Men in Love

Hutch convinces Starsky to see an art film with him.

Originally published in the The Bay City Gazette zine in 2014.

Hutch and me went to a movie last night. I didn’t want to go since it was a work night, but he whined at me, saying he had seen this movie only once years ago and really wanted to see it again, but this was the only night they were showing it and besides he hated to go to movies alone, until I finally gave in to shut him up.

Anyway, they were showing the movie at UCLA, meaning it took forever to find a parking place, and they showed it in a lecture room so the seats were hard and you couldn’t lean back and put your feet up. No popcorn either. It should be against the law to show movies without popcorn. It doesn’t seem like the movies without that friendly buttery smell.

On top of all that, the movie sucked. And believe me I’ve seen some real stinkers—Plan Nine from Outer Space, The Horror of Party Beach, Godzilla Versus the Smog Monster, even The Terror of Tiny Town, which was a Western with an all-midget cast. But this had ’em all beat. If Hutch hadn’t been there, I would’ve thrown popcorn at the screen—if they served any popcorn. That is, before I walked out in disgust even though it cost me a buck to get in.

It was called Women in Love, and it was made after a book by D. H. Lawrence. (He wrote Lady Chatterley’s Lover too, which I read when I was a kid because I’d heard it was dirty. It wasn’t, though. Peyton Place was a lot dirtier. Funny, isn’t it, that ladies write better dirty books than guys?) This movie wasn’t dirty either—that is, it seemed like it was dirty, because there were scenes showing people fucking and a couple nude scenes, like at one point Glenda Jackson took her top off, but I still wouldn’t call it dirty because it was so boring. It wasn’t sexy at all. It was just a lot of people with British accents and old-fashioned clothes yak, yak, yakking all the time. I mean they never shut up! Nobody talks that much—or talks like these characters did either.

There was one scene where this girl and the hero were walking in the woods or someplace and the girl says, “Say ‘my love’ to me,” and the guy says, “Yes, my love,” and then they fall together on the ground and get it on. Really stupid. I mean, I don’t care if a guy’s Robert Redford, it takes a better line than that.

I wasn’t really sure of the plot, if it had any. I think it was about two sisters getting involved with two guys who were best friends, but that’s just a guess since I admit my mind wandered a lot during it. Hutch had told me while we’d been waiting for the movie to start that it was about the disillusionment of the young after the Great War and their looking for salvation through love, but I didn’t get any of that.

The main scene I remember is where this guy named Rupert, the hero (I guess they don’t call them heroes in art movies—they call them “protagonists”), he wrestled with his best friend, Gerald, naked on a red rug in front of a roaring fireplace while some dramatic music played. I kept expecting them to fuck, but they didn’t. All they did was, after they wrestled a while, they talked about becoming blood brothers.

I whispered to Hutch, “Does this mean they’re engaged?” but he just pretended he didn’t know me. He does that a lot when he takes me to anything that he calls cultural.

Anyway, the movie ended with Gerald, the hero’s best friend that he’d wrestled naked with, freezing to death, which Hutch said was symbolical of something, I forget what—and Rupert and his girlfriend, or maybe she was his wife by then, were talking about it. Old Rupert felt really bad about his friend’s death, and he said something like he loved her, that she was all women to him, but he loved his friend too, and he wanted both kinds of love. And then the credits ran.

A really dumb ending. It would’ve depressed the shit out of me if I hadn’t already been half asleep by that point. The movie had been over two hours long and it’d felt like a couple centuries, at least. At least The Terror of Tiny Town had been only an hour.

Afterward, while I drove the Torino from Westwood back to Hutch’s, Hutch raved about the movie, how beautifully sensual and provocative it was, how Glenda Jackson’d won an Oscar for her part, what a great writer D. H. Lawrence was and all other kinds of bullshit, using words like “textured,” “literate,” and “primal” a lot. That’s the way Hutch thinks. A guy who’s called a good writer by some stuffed shirts in a university somewhere writes something so that means that it must be good, and the fact that it was a stupid, boring story had nothing to do with it.

