A Love Story

A Love Story
~ Chapter 10: Allan Susanto and Desmond Kwok~

written: 09-10-07

Let me tell you a story... it's a story thats haunted me over the past 3 years, and...to be honest I don't know when it'll ever stop haunting me. It's the perfect love story, one that almost dances itself as unreal... maybe even too fantasy-like, but...it was real. It was a story written into my life like no other.... and yet, for some reason i've never been able to tell it except with one stranger. This story is a love story, my love story...

It all started in Febuary 2003. Amongst the lonely months of darkness, a final blow to my already weakened heart was delivered over night and i fell to my kness in defeat. After what felt like a blissful dream had abrupty ended... I knew nothing but sorrow and demise for the nights to come... i wasn't hiding from the world, i died. Vincent Pun stopped my from dreaming, stopped me from living, stopped me from believing that genuine happiness exsisted. Everything that followed within those days and weeks seemed empty and as I struggled to recover, i knew that deep inside i had begun to rot away. Vincent Pun, the guy I was proposed to... had left me for Louis He...completely left me.

The worst part was that I didn't understand why he left me. I didn't accept his reasoning and didn't want to go about my days completely lost. The sensation of confusion began to stir my emotions... by mid year a light flickered in the darkness. Dim and small, that tiny ember ignited from within and engulfed the darkness. Anger, in it's purest form, grown from sorrow, and fed off by a confused rage. My underlining logic was that if he couldn't help me understand then I would force myself to understand why he did what he did. I would place myself in his position and cmmit myself to his actions and see first hand at exactly why he did this to me.

I began to meet and date alot of people... four of them infact. My main objective was to become romantically involved with more then one person at a time and then damage them the best i could. Metaphorically speaking, I began to dream out of control. I wanted nothing but to harm people emotionally, I wanted to see through Vincent's eyes and understand...beneath it all....the pain had taken over my mind, and i began to project it everywhere.

Along the way, i came across the idea that I could possibly start a real relationship with these people i met, but my mind was so tained by anger and hate...I couldn't think without trailing my thoughts back to my original intent. I'm aware that I hurt alot of people within this time frame, but i didn't care. It was around this time i developed a new defense mechanism for myself...my "diamond form": the ability to shut off compassion, sympathy, and empathy, leaving me cold and hard...ignoring everything around myself and turning my psyche into an impervious weapon. I no longer wanted to feel.

One day at work, one of my coworkers (Alice Leung) who's also a close friend came to me telling me that one of her friend's friend had recently came out. At the time I thought that maybe if i started dating like a normal person, that things would be better for me. I told Alice that it was completely up to her if she really wanted to hook me up with this guy she was talking about. A week would go by and i'd ask her again if she got the guy's information for me...telling me that she forgot and didn't have time to get a hold of her friend Ricky for the information. Discouraged, i assessed that this would go nowhere. This "Hook-Dez-up-With-Ricky's-Friend" Thing went on for WEEKS

Amongst the people, dates, and friends i met in 2003, one of them stuck out above them all... Trevor. He had deep emotions towards me and wanted to date me. But many hints of distrust, deceit, lies, and instability drew me away from him. He seemed to care for my well being and saw that i was in several layers of pain. What he could decipher of me made me want to keep him as a friend at least. He along with my close friends saw how self destructive i had become over the years time. They knew that no matter how many hearts i broke, no matter how "fine" i told people i was of the break up, that nothing would ever "fix" me unless i found out the truth behind what had happened between me and Vincent. So in Febuary of 2004 I was sent to Vincent in Toronto, to get the closure that i so deeply needed.

The week i was there...sure enough, as i spent time with Vincent, and talked with him... i left Toronto with what i needed. It almost felt like an spiritually emotional cleansing of some sort. I came back to San Francisco with a much clearer head. Though my heart was still in tatters, at least i could finally let go of what had happened.

