Transparent

1.8K

“When he’s happy he just owns all the light in the place.”

 

This first appeared in the zine “Dangerous Lives, Dangerous Visions 4” published in 2006 by Flamingo.

---

A person can see the blood moving under Hutch’s skin. No kidding. These light blue lines, or in his wrist they’re like blue strings or something, a knot or a snag here and there just for more of a human look, and then a kind of bluish shadow up the inside of his arm. Must’ve been a gift to those punks of Forest’s, the veins just sitting there practically begging to have something stuck into them. And there’s a little of that at his temples too, and if he’s really stressed, I can absolutely see the pulse there.

I mean, God don’t make ’em whiter than that.

I think it’s camouflage. Up in that frozen North, y’know, in Minnesota or Norway or wherethehellever, those white-blond heads and white-pale skin must just blend in. It’s like a survival thing.

It’s a lot less of a survival thing round here, that’s for sure. I can always find him in a dark alley, see him waiting in the car from a block away … scares me, y’know? ‘Cause there’s no reason I should be the only one to see that blond beacon shining there. It’s amazing he can ever sneak up on anybody, stake ’em out, any of that.

‘Course, he always says that about the Torino, too, that it’s a wonder every crook in town doesn’t know it by sight, sound, and (when he’s really being pissy) smell. So I guess we’ve both got our liabilities. Sorta. ‘Cause I really love that car, and, well …

It’s not like I’m gonna suggest he dye it or nothin’.

Huh, that reminds me of that drag queen, Sugar, asking Hutch if he colored his hair. And Hutch all stirred up, kinda insulted and kinda embarrassed about that, saying it was natural. Oh, yeah, natural is right. In the shower, his hair just lies down flat and damn well disappears. All, um, all over.

I first noticed it at the academy, years back, but yeah, it was like that this morning, too.

So, speaking of being transparent, I was positive everybody laying eyes on me when I got to work would just know. I kept catching myself bouncing, grinning, whistling through my teeth–got a grip a dozen times, then caught myself doing it again. Might as well have had a big neon tattoo across my forehead: “Finally Laid Hutch.”

And across my back a sign that said, “And It Was So, So, SO Good.”

We drove in to work separately. I got there first. Hutch had to stop at Venice Place and put on clothes he could be seen in, ’cause we were a little rough with the ones he had on yesterday. Damn, seeing him in them this morning was more than enough to get me going all over again–that wrinkled shirt with two buttons missing, untucked so it’d cover the pants held together with just the belt because that zipper was D-E-D, dead. And Hutch in them, just … Jeezus, so beautiful. When he’s happy he just owns all the light in the place.

The squad room’s swinging door was pretty active, what with third-shift guys leaving and first-shift guys getting in, but this time when it went Shuff? Shuffshuff, I knew without looking who was there. I didn’t dare even look at him, though I couldn’t stop the way my mouth curled all by itself, the tingly hot feeling on my face, the way my hands quivered a little as I tucked the top page of the file I was reading under the stack, but I figured if I kept my head down (yeah, I told Little Davy, pressing against the fly of my jeans, keep my head down) maybe nobody would notice.

Except Hutch, of course, and he already knew.

He passed behind me, just his fingertips touching between my shoulders and burning right through both shirts. “Hey,” Hutch said.

“Morning,” I muttered.

Hutch hung up his coat and sat down on the other side of the desk. “Some of that for me?” he asked.

And his mouth was quirking under that mustache. He knew just what he’d said, the tease.

So I pulled out the chunk of file I’d already read, shoved the papers at Hutch, and scowled–which just made that gorgeous bastard grin even more–then I kinda growled, “Read it. Dobey wants us in his office in ten.”

And if my feet kept stretching out and bumping Hutch while we were reading, that was just a mistake, right? Because these tables aren’t wide enough for two tall guys, especially when one of them has legs that go on for miles. Next time, I caught one of Hutch’s feet between both of mine and squeezed a little. If only they were bare, we could’ve played footsie for real. Hutch let go his breath with a little chuff, and I couldn’t help thinking about how it would feel to run my foot up the warm broad surface of Hutch’s, the way the bell of the pants-leg would let me tuck my toes up there, the way Hutch’s legs feel so much furrier than they look ….

“Are you reading at all? You’re not moving your lips and I’m out of pages, here.”

I handed over another couple of papers with a grunt.

