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The first day Starsky was able to sit up more than just a few moments made him feel like he'd jumped the most important hurdle and was now on the flat, headed for the finish line. He was enough of a hospital veteran to know that this was an illusionary victory; that there would be setbacks all along the way, but just then, he didn't care.
Sitting up felt powerful. Even though he was pumped full of morphine, sitting hurt more than anything good ought to. Moving hurt—so much that every part of getting into the chair by the bed had been a task of Herculean proportions. Even with the nurse's help, he'd broken out in a sweat transferring from the mattress to the chair. Just sitting still and breathing was a chore. But Starsky endured that pain because he was waiting for Hutch--and because it proved that he had succeeded. That was more than enough.
The nurse had given him half an hour. He wanted to stay up until Hutch arrived—to get a glimpse of that light in Hutch's eyes. To see him happy again. Their lives had become completely entwined over the years, symbiotic to a point where he knew just how his partner ticked—and vice-versa.
Symbiotic. There was a ten dollar word that Hutch would be surprised he knew the meaning of.
Or maybe not. Hutch often acted insufferable and pompous, but that was only when he was feeling insecure. When Starsky and Hutch were alone, things were different— all of the stuff like their backgrounds, like religion, money, status—none of that mattered. It was as if they were joined at the hip, two individuals with a single heart.
Symbiotic. He'd actually looked it up, once. He and Hutch fit the second definition perfectly: the close union of two dissimilar organisms in a mutually beneficial relationship.
Yep, that was he and Hutch. That was why Starsky had done what he had to do to keep Hutch alive. That he himself had also survived was the bonus.
He'd won the prize—and wanted Hutch to share it with him, too. Life.
Survival had been hard on Hutch so far. The signs were sketched in every line of his body. In the past weeks, Hutch had looked drawn and stooped, his shoulders weighed down with so much grief. Seeing Starsky gunned down had permanently engraved the sorrow onto his face.
Starsky knew he had it in his power to change that—to bring back the light in his partner's blue eyes. To restore life to both of them.
At least, he fervently hoped so.
Because the first dictionary definition of symbiosis was the one he wanted to define his new life, more than anything else on this planet.
Two organisms living together in a more or less intimate association.
If Starsky had his way—there would be no 'less' about the intimate association. Intimate in all the myriad ways, babe.
The thought of it made him laugh. Which hurt.
A lot.
Hutch walked in when he was still laughing and holding his chest.
Hutch saw him and smiled—that light in his eyes transforming his face, removing almost all traces of fear, grief and anguish.
"Starsky!" Hutch came in fast, arms out, and then stopped a few inches from Starsky's chair, uncertainty and hope hovering around him like a cloud. He obviously wanted to grab Starsky in a tight hug, but wasn't sure how to do so without hurting him.
Starsky wanted rough, unguarded and physical. He would accept anything he could get, because they were both alive.
"C'mon, dummy," he said as loudly as he could, because it hurt even to talk. But the hurt was real, and that made him stronger.
"You're sitting up!" Hutch knelt, carefully taking Starsky's hands as if he were made of the rarest porcelain and about to shatter.
"Master of the obvious today, Hutch?" Starsky wanted to laugh again, but his chest still ached from the last time, and he had to conserve his energy. That drill sergeant of a nurse was going to come back at any time to shovel him back into the bed. Not to mention the battalion of medical staff that followed in her wake; respiratory therapist, physical therapist, the damned grief counselor, and all the interns who trailed after the attending physician like ducklings in a pond.
"Smartass," Hutch said with a grin and pretended to slug Starsky's arm. His fist didn't even connect, but the gesture satisfied Starsky. It was a start. Normalcy was reasserting itself, and ever so slowly, they'd get back to where they had been the night before he was shot.
The mess with Kira had come and gone, a blip on the road of life. The bond he and Hutch shared had been reestablished as if it had never broken. But there was something missing. Starsky had still yearned for something solid and real—what he hadn't gotten with Kira, would never had gotten with Kira.
