Queenie(35)

“We’ll be waiting for hours,” she said, turning to face me. “And I do care about your sexual health, but we cannot just disappear for hours.”

“Darcy, do you care about my sexual health?” I asked her. “I’ve been having more . . . indoor activity than usual recently, and it occurred to me that I should check that things aren’t going to start falling off.”

Darcy rolled her eyes. “You sent me an e-mail about ninety minutes ago telling me that this was the day that you got your act together. Just go at the weekend?”

“Honestly, it won’t take long,” I pleaded. “And Gina’s calendar says she’s out of the office this afternoon. I just want company, please, please.”



* * *



Two hours later we were sitting in the waiting room of the sexual health clinic around the corner. When we walked in and were on speaking terms, we’d agreed that it was the most depressing room either of us had ever been in before we’d even sat down. The only color came from the dozens of pamphlets that covered every wall. Darcy was refreshing her work e-mails next to me, and had stopped talking to me out of anger an hour ago.

“I said it would take hours.” She put her phone in her pocket and turned to me.

“Only two and a half. It’s a busy time of year, Darcy, I couldn’t predict this.”

“What, November?”

“It’s close to Christmas, everyone is getting jolly!”

“I predicted this, didn’t I? I’m going to go back to work.”

Just as she jumped up to leave, a male nurse came through the doors and, as expected, screamed my name through the waiting room. “Coming, coming.” I got up and the nurse smiled at me and walked through the double doors to the assessment rooms.

I followed him in, my legs beginning to feel wobbly when I was taken into a room a little too similar to the hospital scanning room. I sat in a squeaky plastic chair next to an old brown desk. The nurse tapped some things into his computer.

“Now, it says on the form that it’s your first time here?”

“Yes,” I replied.

“At this clinic, or any sexual health clinic?”

“Any,” I told him before my stomach sank slightly. “But I’ve been to the Lewisham Hospital gynecology unit for something else. Not that that matters.”

“Have you ever been tested before?”

“Never.”

The nurse smiled at me flatly, his gray eyes peering out from behind his narrow glasses. He took another look at the form I’d filled in. “So, no symptoms, just a checkup?”

“Exactly.” Why wasn’t I able to say more than one word? Fear, probably.

“Okay, so I have a few questions,” he said. “It shouldn’t take too long.” I wanted to turn and run back out to the waiting room. It was exactly times like this that I realized I was desperately lacking some sort of maternal figure in my life. Though there was no way that Aunt Maggie would have accompanied me here. Ever since I’d said cervix after the gynecology unit, she’d kept a distance.

“So, Queenie. Your last sexual partner. When was that?” the nurse probed without looking at me.

“Um. Yesterday.”

“And was it a casual partner, or a long-term partner?”

“Casual,” I said.

“Right, okay. And was the sex protected or unprotected?”

“Unprotected.” I crossed and uncrossed my legs.

“And this partner, where were they from? Were they from Africa?” the nurse asked.

“Were they from . . . Africa?”

“Higher risk of HIV,” the nurse told me.

“Maybe you should explain that. But, no. He was Welsh,” I told him, Guy’s accent popping into my head. He didn’t say he’d slept with anyone when he’d worked in Cameroon, so I put it out of my head.

“And was this oral, vaginal, or anal sex?”

“Um. The latter two. And all three for him. But you probably don’t need to know that. You know what I mean. Sorry.”

“Don’t worry, it’s good to know as much as possible.” The nurse smiled and typed some things into the computer.

“And the partner before that. When was that?” he asked, turning back to me.

“Um. Three days before that,” I said quickly.

“And is that a casual partner or a long-term partner?”

“That partner was also casual.”

“Okay, great,” the nurse said. I suspected that he did not think it was great. “Protected or unprotected?”

“Unprotected.”

“Okay. And was he from Africa?” More tapping into the computer. I could swear it was getting faster.

“From the nebulous Africa? No. He was just . . . white? Sorry, is white offensive to you? Should I say . . . Caucasian?”

“White is fine,” he said. “And before that?”

I counted on my fingers. “A week and a half before that?”

“Was the partner—”

“Casual,” I responded.

“Okay, thank you. And was the sex—”

“Unprotected. Not African.” I nodded.

“And before—”