“What an incredibly bold film,” Hutch said, still enthusing. Y’see, intellectuals like Hutch don’t call movies movies. They call ’em films. “All the symbolism—such as the moment when Gerald is astride a white stallion, symbolizing his sexual power, which later becomes destructive… and the couple who drown together, carried away and then destroyed by their lust… incredible. I think, though, that it was not so much about the destructiveness of passion as about the two different couples exemplifying the two types of love—the conventional and the unconventional, the loving and the violent. Or maybe it was about Rupert’s eagerness to experience love in all its forms and guises, and his best friend Gerald’s inability to love, or resistance to love. What did you think?”

I tried to think of an answer that didn’t sound too nasty, but gave up after a few seconds. “I thought it sucked,” I said.

Hutch looked at me as if I’d just run over his puppy. “What? Why?” he asked.

“Why did it suck? Well, for one thing it wasn’t even about real people. Who talks like that? Who acts like that? Like that part where the hero was at the table with his friends sayin’ how snackin’ on a fig was the same as eatin’ pussy—what kinda thing is that to talk about when people are tryin’ to enjoy a meal? I’ll tell ya, I may never buy a package a’ Fig Newtons again. And what was that bullshit at the end about anyway? Where the hero was sayin’ he wanted to love both men and women—were they sayin’ the guy was gay, or what? ‘Cause I must’ve slept through the part where he came out of the closet.”

Hutch looked exasperated. “Starsk, his love for Gerald could have been physical or it could have been merely emotional and spiritual, but whatever his sexual orientation was not the point. The point was that he wanted to experience love—was eager to experience love—no matter what form it came wrapped in. Don’t you ever think how much better life would be if we were all free to love whoever we wanted as long as the other person is a consenting adult?”

“I’m not against sexual freedom,” I protested. “But hey, if these two guys wanted to get it on, they should go ahead and do it, not waste time wrestling naked with all their dangly bits… well, dangling.”

Hutch groaned. “You missed the point entirely, didn’t you? The point was not whether these guys had a sexual relationship or not—or even if they wanted to. That could be left up to your imagination. The point was that Rupert wanted a blutsbrüderschaft, a blood brotherhood, with his best friend—craved it really—and when his friend died, he lost all hope of having that kind of love with another man. He even told Ursula at the end that she was not enough for him, that he wanted another kind of love to be complete, to be happy… to share an eternal love… with his friend.” He paused, and then added softly: “Just like you and me.”

I couldn’t think of an answer to that. How can you argue with somebody who just told you he loves you? So I shut up.

But I admit Hutch had given me something to think about. A whole lot of somethings.

***

Maybe this shows that I’m not too well-equipped in the brains department, but it wasn’t until we were walking up the steps to Hutch’s apartment—and I was watching that perfect, round ass of his in those tight jeans—that I figured it out. I grinned to myself as I followed him through the door. Hutch was pretty subtle at times, but not too subtle for me. Whether that’s because I’m a great detective or just because I’m his partner, I dunno.

I popped some popcorn—to make up for not having had any in the movie—and while we sat on his couch and ate it, we listened to some Billy Joel on the stereo and drank some red wine. Somewhere along the line I wound up snuggled against Hutch, and he put his arm around me and held me close.

And then I moved so my face was right in line with his, and kissed him.

The kiss felt good. Real good. Hutch’s lips were soft and warm, and he tasted so fresh and clean I swear you could’ve eaten off him.

When we finally came up for air, I noticed Hutch was clutching my arms, tight. And his big baby-blue eyes, with those long gold lashes, were staring right into mine. I guess it’s a cliché to say he was looking at me as if he’d never seen me before. But he was. And I felt the same kind of way—like we were seeing each other for the first time.

And I said, “Do you want to… ah…”

And Hutch croaked out, “Yeah.”

Eloquent, huh?

***

We didn’t do anything more on the couch. We both knew our first time was too important for that. So we stood up and walked into Hutch’s bedroom together—but not kissing, not even hugging, just holding hands tight.