He'd taken a step back earlier on that day, and bumped into Hutch, just exactly where he'd expected him to be. Where Hutch always was. Something in that moment had taken shape, with astonishing clarity, and he'd seen a profound truth.
Seen love.
Why he'd never recognized what was right in front of his face—and at his back, was baffling. The one stumbling block to overcome was to find out if Hutch saw him just as clearly.
Monday, May 14th, after the baseball game on the TV, but before the 11 pm news. He and Hutch had had their feet up on the coffee table; the game only an excuse to hang out together. White Chinese take-out boxes from Princess Lotus were piled in an untidy stack on the coffee table, and two empty Bud cans and the extra, unopened fortune cookie lay forgotten to one side.
Starsky had crunched his cookie and read his fortune already. Take time to slow down and see what is coming at you.
Hutch's had been even more prosaic. Today is the first day of the rest of your life.
Starsky had felt something in the air, tantalizing and sweet. It tickled his upper lip, and made him crave more than beer and Lemon Prawns. He'd turned to Hutch—for what he hadn't been entirely sure--to find Hutch staring at him, eyes wide with promise and something unexpected but wonderful.
His breath caught in his throat, Starsky had leaned forward; to say the right words, plant a kiss, or perhaps receive one. Hutch's blond eyebrows had raised just as a loud crash from the street broke the moment.
"What the hell?" Hutch had leapt up to look out the front door, leaving Starsky poised on the couch with the start of a woody.
One of the neighbors had come home drunk and knocked over the trash cans. His wife came out to heap abuse on his head, shouting in Chinese. In the ensuing noise and confusion, Starsky palmed his need while Hutch monitored the unexpected domestic squabble like a cop, ready to wade in should there be violence.
Mrs. Chin had shoved her husband into the house with a curse that needed no translation.
"I guess I'll get going then," Hutch had said, and Starsky was sure he heard the question that hovered in the air between them. Did you feel what I did? Do you want what I do?
But the moment was long gone, and there was no instant replay in life.
Coward that he was, Starsky had gathered up the beer bottles and leftovers to carry them into the kitchen. "It's my turn to drive tomorrow. I'll pick you up."
"I'll be up," Hutch had said, and gone home, leaving Starsky feeling like everything had been left unfinished.
Take time to slow down and see what is coming at you.
Coming back to the present, pain lanced through Starsky's chest and he moaned, wishing like hell that he hadn't. He had to be strong. He and Hutch had so much to talk about before the nurse came in and shooed him back to bed.
"Hey, buddy?" Hutch asked, squeezing Starsky's cold hand. "You with me? Do you need your meds?"
"Just taking time to look at you, is all." Dispelling the memory, Starsky drank Hutch in, filling up the scared places in his soul with all that light. With his pale hair and fair complexion, Hutch shone like a candle. Even on the hardest days, he had been the beacon Starsky chose to navigate toward. The glow of his smile was incandescent. Starsky had to blink, the afterimage of Hutch in purple and green branded against his eyelids.
"You look like you're spacing out." Hutch perched on the side of the bed since Starsky was in the only chair. "How long are you supposed to be up?"
"Long as I can stand it," Starsky fudged. Just having Hutch there doubled his endurance, especially when every single breath cut like a knife through his recently sutured chest. "I was waiting for you."
"You got me—all day. No plans except to spend the day with you."
"No ladies lined up, dazzled by the Hutchinson charm?"
Something passed over Hutch's face, indefinable and sad, but it was gone in an instant. Starsky felt the longing again, welcoming it back like an old friend. Nothing had changed. They were both poised to take that next step. He knew Hutch as well as he knew himself. He was certain Hutch felt that need, too. That want. And it wasn't for a lady.
They just had to find their way to each other. Sitting toe to toe, they had to see past all the old fears—and the new guilt—back to symbiosis.