By the time we went in to talk to Dobey, I was pretty much in work mode, but I still thought I’d better not sit on the arm of Hutch’s chair, the way I usually did when he wasn’t balancing all that blondness on the arm of the one I was sitting in. Today, it would just be borrowing trouble to be that close. I’d be itching to slide an arm around his shoulder, goof around with his hair or the lobe of his ear …

Dobey gave us an odd look as we settled into the two chairs and didn’t even pull them close to each other. So I tried twice as hard, like when I’m undercover and the guy I’m snowing seems like he’s wondering who the hell I really am. I leaned forward and looked as sincere and serious as I know how, and spoke right up when Dobey asked anything. Hutch was trying hard too, I could tell.

Fortunately, it was an easy case as far as knowing who the perp was. What was gonna be hard was getting the wiseguy to take the fall. There was a young girl and a guy she said was her boyfriend in the foreground, just cluttering up the landscape, I was positive. Trouble was, the girl had an uncle and the uncle was an alderman and the alderman was the mayor’s best buddy, just about, so there was all kinds of pressure to just go investigate something else, thanks.

Hutch was talking in that rough-soft, relaxed patter he gets into and that’s usually so convincing–but that perplexed look kept growing on Dobey’s face. Damn, we were just hanging ourselves here, and I had no idea what to do about it. Didn’t want to come out, no sir. Dobey’s a good guy, but there are things I just don’t want to lay on him, and this would be right near the top of that list.

We got up to go, and Dobey looked up and opened his mouth, then closed it, then opened it again–shit, this is it, I thought.

“Are you boys–all right?”

Then I had to see Hutch’s face, and he stared right back, looking poleaxed. I’m sure I did too. All right? I nearly laughed out loud. All right? Oh, I dunno, Cap, does sated, ecstatic, tantalized and hysterically happy count as all right?

“Uh, yeah, sure,” Hutch said after a minute.

I was already adding my brilliant two cents: “Sure, Cap’n.”

Even that didn’t seem to help. But after a moment, Dobey sort of shook himself and said, “Well, get on with it, then,” in a normally gruff way.

We got. And it was a big relief to get away from the all the guys in the squad room, all the moving around. I felt less like I was on guard even though we couldn’t do anything, right in the Metro parking lot, getting into the Torino just as we’d been doing for years and years.

I slid into the driver’s seat, which had been in the sun and began toasting my butt right away, and even in that hot-car air I could feel Hutch’s eyes on me, as scorching as his fingertips had been when he touched me in the squad room. Crazy. Nice. I turned to tell him so, and oh, just look at that … I was lost in the sky and sunshine next to me, snow-blind, dazzled, until Hutch tapped my leg and said, “Hey,” and all the velvet of his voice couldn’t stop it from being a reminder.

“Sorry.” I was a little embarrassed, so I gunned up the car with more force than it really needed, so that the two guys getting into a squad called something as we zoomed past and lurched around the turn onto the street.

Instead of bitching about my driving like he usually would, Hutch touched my leg again. “Don’t be sorry, babe.”

“You’re too gorgeous to live, you know that?” Eyes on the road. Eyes. On. The. Road.

“Back at you.” And now his voice told me he knew just what I was doing, didn’t mind, but thought it was funny anyway.

We went to see the alderman’s niece, who was a pretty little piece with long blonde hair and eyes all raccooned up with dark liner and false lashes, which she fluttered like mad at Hutch … but she looked at me like I was, oh, a footman or somethin’, strayed into the wrong part of the mansion. Girl had no taste, as I wanted to point out, but since we had a job to do I just caught my blond’s eye and promised myself I’d get back to him on that.

And he smirked just a tiny bit before he got back to charming her.

Yeah, we do read each other’s minds sometimes.

So he buttered her up and I took notes, kind of hovering in the background, trying not to distract her. I didn’t mind if I distracted Hutch a little, seeing as he was still distracting me in a big way. But he was apparently ignoring me, focused on the least movement of those lashes or the small, restless hands. She was the one who kept looking back and forth, running those skinny fingers through her hair and plaiting them together on her knee, then waving both hands as she talked, then playing with one earring.

When I cruised singles bars–not that long ago–I used to look for little hands like that. Used to enjoy seeing them on my cock, and the feeling was nice too, of course, but I liked how big it made me look when the girl’s hands were small. When she had to use both of them to get me off.

