In the aftermath of the Marianne Owens case, Starsky and Hutch aren’t in synch. Huggy has a unique idea for patching up the partnership, but will the results exceed his expectations?
This story was originally published by Lucy & Elaine in Test of Faith, October 2006. I offer a hearty round of applause to the editing team who helped bring this story to the wonderful tribute zine that focused on the ever-important theme of Trust Between Partners. Thank you, ladies, for the honor of working with you.
A rumor has it that it’s getting late. Time marches on. Just can’t wait. The clock keeps turning…why hesitate? You silly fool, you can’t change your fate. Let’s cut a rug… A little jive and jitterbug. We want the best. We won’t settle for less. Don’t be a drag. Participate. Clams on the half shell and roller-skates, roller-skates.-“Good Times” by Chic, 1979
Huggy Bear Brown, said to be a legend in his own time, watched over The Pits with the pride of an absolute monarch observing his kingdom from a high hill. An impromptu midday pool game was heating up, several couples had found space for dancing to jukebox tunes, and his waitresses–led by the incomparable Anita–were gliding between tables seeing to every patron’s need with flair and precision. He tried not to look at the cop who had pulled up to the counter for a burger-and-fries basket. Years had taught him to recognize when Hutch wanted to be ignored. Harder to ignore was the man’s blue-and-yellow bowling shirt, best put to use washing windows or mopping up bar spills, but Huggy tried hard to pretend Hutch was in one of his earth-tones ensembles and that all was well in the world of The Brooding Brunet and Bitter Blond.
The missing half of the pair showed up then, and Huggy saw Hutch cough and lightly pound at his chest to force down the french fry he’d just sucked into the wrong pipe. Starsky settled on the stool beside Hutch’s and motioned for Huggy, who sauntered over, careful not to give away that he had witnessed the silent drama accompanying Starsky’s arrival. “State your pleasure, and it’ll be yours at my leisure,” Huggy said.
Starsky eyed Hutch’s half-eaten burger. “What he’s having.”
Well, that was a pleasant surprise. Recently, the partners had made a point of different orders as if to underscore their desire for separate identities. Huggy relayed the order to Lisa as she passed by with a tray of empty plates, and then set about drawing up a cold soda to whet Starsky’s whistle.
“You didn’t hang around to hear Stanton’s deal,” Starsky said to Hutch.
“It was out of my hands.” Hutch didn’t look up from his cold fries.
“Out of sight, out of mind? Doesn’t sound like the Hutch I know.”
Hutch looked at Starsky then, and Huggy wished he hadn’t. “The Hutch you know? That’s a good one, Starsky. Marianne and I said our good-byes even before her brother ended up with a gut full of lead. Whatever deal Stanton could find in his shriveled husk of a heart to give her couldn’t undo the way it all went down. Dobey filled me in before I left. I know she’ll land on her feet. And that’s no thanks to me. So if you’ve come to deliver a similar message, save it.”
Starsky raised both hands in the air. “Right. Sorry I interrupted your lunch.” He left his seat without touching his brimming soda glass and turned to leave, but Hutch waved him back down on the stool.
“I’m done with lunch,” Hutch said, pushing back from the bar. “See you when I see you.”
“No, you stay. I’m not hungry. I’ll be at the station catching up on the paperwork. In case you’re interested, Dobey’s breathing down my neck wondering where you are. Stanton’s bitching about the case reports, and–”
“Stanton can go to hell.”
“And Dobey?”
Hutch raised an eloquent palm and shrugged.
“If it’s all the same to you,” Starsky said, frowning, “I’ll let you tell him so yourself.”
“It’s all the same to me, Starsky, has been for a long time. Or did you miss that?”
With one more bewildered, wounded look that couldn’t touch the defeated weariness in Hutch’s slumped posture, Starsky headed for the exit, and Huggy watched a black cloud descend over his kingdom. The laughter at the pool table had hushed. One of the dancing couples now stood at loose ends, watching the men at the bar, and the regulars at a corner table were pointing at the bar and talking with their heads bent low over their beers.
“Bring your curly-haired self back over here!” Huggy shouted, causing Hutch to clear the barstool by a few inches in his startled jump.
Starsky went absolutely still. At the same time, the song providing cover noise faded into a silence too vulnerable for Huggy’s taste. He nodded at Lisa, who deposited Starsky’s burger basket and hurried to fulfill Huggy’s implied demand for the loudest music she could find on the temperamental machine. At first, Huggy thought the power humming and umpeta-umpeta rhythm were just what the doctor ordered, but then the vocalist began pleading, “Don’t leave me this way…” and Hutch hunched even tighter in on himself with his elbows propped on the bar.
Starsky came back to the bar and sat down, fighting against glances that clearly wanted to linger on Hutch’s dejected slump. “What’s on your mind, Hug?”
“Ain’t what’s on my mind; it’s what ain’t on yours, seein’ as you forgot you just placed an order for one of my basket specials.”
Hutch started to rise.
“Sit your ass down, Blondie,” Huggy barked.
Suspended in the act of leaving his seat, Hutch stared at him, then shrugged and slouched back down at the bar.
“Huggy, no kidding, what’s gotten into you?”
“Starsky, you’re developing a profound talent for asking the wrong questions. Flip that one around, too. What’s gotten into the two of you, that’s my problem.”
“Huggy, it’s none of your–”
“None of my business or none of my concern?” Huggy snapped at Hutch. “It’s my concern ’cause I like to flatter myself that you clowns are my friends. And it’s my business in more ways than one. The Pits is all about atmosphere, and you’re my most well-known regulars. When you’re in here acting like the sun rises and sets on each other, the whole place catches on, and I get a real cool, mellow groove flowing. Lately, I’m better off if you’re in here one at a time, ’cause when you’re together, the groove turns to stone, and some of my other regulars are starting to be regulars at other bars.”
Starsky and Hutch looked at each other and just as quickly looked away. Instead of a sharp retort, Hutch said quietly, “You’ve made your point, Huggy. If we’re bad for business, we’ll take our business elsewhere.”
Huggy snatched up Hutch’s neglected basket special. “No, I obviously didn’t make my point. If all I cared about was my business, then yeah, that’d solve my problem. But the three of us, we count for more’n that, last I checked, or do I have my facts wrong?”
“You’re the one in the know, Huggy,” Starsky said. “You tell us.”
“Damn right I am, Starsky, and don’t you forget it, neither. You know what you fellas need? You need wheels.”
Starsky rummaged in his pocket and brought forth his key chain, rattling it at Huggy’s eye level for emphasis. “Unless some fool with a death wish has boosted the Torino from your alley, I have wheels. Hutch’s wreck is a loose use of the term, I agree, but it does have wheels.”
“Not that kind of wheels, smart mouth. Meet me here at midnight. I’ll have Anita close for me. I’m taking you somewhere you need to go in a real bad way, and in my car so you can’t make up some police excuse and leave me standing.”
“Huggy, you know that’s not how it works. Hutch and me, if we’re called in, we–”
“Fine.” Huggy grabbed a napkin and hunted around until he found a cap-less ballpoint pen that scribbled legible black ink. “When you go back in, give Dobey this number. Tell him after half-past midnight to try this number before he starts ringing your home phones. If he calls in with something that can’t be taken care of by one of the other fifty-odd teams in the precinct, you can leave in my Caddy and I’ll find a way home. Deal?”
Hutch’s expression could have been used to make lemonade. “Whatever you’re trying to accomplish, Huggy, it’s appreciated, really, but I’m not in the mood for–”
“I don’t care what you’re in the mood for, Hutchinson. If you turkeys bail on me with this, you can consider this font of information officially dry. I’ll turn into the deafest, mutest man on the street. You dig?”
“Huggy, that’s–”
“Extortion, coercion, blackmail, you call it what you want, Detective Starsky. Just be there or be square. Translated for the jive illiterate, that means shit out of luck.”
~*~
Hutch got out of the Caddy’s passenger seat, looked up at the neon sign above the massive building’s ornate façade, and promptly ducked back into the car. “BC Skates, Huggy? If that’s a roller rink, you can forget it.”
Huggy scowled at him from behind the wheel. “Okay, Hutch, we’ll forget it. And I’ll forget every hot little set of digits I use to connect you guys to the action goin’ down before it goes down. As my buddy the Turkey is wont to say, how you like them apples?”
“You know, Huggy, that’s not exactly how our arrangement works, considering we’re the–”
Starsky leaned forward from the backseat and clamped a hand down on Hutch’s shoulder before he could get them in serious Dutch with the man on a mission. “Huggy, we’re here, we might as well see what you got in mind. Right, Hutch?”
Hutch transferred his frustration in a glare at the backseat passenger. “Starsky, so help me–”
“Roller skates, brother,” Huggy said, voice softening. “I’m not asking you to shimmy up Everest with me on your back. Hell, I’m not even asking you to dance, which’d be the equivalent, I know. Not asking for any lutz action or twirls or backflips. Just strap on some skates and get out on the floor with each other while I crank some tunes.”
“Explain the point of all this to me, or I’m sitting right here until we’re all old and gray.”
“Not something I can explain, Mr. Hutchinson. You have to get out there and experience it for yourself. Are you in, or am I retiring my voice box and my phone-dialing hand?”
“Just so it’s understood that I’m doing this under duress,” Hutch said gloomily.
Starsky tried to lighten the mood with a smile he made Hutch see by tapping on his partner’s shoulder until Hutch made eye contact. “Come on. I’ve done some skating. Kinda fun when you get the hang of it.”
All hope was not lost when the smile could still erase the Hutchinson frown and smooth deep brow lines. Hutch’s lips even got in the act, turning up slightly at the corners, and his nod meant Starsky was on a slightly longer leash for the time being. Jazzed by the possibility that Huggy might be on to something, Starsky was first out of the car and, turning around to walk backward, beckoned Hutch with both hands. Hutch shook his head with some typical long-suffering my-partner’s-a-moron eye rolling, but he didn’t exactly trudge forward either.
Inside the rink, Huggy led them through the dimly lit entrance, pushing ahead of them through the turnstiles, fumbling to open the inner doors with a large key he pulled from a chain around his neck, and then disappeared for nearly a minute, leaving his guests in the dark. The lights flashed on in stages, illuminating the carpeted benches and concessions area, followed by the deejay booth and finally the enormous polished floor that probably rivaled some Olympic-sized ice rinks.
Huggy reappeared, looking smug. “They closed at midnight. We’ve got it all to ourselves.”
Starsky was trying to take in all the amenities and décor, but he could have turned circles for a full five minutes and missed something in this oversized roller-skating heaven. “How did you swing this, Huggy?”
“I called a guy who called a guy who owes that guy and me both a favor,” Huggy said, his pride in his connections shining as brightly under the fluorescent lighting as his red sateen jacket and matching beret. “That guy happens to run the place.”
“And he lets you throw private after-hours parties in here?” Hutch asked dubiously.
“On special occasions, yeah. In my circle, it’s all about trust. He trusts me not to do anything illegal, stupid, or capable of burning the joint down, and I trust him not to brag about lending me the place for a few hours after closing. You two are supposed to know all about trust, so where’s the big surprise in all that?”
Hutch shrugged and looked around, clearly unsure where to go or what to do in a roller-skating rink. Huggy motioned toward the large counter for skate rental. “Word of advice. I know you’re packing under that safari and suede, and you don’t need several pounds of metal strapped under your arms tipping your balance out there. Wanna entrust the cannons to me? I’ll keep your li’l ones safe and sound in the deejay booth.”
With a discussion of nods, raised eyebrows, and shrugs, they came to an agreement, and Starsky was the first to shed his khaki “safari” jacket to unhook his holster. He chose to leave the bulky jacket off as well, draping it on the counter, but Hutch slipped back into his suede as soon as he handed over the holstered Magnum to Huggy, who ducked behind the counter in search of skates. “Now, the sizes I dole out might not match what you think you wear, but roller skates can be kinda tricky that way. Sorta like bowling shoes.”
“Right,” Starsky said, more to sound like he knew as much as Huggy on the subject than to agree. Hutch didn’t have to voice the skepticism plain on his face, but he accepted the pair of scuffed brown skates Huggy handed him.
Heading for the nearest bench, Hutch stumbled down the unexpected dip in the flooring obviously meant to challenge skating novices even before they changed out of street shoes, and Starsky didn’t have a chance to verbalize a “watch out” before Hutch landed up against the bench in a half-kneeling sprawl. Hutch looked over his shoulder at the flooring with expressive contempt for the criminally negligent assholes who build roller skating rinks, and Starsky concealed a laugh by clearing his throat as he turned back to the counter for his skates.
“I don’t mean to rain on your parade, Huggy, but putting my partner on roller skates might not be the brightest idea to come out of your creative brain.”
Huggy let out an eloquent harrumph Dobey would have approved. “When he hasn’t been in the dumps lately, he’s been on a high horse. Few spills on his rump won’t do him harm.”
Starsky’s responsive grin at the prospect of some good Hutchinson slapstick triggered a rare, ominous frown from their host. “Don’t be feeling so righteous about yourself, bro. You could use a few slips yourself, Mr. My Partner’s Filled in Plenty.”
Propped casually on an elbow waiting for his pair of skates, Starsky had to double-clutch at the counter to avoid one of the slips Huggy recommended. “How the hell–?!”
“When your partner takes the drastic step of getting smashed on his lonesome, he actually lets things come out of his mouth that don’t paint you in a god-like light, Starsky. And being just a few days out of the hospital probably didn’t do wonders for his discretion. Now, Joan Meredith’s one very fine, very foxy lady, cop or no, but you oughta be ashamed, man, ashamed.”
Starsky felt anger tense and curl in his gut. He didn’t want to revisit the nightmarish limbo between Bay City and Hell when he’d watched Hutch’s gurney roll into the trauma room out of his reach and emotional jurisdiction, or the days that followed when yet another close call involving Hutch had done funky things to his wiring, changing him in ways he’d rather forget. “It was a stupid damn joke, Huggy, or at least I intended it to be. No different than him making me out to be some kind of freak show just ’cause I’m left-handed. If we can’t joke around with each other anymore, we’re both screwed, and we’ll end up with too many ulcers to count.”
“Oh, yeah, a joke,” Huggy scoffed. “Sayin’ that shit to your partner when he’s in the hospital with a slug inches from his ticker. Hah, hah. ‘Bout as funny as putting a banana peel down in front of a blind five-year-old. ‘Bout as funny as that amnesia crap he pulled on all of us to teach a certain vehicular lunatic a lesson. And don’t get me started on that hide-and-seek bullshit you two got up to. Or for toppers, that sideshow with that blonde lady cop Kara or Kira or whatever the hell her name was. You dudes were the closest thing to head-butting moose I ever seen outside Alaska, and I never been in Alaska!”
“Cool it, willya?” Starsky said louder, then glanced over to where Hutch was struggling to get his left skate on over his white tube sock, and chose to lower his voice. “Why didn’t you call me if Hutch was in your place tying one on? You know better.”
“You said the magic words, Starsky. My place. Mine. In my place, I drop a dime on whom I want to drop said dime, and I did not care to drop a dime on you that time. Last thing he needed was to see you come sweeping in on some halfhearted mercy mission.”
“Halfhearted! You’re outta line, Huggy. I might not be free of blame, but I’ll be damned if I let you tell me anything I do in regards to Hutch is halfhearted. The last six months have been rough, and we’ve both been acting like a couple of soreheads, I know, but we’ve talked about it, we’ve worked through it, we’re past all that.”
“Then act like it!” Huggy tossed back at him, in the meanest mean mistreater role he had ever played, to Starsky’s knowledge. “I thought when your brother was here that I was seeing the Second Coming of the Dynamic Duo. You and Blondie were in sync, man; you had each other’s backs all the way down the line. Then Hutch got put undercover with that blues siren, and the Dynamic Duo turned into the Dynamic Who-o and suddenly I’ve got two strangers in my bar again. How the hell did that happen?” He shoved a pair of skates across the counter.
“I don’t know, damn it!” Starsky started to the shove the skates right back again. He agreed with Hutch. This was a juvenile, ridiculous waste of time. Just because Huggy had gone and lost half his marbles didn’t mean that his two best friends had to find a new hobby.
But then Starsky caught movement in the corner of his eye and watched as Hutch wobbled in a combination roll-walk toward the skating floor, unsteady as a baby giraffe with four left legs and trying so hard to hide that he feared the slippery surface ahead of him, just as the baby giraffe would quake before a pride of lions between it and the herd’s favorite watering hole. Starsky’s heart melted, bringing a warmth to his cheeks and forehead, under his throat and down his neck, that he had felt around Hutch at the weirdest times for months now. Weirdest of all were those hard-ons during that hotel diamond heist sting every time Mr. Marlene was in rare form, but Starsky knew better than to dwell on that painfully embarrassing memory, or he’d shed his skates and walk home in his socks if necessary.
Huggy tapped on his shoulder. “See, I’m depending on you to keep him upright out there. You’ve got enough rhythm and balance for the both of you. And I’m hoping, once he gets over himself and starts depending on you, he’ll tell you what’s really been burning a hole under his skin these last few months.”
Starsky forgave Huggy the “halfhearted” remark with a smile and joking tweak of the Bear’s crooked beret. “I’ll have him jawing to me in no time.”
“I’m headed for the deejay booth to put some music in the mix.” Huggy swept their holsters into a tender cradle of his arms like a preemie in blankets.
Starsky hurried over to the bench to exchange his Adidas for roller skates. The skates Huggy had chosen did look more suited to Hutch’s feet than Starsky’s, although he had to admit the fit was snug but not too tight, with enough room for movement and unlikely to raise blisters on his little toes. He experimented with a couple of push-glides on the carpet and then hastened to his partner, who had just maneuvered all the way to the step-down onto the skating surface and appeared ready to sell his soul for a railing around the entire rink to hold onto for support. Starsky would give him something better. What need had Hutch for a cold, impersonal railing when he could have his partner’s nice warm arm?
He skate-walked alongside Hutch and said, “Hold onto me. The first step can be rough.”
Hutch dashed his hopes. He had the stubborn set to his jaw. “I’ve got this.”
Concealing his disappointment in a shrug, Starsky stepped off onto the skating surface in a glide and felt his legs react to the unusual demand for balance. He wavered and rode out the tendency to push his feet outward in opposite directions, canting his hips until he found his center and remembered the basic mechanics not just in his mind but also in his body. Hutch had no such frame of reference. One step onto the slick floor, and he did an unintentional half-split, pitching forward and bracing his palms on the floor to avoid landing on his face. Starsky rolled over to lend a helping hand, but Hutch jerked his head in an unmistakable rejection of the assistance.
“You never went ice skating in Duluth?”
“This isn’t ice skating. Instead of two blades to contend with, I have eight wheels.”
“Yeah, and that funky-looking rubber toe stop up front that helps you brake. Like the toe pick on an ice skate. You gotta use that rubber thingy, Hutch.”
“Thank you, Starsky. I figured it was there for more than decorative purposes.”
