There Is Also Life

Morning was one of his favourite times of the day. There was hope that the new day would be better than the last, and Hutch dozed for a moment, savouring that knowledge. Soon, he would get up, sit at the table, and plan the day, over a cup of coffee, and a healthy breakfast.

Of course, plans often fell apart, which was why you needed a Plan B. Or, if all else fails, Plan Z, Hutch told himself, in Starsky's voice. Starsky. Now, there was a plan. Hutch reached across the bed for his partner. The sheets were cold, on Starsky's side, and Hutch frowned. Starsky rarely got out of bed before Hutch. He heard a chuckle behind him, from the bathroom door, but didn't turn. He pretended he hadn't heard, and went on searching the bed, looking under the pillows. Between the sheets and the blankets. Under the bed.

'Starsky? Where the hell are you?'

He felt warm arms circle him from behind, and a warm body press against his, tenderly. Ah. This was his favourite thing about his favourite time of the day. Making love in the morning. Getting the day off to a good start, so to speak. Then, even if the rest of your plans fell apart, you had the memory of something that went right. The best something.

Starsky was kissing the back of his neck. He was mumbling about not having enough time. That was just it. There was not enough time. There would never be enough time, not now. They had wasted time, aeons of time, trying to prove something, to themselves, to each other, to Fate. And it had all been a lie.

Hutch turned, and looked at the one he loved. Glowing eyes, so much brighter than they had been a year ago. A mouth soothed by many kisses, but still a little tight and bitter. Not enough kisses, thought Hutch. He kissed that mouth again, and then again. Starsky was burrowing down under the covers, making the exercise difficult. Hutch laughed. They were too old for passion, and they had known each other forever. It should be silly, but it was not. He wrapped his hand around Starsky's cock, and felt his lover shudder in his arms.

'Come here,' Hutch begged.

'I am here,' said Starsky. He took hold of Hutch's cock, teasing it with his long fingers, until it swelled in protest.

They tumbled back among the sheets and blankets, stroking each other gently. Hutch wondered what it would have been like, if they had given in to this passion years ago. He imagined them in their twenties, instead of their sixties.   Agile and limber. Smooth skinned. Able to get it up three or more times in one night. He chuckled into Starsky's neck.   It wasn't necessary to do it three or more times, he thought, if you got it right the first time. And if they'd given in to their passion then, supposing they'd even been able to acknowledge it to themselves, that passion would have burned out long ago. Instead, it had stayed banked, under the ashes of friendship and disappointed love, until the conditions were right, and it burst forth in glorious Technicolor.

Starsky moaned. 'We should get up,' he said.

'Yes,' said Hutch. 'Let's get up. Oops! I already am. Hmm. So are you.'

'Hutch!' Starsky moaned. Hutch slid down his body, and took Starsky's cock in his mouth. He settled in comfortably, for a nice, long session of fellatio. That was the upside of growing old, he thought. They were retired, and premature ejaculations were a thing of the past.

******

Starsky was bustling around the kitchen, when Hutch got out of the shower. 'Aren't you dressed yet?' he asked Hutch, plaintively.

'Let me dry off first,' said Hutch. 'Did we have plans for the day? Guess my memory is going.'

'It's the first thing to go, Hutchinson. Put on something comfortable. We're going to be spending a lot of time sitting.'

'We are? First I've heard of it. I was thinking of going Christmas shopping. That involves a lot of walking, if my memory serves me.'

'Christmas shopping? You?'

'Yeah, me. My opinion of Christmas has improved over the years. Specially after last year.'

'Yeah. Last year. Remember that. Keep last Christmas firmly in your mind, Hutchinson. Go get dressed. We don't have much time.'

'What is all this about time? We're retired, remember? We can do what we want.'

'You can do what you're told.'

'Who died and made you king?' asked Hutch.

Starsky laughed more than he should have, at the adolescent joke. 'Go get dressed,' he said again. 'I'll make breakfast. Shoo!'

