March 2017, continued

"Where did you hear that? Did someone do something to you? Did you try to do something to a girl?" Michael sounded furious.

"I heard it in a YouTube clip" Ming Lim lied. "It sounded silly…. So I guessed it meant something else…."

Michael sighed. "There were assholes, probably they're still out there, who used to have a saying. 'No means maybe, maybe means yes, and yes means anal.' It was based on this stupid thing that girls are too shy to say what they really want when it comes to sex. Like girls who said 'no' really meant 'yes', so it wasn't rape if the guy did her. Basically, guys were trying to justify getting laid without consequences or something. So a while back, some people came up with 'no means no' in sex ed classes. It meant, if she says no, take it as she means no and don't pressure her. If she really means yes, she'll tell you. But there are a lot of date-rapes, especially ones where they got the girls drunk. So they basically couldn't say no…. So they changed it to 'yes means yes', meaning get enthusiastic and sober consent before you have sex. Nǐ míngbái ma?" Do you understand?

"Míngbái." I understand. No I don't. I mean, I understand the phrase… but why…. Michael went into the bathroom to shower and Ming Lim rolled to stare at the wall. Why did Eleanor tell him that 'yes means yes'? He wasn't doing anything to anyone! He hardly even talked to the girls in his classes, never mind get close enough to one to ask her out on a date! Surely that was supposed to happen before you would even ask her to have sex with you? Yeah, OK, there are people in movies who hop into bed with someone before they've had a date, but I'm not like that! I've never even gone on a date! But Eleanor wasn't talking about dating some random person…. She was talking about Michael! He rolled over to not look at Michael's bed.

His roommate came out of the bathroom, done with the fastest shower in the history of the planet. "Are you OK? You don't look so good…."

"I don't feel so good. I think I have a fever." I feel so hot. A cool hand pressed against his forehead and then a cheek.

"No fever, but you are flushed…. Are you hurting anywhere?" Michael sat down on the edge of the bed, sending another heat wave through his roommate.

Ming Lim stared up at Michael, not knowing how to answer that question. His stomach hurt, his chest hurt, everything felt funny. But it wasn't an actual pain…. The younger boy had taken his contacts out in the bathroom, and was wearing his glasses again. If his roommate was model-gorgeous with his contacts in, he was super-model-gorgeous with glasses. Like it kicked the sexiness up from a perfect ten to a twenty or something. Amazingly smart, sexy, nice…. That cool hand pressed against his forehead again, and it was as if something unlocked in his brain: I want you. He wanted this boy's hands against every inch of his skin, taste his kisses…. He wanted it all…. To fall asleep in his embrace again, wake up cuddled with him again. Was this love or just lust?

Michael hissing, "You want what?" snapped him out of his thoughts.

"What?" he was confused.

"You just said you want me," Michael explained through clenched teeth. "Don't say things like that, do you hear me? People will get the wrong impression." At Ming Lim's blank face, he added, "You have to clarify what you want me to do, or it sounds like you want to make-out with me."

Ming Lim nodded slowly. "I know what 'I want you' means. I watch American movies."

"Good, just so you're clear." Then Michael got up, shut off the light and crawled under his covers.

And Ming Lim felt his heart breaking… finally understanding what Eleanor had been trying to tell him…. She wasn't cautioning him about Michael saying yes…. LimDidi…. yes means yes. Anything else, including silence, means a very firm no. He curled into a ball, and tried very hard to lie still so the bed wouldn't squeak, tears soaking his pillow…. Michael's silence to Ming Lim's declaration was his answer. He doesn't want me.

August 2017

Michael collapsed spread-eagled onto his bed. His real bed back in Concord, not the one in the room he shared with the roommate from Hell. His professors had been more than mildly upset when he announced he was taking August off from studying. But really! He was almost seventeen, he wanted some time to be a kid, he wanted to get his driver's license before he retired, and he really needed to get away from that emotionally stunted, acting like a fucking toddler, Ming Lim. Seriously, the dude needed therapy or something.

What the actual fuck is wrong with you? He wanted to scream it almost daily since that March Madness game night. Yeah, so the guy might be slightly embarrassed at saying 'I want you' to another guy… so what? He wasn't feeling well, and he had a slip of the tongue. Happens to everyone. Literally everyone. There was no need to turn it into this big, huge, 'I'm never going to talk to you again' thing.

Which was what had happened. Overnight, Ming Lim went from acting like a kicked puppy to acting like Michael didn't exist. Wouldn't talk, wouldn't answer questions. Wouldn't even respond to a 'please pass the salt' request at dinner! He went to school, played his violin, and went to sleep. And in between, he treated Michael like a social pariah. Oh, and every night, he cried. Literally every single fucking, goddamned night he'd lie in bed, all curled up around his pillow, and cry. Yeah, he tried to hide it, but how do you hide sniffing and shaking and blowing your nose every single night? Impossible. For Christ's sake, he slept with a fucking box of tissues! And it wasn't being used to clean up cum like a normal person!