Starsky looked away from Hutch’s concerted effort to right himself and remain standing. He searched for signs of Huggy and spotted him across the rink up in the elevated, screened deejay’s booth. “Hey, Huggy, can you hear us?” he yelled.
“Barely,” Huggy answered over the deejay microphone. “You’ll have to shout. I’m about to put on some tunes.”
Starsky wouldn’t have expected Huggy to opt for Grand Funk Railroad, but he didn’t mind the power ballad that came blaring through the rink’s excellent speakers.
I’m in love with a girl that I’m talkin’ about; I’m in love with a girl I can’t live without; I’m in love, but I sure picked a bad time to be in love… A bad time to be in love….
A muted cry behind him ceased Starsky’s hip shimmying and he twirled in a tight circle to investigate. Hutch was sprawled on the floor and shooting a malevolent stare at the deejay’s booth. Starsky skated closer to the side of the rink where Huggy perched. “Hey, Huggy!” he shouted. “Ix-nay on the ong-say! Hutch doesn’t like that one!”
“All right, lemme see what else I got.”
Starsky thought he’d hear a disco beat, but Huggy was either stuck up in the booth with nothing but a stack of rock ballads, or had forgotten that this wasn’t Couples’ Night at BC Skates.
Precious love I’ll give to you, blue as the sky and deep in the eyes of a love so true, beautiful face you make me feel light on the stairs and lost in the air of a love so real. You can count on me. You can count on my love. You can count on me. You can count on my love to see you through….
Hutch had figured out how to do a jerky push and glide, traveling several feet before he began to shake and tilt to one side or the other. He was focusing all his energy in staring a hole through the deejay’s booth. “For God’s sake, that’s not music to skate to, Huggy!”
“You clowns are picky, you know that!” Huggy barked over the microphone. “All right. Try this one for size.”
The disco beat Starsky had anticipated flowed mellow and light, but then Andy Gibb’s sweet voice rang out, and he cringed, knowing Huggy had gone from bad to worse.
For so long. You and me been finding each other for so long. And the feeling that I feel for you is more than strong, take it from me. If you give a little more than you’re askin’ for your love will turn the key. Darling, I would wait forever for those lips of wine. Build my world around you, darling, this love will shine, watch it and see….
In unison, they put their hands around their mouths, bullhorn fashion, and screamed at the would-be deejay, “NO!”
Starsky could practically hear the needle scratch on the record as Huggy yanked it in frustration. “If you don’t quit trashing my choices, I’m gonna ditch you losers and quit wasting my time. Maybe this is more your speed.”
Starsky knew Huggy was out to get them when the anthem of the South blasted through the rink. Between the music and his teetering, Hutch looked green around the gills, and Starsky rushed to the rescue, skating quickly toward the booth. “Sweet Home Alabama?! Hey, Huggy, come on, do we look like Skynyrd fans to you?”
Huggy smiled down at him from behind the clear booth screen, but the smile was evil. “Just trying to find something to match Hutch’s fringed suede jacket get-up and long hair. And given the right motivation, you’ve been known to knock back some serious moonshine, Curly.” He yanked the needle. “Kidding, I’m kidding! Talk about soreheads.”
“You call us honorary soul brothers,” Starsky yelled up at him. “So play us some good soul with a kicking backbeat and leave it at that.”
“Well, why didn’t you say so?” Huggy did a soul-man twirl. “I’ll put on the lovely Ms. Nightingale just for you.”
“Ms. Nightingale?” Hutch asked Starsky.
“I doubt he means Florence.”
Ooh and it’s all right, and it’s coming ‘long. We gotta get right back to where we started from. Love is good, love can be strong. We gotta get right back to where we started from.
The song had a good backbeat and plenty of soul. Starsky motioned for Hutch. “Come on, can’t lose with this one. Now, the basic thing is just to skate in a circle around the rink to the music. Think you can handle that?”
“Watch me,” Hutch said, and promptly pushed off on the wrong foot. Two stumbles forward and his knees hit the floor before Starsky could get to him.
Ooh and it’s all right, and it’s coming ‘long. We gotta get right back to where we started from. Love is good, love can be strong. We gotta get right back to where we started from.
“I’m gonna kill him,” Hutch burst out, struggling to his feet, one pointed look stopping Starsky’s reach for him.
“Calm down, big guy. Assaulting Huggy might be tempting right now, but you’d never forgive yourself. Start with your right foot; yeah, like that. Okay, now with the other, and let yourself glide until you feel the momentum slow, then repeat. See, no big deal, hm?”
Do you remember that day, that sunny day, when you first came my way? I said no one could take your place. And if you get hurt by the little things I say, I can put that smile back on your face.
“Hey, Hutch, we’re basically fine, you’n’me, right?”
Hutch was staring down at his feet, concentrating on keeping his balance and momentum in cooperation with each other, but he said absently, “What?”
“You know…” Starsky didn’t want to itemize their recent partnership hiccups. Well, to be honest, some of the shit they had pulled on each other qualified as more than hiccups. “I’ve pulled some bonehead stunts recently. We both have. But what we’ve got doesn’t cave in to bonehead stunts.”
“What bonehead stunts, Starsky?” Hutch asked, sounding truly confused.
“Jesus, Hutch, you gotta ask? There’s a whole list. Was a time, if we wanted to play games, we’d go for the Monopoly board, throw down a few beers over a chess match, or pull out our tennis gear or shoot hoops. Lately, we’ve been too busy playing head games with each other to do any of that good ol’ simple stuff. But we got through it. It’s over. Done with. And we’re okay. Aren’t we?”
“Why are you bringing this up now?” Hutch demanded, making the mistake of taking his eyes off the tops of his skates. Instantly wobbling, he flung his arms out to the side and regained his balance.
“I just wanted to clear the air, and–”
“Huggy, that’s why! Damn him for playing snitch!” Hutch tried the impossible, executing a turn that would have him skating toward the opposite end of the rink, presumably to chew out the deejay. Instead he landed in a tangle of legs and pounded on the floor with both fists. “I’m gonna kill that skinny jive fink!”
“Hutch, like I said, you’d never forgive–”
“I’ll have my conscience surgically removed. Help me up so I can get me a bearskin rug!”
“Oh, so now you want my help?”
“Never mind. I’ll get up myself.”
Starsky skated over and bent down, offering his hand. “Huggy’s not the problem, buddy.”
Huggy was oblivious to his own near-death. He had exchanged the completed Ms. Nightingale for more disco soul, and the beat was so perfect for swaying that Starsky wanted to pull Hutch to him and twirl him around in circles. He felt his face heat again at the thought and dropped Hutch’s hand when Hutch steadied himself.
So I’d like to know where you got the notion… Said I’d like to know where you got the notion to rock the boat. Don’t rock the boat, baby. Rock the boat. Don’t tip the boat over.
“We owe him one, in fact. It’s been too long, Hutch. Too long since we spent time together like this. Why?”
Ever since our voyage of love began, your touch has thrilled me like the rush of the wind. Your arms have held me safe from the rolling sea. There’s always been a quiet place to harbor you and me.
“Blame Dobey. He barely lets us grab catnaps in between shifts these days.”
“Nope. Can’t blame the captain for all of it. We’ve found time for other things.”
Up to now we’ve sailed through every storm…and I’ve always had your tender lips to keep me warm. Oh, I need the strength that flows from you. Don’t let me drift away, my dear, when love can see me through….
Hutch paused, apparently trying to figure out why his left foot dragged when he pushed off on the right. “Yeah, you’re right. Other things. Between poisoning myself with botulism and letting a homicidal thirteen-year-old take her best shot at me, I’ve spent more time in Memorial than Venice Place. Monopoly and one-on-one at the park haven’t topped my list of priorities.”
Unwilling to put his hands over his ears to block out the bitterness in Hutch’s voice, Starsky had to look away so he wouldn’t see it on the tender face he couldn’t stand to see marred by anything unpleasant. He could still feel Hutch beside him, so he skated ahead to escape the crushing nearness. “Not what I meant, and you know it. We’ve found time for other people.”
“Sure. We’ve found time for our recreational love interest of the week,” Hutch said behind him.
So I’d like to know where you got the notion…to rock the boat. Don’t rock the boat, baby. Don’t tip the boat over….
Starsky pivoted and came to a dime stop on his left skate. “You make that sound like a crime. What’s wrong with red-blooded guys getting a little healthy recreation and stress relief?”
“It’s not a crime, Starsky. But my attempts haven’t been all that healthy and sure as hell not stress relief. It’s like I’ve been compiling research on how to screw up relationships with the opposite sex. And one woman I wouldn’t take to a dog fight–”
“You wouldn’t go to a dog fight yourself.”
“That’s not the point, Starsky! One woman I wouldn’t do anything sexually with, up to and including harassment, threatens to file a harassment suit against me. Man, when you’ve got maniacal meter maids after you, you’re really on the world’s shit list. And you know why, Starsky?”
“No, why?”
“I have a theory on this. Really. I think when you keep trying to put a round peg in a round hole that’s decided it wants a square peg after all, you end up in big trouble. Women have a sixth sense about it, I’m telling you, and you’re in for some bad karma.”
“Why are you doin’ this, Hutch? Talking at me, not to me. Using that introspective jazz of yours instead of coming out and saying what’s really on your mind? All during this last case, you were so damned determined to play it solo. I know you were under alone, but even when you came out of the cold, you acted like my shoulder wasn’t worth leaning on. Why? Don’t you trust me?”
Hutch stumbled again, but getting better at using his toe stop, he managed to avoid a nasty spill. “Why the hell would you think that?”
Starsky came to a dead halt, trying to ignore the background music. “Why didn’t you at least contact me when Fitch’s thugs roughed you up? Why’d you go to Marianne’s?”
Hutch’s eyes held breathtaking pain. Pain that had to reach all the way down into his inner being, throbbing like a deep cavity continually splashed with cold water. “My God, Starsky, you have to ask me that?”
“Yes, damn it, I do.”
Hutch carefully skated a choppy line over to him and put his hand on Starsky’s shoulder. “I was scared for you. I was in lousy shape and not sure I could shake them if they tailed me. I knew the rent-a-thugs wouldn’t lean on Marianne. That’s not how Fitch works. I knew I could hide there and regroup without putting her in danger. But you were a different story. You weren’t in the limelight with Fitch, and I didn’t want you there. I didn’t want to lead those mob hacks back to you. Christ, Starsky, don’t you know I would’ve preferred a taste of your Florence Nightingale act? You would’ve known to get me a beer, put on some good music, run a hot bath, and leave me to my own devices until I quit calling myself names for getting in that position in the first place. Then you would’ve–” Hutch shut up, fear flickering in his eyes.
“What?” Starsky pressed, sensing something important.
“Bandaged up my scrapes and my scraped pride,” Hutch said. “With me supervising, of course, and bitching about your technique.”
“Hell, Hutch, you should’ve come to my place, dragging all those goons behind you. I would’ve made corned beef hash out of ’em for putting their hands on you.”
Hutch risked a slip-and-slide to put his arms around him in a hug that took Starsky back to a time when hugs came easily to them. He slipped his arms around Hutch’s waist and hesitated. He knew how to hold a grieving Hutch, how to tighten his arms around a hurting Hutch and absorb the pain, how to throw a casual arm around his shoulders and say simple things without words. He had no idea how to convey with his arms the feeling racing through him now, electro-chemical synapses his nerves had no experience handling.
Let this love never cease… Peace….
Still waters run deep….
Starsky pushed backward on his skates, grasping Hutch’s arms to make sure the new skater didn’t topple at the sudden removal of support. “Think we’re supposed to be skating, not standing around holding each other up.”
Hutch had the irritated cavity look again. Pushing away a couple of feet at a time, he waved his hand at the rink, the deejay booth, at Starsky. “This is ridiculous. Huggy’s just paying us back for a couple of conks on the head and trashed bars he’s ended up with over the years. And we’re a couple of class schmucks to let him bring us here and get his kicks at our expense. My expense, anyway. You’re doing just fine.”
Starsky made it to him in one smooth coast on his wheels and grabbed at Hutch’s elbow. “Hey, where’s that coming from? That doesn’t sound like you, partner.”
“Come on, Starsky, why are we here? I could be home catching up on sleep, tending a few of my neglected problem children in the greenhouse, working on that song I’ve been meaning to finish. You could be doing whatever it is you’d rather be doing. Look, don’t mind me. I’m just a real bone-tired class schmuck right now.”
Never you mind if I don’t tell strangers passing by. If I don’t brag or boast. Lift my glass and say a toast. About my love for you. How it runs so deep and true. And yet it’s so, oh, ’cause don’t you know…still waters run deep….
“I’m here with you right now, and all I want is to spend time with you, so why can’t you just relax? Used to, we could’ve gone somewhere to unwind together, and we wouldn’t be thinking what else we could be doing, or what a waste of time it was.”
Visibly fidgeting, Hutch couldn’t skate quickly or smoothly enough to put the distance he obviously wanted between them, but he kept his eyes on the concessions cafe’s table and chairs, on the walls with their posters of musicians and champion roller skaters. Starsky watched him. He was a blond live wire. Come to think of it, Hutch had been a blond live wire around him for several months. And Starsky had felt the uncomfortable itch around his partner as well. Was that the real reason behind the needling edge to their competitions and jokes lately? Did they need a distraction–any distraction–from the disturbing knowledge that something kept them from comfortably spending down time together? If so, what was the something that kept getting in the way? Why couldn’t Starsky nail that down? Get down to basics, Starsky told himself. Make sure all the basics were still intact, and then build a case from there.
“Hutch, you never really answered my question earlier. Do you still trust me?”
Hutch stopped too quickly for his toe stops to compensate, and had to do his arms-out-for-balance thing to avert a backward drop to his ass.
Starsky wondered when someone had exchanged the polished flooring for ice that had the frightening ability to latch onto his skates and migrate up his legs to his belly. “God, is that it? I’ve hit on it; you don’t trust me. Hutch, look at me. Do you trust me?”
Hutch stared at him. Stared through him. “Yes, Starsky, I trust you.”
Starsky shook his head. “Not good enough. Two years ago, I wouldn’t’ve got the whole sentence out of my mouth before you said yes.”
“Starsky, if you’re trying to figure out what’s wrong with me, trusting you isn’t the–”
“Let’s start with something small, Hutch. Aren’t you tired of falling yet, trying to do this on your own? You’ll end up with bruises on top of bruises. Take my hand, hm? Let’s do this together.”
“That’s not something small, Starsk. Putting my life in your hands out on the street, fine. But I have to tell you, I’m working on a serious complex that I won’t get out of this rink without breaking my neck on these damn things.”
“Even better, then. Trust me with something big. Trust me not to let you fall, okay?”
Hutch held out his hand. “Okay.”
Getting into the deejay groove, Huggy changed records again and must have found the lighting panel, because the overhead disco ball began shimmering sparklers on the floor and the main lighting dimmed to a sexy twilight. Hand in hand, they accomplished an entire lap around the rink, skating side by side without faltering, and Hutch followed Starsky’s lead when he picked up the speed to match the disco love song feeding the electricity in his body, collecting where his hand grasped Hutch’s, making him wonder why their skin didn’t catch fire.
Love is in the air… Everywhere I look around… Love is in the air… Every sight and every sound… And I don’t know if I’m being foolish. I don’t know if I’m being wise. But it’s something that I must believe in, and it’s there when I look in your eyes….
“I think Huggy’s gotten away from the soul music again,” Hutch commented.
Starsky smiled. “Who cares? Ready to try something a little more adventurous?”
“I’ve been ready,” Hutch said in an oddly choked voice.
Starsky held out his other hand for Hutch to take in his. “We’re gonna crisscross our arms and I’ll pull you around in a circle. You just go with me, pushing forward a little bit when you feel yourself start to slow down. Ready?”
“Go for it.”
“Trust me not to let you fall?”
“Always.”
Starsky grinned at the instantaneous response. “Okay, then.”
With their arms forming a perfect X between them, Starsky initiated a spin, staring into Hutch’s eyes, delighted when his partner broke into a full, toothy smile, and their motion generated a breeze that picked up Hutch’s soft blondness.
Love is in the air. In the rising of the sun. Love is in the air when the day is nearly done. And I don’t know if you’re an illusion. Don’t know if I see it true. But you’re something that I must believe in, and you’re there when I reach out for you….
“This is incredible,” Hutch enthused, and the happiness in his voice did strange things to Starsky’s jeans, shrinking them in only one location, just beneath the zipper.
“You guys are gettin’ go-o-o-d out there,” Huggy yelled to them without the microphone, clapping his hands and whistling. “See what a little teamwork can do?”
The reminder proved that Huggy’s timing wasn’t always perfect. Startled by the shout, Hutch jerked his arms, pulling Starsky forward unexpectedly, and requiring all of Starsky’s innate balance to keep them both on their feet. He released Hutch’s hands and watched his partner try to shake off some depressing thought that appeared to be dragging his whole face down.
“Hutch, please. Enough already. Tell me what’s going on so I can do something about it?”
“I’m out of my head tired. I don’t know when it started, but our cases have been getting harder, rougher, or there started being less we could do in the end to make anything right. Is the world out there getting shittier by the day, or am I turning into a shitty cop?”
“Hutch, you’re this city’s second best cop, and that’s in your opinion. In mine, you’re the ace all the way. Problem is, you care too much when you get trapped in lost causes. This thing with Marianne–”
“Like you didn’t care too much with Emily?”
Starsky frowned. “No, you’re right. I went overboard with Emily.”
“Wait, partner. I didn’t mean that as a criticism. I was worried about you, and the toll it was taking, but the intentions behind your actions weren’t the problem. Like I told you, I loved your caring–”
“You told me you love me,” Starsky said, his own voice louder to him than the mellow Three Dog Night Huggy was playing.
How can people be so heartless, how can people be so cruel? How can people have no feelings? How can they ignore their friends? Easy to be hard…easy to be cold….
“Starsky–”
“You said you love me. Jesus, Hutch, did I even say anything that night when you said that? I can’t remember.”
Especially people who care about strangers, who care about evil and social injustice… Do you only care about the bleeding crowd? How about a needing friend? I need a friend….
“Er, no. You were laid pretty low about Emily’s situation. Probably wouldn’t have noticed if I came in the apartment that night playing a trombone and riding a unicycle.”
How can people be so heartless? You know I’m hung up on you.
Easy to be proud… Easy to say no….
“Where the fuck have I been?”
Hutch didn’t ask him to explain the outburst. “Not just you, Starsk. Me, too. We’ve both developed this habit of turning away from each other and dragging innocent women into some kind of atonement for our own screw-ups. Or maybe not screw-ups. Our own futility. I don’t know about you, but I’ve been feeling pretty damned futile lately.”
Especially people who care about strangers, who care about evil and social injustice… Do you only care about the bleeding crowd? How about a needing friend? I need a friend… Come on, easy to give in….
Starsky stopped skating. Their conversation was too important. It felt like he was trying to dig a splinter out of Hutch’s palm and had the tweezers right over the perfect spot. “Hutch, there’s not a damn thing wrong with taking responsibility, but call a spade a spade. Marianne got a rough deal in life, but she could’ve made other choices. You can’t exactly call her innocent.”