But Hutch, well, no way to pretend those hands are anything but what they are–big, deft, strong, with long fingers and wide palms–and he can practically hide my cock if he cups his hand around it.

Oh, man, I couldn’t think about that, not while she was looking at me, not while we were working. But it took a while to stop, and meanwhile I felt my face heating up and saw the girl’s dark-rimmed eyes on me.

Crap! I thought. Why not take out a fucking billboard, Starsky? But she didn’t say nothin’, so maybe it wasn’t as obvious as all that.

“I,” she said to Hutch, “I, uh, of course we were there until ten. Longer, like I said. We just, we,” looking at me again, then back at him, “talked …” and then it seemed to dawn on her how obviously she was lying, and she said more quickly and with more of an edge, “We’re going out, you know. Dating. So we, if you want to know, we were necking. In the car.”

“Then you probably weren’t paying a lot of attention to the street,” Hutch said, as easily as if it wasn’t the only thing we were there to hear.

“Nobody could have gone past without my noticing.” Another eyelash flutter. “I’m very observant.” Looked to me like Hutch could have her away from that boyfriend in a New York minute. That might be something to keep in mind for later. At least to tease the blintz with. (I’ve always got an eye open for new material.)

Hutch tried showing her the pictures, and she did what we expected, which was that she did not identify the guy that she said she hadn’t seen going in or out of the condo he turned out to own through about three intermediaries. The one with the call girl OD’d on horse when she only took coke as far as her friends and roommates knew.

Little Miss Eyelashes here was jumpy enough to be a cokehead herself.

Now, that was an idea, actually.

Since she was stonewalling us as far as information went, we thanked her for her time–have a nice day, Miss Kathy Stevenson, remember us to your uncle–and got out. I mentioned the coke thing to Hutch, and he said he’d love to have a blood test but he felt the alderman might have something to say about it if we tied her down and took a sample.

“Tied her down! You got kinks I don’t know about?”

“I, I, I,” and then he stopped himself, swallowed, and said in a different tone, “Oh, yeah, I do.”

Wow! Talk about a bedroom voice, he’s got one.

Two can play that game. “Here I thought you were such a vanilla boy.”

We were at a light, and he leaned over until I could feel his breath in my ear. “Boy?”

My cock was evidently on some kind of spring. Or else remote-control to the button in Hutch’s voi– oh, god, he was touching my leg again, on the inseam this time, reaching around, between, under, and his tongue was in my ear and my head was back and somebody behind us somewhere leaned on his horn.

“Th-that, that was, that,” and I sounded like him, and drove like him too, all jumpy and too much clutch. “What was that?” The car was gonna stall and I was gonna explode or something. I wrestled the shift. The car lurched forward. “God dammit. Don’t you ever do that again.” I really was irritated as well as achy with frustration, and there were hours and hours of the day to get through, here. “We’re at work!”

“I know. I’m sorry.” He sounded like he really was. I glanced over, and yeah, he was red-faced and looking away, rubbing his mustache and his chin the way he does when he’s uncomfortable or guilty.

Of course I had teased him too. “We’ve gotta keep our hands off.”

“I said I was sorry.” So then I knew he meant it, because it was pissing him off to admit that he’d been wrong.

“And I said ‘we.’ I’m sorry too, b-” –not the time to call him babe– “Blondie.”

We drove in silence for a while, still not working but at least not trying to rev each other up when we couldn’t do jack about it. I’d never been so clear about why couples weren’t supposed to work together. Yeah, what we needed was a honeymoon, wear some of this out, get used to it. I’d love that, like that island trip I took way back when, after I was poisoned … only with Hutch this time ….

“It’s just,” Hutch broke into my thoughts even though his voice was quiet, “you’re so responsive, you show everything. It’s hard to keep from, oh, pushing you, seeing you lose it–that’s just so, it’s just amazing, Starsk. I feel ten feet tall, like a sex god or something. I lay one hand on you and you’re practically coming. What are we gonna do if it goes on like that?”

I couldn’t help but say, “Lie back and enjoy it?” but I knew what he meant. “No, I know. I was just thinkin’ myself that it’d be great to have a honeymoon. I mean, that’s what they’re for, right? Fuck like bunnies and then go back to the real world, kinda wear out the sex thing until you can be normal?”

He snorted, but then acted all prissy: “You’re disgusting.”

