Concentrate

Hutch has a splinter. Starsky gets a bit of a shock when he tries to take it out.

Starsky could see the splinter, he just couldn’t get hold of it. Hutch tried to pull his hand away. “Ow, Starsky, for crying out loud.”

“Will you hold still?” Starsky squinted. “I’m trying to penetrate.”

In the quarter second after he said it, he felt his face go hot, and then turn to ice. Hutch’s hand went suddenly still in his.

“You know, Sigmund didn’t really believe in the Freudian slip.” Starsky tried to look up. “It’s called a slip of the tongue,” Hutch said. “Cat’s got yours, I guess.”

Starsky tried to think of something other than the feel of Hutch’s fingers threading themselves around his. What the hell was he doing?

“I, uh, I don’t see the splinter.”

“I think you got it.”

Got what? What do I got?

For a second he couldn’t think where he was, or what he was doing there. He took a furtive look around without lifting his head. The place seemed familiar, but he still couldn’t ground himself. What the hell was going on? Maybe he should ask.

“Uh, what the hell are you doing?” He finally managed to tip his head back, and while he couldn’t quite bring himself to look at Hutch, he did now see them both reflected in the mirror above his bed. Oh. That’s where they were.

Oh, dear God.

He felt his fingers tighten around Hutch’s. Luckily, the way he was kneeling there, by the light so he could see the splinter . . . jeeze, the fucking splinter . . . God, Davey, don’t say fucking . . .

“Well, hmmm,” Hutch said, “I thought you said you wanted to penetrate. I was a little taken aback, but, you know I’m a people pleaser.”

You’re a what?

“I, uh, I wouldn’t have, uh, called you that.”

“Maybe there’s a side of me you don’t know about. Maybe there’s a side of me I should have . . . let you see.”

Maybe there’s an escape hatch in the floor that I’ve never noticed before.

And yet, none of his muscles made any get-out-of-here proposals. The only response he was aware of felt more like a get-in-there recommendation. It was making his pants feel uncomfortable. Or possibly it was the way he was still crouched over Hutch’s hand, pretending he still cared about a no-longer-there splinter.

Could be he was out in left field somewhere and his imagination had just caught a fly ball. If so, then all he had to do was turn fast and zing it to home plate for the out.

Hey wait, this was his bedroom after all, his bed that Hutch was sitting on. What if he was just having a particularly seems-real dream, and all he had to do was turn over and open his eyes? Except that he’d still have to figure out why he’d had a dream like this one. He should ask if Hutch knew anything about dream interpretations—uh, no. Not a good plan. He looked down at himself to see if anything give-away was visible, and noticed that he was still holding Hutch’s hand like it was the only thing in his life that still felt real.

Maybe he should let go, straighten up.

“Maybe,” Hutch said, “you should say something at this point.”

Like what?

“Like what?”

“Like, ‘I’m going to let go of your hand now, and use mine to slug you one.'”

“Or?”

“Is there an ‘or’?”

Half a minute ago I wouldn’t have thought so. Should I say that?

“Starsk, I’ve been waiting a long time for an opening like you just gave me.” Starsky groaned, and Hutch squeezed his fingers. “Tell me now if there’s an ‘or’ because otherwise—if I’m about to get slugged—I should probably be working out some kind of defense strategy.”

What should I be working out? Huh? Hutch?

“It’s just that . . . I don’t . . . uh . . . well . . . I could . . .you . . .”

He pulled his hand away from Hutch’s, and took note of the disappointed droop that appeared by his mouth. Then he stood up fast so Hutch could clearly see that even if Starsky couldn’t find any coherent thoughts to share, he could still let him know that there did seem to be an “or” where he would not have expected to find one.

“Hold still.” Starsky touched a finger to Hutch’s lower lip. “I think I really need to concentrate.”