And worse? He had no fucking clue what those three words had done…. This smart, beautiful, insanely musically talented man, accidentally said 'I want you', and Michael's insides had started flipping around like they were on some wild amusement park ride. Those three fucking words invaded his sleep, prevented him from concentrating on his classes, took hold of him while he was jacking off…. He could picture it so easily… sucking on that bottom lip…. Feeling the other man's cum coating his hands. Looking down at those beautiful eyes welling up with tears when he tried to deep throat Michael's cock. He wondered all the time what it would feel like to have Ming Lim's cock in his mouth, stretching his ass…. What did he taste like? How big was he anyways? Would it just hurt being fucked, or did having a cock rub up against your prostate really feel that good? What would it feel like to fuck Ming Lim… feeling that little hole so hot and tight and slippery with lube squeezing the life out of him….

He had it so bad, he stopped going out with other people and everything. It really wasn't fair to take some girl out to dinner when the person he wanted sitting across from him playing footsies was someone else…. And other guys just felt… wrong: the wrong body shape or height, the wrong accent, the wrong eyes.

Why the fuck did he have to have a crush on that asswipe who treated him like dirt?

His first day home, and he had the house to himself. His parents and twin were off working, and Eleanor had disappeared to go hang out with friends the minute after she dropped him off in the driveway. His phone pinged letting him know he had a text.

Eleanor:

Call ur roommate. He's texted me 10 times
since we left Boston asking if ur coming back.

Michael:

My stuff is still there.
Obs I'm coming back

Did something happen?

He had a freudian slip in Mar
and has completely ignored me since

What did he say?

Nothing. He was feeling sick and
said I want u and forgot to tell me
what he wanted me to do.

Srsly? U R so fing clueless.

What?

After a Mar Madness game right?
Mr Oblivious.
Call him

And say what?
The shithead has refused to talk to me since then
More than 4 fucking months.
Not one word.
If he has something to say to me,
he can say it to my face when I get back.

He threw the phone down on the bed, ignoring the new incoming text pings. Thinking of his roommate made him horny. Thanking his luck that he was alone in the house for the next few hours, he grabbed an old towel, some lube he'd hidden from his brother, turned on his VPN on his phone so his parents wouldn't see what he was watching, and proceeded to enjoy several videos. In the one that finally did it for him, there was this little teenage-ish skinny kid, maybe five and a half feet tall, hundred pounds sopping wet, on his hands and knees begging and moaning while this white haired guy fucked him with a cock that seriously had to be three and a half or maybe even four inches in diameter! The kid was not exciting to look at, the old dude was just gross, and the thought of having something that wide up his butt was scary, but the way the kid moaned… the way he shoved his ass back onto that cock like it was the single best thing that had ever happened to him… the way he begged and cried for every single inch…. The way he came just from having his ass penetrated…. Michael wiped himself up and hid the towel and lube away, and wearing only a pair of boxers, slid under his covers to sleep off the orgasm. And in his dreams it was Ming Lim who was face down on the bed, pulling his ass cheeks apart and begging to be fucked.

September 2017

Ming Lim paused before setting his violin case on his desk: Michael was back. And in the same position he'd been in the first time they'd 'met'. Ripped jeans, faded concert T-shirt, gel eye-mask, clothespin, earbuds, and playing his electric violin. He was darker, tanner, than he'd been; he must have played in the sun all month. His hair was different: metallic silver threading through the natural black, and slightly longer than he had kept it over the winter and spring. It looked good on him, though. He had another piercing in his ear, too. The original hole had a silver dangling earring with a little spiked ball on the end that sort of looked like a mace brushing against his shoulder. The new piercing held a small silver hoop.

He'd left without a word. And arrived without a word. Not that Ming Lim deserved to be notified either time, given the way he'd behaved…. Eleanor had called him the night Michael left and bitten his head off. "Get your head out of your ass before school starts up again, or I'll do it for you," she warned. "You don't get to treat someone like shit because he didn't understand you. You'd told him you were straight, for God's sake! How the Hell was he supposed to suddenly understand you meant it when you told him you wanted him? Straight men don't 'want' other men! He speaks something like ten languages; pick one and tell it to him plainly and honestly. I like you, I love you, I want to jump your bones, be my lover. But you better be nice to him even if you don't have the guts to fess up because if you hurt him again, I swear to God I'll Lorena Bobbit you with a rusty spoon, grind it up with some vegetables, and force feed it to you in steamed dumplings!"

He'd had to google who Lorena Bobbit was and felt more than a little bit faint at reading the article. He was just really glad she was giving him the chance to make amends before she attacked him with a rusty spoon.

"Whaddaya want." Michael sounded understandably pissed off. He had pushed the eye-mask up to his forehead, the clothespin was gone somewhere, and the earbuds cords dangled down his shoulders.

"I want to apologize. Duìbùqǐ." He bowed so his back was parallel to the floor. He thought about kneeling, but thought that might be too much.

"For what?"

"For being an ass. I thought I was protecting myself, but I was just hurting the both of us. Duìbùqǐ."

"You're forgiven." He pulled the mask back down.