“Oh,” I said, and then stopped, because this was one way I could get him going without breaking our new rule.

“Oh what?”

“Oh-my-partner-didn’t-get-any-on-his-honeymoon-with-the-ex-bitch,” I said.

“I didn’t say that!”

“No,” I said, smirking. “You didn’t say that.”

“Look, Van and I had a perfectly nice honeymoon.”

“I betcha went hiking.”

“Well, we did, actually.”

“Uh-huh.”

“She enjoyed it, too.”

“Uh-huh.”

“She did, Starsky, it didn’t turn bad that early! And she never said different, not even when, well, we were saying any damn thing to hurt each other.”

And then I was sorry to have brought it up, because it makes him sad to think about Vanessa, like it was his fault not only that they split but that she was killed years later. I opened my mouth to take it back or something, but he got in first: “Not everybody freaks out over imaginary bears, Starsk.”

I grimaced, but in a few seconds, I said, “Anyway, if she had you horizontal for some of that time, it can’t have been such a bad deal. You’re worth it.”

And when I glanced over this time, he was looking down and kind of smiling.

He is worth it. And I do want to show him I think so.

We followed up the coke idea by going to Huggy, who said he’d find out if she was a regular buyer, and if condo-guy, whose name was Gerald Finney and who wasn’t in any of Narco’s files, was supplying. But he kept looking at us funny, too, and finally I slapped my glass of lemonade down on the bar, hard enough to let him know he was pissing me off. “What is it, Huggy? What’s the matter with you?”

“With me? Ain’t nothin’ the matter with me, it’s you two’re acting like, well, dunno what.”

Like in Dobey’s office, Hutch and I looked at each other for a second–then Hutch’s eyes slid away and he gave me an awkward clap on the shoulder. “Well, Starsky’s always, uh, y’know, how would we even see weird from where Gordo is?”

Oh, brother. That wouldn’t have worked even if it made sense.

Huggy gave him the eye. “That Sergeant Blonde Bombshell you guys were dukin’ out over before, she’s history, right?”

“Kira?” I asked, surprised. “Yeah. Huh, I don’t even know where she is now, transferred out right after we closed that case.”

“Then where’s the beef here, my brothers? You both actin’ like the other one’s got cooties.” He looked back and forth as if he was going to start a peace conference, or something.

“No,” I said, “we’re good.”

Hutch rubbed his face and then began to laugh, the way you do when something’s just screwed, nothing you can do about it. “We’re good, we’re fine, better than fine,” he said. “Believe us, Hug.”

“Uh-huh,” but he was still skeptical.

Hutch ran one hand through his hair, which I would rather have done myself, but even looking was nice; I grinned. Then Huggy said, “Uh-huh.”

Doesn’t matter what Huggy knows, so I nudged my shoulder into Hutch and repeated, “Uh-huh,” myself.

Hutch grinned back. “Yeah.”

“Okay.” Huggy got serious. “Here’s what it is.” He tapped his long, skinny finger on the bar. “You tryin’ to act normal, and let me tell you, like the blond man said, can’t see normal from where you usually stand, so give it up.”

“That makes no sense when you say it, either.” But nobody was listening to me.

Hug went on, “You’re always so touchy, nudgey, huggy, in each other’s space that when you’re a foot apart it looks like fightin’.”

“Hmm.” Hutch took a swig of my lemonade. “Guess that’s what Dobey was getting at.”

I took the glass back–“Guess so”–and drank the rest.

“Bless you, my children. Now the Bear must move on to re-noo-merative work, here.”

And he did–move along, that is. I don’t know how much money he made wiping down the bar and then leaning way over it to sweet talk a girl eating the lunch special.

“Well, that was easy,” Hutch said.

“Nah, that was Huggy,” I answered–and come to think of it, that didn’t make sense either, or it wouldn’t have to anybody else, but Hutch just nodded.

We went off to talk to the boyfriend, Carlo Wolf, of all names. I was supposed to be good cop here because Hutch can’t stand that kind of young whippo and the rage and scorn is usually all over him. While me, well, a punk like that just reminds me too much of me and Nicky for me to automatically lose my mind. Not that I haven’t been known to, depending on what the guy’s problem is, but on the whole I can deal better than Hutch.

