I keep waiting. Hoping that she would write again. Hoping that she would take me back. Too much to hope for I suppose. I keep wishing too, that I never got HIV and things could be the way they used to be. Life was so easy then. As they say, “You never miss the water till the well runs dry.” It’s been so long since I saw her face, touched her skin, and smelled her hair. I miss her so much. {{more}}

They say a man isn’t supposed to cry but this is too much to handle. This pain, this physical pain, this heartache is too much. I spend my nights drinking and crying. I hardly sleep and when I do I am up by two a.m. and I can’t go back to sleep.

My days are spent in replay. I think about what I could have done differently, how I could still be with her. What I could have done to prevent myself from getting HIV. Condoms! Simple as that! Condoms! That could have spared me all this anguish. If I had used them all the time, everything would be different now.

The fact that all this could have been avoided makes it harder to handle. “Prevention is better than cure,” they say. In this case, there is no cure and I never thought this would happen to me, so what prevention was I studying? I was only thinking that I should not get anybody pregnant. What’s the point in rethinking all of this? It’s too late now. What’s the point of living. Many nights I plan how to take myself out of this misery. Only each time I imagine her face when she hears I have killed myself. I imagine my mother’s grief and I realize that not even suicide is a solution.

I feel so weak every day. A few days ago I started vomiting. Initially I thought it was a hangover from drinking the night before but then the diarrhoea started and wouldn’t stop. I know I heard something about AIDS and diarrhoea and vomiting. I don’t remember what they said though. I am so confused all the time now. So unhappy. I have sores and rashes on my body. Pain, too much pain.

My mother keeps insisting I go to the hospital but I refuse each time. I am too ashamed to go. They would find out I have it. I can’t live with that. My mother insists I can get help. She knows less about AIDS than me so what help could there be now.

She says she called some AIDS hotline and they advise you find out early so that you could get help and treatment. What could treatment do for me? It can’t cure me. All I want is Nikki. No hospital, no doctor, no drugs. Just her. Nikki, Nikki. I am too tired to write anymore. My mother is checking on me again …

More next week.