SM: How did you capture their attention?
Marvelyn: Well, I just kept it real with them. I just told them when I was in high school I didn’t have [HIV], just like you. And I would really point at them and say ‘you, yes you. I had an attitude just like you. I wore my shoes just like that, uh huh.’

SM: What is it that actually gets through to people when you speak about protecting yourself against HIV?
Marvelyn: [Speaking about how] I felt I was really above HIV—like it couldn’t happen to me, was something I didn’t need to know [or] care about. I think that’s important because I would have never gotten an HIV test … ever. It took for me to be unconscious for [the doctors] to test me without my knowledge for me to get an HIV test. Had I never gotten that HIV test, here it would have been four years that I wouldn’t have known I was HIV positive. All because I thought I was above HIV, not even knowing that the ‘H’ in HIV stood for Human. I thought it stood for Homosexual or Heroin Addict. You know, anything but me.