“And Emily was? A lookout for a jewelry heist isn’t exactly blameless, either.”
“Agreed. Maybe it hurt so much to watch you go down that road with Marianne ’cause I’d been down that road myself, you ever think of that?”
“Regardless of their choices, they didn’t deserve to get caught up in our guilt merry-go-round. We’re not innocent, either, when it comes to that. And I’m tired of that feeling of futility. I want to be involved in something that never makes me question why I’d fight for it, die for it.”
The upbeat bubble-gum rock Huggy had cranked back to maximum volume made Starsky’s legs itch to skate-dance, but Hutch looked ready to shed his skates and hurl them in the direction of the music booth.
Who loves you, pretty mama? Who’s always there to make it right? Who loves you, pretty baby? Who’s gonna help you through the night?
“You are involved in something like that, Hutch. You sure as hell weren’t futile when Nick was here. I wouldn’t have made it through that without tearing my hair out or murdering the kid if you hadn’t kept me grounded. Did I ever tell you how much that meant to me?”
Who loves you, pretty mama? Who’s always there to make it right? Who loves you, pretty baby? Who’s gonna love you?
“You didn’t have to tell me. You made it plain as day. I hated to see you go through that, Starsk, and I know it’s rough on you that you and Nick can’t have the relationship brothers should have in an ideal world, but I have to admit I was glad you wanted me by your side in the middle of that mess.”
When tears are in your eyes, and you can’t find the way. It’s hard to make believe you’re happy when you’re gray. Baby, when you’re feeling like you’ll never see the morning light, come to me, baby, you’ll see… Who loves you…?
“Of course, I wanted you there.”
“No, Starsky, don’t you get it? It hasn’t been ‘of course’ for a while now. Too many times recently we haven’t been reaching toward each other when things got tough out there. That was one time when you did let me in on the rough stuff, and for the first time in I don’t know when, I saw my purpose in life with something close to clarity.”
And when you think the whole wide world has passed you by… You keep on trying but you really don’t know why. Baby when you need a smile to help those shadows drift away, come to me, baby, you’ll see, who loves you…who’s gonna help you through the night, who’s gonna love you, love you…?
Starsky watched Hutch skate jerkily toward the carpeted edge of the rink where he sat down with exaggerated caution and stretched his legs out in front of him. If he could have managed it without breaking his neck, Starsky would have reared his leg back for a swift kick to his own ass. From the earliest days of their partnership, he’d learned that Hutch was all about filling Starsky’s cup until it ran over, with whatever Starsky needed at any given time–comfort, companionship, healing, support, partnership, advice. Lately, though, Starsky had found excuses not to let Hutch near the cup even when it was nearly empty and in dire need of refill. He just didn’t know why, other than the urge to avoid a strange yearning that came over him when Hutch focused all that attention his way. He’d felt it steadily during the near disaster of Nick’s visit, but keeping his little brother’s neck off the chopping block had pushed everything else to the background.
The music changed again, and Hutch breathed a relieved sigh Starsky could hear from several feet away.
Now I told you, so you ought to know. Takes some time for a feelin’ to grow. Oooh but you’re so close now, I can’t let you go. Oooh I can’t let go.
He rolled at a lazy pace over to Hutch and stopped, balancing on one toe stop. “What you’ve said makes sense, okay? Care to put a bottom line on it for me?”
With you I’m not shy to show the way I feel. With you I might try my secrets to reveal. For you are a magnet and I am steel.
“I’m just saying it’d be nice if we could start turning inward instead of outward again. Find what we need in each other. Quit looking to strangers to pick us up when we get knocked down. Give me one reason why we need to be looking farther than right here.” Hutch pointed at his chest, then at Starsky’s.
Starsky nodded. “Like the lady said, ‘Gotta get right back to where we started from.’ But, Hutch, there’s one thing we still have to turn outward for, know what I mean?”
“No, I don’t,” Hutch said, but he sounded like he knew what Starsky referred to, if not what he meant–a significant difference that left Starsky momentarily flabbergasted. One possible meaning behind Hutch’s sudden fascination with pegs and holes occurred to him, and Starsky had to clench his toes for traction to avoid an unintentional back flip.
In the awkward silence of Huggy’s longer than usual pause between tunes, Hutch tried to pull up to a standing position, but his brain, legs, and eight wheels couldn’t find consensus. His legs whooshing in one direction, his upper body determined to pitch the other way, he closed his eyes, his facial expression that of bracing for impact, but Starsky grabbed him. The awkwardness of their impromptu embrace reminded Starsky of grabbing Hutch in a similar way outside a lake cabin, the embarrassing but hilarious memory made vivid by the identical expression on Hutch’s face now.
“Will you please let me go?” Hutch asked in that same tone of strangled frustration.
“Why?”
“If you don’t let me go, I won’t be held responsible–”
“For wh–?” Starsky didn’t get the question out before his lips had two new friends pressing close for an insistent hello, and his cock was a growing boy concerned only with surviving murderous denim to get closer to its counterpart in Hutch’s jeans. The voice of common sense inside Starsky’s head, for the last decade a Midwesterner, started listing fifteen reasons why this was weird, disastrous, downright wrong, and insane on top of it all. Hearing the lecture in Hutch’s voice while the man himself was doing his best to kiss Starsky was Twilight Zone enough, but the brush of unexpectedly silky-soft hair against his upper lip short-circuited his last coping mechanism, and he pushed away violently before a third friend poked out of Hutch’s mouth to say hi. Arms flailing, he started to fall backward, but Hutch’s valiant reach for him prevented a sore bum. On the whole, Starsky would have preferred bruised buttocks to the electrical shocks he felt through his thin cotton jersey where Hutch’s hands grasped his upper arms.
Huggy had finally located another record, but now it was Starsky who wanted to throw a brick through the deejay’s screen, because the singer’s all-too-familiar plight tormented Starsky’s ears and fueled his traitorous erection. He jerked away from Hutch’s hold.
I’ve been lonely too long… In the past they’ve come and gone… I feel like I can’t go on without love… I’ve been lonely too long… As I look back, I can see me lost and searching. Now I find that I can choose… I’m free… So funny I just have to laugh…all my troubles been torn in half… I’ve been lonely so long….
Starsky tried to speed skate away from the music and Hutch, but he couldn’t escape himself…or the realization that he’d known, somewhere, on some level of consciousness, what the yearning was that he’d felt recently whenever he let Hutch get close emotionally.
“I warned you,” Hutch called to him.
He didn’t sound sorry, damn him. That wasn’t how it should go down. Hutch should be tripping over himself to apologize for nearly knocking Starsky on his ass with those soft, sweet, mustached male lips. Instead, he sounded smug. Happy. All knowing.
Now look at me, gliding through this world of beauty, everything I do brings ecstasy. No wonder I could die… I feel like I’m ’bout ten miles high… Found myself somebody. Don’t have to be alone no more….
“Starsky?” Hutch called again.
That was better. Hutch was starting to sound a little uncertain. Good. They were on even ground.
“Starsk, you okay?”
Instinct or some strange sexual reaction that increased blood flow to his ears made him turn his head just in time to see Hutch bound for a major wipeout with no rush of waves to break his fall. Starsky performed a crossover pivot worthy of an Olympic figure skater and bent both knees for an extra burst of forward speed that brought him in a rush to prop Hutch up in his arms.
“Thanks,” Hutch said, a little breathless.
“What the hell were you trying to do? You’re not ready for that kind of speed. Looked like you thought your skates had turned into a surfboard.”
“Trying to get to you, that’s what. You’re the one that lit the afterburners on your skates.”
“I appreciate the thought, but I’d rather not break in a new substitute partner while you recover from a broken ass.”
Hutch actually grinned at him, the gorgeous fool. “You said you wouldn’t let me fall.”
“Yeah, but I wasn’t even looking at you just now.”
“Didn’t matter, did it? You’re here, and I’m not on the floor with a broken ass.”
Starsky stared, dumbfounded. “God, when you believe in someone, you go all out, don’t you? But you risked a helluva lot with that kiss, Hutchinson.”
You can ring my bell…you can ring my bell….
The bright Hutchinson grin had yet to diminish. “No, I didn’t. I tried to tell you, trusting you has never been the problem. I couldn’t be sure you’d go for it, but I knew you wouldn’t skate out of my life.”
The night is young and full of possibilities. Well, come on and let yourself be free… My love for you so long I’ve been saving…tonight is made for me and you… You can ring my bell…ring my bell….
Faced with the beauty of Hutch’s faith in him, more precious to him than his own lifeblood, Starsky let his body rule him, his heart leading the way along the path his hormones had already forged. His kiss built on Hutch’s, unafraid this time of open-mouthed tongue action. The force of their mouths grinding harder and harder, coupled with their grasping arms and desperate attempt to meld into one being from the waist down, threatened to send their wheeled feet in four divergent directions. But they found balance in each other’s arms they could never have accomplished alone, and Starsky realized, stunned, that he was pushing them in a passable straight line, Hutch managing the backward skating with remarkable ease, while they kissed. The motion lent an erotic edge to the dance of their lips that Starsky had not imagined possible, his groin ready to burst into flame, and his cock throbbing in remarkable rhythm with the bump-bump-bump of the disco groove Huggy was putting down.
You can ring my bell…you can ring my bell….
Then the music died and bright overhead lighting startled them out of their first real kiss.
“What the hell?” came a shout from the deejay booth.
Half of Huggy’s brain was still trying to tell him he hadn’t really seen what he saw. His other half wanted him to bang his head against the deejay screen. For a cat supposedly hip to the whys before they became wherefores, he had blown it big this time. Early in his relationship with the famed detective team, he had feared his friends’ closeness was an outward projection of something carefully hidden behind closed doors, but over the years, he let seeming evidence to the contrary relax his vigilance and lull him into a false sense of security. Until tonight, when he looked up from coaxing a grouchy sound system back to purring happiness…and saw his two best friends in a rolling lip lock quickly escalating to wheeled foreplay. The obvious beginner’s awkwardness proved to Huggy that they had not been keeping secrets from him, little consolation in the face of the realities he had to bring them hard up against if he wanted to call himself their friend.
He forced himself to concentrate on shutting down the sound system and leaving the deejay’s booth in the pristine condition DJ Oyster Cat expected. Then he grabbed the holstered weapons–one more reminder of the realities Huggy didn’t need right that second–and hurried down to join the lovebirds on the skating floor.
He stopped on the carpeted edge of the rink and waited for them to skate over. Hand in hand, of course. Huggy cursed under his breath again. He meant to say something soft and understanding first, but the words out of his mouth sounded harsh to his own ears. “Why you white boys wanna go and start something that’s got no kind of happy ending? Or do you think the poh-lice department is ready for a Cinderella story with two Prince Charmings?”
Shocked, Hutch stumbled, but Starsky’s firm grip on his hand prevented a tumble. “How do you know we’re just starting?” Starsky asked, deflecting Huggy’s dire prognosticating.
Huggy scorned him with a sideways frown. “Are you out your mind? You think I ain’t been up and down both sides of the street enough to know a first kiss when I see one?”
“Well, technically, it wasn’t our–” Starsky started, but Hutch’s headshake silenced him. Starsky cleared his throat and said instead, “Why’re you pulling the surprise act, Hug? You set us up for this all down the line. It’s like you were in our heads.”
His inner fairy tale enthusiast wanted to applaud their lack of self-consciousness. The ladies’ men were busting out all over with pride in holding hands, pride in what Huggy had seen. But streetwise and street-weary Huggy had to squash the impulse to jump and shout. “Starsky, don’t take this the wrong way or nothing, but last place I wanna be is in your head. And how the hell you figure I set you up?”
“The music, for one thing,” Hutch said. “If this is a Cinderella story, you were the fairy godfather in that deejay booth, dispensing disco magic. Well, guess what?” Hutch laughed and lifted Starsky’s hand to his lips for a quick kiss on the knuckles.
“I’ll try to disregard that you just called me a fairy. But this ain’t no bippity-boppity-boo, Blondie.” Huggy hated bursting a happy Hutchinson’s bubble. “It’s more like bippity-boppity-bam! And the joke’s on all of us.” He held out their holsters. “Here, in case you two’ve managed to forget what you do for a living.”
Starsky released Hutch’s hand to accept his Beretta, but he didn’t rush to strap it back on, and Hutch let his holster hang by its shoulder strap down by his side. “Huggy, why did you bring us here, if you didn’t want us to get to the heart of things?” Hutch asked.
“I brought you here to make up, yeah. Did I say at any time that you had to kiss and make up? As for the music, I was playin’ what DJ Oyster Cat left out from tonight’s skate. It’s February. Every Friday night in February is Young and Old Love Night at BC Skates. Didn’t you see the big honkin’ sign on the outside window?”
Starsky narrowed his eyes. “Oh, and ‘Sweet Home Alabama’ fits in with that so well.”
“It must’ve been someone’s special request. You don’t believe me; go look in the booth. Listen, fellas, I wouldn’t’ve set you up for this intentionally. Call me crazy, but I kinda like having you chumps around in one piece. This is a hard road you’re thinking about walking. Hard for everyday folks like me, even. Hell, I quit walking it even part-time ’cause I got tired of taking a hating world into bed with me. Only thing harder than being a black man in a white man’s world is a being a gay black man. In my world, there’s hardly any such thing as bisexual. A guy is either queer or he isn’t, hear me? Only thing harder’n being a gay black man is being a gay cop. You guys don’t get a bisexual cop-out either, pardon the phraseology.”
“We know it won’t be easy, Huggy.”
“You don’t know half as much as you think, Starsky. You won’t know until you’ve been in it up to your necks.”
Hutch reached for Starsky’s hand again, but he was looking away, and the grief visible in profile cut Huggy to the quick. He sighed. “You’re not gonna take my advice and climb out of the pool before you reach the deep end?”
He watched them look at each other with solemn faces and then shake their heads in unison. Partners all the way. Ready to face the firing squad together. Huggy steeled himself to watching an uncertain and dangerous–more dangerous than usual–future open up in front of his best pals. Resigned, he couldn’t continue to be their first taste of a negative outside world. He had issued the warnings; his conscience was clear. He was also in a position to help them, and he’d be damned if he didn’t. “All right, lover boys. Let’s get you out of here now that I accomplished ten times more than I set out to with this experiment. On the way home, I’m gonna hand out some advice, and you better listen closer to Papa Bear on this inside info than you did to any of my hot crime fightin’ tips.”
Surprisingly, Starsky now looked angry. “Care to explain the whiplash change of opinion, Huggy? You come down here and chew us out, then you turn into the great enabler?”
Huggy glared at him. “Maybe I didn’t make myself clear. The three of us, we’re tight. I’ve got no problem with you dudes digging each other. My problem is that I already worry about you guys on a daily basis as it is. My problem is that you walk a rickety rope bridge through life anyway, doin’ what you do, and you don’t need to hand the nasty elements in the world out there a big fat knife to cut the rope. But, hey, if you gonna walk, then I’m gonna hold the ropes, ’cause I owe you, and I’d do the same if I didn’t. Are we clear where I stand now?”
“Crystal, Huggy,” Hutch said. “We appreciate the concern.”
“Yeah, Huggy,” Starsky added, with a smile that didn’t disperse the shadows on his face. “Thanks.”
“De nada, brothers.”
Out in the parking lot, Hutch looked at the Caddy’s backseat with such forlorn wistfulness that Huggy laughed out loud. “Go on, slide in the back, Hutch. Won’t be the first time I played chauffeur.”
Once on the road, he gave them one quick look in the rearview mirror and realized he didn’t need to worry about their privacy. They sat close together, a fraction of an inch between their thighs, but they faced forward and seemed determined to keep their hands off each other. Huggy could imagine electricity crackling in tiny silver-blue lightning bolts between them. He turned off the radio and said, “Listen. Slow is the way to go with this new thing you got going on. You’re barely out of the womb. Don’t even need to try crawling yet. You don’t have to cram a decade of loving into one night. If you take it easy at the start, you’ll thank yourselves and me later. Know what I’m saying?” He risked another glance in the mirror.
They were looking at each other. The intensity of the passion bubbling just under the surface robbed Huggy of breath. He knew if he pulled into a dark alley, they would be all over each other, completely oblivious to his presence and unable to put brakes on the drive to couple. “Damn it,” he said. “Know your audience, hell! I should just keep my fool mouth shut. You two aren’t known for slow with anything you’re in together. All right. Pit stop, fellas.”
Starsky looked away from Hutch’s eyes then. “What, Huggy? Did you say something about stopping?”
“Yeah, pulling into the twenty-four-hour Rx and More on Third and Webster to pick up some goodies you’ll need to make it through the night.”
Finally, there was a hint of self-consciousness in Starsky’s bashfully dropped gaze and Hutch’s concentrated stare out the window. “We…uh…we can take care of it, Huggy,” Starsky said.
Huggy laughed at him. “Hormones done short-circuited your brain, man. In this part of town, if either one of you guys went in the store and bought this stuff, you might as well march your asses into the IA offices on Monday morning and start making out in front of the whole crew.”
He didn’t dare pull the Caddy into the parking space directly in front of the well-lit drugstore’s front windows, choosing instead to park around the side by the dumpster. Still, they were not the only late-night patrons, so he turned around in the driver’s seat and said, “Hang tight and don’t get up to anything out here you wouldn’t wanna see on the first page of the morning paper. Back in a few.”
~*~
“He’s right, you know,” Hutch said, sounding like every word was a strenuous effort to use his mouth for speech when he wanted to use it for something else. “We’re asking for it with both barrels.”
“Can you walk away from it?”
“No, can you?”
Starsky gritted his teeth. “Not without someone holding a gun to your head, no.”
“Starsky, I’ve got to–got to touch you.”
Starsky watched Hutch’s hand hover over his thigh and he jerked away from the impending touch. “No. Not there.”
“No, me neither. Where?”
“Scoot over some.” In the increased space between them, Starsky rested his hand on the seat and nodded. Hutch’s hand came down on his, hot, palm sweaty. Starsky wanted to scream. He made himself think in complete sentences, formulate questions. “Hutch? You’ve been wanting this awhile?”
“So have you.”
“Yeah,” Starsky admitted. “But you’ve been consciously wanting it longer. Me, I’m just now dragging it out of my subconscious.”
“What’s your point?”
“You talk about me not letting you get close during the rough times lately. You were holding me off with both hands, too. Was it ’cause of this?”
Hutch’s sigh was an admission it itself. “When things started changing, your ways of being there for me just made me want more. It wasn’t enough to have you come over, find something good on the tube, and ply me with popcorn and beer and weird trivia facts until I broke down and let you put your arm around me so I could talk it out. I needed your arms around me, and I didn’t need to talk. Not with words, anyway.”
“Makes sense. I felt it, too. Just didn’t let myself put a name to it.” He felt Hutch’s tender, understanding gaze warm the side of his face, and he clamped his free hand down ruthlessly over his groin. “Don’t look at me, Hutch. You look at me, and I’m gonna kiss you, morning paper be damned. And if I do that, I’m goin’ off like a twenty-one bottle rocket salute.”
