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44 11 Ifound a post­ card of the old chief in a card shop and ­ pinned it on the wall over my bed, hop­ ing to con­ jure the boy I’d lost. I ­ turned and saw Tanya, lean­ ing on the door­ jamb, and I gave her a sheep­ ish ­ glance. “Don’t pine, Shame. Do some­ thing con­ struc­ tive.” What was she, my big sis­ ter? Well, sort of. And then she was rush­ ing ­ around, gath­ er­ ing her ­ things, shov­ ing fold­ ers, fly­ ers, cards into her back­ pack with its ACT UP but­ tons and Queer Na­ tion stick­ ers plas­ tered all over it. There was an ACT UP meet­ ing that night and she was head­ ing there. She went all the time, was on a com­ mit­ tee even. I’d been be­ fore, but my at­ ten­ dance was­ spotty, pred­ i­ cated more on a vague sense of guilt, on right­ eous anger, and be­ cause it was the scene for cute boys with the sex ap­ peal of rad­ i­ cal pol­ i­ tics. I’d gone to ­ street pro­ tests and taken pic­ tures, but I ­ didn’t like to think about the ac­ ro­ nym too much ex­ cept for how not to get it, and when I spent too much time think­ ing about it, I got de­ pressed and par­ a­ noid. And I was ­ afraid of de­ pres­ sion and par­ a­ noia al­ most as much as the ac­ ro­ nym. I pre­ ferred Queer Na­ tion ­ kiss-ins at down­ town de­ part­ ment ­ stores. Tanya ­ turned and ­ looked at me as I sat and ­ stared at her col­ lect­ ing her ­ things. “Come on.” At the ACT UP meet­ ing, I just sat there and lis­ tened, ­ slouched next to Tanya with her set jaw, sur­ rounded by the ear­ nest multi­ tude, who 45­ ranged from the ­ leather-jacketed ­ pierced in­ tel­ lec­ tu­ als who ran the show to as­ sorted hot young art­ fags and des­ ic­ cated ’70s-era guys—men who’d seen so many ­ deaths, I ­ feared they were death it­ self. There were ­ bouncy, ro­ tund baby dykes and men­ ac­ ing ­ butches, smil­ ing holy men, re­ as­ sur­ ing Venus of Wil­ len­ dorf sex work­ ers, and sev­ eral male cou­ ples with their hands ­ gripped so ­ tightly their knuck­ les were white. There were guys who ­ looked like ­ they’d never have been at such a meet­ ing if it ­ hadn’t been for the great equa­ lizer of the ac­ ro­ nym, and there were the wack­ jobs who ex­ isted among all ­ scenes in San Fran­ cisco and could be found­ wherever sub­ ver­ sives gath­ ered. Tanya got up and spoke and said some­ thing about Bur­ roughs Well­ come and AZT, and then they ­ spilled out of her—ac­ ro­ nym after ac­ ro­ nym: CDC and NIH, FDA and PWA, PCP, ddI and ddC, Com­ pound Q. She was the real thing and I ad­ mired that and knew then ­ that’s why I sorta liked her de­ spite how we ­ clashed over ­ things ­ around the house. But I still hated those ac­ ro­ nyms more than I liked her and ­ wanted to swat them away like mos­ qui­ toes. “I think I’m gonna go, Tanya,” I whis­ pered to her after she’d sat down ­ post-speech. She put her hand on my thigh to keep me there, but I ­ squirmed free, in­ con­ sol­ able de­ spite the play­ ful ­ antics of the mod­ er­ a­ tor, who had a lamp­ shade on his head and ­ strings of Mardi Gras beads­ across his chest. He ­ looked at me, grin­ ning, when I got up: “Bye,” he ­ minced. I waved sheep­ ishly, mor­ tified at the pub­ lic flir­ ta­ tion that put me on the spot. Off I went to walk and ru­ mi­ nate, hur­ ry­ ing up 18th ­ Street from the meet­ ing at the ­ Women’s Build­ ing, and ­ through Do­ lores Park, which was liv­ ing up to its name just then, misty and shad­ owed in the grow­ ing dark­ ness. And in ­ spilled the fog, huge banks of it over Twin Peaks, si­ lent, crash­ ing and break­ ing like a slow wave, then creep­ ing and foam­ ing­ around cor­ ners, slip­ ping...

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