Red-Letter Day

350

A tired Hutch isn’t catching on to all the subtle reminders Starsky keeps leaving him. What’s so special about tomorrow’s date?

 

First published in the zine, Lifeline: A Decade of Sweet Revenge, in May, 1989, on the 10th anniversary of that episode.

Special thanks to Donna F. for helping to digitize this story for the archive.

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They pulled into the basement garage, one more assignment completed, another day, another dollar, on this day, which had brought no spectacular departure from a succession of routine events and encounters. And now, Hutch thought with no enthusiasm at all, the inescapable sequel of the paperwork. To neglect that chore any longer would be to invite disaster. Besides being against the rule book. And keeping you off the street, he reflected with a sidelong glance towards his companion.

He got out of the car and looked around the cavernous area with distaste. This, he remembered, was where they had checked out the Torino when that Drew case was running, when it was only by fortunate accident that they’d found what they were looking for. If Starsky had not dropped those keys… He shivered. The shadowy place seemed haunted by too many sinister associations, premonitions, forebodings. These days, such questions were ever-present. But, as always these days, he was also aware of reluctance to look at answers… easier to shut out both answers and questions.

He turned to follow Starsky, now way ahead, almost at the elevators. “Hate this kind of day,” he grumbled tiredly as he caught up. “Switching shifts after tomorrow — hate that too.”

Starsky considered this, leaning against the elevator side as they made the ascent to the squad room. “Yeah? Guess I’ll settle for having shifts to switch,” he said lightly and stepped out into the hall.

Hutch followed along. “Hate paperwork, too,” he muttered.

“Hey, paperwork’s okay.” Starsky assessed his partner’s ill-humor, still insulated, it seemed, within his own euphoria of being back on some sort of job. “Bad mood, huh? Probably your biological time-clock.”

“I know, I know. You were reading this book…”

“No. Was your Geographic. Depends whether you’re an owl or a lark.”

Hutch groaned. “Now more nature notes. Happens all the time since you got Louise.” Then, “So where is it? Should have been here yesterday. There was that two-parter I was waiting to finish.” On the threshold of the squad room, he halted to glare at Starsky. “What’ve you done with it?”

“Hostile.” Starsky shook his head. “I was just telling you. You’re always saying I should get my mind improved. Free day tomorrow — you can read it then.”

They contemplated the welcome prospect of uninterrupted time as they began working through the backlog of files, which were the main feature of the desk right then. Nearly an hour later, Hutch initialed the last of the forms and, surfacing, watched Starsky for a few moments, his fascinated attention held by the idiosyncratic typing style in synch with the faint Latin-American beat from a radio somewhere in the background of noise. He let the familiar scene take over.

Months after, it could still be hard to accept this return to an old normality, to take anything for granted. Those months, adding up now to almost a year — a year in which day had followed day in a barren stretch of almost unbroken and anxious uncertainty, had produced the effect of excluding any faculty of ordinary acceptance. Too long on overload. Yet, surely, that bottom line wasn’t illusory: we made it. Still here, still around. “Already have a partner,” he’d told Dobey at one desolate time. And I still have a partner, he told himself now.

Idly, as he waited, he scanned the pages of the office diary, open on the desk between them, and now restored to the light of day as the paperwork diminished.

“What’s tomorrow?” he asked, pointing to the red circle around the date.

Starsky withdrew the papers from the machine and scribbled his initials.

“Uh…huh…?” he murmured noncommittally, not looking up.

“Red stars, too,” Hutch commented. “What–?”

Starsky pushed back his chair. “Work on it while I take these in,” he suggested and disappeared into the inner office.

“Come on,” he urged a minute later. He grabbed his windcheater from the floor and headed for the exit, leaving Hutch still frowning over the diary.

“Look…” Starsky turned as Hutch indicated another date seven days earlier. One word stood out in red letters. ‘Remember.’ And a week before that — ‘Don’t forget.’ “Remember what?”

“Think about it. Now will you come on before Dobey finds that last one. It’s under the whole stack, but we don’t want to lose any time.”

Starsky led the way out. At the door, Hutch paused to look at him inquiringly, collecting in return a glance he couldn’t entirely interpret. Courteously, Starsky allowed him precedence into the hall, and turned to wave to their colleagues still trapped within the system. He intercepted the newspaper which Minnie was about to consign to the trash basket. “Today’s? Thanks.” He rewarded her with a pat and a smile, scrutinized the pages as they returned to the car. No schedules now more taxing than dinner and a quiet night in. “Your turn to make it,” Starsky reminded.

The unhurried pace of the day’s ending blended now with that most efficient aid to relaxation — knowledge of a free day to come. Hutch sighed comfortably and leaned back, surveying the remains of the imaginative dinner he’d just prepared. The remains seemed particularly abundant around Starsky’s plate.

“Replete?” Hutch enquired.

“No.” Starsky seemed unimpressed. “Maybe tomorrow will be better, though,” he added hopefully.

“Tomorrow? Could fix us another bean sprout salad. Or I got a better idea — why don’t we make it a fast day? Could start with lemon juice if you’re really hungry.”

Starsky stared at him in disbelief. “You may,” he said coldly. “But I’d have thought tomorrow rated higher than lemon juice.”

“We’ve had days off before.”

“Sure.” Starsky got up and headed purposefully for the refrigerator. “And I’m still hungry. Won’t even last ’til tomorrow like this. Have to get my hands on something during the night.”