“You and me both. What the hell is Huggy buying that takes this long?”
“I don’t care if he’s buying Preparation H, Alka-Seltzer, and Mentos. I just wish he’d get out here before these damn jeans castrate me.”
“Don’t even joke about that!” Hutch nearly yelled in his alarm.
“Do I sound like I’m jokin’?”
“Here,” Hutch started to slip out of his jacket. “Unzip and drape this over your lap.”
“Not that jacket.”
“What’s wrong with my jacket?”
“Nothing. It’s your jacket,” Starsky spit out, trying very, very hard not to think of soft, Hutch-scented suede draped in a cloth caress over his lap. “I’ll manage.”
“Starsky, I need to be upfront about something before we go any further with this.”
The worry in Hutch’s voice almost made him turn his head for a look, but he stared at the back of the passenger seat instead. “What?”
“I…I want your ass. I really, really want your ass.”
“Oh, God.” Starsky yanked his hand out from under Hutch’s and made quick of work of unzipping and shedding his own jacket to drape over his lap. He sighed in the luxuriant freedom. “I figured as much, the way your hands were all over it back at the rink. Yours for the taking, Hutch.”
In the electrically charged, lust-heated backseat, his partner’s audible gasp quickened Starsky’s breathing in sympathy. “You’re sure?” Hutch whispered.
“You’re not the only one in this partnership who knows how to believe in someone. If you could trust me to keep you from breaking your neck on roller skates, I can believe you’ll make me like being fucked by a man. And not just any man. Far as I’m concerned, you’re the only man in the world. How d’you feel about me wanting some of your trunk space?”
With a pained groan, Hutch performed the same lightning-fast unzip and jacket covering maneuver. “You can have mine first.”
They both nearly brained themselves on the roof when the driver’s door opened and Huggy got in the car. One look in the backseat at their jacket-covered laps, and his face was all grin. “You boys are a mess. But don’t worry; one day when you’re too old to have real teeth–”
“Huggy,” Starsky said, making the name sound like a cuss word. “If you say we’ll laugh about this one day, I’m liable to deck you.”
“Oka-ay then. You should be glad I’m plunking my money down on you and the blond living long enough to lose all your teeth, but hey, be a half-empty glass if that’s your scene. Where to, gents? Venice or Starsky’s treehouse?”
“Treehouse?” Starsky wondered what connection Huggy made between his apartment and a treehouse.
“What about our cars?” Hutch asked.
At some point between the skating rink and drugstore, Huggy had turned into the Gay Guru on a Mountain, dispensing looks of amused pity for their unenlightened state. “Your brain cells are shutting down in your horniness, Dee-teck-tive. You cats don’t have the wherewithal right now to drive a straight line in an empty parking lot. You think you’d make it home in separate cars? And you know how I know? ‘Cause you were the one that asked, and Starsky hasn’t said word number one about his precious wheeled tomato hanging out in my alley. Trust me. Your cars will survive the night at the bar.”
“Venice,” Hutch said, careful not to look at Starsky. “More privacy with that other apartment vacant.”
“Venice,” Starsky agreed.
Huggy turned back around and keyed the ignition. “Thought so, and boy am I glad, since I’m leaving my car with you overnight in case the gods really do a number on you, and Dobey starts ringing your phone off the hook.”
“How will you get home?”
Backing out, Huggy slammed on brakes to avoid a Malibu that gunned past the bumper. “Thanks for the concern, Starsky, but I won’t be going home tonight. Thinking y’all might be up for Venice, I called a friend of mine on the drugstore payphone. He lives just a block or two from Hutch’s, and I called to see if he’d like to see me for old time’s sake. He’s happily single and more than in the mood to reminisce. He’ll see me home safe and sound tomorrow, and you can drop my car by The Pits and retrieve yours. Assuming you can pull yourselves out of bed long enough.”
“Thought you quit walking this road.”
“Yeah, well, a certain couple’a street cops reminded me how exciting it can be.”
“Who is this guy, Huggy?”
“Why you asking now, Starsky? From almost day one, you guys knew I’d swung both ways in my time, and you never asked about any of my male interests. Now you and Hutch are about to hit the sheets, and you think that gains you entrance into some gay brotherhood and you get all the details of my love life? Sorry, Charlie, it don’t work that way. If there’s something I think you should know, you’ll know.”
After that gentle smack down, the car ride remained an unbroken silence among equals until Huggy pulled in front of Venice Place. Then he exchanged his mountain guru persona for Sex Ed teacher and began a running lecture based on the contents of the drugstore bag. Caught between embarrassment and mindless lust, Starsky tuned out the graphic details, hoping that Hutch, despite his frozen shell shock, might actually be paying attention. He came back to awareness when Huggy pulled out a familiar blue-and-white tube and waved it around in circles and other interesting shapes to hold their attention.
“There are four of these beauties in this bag,” Huggy said, “and don’t think you’re guilty of overkill if you use all four tonight, catch my drift? More is more, in this case. Eventually, it won’t matter so much, not four tubes’ worth anyway, but for a couple of virgins, there’s no such thing as too much. If you can’t come in my place and sit down on a barstool without flinching, don’t even walk through the door. I ain’t kidding, fellas.”
Hutch emerged from shell shock. “Huggy, talk about overkill. We’re not teenagers who know nothing about the birds and bees–”
“Hutch, shut your mouth and listen close. Much as I hate to admit it, information flows both ways in and out of The Pits. Not much I can do about that. So if you want it noised around the street that you two really are up each other’s asses and not just in each other’s pockets, go on and come in and wince when you sit down. Believe you me, that’s a weapon you don’t want in the wrong hands out there, and I’m not even talking about your brother cops. I done told you, people watch you guys in my place. You come in there all happy, people gonna figure you patched things up, and that’s fine. Just make sure that’s all they keep thinking.” He twisted his key chain until the car key popped off, and handed the key and bag to Starsky.
Starsky allowed himself one peek in the bag to confirm the presence of four tubes of lubricant. “Jesus, Huggy, the cashier must’ve thought you were on your way to an orgy at the Parrot’s backroom.”
“In that part of town? Hell, no. Cashier saw a black man coming up to the counter this time of night, all he cared about was that I didn’t have a gun in his face demanding money from the drawer. Didn’t even look at what I was buying beyond the price sticker.”
Huggy rarely spoke of racial injustice, a pain that ran too deep for casual words, but when he did broach the subject, his words carried the weight of generations. Starsky and Hutch both reached for his shoulder at the same time, and Huggy laughed. “Hopeless, you guys. You’re hopeless. Aw, okay, you’ve squeezed the shoulder, I’m good, you’re good, we’re good.”
“Huggy, be careful walking to your friend’s place,” Hutch said with a smile.
Huggy returned the smile at double the wattage. “Will do, blond brother, and thanks for the concern, especially in your…eh…distracted state. But compared to the hood I grew up in, Venice is as safe as my mama’s backyard. Go on, get outta here before your dicks freeze permanently in the up position.” He snickered. “And be careful climbing those stairs half in each other’s pants.”
~*~
“Why is it that you always have to look on the dark side?” Hutch demanded. “Why can’t you expand your world to include the good, too? Like me, for instance. I’m…I’m expanding this greenhouse.”
Starsky did an Oscar-worthy job of hiding a smile. Less than twenty-four hours after Hutch poured out his feelings of exhaustion, fatigue, and futility, he was sitting here lecturing Starsky for not seeing all the good in the world. But it wouldn’t do to show his amazement at how quickly a night of restored partnership heightened by incredible, if at times challenging, sex could put Hutch back on the sunny side of life. So Starsky muttered an appropriate, “Yeah?”
“Yeah. Sure it’s gonna cost me an arm and a leg,” Hutch continued as if Starsky hadn’t spoken, “but it’s worth it because of my positive attitude. And you know something?”
“What?” Starsky asked, deadpan.
“It works.” Hutch was leaning in to him now, cradling his own chin in hand and pointing, using all his professorial body language. “You know, I went down to the bank yesterday. My bank.”
“Mm-hmm.”
“–for a home improvement loan, and you know what?”
“What?”
“I got it,” Hutch announced, so intent on his victory that Starsky hardened more than he had at Hutch’s reference to “getting off” while tending his fern, or African violet, or whatever the problem child du jour was. “You know why?”
“Why?”
“Because of my positive attitude. ‘Course, the fact that we’re getting that pay hike next week, now that doesn’t hurt, but the point is, that there is a lot of good news in the world.”
“Yeah, I suppose you’re right,” Starsky said, inspired with comedic timing and an irresistible joke.
“‘Course, I’m right,” Hutch answered with a touch of smugness, playing right into the jokester’s hands…hopefully in more ways than one if Starsky worked this just right.
“Even if this story is true,” Starsky added after the appropriate pause for effect.
“What’s that?” Hutch asked, off his guard and at Starsky’s mercy.
“City Police Lose Bitter Battle for Pay Hike.”
“What?!” Hutch yelled, grabbing for the newspaper.
Exuberant over the philosophy-of-life lecture, another sign that his big beautiful blond felt comfortable around him again, Starsky let him seize the newspaper in search of the damning article about the police pay hike defeat.
“You asshole!” Hutch crushed the paper in his frantic rifling through the pages. “There’s no such article!”
“Gotcha!” Starsky laughed.
“Asshole!” Hutch growled again, punctuating the insult with a shove to the laughing Starsky’s shoulder that nearly pushed him off the bench. “I’ll bet you made up that disgusting stuff about the man-eating wild monkeys, too.”
“Nope. That’s on page three. Check it out if you don’t believe me.”
Hutch thrust the paper at Starsky and returned to his beer. “No thanks.” He took another swig of beer. “Asshole,” he muttered into the bottle.
“Hey,” Starsky said, swallowing the last chuckle. “Even if they really had lost the fight for our raises, you would’ve gotten your expanded greenhouse.”
Hutch cocked one eye in his direction. “Yeah? How you figure that?”
“‘Cause you’ve got an interested, not to mention solvent, and not exactly silent partner right here. I’m always up for a good investment. Would’ve already made the offer if I’d known you were thinking about it. When’d you find time yesterday to hit the bank?”
Hutch offered him the smile that always preceded a particularly lame Hutchinson joke. “I didn’t exactly hit the bank, Starsk. Just went in and applied for a loan.”
Starsky groaned and raised his own empty beer bottle. “I need a few more of these in me before I can take knee-slappers like that one.”
“High comedy, Starsk. Difficult for the lowbrow to appreciate, I know, but–ouch!”
Starsky released his pinch grip on Hutch’s side. “Ya big baby, you’re wearing a thick shirt; it couldn’t’ve hurt that bad. And you deserved it. Seriously, the bank?”
“Oh, yesterday after lunch when I left Huggy’s. Stopped in on my way to the station.”
“Any particular reason you haven’t done it before now?”
Hutch gathered up his two empty bottles along with Starsky’s and hurried into the apartment. Starsky folded the paper and placed it on the small plant table beside Hutch’s green-leafed Donna Summer fan, then found a more comfortable position on the bench with less pressure on his delightfully tender rump. Hutch appeared, swinging two open bottles by their necks, and presented one to Starsky with what looked dangerously like his bedroom smile. Starsky trembled all over at the reminder that he now knew Hutch’s bedroom smile.
“Something I told Marianne kept coming back to me,” Hutch said. “In so many words, I told her she had to know what she wanted in life and decide she was worth it.”
“So you decided to practice what you preached?” At Hutch’s nod, Starsky slid closer to him on the bench. “Is that why you made your big move with that kiss last night?”
Hutch’s smile was definitely the bedroom variety. “Maybe. Might’ve also had something to do with the hard-on you sprung when you spun me around the skating floor. Or how you trembled every time you touched my hand.”
Time for Starsky to make his own big move. “Sitting pretty comfortable there, Blondie. Soreness better?”
Hutch’s ears pinked. “Better. Never was all that bad. You’re not exactly squirming.”
“I’m doing fine. We took Huggy’s advice.”
“Did we ever!” Hutch laughed. “Emptied three out of the four tubes of lube, permanently ruined my best sheets, and put a dent in the wall with those brass head rails.”
“Umm, yeah, but they sounded so good slamming up against the wall.”
Hutch’s upper body had a fine tremor of desire. “Thinking maybe I’d like to hear it again.”
“Me, too, but not right now,” Starsky said, plucking the bottle from Hutch’s hand. After a lingering pull on it, staring into Hutch’s eyes, he set it down on the potting table. “We probably need to go easy for a day or so, or we’ll never be welcome at Huggy’s again.”
“You’ve got a point. He had that I-told-you-so look when he met us out back this afternoon to exchange cars. What else do you have in mind?”
“Little of this, little of that. Huggy’s right. We climbed the whole mountain last night, but we missed some of the scenery on the way up, y’know?”
“Scenery, what sce–?” Hutch opened his mouth to Starsky’s kiss, their enjoyment of shared beer breath emphasizing their male-male connection in a way that tightened Starsky’s balls and pumped his blood to the brink of his heart’s capacity. He delved deep into his lover’s mouth, using his hands on Hutch’s face, neck, shoulders, arms, wherever he thought petting might stoke the fire, loving every touch he received in return. After a hot, wet interlude of necking, Starsky pulled away and left the bench to kneel in front of his partner. He pushed Hutch’s legs apart and knee-walked closer to his target.
“Starsky?”
“Thought about trying this last night, but we were too busy figuring out how to shove tab A into slot B without maiming ourselves for life.” He unzipped Hutch’s jeans, and the man under his spell lifted his ass on cue, allowing Starsky to slide the denim and underwear down to his thighs in one smooth motion. Hutch lowered himself again in a scoot backward, needing the bench’s firm wooden back for support, and watched Starsky contemplate the flushed, moist-tipped erection that jumped at the freedom.
Hutch couldn’t stand the heated stare for more than a minute. “Starsk, you…you can suck me if that’s what you’re–”
“Yeah. I’m kinda working up to that.”
Hutch gave a soft moan. “Not to rush you or anything, but you got any idea how long the working up to it will take?”
“All revved up?”
Hutch looked down at his groin. “I hope that’s what it is, or there’s something seriously wrong with my dick.”
“Nah. Nothing wrong with this big fella. I’m just coming up hard against the realization that being a talented suckee doesn’t make me a great sucker.”
With another tight moan, Hutch reached down to pet through Starsky’s hair and said, “How can I help?”
Starsky smiled up at him. “Tell me what you need to feel, what’ll blow your mind.”
“The thought of you blowing me blows my mind, but…okay, okay, lame jokes aside. Take the tip in your mouth–just the tip–and suck on it. Oh, God, that’s right, like that. Now slide your mouth slowly down.”
Sliding his mouth down the shaft per Hutch’s request, Starsky stopped midway and gripped the flesh with his lips like a miniature fist, inwardly shouting in victory at Hutch’s unabashed squeal.
“What the–?!”
Starsky pulled his mouth free and grinned up at his stunned partner. “Had that done to me by a very orally minded young lady once; thought you might like it much as I did.”
“Ummmhmm. All right, now give me some up-and-down action. S-slower, I’m n-not that far from–oo-ooh yeah, you’re good, you’re good, you’re… Starsk… Now use your hand. I like fingers on my balls. Three or four, not one or two.”
Starsky came up for air again and said, “You sound like James Bond orderin’ a martini. Shaken, not stirred.”
Hutch glared at him. “No smart-ass commentary on my expert blowjob lesson.”
Starsky feigned shock, clutching at his chest and rolling his eyes. “Expert? Expert, how? How many cocks’ve you sucked?”
Hutch looked ready to add some throttling to his glare. “I’m going to ignore that question on the basis that you and I both know it’s rhetorical.”
“Meaning zero.”
“Yes, Starsky, zero. A number that’s unlikely to change if you don’t do something besides gab at me!”
“How you can talk that sensible with a hard-on like this…makes you kinda superhuman.”
“Superhuman, hell! Focusing on semantics is the only way I can keep from coming all over your face. Now suck me with that fast-talking wet mouth of yours, please!”
“Tell me something. Am I the first person to suck you off on your greenhouse bench?”
“First and only. But I’m not off, yet, Starsky….”
Taking the hint, Starsky lowered his mouth again, teasing Hutch’s generous sac with three fingers–not one or two–and he didn’t pull away until he knew the most intimate taste of Hutch in his throat. The mechanics were awkward, with the edge of the bench butting against him, and Hutch’s involuntary sway, but Starsky loved the exotic atmosphere. It was like hot, fast love in a jungle. One day, when he had a little more experience, and some time to ponder the logistics, he would fuck Hutch on this bench, surrounded by all his precious green life, and turn him into the wild man Starsky knew his partner could be.
~*~
Love is higher than a mountain, thicker than water. You’re this dreamer’s only dream. Heaven’s angel, devil’s daughter.
“The deejay didn’t announce a couples’ skate, did he?” Starsky asked.
Engrossed in keeping his balance with half-pint Olympic-class speed skaters whooshing by him in a laughing blur, Hutch couldn’t be bothered to answer the question.
“Huh, Hutch? Did you hear him–?”
Hutch sighed. “No, I didn’t. But judging by the number of preteen Evil Knievels out here on roller skates, I doubt it.”
Unarmed and shaken by the attempt on their lives at the outdoor café, he and Starsky had decided to spend the rest of the day in public places–indoor public places. After three hours at a bowling alley and a lengthy dinner at a jam-packed diner, watching Starsky’s out-of-character grumbling over every penny spent, and his general moroseness dip toward outright dejection, Hutch had suggested roller skating, mindful of the enjoyment Starsky had shown the night their love lives changed forever. At first, Starsky had perked up, chattering about the differences Hutch would see in skating with a crowd and a full deejay set-up, and he didn’t mutter one negative word over the admission price for two adults or the skate rentals. But half an hour after hitting the skating floor and finding a non-life-threatening rhythm and pace amid the expert skaters of all ages, Starsky’s mood darkened again, and he kept throwing glances around as if primed on the edge of a stakeout bust.
“Maybe it wasn’t a good idea to come here,” Hutch said sympathetically. “I’ve been worried, too, about endangering innocent people. Those goons didn’t care if they took out half that cafe. What’s to keep them from starting a rampage in a skating rink? And we’d be hard-pressed to outrun them on wheels.”
“What?” Starsky asked, looking at him strangely.
Disco romance faded into silence followed by a loud drum and guitar rock song intro, and Starsky seemed to relax, but then the vocalists began yell-singing their tribute to the noblest emotion, and Hutch watched his skating partner tense again.
Love is like oxygen. You get too much, you get too high. Not enough, and you’re gonna die. Love gets you by. Love is like oxygen. You get too much, you get too high. Not enough and you’re gonna die. Love gets you high.
“What’s wrong, Starsk?”
Starsky glanced behind them again. “You notice how everybody’s lookin’ at us?”