When Hutch emerged from the bedroom, dressed in old, faded cords, and a sweater, Starsky had breakfast ready. Cereal for himself, a health shake for Hutch. He handed Hutch his drink. 'Enjoy!' he said. 'Then we have to hit the road.'

'Hit the road? I thought we were going to be sitting all day?'

'You'll see,' said Starsky.

His eyes were twinkling, and Hutch began to worry. When Starsky started plotting something, it meant trouble. What sort of trouble was he in for? Starsky wouldn't say. He whistled and hummed to himself as they drove downtown. Christmas carols. Rudolf the Rednosed Reindeer.   White Christmas. Jingle Bells. For God's sake, thought Hutch. We live in California. Los Angeles. When was the last time we had a White Christmas? Do we even want one? Imagine the traffic snarls. But not all the music was Christmas carols. He also hummed snatches of music that sounded familiar, but ominous. That nagged at Hutch's mind.

'Starsky?' he asked. 'Where are we going? Why won't you tell me? What's up? Why am I sitting here with you, putting up with this?'

'Because you love me, Hutch. Right? You do love me, don'tcha? You've enjoyed the last year, haven'tcha?'

'Starsk?' asked Hutch. 'What have you done? Let me out of this car!'

'In a minute. Gotta find some decent parking.   God! This is gonna cost a fortune. Oh, well. It's a once in a lifetime thing.'

'What is, Starsk?' Hutch bellowed.

Starsky turned to him, a gentle look of reproof on his face. 'Darlin', you have to calm down. We're not young any more, remember? No use gettin' your blood pressure in a tangle.'

'My what in a what? Never mind. Starsky, just tell me where we're going, and I'll calm down.'

'We're going to see a movie, that's all. See? Now, was that any reason to get so scared?'

'I wasn't scared, I was just.... A movie? At this time of the morning?'

'Well, we have to line up for this movie. Ah, here's a good parking lot. Never had my tires slashed yet. Come on, Babe. Outa the car. Grab those cushions from the back seat, will you? We're gonna need them.'

'Starsk? What movie are we going to? Why do we need cushions? Hmm? Just drop me a little hint?'

'You'll see in a minute. God, Hutch. You're like a little kid. Are we there, yet? Is it over, yet?'

'Did you come, yet?'

'Funny, Hutch. Oh, look. There's our line. Come on, Hutch. What's keepin' you?'

'Our line? That's our line? God, Starsky, we'll never get tickets. Look how many people are ahead of us.'

'Oh, that's not the ticket line. There is no ticket line. I have the tickets already. That's the line to get good seats. Otherwise we'll be split up. Or sitting way at the back. Or in the front row. Or off to the side....'

'Starsky? Starsky?'

'Isn't it great, Hutch. You wouldn't believe the trouble I had getting these tickets. I gave up, several times. But then I thought, no. People in those stories, they had lots of chances to give up. But they didn't.'

'Starsky!' Hutch yelled.

'Yes, Hutch? What is it?' Starsky asked, with his most innocent expression.

'What movie are the tickets for?' Hutch asked, softly.

'What movie do you think they're for?'

'I don't think, Starsky. I think I'm incapable of thinking.'

'They're for The Lord of the Rings, of course. Dummy. How many hints do I need to drop?'

'Which one, Starsky?'

'What do you mean, which one?'

'Starsky, you didn't do what I thought you did, did you? Tell me you didn't buy tickets to all three?'

'I told you, Hutch. It's all one movie. We're watching The Lord of the Rings. The whole movie. This is December 16, remember? The Return of the King starts at 10 PM. We get to see it two hours before anyone else.'

'You get to see it, Starsky. I'm not sitting through three movies. They're each three hours long. That's nine hours.'

Starsky turned to him. The excited light in his face was fading. 'Hutch?' he said. 'Don't do this. I worked hard to find these tickets. They cost me over a hundred dollars. I wanted to do something special for us. Remember last year?'

