories, hospital visits, medicine, attempts at trying to cram as much of Justin's "bucket list" into what remains of his life, trying to be hopeful, and all of us will spend our days with this black cloud looming over our heads as we try not to focus on the fact that we will be losing another family member to this horrible disease soon.
We have a responsibility, not just to ourselves but to our partners, our loved ones, the world and our family to get tested as often as possible, to stay healthy, informed and aware.
Justin hasn't lost his vivaciousness or his flair for life, he's wiser now, he's sicker, but he's still the same guy who tossed me over his shoulder and carried me to my Drama class, one day, our freshman year in college, because he said that "Divas don't walk."
His story has motivated those of us who remain to get tested but to also tell his story so that through his life and impending demise, we might save the lives of others.

By the way, Justin's favorite movie is "Rent" and his favorite part? The restaurant scene where the cast sings "La Vie Boheme." Favorite line: "Actual reality, Act now, FIGHT AIDS!"