The weeks had gone by after my trip and another coworker of mine, Rene Jimenez, came to me asking if i wanted to hang out with one of his friends...that his friend might be able to hook me up with someone. I kept dodging this invite because I already had Alice trying to hook me up with "some guy" friend of a friend, and now my other coworker... i just didn't want to get my hopes up. I just spent more then a year recooperating form my last break up and had finally began to be able to walk on my own. That same week I asked Alice again about the guy she was trying to hook me up with...still the same excuses...

Given the fact that I was already on several different profile type websites, a new one had popped up. How mainstreamed it was drew me crazy. Downelink.com. i hated the idea of the website, but finally caved in and decided to sign up. Immediately I saw the several hundreds of friends that I had grown with and begun adding them all. It still didn't feel "right" though, i knew all these people, i knew these faces and shared so many experiences with the hundreds. Why wasn't there anything or anyone new? So I decided to search a few profiles through the search engine. I decided that i'd search in "San Francisco, Male, 'around my age'". Sure enough it pulled up nothing but familiar profiles, too young, too old, etc. After flipping over a few I noticed a peculiar one.It was a boi peering out his window shades with the caption "Boo Radley ain't got nothing on me". It was funny in a dorky way... but something about that picture... i've seen it somewhere else before. Figuring that I didn't have that many gay friends that live IN the city of San Francisco who were MY age, i decided...hell why not, message him. That was the purpose that i had in mind: Find new friends that live closer and hang out with them. I left a message to the boi and headed to work.

That day at work, i had one of my classic "bad days" bussiness was slow, coworkers were called off sick left and right, my sales were low. I began to stare at the clock waiting for 9:30pm to roll around so I could get the fuck out of there. Before the last hour the store was about to, a black guy came walking down the aisle and waved at me saying my name. "Hey! Dez" i ran through all the faces in my head trying to pinpoint exactly who it was...it was Karim. A friend of mines who lives half a block away. Trailing right behind him was a pretty cute Asian guy and all i could think to myself was "no way that guy is with Karim"... sure enough, he was. Karim and I chatted a little bit while his friend stood there...i don't know...i think he was staring at the expensive jeans...that or bright colors in my department. "Oh, i want you to meet my friend...Dez this is Allan. Allan, this is Dez." As i glanced at him he seemed a little familiar. Something in my mind lit up and pushed my mouth to blirt out "Are you on Downelink?" to the Asian guy. Turns out he was...well at least now i know he's gay. Then i thought, wait...is this the same guy that i messaged earliar today? I asked him about it and he looked at me bewildered. He told me that he didn't think it was him, that he hadn't checked his messages yet. "Oh" After a few more exchanged words, i found out that he did infact live in the city. I asked if he wanted to hang out sometime and he agreed...we exchanged numbers said our goodbyes. This put a smile on my face and totally made my evening. On my way home i get a text message from Allan "Oh, i guess that was you that messaged me this afternoon." I got home and found his reply with his AIM Screen Name and we began to chat.

As much as i would have loved the idea that the two of would ever date, i thought to myself that the chances of him liking me were close to impossible...but... at least now i have a friend that i can share my world with. The first few nights we went out i took him on night hikes, exploring the edges of the city that he's never known about, and just...sharing with him alot of special places that i've been to that not many have seen. If we weren't hanging out, we'd be on the phone talking with one another about random things... even if he was out with his friends at the Dragon Lounge, he'd miander over to the park across the street and we'd chat for some time. The days begun to grow longer and i knew i started to develop some kind of emotional tie with him, but knowing my boundaries...i tried hard not to jump at it. Still though... each time his name showed up on my cell phone i smiled and answered.