Starsky focused on the here and now because it was easier than working through exactly what had brought them to this hospital room in late May. Truthfully, he didn't want to dwell on getting shot. He dreamed about it often enough.
"There are more flowers every time I come in. The bromeliads are a unique touch," Hutch said, examining the wealth of get-well bouquets stashed in every corner of the room. He scratched absently around the edge of a white bandage on his left wrist.
Starsky wasn't even sure which one was a bromeliad. And he didn't care. It was nice that practically every person he'd ever known had sent a card or flowers, but he was far more interested in what was going on with Hutch. And why hadn't he ever noticed that discrete bandage wrapped around Hutch's arm? Had he been hiding it with long sleeved shirts and jackets for the last weeks? Or had Starsky been so out of it, snowed on narcotics, that he hadn't realized Hutch had been injured, too? The thought left him chilled.
Maybe he hadn't accomplished his goal after all?
"Did you get shot?" Starsky licked his suddenly dry lips, guilt smacking him in the gut. Hutch's guilt, which sometimes filled the room, had nothing on his own.
"No, what made you think that?" Hutch abruptly stopped scratching, leaving his hand suspended just above his wrist. Distracted by the curve of Hutch's long, elegant fingers, Starsky wanted to reach out and grab hold, to feel his slightly smaller hand engulfed in Hutch's fist.
"You don't usually nick yourself shaving your wrist."
"This?" Hutch slipped a finger under the edge of the white tape and flipped the bandage off, revealing a neat slash, nearly healed over. "I got cut—had a couple stitches. Had them removed this morning."
At least none of the bullets had hit him.
"How?"
"Starsk," Hutch said with a bemused expression. "You've had stitches…"
"No, I mean, who—uh." Starsky took a shallow breath, the pain building in his chest the longer he was upright. "Who stabbed you?"
Hutch looked like he wasn't going to explain, but then he shrugged and sighed. "You'd find out sooner or later. I just didn't want you to have to worry about those first days…things were chaotic, Starsk. Horrible. The doctors…I…didn't know whether you'd survive." He raised his eyes to Starsky's, and Starsky felt the full measure of Hutch's grief like another bullet. Something else was there, too, exactly what Starsky had been hoping for. He just had to find a way to draw it out.
"The doctors told me there was massive damage." Hutch swallowed and bit his bottom lip. "I couldn't think. Huggy and Dobey kept me moving forward, got me going—thinking like a cop again." He gestured vaguely toward the hallway. "There was one attempt on your life after you were here—as if having nearly died on the damned operating table wasn't enough, they had to try and do it under my nose, taunting us. He never got to you. I caught that the asshole, and maybe…" He shrugged again, remorse obviously still haunting him even with Starsky right in front of him, alive and recovering. "I don't know—I had some clues, and went to follow up on them when a guy in the garage came at me with a knife."
"Fuck," Starsky said on an exhalation, releasing the breath he hadn't even realized he'd been holding. His chest ached abominably, but he ignored that.
"One of those blessings in disguise kind of things. Because that got me going in the right direction, got me motivated. I'd hunt down whoever did this to you. And I did." Hutch smiled beatifically, and in that moment, Starsky didn't care if he ever got what he'd ultimately wished for, because he'd made Hutch smile like that.
Hutch inhaled sharply which sounded suspiciously like he was about to cry. "And then, you died, and you lived."
Such a simple statement that held so much meaning.
Hutch blinked rapidly and turned his head, going back to his examination of a weird red spiky plant reminiscent of the more common iceplant that thrived in California. Starsky watched, giving him a moment to grapple with his emotions.
"Hutch," Starsky paused, but between Hutch's dazzling smile and the morphine that only succeeded in muting the pain in his chest, it was getting hard to think coherently. "What'd they do with the bullets?"
"What? W-why?"
"I want one." Starsky braced his chest with one hand, feeling his heart thudding against his palm. Oddly reassuring.
"Like a souvenir?" Hutch reared back, his skin pale except for two bright splotches of red on his cheeks.
