A Lying Shame

by Rae 7/2007

Part 1

As soon as he said it, Starsky wished he hadn't, but as soon as he'd said it, it was too late to take it back. Instead, he looked down and folded his arms across his chest.

Hutch just stood there, still as a freeze-frame.

"Don't lie to me, Starsky."

Hutch's voice was so low and tired that Starsky thought maybe he could get away with pretending he hadn't heard. That would just make two lies, though.

"I'm not lying." So that was still two. In the last five minutes, anyway.

"You think I can't tell?"

He was trying to make Starsky look at him, but Starsky wasn't going to do that even if he wanted to, which he didn't. He thought he might never be able to again.

"I'm sorry." But it wasn't for what Hutch probably thought he was sorry for.

"You're sorry?" Hutch took a step back. He put a hand to his stomach the way he did sometimes after he'd gotten gut-punched in some alley or in a warehouse, or wherever a bad guy had tried to get the better of him. "You have nothing else? Just you're sorry?"

Starsky just nodded.

"We're done then." Hutch turned away, picked up his jacket. Made it three steps toward the door.

Done? Done with what? Done how? Starsky felt a burn start deep inside, where it was going to do the most possible damage while leaving no visible evidence. Maybe he should just tell him. Get himself off the hook.

What was the point of that if Hutch just ended up on it in his place?

"I love you." His throat felt tight, like the words had to force their way out.

Hutch's jacket ended up on the floor in a heap, and Hutch's hands ended up in fists by his sides.

"That's what? Your excuse? Your absolution?"

"No. I just wanted you to know." It was time to look at him. It was important now. So he tried. He really tried.

"You have a damn strange way of showing it."

"Hutch. Please." Still, he kept his arms up, like he didn't dare drop them. Couldn't drop his defenses. But against what? For what?

"Starsky. Tell me what happened. What really happened."

"I . . ."

"Tell me or I'm leaving."

He'd probably forgotten, or didn't care, that they were in his apartment. Where was he going to go?

"Hutch." The word felt like it was something tangible. It tasted odd in his mouth.

"Goodbye, Starsky. Next partner, don't lie to him."

Hutch turned back to the door, tripped over his jacket, and nearly fell.

Starsky reached for him without thought, an automatic response. Hutch batted his hand away, hard enough to hurt, but not there, not where the blow connected. Somewhere else, somewhere a lot more vital.

"I'm sorry."

"Yeah. So what?"

He picked up his jacket and left Starsky standing by the open door. Starsky knew what that meant: Don't be here when I get home.

He went and sat on the couch. He didn't bother to close the door.

When he woke up, it was almost dark. His neck was sharpshooting daggers up the back of his skull, and his right foot was numb.

He sensed rather than saw that Hutch was there across from him in the chair, quiet. Waiting.

Starsky tried to think of something to say. Nothing came to him. But he looked up, finally, and rubbed at his face.

"Tell me the truth," Hutch said. "Please."

"I can't." He saw a faint glitter somewhere near where he thought Hutch's eyes were. "If I do, it’ll change everything between us."

"If you don't, nothing can ever be the same."

Not fair, Starsky thought, but true.

"I can't." What he meant was, I don't want to. I'll lose you. I don't want to. He saw the faint shimmer from the streetlights in Hutch’s hair. He wanted to touch the small glints with his fingertips.

"I figured something out anyway," Hutch said. "Over at Huggy's."

Hutch had gone to Huggy, and Huggy had come through somehow. He wasn't sure he wanted to know what Huggy had come up with.

"What did he say?"

"He said, 'Why would Starsky lie to you? Think about it.' That's all. So I thought about it."

Starsky stopped breathing.

Hutch said, "There's only one reason, isn't there? There's only one reason I'd lie to you, so I know why you’d do it."

Starsky thought maybe he should have left while he'd had the chance, before Hutch came back and torched his defenses. He could still go. Go now, get out.

"Whatever you think you're protecting me from, this is worse. Don't you understand that?"

"You'd think so," Starsky said. "But you'd be wrong." He found he'd crossed his arms in front of himself again. Like that would help. "Can’t you just let this go?"