Hutch was afraid to try turning his head for fear that his legs would catch on and try to go along for the ride, but he figured after twenty minutes of no falling and no need to even reach for Starsky’s arm for balance, he could risk a couple of peripheral glances. He saw no overt staring. Nothing to indicate they were receiving any more attention than the other skaters. But the intensity of Starsky’s discomfort turned his spinal cord to a column of ice with no specific reason he could name. “Uh, no. Why do you ask?”
Time on my side. I got it all. I’ve heard that pride always comes before a fall. There’s a rumor going ’round the town that you don’t want me around. I can’t shake off my city blues. Everywhere I turn I lose….
“Come on, Hutch,” Starsky forced the words through nearly closed lips. “We’re the only guys out here our age.”
“No, we’re not. That guy over there with the girl in red looks about our age. And him, there, twirling the Flamenco-skirted lady who really knows how to skate, he’s got to be at least thirty.”
“With women, yeah!” Starsky snapped. “You didn’t let me finish. We’re the only guys out here together.”
“So?” Just when the possibility of a very important “so” occurred to him, the song’s chorus played again, and Starsky swiveled on his skates in a perfect spin marred by his angry look at the deejay booth.
“Don’t they ever play songs without ‘love’ in the title? I wonder if they even have anything up in that booth besides ‘Sweet Home Alabama’ that’s not a love song?”
“What’s wrong with love songs?” Hutch asked.
“Don’t ask me. Ask everybody else that wants to know what we’re doing out here.”
“Starsky, you’re pretty much redefining paranoia right now.”
“Oh, yeah?” Starsky softened his angry look when he faced Hutch, but not by much. “You didn’t see that kid in the green stare a hole through us on his way by a minute ago.”
Hutch laughed out loud and looked around for the teenager in question. “Him? He’s wearing what amounts to a green jumpsuit with sequins. Looks like a male figure skater costume. Hell, not to stereotype, but he was probably checking both of us out.”
Starsky’s visible discomfiture increased by a striking blush and roll of shoulders that too closely approached a shudder for Hutch’s liking.
“Interesting how you weren’t scandalized when that high school girl skated by winking at you. Her damn skirt was so short, she needs to stand with her legs together and let someone pull her along to keep on the safe side of legality.”
“I’m not scandalized,” Starsky said, low-voiced again. “I just didn’t think we were that obvious. You know, that he could think we’re fair game for checking out. We’re not even holding hands or skating all that close.”
Hutch smiled. “If the kid is gay, Starsk, he’d probably give us a second look whether he thinks we are or not. We’re not being obvious. Anyway, who cares? We don’t answer to the police department rules and regs now. Wanta hold hands?”
Starsky shied from Hutch’s outstretched hand with the wide-eyed alarm of a skittish colt rearing from a snake underfoot. “No! I mean…yeah, but….”
A daredevil kid spinning and gyrating past, dribbling an imaginary basketball and doing his damnedest to be the first Harlem Globetrotter of Asian descent, bounced his invisible ball too close to Hutch to avoid collision. The kid kept his balance with ease, but Starsky had to grab Hutch around the waist for support while the inexperienced skater coaxed his legs into staying on course, and the miniature globetrotter gave them a look combining amusement and disgust as only teenagers can do.
“Sorry, guys,” the kid snickered, making a mockery of the last word, and skated away in the roller skating version of a layup into an invisible basket.
“Hey, watch where you’re goin’ before you hurt someone out here!” Starsky yelled at the boy. Hutch put a comforting hand on his arm, but Starsky flinched from the touch.
Hutch did a double take. Starsky had looked embarrassed by his hold around Hutch’s waist, yet he’d unashamedly pulled that maneuver on half a dozen basketball courts all over the city with any number of competitors and teammates looking on. After years of platonic hair ruffling, arm squeezes, full body hugs, and a sizable collection of other touches that had verged on caresses–some of which had taken place right under Dobey’s nose–Hutch’s touchy-feely partner could get embarrassed about this?
When I get home, babe, gonna light your fire. All day I’ve been thinking about you, babe, you’re my one desire. Gonna wrap my arms around you, hold you close to me. Oh, babe, I wanna taste your lips. I wanna fulfill your fantasy.
“Well, there you go, Starsk. A song without ‘love’ in the title. Happy now?”
Starsky gave him a sour look, his response drowned out when the deejay’s smooth, radio-quality voice boomed over his microphone, “Listen up, cats and kitties. Gonna spin you some lighting magic, so let’s make this one a couples-only skate. All you lovebirds out there, skate close and cuddle closer, ’cause you’ve got the floor!”
I don’t know where I’d be without you, babe. I don’t know what I’d do. You’re not just another lover. No, you’re everything to me.
The overhead lights dimmed, and the silver disco ball began its sparkler trick that Hutch remembered from their special night, raining diamonds of light on the floor. He turned to make a comment on it to his partner, and realized he had to book it to catch up to Starsky on his way to the carpeted sidelines.
Every time I’m with you, baby, I can’t believe it’s true. When you’re lying in my arms doing the things you do. You can see it in my eyes, I can feel it in your touch. You don’t have to say a thing, just let me show how much….I love you, I need you, yeah….
He sat down next to Starsky on the carpeted bench near the concessions area and hated the helpless ache developing inside. “Where’s the fire, Starsky?”
“You heard the deejay. Couples-only skate.”
“No kidding. We qualify.”
Starsky turned a heartbreaking frown his way. “Why’re you being so naïve about this, Hutch? No, we damn well don’t qualify. Not to those people out there. You heard the deejay. ‘All you cats and kitties’.”
“It’d be a pretty enlightened skating rink for him to say ‘cats and cats’ and ‘kitties and kitties.’ But people from all walks of life are out there. Yeah, I’ll admit I don’t see a same-sex couple right now, but I doubt they’d be up in arms over two guys staying on the floor during a couples-only skate. And you can’t know what all of them would think about us.”
“Most of ’em.”
“Maybe. Why do you care? If we were still on the force, it’d be too dangerous to advertise. But now, we’re free to advertise what we want, within reason, and holding hands on the skating floor isn’t enough to land us in jail.” Hutch nudged Starsky with an elbow and tried to laugh. “If we got arrested for that, our former employers would be buying us a retirement villa in Rio after we took them to court and sued their pants off.”
I wanna kiss you all over. And over again. I wanna kiss you all over. Till the night closes in. Till the night closes in.
Hutch’s hope that the sensuous song would inspire Starsky to suggest they go home and be affectionate in ways that could get them arrested in public was dashed by the darkness in his lover’s tone and the worry that appeared to be tangibly weighing on his shoulders. Starsky hunched over and crossed his elbows over his knees. “If she knew the truth, Mardean Rigger would probably think she had cause to sue the Department.”
“I agree. The handling of Lionel’s case, not to mention the way they treated his good faith and legitimacy as a source, was criminally negligent, and I’m still sick to my stomach we were caught up in the middle of that mess with no way to keep him out of the spotlight.”
“Not talking about that. I meant the Department allowing lovers to work as partners.”
Hutch laid his palm gently over the small of Starsky’s back, but the sudden rigidity of muscle under his hand made him draw his hand back as if from scalding heat. “Oh, come on, Starsky. They didn’t ‘allow’ us. They didn’t know. If they had known, we wouldn’t have been on the force at all, much less paired with each other. No one knew. We worked hard to make sure no one knew.”
“No one except the mechanic who banked his reputation and probably his life on me running out of that building when your car turned into fricasseed squash. ‘A weapon in the wrong hands,’ Huggy said. Didn’t get us killed, though. Collateral damage.”
I’m gonna walk away from love…gonna walk away, gonna walk away. I’m gonna walk away from love. Gonna walk away….
Hutch wondered if he now knew how allergic people felt after a bee sting. He couldn’t seem to swallow no matter how hard he tried, and the back of his throat felt like thousand-year-old parchment. “Starsk, tell me the truth. Do you believe you rushed out there to me because we’re sleeping together now?”
I’m gonna walk away from love…gonna walk away, gonna walk away. I’m gonna walk away from love. Gonna walk away….
Knowing the wrong answer would probably destroy their love affair as efficiently as someone had iced Lionel, Hutch felt his lungs expand again when Starsky shook his head. “I’ve had to ask myself a few hard questions. But I’m the guy who blew away those kidnappers when I thought you were a goner, never mind the missing girl I was leaving to swing in the wind, and that was before we’d even talked about going to bed. I know abandoning Lionel had nothing to do with what you and I get up to off the job. But what I know and what the world knows are cats of a different color.”
It’s not that I don’t love you. You know how much I do. It’s not that I found someone who can take the place of you. It’s just the fear that builds within me every time you touch my hand. And a dread that shakes my body that even I don’t understand.
“You have no proof that rumors or suspicions about our personal relationship had anything to do with the way they set up Lionel. There aren’t words for how deep it cuts that we lost him, but please, Starsky, don’t tell me you’re giving the sons-of-bitches responsible one more victory by sitting here second-guessing what we have.”
So I’m leaving. Yes I am. This time I’m playing it smart. I’m going to walk away from love. Before love…breaks my heart….
“Hutch, right now I’d give my left nut to have you wrap your arms around me like that couple at that table over there.” Hutch followed the line of Starsky’s head tilt and spotted the college-age boy and girl cuddled up together on one space-age, neon-green-colored plastic booth bench at a snack table. He started to move his arms and fulfill his partner’s request, but Starsky’s preemptive slide a few inches away forced him to wrap his arms around his own chest for want of someone better to hold.
“No badges, no IA watchdogs in sight, and I still can’t get comfortable with holding you in a goddamn roller rink. Hell, two years ago, when we weren’t banging each other, I probably would’ve been hanging all over you and raising the eyebrows of half the people in here. And now, ’cause we are, I feel like this bench’s too small for both of us. Something’s not right with that, Hutch, hear me?”
In the blissful silence at song’s end, Hutch hoped for anything neutral, including the “Hokey Pokey” or “Itsy-bitsy Spider,” but DJ Oyster Cat obviously had a thing for lover’s lament set to pop rhythm.
Don’t pull your love out on me, baby. If you do, then I think that maybe I’ll just lay me down, cry for a hundred years. Don’t pull your love out on me, honey. Take my heart, my soul, my money, but don’t leave me here drowning in my tears….
Watching Starsky’s frown waver and his lowered head droop another inch, Hutch had to take action. “I know they have something up there besides love songs!” He drew his hand across his neck in a slicing motion. “I’ve had it up to here with love songs!” Hastily untying and removing his skates for the stability of sock feet, he jumped up and left Starsky sitting on the bench.
With one goal in sight, Hutch pushed through the milling teenagers, dodged clusters of laughing adults, and located the carpeted stairway to the deejay’s booth. He reached over the waist-high half door and turned the lock. DJ Oyster Cat glanced up from sifting through records and switched off his microphone.
“Hey, man, you better take yourself back down those stairs before I call security up here to drag your ass down ’em.”
Hutch held up both hands to convey that he came in peace. “I’m an ex-cop,” he said. “Believe me, the last thing I have on my mind is violence to you or your glorified stereo.”
DJ Oyster Cat did not look impressed. Hands on hips, he tilted his head to the side and smirked. “Listen, Mr. Ex-Police Man, that means about jack shit in here.”
“Ex-Detective Sergeant. And you listen. I’m all for freedom of expression. I’m all against censorship. But for ten consecutive minutes, could you not play a love song? I know you have at least one song that doesn’t use the word ‘love’ in it.” He squeezed into the small booth and reached for the deejay’s stack of records. “Here, I’ll find you one.”
“Hey, hey, hey!” the deejay yelled, grabbing for the records. “Easy on the tunes! God, man, you like living dangerously. Even the cat that runs this place knows better than to come in here and put his paws on my tunes. Only the very special and very invited get to come in here and touch my tunes.”
“Listen, Mister, you don’t want to bother me with trivialities right now.”
“Trivialities! Mr. De-teck-tive Man, in this booth, I’m next-door to God.” He held out his hand in a mocking offer of handshake. “Allow me to introduce myself. Confucius H. Christ, at your service.”
Hutch didn’t shake the hand offered. “Yeah? Well, right now, I’m feeling like Nietzsche. The cat who said–”
“God is dead,” DJ Oyster Cat finished, looking sympathetic for the first time since Hutch had barged into his domain. “Man, you must be having serious heart issues.”
“My partner is,” Hutch said, purposely using the ambiguous word. “And when he is, I am. So can you please just–?”
“Hey, blood, love is love. Nothing to get uptight about.”
Hutch thought seriously about breaking one of the man’s precious records. “Really? You see that curly-haired guy in the jeans and leather jacket on the bench down there? Tell him that.”
Now DJ Oyster Cat’s smile went beyond sympathy all the way to empathy, and turned Hutch’s heart upside down. “Skittish man friend? I can dig your troubles.”
The turn of phrase brought Hutch up short. He looked closer at the man. DJ Oyster Cat dressed more for a European runway than a Southern California roller rink. Creamy cashmere accentuated a well-developed chest and his deep caramel complexion, his jewelry unique but not gaudy, and his slacks had probably cost enough to gas a Buick up for a year. Stylish, attractive, natural sense of self worth, intelligent and passionate about his chosen vocation–Hutch knew someone who would find that combination irresistible.
“You live in Venice, about a block or so from Venice Place and Chez Helene?”
“Nope, but my brother does. You know my brother Curtis?”
“No, but I–”
“Got a skittish man friend himself, Curtis does,” DJ Oyster Cat interrupted. “My brother’s a doctor and you think he’d be the one scared of the E-stab-lish-ment–a black doctor in a white doctor’s world–but hell no, it’s his man friend who’s got nobody to answer to but himself, the fool. Love both of ’em, man, but their on-again-off-again shit is enough to drive this brother insane, I will tell you that. Me, I say be cool, be cool. My ladies come and go, sure, but my music is here to stay and that keeps my groove on the nice and easy. Sure you don’t know Curtis?”
“No, but I think I’ve met his skittish man friend a time or two.” Despite his own developing panic over Starsky’s attitude, Hutch tried to smile, and held out his hand. “Small world. I’ll take that handshake now, if you don’t mind. Here’s to an end to skittishness everywhere.”
“Hear, hear, my brother,” said DJ Oyster Cat, shaking Hutch’s hand vigorously. “For you, I’m gonna spin something that won’t tread on your partner’s tender tootsies or hurt his heart. Any time you’re here, you’ve got my ear. Just tell me what you want.”
“Thanks.” Hutch left the booth, strangely comforted by the brief commiseration.
Behind him, DJ Oyster Cat had switched on the microphone. “Cats and kitties, I was about to give you some of the incomparable Mr. White, but I’ve had a request to put the fre-e-e-e-ze on rhythmic romance for a few spins. So let’s boost the tempo and boogie. Get out your rags and buckets, BC skaters, we’re going to a Car Wash!”
Hutch cringed, and decided he should go back up to the booth and break all the man’s records. He hadn’t asked for a grand announcement, just the thing to turn a skittish man friend into a bolter. He needn’t have worried. Starsky sat glued to the plush bench, guarding Hutch’s rented skates. Hutch rushed back to him, and, desperately needing the reassurance of Starsky’s warmth, sat down right next to him so at least their arms brushed. “Would you say you’re feeling skittish right now?”
Starsky’s wide eyes and wrinkled nose confusion were priceless and would have made Hutch laugh out loud under any other circumstances. “Huh?”
“Never mind. Can you see Huggy with a doctor? Don’t know why, but I’m having a hard time wrapping my mind around that one. Must be one last remnant of Hutchinson snobbery I haven’t beaten down all the way.”
Starsky looked away from him, too absorbed in his own darkness to ask what Hutch meant about Huggy and the doctor. “Let’s get out of here, huh? If that goon squad hasn’t chased us down by now, I doubt they will. Must’ve been an isolated scare tactic.”
“Fine,” Hutch said, not trying to hide the weariness in his voice. “Sitting on the sidelines watching people skate is about as fun as a dental appointment anyway.”
~*~
Hutch watched Starsky’s aimless knee bouncing. Home from the roller rink, Starsky had entered the apartment behind Hutch on a nonstop near run to the greenhouse where he sat down on the bench and hadn’t budged since.
They were grieving, Hutch told himself, not in the way Mardean and Jamie were, or Huggy, but grieving nonetheless. Grieving not only for Lionel, but also for what they had lost along with him–their self-respect as cops, their belief in their ability to do the right thing, and possibly their friendship with Huggy. That was enough to put anyone in the doldrums. After a night of we’re-so-glad-to-be-alive-and-together sex, they had been abstinent in the days that followed. Hutch had thought the roller skating excursion might ignite a spark, but now he knew tragedy wasn’t the only demon chasing Starsky, and the trip to BC Skates might just have poured water on their fire’s remaining embers.
He wondered how he still had a pulse after that thought, but one look at Starsky’s slumped profile, and he understood. His lifeblood flowed with one purpose when there were no others left, to be there for Starsky. And if that meant taking the first step into his own private hell, he’d have to learn to like the fire. With that in mind, he went into the greenhouse and sat down beside his soon-to-be-temporarily, or permanently, ex-lover and held out a beer bottle.
“It’s okay,” he said softly, when Starsky accepted the beverage with a weak smile.
“What is?”
“To tell me something isn’t working. The way you were acting at the rink, Starsk, it wasn’t all about Lionel. It was typical guy-looking-for-an-out. I’ve done it myself. Is this something I can fix?” Hutch had to look elsewhere, finding a nearby potted violet and counting the leaves for a needed distraction to steel himself against the embarrassment of his next question. “Is it something about the way we are in bed? Something I need to improve?”
A warm hand cradled the back of his neck and encouraged him with a gentle push to turn his head and make eye contact. Starsky’s blue eyes were shimmering, his expression a fine line between pleasure and pain. “You know how you make me feel in bed. You have me screaming like I never did before. Hell, you give a whole new meaning to ‘coming,’ ’cause I damn near end up in a different geographic location after we get through.”
“Same here, Starsk.”
“But that’s the point. People who feel that way about each other are entitled to some basics, don’t you think? Holding hands in public, smooching on a park bench, the couples’ skate at BC Skates, just to name a few of the smaller ones. Won’t even get into the bigger ones too far out of reach to even see. I want those basics with you, Hutch. Without having to look over my shoulder or think about the world. Without taking a hating world into bed with us. The world out there’s breaking my heart.”
Oh, God. So the mutterings at the rink and the skittishness weren’t just symptoms, they were the disease. Hutch had lifted up supplication to any gods that might befriend novice homosexuals for a fixable problem. He should have known otherwise. Starsky wouldn’t brood over something he could readily get from Hutch. Starsky would put on that horny smile and push them both into bed to make sure Hutch got whatever it was right.
The timing of this made sense, Hutch realized. While on the force, they’d had to be so careful and discreet they gave little thought to what they couldn’t have, trying too hard to survive and keep secret what they could manage together behind closed doors. Off the job, in their freedom to think about a future without that immediate danger, the world’s conventions and restrictions became too striking to ignore.
“Starsk, it’s a shitty way to live, you’re right, but at least we’re alive and together. Other cultures have had to fight for those basics you’re referring to. If you’re up to the fight, I’m with you all the way.”