Hutch felt ashamed. He stared at the ground. Of course. Last Christmas. The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. Christmas Eve.

'I'm sorry, Starsky. You're right. I'll go with you.'

Starsky smiled again. He took Hutch's arm. 'Come on,' he said. 'It won't be so bad. They're giving us meal breaks, in between movies. We've been on stakeouts that dragged on longer.'

'Okay,' Hutch mumbled.

'Try not to sound too excited.'

'I won't. I mean, I will. I mean....'

'Shut up, Hutch.'

They joined the line. Right in front of them, were two little girls. Well, he supposed they were young women, but everyone under thirty looked like a child to him, now. They wore tight jeans, cut low on the hips, and well above the ankles, and tight tops, that missed meeting the tops of the jeans by several inches, but clung lovingly to their breasts. They looked cold, but determined not to confess it, and put on something warm. What was this? The feminine version of machismo? Machisma?

'You think we should be gentlemen, and offer them our jackets?' whispered Starsky.

'Nah,' said Hutch. 'They'd probably kick us in the nuts.'

Starsky sighed. 'You're right,' he said. 'Let 'em freeze.'

In front of the shivering maidens, was a tall man, wearing a long, white robe, and carrying a long, white staff. He had long, white hair. When he turned to look around, Hutch saw he had a long, white beard. Saruman the White, thought Hutch. Or Gandalf the White. Which? I better not ask. I'll look like a fool.

'Hey!' called Starsky. 'You Gandalf the White?'

The Wizard grinned. 'Yeah, man. How'd you know?'

'Lucky guess,' said Starsky. He murmured to Hutch, 'How much luck do you need, when the odds are 50-50?'

'Mm,' said Hutch, absently. He was watching a news crew move down the line, interviewing the movie-goers. Great, he thought. I'll end up on the noon news. Standing behind a guy dressed as Gandalf. Well, not right behind. I'm right behind a couple of teenage girls, wearing less than the hookers down on Main Street. I'll look like a dirty old man. A chicken hawk, or whatever they call them, these days.

'Hutch?' asked Starsky.

'Mm?'

'You really unhappy?'

'No. Why?'

'You look unhappy.'

'Well, I'm not.'

'Okay. Because if you are unhappy, we could....'

'Excuse me, sir,' said the brightly smiling interviewer. She was brightly dressed, and her voice was bright. The camera aimed its eye at him, dark, and silent, but noting every wrinkle, every frown, Hutch knew. Noting, and exaggerating.

'Could you tell our viewers what you're doing here today?'

What am I doing here? Hutch wondered, himself. Other than being a bastard to the person I love most on earth?

'Why am I here?' Hutch asked, out loud. He smiled into the camera. 'Last year, on Christmas Eve, I asked an old friend to see The Two Towers with me. At the end of the movie, we realized we loved each other, and we've been living together ever since.' He put his arm around Starsky. 'My friend -- my lover, I mean -- is taking me to see the Trilogy, as an anniversary present.'

'Aw, how sweet,' said one of the shivering maidens. The other gave them a thumbs up sign. The Wizard grinned. 'Happy anniversary!' he said.

The interviewer smiled, even more brightly. 'Thank you,' she said. 'Enjoy the movie.' She moved on down the line, to the newcomers behind them.

Hutch imagined his interview being edited out, once they got back to the station. He turned to Starsky, expecting a chilly reception. Starsky gazed at him, adoringly. 'I told you,' he said. 'It won't be so bad.'

'Yeah,' said one of the half-dressed girls. 'They're showing the extended versions, of the first two movies. An extra forty-five minutes for each of them. Right up on the big screen. First time ever in a movie theatre, I think.'

Great, thought Hutch. How's my back going to hold up? To say nothing of my bladder?

Starsky patted his arm. 'It's for our anniversary,' he said. 'Show us what you're made of.'

'I just did,' said Hutch. 'I outed us on TV.'

'At our ages, who cares anymore?' asked Starsky.

