Work Text:
Birth of a Partnership
By TLR
Plot: Starsky and Hutch meet for the first time, as fourteen-year-olds.
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Hutch was fourteen and trying to act older. His father said boys should learn to run before they learn to speak their minds, but he thought walking was wiser first, so while his uncle was away on business, he thought he'd hitchhike into Bay City and walk around the blocks. There was a new late-night movie house opening up and he wanted to see what was playing.
Just as he passed an alley behind a payday loan place, he heard distressed breathing.
He almost kept going. People in alleys didn't always want to be seen. But the sound was small and steady, like somebody counting through pain. He stepped into the mouth of the alley and looked. There was a boy about his age on the ground with his back to a dumpster, knees up, arms around his middle like he was keeping himself from falling apart.
The boy looked up when Hutch began walking his way. The light from the street put an auburn halo on the boy’s hair and left the rest of him in shadow. He didn’t reach for anything. He watched Hutch’s hands.
“Hey there,” Hutch said.
“Keep walkin',” the boy told him. His voice was rough but not mean. He tried to make himself bigger and failed.
“You need a doctor.”
“I need you to keep walking.”
Hutch stepped closer until the sharp stink of the dumpster pushed at him. “I’m not here to start something.”
“Good,” the boy said. “I’m fresh out of something.”
The left cheek was swelling under dirt. A split at the lip. Blood had dried along a cut near the eyebrow and made a dark line toward the ear. The T-shirt was one size too small and wet from the ground. There was a scraped patch on one elbow with grit stuck in it, and one ragged sneaker had come untied and the sole was separating.
He shifted and lost a breath. Tried to hide it. Didn’t manage.
“Can you stand?” Hutch asked.
“Can you mind your own business?”
“Not tonight.”
The boy rubbed one wrist. “You look like the kind of kid who puts his nose in where it doesn't belong.” He saw the differences. Where the blond kid's clothes were neat and clean, shoes casual but new, his own were secondhand and worn.
“I look like a kid who knows where the hospital is.”
“No hospitals,” the boy said, quick. “No cops.”
“What about a sink and some peroxide.”
He hesitated. Hutch could see him sorting choices he'd rather not make. “Who are you.”
“Kenneth Hutchinson. Hutch to my friends.”
“Yeah, who cares.”
“What’s your name?”
“Starsky.”
“Not your first name.”
“It is tonight.”
He tried to stand without Hutch’s outstretched hand, and failed, and then accepted it grudgingly. He was lighter than he looked, or Hutch was stronger than he knew. When he got upright he swayed once and caught himself on the dumpster. He laughed once at his own wobble, short and embarrassed.
Hutch said, “I live with my uncle Ray about an hour out. He's an architect away on a job. We have a big cabin, hot water, clean towels, a real bed. I can patch you up and bring you back in the morning. I took First Aid in Boy Scouts and Sea Scouts.”
“I’m not a stray,” Starsky said. “Got my own bed, my own family. It's just, we hit a rough patch right now, no big deal.”
“All right, that's good. I was just trying to help.”
Hutch turned to go away, but Starsky said a bit softer, “Hey, um... but why would you?”
Hutch looked back. “Why would I what?”
“Help I mean.”
Hutch shrugged. “Seemed like a good idea. I try to help everybody I can.”
Starsky studied Hutch’s face to see if there was a trick, the brunet's eyes dark blue jewels appraising like a street cat’s, but there was something vulnerable, not knowing who to trust but wanting to.
“You're well-spoken as my aunt likes to say,” Starsky said.
“I like to read.”
“What are you, a librarian?”
“What are you, a comedian?”
Starsky looked past him to the street. Nobody there. “I can walk,” he said. “But I’m not getting in a car unless I’m sitting by the door.”
“Fine. I hitched here, but we can take a taxi back.”
“And I can bail if I don’t like it.”
“Also fine.”
“And if this is some rich kid prank, I’ve been punched by better before.”