Starsky squeezed Hutch’s neck one last time and withdrew his hand. He hadn’t taken the first sip of his beer, the bottle propped between his legs and forgotten, but the imagery of the longneck standing at attention so near Starsky’s groin served as poignant reminder of what Hutch stood to lose in just the sexual part of their relationship. He couldn’t even contemplate stepping back from the closeness, the intimacy that drew circles around anything they’d had before.
“Hutch, right now everything’s upside down. Can’t even explain it. You haven’t felt it?”
“I’ve felt something. Guess I was afraid to look too hard at it.”
“What I know how to do, better’n anything else, is be your best friend and partner. This new stuff, it’s great, like I said, but it’s new…and I’m on shaky ground with it.”
“How can I help?”
“I need time, Hutch. Time to get my head together about where we’re headed, what we’re up against out there. Can we take a break?”
Hutch couldn’t resist brushing his fingers through the curls dipping low over Starsky’s forehead. “I remember you saying you couldn’t walk away from this unless someone held a gun to my head.”
“Before Blaine’s case opened my eyes about a few things, I didn’t hate gays, but I was one of the guys who thought the explanation for two men together might make a good Star Trek or Outer Limits episode. I sure as hell wasn’t breaking my neck to lend ’em a hand or help their cause, except for the fairness I tried to show everybody on our beat who wasn’t out there hurting other people. But now, the thought of millions of other guys like I was back then, not to mention the people who do take ignorance up a notch or three to hate, feels like a fuckin’ Howitzer pointed at both our heads.”
“You want to turn back the clock to the buddy-buddy days?”
“I know we can’t do that. Can’t erase what’s been, and I don’t want to. I’m saying can we stop the clock for a while?”
In other words, suspend all the romantic feelings and physical expression of them until the world changed, or Starsky’s perception of it did. Hutch hopped up from the bench and fled to the boundary of his greenhouse, wanting to run and keep running, out into the sky and far, far away. He gulped down half his beer but barely tasted the alcohol. He tried hard not to hate the world. He tried hard not to hate the people who had never given a thought to love being gender blind, or the people who had given it a thought and condemned gender blindness to a special corner of Hell. Hutch didn’t believe in hate. Hate did nothing but destroy, tear down, undermine. But he could understand now, in a deeply personal way, why some gays and lesbians shied away from heterosexuals–all heterosexuals–as fervently as they were persecuted by the straight world. A vicious, ravenous cycle. In a community of weary adult swimmers in those choppy seas, he and Starsky were still children unable to stray off the beach.
No wonder Starsky feared the rip currents.
Staring at his hands, the curve of his right around the beer bottle, his left palm up, he wondered how he could ever teach them to touch another person sexually after he quit touching Starsky. “Is this a ‘see other people’ break you’re talking about?”
In the lengthy silence that followed, he looked over his shoulder and felt a dull pain at Starsky’s brow-scratching, knee-tapping, foot swinging discomfort. “Maybe a ‘wait and see’ break?”
“It’s not like you’d be breaking some vow, Starsky. We fell into bed that first night and didn’t do a lot of talking. No promises or sweet-talking. And I’m not complaining. It was one of the best nights I’ve spent on this earth. Bottom line: I love you, and that’s here to stay. No matter what goes down.”
“I love you, too, Hutch. That’s not in question here, okay?”
“So what now?”
“Whaddaya mean, what now? We’re partners; that’s what. We’ve got that job interview at the employment commission tomorrow, and we’ll go together. We’ll find work together. We don’t let quitting the force start shaving that seventy-five percent of time together down to thirty or less. Can you handle that without the–you know?”
“The hanky panky?” Hutch smiled. “Handled it before, didn’t I?” Not well. I’ll do better this time.
With a few absent-minded swallows, Starsky paid lip service to his neglected beer and rose from the bench. “All right, then. I’m headed out.”
“Headed out where?” Hutch asked, confused.
“My place, dummy,” Starsky said, smiling. For all his talk about not turning back the clock, he sounded like the Starsky of four years past.
“Starsk, you think that’s a good idea? All other issues aside, we were targets today. There’s safety in numbers. Stay here. You’ve survived my couch before. Or I can take the couch, and you can have the bed.” At Starsky’s headshake, Hutch had doubts about their partnership surviving for the first time in months. “What happened to not cutting down on time together?”
“I meant that, Hutch. But tonight I need to take a step back. Look, they’ve taken their parting shot. We got the point. We’re off the force and laying low, right? Right. I doubt they’re going to all the trouble of coming after us at home. But if it’ll make you breathe easier, I won’t park the Torino right outside my place. With no car outside Venice Place and no Torino outside mine, any casual observers will have to do some higher math to figure out where we are. When do you want me here in the morning to pick you up for the interview? Thirty minutes before?”
“No. Call me when you get home, tell me where you’re parked, and I’ll meet you there.”
“How?”
Hutch tried to look blasé about replacing the precious decrepit Ford Starsky had bought him after an attempted hit in the form of a car “accident” claimed the first squash mobile. The hit man who had blown this LTD sky high had not just demolished a car, but with it the tangible reminder of the first time he had said the words “I love you” aloud to Starsky, if only in a half-joking, grateful manner. “I’ll take a cab to Wally’s good ole chariot emporium and pick up some wheels. Funny, now I really do need wheels of the non-roller-skating variety.”
Starsky’s grimace implied that Hutch had just suggested slashing all the Torino’s tires for kicks. “You’re going to Fifth Avenue’s brother for a car? For God’s sake, can’t you respect the automotive industry a little more than that?”
“Wally’s a crook, but he’s got a few worthwhile deals if you have the eye for a diamond in the rough. I’m not in the market for a big red-and-white bull’s-eye to match yours.”
Starsky shrugged. “Suit yourself.” He smiled again and took a step closer to Hutch. “How about a kiss for the road?”
The request was so classic Starsky that Hutch didn’t bother protesting how a kiss would muddy the already murky waters of what Starsky hoped to accomplish with their “break.”
He waited for Starsky to come to him, but that ended his passivity. When Starsky neared within reach, Hutch pulled him by the hand into his arms and then pulled out all the stops, showing him in sexual language what he couldn’t tell him. When Starsky tried to quicken the movement of their lips, Hutch slowed them down to sensual lingering. He captured Starsky’s tongue in his mouth and spared none of his best moves, fighting for him in a way he couldn’t fight the world. Only when Starsky seemed determined to leave without half his tongue, if necessary, did Hutch let him go. Still panting and close to seeing stars, as if Cupid had opted for dropping an anvil on his head instead of piercing him with the cliché arrows, Hutch watched his world leave the greenhouse.
Starsky made it as far as the threshold before he did an about-face and returned equally breathless to Hutch. “How about one more for the road?” He went into Hutch’s arms, and Hutch dropped his beer bottle to its demise so he could make use of both hands, having much better activities in mind for his right than dangling a sweating beer bottle by the neck. This kiss outdid the other, and their bodies joined in the fun, including their legs, which were charting a course to the greenhouse bench.
Hutch planted his feet in an effort to slow their momentum. Starsky swayed up against him, then melted, turning his chin up in search of another kiss. Lightly cradling Starsky’s face in both hands, Hutch smiled on him. “God only knows how much I want you right now, but I have to ask. Can you handle it?”
“What d’you mean?”
“Thought you had to take a step back?”
Starsky brought his hands up to cover Hutch’s. “I was taking a step back, several in fact, toward that bench. Until you stopped us.”
“Starsk?”
“You always ask, don’t you? You always ask, you never just take.”
“I took that first kiss without asking. Nearly shocked you off your skates.”
Starsky grinned. “That kiss was nothing but one big question, buddy. You were so nervous you could hardly keep your lips pressed to mine. Point is, I can always trust you to be thinking up here…” He tapped Hutch’s forehead with a tender fingertip. “…about what I need. No matter what this here…” He stroked that fingertip down the front of Hutch’s jeans. “…is thinking.”
Hutch reached down and held that fingertip in place, feeling himself throb against it. Starsky closed his eyes and gave a slight jerk of his hips. “Starsk. Starsky,” Hutch said until Starsky opened his eyes. “You can trust me. Period.”
“I know. I do. With my life.”
They ended up on the bench, their jeans yanked down to their thighs, jerking each other off and using their unoccupied hands to pet and soothe. For a casual jerk-off it was a rough, draining ride, intensified by their passion and the threat of separation hovering near, and they crashed on the other side of it in each other’s arms, half-kissing, half-snoozing, half-dead.
Starsky bounced back to life less than ten minutes later, reached for his leather jacket that had ended up in a heap on the nearest plant table, and looked ready to make good on his promise of leaving. Hutch tugged on his hand. “Starsk, please. Stay here.”
Starsky brought that hand to his lips and kissed the knuckles before releasing him. “Can’t. If I stay, we’ll land in that brass bed of yours, and I can’t handle that right now. A few minutes of those bed rails slamming the wall would shoot my will power to hell.”
“Thought you trusted me.”
“Do. Don’t trust myself.”
“Starsky, what’s it matter what we are to people out there? Hell, we can pretend we’re still cops and keep hiding, if that’s what you want. What we are in here isn’t anyone’s business but ours unless we want it to be.”
“Fact that you gotta say that to me is the problem, Hutch. What I feel for you in here…” His loosely balled fist pounded up against his chest. “Is solid. I need time to decide how to handle what we’ll face out there when we quit hiding. I wasn’t thrilled about having to be one person behind closed doors and another out in the world, either. Undercover as a cop is one thing. Never had it in mind for my love life.”
This time Hutch’s world made it all the way out the front door.
~*~
Hutch saw the pretty blonde eyeing him again and hoped she didn’t have it in mind to ask him to skate. Her suede halter-top and tailored jeans advertised a body he could play like a Stradivarius, if he decided to take up the violin, and her girl-next-door face and innocent smile didn’t hurt. He hadn’t carded her, but she carried herself like a woman who had seen at least a quarter of a century, well beyond legal.
But he wasn’t here to pick up a skating partner or a one-night stand.
He and Starsky had been playing a good-natured tug of war with Allison May since they left the steps of the County South Building that afternoon. After a debate over what they could all do together–and Allison’s unstudied conventionality kept one suggestion from even being uttered–Starsky had suggested they be BC Skates’ best-dressed roller skaters.
Suits, dress, and all.
Fond as he was of the girl, Hutch had hoped against hope that Allison would say she couldn’t skate any more than she could roundhouse kick through six stacked 2 x 4s, but she had given her heroes one of her sunshine smiles at the idea. She hadn’t skated for years, she told them, but she used to really enjoy it when she had a summer job in high school at one of those drive-in diners where the waitresses wear skates. Starsky had expressed his disbelief, and Hutch had to endure Allison’s description of her cute little waitress uniform, and cute little white skates, and cute little bobby-soxer ponytail, while Starsky stood by practically salivating.
Hutch could see the headline.
All-American Cop Reunited with All-American Girl, Expecting All-American Triplets.
Heterosexual America rejoices.
So on their last free day before officially rejoining the ranks of BC’s Finest, they were roller skating in their best suits, playing a grown-up version of “keep away” with a friendly, good-hearted girl who enjoyed soaking up the attention. Starsky had won this round, by virtue of his skating prowess–or prowess compared to Hutch, anyway–and whisked Allison off into a cuddle skate at the far end of the rink.
Watching them from a distance, Hutch was astonished that he didn’t feel what he’d expected. He had waited for the bright, colorful, no-expense-spared skating rink to turn into a dim, cheap dance hall in his mind. But the disco soul and laughing skaters flying past him weren’t all that kept him oriented to place. Instead of jealousy or anger, a bittersweet combination of happiness and mourning filled him–happiness for Starsky’s enjoyment of twirling Allison around on skates with no disapproving glances or snide remarks to darken their fun, mournful that he couldn’t give Starsky such a simple thing himself, through no fault of his own.
I really am in love with him. The happy for him if it kills me kind of in love.
Why wasn’t he afraid? He should be afraid, if he had any sense.
She had everything Starsky needed. He was her hero, just as he had always been Hutch’s. Back in the day when she was Laura and Starsky was Davey, they’d shared a friendship as tight as a storybook family. They each knew the loss of parents. They had faced danger together. She could give him children and a relationship he could parade around town with pride and no fear. She could be his partner, not professionally, but in every other way that counted. Everything Starsky needed to replace what his broken childhood had cost him, he could find in her.
Knowing all that, Hutch still had no intention of skating over to slap Allison’s cheek with a glove and set up a dawn meeting place for settling this once and for all at ten paces, turn, and fire. He had no fear that he stood in front of another Kira crossroads with betrayal down one road and mind-racking loss down the other. So he watched Starsky with his girl-next-door-friend and half ached, half smiled. Suddenly feeling himself the center of attention, he looked up and around, almost sniffing the air for danger. Scanning the rink, his gaze stopped on DJ Oyster Cat. The deejay had been watching him.
Watching him watch Starsky.
The generic disco song ended abruptly, courtesy of the deejay, who appeared to be speed-searching through his collection. Then a voice over the microphone broke the silence. “Hey, BC Skaters, if you’re feeling a little underdressed, you got reason. We got us a Brooks Brothers fashion show in here today. So for the well-dressed curly-haired dude and his lady friend, I’m sending out a little Gibb family wisdom. Listen up, Don Juan.”
Baby, I can’t figure it out. Your kisses taste like honey. Sweet lies don’t give me no rise. Oh, oh, what you trying to do? Livin’ on your cheatin’, and the pain grows inside me. It’s enough to leave me crying in the rain. Love you forever, but you’re driving me insane.
Hutch watched in horror as Starsky stumbled and nearly pulled Allison down with him. She looked befuddled at the singling out, but Starsky, recovering quickly, skated her around in a gentler circle, his gaze searching for one face in the crowd. From the distance, even with the view obscured by passing skaters, Hutch could tell Starsky’s eyes held no accusation when they locked on his, only shock.
And I’m hanging on. Oh, oh, oh, oh. Oh, I’ll win, I’ll never give in. Our love has got the power. Too many lovers in one lifetime ain’t good for you.
He had to get to that deejay booth, Hutch decided, or die trying. Whatever DJ Oyster Cat’s intentions, to help Hutch’s cause or to do for him what he couldn’t seem to do for his brother Curtis and Huggy, Hutch had to silence that song before Starsky ended up with more than a broken leg. Hutch would never survive watching that all-important heart break across the rink.
You treat me like a vision in the night– Someone there to stand behind you when your world ain’t working right. I ain’t no vision, I’m the man who loves you inside and out, backwards and forwards with my heart hanging out. I love no other way. What am I gonna do if we lose that fire?
Adrenaline, and desperate need to preserve Starsky’s sanity if nothing else, transformed Hutch into a competitive-class skater. He weaved through the flowing circle of skaters without faltering, and skated a flawless straight line over to the carpet.
Wrap myself up and take me home again. Too many heartaches in one lifetime ain’t good for me. I figure it’s the love that keeps you warm. Let this moment be forever, we won’t ever feel the storm. I ain’t no vision, I’m the man who loves you inside and out, backwards and forwards with my heart hanging out.
Skating on the carpet proved more challenging, but he couldn’t waste time unlacing and shedding his skates. Waylaid by a group of stumbling, giggling middle-schoolers who apparently had as little skating experience as he did, Hutch nearly brained a few of the oblivious kids in his haste to reach the stairs to the deejay booth. By force of will and his nobler instincts, he threaded through their undulating maze without brushing even his coat sleeve against one of the maddening preteens.
Don’t try to tell me it’s all over. I can’t hear a word, I can’t hear a line. No man could love you more. And that’s what I’m cryin’ for. You can’t change the way I feel inside.
He risked a nasty spill to turn his head for a glimpse of Starsky. He had no idea what his partner could be saying to Allison, but the headshakes and hand gestures weren’t indicative of pleasure. Then Starsky was escorting her in a smooth skate over to the nearest sideline. More determined than ever, Hutch made peace with the carpet and reached the stairs, gripping the railing and pulling himself up the stairs one skate at a time, knowing that one wrong move would mean a backwards tumble that might literally break his neck.
You’re the reason for my laughter and my sorrow. Blow out the candle I will burn again tomorrow. No man on earth can stand between my love and I. And no matter how you hurt me I will love you till I die….
At the top of the stairs, he didn’t try to get the door open. Clinging to the railing one-handed, he waved his other hand until he got DJ Oyster Cat’s attention. “What the hell are you trying to do?!” He yelled under cover of the loud music.
DJ Oyster Cat opened the door and beckoned him in the hallowed musical palace. “What you mean, what am I trying to do? I’m trying to put your two-timin’ man friend in his place. Shi-i-i-it, Mr. Ex-Detective Man, you deserve better’n that fool, don’t you know that?”
“Turn it off!” Hutch shouted. “Right now. Put on something else. Anything else. Scratch that. Anything without a message meant to skewer my partner.”
“Okay, okay. Damn, that’s what I get for being a Good Samaritan.” DJ Oyster Cat yanked the Bee Gees and replaced them with metal guitar and drums. Hutch had never been so glad to hear “Teenage Rampage.” As soon as the background singers began yelling, “We Want Sweet! We Want Sweet!” the middle-schoolers took over the floor, skating in a cheering, serpentine pattern that proved Hutch wrong about their talent.
Protected by the loud music, Hutch glanced at the microphone switch for reassurance that it rested safely in the off position. Then he set about tearing a chunk out of DJ Oyster Cat’s hide. “It’s not what you think,” he told him. “We’re here together, the three of us.”
“Oh, it’s like that.” The deejay scowled. “Hey, man, you want my advice? If men’re gonna be with men, they need to be with men. If they’re gonna be with women, they need to be with women. When they start trying to sit on top of that high pointed fence, they get a sore ass that ain’t the fun kind. Take it from my brother Curtis. He has to put up with that shit from his man friend.”
“It’s not like that either. You don’t know what you’re messing with here.”
DJ Oyster Cat had cynical smiling down to a fine art. “Oh, really? Suppose you tell me what I’m messing with? Go on, Goldilocks. School me. What am I messing with?”
“She’s a friend of ours. She’s had a rough time like you wouldn’t believe, and we brought her here to give her a few laughs. She knew my partner when they were kids.”
“You’re trying to tell me that’s the only reason he’s doing roller skate ballet out there with her? I think I need to dust off the Gibb brothers again. I got another one for Mr. Slick.”
“Don’t you dare,” Hutch growled, reaching inside his jacket and flashing his badge. “I’m not an Ex-Detective Man anymore. Believe me, you don’t want me to quit pretending I can’t see the distinct shape of a joint in your vest pocket!”
“Hey, brother, lay off the poh-lice man vibe. It’s purely medicinal.”
“Possession in a place frequented by minors is purely a ticket to jail. My partner’s skating with her because he can, while I’m still trying to figure out how to do more than skate-and-stop in these damn things. I’d land her in the ER if I tried to twirl her around.”
“Uh-huh. That don’t change the way you look at him while he’s doing that twirling.”
