The Bridge

Sun Bo Xiang was shivering slightly. The cool Taipei nightair cold around his shoulders. He took a deep breath in and held it for a second. He needed to clear his head. He just needed a little break from… well, yeah, from what… 

He had been looking forward to this night for weeks. Lu Zhi Gang had promised to finally introduce him to his mahjong friends and strangely enough Bo Xiang really wanted to meet these friends. He wanted to know everything about Zhi Gang. What he liked, what he hated, what made him laugh. And yes, this meant by default also his friends. 

So to finally meet them and not just in the role of Zhi Gang’s annoying junior from the gym, but as his boyfriend, should have been reason alone to really enjoy the night. So why was he outside here? Alone, while the rest of the group most likely didn’t even notice his disappearance. 

It all had started nice enough. They met in a bar that was owned by one of Zhi Gang’s friends, Shao Wei. He had closed it down for the evening, making it somehow an even bigger event for Bo Xiang. He had been to a few bars so far. But since he just turned 18 a couple of months ago, he wouldn’t say he was a frequent visitor. And now being in a closed down bar was a tiny tad intimidating even for a big mouth like Sun Bo Xiang. 

It hadn’t taken long until everyone found a place around the huge table, right in the middle of the big room. A table huge enough to fit this big crowd. Bo Xiang had started to count them as soon as his butt had hit his chair next to Zhi Gang and wow… He counted 20 seats and it didn’t take long for every chair to be occupied. 

Right after the food had started to arrive everyone got engulfed in a discussion about doing their tax returns and shared notes on the best tricks for small businesses, before they moved on to international politics. 

All Bo Xiang could do was smile and try to pretend to listen as he clearly had no idea what they were talking about. Heaven’s, he never had had even a job to begin with. He was still a student and even though he never thought that the age difference between himself and Zhi Gang was a big deal, tonight for the first time, it felt different. 

Tonight for the first time it felt like there was a huge gap between them and Sun Bo was not sure if he ever would be able to cross this gap. For the first time he could see why Zhi Gang was so reluctant in the beginning to even consider dating the younger man and Bo Xiang hated that thought with every fibre of his being. 

Zhi Gang was his soulmate, his one true love. 

Bo Xiang was never more sure of anything else in his entire life. It was like his whole existence just based on this one truth. Once he had laid his eyes on the slender frame of the older man he was lost. And he knew that he had to have him, whatever the cost. 

And as headstrong as he was, he had managed exactly that: Making Zhi Gang his… 

But did he maybe make a mistake? 

Seeing his beloved Zhi Gang getting all excited talking about business ventures and politics just showed Bo Xiang where he was lacking. He tried to think back what his conversations with Zhi Gang had been about and he mainly could remember them talking about sport and fitness, both of them being quiet into a healthy lifestyle. Other than that they discussed movies they had seen together or computer games they both had played. 

Contrary to what most people might have expected of him Zhi Gang was actually a kick ass competitor in most of the games out there. It didn’t matter if you presented him with a racing game or some highly complicated strategy game. 

He would beat Bo Xiang time and time again and it just ended up in this weird little competition between them, where the loser had to do the most ridiculous dares for the winner. And since it was mainly Zhi Gang winning he had been forcing him to study more and harder then ever before. Bo Xiang’s ideas for dares were absolutely more on the dirty side of the bedroom, but Zhi Gang didn’t seem to mind and sometimes Bo Xiang was not sure if Zhi Gang just let him win… For exactly that reason..