Chapter 12
I’ve never been in pain like this before.
It didn’t hurt this bad when Liam walked out.
Admittedly that was my heart, and this is my arse.
I’ve been lying face down with my bum up in the air trying to cool it in the breeze of the open window for the last six days since I returned from New York.
I’m radiating a temperature hotter than hell, which is clearly where I’m going after this life is done with me.
I had to extend my sick leave for the first week of my February roster and miss out on the two-night Toronto trip I’d been looking forward to.
I planned to visit Niagara Falls and the CN Tower, and possibly a couple of the local gay bars, although right now I never want to see another homosexual ever again.
My head pounding and temperature rising, I self-diagnosed Covid.
After vomiting for forty-eight hours, I started to think it might be something more sinister.
Then they came. The blisters. Down there.
At the back door. I consulted Dr Google and discovered I had syphilis.
God’s way of punishing me for getting pissed in New York and sleeping with, well, someone.
Or it could have been Derek. Or thingymebob from the night before him.
I phone the sex clinic praying they will prescribe me something for the pain.
They don’t. I’m asked my symptoms; I can hear the nurse tapping away on her computer as I list them.
She attempts to repeat my name back to me using the phonetic alphabet; Charlie, Alpha, Lion, Lion, Umbrella, Monkey – she’s not very good.
‘Come straight to the clinic. You’re not to travel on public transport and please wait outside when you arrive until we’re ready to see you and you’ve called me back to let me know you’re here.’ She hangs up.
I load an Uber and grab an ice-pop from the fridge to cool me down.
I’ve not had one since I was a child but it’s all I’ve lived off since getting home from New York.
I look at it and for a brief second have a thought that if I literally stick it where the sun doesn’t shine, it may ease the burning.
I lower myself into the Uber and pray for no speed bumps or potholes. I focus hard trying not to be sick or shit myself. Eyes down staring at my feet, sweat on my brow, head too heavy to lift, I will the driver to speed up.
On arrival, the brown prefabricated building doesn’t fill me with confidence, its structure showing years of neglect.
The rainwater gushes over the top of the guttering like a cry for help.
I call the receptionist to let her know I’m here, waiting at the side entrance like a leper.
A doctor and nurse both wearing hazmat suits greet me at the door, smiling from behind visors, although their eyes tell me I’ve nothing to smile about.
Their outfits seem a little overkill for a touch of syphilis.
The nurse, possibly early thirties, it’s hard to tell in her outfit, seems over excited.
Her demeanour more fitting to a city centre bar at two in the morning than a sex clinic in the early afternoon.
‘We’ve been waiting for one of you to come in, you’re the first,’ the nurse tells me.
I feel like I’m the winning call out in a game of sex clinic bingo. I half expect the receptionist to run out, check her ticket, then give her the afternoon off for winning a full house.
‘This way.’ The doctor holds the door of a treatment room open.
She is shorter than the nurse. More negative. She’s pinned a colourful pride badge to her white hazmat that reads, you’re safe with me, in rainbow colours. The bright badge a substitute for her personality.
The doctor continues. ‘Sit down, OK, now what seems to be the problem?’
I sit down carefully on the chair, my arse feeling like it has been stabbed with a sharp knife the minute it touches the surface. I swallow the pain to hide my embarrassment, but I’m sure my eyes have popped out of my head like a cartoon character giving the game away.
‘I’ve had a temperature for a couple of days which led to vomiting. I thought it was Covid but then I started to get little blisters on my bum.’ I respond with minimal eye contact, my palms dripping.
‘And is that on your bum cheeks, on your anus, or up inside?’ The nurse asks like she’s asking me if I want chocolate, strawberry, or vanilla milkshake with my McDonalds.
‘All three,’ I answer like a greedy child.
‘We’re just going to go through a small questionnaire.’ The nurse clicks her pen. ‘How many sexual partners have you had in the last six months?’
‘Erm…’ I stall to think.
‘Just a rough figure.’
I use my fingers to start counting but run out of digits when I get to ten.
‘More than five?’ The nurse pauses and looks at me. ‘More than ten?’ She nudges me for an answer. ‘Over twenty?’
