Thanks, It Has Pockets

“You done?” Starsky asks.

“Mm-hmm.”

“One more,” Starsky says, and I nod.

We’ve been reduced to monosyllabic words and grunts, and no wonder. We’ve been up and going since the ass-crack of dawn. This is the last report in a long line of reports, at the end of a very long day.

From across the room, we hear a snicker and a snarky “Whatsa matter, ladies? Tired?”

“Fuck off, Udell,” Starsky and I say in unison, to which the other officer snorts his disdain.

“I’d be tired too, if I had to be joined at the hip the way you two are—sick and tired.”

The rookie seems to think he’s said something clever, and I see several other pairs of eyes rolling, besides my own. Starsky doesn’t even react, his attention already back on his notes. Udell’s partner, a seasoned detective named Eisen, scowls and jabs his elbow into the younger man’s ribs.

“What? I’m just sayin’. You know how they are, they’re always together,” Udell complains defensively, and would have probably continued if Eisen’s elbow hadn’t promised more of the same.

Ah yes, that old refrain: Starsky-and-Hutch, the Dynamic Duo, two bodies sharing one brain, a package deal. It’s threaded through with insinuations, comments, and sideways glances; the implication that we’re ‘too close.’

I’ve never been able to square that circle. Partners, and police partners especially, are supposed to be tight. You’re supposed to know how the other thinks and reacts, to be committed to watching their back, to care about that person’s life and well-being as much as your own—if not more. Out on the streets, it’s you and your partner against the world, and they are your best and last defense against the enemy without. They’re the only one you can trust implicitly, and you know they feel the same about you. That’s when it works, that’s how you survive the shit that gets thrown at you from day to day. Not just survive, it’s how you become a better cop. Your partner is there to keep your head on straight, to keep you from losing it, to keep you from burning out. You do them the same favor.

Partnerships that aren’t built on a strong foundation of mutual respect and solid friendship don’t last. Being close is an advantage, not a flaw. That’s my position, and I stand by it.

Still, Udell and his ilk, they’re… not exactly wrong. I don’t mean about how we handle ourselves on the job, no. But in that whispered gray area of their innuendoes? There, their suspicions are unproven, but not unfounded.

Starsky and I spend three-quarters of our lives together. No one else in the Department does seventy-five percent. Just us. In another day and age, people might have said we lived in each other’s pockets. Of course, when they said it they were talking about married couples, I think. Which we are most definitely not.

Also, living in each other’s pockets just wasn’t ‘done,’ as if it were somehow gauche that two people in love should even want to spend time in each other’s exclusive company. It was something to be mocked, not envied. It wasn’t fashionable.

That tracks with us, I guess. How we feel about each other is not in fashion, in more ways than one.

What does Starsky do during the twenty-five percent of the time we’re not together? Same as what I do—go out with some chick, usually. Take her for a nice dinner, go dancing, have a good time. Sleep with her, if she’s willing.

Because that’s what guys are supposed to do, right? Real guys, real cops.

Real guys, real cops, we’re not supposed to be doing the whole hundred percent with our male partner. That’s the society we live in, the society that says two men can’t be all things to each other. That it’s wrong for two men to love each other, body and soul.

So we do the seventy-five. It’s as much as we can get away with. We give each other everything we have, everything we are, except we hold back the twenty-five. We play the field, as they say, and isn’t that a riot? Because that’s what this is—we’re playing nothing more than a fucked up game according to someone else’s rules.

Well, we’ve gotten pretty good at bending those rules. And, I mean, I’d be lying if I pretended we didn’t enjoy the dating scene. Especially Starsky, who never has any problem attracting the ladies. We know how to dole out a couple percent here, a couple percent there. We keep it fun, keep it easy. Make no promises, allow no expectations, nobody gets hurt.

And if that last part sounds like a crock of shit, it is. Promises are no less real for having been made in the silence of your heart, expectations raise themselves despite your best efforts, and bang, there’s a world of hurt, right there. I’m insanely jealous of any woman who gets even one percent of him, even if it is just for appearance’s sake. He’s mine, and he damn well knows it.

Starsky’s eyes flick up from the typewriter. His gaze immediately hones in on mine, as though he’s expecting me to be looking at him.

Well, of course he is. I’m his, and he damn well knows that, too.

“You about finished?” I ask. I’m ready to punch out. Quitting time.

“Yeah,” he says, zipping the form out of the typewriter and presenting it to me. I sign on the bottom without so much as a glance over and hand it back.

He’s what keeps me alive and sane, and I keep him grounded and whole. This love is the most amazing feeling I’ve ever had about anyone, but it’s terrifyingly all-consuming. Some days, even seventy-five percent just isn’t enough. Some days, we take it all, because we have to. Because I think we’d die if we didn’t. One hundred percent, and fuck the world.

Some days… like today.

“Yeah,” he says again, meaning something entirely different. He scrawls his signature next to mine, gives me a quick nod, then heads into Dobey’s office.

I try not to watch his ass as he goes.

Let’s face it: there’s a very real chance that one day we’ll screw up and get caught. The shit will hit the fan, and everything will come crashing down. We’ll be drummed out of the force—quitting time for real, and for keeps. That thought is ever-present and inescapable.

Yet, as each day passes I find I care about it less and less. A future without a badge? I can handle that. But I can’t imagine my world without Starsky in it, and I refuse to even try.

He’s back, and I get to my feet.

“Let’s roll,” he says, and shrugs into his windbreaker. I’m pulling on my jacket at the same time, and as my hand emerges from the sleeve, my fingers snag onto his pocket, just for a moment.

He catches my grin and raises an eyebrow. “What?”

I shake my head the tiniest bit. Not now. Starsky shrugs amiably, content to bide his time.

Later, when we’re alone, I’ll tell him about the pockets. Not that we’ll need any. I don’t have to have any pockets to prove how I feel about him.

I’ll take seventy-five, if I have to. But I want the hundred.