This was certainly going well.
"That bastard gave them to me, I should keep at least one of 'em," Starsky said flatly. This wasn't what he wanted to talk about but it would all lead up to what he really meant to ask. "Are they in the evidence room?"
"I guess so." Hutch looked wary and disturbed. "I still don't see why you'd want to keep one."
"Because I saw them." Pain shot through his chest, exactly like the moment of impact. He wavered, the room growing dimmer for just a moment, with only Hutch's flaxen hair shining in the gloom. Starsky clenched his teeth—he hadn't expected such a visceral response. Hutch's voice shouting for him to get down behind the Torino echoed in his ears.
He could almost count the bullets hitting him, all over again. The first one high on the left, slamming into a rib and then ricocheting off into the upper lobe of his left lung. The second, lower and slanted downward because he'd started to turn by then, to go for his gun. That one had buried itself in his stomach, severing his esophagus from the organs below. The third had gone to the right, through his diaphragm, stopping just short of his liver. By that time, he'd had his pistol in hand and could see the police car barreling past with the muzzle of an automatic weapon poking from the window. He'd raised to fire, and in that moment, known his purpose. Why he was in line with the bullets, and not Hutch.
Two more bullets had hit him, because he let them. It had almost been like he'd willed the bullets to strike, so that they didn't get to Hutch. The cruiser had almost passed them, the trajectory of the shots more slanted and further away, so the remaining bullets caused relatively minor wounds. The fourth had plowed a furrow just under his right arm, into the arm pit. The last had glanced off his head as he went down, the wound almost hidden in his curly hair.
Starsky wasn't actually sure whether he actually remembered the bullets striking so vividly. Possibly, he'd filled in mental gaps when he read the doctor's notes, and simply imagined feeling where the bullets hit. Memory was tricky, especially when everything had happened so fast. It only took ten seconds to irrevocably alter his—and Hutch's—lives.
But there had been that one moment when time stopped. When he'd seen his would-be killer. Seen his hand pumping the trigger of the gun. Seen the individual bullets leaving the rifle barrel, and had moved just enough to prevent any one of them from hitting Hutch.
"Starsky!" Hutch's voice verged on panicky. He had his arms around Starsky, supporting his shoulders and neck because Starsky had slumped forward without realizing it.
"Terrific," Starsky muttered, muddle-headed. "Didn't think morphine was supposed to give me flashbacks."
"Nearly gave me a heart attack." Hutch ran a barely there-hand down Starsky's right cheek and then into his hair to cradle his head. His fingers graced over the thick scab covering the path of the fifth bullet. "You need to get back into bed."
"I need to finish this!" Starsky would have yelled if he had the energy. He managed to get Hutch's attention, easily enough. Saw the flutter of Hutch's pulse in his neck and yearned to lean forward—it was only an inch or two—and kiss that palpable proof of life.
"What?" Hutch snapped, the fear he masked with anger nakedly obvious.
Hutch's guilt had returned. It cloaked him like a shroud. Hutch's brightness usually outshone the guilt, the terrible fear, but Starsky had always known it was still there. Hutch obviously thought he should have saved Starsky's life.
And Starsky knew he'd saved Hutch's, only to have Hutch inexplicably save his a few days later. Against all expectations. Against all logic.
Didn't that prove they were meant to be together? That simply being in each other's lives made them stronger?
Hutch helped Starsky lean back against the chair and stayed poised as if he was sure that Starsky would crump at any time.
Slumped against Hutch's left arm, Starsky wasn't so sure he could sit up that much longer. His energy was almost zero but he needed to get this out. To clear the air before the nurse came back in the room.
It was that important.
"Hutch." Starsky took a ragged breath. It hurt, but he plowed on ruthlessly. "You ever had one specific moment when you wanted time to stop so that you could change what happened next?"
"Sure." Hutch relaxed marginally, curiosity—and probably, a certain amount of exasperation for Starsky's usual roundabout reasoning--lessening some of his fear. "Maybe, if I could have had a second to think straight, I might not have married Van."
