Consequences

The death of a young boy brings up painful memories from Hutch’s past.

“Did you ever want kids?”

“You mean besides you?”

The retort wasn’t in jest and he shouldn’t have asked. Not after the day they’d had. It was the culmination of an ordeal that had started before Christmas, when they’d joined others searching a mall and its acres of parking for the missing son of one of their own. The madness had been overwhelming—crowded venues of Santas and helpers and fidgety children and long lines of tired shoppers whose only desire was to pay for their stuff and get the hell home.

It got worse. The six-year-old was found dumped in a culvert beyond the parking lot at the north end, badly beaten and half buried. He’d died before they could move him, but not before naming his killer—the wannabe boyfriend of his widowed mother. She’d been a cop’s wife and his loss in the line of duty was still raw two years later. She and Andy weren’t ready for another man in their lives, but he wouldn’t take no for an answer. He’d threatened revenge when she’d gotten a restraining order, but she hadn’t really thought he’d go that far.

Then Andy disappeared at the mall.

His killer was spotted two hours later, buying beer at a market on the street where Andy lived, still wearing clothes that were filthy from the culvert, dirt not quite hiding smears of Andy’s blood.

It was on the way home from Andy’s service that Starsky had asked the question. Maybe it was fallout from the holiday season. Maybe it was spending the day with cops and their families and a grieving wife and mother. Hutch had been moody and increasingly withdrawn.

They were almost back to Starsky’s place when Hutch finally noticed. “You were supposed to take me home.”

“Says who?” Starsky pulled into his driveway and turned off the car. “I don’t think you should be alone, Hutch. I know I don’t wanna be.” He turned to look at his brooding partner. “C’mon inside and have a beer. We don’t have to talk. We can watch TV or take a nap. Neither of us has had much sleep.”

Hutch glowered in the passenger’s seat, unconsciously clenching and unclenching his fists.

“Please?” Starsky didn’t push any harder than that. He just waited patiently for Hutch to make up his mind.

After a few minutes, Hutch opened his hands, rubbed them against his suit pants and sighed. “All right. One beer.”

Starsky nodded in quiet relief. “Let’s go.”

*****

“Go change while I get the beer. A pair of your jeans and a flannel shirt are on hooks in the bedroom closet.” He didn’t wait to see if Hutch was paying attention, but he heard the closet door open as he pulled a bag of Fritos from the pantry and two beers from the fridge.

He set them on the coffee table and slipped into the bathroom to change into jeans and a t-shirt hanging on the back of the bathroom door. Starsky threw his dress shirt into the hamper and hung his suit on the door hooks to go into the closet later.

Hutch was slumped at one end of the couch with his eyes closed when Starsky returned. The TV was still off and the beer was ignored; the bottle was sweating a ring on the coffee table. Starsky stood guard a few minutes more and when he heard a faint snore coming from his partner, he nodded affectionately and fetched the quilt off the end of his bed and draped it over Hutch.

*****

Two beers and half a bag of Fritos later, Starsky was still guarding Hutch’s sleep when the nightmare started. Hutch twitched and mumbled, but when his arms got tangled in the quilt, he let out a scream and tried to fight his way out. Starsky lunged for the blanket and pulled it off in time to take a punch from a freed hand.

It knocked him onto the floor, tangled in the quilt.

“No! NO!” Hutch was still punching wildly at something unseen.

“Hutch! HUTCH!”

“Huh? Wha—Oh God.” Hutch slowly wiped his face with a flannel sleeve, then leaned over and untangled the quilt so Starsky could get up off the floor. “I’m sorry, Starsk. Did I hurt you?”

“I’m okay, Hutch.” He wandered into the kitchen to snag a couple more beers, then handed one to Hutch. “Here. Help yourself to the Fritos on the table. I’m thinking about ordering a pizza.”

Hutch opened the beer and took a long swallow. “Not now. I’m not hungry. Maybe later.” He leaned back on the couch and sighed, but didn’t say anything more.

Starsky sat next to Hutch, needing to be close. “You’ve had that nightmare before.” It wasn’t a question.

“Yeah. I have.” But he didn’t elaborate.

Starsky didn’t pry. “Hutch—”

“You asked me if I ever wanted kids.” Hutch took another swallow of his beer to buy time. “No. I never did. I don’t want kids, Starsk. Ever. I was very careful about that before we got together. I’d make a lousy father and I don’t want that kind of responsibility.”

Hutch’s answer shocked Starsky. “What are you talking about? You’re great with kids.”

“Maybe. Other people’s kids. Troubled kids. Abandoned kids. Lost kids. Runaways. But they aren’t mine. I can hand them off to someone else and walk away if it becomes too much. And it eventually does.”

He realized Hutch was being brutally honest and he hurt for his lover. “Because of what happened when you were a kid. You need to talk to someone about that.”

“You know I have, Starsk. And you know it helped. But it won’t change how I feel now about having kids of my own. It was hard enough teaching my inner child that what happened wasn’t my fault, despite everything my father said.”

He watched Hutch close his eyes and take slow, calming breaths and he damned Hutchinson senior again for insisting to family and sanctimonious business partners that the kidnap and rape of his nine-year-old son by a well-heeled associate was the boy’s own fault. How the hell could that son-of-a-bitch say such a thing about a child? Let alone his own son.…

It infuriated him now as much as it did the first time Hutch told him and he still wanted to hurt the fucker.

Hutch knew what Starsky was thinking. “Let it go, Starsk. I’m okay. Sometimes, when the victim is a child, it can hit me, even after all these years.”

You mean when the victim is a young blond boy, no matter the damage done.

Starsky thought about how lucky he’d been as a kid growing up on the streets. They didn’t have much, but his mother nurtured his brother and him. As well off as the Hutchinsons were, anything family was all for show. But after their son was released from the hospital, his parents had little to do with him. He finished growing up attended by a series of foreign-born nannies who kept him at a distance and didn’t get close. Even now, his only family contact was an annual Christmas card from some forgotten mailing list of his mother. There was no salutation, no sentiment other than a printed “from Mother” in gold to match the dry greeting in the card. Hutch never read them anymore. They were dropped unopened into the trash by the door.

They sat together for a time, drinking their beers and savoring the quiet. Then—

“Can I ask you something, Starsk?”

He looked at Hutch and nodded.

“Does it bother you that we don’t live together? That I won’t…don’t…want to…to…” Hutch’s voice faded in embarrassed introspection.

“Not at all. Listen to me.” Starsky reached for Hutch’s hand and held on tight, knowing exactly what he wanted to say. “I am quite content with what we have, what we do. I’ll admit, there are times I’d like more, but we don’t need daily fights over closet space or room in the medicine cabinet to know that we love each other. And I don’t need to penetrate you or feel you in me to prove our love.”

Hutch squeezed Starsky’s hand in return and sighed. “I give you so little and you let me get away with it.”

“Don’t be an idiot. I cherish everything you’re willing to give.” Starsky raised the hand he held and kissed it. “Maybe someday we’ll do more, but even if we don’t, we have each other and I feel warm and happy and loved.”

He stood and pulled Hutch to his feet. “Let’s skip the pizza and go to bed. I need to know I can make you feel as good as you always make me.”

He kissed Hutch and led him into the bedroom.