When The Sun Came Up I Was Looking At You

“I’m sorry, buddy.”

The worst of it had subsided an hour ago, the shaking and the mania and the awful sense that there was no shred of the person Starsky loved with all his heart and trusted with his life left inside the sweating, shuddering body in his arms. Hutch was dozing on the bed next to him now, but it was the fitful, unrestful sleep of the starving. Huggy had promised 48 hours of hell and Starsky believed him – Starsky’s unbidden words, though barely above hearing level, had stirred Hutch out of sleep. He made a broken noise, anger and confusion and desperate need, then rolled his head towards Starsky. Even behind the muted glaze left over them by the past week, Hutch’s eyes were a painfully bright blue as he stared up at Starsky. “What?” he croaked, the first half-lucid word he’d said since Starsky had dragged him into the Torino and driven here, and Starsky let out a breath of relief over the easing of a paranoia he hadn’t even realised had been sitting in the back of his mind.

Then he realised Hutch was still looking at him with a question in those eyes, so he reached out to rest a hand on Hutch’s shoulder. “I’m sorry,” he repeated.

“Fo-” Hutch started, then stopped, swallowing dryly. Starsky made an aborted movement for the water sitting on his side of the bed, but Hutch shook his head slightly. He’d barely been managing to keep down one drink of every five, and Starsky guessed he just didn’t want to contend with that right now. He shut his eyes and swallowed again, then managed, “For what?”

Starsky looked away, down at the bland grey bedspread, as he said, “That I didn’t find you sooner.” But that wasn’t what had triggered the thought, and a darted glance at Hutch’s face told him that even through whatever storm he was struggling with in his own mind, he still knew Starsky well enough to know it wasn’t the whole truth. “And-” It was Starsky’s turn now to close his eyes and swallow past the lump in his throat. It was mostly made of shared pain and worry, but there was a sharp edge of guilt to it as well. “When I first saw you- in the alleyway, when I saw the marks, before I saw your wrists. I don’t know, it only lasted a second, less than, but I did think you might have been- using. For a moment.”

Hutch’s voice was as blank as it could be right now as he eked out a husky, “What would you have-,” running out of steam before he finished the sentence. But it was clear enough anyway. It really had been less than a second in the alley, not enough time for his brain to have gotten that far, but it wasn’t as if it took a whole lot of thought now.

“Nothing,” he said confidently. A flash of – not even hurt, hurt Starsky could have dealt with, but a flash of resignation struck across Hutch’s face, and Starsky rushed to clarify, “Nothing different, I mean. I’d’ve told Bernie to keep his damn mouth shut and carried you over here to detox. And we’d have figured it out.” He paused, then amended. “Well, I might’ve done one thing different. Probably wouldn’t’ve told Dobey about it.”

Hutch frowned minutely at that, and Starsky realised with a jolt that he probably shouldn’t’ve let on that anyone but him and Huggy knew until Hutch was in a marginally better state. But it was out there now, and he’d get it when he was more in his own head and thinking about the guys that did this to him. Hell, it had taken Starsky a fair while for Huggy’s voice of reason to actually prompt him into action there, he’d been too wrapped up in Hutch.

“You-” Hutch said, then broke into something halfway between a close-mouthed coughing fit and gagging on the thin air that had to be all that was left inside him. Starsky rubbed a hand up and down his shoulder as he jerked with the violent movement.

When it subsided, it seemed to take any power of speech with it. His eyes had fluttered closed, golden-blond lashes heavy with sweat, and Starsky thought he’d sunk back into sleep until he seemed to summon some great reserve of energy and shifted closer.

As soon as Starsky realised what he was doing, he moved over himself, keeping the hand on Hutch’s shoulder the whole time. With his free hand, he helped Hutch lift his head back onto Starsky’s thigh. When he tilted his face into the cloth of Starsky’s t-shirt and let out a shuddering breath, Starsky carded his fingers through soft hair and said, doing his best to answer whatever it was that Hutch had only got one word of out, “Yeah, of course I would’ve. What, babe, you think I would’ve left you on the streets?”

He took the slight shifting under his hand and against his hipbone as an attempt at a head shake, and nodded. “Good. You’re smarter than that, blondie. You got any doubt ’bout what I’d do for you, you’d have to surrender the brains role of this operation.”

The half-groan Hutch emitted could’ve been meant to be a smart-mouthed comeback or, given the situation, some kinda genuine comment on Starsky’s underselling his own intelligence. “Not that it ain’t under constant threat anyway,” he added, figuring that’d cover either possibility.

Hutch coughed, then whispered, so low that it took Starsky a minute to piece together the words. “No. Love you too.”

The hand Starsky was gently stroking across Hutch’s hair stilled when that sank in, beyond his control. It wasn’t that he hadn’t known it, just that they’d never said it. Not like that. Maybe all he’d needed to do was get Hutch in a situation where he wasn’t capable of covering it up with fancier words. Recovering himself, he kept stroking, not wanting to throw the big lug off. Last thing he needed right now was negative reinforcement, in the spirit of which, “Yeah. I love you, beautiful.”

Hutch tilted his head back slightly, squint-glaring up at Starsky through the wrecked dark red bruises ringing his eyes.

Starsky chuckled lightly. “Shut up. You’re always beautiful.”

Hutch shook his head minutely, like this was just another one in the long list of Starsky’s nonsensical statements that he had to put up with, then buried his face back into Starsky’s shirt as a single hard shudder ran through him. He pushed out a sharp exhale, like the air was punching out of him, and Starsky could feel the warm breath through his t-shirt, grazing over his stomach. He tightened his grip on Hutch’s shoulder, pulling him closer in, and winced slightly as the movement ran from his shoulder down his back, tugging at muscles that had been fixed, tense, upright for too long. He wished he could lay down next to Hutch. Well- “Hey, Hutch, it okay if I come down there instead?”

There was a moment’s pause, Starsky looking down at the still blond head, before it moved slightly up and down. He sighed in relief, then contemplated the logistics of the actual getting down there, considering the head on his thigh didn’t seem inclined to move. Eventually, he just slid his hand under and lifted Hutch’s head slightly, with very little co-operation but at least no active resistance, and did his best to wriggle down without further disturbing him. Which wasn’t great on his back, and if they’d been in any normal situation probably would’ve been a sight Hutch’d be teasing him about for years to come, but it got the job done. Hutch had dropped his head onto the bed at some point in all that, but as soon as Starsky settled down and stretched out, flat on his back – and he had to admit this mattress of Huggy’s was actually surprisingly comfortable – Hutch leant back over. Starsky reached out, negotiating head on shoulder without too much difficulty. The breath now puffing out against Starsky’s neck was still too hard, too fast, and Starsky sighed, turning further towards him. He wrapped his other arm around Hutch, pulling him up until he was lying half on Starsky’s chest, blond head tucked under his chin.

“Hey, Hutch,” he said, quiet as he could, aware that Hutch could probably feel his voice vibrating through his chest and throat.

Hutch made a faint sound of acknowledgement.

“I love you,” Starsky repeated, hoping for equal parts provocation and soothing, even though he couldn’t see his face to check. “We’re gonna get you through this.” That was just soothing.

Hutch’s chest rose and fell against Starsky’s a couple times before he mumbled, “I know.”

“I ain’t gonna blame you for anything.”

That got no acknowledgement but a hitched breath, and, a few moments later, an odd feeling against Starsky’s collarbone that it took him a second to place as tears. Starsky squeezed Hutch tighter, rubbing one hand firm between his shoulderblades as the pain and need made its way out the only way it could right now. The whole 48 hours were going to be hell alright, but they’d get through it. Together. Like always.