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 A LONG WAY DOWN

The Edsel was eating up the Mojave miles, already less than a couple of hours away from L.A. Back in the city where nothing is clear. Then what? What difference could another place make? Hadn't worked before, Starsky wryly reminded himself.

Hell, he was sorry about Mitchell. The guy was okay and for him to have to die like that was tragic. But Mitchell had been no more that a catalyst. See? I can use the fancy words too. He'd been all set to get out of Vegas...made sense for him to deal with the paperwork and leave the funeral arrangements to Hutch, but then Jack's family had fixed the final homeward flight to the Minnesota they and Hutch knew so well and where he could have no place. It was just one more example of a set-up paradoxically both new and familiar, still needing to be worked out and no step-by-step, simple instructions for doing that.

So after all the phone calls and after the mailing of the special delivery package, there had been nothing to keep them in Vegas and they'd begun the return journey late on the previous day, with Hutch waiting for him with undisguised impatience in the driver' seat...no sharing on this trip, not even in anything so routine as driving. The overnight motel stop had brought no kind of relaxation, both of them tense, tired and taciturn. Had they exchanged more than a dozen words since that stop? But a motel was easier than a night in Mitchell's apartment or finding some Vegas hotel. They hadn't discussed the choices but they'd come to the same conclusion. Was that good?

The case might be tied up except for neatening the bows but there were still some things no nearer being worked out. Starsky turned on the radio -- loud -- trying to crowd out thoughts that chased each other around and around in unresolved circles, ignoring his partner's irritated reaction to the blaring sound, superimposed on deadening heat. Irritated? That was hostile if he'd ever seen hostile. Hutch's silence was somehow more insistent than any number from some radio rock band.

Partner? Yeah, sure, that bit was technically accurate. We were -- are -- together on a working assignment. That's partner, huh? A case we're both involved in. An investigation. But, for us, partner used to mean a whole lot more than that. So where did we lose all the rest? And when? Starsky couldn't be sure. The answer to that was something he'd been trying to nail for a while now. It had been there already when Cameron showed up that day.

His thoughts went back to the outward drive, scoffing now at his own naive idea that a new case in a new place could snap them out of whatever had been happening to them in the past few weeks. He couldn't name it, couldn't tie any label on it. It was all elusive, somehow defying or challenging labels, but it was there and he didn't like whatever it was. Did Hutch refuse to see it? He only knew that at the end of each difficult shift, some signs were inescapable. He'd tried to tell himself that a new case like this one could be the chance to start over, had given the idea build-up, wanting to believe it.

So it hadn't worked, and he'd used the guidebook as a let-out for finding something to say...some sort of substitute dialog. And when did we ever need words before? Maybe he was imagining too much. Only he knew he wasn't. Bottom line, Hutch: what's changed? It's not the way it was. And why? They were coming into San Bernadino and he glanced at his companion. "Want me to drive?" When he didn't get any reply, he turned the radio volume lower and repeated the question.

"Not much point now. We're there practically." Brief, dismissive. And not true. Not with the miles of cross-city driving ahead of them. Starsky let it go, hanging on to the couple of good memories salvaged from the last downer days. There was an efficient partnership still. That hadn't been touched. It had showed in the way the mechanism had slid smoothly into gear that day at the Pruitt house and, afterwards, in those final moves. But mere, efficient mechanism was never our style. Where did all the other things go? Yet it was still something to hold on to.

And Vicki. The times with her had at least got him away from the re-runs of the reunion scenes that his partner and his partner's best friend had played out all those times. All that 'do you remember?'...Hutch had looked at him oddly, maybe really looked at him for the first time on the whole trip, when he'd voiced the tentative plans for Vicki, but he'd gone along with the idea. Have to figure some way to explain that so Dobey buys it. Tell him we were playin' eno or something. That was another thing -- departmental money to be accounted for, the original stake money anyway. He felt no scruples he couldn't swallow...only suppose Hutch didn't want to be associated with 'explanations'? But after the last encounter with Pruitt, Vicky would be lucky to work again in weeks -- lucky too that Jack had been around that night. Using the money this way couldn't be wrong and there was the bonus of that special satisfaction of dodging the system...one good thing in this whole mess. You feel the same way about that, partner?

Back in the city now, and nothing changed. The sense of separateness was strong again, strong as on the earlier journey. He'd seen that manner before -- Hutch, cool, managing, taking charge, issuing instructions but the cutting edge had never before been turned in his direction. Sure he'd heard a million times, in colorful detail, his partner's low opinion of his less endearing traits: Hutch had made a daily practice of spelling out all those. But this was different. Like over those drinks? Stupid sniping? Points scoring? Like despising the rootbeer, going for that coconut, the whole superior bit...wanting to share though. But all that was pretty routine.

What hadn't been routine had been to have that carton removed from his grasp, and, seconds later, put into Mitchell's hand. Just the way it went down? Probably. Or Hutch telling him something else? Whatever -- absurdly -- it was one of the sharpest recollections of this whole shitty trip. And not trusting him with the money...really not trusting him. Serious about it. Detached. No fun.

The sense of exclusion had grown. That -- and maybe the sheer lack of sleep -- had turned him into a looker-on for most of that night on the town. What was it they said about lookers-on? So what was your game buddy? And yet, it wasn't, he felt, a calculated exclusion. He just hadn't rated enough to be deliberately left out of anything.

Plain jealousy? But why? And of what, for Pete's sake? Over-reacting? Maybe he should take that one out for a long, close look. Did I take too much for granted? Never used to be all these questions. It's those that are new.

He remembered drifting out of exhausted, unrefreshing sleep on the hospital couch, vaguely aware of words before he turned the sound into sense. And then checking as realization broke through -- checking that first, spontaneous movement to share, to comfort, unsure as never before that it would be okay to make the first move. Did he have any part in such things? Seemed to be a lot of places in Hutch's life where he didn't feature. Simpler not to open his eyes.

Think about it. Talk about it too, babe.

A long way down, Hutch had said -- for all of us. Yeah...and how far back to where we used to be? And you, partner -- you still there?

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