"I could." He leaned in closer, and Starsky knew he was trying to see his eyes. "I could, and then what?"

"Then we just forget it and move on."

"Could you do that?"

Starsky wanted to move, do something. He had some vague sense that flight rather than fight was the way to go, but really, he knew neither option would work. Nothing would.

"No."

"I can't either."

"But I would. If you asked me to."

"Starsky . . ."

"Please, Hutch, please. Please." And then he dropped his arms, and put his hands out, palms up. Take my hands, Hutch. Please, just take my hands.

"I think I need you to go, Starsk."

At least he'd said "Starsk." That was something. Something small, but something.

Starsky let his hands drop, defeated, onto his knees. "All right." He stood up. "What now?"

"Pick me up tomorrow. I need time to think. Sort this out. Then we'll talk."

"I'm sorry." He hadn't meant to say it again.

"I know."

Starsky turned and left.

Part 2

At a fairly young age Hutch learned that if he wrote down all the shit he couldn't stop thinking about, then he could trick his brain into believing it didn't have to worry about keeping track any more. Sometimes that even worked.

This time, though, he knew there wasn't any point in trying to fool himself. There weren't any tricks available for this particular problem. And even without a brain in overdrive, it was too hot to sleep. So he gave up trying and went back to the beach. At that time of the evening the boardwalk was still full of skaters and weight lifters, drinkers, lovers, music that changed from good guitar to bad percussion to promising vocals as he walked. The air smelled of fried fish and popcorn. He kept his head down so he wouldn't get caught up with nodding to strangers, or worse, see someone he knew. He veered left off the boardwalk and kicked off his shoes. Even at that hour the sand was still hot.

The tide was ebbing, and he was able to walk far enough out that the sound of the surf made a welcome change from the sounds of the people behind him, the happy people whose partners hadn't just lied to their face.

He stopped at the water's edge and let the wavelets cool his feet. He thought he could see the horizon—the faint line between black and black. The breeze was still hot, like it came straight off the sun even in the dark.

He imagined Starsky pacing in the dark of his apartment right now, or maybe, driven out by the heat too, flying in his car, windows down, driving too fast to leave room for any thoughts other than staying on the road. Unless, oh God. Unless maybe staying on the road wasn't a priority.

No. No way. Nothing that could happen to either of them could put them that far over the edge.

And Starsky would never do that to him.

Before tonight, he would have sworn that Starsky would never have lied to him, either.

Jesus, Starsky. He wanted to shout it. What the hell is going on?

What had happened between "Don't make me choose" and "If I tell you it will change everything between us"?

He turned right and began to walk. He wanted to run, but he needed to think. Running was for escape, for avoidance, and that wasn't what he'd come here for.

He let his mind do the work instead, letting it run wherever it wanted.

To the squad room that morning . . . a fan and hot coffee . . .

"Where were you last night?"

Starsky'd never even looked up. Hadn't looked at him once.

"Sorry I asked."

Now he wished he'd pushed it. Starsky had looked beyond weary. Said he hadn't slept. What else would Hutch have thought other than the obvious?

Dobey'd sat at the detectives' desk. His words had been nearly incomprehensible.

"Blaine's dead."

And Starsky had said, "Who?" in absolute disbelief, and then, "We were with him last night."

But that wasn't right. They'd worked with Blaine the night before. Last night, like most of the other Friday nights of their lives, they'd gone their separate ways, off on a couple of dates. Or so Hutch had thought.

"You must be suffering from heat prostration if you think that John was here with a two-bit hooker . . ."

But not, "if you think that John was here with a man . . ."

"Up until six months ago, he was in here with the same guy, and recently there've been others."

And Starsky had said, "Well, he must have been under cover."

And not, "no way he would have been here with a guy."

"Oh, Starsky."

Hutch turned for home. And ran.

Part 3

When Starsky was nine, his father sat him down on the burnt-orange sofa and gave him his first lecture.

"You're a big brother, now, son. You can't act any old way you want to anymore. You have to set an example for those who look up to you."