"Hutch, I saw the bullets. I heard you yell, tell me to get down." Starsky panted. This was getting too hard, and he still had too much to say before he was too tired to talk. "Like everything got so slow that I could see what's usually too fast, and I could see that damned bullet hanging in mid-air."
"Starsky…"
Starsky waved away his protestations. "I was so afraid. I knew I was shot, but not how bad. I just…" He looked up at Hutch finally, and gave in to that glorious brilliance, that shining light. "I just had to protect you."
"You're delirious." Hutch pressed a hand against Starsky's forehead, their faces so close that Starsky could feel Hutch's breath on his cheek. It ticked, and he wanted to laugh, but that would have made the pain even worse, so he tucked away the memory of that first almost-kiss to savor later. In case there never was a real first kiss.
"Am not." The frisson of annoyance gave him a boost. "I knew what I was doin', Hutch. I took a bullet—"
"You took five," Hutch said sharply.
"Five." He conceded to the truth. "I didn't know about the first ones 'til after they hit, but I saw that lead bastard coming. Saw it headed for you, like your hair was like some bright homing beacon, and I couldn't…" Starsky coughed, which sent agonizing shock waves through his chest. He had to wait out the pain, and used the time to coalesce his thoughts. "I know how you think, Hutch. You blame yourself, but that ain't the way it went down."
"You stepped in front of a bullet?" Hutch whispered, his fingers suddenly too tight against Starsky's skull, pressing into the sore spots.
"No choice," Starsky said simply. "'Cause I love you. And I just gotta know…"
"Damn you, Starsky. Damn you."
And then time did stutter to a stop, because Starsky had no memory of Hutch pulling him in, or of Hutch's lips finding his. There was just before the kiss, and then suddenly, they were kissing. He was sucked bodily into Hutch, falling weightlessly headfirst into bliss, caught in the moment of pure, absolute perfection.
Today is the first day of the rest of your life.
"What the fuck were you thinking?" Hutch whispered harshly. He jerked away, the hand nearest to Starsky's right cheek raised as if he'd meant to slug Starsky instead of kiss him.
"You kissed me!" Starsky retorted, confused. His lips tasted of Hutch, and stung from the violent contact.
"I don't mean that!" Hutch shoved air instead of smacking Starsky. He hissed, the fear and anger so closely connected, and dropped heavily onto the bed, staring at Starsky. "How could you…I…damn."
"Cat got your tongue?" Starsky grinned, just a little.
"Don't start." Hutch stabbed a stiff finger in Starsky's face. "I don't know what to think here."
Knowing he was playing with fire, Starsky chanced getting scorched. "You didn't answer my question."
The look Hutch gave him would have felled a mortal man, but Starsky was beyond such worries. He'd already died a couple of times, and had the burns from the defibrillator paddles to prove it.
"Yes, I love you!" Hutch shouted. He gasped, the color finally coming back to his face, and grinned ruefully. "So what are we going to do about this?"
"Have sex?" Starsky asked hopefully. There was no way in hell that he could do anything so enthusiastically physical when his dick was limp as a dishrag from the morphine.
Hutch's laugh sounded painful, as if shot unexpectedly from some dark cellar where he'd left such black humor buried and forgotten. "How do you do that?"
"What?" Starsky pretended innocence. He actually hadn't expected such immediate success. Now he wasn't sure what to do. The old maxim "the flesh is willing but the spirit is weak" didn't quite fit, because the spirit was more than willing. It was his body that had a ways to go.
"Turn everything around." Hutch raised his arms as if to encompass all that had happened in the last two weeks. "You tilt me off my axis every day."
"I got tired of waitin' for you to analyze it every way to Sunday and then some," Starsky said wearily. He really was tired. His chest hurt even worse, and it must be nearly time for another dose of morphine. What helped mitigate the agony was the sure and steady knowledge that Hutch really did feel the same way he did.
