Red and White Knights

Chapter 5

Ted:

I watch Joe and Danny bolt from the bar, following the other cops responding to the Red-and-White. Pop told me once that he thinks Joe might have PTSD because of what he saw that night, and after what I saw first-hand this night, I have to agree. It’s a God-awful thing to have to carry something like that around for the rest of your life. Maybe if he was an asshat, I wouldn’t feel so bad about it, but he’s a great cop and a really good guy. It’s a shame.

I look around at the people left in the place. Pop is still over by the booth, talking to the kid, Dylan. They’re looking at the photos and the guns, and Dylan’s eyes are wide, and his mouth is hanging open. I have to smile. I know exactly what Pop is telling him; I’ve heard it a thousand times.

My bedtime stories were about Starsky and Hutch.

They’d been gone for a couple of years by the time I was born, but Mom says Pop was telling me about them on the ride home from the hospital. He always smiles when he denies it.

I actually think I remember a little from when I was just a toddler about Pop putting me to bed with stories about his “adventures” with two cops and a magical red and white car. Then, as I got older, the stories became more reality-based and more detailed, and at about twelve or thirteen, I realized that they weren’t just stories: my Pop had been friends with the most successful Bay City detectives that ever were. I also realized that they weren’t just adventures, but often life-threatening police investigations that actually put my old man’s life in danger. When I asked him why he would let them involve him in that stuff, he said they were the best friends he ever had, and, sometimes, you have to do things for your friends.

He waited until I was eighteen to talk about the night they died. I wanted to hear him tell it, so I didn’t let him know that I’d looked it up ‘way before that. It turned out he hadn’t been with them when it happened, thank God, but he was at the hospital with Uncle Harold when the bodies were brought in. It broke my heart to see his eyes well up with tears, even after all those years.

The Dobey’s visited often in those days, and when they did, it never failed: we would all sit around the dining table and talk into the night about what life was like back in the day with Starsky and Hutch. Once in a while, Cal and Rosie would show up, too, and listening to them made me so jealous that they had been there and not me. But I never got tired of it, and, truth be told, I really miss those times.

Of course, we also talked about the Red-and-Whites. Uncle Harold said no one believed it was really them at first, but that the night calls from “Zebra 3” kept coming in, and the collars kept adding up; so the department eventually assigned a special designation just for those calls. Pop said once word got out that two dead cops had been seen in the bar, the rest of the BCPD just started hanging out there, not that he appreciated it at first. Eventually, he just accepted it, and by the time I graduated high school, he was so busy, he wasn’t able to spend much time at home. So to help him out, I started working with him part-time while I got myself a degree in restaurant and bar management, and the n the place really took off.

Diane, our head waitress, nudges me back to reality with an order: two vodka martinis and a cuba libre. Those would be for Detectives Standish, Albertson and Horvath, making their usual stop here on their way home: same time, same drinks, five days a week. She rolls her eyes and picks up the beers in front of me for more regulars at table five. She’s been with Pop pretty much since the beginning, except for the time she took off to raise her family. She’s the one who put the reserved sign on the booth and made the rule about having clean beer glasses upside-down on the table every day. And, though she doesn’t say so, I can see in her eyes that she’s got stories about Starsky and Hutch, too. We’ll talk about them some day, when she’s ready, I guess.

As I fill her order, I think about the first time I saw them. At first it looked like the booth was filled with smoke; then suddenly there they were, and Starsky rapped twice on the table with his knuckles and held up his hand with two fingers outstretched. He seemed to be looking right at me, and I could read his lips: “Draw two, bartender!”

Now-a-days, no one pays much attention to them. The older cops might raise a glass toward the booth, but no one gets excited anymore. Somehow it’s become normal to have two ghost cops in the back booth drinking ghost beer. No one’s ever been able to communicate with them, but I still think about Starsky looking at me that night, and I wonder if they see us, or if it’s just a replay of some long ago night at The Pits. But then, wouldn’t he have said, “Draw two, Huggy”? Guess I’ll never know, at least not in this life.

Uncle Harold died a couple of years ago, and Mom and Pop started spending a lot of time with Aunt Edith. She was really frail, and they didn’t like her being alone when Cal and Rosie couldn’t be with her. We spent time with her on Sundays after church and helped out taking her on her errands and such. That went on until she passed, too, just a few weeks ago.

So now Pop comes down to the bar most nights, or when he hears a Red and White on the scanner and he’s close by. He can’t talk to them, but he can see them, and he’s always got a smile on his face when he does. It’s a big smile, but it’s sad.

He put another glass on the table after Uncle Harold’s funeral, thinking maybe it would be “draw three” from then on, but that hasn’t happened yet. Not long ago, he told me to be sure to put a fourth glass on the table when he’s gone, just in case.

Not that he’s going anywhere soon. He’s in great shape, and I pray to God he’s going to be around for a long time to come.

I look over to the booth again and watch him for a minute more, barely even noticing when Diane comes back for Standish, Albertson and Horvath’s order.

Reluctantly, I turn my attention back to work when a uniformed cop bellies up to the bar. “Hey, Ted, what’s shakin’?”

He’s not a regular, but I recognize him, and I smile. “Hey, Jackson, long time, no see.”

Chapter End Notes:

It seems that in all of this I have neglected to thank my best friend and beta reader Bob for his insight and input. He’s the best!

Sorry this has taken so long. Feedback in appreciated.