Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 14:23:39 -0800 (PST) From: Stephen Aramburu Subject: Power of Love 1 The central theme of this story is not about sex, though it does contain sex between two teenaged boys. If you aren't of legal age, do not read this. This is a true story that happened in China just this past summer, but the names have been changed into those which look and sound nothing like the actual names of the actual characters in this story. Prologue Well...where can I begin? It was the summer of 2006. That was the year that changed my life...the year that I met my soul mate...the boy who stole my heart and made me fall head over heels for him. I was your ordinary Chinese freshman. I grew up in Xuzhou, China, aka the Las Vegas of Asia, where I'd spent all the fifteen years of my life. My parents had very high- quality jobs. My dad was a government official, an influential member in the now semi- Capitalist Republic of China. My mom worked as a saleswoman for Motorola and a part- time model. They were your typical Asian parents. They were very strict on me and expected nothing less than all A+s in every one of my subjects. They would punish me severely if I didn't meet those expectations and came pretty close, one time, to disowning me. But I loved them nevertheless. Compared to some of my friends, I was very spoiled. Xuzhou was heaven for me...I did hear of other world-class cities around the globe, such as Paris, Zurich, Las Vegas, etc., but I couldn't have imagined anywhere in the world that was better than my hometown. I went to a great school and had many good, but not particularly close, friends. I'd just graduated from middle school in the summer of 2006 and life was getting better and better for me. I'd just gotten a full score on my Post-Middle School placement test and had been accepted by the most prestigious high school in the southeastern quarter of China, the Xuzhou Academy, which was conveniently located just several blocks away from my home. Other students who were accepted by this high school had to travel five or six hours by train just to arrive at this academy. Of course, I was thrilled beyond reason. In China, unlike America, academics are everything to us student and completely dominate our lives. Colleges accept students based upon the students' test scores only and extracurricular activities, such as sports or music, aren't even a factor in the very competitive struggle for a decent education and a high-paying future job that didn't bring shame upon your family name. That's not to say that I didn't play any sports at all. But there was just so purpose for learning how to swim or play basketball other than for fun. I was very active, however, and maintained a nice, athletic figure. So onto the story. Power of Love Part 1 I was in my room, cleaning like a maniac, with my annoying mom to me to clean faster and with more care. My mom often had her mood swings...one minute, she would be happy as hell, then the next minute, she would get pissed off because my clothes were not folded perfectly enough, or my shoes were not exactly parallel to one another on the shoe rack, or the events in a sitcom on TV didn't end up exactly the way she wanted it to. I wouldn't talk back...it was disrespectful, especially for an Asian kid, Chinese to be exact, to talk back to their parents. "Zequin, have you studied for your Calculus test?" my mom asked. "I don't have a calculus test!" I said. "I'm 15 years old!" "That doesn't mean you shouldn't study it again and again and again!" she fired back. "Yes, ma'am" I sighed, exasperated. I couldn't believe my luck. Summer was in full swing and there wasn't to be another day of school for at least the next two months. All my friends from school were either on vacation or an exchange student in other countries and other parts of China, and I had to be stuck at home with my mom. Mom wasn't always this naggy about my room being absolutely clean. But every time a guest would come over, my room would be the one they would always stay in. My dad was an ambassador for China, and many foreign guests had stayed over in my room in the past. This time, it was a 14-year-old tennis prodigy who trained in the U.S. Wong Yecheng was his name. He was born in China, but moved, at an early age, to the famous Bolletierri's Academy, which produced champions, such as Sharapova and Agassi. My dad discovered him when he was three years old and agreed to sign him up for the Olympic Committee of China. With the 2008 Olympics just around the corner, Yecheng was going to stay in our home for the summer, before he was to begin his training at the Xuzhou Tennis Academy, twenty minutes away from our home. He was scheduled to represent China in the Olympics as a tennis player. (the story happened in 2006, so at 16 years old and already playing for China, that's a pretty damn good achievement.) My dad already left to pick Yecheng up at the airport in Shanghai, which was about a three hour drive from our home in Xuzhou, China. Our family wasn't incredibly rich, but my dad, being both an ambassador and a member of one of the branches of the Communist Party, got many free benefits. The government pretty much covered all the expenses of travel, food, clothing, and electronics. We didn't have to that much money, but we didn't have to spend that much money, either. Let me tell you a little bit about myself. I am Wang Zequin. I am 15 years old and of an average height, about 5"6. I have a very lean, muscular body because I play many sports, such as basketball and soccer. I am also a very decent swimmer, able to swim numerous laps, but not very quickly. This year is my first year in high school (China has a 4-year middle school and a 3-year high school) and I had just been accepted into the most prestigious academy in my entire province. A lot of girls want to date me because I am, perhaps, the most attractive boy in the entire region. My mom doesn't approve, though, and says that I should concentrate on my schoolwork and on developing a stable future for myself, before I could even consider dating girls. That was perfectly fine with me. Girls are pretty, but I've never been extremely interested them, for some reason. Some of them were pretty hot, but they always lacked that special something that made me like them. It never occurred to me that I liked other boys more than girls, but that was partly because I'd