I set up my camera again, ignoring the harrowing cold -- though I was inside a building -- and pressed on with my interview. I'd always come here -- ten years had passed since my "hit" documentary, "Today 4 U" -- to this Life Support group, which had always remained small, virtually unheard of.

The newest member was young, it almost pained me to see her and her guy friend, who hovered on the fringe, there. I wanted to interview her, see why she was here. She consented to my taping it. So I brought out the camera.

"So..." I said, adjusting my glasses, which were veritable coke bottles as I gew older. Although, thirty one doesn't strike many as old. Well, it is if you've married your camera.

"So..." She echoed, rubbing her pale hands together. Pale describes her best; close up on her pale skin, pale lips and limp hair. She looks sick -- but, according to her, she doesn't have AIDS like most of the others who have already left. She shivers and coughs, breathes hard and leans on her chair for support.

"I'm sixteen." She coughs finally. I pull out of a close shot and focus on her intent face. "I have...a disease, it's like hemophilia, but not quite."

"You bleed?" I asked. Rudely, I'll admit, but she shrugged.

"Yeah, I bleed. I bleed a lot. We can't afford the shit that keeps me from bleeding to death everytime I get my period any more."

I'm taken aback, though only slightly, as she wheezes, closing her eyes.

"I'm anemic now. One more cycle -- I don't know if I could get up again. Hell, they told me I'm down six units -- I've got almost nothing left."

I pulled out more as she twists her pale hands again. She looks like a vampire with her dark brown hair and her dark brown, sunken eyes. Young. Going to die -- maybe at least -- I'd seen it more times that I could count now.

It never failed to make in impression on my though, somehow it never changed. They would speak to me for a few minutes -- and that would become the only documented evidence that this person had existed, had taken part in the human race. Whether it was a mistake -- something that was never meant to happen -- on that one night they let themselves slip, only to contract the disease so many of my friends have and had, or it was something else.

I let the camera stop on its own. "Are you ready?" I asked softly.

She shook her head numbly. "Not really. I mean, that's if I die. I probably won't. I'm just overreacting. I do that a lot. It makes me faint. It's kind of embarrassing."

I slid my camera back into my bag, wondering how I could use a few minutes -- maybe just seconds -- of a anemic girl saying she was going to die because no one could get her medicine. Wondered why if her death could be prevented, why then was nothing being done.

"Can't afford the hospital." She said sharply, glaring at me. "I know that look. You're pitying me. I can't abide that. Fucking cameraman."

I stood and shouldered my bag. She stood -- and had to have her friend immediately come and support her. When we got outside, I watched them get ready to walk some unknown number of blocks while I cruised back into a better part of the city in my warm BMW -- an indulgence I'd allowed myself seeing as I'd always wanted one as a kid -- debating on where I should get dinner tonight.

It seemed wrong. Three weeks later, when I was able to document Life Support again, she wasn't there. Her boyfriend was though. I raised an eyebrow. He looked at his sneakers.

"Blood loss -- eight units, couldn't support herself anymore. Died in her sleep."

Somehow, it never changes.

Ok then! A few things -- VWB Disorder is like hemophilia, but it's easier to control based on how bad you have it. In some cases with girls, they can lose immense amounts of blood through 'that time of the month' and be virtually incapable of stopping it. "Six units" is nearly fifty percent of over all blood in the body of an average unit. Stoop below that and death is pretty imminent.

It's not fun, one gets anemic, very pale and weak. Because VWB is like hemophilia (the difference is that one bleeds so fast that theclotting factors of the blood are pushed out-- instead of being is can't clot) it takes some time to recover. Hey, I was told a month ago I was going to die -- I was down six units and had to have two blood transfusions. XP

So, I felt like explaining a little.