He'd done his best, but his best hadn't been very good. So he'd gotten shipped off to the other end of the planet, where he didn't know any boys who might take him back behind the field house and get him to do dirty things that only little perverts would do. Luckily, by then his father was three years dead, and would never know why his mother had put on the same dress she'd worn to pop's funeral and driven Davey to the airport. She thought she'd done right by him.

Well, she had. Just not the "right" she'd meant.

He sat on the edge of his bed, wishing he could go back, just to yesterday. Just to yesterday would have been enough.

Hutch had said, "You do this again, you're gonna blow a partner."

Oh my God, Hutch. He almost laughed. You have no idea.

And Maggie. All her pain held out to him and to Hutch, and all her pride. "There are some things better left unsaid." Had she been trying to tell him something?

He hadn't looked at her, at either of them, the whole time they'd been in her house. But nobody had looked at anybody since Dobey'd said those words. "Blaine's dead." Starsky hadn't even been able to take in what he'd meant. "Who?" he'd said. Like he didn't recognize the name.

"I'm sorry, Johnny," he said to the air that he could barely breathe. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry."

"You sure have a lot of sorry in you," Hutch said. "Want to let some of it out?"

Starsky hadn't heard him come in, but he wasn't surprised. Wasn't startled. Wasn't—scared. You should be. You will be. He put his hands on his knees where they had something to grip. He kept his head down.

"I told you."

"You told me shit. You told me a flat out lie, and I'm here for you to take it back. I'm here to listen. Tell me now, Starsky. Where were you last night?"

"No."

"Okay, then I'll tell you. You knew all along about Blaine, and you were with him last night."

"No."

Hutch shook his head once like he couldn't believe Starsky was still trying the play the same bad hand. "You started the lie in the car, didn't you? You said, 'How could anybody live that life' and you said, 'How could he have been gay without my knowing it,' but you weren't talking about you and him, were you?"

Starsky thought if he could will his own heart to stop beating, he would do it. His hands moved on their own, flexing against his knees. His fingers hurt, and his kneecaps under them. Still it was dark, but he could see Hutch perfectly, even though he couldn't look at him. Hutch smelled of ocean, of sweat. Of anger.

Hutch took a step toward him. "And I said, 'How would you have felt if he'd told you,' and you couldn't answer. All you could come up with was 'I don't know.' And you couldn't look at me. You never looked at me one time the entire day." He took another step, so close now that Starsky could feel the heat of his body move in and mix itself with his own. "You are one stupid son of a bitch, Starsky."

He couldn't move any closer without knocking into Starsky's knees. Starsky tried to push himself farther back, farther away. But he couldn't make the muscles move. So he looked up.

"All right. All right! I was with Blaine last night. I knew about him, all right? You happy now? And he knew about me." And that—that he hadn't meant to say out loud. He took a short shallow breath. "But it's not what you think."

Hutch turned to stone, turned to ice. "You have no idea what I think." His voice was toneless. "You don't know me at all, do you? And I don't know you."

See? I told you to be scared. Are you scared now? You should be. It's all over now.

"Hutch."

"If you open your mouth again, it better be to tell me the truth, or so help me, Starsky, we really are done."

But not done yet?

What the hell was he supposed to do now? What the hell could he say? And how could say it? How could he start?

I can't tell you when I'm sitting here on my bed with you standing above me like that, looking like that . . . Starsky stood suddenly, and Hutch took a step back.

"I'll tell you." He saw Hutch's shoulders come down a full two inches, and he saw him blink. "Just, not here. Outside somewhere. I can't breathe in here."

Hutch let him go by, and followed him out of the apartment.

Part 4

Hutch drove, because they needed his car for where they were going. Off the West Imperial Highway, somewhere in El Segundo, there was a place to pull off into a scrubby wide lot. It was directly in line with the east/west runway at the far end of Los Angeles International Airport, near the beach. No houses, no businesses. Just weedy gravel and chain link, and planes so close overhead that if you reached up you could almost graze your hand along their bellies as they lifted off. The sheer size and sound of a 747 a hundred feet above you always put things into perspective. One of Starsky's stewardesses had shown the spot to him, and he'd shown it to Hutch. There had to be some kind of ironic humor in that.

