Wishmuch - 1. A Chance Encounter

Michael Lane or Mike was gay. At the age of 22, he finally had come to terms and was comfortable in his own masculinity to admit that he was indeed… gay. However, he was a late bloomer. Because of this, he had zero experience with another male. There were no dates, no sex, no experiments, nothing at all. In addition, to make things worse, Mike was a deep closet case.

When Mike was 17, he’d dated the belle of the school. Shelley Maverick was beautiful, gentle, popular and the one and only homecoming queen. Mike on the other wasn’t part of the popular group. Although he was not the star quarterback of the football team, he’d held his own ground as the captain of the swim team. His dedication towards the sport had groomed him well physically. They’d dated for almost 2 months before calling it quits. Rumor had it maybe the sex wasn’t great, but the honest truth was Mike and Shelly didn’t even kiss. The furthest the couple went was holding hands.

Shelley did her best, attempting to seduce Mike with all her tricks only to find his face had turned green with disgust. Feeling exasperated, she questioned, “Don’t you wanna kiss me? It’s been what… 3 weeks already.”

Mike was speechless. He had no idea what to tell her, definitely not the truth. The thought of the repercussion if his deepest, darkest secret was exposed had him quivering. He could not even fathom how messed up his life would become.

Steeling his guts, Mike braced himself, “I don’t think we are right for each other. Maybe it’s for the best if we stop seeing each other anymore.”

Her eyes turned red, tears threatening to fall. It made him wonder how could she feel attached to someone so quickly when she didn’t even know the other person at all. With a shake of his head, “I’m sorry Shelley, I gotta go,” Mike said as he walked away in the other direction.

***

The moment the clock struck 6 pm, Mike collected his belongings and headed out inconspicuously. He didn’t wanna get held up by redundant questions and pleasantries from fellow colleagues or managers. Buckling his seatbelt, he drove a short distance to his favorite Chinese take-out restaurant and placed the usual orders while waiting patiently for his food.

It didn’t take the man long to have his dinner. After a soothing hot shower, Mike felt refreshed. Dressed in a comfortable used tee shirt and old sweatpants, Mike lounged on his couch with the laptop on the coffee table. His fingers flew across the keyboard entering his username and password on the website. As he waited to be logged into the home page, he held his breath in anticipation.

‘You have a new mail’

The hand holding the mouse trembled in excitement. He double clicked on the message he’d sent last night.
Yesterday, while surfing his favorite gay porn website, he’d accidentally clicked on an advertisement which redirected him to an LGBT dating forum. He was intrigued by the content, hence he spent a few hours reading and surfing the various topics and contents it had to offer. On a whim, he created an account and published his profile. After which, he went ahead to explore all the different profiles of a different man. Late into the night, Mike continued, and he somehow chanced upon a profile which he had taken an instant liking. Based on his profile picture, he was one cute and good looking guy. He had brunette hair with a natural messed up look, amused green eyes and wearing a huge smile on his chiseled face. With his interest level peaked, Mike decided to drop him a message, hopefully, the cutie would be interested in him.

‘Hi Westleysunshade,
Please add me on MSN xxx xxx, we can chat over there!’

The brunette replied! Mike was beyond ecstatic, his heartbeat accelerated as he launched MSN on his laptop. Adding the ID given by Wishmuch, he immediately checked if he was online, and he was indeed online. Without further ado, he initiated a conversation.

Hi, I’m Westleysunshade, but please call me Mike.
Hi there, I’m Kris. Nice to meet you!

The initial greetings were damn awkward. The pair managed to exchange a few polite topics back and forth. However, as the conversation dragged on, information was shared and questions were answered. Both Mike and Kris learned a lot more about each other, and some tidbits here and there; like the fact both of them lived approximately an hour drive apart, or the fact that both were 22. Soon, the two of them were chatting like old friends, the awkwardness long was gone and was replaced with warm friendliness and mutual fondness.

The night was drawn into wee hours, with plans made to meet up in person soon, the pair ended the conversation as sleep decided to take them into sweet dreams.

***

“Are you interested in watching Avatar?” Kris asked in his clear tenor voice.

After a week of chatting, Kris suggested using Skype instead. As Mike didn’t own any webcam, they had stuck to voice call for now, till they meet up next week somewhere in downtown central. Mike had hoped to make a good impression, however, he’d utterly embarrassed himself with the constant stuttering and stammering due to his damn nerves. Now, he seemed to have better control over it.

“Oh heck yeah, it seems to be real good and highly anticipated,” Mike enthused.

“Alright, I’m going to purchase the tickets now. Let’s make it a movie date,” the brunette suggested.

He agreed with gusto.

The date and time to meet were set and confirmed. As much as Mike was anxious to meet Kris in person, he wasn’t exactly sure what to expect on this date, with another guy. He had zero prior experience in this area. He was still a virgin. He wondered how much experience Kris had, how many past relationships he had before, what were his expectations towards him…… he honestly hoped he would not disappoint Kris when the day arrived. All these insecurities and confidence issues were causing him a mental breakdown.

What should I do? His inner voice pleaded.