******

'What was your favourite moment?' asked Starsky, as he drove them home.

Hutch thought for a long time.

'Hutch? You asleep? It's okay. We'll be home soon. I'm awake.'

'I'm awake too, Starsk. I'm just thinking. My favourite moment? In the whole Trilogy? That's a difficult choice, Starsky.'

'How about one from each movie, then?' asked Starsky. 'Help me stay alert, here.'

'Be alert,' said Hutch. 'The world needs all the lerts it can get.'

Starsky groaned.

'I love the scene with Gandalf and Frodo, in Moria,' said Hutch. 'When he tells Frodo about pity, and how Bilbo's pity for Gollum stayed his hand.'

'Yes, and that choice determined everything in the end.'

'The Two Towers? Aragorn asking Theoden to ride out with him. "Ride out and face them, head on!" And then Gandalf leads the Rohirrim over the hill.'

'That's two scenes, but never mind,' said Starsky.

'It is not two scenes, it's all one scene,' Hutch argued. 'Now, The Return of the King.' Hutch turned to look out the car window, at the lights of the city. All the little Christmas lights, twinkling in every window. 'I love the Lighting of the Bonfires scene,' he said at last. 'It's perfect. That's my favourite part of the Trilogy, right there. What about you?'

'I can't decide,' said Starsky. 'So I'll go along with your choices.' He drove for a few minutes in silence. Then he asked, 'You still angry with me, Hutch?'

'Angry with you? I was never angry with you. What do you mean?'

'This morning. I thought you were angry, about the movies. Me buying the tickets.'

'No, no. Starsk. I wasn't angry. Just... surprised, that's all. I wasn't prepared.'

'Yes,' said Starsky. 'The best things in life, happen by surprise. They aren't what we expect to happen. They aren't the things we plan for.'

'I've been thinking about Arwen and Aragorn,' said Hutch. 'She gave up the life of the Eldar, for him. In a way, isn't that what we do, when we fall in love? Give up our life? Is that why it took us so long to admit how we really felt about each other?'

'You think so?' asked Starsky. 'Is it so harsh, to love? Do you really think we were afraid?'

'Not harsh, no. But when you fall in love, the other person is more important than you are. Your life, your happiness, they're more important than my own. It's scary. And, when we were young, we thought we could make a difference in the world. We thought we could defeat death, but the streets defeated us, in the end. Now, even without being out on the streets, death will defeat us, eventually.'

'Death,' said Starsky. 'There is death. But there is also life.'

Hutch laughed. 'I'm not going to give you a child, Starsky,' he said. 'I'm not Arwen.'

'No. That's not what I mean.' He pulled into their driveway, and turned off the engine. 'I mean, we all die, in the end. But I want to be with you, Kenneth Hutchinson, at the end of all things.'

'You took the words right out of my mouth,' said Hutch. 'Let me take them back.' He pulled Starsky close, and kissed him. He was sixty years old, he thought. It was nearly three in the morning. And here he was, sitting in a car, in a driveway, making out. Could life get any better?

They stumbled in the front door, some time later.

'Man,' said Starsky. 'I'm wiped. Gotta take a shower, though. I'm covered with that stuff they put on popcorn.'

'Me too,' said Hutch. 'Whatever it is, it ain't butter. I'll join you in a minute. I'm gonna check our voice mail.'

'What for?' Starsky mumbled, sleepily.

'Just curious,' said Hutch. He picked up the phone, and punched in the numbers for the voice mail service.

'You have twelve new messages,' said the Voice.

'Really?' asked Hutch.

'First message!' announced the Voice.

'Hey, Starsky and Hutch. Just saw you on TV. When you guys come out, you come out. No messin' around. See you tomorrow.'

Thanks, Huggy, thought Hutch. So much for being edited out of the news. He hung up the phone, without checking the rest of the messages. Time for that tomorrow. Starsky was waiting. Maybe they weren't too old to have sex in the shower. Stranger things happened every day.

*** The End ***

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