But the alderman’s niece beat us to it–when Wolf opened the door, there she was, eyelashes and all, big as life on the couch. Anyway, with her there, it made no sense to switch roles. I didn’t even have to look at Hutch, just dropped back. He stepped around me, easily as if we’d practiced it, which I suppose we really have.

“Mr. Wolf? May we ask you a few questions?” Smooth, but the crease between his eyebrows was deep and his hands were curled up as if he was all ready to make fists, just one wrong word. He was trying, and it would take somebody who knew him to know just how disappointed he was that he couldn’t just do bad-cop with the punk.

Who had ‘dealer’ written all over him in neon letters and sequins, now that I’d thought of it. Oh, yeah, didn’t matter what Huggy found out though it would be nice to have a lead on the evidence. That bit about going out that Miss Niece gave us was total crap, though I wondered if the alderman bought it, and if that was why he wanted the case sidelined. Romeo and Juliet, concerned family member stuff. Wolf strutted around, gave his alibi, even sat down next to the girl and threw an arm around her to bear out the Romeo thing.

“It’s a good thing you’ve got a day job,” I said, soft but not friendly.

“Huh?”

“‘Cause the acting ain’t going no place.” I took two steps forward, leaned in. Miss Stevenson couldn’t squirm away fast enough, was on the other end of the couch before Wolf’s arm fell into the space she’d been in. “Give. It. Up. You sell. She buys. That’s what’s between you. Anybody can tell who’s not stupid, and–” pause for effect, and it had a nice one, both of them showing the whites of their eyes– “you aren’t telling us you think we’re stupid, are you?” Dropped my voice a little more. “It really upsets me when people think I’m stupid.”

“Starsk,” Hutch’s hand was on my biceps, as if holding me back. Squeezed once for me, though, and again on the nape of my neck when I straightened up.

Kathy Stevenson’s eyelashes flew up, like a flashbulb had gone off inside her head, and she looked back and forth at the two of us and then sat back into the couch. Her mouth quirked. She looked at Hutch again, and shook her head.

While all this was going on, Wolf was staring at me as if I was the cat and he was the bird, which was the place I was trying to get him to, but it’s always kind of weird when it’s so easy. He shook his head too, but fast and scared, so that for a second they were both doing it. Stereo, perpetual motion, those little nodding-head dog toys in car windows … I thought of that stuff and then frowned harder, focusing.

Wolf was scared, and not just of me. “You think we’re not as tough as Finney?” I growled, to give Hutch his cue.

He took it smoothly, saying, “Buddy, buddy, back off a minute,” and I let him pull me a step or two away. “Listen.” He stood over Wolf with his head a little bent, looking compassionate and wise as an angel. There’s never been a better good-cop. I wanted to confess something myself. “It makes sense to be afraid of Finney. He’s a rich guy, a powerful guy. And we’re just two ordinary cops. I understand, Carlo, I really do, but you’ve gotta think ahead more. It isn’t just us, there’s a whole department, and Narco, they’ll be after Finney any time now. Watching contacts, shaking down the guys like you. When Finney finds that out, you think you’ll still be safe? I don’t think so, Carlo, I’m sorry, but I don’t. I’ve seen guys like you before. I’ve seen them in this corner, when the cops close in and the bigger guy begins to feel the heat. And I’ve seen them go down. This isn’t the safe way. I’m telling you. It’s not.”

It’s not just that Hutch is so beautiful, so fucking gorgeous that everybody feels it, from the straightest macho guy ever to … oh, I dunno, kids and dogs. What really gets people is that he tells the truth to ’em. A little canted in our direction, maybe. But there was no getting away from it, Wolf was taking a dive any time Finney thought it would take a little heat off. Everybody in the room knew it.

“Sooner or later we’ll get him,” I said, telling the truth too, if in an angrier voice. “But if it’s later, Wolf, you won’t see it.”

“If we get him on the murder, it’ll be sooner,” Hutch said, apparently to me, but really for Wolf. “If he’s the one who went into that condo and killed her–”

“He did. He did,” said Wolf. I looked down, so he wouldn’t see my triumph, which from the bad-cop does tend to put the whippos off. And when I raised my head again, it was to meet the girl’s gaze. Miss Stevenson. Under all that makeup and trendy clothes, she just was a ‘Miss Stevenson,’ I don’t know why.

