There’s a horrifying story I was once told about a man who gave seven women herpes in the space of a month. It was one of those classic urban legends designed to scare teenagers into using protection—at least I thought it was, until I met one of the women involved.

The woman was in her late twenties, and I’d been thrown into a group chat with her at the behest of a mutual friend who wanted to prove she didn’t ‘make this shit up’. I asked the woman how it happened, which seemed a redundant question; I knew how it happened. But still, I was baffled by her circumstance.