"Michael, wait…. Wǒ xǐhuān nǐ." I like you. "I want you. In that way want you. I thought it was just… I don't know. Lust maybe? Or… how do you Americans call it? Crushing? It won't go away…. No matter what I try."

Michael pulled off the eye mask and threw it on the bed. "Stop it," he ordered. "You ignored me for five months the last time you slipped up, and I really don't want to start the school year the way it ended."

"I didn't slip up: I told you the truth. I wanted you then, too." At Michael's snort of disbelief, he continued, "You said it yourself! How did you put it? Sober consent! I said I wanted you; you told me to not say it and went to bed!

"I was so hurt…. I had hoped you liked me too…. DaJie... she said I wasn't clear. That you understood I don't like men, so why would you think I meant it? What was I supposed to do? I've never liked anyone before. I just know I like you. So I'm telling you again: I want you. I want to kiss you, hold you, make love with you…. I want to wake up in your arms every morning. Suǒyǐ nà… nǐ yě kěyǐ xǐhuān wǒ ma?" So, can you like me, too? Please say yes… please say you can love me, too. He could feel his whole body trembling with an almost overwhelmingly intense combination of apprehension, fear, desire, and hope.

Michael slowly placed his violin on the bed and stood up, standing way too close to his roommate, earbuds clicking as they hit the floor. "You like me? For real?" Receiving a nod, he ordered, "Kiss me, then. Prove it."

Ming Lim threaded the fingers of one hand through Michael's silver streaked hair. So soft. The other he wrapped around the other's waist and shuffled forward until their chests were only one deep breath apart. He closed his eyes, gathering up his courage to close that final distance, when something soft and warm sucked on his bottom lip. He gasped in pleasure and surprise, and something hard, wet and warm invaded his mouth to tangle with his tongue. His arms spasmed, dragging the body in his arms closer, even as he opened his mouth further, encouraging his roommate to explore as he wished. He had no idea what he was doing, but every swipe of Michael's tongue against his seemed to increase his heartbeat…. Who needs to breathe? His hands slid down to the hem of Michael's t-shirt. Do I slip my hands underneath or push it up? Wanting, needing, to feel bare skin against his palms, he decided the shirt needed to come off. He pulled and yanked until the shirt got stuck at their necks…. He stepped back long enough to pull the shirt over Michael's head and then pulled his own off as well, before sinking his mouth to the hollow where Michael's neck met his shoulder. He breathed in deep, inhaling the scent of Michael's skin overlaid with his body wash…. Intoxicating…. He had missed the smell of that soap filling up the bathroom…. "A'Xiàn, let me love you," he begged, in between kisses.

Michael pushed him back. "Who is A'Xiàn?"

"Who?" Ming Lim was spacing out, drugged by touching and tasting.

"Who the Hell is A'Xiàn?"

"I have no idea who you're talking about," Ming Lim pleaded. His hands kneaded the supple skin. "Please love me, Michael. Let me love you."

"You have another lover and you're calling me by her name? Or is it a 'his name'?" Michael accused.

"I don't know any A'Xiàn. I've never had a lover. You're the first person I've kissed. Or wanted to kiss. Just you, Michael. Only you." He dropped to his knees and fumbled with the button and zipper to Michael's jeans. He hadn't thought of doing this so soon, but after that, whatever it was, after calling Michael A'Xian…. He carefully pulled down the pants and boxers, baring the objects inside. And found himself faced with a throbbing, bobbing penis. The tip was cut, pink, and slightly wet. Do you lick or suck first? He wrapped one hand around the base of the shaft and was slightly dismayed to see that there were still seven or eight centimeters exposed. There's no way this whole thing will fit in my mouth! He tried to imitate the porn stars he'd seen, sucking as much of the thing into his mouth as he could take without choking and using his hand on the rest. It looked a lot easier to do when it was a porn star matching his lips and hand movements. It didn't taste too bad; he'd been afraid it was going to taste or smell like pee or soap…. Even the liquid spurting onto his tongue and mixing in with his saliva wasn't that bad…. Salty. A little sweet. He looked up to see if Michael was enjoying his efforts and nearly swallowed the whole dick at the sight! Michael's face was the very definition of ecstasy! He was panting and muffling his moans and groans by biting his lips.

Ming Lim redoubled his efforts, licking and sucking and jerking his hand back and forth until Michael groaned, "Oh, fuck, stop. I'm going to cum. Stop Ming Lim!"

The older boy paused long enough to say, "Cum, then." His jaw was aching, his arm was getting sore, his knees hurt, he was so incredibly hard himself, and he was loving every second of it…. He choked a bit when the dick in his mouth swelled up even more and jerked out hot, viscous liquid. He tried to swallow it all, but some slid out and down to stain his pants….

Michael fell back onto his bed, ignoring that he was almost naked. "That was…. Where'd you learn how to do that if you've never had a lover?"

"Chinese boys watch porn just like American boys…. It's just harder to get a hold of over there…. Michael… can I have you?"

"Huh?"

"Can I make love to you?"