First, we went out to a shed in his back yard where he reached under a pile of canvas rolls - like rolled up rugs - and took out a large fist sized package wrapped in a green cloth. "Gypsy leather," Tony told me.

We were out for about an hour walking our bikes through the woods, when Tony stopped next to this odd looking plant - sorry, but I can't describe it to you. You'll have to ask me in person if you're interested.

"Now, we have to pick the little leaves - but none of the stems or the berries." and we started to work. In short time, we had a good two handfuls. Then Tony took out the green leather wrapped package and unwrapped this stone cup-like thing and a grinding stone. I later found out that this is called a mortar and pistol, or something like that. "Ivan let me have this as long as I promised to keep it secret until I met "the right kind of boy" - somebody who I could share it with. Who would really appreciate it like I do. Now lets grind all these leaves up, before the moon goes down," he said. After a while, we had a green goo in the bottom of the cup.

I can't tell you what happened next. It's a secret, unless Tony or me meets you sometime and we think you're the right kind of boy. In any case, it took us about an hour to prepare the plant (I was really late by now - mom would be mad), and I ate it up eagerly.

Nothing. I felt nothing. "You will!" he told me. And with that, we headed out of the woods. "I'll see you tomorrow," he said, "and we can work out with my dumbbells."

"I kinda wanted to work out at the high school gym, but I don't think you're allowed to," I said with disappointment.

"You can do both now, dummy!" he laughed. "You CAN'T overtrain anymore. Work out at school, at my house, before school, before bed, as much as you want. The more you work out, the faster you grow. You're supercharged now - like me!" He laughed.

I smiled, said goodbye, and headed the other way towards my house. After about 100 feet or so, I glanced behind me and saw that Tony was looking at me walk away and that he had his hand on his crotch. When I looked back, he raised his hand in a wave and turned back toward his house.

As I walked home pushing my bike, I remembered what Tony said about Ivan. Every exercise that I now do will have ten times the effect or more on my body. What was I waiting for? I lifted up my bike and tried to do presses with it. It was an extra-light bicycle so it wasn't worth much, but I figured every little bit counts. I couldn't wait to get home, so I ran - with my bike over my head the whole way. It was about a mile to my house, and for some reason, I made it without slowing down. And Mom was busy on the phone, so she wasn't mad - or paying any attention to me. I ran up to my bedroom.

Once in my bedroom, I pulled out my weights and began to lift and curl and press and squat and every other movement I could think of. Over and over again. I just kept the image firmly in my mind - I was going to get really big! I wasn't lifting any more weight than I usually did, but I was doing more reps - I didn't seem to get that burning feeling in my muscles when you can't do one more rep. And between sets, it seemed like my muscles didn't feel as tired, or take as long to feel ready to go again. At eleven, my mom burst into my room in the middle of a set of curls. "Get to bed, David. Too much training is no good for you. You know that." I got into bed, and when she closed the door and walked into her bedroom, I got out of bed and began (with images of Tony's incredibly ripped abs) to do crunches and leg-lifts. Quietly.

The next morning, I woke up feeling great. I examined myself very carefully in the mirror, but no, I looked the same as always. All I could think about was working out. I biked to school as fast as I could, reminding myself to ask the coach to borrow some plates to weight-down my expensive lightweight bike. Or maybe I'd buy some.

School that day dragged on for weeks, it seemed. English was particularly bad, as we were doing vocabulary. I sat clenching my muscles, thinking about getting big while the teacher wrote words on the board. I ignored him. At one point I told myself that now that I took the plant, studying hard would be exercise to my brain, and that I shouldn't miss the "work out" time. But, like Ivan told Tony, "that is not what I desire from the plant." So I sat silently through English and all the rest of my classes and daydreamed about my workout to come after school. As it was Friday, I didn't have to work at the Jr. High, and I planned on killing myself in the gym.

And when 2:45 came, I basically ran to the locker room to change and start becoming, well, whatever I would become! I lifted and lifted, with an intensity I don't think I ever did before. I was completely ignoring the two other guys lifting that afternoon. I think they thought I was being rude intentionally. But I wasn't. I was just focused. I squeaked out every last rep that I could in each set, and barely rested between sets - about ten seconds, no more .

I definitely noticed a difference in my workout. My muscles were recovering very quickly when I paused to rest, and I really pushed myself hard. I tried to lift more weight in every exercise than I did two days previously at my last workout, and I found that I could! The last time I did bench presses, I used 155 pounds and could do three sets of ten, nine, and seven reps. Today, I loaded on 165 pounds and forced out eight sets of eight reps each! Amazingly, while I used to tire easily by the third set and couldn't do nearly as many reps as in my first set, now I just didn't seem to tire. Every set I felt as fresh and strong as the first one! And I don't remember being able to do eight reps at 165. Every exercise was the same.

The other thing I noticed was that I seemed to be getting a bit more pumped. My muscles felt like they were going to burst out of the skin. My whole body felt tighter than usual, and I continued to push out rep after rep, set after set, exercise after exercise. Before I realized it, it was 6:00 and the coach was yelling at me to leave. Holy crap. I had been there for over three hours, never resting for more than ten seconds at a time. The other two guys had left, well, I don't know when. I didn't see them go. Others might have arrived, worked out and left, unknown to me. I was oblivious to everything but the feeling I was getting from this workout.

Racing out of the gym, I landed on my bike and pedaled home fast. And despite all the sets of 205 pound full squats I had done (I lost count of how many sets - probably around twenty) at 08 reps each set (I never could do more than 5 reps at that weight before), I seemed to be pedaling as fast as always. Maybe a bit faster. I was motivated to get home. I wanted to call Tony and apologize for not working out with him. And, I was HUNGRY like I was never hungry before.

Arriving home, I found a message on my answering machine. It was Tony - he and his mom went to his aunt's for the weekend at the last minute. "I'll see you when I get back, I hope. OK? Sorry about missing our workout." So he didn't know that I forgot about him that afternoon. Relieved, I raced into the kitchen and attacked the refrigerator.

"Don't spoil your dinner," mom said. "I'm making a ten-pound roast." Great, I thought, but what will you eat?

After dinner, I went up to my room. Mom thought I would be sick from how much I ate during dinner, but I felt fine - and bursting with energy. I got upstairs and began to lift my pathetic bedroom weights, plus pushups, chin-ups, crunches, leg lifts, dips between two chairs, and everything else I could think of, set after set with virtually no resting, until Mom yelled at me to turn off the light and go to sleep.

"It may be a Friday night" she said, "but you need your sleep." It was almost midnight and frankly, I was kinda tired. I was just so focused on my exercising I didn't stop to think about being tired. I collapsed in bed without even taking off my clothes and flexing in the mirror! And, for the first time in as long as I could remember, I fell asleep without even jerking off. Imagine that! •