In the early 1980s, as AIDS began its terrifying spread through New York’s gay community, Brent Nicholson Earle was an actor and house manager finally living openly in the city he adored. One morning, after a long night out dancing at The Saint , record executive and nightclub boss Mel Cheren stopped Earle with a challenge that would change his life.  “If all you’re doing is taking,” Cheren said, “you’re not really part of us. You have to give something back. And your community is in trouble. Figure out what you can do to help.” Earle watched helplessly as friends fell ill. Then he came up with an idea so improbable it bordered on absurd; he would run the perimeter of the continental United States—9,000 miles, roughly 20 miles a day—to raise awareness for AIDS. He called his journey A.R.E.A .—The American Run for the End of AIDS—and, against all logic, he completed it. At the time, the AIDS epidemic was shrouded in fear, misinformation, and political silence.…