You’ve Got Mail!

Written for the 2014 Big Bang: S&H Present Tense

With interior art by Nicol Tyler.

It’s been four years since Gunther tried to kill Starsky and Hutch. That was in 2010. The attempted hit left Starsky unable to work the streets, so he and Hutch went back to school. Now Hutch is working in the coroner’s office, while Starsky’s counseling kids. Starsky, who saw his father gunned down and killed, is making the best of his life and is grateful to have it. Hutch — also grateful that Starsky is still alive and with him — hasn’t quite been able to put the past behind him.

S: USE YOUR DAMN PHONE!!!!!! USE YOUR DAMN PHONE!!!!!! TEXT ME BACK! NOW!!!

H: Starsk,

There is no reason to email me in all caps. There is no reason for me to actually use that phone. I have told you this a hundred times, calmly. I cannot see the buttons, let alone send you a coherent text. I am not a teenager. I’m in the middle of a meeting. I will call you later.

Hutch

S: AWGTHTTGA?????? (Are We Going To Have To Go Through This Again?)

H: I hate it when you do that, David.

S: Do what, Kenneth?

H: THAT.

S: Oh. If you would GYHOOYA you might be hip enough to get it. (Get Your Head Out Of Your Ass)

H: You are not sixteen. I am not twenty. I’m counting to ten. People are staring. What is so damned important?

S: DILLIGAS (Does it look like I give a shit?)

K: I remember that one from last night, DH. See? Now what is so damned important? In English.

S: I’m lonely.

H: Are you at work?

S: Yes.

H: Find someone to play with, Dr. Starsky.

S: I wanna play with you, Dr. Hutch. I wanna play DOCTOR with you, Dr. Hutch.

H: Not here. Not now.

S: I learned another one.

H: Another what, Starsk?

S: TABOOMA!

H: And?

S: Take a bite out of my ASS!! Isn’t that dirty???

H: Yes, Starsk. What grade are you in?

S: has never been my strong suit.

S: Hutch?

S: Hutch? ILU

S: Say it, Hutch.

S: Hutch?

H: ILU, ok???

S: HA!

H: Are you laughing or is that another of those silly abbreviations?

S: Not abbreviations. Acronyms.

H: I was laughing. ROTFL.

S: Rolling On the Floor Laughing.

S: Very good. That medical degree you got did some good, isn’t it?

H: I left the meeting. My pager is going off. I will see you tonight?

S: Pal, speaking of getting off…

H: You make me crazy. I have a really bad headache right now.

S: Hutch?

H: Starsk, you know how it is. What can I do to make it better?

S: Come home. Please.

S: Hutch?

S: Are you okay?

S: t’s been a week since we had a night together.

H: You must miss those long nights on stake-out? Babe?

S: Sleeping with my head in your lap, Hutch.

H: I don’t miss being a cop, pal.

S: I never quit being one. Even with a Dr in front of my name.

H: I guess you’re right, partner.

S: Speaking of which.

H: I’ll be home in an hour. I need you. I love you. I’d do this all over again.

S: In a New York minute, love.

***

Starsky unlocked the front door of his and Hutch’s home and wheeled himself into the small foyer. A quick sound of toenails against the hardwood floor and bounding grace greeted him. “Sam!” He hugged the dog’s big old concrete block head against him. “Want out?”

Once Sam was settled in the small, fenced backyard, Starsky glanced through the mail that had made its way to the dining table. It could have been Huggy or the cleaning people that came, thankfully, once a week. He squinted at the sliding glass doors, frowning at the deep barks. Caught a squirrel or something. Shaking himself, he dropped the unopened envelopes on the table and rolled his way to the bedroom to change.

Would Hutch really keep his promise and be there? Perhaps he should start some dinner and hope for the best. Lately, ever since Hutch’s promotion, he’d been called to more and more crime scenes, a freelance observer for the coroner’s department suddenly and swiftly working his way to a real political office. It had been a stroke of genius when Hutch went back to school… after the accident, of course. Forensics was always his first love.

And me his second. For six years. At least I hope so!