“Yes,” she said, with that little almost prim thing going on in her voice. “Yes, I’ll identify him too. He did go in. I was in the car with Carlo because I was–” she still didn’t want to incriminate herself, surprise, surprise– “do I need to say?”

I shrugged. Hutch told her, “The identification is what we’re looking for. But the defense will do what they can, in court, to discredit you, and then you’ll be under oath. I think we can cut you a deal, though. Especially if there’s nothing in your apartment by the time it’s searched.”

“Oh,” she said, “that, I can assure you.” With a little smile that somehow reminded me of a cat.

“You wouldn’t wanna give your uncle a call, too?” I knew I was bending the bad-cop rules, but, well, I hate the politics thing.

And what do you know, she winked at me, like we were on the same side all of a sudden. “I’ll do that,” she said. “He can hire me a lawyer, that’ll make him happy. And I think one for Carlo, too.”

Wolf looked confused, but I don’t think it’d take much even on a good day to fog his brain. I sneered at him, which at least was something I knew he’d understand, and made a show of stomping over to the door. “Well, since I gotta go without the fun I thought I was gonna have,” I said, “let’s get this frigging show on the road. Down to Metro, give us the statements, we’ll talk deals.” I kind of spat out the last word.

Hutch held out his hand to Miss Stevenson and she got out of the couch like a debutante, but was weirdly unflirtatious all the way down to the car, and all the way to Metro, and all the way to the interrogation rooms … by the time Minnie and the lawyer were in there with her and I was actually taking her statement (while Hutch was getting Wolf’s in another room), I was really confused myself, though I tried not to show it.

At last it was over, and the lawyer sashayed out–she was a snazzy corporate babe in a charcoal suit and little gold-chain earrings that swung back and forth whenever she turned her head, with a big black leather briefcase that opened and closed with a loud, impressive clack-clack. Miss Stevenson followed, but surprised me by putting one hand on my arm and smiling for real into my eyes.

Who are you, I thought, and what have you done with that snippy little rich-girl witness?

“Good luck putting that man away,” she said. “And, well, good luck–” she leaned in. “My brother’s gay,” she almost whispered. Then grinned like that explained everything. “Just, just, good luck,” and then she left, and I was standing there with my mouth half open.

“What was that about?” I asked Minnie, because, well, she is a cop, so it seemed like a good idea.

But she wrinkled her nose and hit me in the back of the head with the file folder she was carrying, then shoved it into my hands as she swept out the door. “Yeah, Starsky, what was that about,” she said sarcastically.

So I guess she’s all right too.

Still, it felt like I’d slipped into some kinda Star Trek universe or something. It actually made me feel better when the girl in Files made eyes at me, just like normal, so I thought, OK, it’s not really tattooed on my face.

And then I met Hutch in the hallway and he gave me that happy, toothy grin that makes me all sloppy inside. It has for a long time, really.

“Hey, big boy, wanna get a bite?” I said, doing Mae West.

He glanced past me, then over his shoulder. “Long’s it’s where I can cover it up,” he said softly, “hell yes.”

I gulped. “Food,” I said, “I meant food.”

“Well, I want to eat in tonight,” he said.

“You jerk,” I said, giving him a little shove, “I thought we weren’t gonna do this.” Two uniforms went by then, saw us, and one kind of nudged the other, but they were both grinning and it wasn’t a problem.

“Starsk,” said Hutch, “we do this every day.” His tone was conversational though he was keeping an eye on passersby, too. “We always have. We can’t stop. That’d be weird, that’s what almost got us in trouble.”

“You mean,” I said, smiling myself, “hide in plain sight.”

“Might as well,” he said, slinging an arm over my shoulders and steering me to the staircase down to the cafeteria, “’cause, Gordo, you’re completely see-through.”

“Me!” I poked him, he let go, and suddenly we were chasing down the stairs like kids. “Me! Hutchinson, you’re like glass! I can leave fuckin’ fingerprints on you!”

And now we were off the stairs, just inside the door to the basement hallway, and he dropped his voice again. “Oh, not right now. That’s for later,” and the way he looked when he said it–I ended up walking down the hallway with a blush I couldn’t do anything about.

Because it isn’t just Hutch’s skin that’s transparent. Sometimes I can see right into his, well, his soul, I guess. And that time, crammed together at the bottom of a narrow staircase, in front of a heavy fire-door, under a bare fluorescent bulb, I looked in his eyes–

–and saw myself there.