And wanted to have sex with him.
Hutch might not have said so out loud, but Starsky knew, just the same.
"I have…been thinking about you…in a different way," Hutch admitted hesitantly, finally taking his hand just as Starsky had imagined he would. Hutch's hand wasn't really all that much bigger, but the way he curved his palm around Starsky's, tucking Starsky's cold fingers in as if they were something precious to be preserved forever, was like nothing Starsky had ever felt before.
"Oh? When?" Starsky felt the corners of his mouth curve into a sleepy smile, positively content. He wanted to sit like this for ever, but his whole body was rebelling the over-exertion.
"You want to know chapter and verse?" Hutch ducked his head and found Starsky's mouth again.
Warmth, sweetness and love filled the kiss with so much promise Starsky though he would burst. Morphine be damned, enough of this, and those endorphins Hutch always went on about would eradicate all the pain.
"I read you loud and clear," Starsky said, panting. "At the risk of sounding like I'm making some kinda lewd proposal, think you can get me into bed?"
"Hey—I'll take all the lewd proposals I can get from you." Hutch knelt down beside the chair, still holding Starsky's hand. "Tell me one thing, first. Why'd you take a bullet for me? Starsk, you were already…"
"Dying?" Starsky nodded. He'd known he was dying from the instant the bullets slammed into his back. Precious seconds had been lost while he'd fumbled with the damned keys and then tried to get his pistol clear of his shoulder holster. He'd felt death before, that night on Ed Bellamy's roof. He'd always known that forfeiting his own life in exchange for Hutch's was the right move. "Because I loved you. I love you, and I gave you what I could."
"I don't know what to say," Hutch whispered, turning Starsky's hand to kiss his palm.
"Get me into bed, and I'll bet you'll think of a few things," Starsky said to lighten the mood. The last thing he wanted was to be maudlin on a day like this. The waiting was over. He had what he wanted most in life.
"You talk big, but I suspect you'll just fall asleep on me."
"Not taking that bet." Starsky hoisted his eyelids up with supreme effort, but he was losing the battle to stay awake.
"Remember the night I carried you into the back room of the restaurant?" Hutch slid one arm around Starsky's shoulders and the other under his butt. "I did it before, and I can do it again."
Getting the idea belatedly, which just proved how dopey he really was, Starsky tried to raise his right arm high enough to curve around Hutch's neck. The muscles weren't up to the task and all he got was another distinct pain in the location of bullet wound number four. "Huh. You nearly dropped me that time."
"Relax, I've got this down." Hutch settled Starsky in his arms and hoisted him up.
Leaning against Hutch's chest, Starsky heard a crunch. "What the hell was that?" he squeaked. "Did you break your back?"
Hutch laughed, and Starsky felt the rumble all the way down his rib cage. The joy transmitted through his bones, into his muscles and sinews, working to heal him from within.
"That was the surprise I brought you, but it's not worth much now." Hutch bent, depositing Starsky on the bed with infinite care. He fluffed pillows and smoothed sheets like a tall, blond nurse who just happened to carry a gun.
"Leave that alone!" Starsky grumbled. The bed wasn't anymore comfortable than the chair had been. Hutch's arms had been far, far better than a skimpy mattress and flat pillows. He was almost to the place where even Hutch's presence didn't alleviate the worst of the pain, and he needed relief before the agony completely overwhelmed him. He braced one arm over his chest, trying to breathe without whimpering. "What'd you bring me?"
"I went to your house to collect the mail and clean up a little. Water the plants." Hutch fished a handful of crumbs out of his breast pocket. "And there on the kitchen counter was the last fortune cookie, the extra one Ling Fa threw in because she thinks you're funny." Hutch held up a tiny slip of white paper and dusted off the fortune cookie remains. "Want to know your fortune?"
"Must be yours," Starsky said. "You found it."
"Then it's ours. I found it, and you crushed the cookie." Hutch cleared his throat. "You will find love in an unexpected place."
Fin