‘Over twenty.’
‘And were they men or women?’ She’s clearly been on a diversity course and been told to never assume.
‘Men.’
‘And are you still in contact with them?’
‘No.’
‘Did this include anal sex?’ Her tone tells me she’s really enjoying this.
‘Yes.’
‘And were you the submissive partner or the dominant or both?’
‘Submissive.’
‘Oral?’ She asks.
‘Yes.’ I confirm.
‘And has anyone ever paid you for sex?’
‘No.’ But I normally make them buy me a drink first.
‘Have you paid anyone for sex?’
‘No, but I have slept with an escort.’ It’s like I’m in confession and I want to be rid of my sins.
‘I didn’t know he was an escort. I really liked him.
We went on a date, we got on. He was funny and beautiful.
Dead tall.’ I can’t shut up. ‘When I text him the next day to ask him out again, he said he had something to tell me, that he was sorry he hadn’t been honest, and that he was an escort and not a mechanic. ’
Neither the nurse nor doctor show any reaction.
‘Has anyone ever forced you into sex?’ The nurse continues the interrogation.
‘No.’ But I do like to be spat on and choked.
The nurse puts the clipboard on the desk, picks up a box of purple latex gloves, takes two out, and offers the box to the doctor, who snatches a pair.
‘On the bed.’ The doctor points to the red clinic bed. I look at her like I don’t understand the simple instruction.
‘Drop your pants and get on. Bring your knees up to your chest.’
I understand that.
I’ve dressed for the occasion with a pair of loose joggers and perfectly respectable pair of high street branded boxers: boxers which say that I’m boyfriend material and not a bit of Saturday night trade.
I follow her command, drop my boxers and shuffle onto the bed, making sure to avoid eye contact at all times.
I feel the doctor’s hands on my bum. She spreads my cheeks apart like she’s trying to capture the last bit of dignity I have left before chucking it into the clinical waste.
‘Hmmmm, I see,’ she says.
And I know what she can see is my arse hole. I don’t respond.
‘You’ve got blisters around and inside your bottom. This isn’t syphilis,’ I’m about to breathe a sigh of relief when she adds, ‘but I’m afraid it does look like mpox.’
Fuck my life. ‘You mean monkeypox?’
‘We call it mpox now. I’m going to have to take a swab to send for testing, is that OK?’ The doctor isn’t really asking, she’s already taking the swab out of its wrapper. ‘This may hurt,’ she says as I feel a sharp pain in my arse like I’m being fisted without lube.
My body jumps a couple of centimetres off the bed.
‘Do you want me to hold your hand?’ The nurse asks.
‘I’m OK.’ I’m absolutely not OK.
‘Was the sex rough?’ The doctor asks.
‘I don’t remember,’ I whisper through gritted teeth.
With that she pauses, her firm grip loosens.
‘Oh sweetheart, no wonder you’re in pain, he’s torn you.’
I’m mortified, frightened, and embarrassed. I want to get my pants back up and hide away somewhere the gays will never find me, like a bar on Deansgate on a Saturday night.
‘Will it heal?’
‘I’ll give you some cream to help with the pain. You’re going to need lots of paracetamol, and you need to make sure no one comes near you or touches your bath towel. It’s highly contagious.’ She lightly taps my bum signalling the examination is over and I can make myself decent.
‘I’ve got a flatmate,’ I whimper.
‘If you don’t have separate bathrooms then keep everything as clean as possible. Don’t share a bed with anyone. You’ll need to isolate for three weeks. I’ll just go and get you the cream.’ And with that, the doctor leaves the room.
‘There’s nothing to be ashamed of you know.’ The nurse reads my face.
‘Isn’t there?’ I ask myself aloud.
‘It’s going to get a lot more painful before it gets better. You really need to look after yourself.’ She tilts her head and pats my hand.
I stare at the educational poster on the wall, Syphilis, Know the symptoms…
I wonder if Liam got tested after all the times he cheated on me, or if it’s another thing I can hate him for.
The nurse breaks my trance, takes a fishbowl of coloured condoms from the shelf above the desk and offers me them like she’s offering a child a lollipop. I shake my head. Too little, too late.