Returning his badge to his inside pocket, Hutch gripped the edge of the music counter to keep from clenching his fist. “Okay, you’re right. Most guys in my position would feel threatened. But you know why I don’t? Because of three symphony tickets. Because he told me that he’d never let me fall. Because whenever he says ‘trust me,’ he’s really saying ‘I love you.’ I’ve got the upper hand, and I’m going to hold it patiently until all the cards are dealt. So lay off the musical psychology before you hurt a good man who doesn’t deserve it.”
“Good man or not, I hope that dude has some brains under that white man’s ‘fro and wakes up to what a solid bet he’s got in you.”
“He knows what he’s got in me. Meanwhile, I’m gonna call it a day and maybe they can live down all the attention you focused on them.”
“No call for you to leave, my brother. You can hang out up here with me if you want.”
“Thanks, but no. I nearly broke his trust in me once over a woman. I won’t risk doing it again, even by accident and what’s probably looking to him like a conspiracy right about now. You remember what I said about that high-priced hand-rolled ‘cigarette’ of yours, and play ‘Car Wash’ ten times in a row if you have to until they’re done skating. No lover’s lament crap, do you understand me?”
“Understood, blood. Un–der–stood,” said DJ Oyster Cat, with the same reluctant acquiescence that Merle the Earl perfected in the face of Hutch’s no-nonsense demands.
With a final handshake, Hutch wheeled around with his eyes closed, unprepared to descend the stairs in skates. After a moment of inner coaching and a deep breath, he opened his eyes and reached for the railing.
Starsky waited for him at the bottom of the stairs. Hutch forgot his fear of the stairs and toe-stopped his way down them, balancing with the railing. “Starsky, I had nothing to do with that song. I had no idea he’d– I mean, last time we were here, when I went up to the booth, I, uh, said a few things that…um…I couldn’t have said if we’d had badges, and he figured–”
Starsky gave him one of his impatient shrugs. “I know you better’n to think you’d set me up like that. And I don’t care about a dumb song, but I care about your reaction to it. What’s happening right now with you, tell me that? That’s my only concern.”
Hutch waved away Starsky’s offered assistance in keeping his balance off the bottom step. “What’s happening is that I’m going home. See you at the station tomorrow for our first shift back on the job. Have fun, and get Allison home by a respectable hour.”
Starsky skated alongside him. “Hutch, can the bullshit. You don’t sound like yourself.”
Hutch stopped and waited for Starsky to skate awkwardly on the carpeted flooring around to face him. “Where is Allison?”
Starsky pointed across the rink. “She ran into a girl she used to work with at that drive-in restaurant and they’re doing the ‘remember when’ thing. Small world.”
“Yeah, and every time we come here it gets smaller.”
“Well, if you won’t tell me what the hell’s going on, and I can’t convince you to stay, at least tell me what I can say to Allison when she asks why you left.”
“Tell her the Gibb falsetto heard ’round the world triggered a mean sinus headache that I can’t cure without a dark room, good beer, and my favorite blues album.” He started skate-walking toward the rental counter to return his skates and pick up his locker key.
“Allison’s a friend, Hutch,” Starsky was saying behind him on the way. “Our friend. As in both of us. I’m not–” Starsky’s voice dipped to a whisper. “I’m not sleeping with her.”
“I know that, Starsk, but don’t tell me the thought hasn’t crossed your mind.”
“I’ll tell you that when you tell me it hasn’t crossed yours. You were the one that wanted to spend time alone with her, remember?”
Hutch stopped so suddenly that Starsky had to clutch at his arm to slow his own momentum. “Old habits die hard. When we meet a beautiful woman at the same time, it’s instinct to compete, especially–” he lowered his voice, “especially when my one reason not to was on hold until further notice. But I had no intention of carrying it as far as we did with someone I don’t care to name. And when I found out who Allison was, the only reason I wanted to spend time with her away from you was to pick her beautiful brain about a part of your life I didn’t have the chance to share with you.”
“And now you’re gonna just leave me here alone with her?”
“You’re a big boy, Starsky,” Hutch teased, daring to wink at his nonplussed partner. “Allison’s tough under that high-school-sweetheart prettiness, but I think you can handle her on your own.”
He hustled over to the rental counter and deposited his skates in return for the key to his locker, where he retrieved his dress shoes and hurried into them. Hutch’s parting remark had left Starsky so flummoxed that he tried to follow him out of the rink without returning his own rentals. Halfway through the exit walkway, Hutch heard the guy at the rental counter shout, “Hey, you in the suit, you can’t leave. You still got our skates on!”
Starsky was a sight, trying to stand on one wheeled foot and yank the other skate off, but Hutch knew his partner’s agility, and the opportunity for guaranteed escape wouldn’t last more than a couple of minutes. He rushed to the outer door and out into the warmer than usual March afternoon sunshine.
He had counted on Starsky going to his locker for his shoes. He counted wrong. Behind him, a voice shouted, “You in the suit, you can’t leave. You got some explaining to do!”
Hutch spun around to find Starsky heading toward him, wincing and tiptoeing in his thin trouser socks over the roughest asphalt.
“Explain what, Starsky?”
Starsky peered at him, squinting in the bright sun. “You’re not jealous, are you?”
“Nope,” Hutch said, happy that he meant it.
“Really?” Starsky almost–almost–sounded disappointed.
“Were you trying to make me jealous?”
“No, ‘course not. Wouldn’t do that to you or Allison. But you know, with you and me taking a break and all, I can’t see you going off and leaving me unchaperoned.”
Hutch laughed. “It’s up to you to decide what you need in life, Starsk. Allison can give you a lot of things I can’t, like those basics you need. The world hasn’t changed. In fact, as newly reinstated cops, we’re back to the danger and hiding. But I’m not worried about your decision-making skills.”
“Why not?” Starsky asked, sounding desperate to be let in on the secret.
Hutch reached out and tugged on his partner’s tie. “Because even when you’re not looking in my direction, you can keep me from breaking my ass.”
Starsky’s intent, serious, danger-ahead expression relaxed into a slow-growing grin. “Hutch, how do you plan to get home? We’re in my car.”
Hutch returned the smile and gave Starsky a light knuckle cuff on the chin. “There’s a bus stop at the corner. I know all about taking buses now. You kids have a good time.”
~*~
Hutch woke from a wine-induced doze at the knocking on his door. He had opted for a crisp Merlot to accompany the velvety blues on his antique phonograph, and he’d drifted off to sleep on his couch. Rubbing fists in the corner of his eyes, he yawned and tried to gauge the time by the lighting. Only artificial light remained in the apartment. Nighttime. The visitor had to be Starsky. Still, the past few weeks had taught him caution if nothing else. He put an ear to the football poster and said, “Who is it?”
“Your favorite bartender and a friend. Open the door already.”
Hutch opened the door. Beside Huggy stood a taller black man with an average build and a taste for uptown tailoring, but his eyes were kindly, his demeanor humble, and his smile embracing. Hutch held out his hand. “Doc Curtis, I presume?”
The doctor shook his hand, but Huggy looked in need of help finding his jaw on the floor. Hutch smirked at him. “Long story, Huggy. Aren’t you going to introduce your friend?”
“You already know his name, don’tcha? Beats the hell out of me how, but…Curtis Owens, this is Detective Hutchinson. Known to me as Hutch, among other things.”
“I’m glad to meet you,” Dr. Owens said, and Hutch believed him.
“Likewise. Huggy, this is a nice surprise. Don’t get me wrong, but what are you guys doing here at–?”
“Eleven-fifteen p.m.,” Curtis answered, consulting his wristwatch.
Hutch’s heart began to pound. “Starsky? Huggy, did something–?”
“Easy, easy. Starsky is A-Okay. Waiting for you, in fact.”
“Where?”
“BC Skates.”
Curtis was positively beaming now.
Hutch knew then he was the only one in the dark about this surprise visit. “No offense, Huggy, but I really don’t plan to set foot in that rink again.”
“Too bad,” Huggy said mournfully, fingering his chin and giving Curtis a long-faced look. “Tonight’s a real special night for Starsky, and he’s counting on you to be part of it.”
“Real special–what? His birthday’s already come and gone.”
Huggy frowned at him. “Did I say anything about a birthday? Now, are you coming voluntary, or do I have to get Curtis to conk you on the head and drag you?”
“He’s a doctor, Huggy. He can’t go around conking people on the head.”
“He’ll make an exception for me, won’t you, Curtis?”
Curtis beamed at him.
Knowing he should be grateful that Huggy still wanted to darken his door, or Starsky’s, and cared enough about this, whatever it was, to compromise his lover’s Hippocratic Oath, Hutch gave in with a nod. “Yeah, let me get my jacket.”
“Before you do that, change your shirt.”
Hutch looked down at his long-sleeved green jersey. “Why?”
“You’re supposed to wear the loudest Hawaiian you got. Those orders came down from the man himself.”
Hutch groaned. “I’m not in the mood for an elaborate practical joke tonight, if that’s what he’s got up his sleeve.”
Doc Curtis spoke up again. “He also wanted me to convey a message.”
“He? Starsky?” Hutch whirled on his guests. “You’ve met Starsky? When did you meet Starsky?” He looked at Huggy and indicated the physician with a jerk of his shoulder in that direction. “He’s met Starsky?”
“Don’t you wanna hear the message?” Huggy asked, arms folded and lips jutting out, his best attempt at menacing. “Curtis, when he gets like this, you gotta talk over him; though even Starsky don’t get far with it most of the time.”
“What’s the message?” Hutch asked his guest in the most polite tone he could manage.
“Trust me,” Curtis said, still beaming.
“All right, fine, I trust– Wait a second. That’s the message?”
Trust me.
Because when he says “trust me,” he’s really saying “I love you’.”
Starsky at the bottom of the stairs to the deejay booth. Had he overheard what Hutch said?
Regardless, those were words too powerful to ignore. He dashed to find the loudest, most garish, eye-throbbing Hawaiian shirt he could find.
~*~
“Where is everybody?” Hutch asked. They had walked into a dimly lit BC Skates. Only the disco ball shone its own version of a diamond-studded spotlight on the center of the floor.
“This being Thursday night, they closed at eleven,” Huggy explained. He looked at Curtis, his expression as good as a loving finger snap, and Curtis departed for the rental counter. “You’re not here to ask questions. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to follow instructions until all is revealed.”
Curtis returned with an oversized shoebox with an image of a pair of winged roller skates embossed in gold on the top lid. “What’s that?”
“What did I just say about questions?” Huggy snapped at him, but there was a distinct smile behind his bark.
“A gift from your boyfriend,” Curtis said, proffering the box.
“My boyfriend?” Hutch said, eyeing Huggy.
Huggy nudged Curtis. “I think they prefer ‘partner’.”
“Partner works,” Hutch said. “On the job and off, always. But if you’re looking for a more definitive term, Starsky’s what you might call my skittish man friend.”
Huggy turned and began pointing both forefingers at the deejay booth. “Derrick!” Huggy shouted. “Nobody ever teach you to keep your big mouth shut, huh? Derrick!”
“Derrick?” Hutch smiled, opening the box. Inside, nestled in white tissue paper, were gleaming black leather roller skates with high-quality pinkish-red rubber wheels and toe stop. Anyone could be proud of a pair of skates like this, even a thirty-something street cop unlikely to master a left turn in them.
“Derrick James Owens. My brother,” Curtis answered, nodding at the deejay booth, where the inner light had flashed on, and DJ Oyster Cat was making a rude gesture at Huggy.
Coming to a stalemate in their pointed fists and elevated middle fingers, Huggy and DJ Oyster Cat conceded the draw with waving hands, and Huggy turned his laughter on Hutch. “All laced up, Hutch? Good. Now get out there dead center on the floor and wait like a good little boy.”
Hutch glared at him.
Huggy matched his glare. “I ree-fuuuse to call you ‘big boy’.”
Blushing at Doc Curtis’s soft laughter, Hutch rolled his feet back and forth to test the wheels, and then attempted rising from the safety of the bench. He found an inner balance he never knew he had, and skated out onto the floor to loud applause behind him and above him in the deejay booth. In his ratty, weekend-in jeans, the red Hawaiian shirt he would always connect with his undercover stint as a male hairdresser in the city’s most fashionable hotel, and his shiny new skates, Hutch stood directly under the disco ball’s benevolent light and waited for the big joke Starsky had in store for him.
A toe-tapping drum beat and the faint hint of tambourine took Hutch back to a night under the shimmering lights when Starsky had pulled him in a circle on this floor and spun his world into a brand new direction.
Love is in the air….
DJ Oyster Cat turned on a roving spotlight that illuminated the opposite end of the rink, where a tall, dark, and handsome “stranger” in– Oh, Christ, was that skin-tight black Lycra? As the man skated toward him, and then around him, Hutch knew precisely why the gods had not preordained Starsky for an Olympic figure skater. The man would have half the judges and his fellow skaters in collective lust-induced heart failure from one look at that incomparable ass in those second-skin pants. And if that didn’t do it, the generous swell up front would finish them off. The second-skin shirt with its flared sleeves had a plunging V neckline that showed just enough of Starsky’s furred musculature to be erotic with no hint of crass exhibitionism. And someone had known better than to put Starsky in anything with sequins or ribbons or the other decorations found on male figure skater costumes. Sheer, tight, unadorned black made Starsky a deliciously dangerous man of mystery and had Hutch almost to the point of creaming his jeans. Circling him one more time, giving him an aphrodisiac smile, Starsky skated toward the opposite end, paused on toe stop, and turned. The song built to one of its romantic crescendos, Starsky skated toward him, building up speed, and just when Hutch expected disaster, collision, a bone-breaking fall, the gorgeous skater went down on one knee and let his momentum glide him to a perfectly timed stop at Hutch’s feet.
Starsky was kneeling. On bended knee. At Hutch’s feet. And all he could think to say was, “Wow, Starsk, you’ve been practicing.”
Laughter from the sidelines had Hutch wanting to burrow through the flooring. Starsky looked up at him with one of his exasperated frowns softened by visibly suppressed laughter. Hutch gave him a nervous smile, an even more nervous chuff of laughter, and tried not to feel overexposed when the music faded.
“If the world was a skating rink, and life was the biggest of all skate-offs, you’d take home the trophy, hands down,” Starsky told him. “And I’d be the luckiest man in that great big skating rink if you’d be my skating partner, my only skating partner, for the rest of our lives. Whaddaya say?”
A bark from the microphone made Hutch jump in his skates. “If you’re having trouble with the skating metaphors, my brother, the man’s askin’ you to marry him!”
Starsky had ducked his head, unable to hide his laughter now, and Huggy was back to shooting obscene gestures at the deejay booth.
“And the basics, Starsk?”
Starsky lifted his head. “There’s nothing I need in this life that I can’t get from you. We’ll make our own basics. That’s what this is all about, Hutch. I won’t ever let you fall, and you’ll keep making me like–well, in deference to the ladies present, let’s just say you make me like what I never even imagined ’til you came along.”
“Ladies?” Hutch said, ridiculously focused on the one reference he didn’t understand.
DJ Oyster Cat must have guessed what Hutch was looking around for, because the spotlight played across the sidelines, where Huggy and Dr. Curtis were now sandwiched between two women. Anita winked and gave a catcall, and sophisticated but not prim in her pantsuit, Allison nodded at him, making a little “go on” nudging gesture with her hand.
“Hutch,” Starsky whispered. “My knee’s starting to kill me, tryin’ to balance on this skate. Think you’ve kept me in suspense long enough?”
Why the hell wasn’t he shouting yes in every language he knew? This was his partner, his best friend, one of the best men he’d ever known, who in addition to being drop-dead good looking also happened to be better at sex than roller skating. Coming to his senses, Hutch grinned down at him. “I don’t know, Detective Skatesky. Can you get off that knee and kiss me or do you need a hand getting up?”
“For that I could fly,” Starsky said, and came up from his kneel in a burst of motion that landed him in a rolling, teetering embrace with Hutch. After tense moments that triggered feminine gasps from the audience, the two men’s shared stability rescued them, and they both forgot the onlookers in an open-mouthed, take-no-prisoners, tongue kiss that inspired DJ Oyster Cat to belt out “Disco Inferno.”
Burn, baby, burn….
Surrendering to the flame-like heat of Starsky’s mouth, those warm hands on his back, squeezing his shoulders, touching his face, his hair, Hutch agreed wholeheartedly. Burn, baby, burn, indeed.
“Hey, enough, enough,” Huggy said. The nearness of the voice had Starsky propping a startled Hutch again. Now on skates, Huggy had glided over to them. “Save some for the proper moment in the ceremony.”
“Ceremony?” Hutch asked, still hoarse from the kiss.
Starsky was smirking, the smirk that meant trouble–incredible fun, but trouble. “Like Huggy told us that first night, we’re not known for going slow with anything we’re in together.” He lowered his voice for both privacy and erotic effect. “Don’t know about you, but I could really use a wedding night right about now.”
Oh, God. His zipper would never survive. His dick would die in a good cause, but it would still be dead. After several weeks of their sexless break, the thought of a night of sex with Starsky–a night followed by night after night after night of sex with Starsky… His dick was saved by the one thought that could make him go limp.
“Starsk, we’re on shift tomorrow. Due at Metro before seven a.m.”
“No, we’re not,” Starsky said. “My wedding gift to you. I called Dobey and convinced him to let us start on Monday. We’ve got tomorrow and the whole weekend to ourselves.”
“How the hell did you manage that?”
Starsky winked. “Told him it was ridiculous to come in for our first day back on a Friday. ‘Course, he wanted a better reason, so I hit him with the truth.”
“You what?!” Hutch yelled.
“Yep. Told him you and me were tying the knot, making it official. He said, and this is a quote,” Starsky made his voice into a patented Dobey bark. “‘Starsky! You’ve had over three weeks off the force. That’s long enough to come up with a better excuse for absence than a load of baloney like that one.’ So I said, ‘Okay, Cap’n, would you believe Hutch and me are running off with Ms. May to Paris for the weekend?’ And the captain said, ‘Now that I can believe. The both of you better come back in one piece and ready for work, so tie up any loose ends and be here bright and early Monday morning. No extensions, Starsky, you hear me?'”
Huggy was half doubled over, laughing. “That sounds like the boss man, all right.”
Starsky shrugged, but a hint of sadness dimmed his smile. “Told him the truth. Not my fault he didn’t believe me.”
“Come here, you,” Hutch said, gathering him close. “Love you, buddy, for trying and wanting to try. God, I love you.”
Clearing his throat, Huggy clapped his hands imperatively. “Ladies and gentlemen of the congregation?”
Anita’s skating style matched her waitressing: no muss, no fuss, no frills. Doc Curtis skated cautiously onto the floor, supported by Allison, whose proficiency served them both well. Hutch raised an eyebrow at Allison. “You ladies are our bridesmaids, I suppose?”
“Gosh, I hope not!” Allison freed one hand from balancing Doc Curtis and lightly squeezed Hutch’s arm, careful not to tip his balance either. “I’ve been a bridesmaid twice, and a third time might keep me from a promotion to lady in white.”