The days became weeks, and I headed to work with a new happiness ringing through my soul. Alice came up to me that day... she apologized about how she's been so flakey with hooking me up with her friend's friend. I told her it was ok, that i didn't care to look for a date because I already had a special friend in my life that i was pretty happy with. She laughed at me and asked if I could show her who it was. Okie...i know this sounds eerie but I printed out a picture of Allan and kept it in my wallet. I pulled it out and showed it to Alice. She froze for a second "oh my god! This is the new "friend" you've been hanging out with? This is the guy who i've been trying to hook ou up with earliar this year!" I couldn't believe it at all. She then went on to say "He's got a werid last name right? almost sounds Filipino? it's not Chinese?" "Susanto?" "yeah! oh my god, that really is the same guy!!" Right then and there, I knew that meeting Allan in my life really had to mean something. Weeks later, the same thing happened again. Karim came by to visit me and it would turn out that the guy that my other coworker, Rene, was trying to get me to hang out with was also Allan through Karim. There was almost no way at all that in 2004, i wasn't going to meet Allan.

Thats the beauty of it... I'm not sure if it was when Allan stayed over night and we watched a butt load of movies together, or when I stayed over at his place and he'd drive me to school in the morning, or after a long hike from Ocean Beach to the Golden Gate bridge, or when he wrote in his xanga that he decided to "jump" after we talked about how sometimes...in life you have to close your eyes and take a blind leap in faith and trust that someone will catch you (in which case, i DID) but...somewhere through that time... we began dating. Snide remarks like "Furrytiggercock" (dry hair, his love for tigger, and year of the rooster) or "Top whore" (me always buying shirts and jackets) were thrown around between us, we'd spoon each other....with spoons....it was a bunch of random acts and words of dorkism which some how tranlated into flirting...which ultimately lead us into becoming boyfriends....all happening when he laid besides me in my arms on my bed and he tightened his hold on me while digging his head against me saying "mine" Hell I even got him a little plush Pokemon that i thought he'd like called "Gonbe" (munchlax) As it would later turn out...Gonbe was our kid...one that we'd bring with us whenever we went somewhere on vacation. Allan made me feel secure in my crazy life, he made me feel safe and thats a feeling I had missed for a LONG time

The world began to talk about us. "Dez's new guy" "he asked someone to teach him how to play the piano" "You'll like my friends" "Jen wants to meet you" "Mai wants to meet you." Our schedules were almost completely nocturnal so it made it easy for us to enjoy the nights whether they were spent watching DVDs (one of his favorites) or binge eating at Miyabi's... Cafe Bahgdad, IHOP, come to think of it....we ate out ALOT. We spent as much time with one another and every moment was worth it. I mean he had minor flaws like his inability to handle critisim, or over viewing things that he's never come across in his life like poverty. We had our arguements now and then ( 5 total in 3 years) and I remember particularly one night he took me ontop of the hill by his house where a giant cross stood over the city. We discussed our differences and that night he wrote somewhere online "They say if you love someone and set them free, if they return, it was meant to be. I set 'Hungry' (his name for me) free and he didn't move an inch, MINE!" so I guess even the bad things weren't that bad either but there was another slight niche though. Allan worked in the clubbing industry and that was a whole other world that i decided to leave when i turned 21. I knew at some point i would have to go to one of his parties because he kept telling me about all these people that he wanted me to meet. Gosh...that first night though....

It was at a GameboiSF opening. I had been absent from the "Scene" for quite some time, not to mention i had also quit drinking. I was nervous as hell, scared...and... well...i really didn't want to be there. Course all my friends were there so it was a little comforting to know they were around. When I walked into the club, Allan took me left and right all over the place introducing me to people nonstop. gay friends, straight friends, friends that he had recently met, friends that he's known for years. I've never really been genuinely introduced to my boyfriend's friends out of sheer happiness. It was a new sensation for me, and considering what had happened in my last relationship, it really caught me off guard. That evening, Allan really wanted me to dance with him but I wasn't sure I knew how to anymore since it's been so long. People kept pushing me off my seat, dragging me to the dance floor and I kept turning the offer down, only answering with "Next song". It wasn't until his friends were coming upto me telling me that he really wanted to dance with me and that it would mean alot to him. I didn't know that simple actions could have so much sentimental feeling towards another person so I decided that at the next chance I was given, that I had to set aside my fears and self conciousness and take that blind leap... so i did.