Hutch was sure they lost ten years off their hearing every time they went there, but at this time of night, the take-offs weren't too frequent, and more important, it was open there, and private.

It wasn't far from Venice Beach, not a long drive, but in the dark silence it seemed to take hours. Hutch tried to imagine what Starsky was thinking, was feeling, but all he could manufacture were stupid inadequate words like nervous and worried and upset. He didn't like the way terrified, hopeless, humiliated sounded in his head. So he just drove, and fought the urge to put his hand on Starsky's knee, and to tell him never mind, it didn't matter, nothing mattered but him. But them. That wouldn't do either of them any good in the long run.

He found the broken gate that let into the patchy lot, and swung the car around so it lined up with its back facing the runway. A plane was going to take off soon because the lights were on, strung out for more than a mile on either side of where they parked, seeming to come to a distant point where the land ended and the sky began.

Still in silence, they got out of the car and climbed onto the trunk. That was why it had to be Hutch's. So they could sit cross-legged on the car and try to touch planes.

He thought Starsky would wait, put off what he had to say until after the plane took off. So he actually jumped a little when Starsky spoke.

"Last night," Starsky said, voice low and almost inaudible. He cleared his throat and turned himself a little to his right, so Hutch couldn't see his face. Or so he couldn't see Hutch's. "He asked me to meet him for a drink. No big deal."

No, no big deal. Hutch knew they got together on a regular basis. Why not? Blaine had been like a father to Starsky. Didn't fathers and sons meet for drinks sometimes? Hutch couldn't wrap himself around any other kind of relationship they might have had. And now he no longer wanted to know. But he'd asked for it. He had to take it. Somehow.

"But he wanted to meet at a bar I didn't know. The Green Parrot. We'd never gone there. We usually just went to Huggy's."

Huggy's. Did Huggy know any of this? Hutch began to feel incredibly blind and stupid. He sat still, afraid to move. Afraid if he did, Starsky would stop talking. Afraid if he didn't, Starsky would keep talking. He stayed as still as he could.

"When I got there, he was already drunk. And he asked me to go to his hotel. He didn't even ask if I wanted a drink."

Hutch didn't know if he could bear the next bit. He didn't know how he was going to be able to hear it. Where were the planes when you needed them? He needed one now. But it would just put off the inevitable. He was going to have to listen. Have to hear the words. Have to find a way to live with them.

"I know what you're thinking. But Hutch, he'd never asked me before. And when I didn't answer him, he just looked away and took another drink. I just put my hand on his shoulder, and he nodded, and I walked out."

Hutch let out a breath he didn't know he'd been holding.

"Nick Hunter looks like me."

"Yes."

"If I'd stayed . . . not, you know, but stayed, maybe . . ."

"Starsk."

"I know, I know. But I can't help thinking it." He pulled his knees up and put his arms around them. It made him look small and young. Defenseless. "He was a good man, like Maggie said. He was good to me."

In the distance, a rumble began, and navigation lights swung into view. The plane began to rush toward them, growing, the lights seeming to move farther apart, to get brighter. The roar became too much to stand, and Hutch covered his ears reflexively, like he always did. It didn't make much difference, but he never could keep from doing it. He always felt a little silly, but he didn't care. The plane passed overhead, the sound suddenly diminishing, but for once he didn't reach up, didn't try to touch it.

The silence after it passed was even louder than the roar of its approach.

Now what?

"When I was seventeen, he caught me with . . . with another kid. Ah jeeze, Hutch. He caught me having sex with a boy, and all he did was close the door and leave us."

He took a breath, a hitching sound, like he didn't know how to use his lungs anymore. Hutch tried to say something, but before he could form a thought, Starsky went on.