Stripping off his suit jacket, shirt, and dark blue tie, he eased his butt from the chair and slid gracefully out of his slacks. The bath would be welcome tonight. There was nothing to sniff about his position. Working for social services in the juvie division had its own rewards. Counseling children — and then there were days like today. So much anger. As he ran the hot water in the tub he thought back to his childhood. He’d been angry too, after his father had died. It was the motivation to make him the cop he’d become. After the incident it didn’t seem as important. He’d done his fair share to his father’s memory and he’d always liked working with kids.

Easily, with strong arms, he eased his body into the steamy water and let the silence of the house float over him. The dog had stopped barking and was probably resting close to the glass doors, having a little supper. That’s what he should be doing, instead of soaking himself into a prune. The hot water took away the aches, at least for a little while. Some days it was a real effort to get out of bed and into that chair. But he wasn’t bitter about it anymore. It was a fact of life and there was no limit to where he could go or do. Hutch had made sure of that.

Yes, he missed being a cop. Gunther and his goons had seen to that, but he wasn’t bitter. If anything, he was happier now with his social work than he had ever been as a policeman. Not a lot of guys could say at age forty they had accomplished what he had. A satisfying life, a love that would last a lifetime. And a job that had its rewards. A PhD in social work and child development. More educated than his dad. Pity Ma had not lived to see it. Or Nicky.

Squirming deeper into the hot water, Starsky closed his eyes and tried to picture something soothing, like a nice flat desert landscape or the beach. Maybe if Hutch had time they could go down to Venice or maybe even up north and stay a day or two outside of this busy, crazy as crap, city.

His hands clenched the sides of the tub, easing him up so he would not slide under the water and drown. It’d happened to a lot of people, heard about it all the time. The small of his back was aching, that deep, deep pain that could keep him awake tonight, if Hutch didn’t come home. So many nights he was dragged out to some crime scene; it only seemed to be getting worse in this City of Angels.

Angels. Frowning, Starsky stared down at his useless legs and shrugged. If not for the skill of the doctors and Hutch’s everlasting, dogged protection of him, he might be an angel, or whatever one became after they died.

As he toweled off, he thought about those moments when he’d been told he had died. Just a nice darkness. Warm. He’d not seen his dad, or his brother Nick, who had died just before the incident. Just this very nice soft place where nothing hurt, and there was no sound but a pleasant hum, a sound of dancing and light, dim at first, then easing into a warm pink. Then, like a baby being drawn from its mother’s womb, brilliant flashes, consciousness, and then…it hurt.

Shrugging away the memory, he pulled a worn sweatshirt over his head. Long dark curls, fell past his shoulders. It was unimportant, less than nothing, that he could not walk. What mattered is he had life, he had purpose and he had not died and left Hutch alone. Pulling the worn jeans over his legs and smoothing them up, fastening them, he thought about Hutch being alone. Even after they were together and all the fear was gone, acceptance of his condition, therapy, changes in their lives and careers, he could still see that shadow cross his partner’s eyes every single day. As if he were blaming himself.

And how many millions of times had Starsky told his lover it was as far from his fault as the man in the moon.

He warmed a cup of tomato soup in the microwave and tossed Sam a treat. The dog gobbled it up and curled in a ball at his feet as he pushed himself from chair to couch. He snapped on the control to the sixty-four-inch television that David used on a nightly basis and Hutch rarely watched. The stack of files he’d set on the coffee table last night gave him some reprieve from “Toddlers and Tiaras”.

Lying back on the couch against the cushions, he allowed himself to relax just a little. Flipping open the file, he glanced at the photo of the little boy he had counseled today. Eight-years-old, discarded by his parents, an orphan, but not. Lost, like so many kids he dealt with. Lost in the pit of anger and fury. What they used to call reform school would be this kid’s future if not for his strong belief the child could thrive in a special school for art students in Ontario. Why, the kid was a genius, even if his only medium was a spray can and broken walls.

That one reminded him of a long time ago, a little boy that Hutch had mentored and grown to be a professor at Cal Tech. Hey, there was good in everyone; he’d always believed that through thick and thin.

No Hutch yet, nearly nine p.m. Dropping the folder to the floor, David turned onto his side and groaned. He needed to exercise more, eat less out of cans and fast food joints. Cold burgers and fries six nights out of seven–not exactly what his doctor had in mind when he suggested a consistent diet. Closing his eyes he pulled the hard cushion under his chin and allowed himself to go to sleep.