“No pranks. Tonight.”
Starsky finally nodded and followed Hutch out of the alley, moving in pain. When they reached the corner Hutch hailed a cab.
“You really want to play doctor,” Starsky said.
“I don’t want to leave you in a gutter. That wouldn't be very humane of me.”
As the cab pulled up, Starsky's ankle weakened a bit and Hutch caught his arm. Starsky promptly pulled away and they got into the back seat.
Twice Starsky’s head dipped and snapped back like he couldn't allow himself to sleep. Hutch asked once if his ribs hurt and Starsky said only when he breathed. Hutch tried not to smile and failed.
The last few miles was a ribbon of paved road cut between low hills and stands of trees, and Bay City fell away behind them.
“Never been this far from civilization,” Starsky said.
“Nice, huh?” Hutch said. “See the cabin up there? Ray built it himself.”
Starsky looked at the well-lit property and the fanciest cabin he'd ever seen. “Cool, but I'm no nature boy, and you are definitely a rich kid.”
“He’s the one with the money. I uh, had a little trouble back home in Minnesota, and well, Ray took me in.”
Starsky looked at him in a different light. “Didn't think rich kids had any problems. Poor kids do. Guess we all do sometime, huh?”
“Yeah.”
Starsky glanced down. “I'm a transplant myself. Originally from back east. Pop was a policeman, shot down, so I um, Ma thought it best I live here with my aunt and uncle, tryin' to keep me outa trouble. But what she didn't know was that you can find trouble no matter where you live.”
The taxi stopped to let them out. Hutch gave the cabbie a big tip. Once its tail lights disappeared around a bend, Hutch gestured toward the glass, stone, and wood cabin.
“Home sweet home,” Hutch said.
“And my boarding house for the night. How much I owe you? I can pay you back.”
“Are you kidding? It's on me. But I could use some help with my laundry. It's piling up.”
“Deal.”
Hutch unlocked the door and stepped in first so Starsky could see he wasn’t setting him up. The place smelled like cedar and cherry pipe tobacco. A long room with a stone fireplace, low couch, open kitchen, wide hallway to the bedrooms. Ray left things neat by habit. Hutch turned on some lights.
“Bathroom’s down there,” he said. “First door on the left. I’ll get the kit.”
He gave Starsky space to stand in the doorway and decide. Starsky went in and ran the water too hot first, then adjusted down. Hutch heard the sound of hands under the tap and the catch of breath when water hit a cut. He put peroxide, gauze, tape, antibiotic cream, a clean T-shirt of his, and a pair of midnight blue drawstring sweats on the kitchen counter, wondering what Ray would say if he came home early. Probably nothing. His uncle would do the same.
Starsky came out with water on his eyelashes and curls damp. Without smudges, he looked younger. Hutch had imagined eighteen in the alley because the city puts years on a face that do not belong there. Up close Starsky was fourteen or fifteen, the edge of his ribs pressing a bit through the tight shirt, a small scar near his right temple that looked old, and another on his knuckle that looked like yesterday's.
“Sit,” Hutch said, pointing to a stool at the counter. “I don’t bite.”
“Better not.”
Starsky sat and let Hutch tilt his chin with two fingers. Starsky watched Hutch’s hands again the way you watch a dog you're unsure of. Hutch poured peroxide on a pad and Starsky winced when it foamed along the cut near his eye.
“Sorry,” Hutch said.
“No problem.”
“Who did this?”
“Some guys.”
“How many?”
“I don't know.”
“Why'd they do it?”
“Because I was there.”
“You hit back?”
“Some.”
Hutch held the pad to the cut with careful fingers, then applied the bandage in an x fashion, then cleaned and treated the other wounds.
“A regular Marcus Welby,” Starsky smiled. “My lucky night.”
“Scouts, remember? You hungry?”
Starsky shrugged a shoulder, defenses trying to come up again. “Maybe.”
“Toast and eggs?”
