What it’s like to be one half of a couple where one partner is HIV positive, and the other is not:

We go to the mall and spend too much. We go to multiplexes and laugh at bad horror movies. We scrape by, for several months, on turkey sandwiches and canned soup and whatever meals we can eat with my parents. He offers good advice. He listens to me when I talk, which I’m not sure anyone I have ever dated or loved has ever really done. We, at times, have sex that is identical in every position and maneuver and duration as the time we had it before and yet we both, it seems, enjoy it just as much if not more. We have sex without worry.

“Odd Blood: Serodiscordancy, or, Life With an HIV-Positive Partner.” — John Fram, The Atlantic

See also: “Life After Death.” — Michael Harris, Walrus Magazine, Aug. 15, 2011