Hutch turned on the lamp, and I kind of smiled because I like it with the lights on too. And the lamplight glinted on his gold, gold hair as he moved to take off his shoes and socks and shirt and then his jeans. So beautiful. So graceful. How can a guy who is a total klutz on the dance floor look so graceful when he’s just taking off his pants?

I felt my breath kind of leave my body in a whoosh when he got down to his shorts. He wears boxers, not jockeys, and they were baggy and plain white and not very sexy, but man, he still looked great. Like a big blond Viking, all gleaming skin and gleaming hair and smooth muscle. I walked up to him and unsnapped his shorts and pulled them down and off, but nice and slow because I wanted this to last a long time—maybe forever.

“David,” Hutch whispered. He almost never calls me that.

I didn’t want to say “Ken,” so I didn’t. I just kissed him again and then moved my hand down and—after a second of kind of thinking what am I doing? because I’d never touched another guy’s cock before—took his penis into my hand and then I didn’t think what am I doing anymore. Because it felt… well, yeah, weird but familiar too, not repulsive at all. Hutch was longer than me but not as big around, and his cock was a pale pink color, lighter than mine.

“Ah,” Hutch sighed, closing his eyes as his cock got larger in my hand.

Then I let go of him—although I didn’t want to, I forced myself and it was almost kind of painful, like losing part of myself—and stepped back from him and chucked my shirt and then started to take my jeans off, forgetting to take my shoes off first, so I got tangled up and I cussed and Hutch laughed, damn him, but I didn’t really get mad because I loved hearing him laugh even if it was at me. That’s why I sometimes say dumb things, just to hear Hutch laughing at me.

“You moron,” Hutch said. He looked so beautiful naked, especially with that huge hard on pressing up against his flat belly, all flushed and swollen.

“Fuck you,” I said as I sat down on the bed, and somehow I managed to get my shoes off though my hands were kind of shaking, then I pulled my jeans and shorts off and Hutch pushed me down on his bed and climbed on top of me and kissed me hard.

“Say ‘my love’ to me,” I whispered.

“Shut up,” Hutch said, and then added—if you can believe it—”my love,” and his voice went husky when he said it.

And we lay on his bed kissing, kissing, kissing each other’s breath away as if we’d done it our whole lives.

“You taste wonderful,” Hutch whispered.

“I taste ‘a popcorn,” I whispered back.

“You taste like Starsky,” Hutch said, and then, kissing me again, he gave me a little tongue, licking the inside of my mouth and retreating, then licking and retreating again. Teasing me to death. I loved it.

“Want to pretend we’re Gerald and Rupert?” I said, teasing him back, and then I said in what I thought was a pretty good British accent, quoting the part where the two guys were wrestling in the movie: “‘You know how the old German knights used to swear blood brotherhood—make wounds in their arms and run blood into each other’s cuts and swore to be true to each other their whole lives—'”

“What kind of British accent is that?” Hutch complained. “You sound like Ringo Starr.”

I wanted to say something smartass back, maybe something like, “It’s not your hand I wanna hold,” but no good—I was fast getting beyond the point of coherent speech. Feeling Hutch’s huge dick nudging me while we touched and fondled was fast making me lose all my brains.

“Oh man… I’m croakin’ here, Hutch,” I gasped out.

Then I wrapped my legs around his gorgeous gold body and then we started really wrestling, hard and fast, not like the guys in the movie but moving together like we were fucking, with Hutch on top of me shoving his big dick hard against my belly and me shoving back, tightening my legs around him to get him even closer to me. We didn’t get a lot of friction that way, and his body felt heavy against mine, heavier than a woman, but just watching his eyes blaze into mine made me feel ready to explode. We both were leaking precome all over each other, making a slippery mess, and we were both panting so hard we could taste each other’s breath.

And as we held each other tight and pushed against each other hard and fast—I’d forgot about taking it slow and making it last a long time—it hit me that Hutch was moving as awkward as I was. Meaning he hadn’t done this before either. Not with a guy.