“You cook too?” Starsky asked. “Don't tell me. You learned in the scouts.”
“No. Uncle Ray told me to learn. Two reasons. You won't go hungry, and the ladies will swoon.”
“Ah. Only one thing wrong with that advice.”
“What's that?”
“Even if you know how to cook, you can still go hungry. How can you cook if you got no food?”
“Touche.”
After Hutch patched him up, he put everything away while Starsky changed into the better fitting clothes Hutch had.
Hutch made eggs in a pan that held heat well, simple and not burned, real butter and salt. Toast, jam that Ray had made and put in jars with small labels that said plum.
Starsky sat like he wanted to pretend he didn’t want it and then ate like he had been waiting all day for someone to remember he had a stomach. He wiped the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand. Hutch put a glass of milk and a napkin by his plate and Starsky looked at it like Hutch was trying to pull something, then drank half the glass.
“Thanks,” Starsky said, defenses going down again.
“You're welcome. So... your folks know you're out and about?”
“They know I come back. They work a lot. They’re good people, but mostly they’re busy and tired. They own a little grocery store in the neighborhood, tryin' to feed too many hungry people and keep from gettin' robbed.”
Hutch nodded. “You should call them. Phone's over there.”
Starsky set his fork down. “You're bossy.”
“I make suggestions.”
“You’re not bad at it,” Starsky said.
“Being bossy?”
“Being decent.”
Hutch didn’t know what to do with that, so he put the pan in the sink and ran water. Starsky slid off the stool, went to the sink, and finished washing and rinsing it.
“Now what about that laundry, Hutchinson?”
“Sure, follow me, washer and dryer's in the basement. Oh and you can call me Hutch.”
“Oh yeah? That mean we're friends?”
“Do you feel like we're friends?”
“I don't know. I don't have that many friends. I got more enemies. And then, the guys you thought were friends, stab you in the back.”
“We all have our problems, don't we?”
“Hey, I try not to complain too much. Could be worse. I got a roof over my head and some food in my belly.”
Hutch poked him playfully in the ribs. “Not much. Gonna make a Gordo out of you.”
“What's a Gordo, somethin' to eat? Sounds like a gourd. Or a gordita.”
“Look it up.”
---
After the laundry was finished, they went back upstairs to the living room and Hutch turned on the TV. “There's a TV in the guest room. And help yourself to any food we have. I'll turn you into a fat baby by morning.”
Starsky shook his head. “I’m not staying.”
“Why not? You should rest up.”
“I'll rest at home.”
“But Starsky, I thought... have I done something wrong? Said something or...”
“No, it's me. I just can’t. You fixed me up, I helped you with laundry. Now we're even. So, I gotta go before...”
“Before what?”
“Nothin'. I just... never mind.”
Starsky turned and started for the front door in a slight limp.
“Hey,” Hutch said going after him.
Starsky turned and nudged him back. “I've lost people, Hutch. I had Ma, and a little brother, and a pop. I... ” His voice lowered to a tearful whisper, eyes shiny with tears. “I don't want to lose anyone else. That's what happens. You get close to someone, then you lose them. End of story. And you look like you've lost a little too.”
He turned and opened the door. On his way out, Hutch said at his back, “You're right. I've lost too. But you won't lose me. I'm not going anywhere.”
Starsky kept walking, then trotting, then running on his hurt ankle until he reached the two-lane highway and stuck his thumb out.
Hutch shouted again. “You know what they say, Starsk! Better to have loved and lost, than not to have loved at all!”
Hutch watched the lone figure of who he thought was his new friend, until he lost sight of him around the first bend, then sat on the top porch step. He didn't know where the tears came from, or why, but they came. He remembered how Starsky clung to his sleeve while he was tending to his bumps and cuts. he remembered how meaningful it felt to help someone who needed it. There'd been a connection. A friendship. Something deep and unspoken that you can't explain. A boy who needed to be wanted, and a boy who wanted to be needed. And now it was gone.
The end