Tramps Like Us: A Novel

by Joe Westmoreland

“Home was something in the future that had yet to be created.”

We were all refugees from one kind of torment or another and could never go back home. Home was something in the future that had yet to be created, not someplace in the past.

The main thing was the gravity of it all. San Francisco had been such a party town, such a playground, and now everyone was so serious. Dead serious. People were hugging each other. Some were crying. A lot of people looked scared. A lot of others looked baffled. I was somewhere between scared and baffled. It was the first time I realized how big this thing was. At first we thought it was just the sleazy older leather men who’d done all kinds of wild things that got Gay Cancer. Then my friend Bo got sick. Now Felipe. Then it seemed like everyone was getting sick. I hated to admit it, but Ali hadn’t been looking that great the last couple of times I’d seen him. It was terrifying. No one knew who’d be next and this march just proved it wasn’t only people I knew, but many, many more. I couldn’t understand why it couldn’t be stopped. Science was so advanced and could cure almost anything. Why weren’t they stopping this?

His death felt important, like I was in the presence of something greater than I’d ever known.