The months would go by at a manageable pace. We celebrated one another's birthdays, new years, went to LA to meet my friend Rainier and his boyfriend Bobby, went to Disneyland, celebrated a Christmas together...thanksgiving....watched so many movies, shopped, picnic'd at the beach, parties, clubs, Great America gay days, so many things were done together. Prior to Allan, I never had a boyfriend that lived in the same city as I did and considering I was his first boyfriend...this was a new experience for the both of us. One that was doing nothing but blooming kindness and genuine happiness. Even if we were in the same room with one another doing two seperate things, people would say that they could still see how we were connected with one another. I couldn't have been anymore happier, or prouder to be called his boyfriend. Alot of people were extremely happy for us...as well as a few people who were jealous...hateful even.

I guess you can say all the joy and kindness that was fed into me lead me to forget all the ugliness in the world. Forgetting that beneath a smile... a person can be plotting against you. That what you see, may sometimes not be real. Thats what happened...Sept 2005.

I still kept in touch with Trevor on and off because I saw him as an oppurtunity... that whatever he was dealing with, whatever kind of person he was in the past that had built who he was now..i could fix it. I did in fact make several progresses. I got him to reconnect with his family and they grew a them much closer bond together. This didn't stop the fact that he still had feelings for me even after i found out that he was going to go after Allan and harm him...i told him, that if he even laid a single hand on him I would kill him myself. You see, it was really on and off, not to mention alot of my close friends and family thought he wasn't as bad as it seemed...so instead of looking like a crazy jerk...i played nice as well even if it drove me nuts. One evening I got a text message from him telling me how he had begun working on photoshop for a "company" website he was doing. Snagging several pictures off my site and using what he had learned about the program he spliced some images together and made a sexual image of him and myself. He sent the image to my phone asking what I thought, and i completely disregarded it.

Allan's birthday was coming up and there was a GameboiSF event going on. During the evening at GameboiSF Allan got upset at me and wasn't talking to me or giving me any kind of real attention the whole night. This made me really sad because i didn't know what was really going on...but appearantly everyone else at the club kinda did. I knew something was up because around everyone else he was really nice and accomadating, but when i approached him he was cold and distant...i started getting jealous at everyone that he traded me off for. That night i spent most of my time with his friends Julie and Stephanie, in which case BOTH of them got me completely wasted... i was too upset and didn't know when to stop so I kept drinking that night. Manny and Danny took me home that night and I was throwing up everywhere... my body temperature crashed, my conciousness was zoning in and out...i remember crying in the bathroom and suddenly out of the no where, Allan showed up. He told me he was sorry, and took care of me for the rest of the night. I may have been half aware of the events of that evening, but... knowing that he was there for me, something deeper sparked in me...I knew it....I had fallen completely in Love with him, I knew I was stupid for doubting his feelings for me... that all changed within a few hours.

I woke up that morning to a strange silence and noticed that the blanket and pillow that Allan brought over for us to sleep in was gone, and Gonbe was sitting by my TV with his eyes exd out. I attempted to call Allan to no avail. "what was going on??" was all i could think of. I texted him, only to get a response that basically pointed right back to my phone. It turned out while I was sleeping he began going through my phone and found the picture that Trevor sent me. With that i looked on Allan's xanga to find that he had posted the picture blurred up and wrote something about me cheating on him on it and he decided to dump me. I couldn't believe how he was misinformed and going off on an assumption and I immediately called Trevor over to get me to Allan to get this all straightened out. He even said so himself that he was willing to talk to Allan and explain everything.

my words echoed as they left my mouth: "You don't understand, I can't lose him now, espcially not now."

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