Twenty Thirty Thence

Hutch was betwixt. “It couldn’t have been that time. That was too early on.”

“Still could’a. I remember.”

“You don’t remember exactly when.”

“I remember a lot of things. Like when you slipped on that ice.”

Hutch laughed as he shook his head. “I never slipped on ice. In California? There was never any ice since we lived here.”

“You slipped in New York, at Rockefeller Center, how you grabbed for me. I loved catching you like that.”

“We were together by then, we went to your mother’s to tell her that time.”

“And that went well, she loved you immediately. Just because I did.” Starsky had hand over fist to his own lips, reminiscing about her.

“It wasn’t that time near the brook in Duluth? Next to where I showed you I used to think by myself, after my grandfather died?”

“No by then, you were so under my skin, I couldn’t keep my hands off you.”

“Yeah, my parents noticed. That went so well. I’ll pay forever for that.” Hutch pinched his brow.

“I hope you think it’s a small price.”

“Worth every cent.”

“Still got your inheritance, though. Foiled them anyway.”

“Yeah, outlived them.” Hutch timidly chuckled.

“Outloved them.”

Starsky turned and patted his knee. Hutch covered his hand.

The blond hair was thinning more these days. “How many years? Twenty? Almost thirty?”

“Twenty-thirty.”

“Twenty, hence thirty, since that little talk you wanted to have.”

“Twenty thirty, thence.”

“Except those months, two three times, when we broke it off, because of me. Almost a year once.”

“We never broke, Hutch. I don’t like saying broken up. I didn’t–”

“No, I did. I broke it, kept tearing it up. I thought it was too hard, too scary. The hiding we’d have to do. That women, weddings might matter again.”

“Until finding you under the car, Hutch.”

“No not that time. I know, I went back to you, you took care of me. But I left again. Until the shoot– until Gunther.”

“I hate that fucking name.”

“You can hardly see the scars anymore.”

“I always see them. From the inside out. But you’re the one that makes them invisible.”

“Ahh, Starsk.” The hands entwined. Warm hands.

“Well, anyhow, we ended up having our own ceremony. The bullet holes were still soft.”

“Right, when we thought you’d die that night in ICU. I was so afraid, all that I could see in your eyes. And ashes.” He added so softly, “I was crying myself sick.”

“When I gave you one of my rings in the hospital bed.”

“I couldn’t let you leave without making me your spouse, forever.”

“The nurse staff saw us. But they left us alone.”

“Your heart was beeping on the monitors. They felt those vows.”

“But it wasn’t my time. You kept me here.” Hutch lifted the hands. And kissed them.

“No, it wasn’t, and thank goodness I didn’t have to get old for you, I was worried about that going nude and screaming part.”

“You never had a problem doing that with me.

“Can we do it now?”

“You still got it, don’t you, Hutchinson?”

“Once I finally got it right, yeah. You want me to show you?” A little noisy kiss, lips with lips.

“It was the second one. The ceremony we had in San Francisco, with Huggy, the Dobeys.” Heads bowed, almost in unison.

“I still miss him, the sweet, huge man. God rest him…”

“He loved us. He knew we loved. He knew exactly when.”

“How would he have known?”

“Remember when he was on that guest panel? At the Academy? He met both of us.”

“It couldn’t have been then! He couldn’t have known, known you loved me.”

“Yes, he did. I told him then.” That little side smirk Starsky saved, and Hutch savored whenever it came out.

“No you did not, oh no you…”

“Yes, I did. I went to shake his hand. I pointed you out in the crowd. I said, ‘that blond is my future partner. And I love him to the bottom of the world.'” He was demure.

“He couldn’t have known what you meant.”

“He did. Later, when he paired us up, he asked me, he said, ‘How close are you, anyways? You’re not gay.’ I said, ‘No, I’m way past that. I’m reaching my love all the way to the sky now.”

“My God, all that time he knew.”

“He said, well even if you are, so what?” Starsky made a tiny cross on his own mouth with his thumb. “I said to him, ‘So what, no matter, it will save lives. Ours, and whom we serve and protect.'”

“Starsk, that’s so…true. And beautiful. He really trusted us not to mess up.”

“I think I had ‘im at ‘whom’.”

“He just just left us this year, he’s up there. He knows now.” Hutch gave two small nods to the ceiling.

“The last we saw him, at that folk’s home, when he pulled on my arm, and you went to get his snack tray from the nurse? He asked me, ‘how low was the bottom, how high was the sky?'” Hutch closed his eyes, scrunched his face. A little wet around the eyes. “I told him all I had to do is touch you, the slightest brush, and its was right there, forever.” Hutch wiped that wet, smiled a little. They paused for a reassuring gaze.

“So…wait, what we started this talk about…”

“Yes, we’re having our ‘twenty thirty years in’ talk. I know, I’m not feeble, I’m on subject. Aren’t I?”

“So exactly when was it? That you knew. That you fell in love with me.” Hutch had never really known.

“When I wanted you and I to be a couple?”

“Yes.”

“When I wrote the first S in lipstick.”

“God, Starsk. That was almost the end of me.”

“I saw ashes, too.” Starsky cleared his throat, lowered his head. “Almost smelled ashes. Especially when looking for Callender on that highway. With all those brother cops helping me, combing rocks to find him.”

“What an honor their dedication was. How many people fought to save me?”

“It took every one.”

“It took you.”

“I took you, in my arms that day. No mask or paper frock. I didn’t care what Judith said.”

“I don’t remember that. The day after the lipstick?”

“No, when I found Callender. When we got his miracle blood.” Starsky still felt the sticky red substance as he rubbed his thumb and index finger together now.

“I was unconscious.”

“You were mine. I wiped my hands all over you, I held you to my brow, cradled and cupped your weak head. I sat you up and gathered your chest against mine. I gave you every drop of strength I had left.”

“She saw you?”

“Through the window. She dared come in the room. I held up my hand to her. I said, ‘Don’t dare interfere.’ I rocked you tight.”

“Your touch, your embraces kept me alive a little longer.”

“You whispered ‘Stt…’ Loud enough that she heard you. You reached for me, limp.”

“She left the room.”

“She saw me kiss your mouth fully and slow. She stood, watching through the glass.”

“You could of caught it.”

“That’s probably what she thought would happen. Not me. You weren’t gonna be taken from this life without a lover’s kiss between us. If you were going to go out, your last spent breath would have me in it. ”

“No wonder she gave me that look at the airport.”

“Are you sorry? That I fell in love with you then? Still, I didn’t tell you. Not yet.”

“Twenty thirty years. Since our little talk.”

“Yeah.”

“And yet, we always were. A couple.”

“Yeah. Sure seems so.”

The hands met again, fingers meshed. On the thigh, near the inseam. The other hands, each to a neck. Where the dense curls still fell, just shorter, where they both still had thick hair. Eyes that felt no age reencountered, too.

“Couple us again, Starsk. Over and over. Until we can’t anymore.”

“Until they mix our ashes, Hutch.”