never even heard of homosexuality before. Meanwhile, on the plane... Yecheng looked out the window...it was only 3:00 in the afternoon, yet it felt so late. He had just lost in the quarterfinals of a tournament in D.C. He was in a bad mood throughout the entire flight. He hadn't slept throughout the entire trip...he was too exhausted to sleep. Yecheng felt the bruise on his left arm...it still stung, after many months. But what hurt even more was the memory behind that bruise. "No..."he thought..."I shouldn't think about that..." Before long, the plane landed in Shanghai. Waiting for him at the airport was a handsome, 34-year-old man named Wang Tiangang. Tiangang was like a father to Yecheng. He was, after all, the man who discovered him on a local tennis court, one day, and recommended him to the Chinese government. Yecheng got off the plane, carrying his luggage and his tennis bag. He saw Tiangang at the check-out gate and gave him a hug. "Wow...you've grown up so much!" he said. "You're almost as tall as my son!" Yecheng smiled, but said nothing. The three-hour car ride back home was also filled with silence. Yecheng stared out the window, as the car slid down the highway? So my room was finally clean and my mom left me alone and sat back down in front of the TV. The door flung open at that instant and in came my dad. "Do you need help with you bags?" he asked. "Oh no, I'm fine...thank you," came a reply. Then, Yecheng, the tennis prodigy came in and I was blown away. I had expected him to have a pretty good body. He did work out several hours a day because of his tennis. But the boy in front of me was an absolute god. His brown eyes were deep and dark. His hair was short and highlighted by streaks of blonde (he got highlights, duh! It's an Asian thing). He was 5"3 and had muscular, but not overly thick arms. He was probably no more than 110 pounds. His abs were very thin and toned, though I couldn't see them clearly because of the big shirt he was wearing. His calves were nicely toned. And his ass...oh...I pretty much had my eyes glued to round, yet small bubble butt the whole time. I was getting hard...very hard. He was just the most beautiful organism that I'd ever witnessed in my life. I was sweating and I fought hard not to just reach out and touch that ass. Then, I was confused. What was this feeling I was feeling? Why was I feeling those feelings for a boy? "Yecheng, I'd like you to meet my son, Wang Zequin," my dad said, suddenly putting me out of such thoughts. "Nice to meet you," he responded with a beautiful smile, while extending his arm to me. I shook it. "I...I..."I couldn't say anything...I was just too mystified by his beauty. He let go of my arm and took his stuff into my room. My dad started talking to him. About what, I couldn't tell. I was just stunned by this angel. "Go ask him if he needs help!" my mom screamed. I snapped right out of my train of thought, jumped up, and went into my room, hoping desperately that I wouldn't get a boner as I was doing so. As I enter my room, he was bent over, while opening his luggage. He was wearing khaki shorts, and his sexy bubble butt was looking right at me. I began sweating and my face turned bright red. Then, he turned around and looked at me with his deep, dark eyes. "Oh, hey!" he said in fluent, yet very Americanized Chinese. "I didn't see you, there. W'sup!" "H...hey!" I said, blushing. He looked at me again...confused. "Are you okay?" he said with a bit of a chuckle. "I'm fine..."I replied... "I'm Wong Yecheng..."he smiled, extending his hand out to me. "I'm...I'm" I couldn't think of anything to say. I just shook his hand. I had to concentrate hard to suppress my boner...but I didn't want him to know the humiliating thoughts I thought about him. I needed to say something...anything! "I hear you'll be playing in the Olympics in '08" was all I could think of. "Oh yeah..."his smile disappeared from his face. "That's pretty impressive, especially for somebody your age," I said, feeling a sudden relaxed comfort around him that I hadn't felt before. "Well, yeah. But I'm a dumbass...I never got a formal education like you," he joked. "I'm just an uncivilized athlete." We both laughed. "Do you know Evanescence?" I asked him, trying to start a subject. "Oh...I love that band! They're my favorite. I have almost all of their songs on my IPOD! I hate rap, though." "Me, too!" "It was good when it first came out, but it got really boring. Just a bunch of black people dancing around, pretending to be tough, singing about whores, gangsta, and bling- bling!" he joked in a mock rapper tone. "Since when did rappers sing?" I said. The two of us spent the next hour or so, talking to each other. I more I talked to him, I more I liked him as a person. Yecheng was different from all my father's other guests. He was young, cool, and down to earth. He was, by no means, arrogant or self- worshipping. He didn't think of himself as anything special, even though he was a world-class athlete. We discussed each other's lives. I talked about my experiences at school and he talked about his tennis matches, his training, and his tournaments. We discussed IPODs and the music we liked and movies we've seen. Soon, the two of us were babbling like we had known each other for years...I felt closer to him than I did to any of my best friends, many of whom I had known for years. "Alright, you guys" said my mom, laughing. "It's time for bed...Zequin...you're sleeping on the couch today." "That couch?" he said, pointing at that old, piece of crap that had been around since my grandma was born. "Yeah..." I responded. "I'd rather sleep in hell than sleep on that thing..." he joked, causing my mom to turn red in embarrassment. "Fine," my mom snapped, trying to hold her anger. "But where else is he supposed to sleep?" "We could share this room, tonight," Yecheng suggested. "I mean, it is his room, after all. I'm just the guest." Those words gave me an unimaginable happiness. It was partly because I didn't have to sleep on that damn couch...but there was something more to it...I got to sleep in the same room as that sexy tennis hunk. What was it about him that made my knees weak and my heart jump everytime I looked at him? I quickly put aside those feelings and accepted his offer only very happily. "Such good manners..."whispered my mom, a look of anger and resentment on her face. Then, she left, slamming the door behind her.