“What do you mean by raving?”

“You know he’s got toxo and his brain is, well, scrambled. We call it AIDS-related dementia. He’s not in his right mind and he’s saying things he wouldn’t say if he was. So, don’t take them all that seriously, okay?”

Another patient—Ted something, Bill remembered—approached them, his IV trailing behind him. Ted had once told him he had been a runner who had run a half-dozen marathons. Now he walked slow laps around the cheerfully painted ward. He nodded as he passed, leaving in his wake the sour whiff of disease, like spoiled meat, a smell that permeated the ward. From the dozen rooms, televisions blared soap operas and movie dialogue, punctuated by commercials loudly advertising items for which these men would never again have any use. There were cut flowers everywhere, in vases and bowls. Glittering streamers hung from the ceiling of the common room where one of the patients had, the previous day, celebrated his last birthday.

“Like what?” Bill pressed. “What is he saying?”

Randy was a big, gentle man whose habitual expression was a smile but now he frowned. “You’ll see. Just don’t let get it to you, okay?”

“Sure,” Bill said. “I better go in.”

Randy touched his arm. “Also, he might not recognize you.”

“Yeah, that’s happened before, but there’s usually a minute or two when he knows who I am.”

“Call me if you need anything.”

As he did every time he visited, Bill paused at the doorway to prepare himself before he stepped into the room that Waldo, when he was still himself, had christened “the honeymoon suite.” That seemed like a long time ago, when Waldo could still walk and joke and insist, “Honey, what does the Grim Reaper want with a fat old queen like me? I’m gonna beat this thing, you’ll see,” and Bill had believed him because Waldo was, above all else, a survivor. That was what? Eight, nine hospitalizations ago. With each one, Waldo’s jokes became more brittle until they stopped altogether. The last time, he’d been wheeled into the room in a wheelchair, looked around and said, “Where am I?”