The thought made me tear up, kind of. Hutch… my Hutch… this was his first time. I felt awed.

Then Hutch gave a growl of frustration. “This isn’t working,” he muttered, and moved a little off me so we were side by side, and took my cock in his hand and pulled… which was wonderful, beyond wonderful but kind of not-good too because it meant we couldn’t feel each other’s arms around each other anymore and I’d really liked that. Then, as if he was reading my mind, he moved his free arm around me and hugged me close, and I hugged him back as I took his erection into my hand, but since I’m left-handed and he’s right-handed, we got kind of tangled up in each other. But I didn’t really care.

“Hutch… Hutch…” I kept breathing out. Staring into his big blue eyes, seeing those long gold lashes sweep down and up and down again, oh man, it was easily the greatest moment of my life, greater than when I got home from Vietnam, greater than when I got my first car, even greater than when I got my badge.

“David, my David,” Hutch whispered, still pumping me, panting raggedly as his eyes held mine as if they’d never let go.

And then I felt the pressure in my tortured nuts build to bursting point, past bursting point and I tried to hold back, make this moment last just a few seconds longer but I couldn’t wait and then I was exploding, stars going off behind my eyes in all colors and in all directions like the craziest Fourth of July on record.

Some time later, like a century or two, I opened my eyes and Hutch was blinking at me, and I realized his cock was still hard, a throbbing pulsating muscle in my hand, and I started pumping again but he whispered, “No…in your arms,” and he pushed my hand away and climbed on top of me again and rammed that huge red-hot dick against my belly, ramming, ramming me into the mattress and then abruptly he let out a moan, such a gorgeous sound, and he was splattering semen on me and that felt… well, kind of icky, but kind of thrilling too. Which makes no sense, I realize.

“Hutch, Hutch,” I said, and I felt tears leak out a little. And he kissed me on the lips and then kissed my tears away and I clung to him and waited to start crying, really crying, but I didn’t, I guess because I was too happy.

“I love you,” I said.

Hutch fondled my hair. “‘We loved with a love that was more than love,'” he said, like a quotation.

“Huh? Was that from the movie? I don’t remember it.”

“No,” Hutch said. “It’s from a poem by Edgar Allan Poe.”

“What, that guy who wrote those creepy Vincent Price movies like The House of Usher?”

Hutch just laughed, and once again I loved his laughing. “Yeah,” he said.

***

We cuddled a while, just holding each other close, not even bothering to go get washed up which, for Hutch, was a real big deal since he hates being sweaty or anything.

Then suddenly I snorted, a kind of laugh.

“What’s so funny?” Hutch demanded, almost as if I’d insulted him.

“I was just thinkin’,” I said. “Other guys might’ve seduced me by just grabbin’ me and kissin’ me, or comin’ right out and askin’ me. But you’re the last of the big romantics—you take me to a movie. What’s next, candy and flowers?”

Hutch just looked at me. Then he said, “Was I that obvious?”

“Only to me.”

“Starsky…it wasn’t really a seduction,” he said after a moment, almost stuttering. “I mean, I was hoping that the homoerotic subtext in the movie might get us to talk a little about how we feel, but I never wanted to… to convince you to do something that you didn’t want. I mean… oh, shit, I don’t know what I mean.”

I smiled. “In case y’didn’t notice, Blondie, I wanted like crazy.” Pulling him close, I kissed him once more. Tasting him—wine and aftershave and maleness.

Better than a Fig Newton, by far.

***

And that was all the talking we did until this morning at breakfast, when Hutch, as he put the ingredients for one of his nauseating liver-and-sea-kelp milkshakes in the blender, said to me, “So—you want to become blood brothers?”

I grinned at his reference to the guys in the movie. “We’re already blood brothers, Hutch, don’t you know that?” I said, taking a slug of root beer. “After all, we’re cops. We’ve both bled all over each other a million times.”

Hutch grinned back, then wrapped his strong arms around me and held me close. Cuddling me, once again.

“Yeah,” he said. “I guess you’re right.”

~End~