"The next day he called and told me he wanted to talk to me. I was terrified. But he picked me up at my house and took me down to the pier. He bought me coffee. Coffee. 'First time for everything,' he said, and he laughed, and I knew it was going to be okay. He said I was a man now, and there were some things I should know. He told me . . . about himself, and that he understood about me, and that I was never to think of myself as a freak. But he told me how hard it was going to be, and he said if there was any chance, if I could find some way . . . to choose . . . a different path . . . that I should do that. And then he took me home. He never said another word about it in all those years. And I—"

"You chose the different path."

"Yeah. It wasn't that hard to do, really. He did it, and I know he loved Maggie. Guess there's more than one path to take if you look for it." He moved a little, stretched his legs out. "I'm not gay, but I think, I guess I'm bisexual. I pretty much never thought about it again, until last night."

He turned his head, and Hutch knew he was trying to see his face. He knew he should let him, but he couldn't yet.

"I wish you'd say something."

I can't. I can't think of a single thing to say.

"I lied to you, Hutch. I did. But it wasn't just for me. It was for him, too."

"I understand."

"Really?"

"Really. What else could you have done? It's just, I know you too well. Or I thought I did."

Starsky nodded, and began to fiddle with the car's antenna.

"But you need to understand a few things, too, mushbrain." Hutch smiled. "Weren't you listening to me at all? All day? All day I've been telling you and everyone else. Gay, straight, whatever. It doesn't matter. Labels don't mean a thing. You're not a different man today than you were yesterday." He reached out his hand, not sure if Starsky would take it. Please, Starsky, just take my hand. Starsky didn't move. "You were testing me, weren't you? All day. I didn't know it, but I think I passed, don't you? Didn't you listen to anything I said?"

"I listened." He reached over and took hold of Hutch's hand. "I listened, and you passed. Flying colors. And I'm sorry I lied. For everything. For not trusting you."

"I'm not gay, Starsk. But I love you, too. It'll be okay."

When the next plane came, they reached up, trying to touch it, they way they always did. When it had passed, Hutch dropped his arm and let it fall around Starsky's shoulders.

Starsky turned to him, at last, and the silence after the plane's roaring passage was like a cool breeze after a heat wave.

"Come on," Hutch said. "I'll buy you a cup of coffee."

Epilogue

"Starsky," Hutch said, pulling the steering wheel to the right, "would you consider that, uh, that a man that spends seventy-five percent of his time with another man has got certain tendencies?"

Starsky flipped the pages of the magazine he was reading in the back seat. "You mean three quarters?" He was starting to get a little carsick.

Hutch looked at him in the rearview mirror. "Yeah," he said, and shook his head a little, like he was so impressed with Starsky's brainpower.

"Sure," Starsky said, still reading. "Why not?" He looked up. "You mean that was the case between John and—"

"No, no. I mean that's the case between you and me."

Where was he going with this? "What?"

Hutch went into one of his well-reasoned but slightly insane dissertations about how many hours there were in a week, and about how many of them he spent in Starsky's company. To his serious alarm, Starsky found that what he said actually made some sense. He started to pay more attention. He put the magazine aside, and sat up.

". . . that's seventy-five percent of the time we spend together, and you're not even a good kisser!"

"Yeah? How do you know that?" Starsky glared back at him via the rearview.

Hutch lifted an eyebrow. "You make an excellent point," he said. "Maybe I need to find out for myself." He grinned. "There are many alternate paths one can choose, you know." He straightened the wheel. "And," he said, "there's a first time for everything."

Starsky sat back. And for the first time in three days, he smiled.

There is now a sidequel to this story (as opposed to a sequel): Requiescat

Author's Notes

This story, of course, relies heavily on familiarity with the S3 episode, "Death in a Different Place." I've tried to find a good episode summary, but haven't found one so far. If anyone knows of one, would you please send me the URL?

The vacant lot where they went to talk existed in 1980. I used to go there a lot to try to touch planes with a friend who was a pilot for Delta Airlines. I don't think I'd ever be able to find it now, if it's still there. I don't remember exactly where it was, so I fictionalized the location.

Sincere thanks go to Nik and Laura for edits and encouragement.

Feedback is always appreciated: racric@verizon.net

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