“That’s a couple orders of amen and a side of ditto from me, sister,” Anita agreed. “I wouldn’t be a bridesmaid if someone paid me cold hard cash. Wouldn’t take three times for me. Once would kill my chance at being a bride. We’re witnesses, cutie,” she said to Hutch. “And I’m a disgruntled witness. If a certain skinny-ass officiate had told me I’d be attending a wedding on skates, I wouldn’t have worn the jeans skirt that stops at my thigh.”
Having joined them on the floor, DJ Oyster Cat eyed Anita’s skirt with gentlemanly if blatant appreciation. “For Huggy’s thoughtlessness, lovely lady, I am forever grateful.”
Anita’s disgruntled frown broke into a dimpled smile.
“All right, everybody ready?” Huggy asked, clearly feeling his importance in the moment. With all eyes focused on him, he directed the grooms to face each other and said, “By the power and authority vested in me by the divine holy order of bisexual bartenders, I now pronounce these two head-butting moose mated for life.”
“That’s it?” Hutch asked, staring.
Starsky grinned at him. “You want a long wedding or long wedding night?”
“Put that way…” Hutch then realized the real truth behind the parody of a wedding ceremony. He had no doubt Starsky was behind it all the way, and it was his partner’s way of showing him that he could thumb his nose at the world’s conventions denied them, without tarnishing the beauty and sincerity of making a lifetime commitment to his best friend and lover. Still, while he loved that symbolism, Hutch had to double-check. “Just to clarify. You did just marry me, right?”
Starsky enfolded him, lending the hug a slight sway on their skates that made Hutch feel rocked in a Starsky-scented blanket. “Sure did. To have and to hold, you and me, and only you and me, ’til death do us not part, and all that jazz. Are you gonna try hunting down a signed license or kiss me?”
In the middle of their wedding kiss, Hutch lifted his head and asked, “Head-butting moose?”
“Okay, honored guests,” Huggy said hurriedly, sharing an apologetic smile with Starsky, “Ceremony’s over, on to the reception. You’ll find cake and other tasty treats at the first concessions table.”
~*~
By the time he crossed the threshold, Hutch had to spin Starsky around and up against the closed door for an uninterrupted stint of ass gazing. He groaned from deep inside, running his hands along the slick smooth material clinging to every curve. “I may make you pull this skating costume out just to wear around the apartment.”
In response, Starsky spread his arms, reaching for the doorframe, and braced, offering himself to the man quickly unraveling behind him. Hutch unzipped and freed his agonizing hard-on. With his chest to Starsky’s back, his lips nibbling Starsky’s right ear through the covering curls, he pressed his cock along the groove made just for him.
“I could take you right here,” he breathed into Starsky’s ear.
“You could,” Starsky panted. “Why don’t you?”
“We’ve never done it like this, standing up….”
“So? First time for everything.”
“Can’t take you dry, Starsk, and God help me, I don’t have it in me right now to–”
“Shh,” Starsky whispered. “Remember right before we left the rink and I took that pit stop? Came out of the john to an impatient Hutchinson lecture on my speck of a bladder? Wasn’t in there for my bladder, lover. I went in there to do a little lube work. Knew you’d be in a state by now. Just like I am. So give me what we both want.”
Hutch had no other arguments. He fumbled for the zipper, tie, buttons, whatever would release Starsky’s ass from its Lycra prison. After the pants dropped to Starsky’s ankles, and he managed a few testing nudges to assess the lubrication, Hutch gripped Starsky’s shoulders and thrust up and into the warmth that couldn’t hold a candle to the flames engulfing his mind, his heart, his deepest being. Holding on to the doorjamb for dear life, Starsky moved with him, meeting each thrust, matching him grunt for grunt, groan for groan, until, too long denied, Hutch screamed to his perfect mate, nonsense sounds that meant love in its purest form. Shortly afterward, Starsky was jerking and shuddering in front of him, begging for either air or mercy, Hutch couldn’t hear which.
Finally, the word became audible. “Bitch.”
“Bitch?” Hutch questioned his ability to process language after shockingly good sex. “If that’s a new nickname, partner, we have a problem. If it’s a complaint–”
“No, idiot!” Starsky laughed. “Bench! The greenhouse bench. Help me pull my dead self together and make it out there, wouldya?”
“Oh. Wouldn’t you rather just hit the sack?”
“Later, yeah. Right now I want you on that bench. Or, at least I want us within plopping distance when my dick comes back to life enough to want you on the bench.”
Far be it from him to mess with a Starsky plan of action, considering how the last one went off without a hitch, except their hitching. Hutch carefully withdrew from Starsky’s snugness and turned him around for a kiss. “Think I hit the poster,” Starsky said into his mouth.
“Better the poster than the door,” Hutch answered in their kiss.
“Don’t think I missed either the door or the floor.”
“Screw ’em both. I’ll deal with it later.”
They shed the remainder of their clothes and left a cloth trail in their wake. Teamwork saw them safely to the greenhouse, where a king-sized pillow in a green pillowslip rested on the bench. On the nearest plant stand, a silver ice bucket normally reserved for a magnum of champagne kept two longnecks chilled. Hutch burst out laughing.
Starsky laughed with him. “Thought about having real French champagne that would knock your socks off, but I figured our best memories out here involved brews not bubbly. More our style.”
“Agreed. How’d you–?”
“Huggy disappeared for a while during the reception,” Starsky said.
“Yeah, when you were asking Curtis what kind of doctor–” Hutch started laughing. “Vampire doctor, Starsky? I can’t believe you said that to him.”
Busily opening the beers, Starsky didn’t even spare a glance for Hutch’s laughter. “Well, a hematologist is a blood doctor, right?”
“Right, but they don’t draw all the blood, Starsk. They analyze it and treat its abnormalities.”
“Yeah, they know all about blood. My point exactly. Curtis got a laugh out of it.”
“Sure, but I almost had to haul Huggy downtown for assault on a police officer. Speaking of Huggy disappearing?”
“Oh, yeah. Sent him here with a key on an important errand. Voila.”
Hutch moved the pillow to the side and sat down, spreading his arm along the back so Starsky could snuggle up close. They clinked their bottles together and took simultaneous sips. “This is nice. You, me, sitting naked on my greenhouse bench.” He brought his arm around Starsky to scratch at the lightly furred chest he could touch every second and not get enough contact. “Why the Hawaiian shirt, Starsk?”
“‘Cause I knew you’d pick that one. Reminds me of Mr. Marlene. Okay, so you’re not that guy in real life, and I wouldn’t want you to be. I never want you to be anything but Hutch. But maybe I kinda like when you get a little campy, you know, for laughs. And I wanted to camp it up tonight.”
“A Hawaiian shirt isn’t all that campy, Starsky.”
“No, but the persona it reminds me of is. Hutch, why’d you think I was chasing every skirt in sight during that op? ‘Cause whenever I was around you doing your campy gay hairdresser to perfection, I got harder than hard. Wood, hell. Had a steel rod in my shorts. Just couldn’t handle why. Wouldn’t let myself admit you were the why. Carried that damn ladder around so people’d be too busy staring at it to notice me busting out of my pants.”
Life stirred in Hutch’s groin. “Surprised you don’t like Belle, then. She’s pretty campy.”
“And don’t think I don’t know that’s why you chose her. Trying to make one of your subtle points, weren’t you? I knew that shit about gas mileage was a front. I do like her. Loved how you looked in her, too. Just couldn’t deal with her that first morning. Not after we’d agreed to take a break and it was hands off.”
“Speaking of that break, what made you decide to end it?”
“First off, it didn’t have a damn thing to do with us having to hide again now, so for God’s sake, don’t think that. I wish I could prove that to you without it costing us our skins, but I can’t, other than inviting a few trusted friends to our moose-mating ceremony.”
“You proved it, Starsky. Why did you end the break? Something had to change your mind about the world out there.”
“Today at the skating rink, the faith you had in me took my breath away. Just like that first night when you knew I’d catch you if you started to fall, even when I wasn’t looking. You had so much confidence. So sure of us and what we have, in spite of my hang-ups. I knew with a man like you riding shotgun with me, I could face the world and all the Howitzers in it, babe. So I marched back in there and went up to the deejay booth for a little chat with Mr. Oyster Cat, and then Allison and I had a heart-to-heart.”
“Is she okay with this, Starsky? Really okay, not just grateful and supportive okay? She was very nice to me tonight, but she’s a very nice girl in general, so it’s hard to tell. But you know her….”
“She’s fine. She said she’s just glad she gets to keep us both as friends, which is all she really wanted in the first place. I took her home and then went in search of Huggy. He helped me organize the rest. Told me where to get the skating duds and skates. Arranged things with BC Skates’ owner.”
Hutch raised his beer bottle to Starsky in salute and then polished off the final swallow. “Who made that wedding cake?” The layer cake, chocolate on the inside, iced with white chocolate, and shaped remarkably like a skate, had been the talk of the reception.
“Anita,” Starsky said, his lips around the bottle mouth. Tilting his head back, his throat moved in swallows that had Hutch all the way hard by the time Starsky stashed the empty bottle down in the ice bucket. “She’s good, huh? Record time, too. Told her she needs to start up a cake business on the side. Huggy will probably have my head for that, too.”
Crossing his legs as best he could with an erection that demanded immediate attention, Hutch grabbed the pillow with one hand and waved his other palm up, saying in a slightly lilted voice, “Well, now, what do we have here? Honey, is that Egyptian cotton? High thread-count, too, by the feel of it. My, my, my. What do you want with this extremely soft, extremely expensive pillow, if I might ask?”
Starsky had to close his mouth to keep from drooling. He was stroking himself, and when Hutch fell silent, batting his lashes in the campiest way at him, Starsky moaned. “Someone’s awake now.” He tossed his head, curls in motion, and said, “I’ve been waiting a long time to fuck you on this bench. Tonight’s the night.”
Mr. Marlene turned back into concerned, practical Hutch lickety-split. “Starsky, what’s your fascination with this bench?”
“It’s ours, Hutch. How much action has it seen that didn’t involve me?”
“Uh, very little. And nothing heavy. But, Starsk, the reason it hasn’t seen heavy action is that I didn’t want to kill someone trying to perform sexual gymnastics in a confined space on solid wood with no cushioning.”
“Pillow equals cushion. And you and I are good in any space, confined or otherwise. Any other objections?”
“I haven’t done any lube work.”
Starsky moved, pulling him forward and cramming the pillow behind Hutch’s back, arranging one end of the pillow so it propped against the arm of the bench. “I know. Now that you got me off at the door, I have the control to lube you up real nice. How’s that feel, huh? Comfy? Make sure your whole back has pillow for support. Now lift your legs. Um, hum. Let me at you.”
Hutch didn’t question where Starsky got the lube. For all he cared, Starsky could have plucked it out of the ice bucket. He spread his legs and invited Starsky close for a kiss. The kiss multiplied and then the kisses began migrating. He felt one on his shoulder, his left nipple, his sternum, and his right elbow. He felt warm, wet fingers making love to him ever so gently, patiently, and hoped Starsky planned to use his cock harder and faster than those stretching, circling fingers. Then Starsky was hovering over him, kneeling between Hutch’s legs with one hand braced on the edge of the bench’s back, one hand caressing Hutch’s right thigh, and his smoky eyes begged for a nod. Hutch nodded.
Eyes closing, Starsky plunged into him, confident in Hutch’s readiness. All the way in, Starsky blinked rapidly and his eyelids fluttered, opening to reveal the look of love and contentment Hutch needed to see. Starsky’s thrusts had power and rhythm, the back-and-forth movement forcing the bench to creak its protest, but the strange sound added novelty to their already exciting dance, and Hutch began to shout, hoping the stars above could hear him. He couldn’t manage anything as coherent as Starsky’s name, but he knew Starsky could understand his impassioned gibberish for what it was: all the things he wished he could say to Starsky in front of the entire BCPD. He wrapped his arms around Starsky’s back as his body heaved in the throes of lovemaking so intense he was grateful for his healthy heart and lung capacity as well as Starsky’s.
Starsky didn’t shout, for once. He huffed little passionate breaths and moved his lips in silent screams, but the sweat gathering on his forehead, trickling down his neck, testified to the exertion that robbed him of his voice.
The greenhouse disappeared. The apartment with it. They were out in a nighttime jungle in a world where love was love and the stars approved, and the precious green plant life around them gave them the oxygen they needed to survive the temporary death of two souls merging into one. Hutch was gasping through orgasm, trying to hold onto Starsky whose climactic quaking had pushed the bench to its limits.
But there was no crash or splintering of wood. The bench proved itself tough enough to withstand their best effort. Starsky slumped forward in Hutch’s arms, safely through the storm, and Hutch held fast. Calm, fulfilled, more peaceful than ever before in his life, Hutch pondered selling his bed so they would always come out here for love in their jungle. But, no, every now and then, he needed to hear the sound of brass against the wall.
~*~
“Warm enough?” Hutch asked for the fifteenth time.
Starsky loved his partner more than his own immortal soul, but if the man asked that question one more time, he’d have to hurt him. “I’m fine. You have me in a sweater, a jacket, and two pairs of socks on top of everything else. We’re in California, not Antarctica. How’m I supposed to fit my feet in skates with two pairs of thick wool socks, huh, tell me that?”
Hutch pulled him closer in the sheltering circle of his arm to the point that Starsky wondered how he could walk all smushed into Hutch. “I don’t care about the skates, Starsk. I care about you not coming down with pneumonia.”
“I’m here to skate, Hutch.”
“Of course you are. Why else would you come to a roller rink?”
Starsky smiled. Having survived the trek from Hutch’s car to the front entrance without his physical-therapy-fatigued muscles threatening murder, Starsky could afford to be cocky. He pointed at the sign above the double doors. “Maybe ’cause of that.”
Hutch followed his pointing finger and stopped them both in their tracks. “‘Welcome to the BCGLBA and Friends Holiday Bash ’79.’ Starsky, you’ve gotta be kidding.”
“No, Hutch,” Starsky said firmly. “I’m not.”
“It’s only been seven months since–” Hutch tensed, and Starsky reached up to pat his lover’s chest. “We’ll be recognized. If we walk in there, we’ll be coming out of the closet, Starsky, in dramatic fashion. We’ll probably headline all of tomorrow’s gossip columns.”
“I know. Hutch, listen, they had to patch up my body, but my heart and my brain still know what they want. And they want that bastard Gunther not to win even a smidgen of moral victory. Only way he doesn’t win is if us being off the force for good, and me not ever being a cop again, means we get the opportunity to do what we couldn’t do behind our badges. Can you handle that?”
“With you riding shotgun, of course I can.” Hutch ducked his head for a kiss.
“Hey, you two; bring some of that hot stuff in here,” said a voice from the doorway. They broke apart and looked over at a stranger who stared, pointed, stared, pointed again, and squealed, “Oh, my God. Oh, my God! You’re those–oh shit, they’re not gonna fucking bee-lieve this!” The young man disappeared into the confines of the rink.
Hutch laughed. “Told you. I have a feeling he’s going to spoil the surprise. How did the BCGLBA settle on BC Skates for their holiday party?”
“The steering committee was looking for a fun location, something different than their usual, and Huggy suggested this place.”
“Huggy’s on the BCGLBA steering committee?”
Starsky smiled. “I think my…um…close call convinced him he needs to lose his skittishness.”
Huggy and Curtis greeted them at the door. Huggy took Starsky aside, shaking his hand, pulling him close in a hug, and Curtis squeezed his shoulder, beaming his usual smile, but Starsky had seen enough doctors to know a worried medical professional when he saw one. His hunch received confirmation when Curtis corralled Hutch a few feet away. Starsky tried to focus on Huggy’s chatter about the party and ignore the doctor-partner conference, but his detective’s hearing hadn’t suffered from the automatic bullets that tore through his abdomen and chest.
“He’s still fragile, Hutch, you have to know that,” whispered Curtis.
Hutch’s expression trumped worried medical professional–it was worried partner. Worried life partner. “I know. I know exactly what a fall could do. But he wants to do this, Curtis; he needs to do this, and I’ll be damned if I can say no to him. I sure as hell can’t stop him when his mind’s made up.”
“All right, well, I’d like to discreetly spread the word for people to give him a little extra space out on the floor.”
“Nothing that’ll draw too much attention, Curtis. He’s not here to be a spectacle. Not that kind of spectacle, anyway. I think he wants people to see Detective Starsky coming out. Not a gunshot victim on skates.”
“Understood.”
Huggy had a backslapping embrace for Hutch, too, and then he followed Curtis through the entry turnstiles to the enormous main room. Starsky smiled at his worried Hutch. “Got the good Dr. Owens a little perturbed, don’t I?”
“You’ve got me a little perturbed, Starsk. Judging by the noise level, there’s a massive crowd in there. The entire Bay City gay and lesbian community and all their friends and relatives must be here. That means a full floor, and–”
“Correction. The entire Bay City gay and lesbian community is here now. And I’ve got you. I’m covered.”
Hutch smiled through the worry, his strength and love for his mate transforming him into something timeless, more than just a 6’1″ big gorgeous blond with a quirky mustache and weird ideas about bundling Starsky into twenty layers of clothing to walk across a parking lot in Southern California in December.
“Love you, Hutch. Let’s do this.”
Hutch took Starsky’s hand firmly in his. “Will you trust me not to let you fall?”
Starsky nodded. “Always.”
Hand in hand, heart in heart, they walked through the turnstiles and into their corner of a brand new world. A world where love was love.
THE END
Author’s note: In order to keep the mood of the story consistent, this story uses what many fans believe to be the intended air date/placement of the “Starsky vs. Hutch” episode, October 1978.
SOUNDTRACK
The lyrics and/or mention of the following songs were used without permission but with respect and no intention of copyright infringement:
“Good Times”–Chic
“Don’t Leave Me This Way”–Thelma Huston
“Bad Time”–Grand Funk Railroad
“Count on Me”–Jefferson Starship
“I Just Want to be Your Everything”–Andy Gibb
“Sweet Home Alabama”–Lynyrd Skynyrd
“Right Back Where We Started From”–Maxine Nightingale
“Rock the Boat”–The Hues Corporation
“(Peace) Still Water”–The Four Tops
“Love is in the Air”–John Paul Young
“Easy to Be Hard”–Three Dog Night
“Who Loves You?”–The Four Seasons
“Magnet and Steel”–Walter Egan
“Ring My Bell”–Anita Ward
“(Love Is) Thicker Than Water”–Andy Gibb
“Love Is Like Oxygen”–Sweet
“Kiss You All Over”–Exile
“Walk Away From Love”–David Ruffin
“Don’t Pull Your Love”–Hamilton, Joe Frank, and Reynolds
“Car Wash”–Rose Royce
“Love You Inside Out”–Bee Gees
“Teenage Rampage”–Sweet
“Disco Inferno”–the Trammps
Have any thoughts?
Share your reaction or leave a quick response — we’d love to hear what you think!
-
5
-
1
-
0
-
0
-
0
-
0