“Could be arranged.”

“Yeah?”

“Count on it.”

“I do, babe.” Starsky emerged from the recesses of the refrigerator with a variety of ingredients as Hutch began to make coffee. When he carried the mugs into the living room, Starsky was already far into a king-sized sandwich, cheese on rye, which he had concocted to repair the deficiencies of a health-food dinner.

“Wanna bite?” he offered routinely.

Hutch considered the offer briefly and then leaned forward to sink his teeth into the proffered sandwich. “Thanks,” he grunted around a substantial mouthful. “After all, we don’t begin abstention ’til tomorrow.”

“Abstention?” Starsky’s jaws were arrested in mid-bite.

“From food. Doesn’t get in the way of other things. Could leave more time for other things. You thought of that?”

They sipped coffee as Hutch picked up the newspaper, which had appeared beside him on the sofa.

“Hey, it’s here, too,” he discovered. Starsky studied with him the vivid red line encircling the inch of newsprint.

“Oh yeah…what’s it say?”

Hutch read aloud: “‘You have vitality and drive in marked degree. You are always full of novel and original ideas, a natural leader.'” He glanced at Starsky who was giving him total attention.

“There’s more?” Starsky asked.

With a puzzled air. Hutch returned to the paper and continued: “‘Your dynamic energy and initiative make you an asset in any surroundings. Try to make sure that friends and colleagues appreciate you as you deserve.’ That’s it.”

“Nice,” Starsky commented. “Neat.”

“Why do I get the feeling someone’s trying to tell me something?” Hutch mused. “You got any clues?”

Starsky looked at him searchingly. “And you call yourself a detective? You look at the title of that piece?”

Hutch concentrated again on the newsprint, shrugged. “It’s the horoscope column. So?”

“It doesn’t remind you of anyone?” Starsky prompted.

Again Hutch brooded over the page. “Can’t say it does… ‘vitality’… ‘initiative’… ‘dynamic’…” His voice trailed off.

Starsky sighed patiently. “Couldn’t be clearer. How much more do you need? Oh, okay then…whyn’t you just look at the date?” He met Hutch’s frown. “You find it at the top of the page,” he mentioned kindly.

“Date?” Hutch’s thoughts returned to the desk diary. ‘Remember.’ Remember what? His gaze returned to Starsky who was watching him with a kind of resigned amusement, eyes expectant, the flamelight from the wood stove lending even more than usual aliveness to the expression… alive… ‘dynamic’… Starsky seemed to be willing him to find answers.

Realization struck.

“Tomorrow. Your birthday. Right?”

Starsky nodded, looking pleased. “See? You did remember.”

“Finally.”

Starsky went on, “I was giving you all those clues. It’s called — uh — subliminal influence or something. Guess your subconscious is super-resistant. Next time I’ll try hypnosis.”

“I did remember… thought about it…” He had thought, often, of that special date, and then, just as often, had pushed the thought away, not daring to dwell on it. Making plans assumed too much, tempted too much. Battered resources settled for day-at-a-time time.

“I thought about it,” he repeated. “Only then I–”

“You forgot,” Starsky supplied.

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

“It’s not okay.”

“It’s okay. No big deal.”

“But you like presents and birthdays an’ all.”

“Sure. And now you’ll have to get me something really special to make up.” But the voice was teasing, relaxed. “Like birthday lunch. Birthday dinner. Anyone for lemon juice?”

“We’ll get in a few bottles. Send out for pizza with everything…”

“Hutch. We don’t need anything. Don’t need anything I don’t already have right here.” He broke off, rolling easily across the rug to be nearer the sofa. “We got so lucky this year — enough luck to last a lifetime of birthdays — for both of us.”

He was kneeling by Hutch, the love and the laughter clearly evident. Hutch leaned forward to place a hand at either side of the ardent face, kissed first the shining eyes, and then, lingering, the loving mouth. Starsky smiled back at him, sharing the radiance. “Best present…you know? You feel that, too?” He moved to sit next to Hutch on the sofa and Hutch leaned into the embracing hug as Starsky captured the hand nearest his own, and gently traced its fading scar, memento of another hitman’s knife in another basement garage.

Hutch nodded. “Yes…I feel that too. It’s getting slightly easier to believe.” This kind of hope was a quality they were both beginning to learn, this positive, affirming hope, so long unfamiliar, crowded out so often by wary expectation; yet now, in this newest of new years, it was offset and challenged by brave new patterns and possibilities. He felt suddenly energized, no longer in need of the emotional jump-leads.

“There’s tomorrow,” Starsky’s words picked up on his own feelings.

“Your big day, huh?”

“Right. You going to demand a return game of table tennis or do you have any real plans?”

“You still have that address? That restaurant where they need credit cards for reservations?”

“That place? Sure. Thought you’d never ask.”

“Not like you to forget reminders. Guess I’d got used to counting on your nag-nag-nag style.”

Starsky’s look met his, sharing understanding of one more step back into normality. “Oh, I tried a few subtle hints… took a little longer than you’d expect. So — you gonna fix it?”

“Tomorrow night okay for you?” Hutch offered.

“Could fit you in,” Starsky answered with no hesitation at all. “And if lobster and caviar violate your principles, they probably do scrambled eggs too… Tomorrow night then — wanna drive my car?”