Starsky's POV

I wonder how long this is going to last. When will I come back up to the surface?

I can hear their voices but I can't hear what they are saying…not clearly. The buzzing in my head drowns it out.

I hurt all over.

Can't anyone hear me screaming?

Mom arrived yesterday. I have gotten used to the changing routines and now I know when it is day or night.

I'm used to the footsteps too.

A child recognizes his mother's footsteps.

She arrived not long before the day nurse left to go home to her boyfriend. She talks about him all the time; she tells me how much she wants to marry him but that he says he isn't ready. I wish I could tell him to get on with it. I waited…I didn't feel ready and I lost Terri.

Mom sat on my bed. She is only five foot two and if she weighs more than ninety pounds I'd be surprised. I felt her weight on the bed. I knew she was trying not to cry. She kissed my eyelids.

"Oh Dov." She always used the Hebrew version of my name when she wanted to comfort me. My grandparents wanted them to call me Dovid but dad had decided that the family was American now and so they named me David. Poppa called himself 'Mike' but his police ID card said Moishe.

She kissed my eyelids and took my hand in hers. I wanted to reach out to her but I'm trapped in here. She sobbed quietly and then started to sing one of the old Yiddish lullabies she sang when I was little – back in those special years when I had her all to myself before Nicky was born.

She has such a pretty voice. She's singing quietly as if she doesn't want anyone else to hear. She's singing my favorite song…I'm trying to sing it with her…can she hear me?

Shlof mine kind mine treyst mine sheyner

Schlof-zhe zunenyu…………..

Sleep my child, my beautiful one

Sleep, little son………

It's making me cry. She sang it to us after poppa died. He was my first dead body.

I saw him go down and I dropped the bottle of milk that mom had sent me to get from the store. That's why I don't like to even see a strawberry milkshake! The first time I saw that glop of Hutch's I thought I was going to throw up…he'd put cranberries in it and it was that same muddy pink.

Dead bodies. I've seen plenty of them in my time. Out in 'Nam and back here in Bay City. I thought I'd get used to it in the war: the guy who was running alongside you one minute and lying staring at nothing the next…or the village of the dead. It was the kids that upset me the most. Little kids lying by their parents each with a bullet in the head. That neat bullet hole you read about in the paperback novels; it doesn't happen that much. Usually there's broken bone and if they got it the head there might be brain coming out with the blood.

I wonder how neat the holes in me are. I once told Huggy that there were bad guys out there who wanted to put holes in out bodies where there weren't supposed to be holes.

"I need that like a hole in the head." Hey buddy try four in the back.

Oh I felt them. It was quick and yet it lasted for such a long time.

Slow motion.

It felt like something hit me hard and then I felt the explosion of pain. The bullet burns as it goes in. I fell and I could feel my life seeping out of me. I heard Hutch yell. I felt his hands on me; trying to find the damage. His hands are big and kind of rough. He plays the guitar. Don't believe that romantic novelist crap about "long sensitive musician's fingers" Hutch has calluses on his fingers of the left hand from holding down the strings. His fingers are thick and strong. He has hands like a farm boy.

He's talking to momma now. I can hear her telling him 'no'. Whatever it is mom will win. You try fighting a determined Yiddisher momma, Hutch!

She's holding my hand again. Singing Leila leila leila……….

…………another lullaby.

She lost poppa; she's not going to lose me.

I wonder how long it's been. Hutch comes and goes. I hear him tell momma that he's getting closer. When mom is taking a break he tells me what he's doing and who he's seeing.

I'd love to have seen the shyster lawyer's face when Hutch told him that he was a hooker in a three piece suit.

That nurse is in here again. She has a gentle touch when she changes my tubes and my dressings. I felt her fingernails brush against my skin one time….she has long nails and that surprised me. I thought nurses kept them cut short and blunt.

She talks to me while she's doing all the things she has to do; talks me through it all.

"I'm changing your catheter now David. Ok let's see how those stitches are looking today.

Changing the drip bag David…"

She washes and shaves me too.

I hear Hutch coming. Even in sneakers his footsteps tap, tap along the linoleum. He never could sneak up on people the way I can…he never had to learn to look out for the tripwires.

He's sitting in silence. I can tell that he's watching me. Now he's started chatting about the latest development. He thinks this all has something to do with Uncle Frank's murder.

My nose is itching. Maybe if I try to twitch it….I feel like I'm going to sneeze…no…but I'm pretty sure I moved my nose; the itching has stopped.

I can sense Hutch's eyes on me. He's watching me. Did he see my nose twitch?

It feels a bit like when you dive to the bottom of the pool and then let yourself float back up to the surface. I'm coming back to the surface…

Ok let's see what else I can do. Come to the surface and …open….my…..eyes.

Hutch is staring at me.

Another big effort and I open my eyes again. The lids feel really heavy; like when you are so tired you can't keep them open. But I have to open them now. I have to show him that I'm fighting back.

I open both eyes this time.

"Starsky! You're awake!" Well he did go to college you know!

They made him leave me in peace. Mom sat with me and the next time I opened my eyes there she was crying. I managed to entwine my fingers around hers.

"Davey, oh Davey thank God."

Hutch was back the next day as excited as a flea on a stray dog. He had a ream of printout with him and he sat there reading bits of stuff to me. Every time he got to the name Bates he was so excited that I thought he was going to burst. It took me a while to get into focus. I still have to concentrate to stay conscious for more than a few minutes. He was babbling on about Bates I tried my best but I was so tired. He was telling me how Bates works for Gunther and how Gunther owns all those mortgage companies that Uncle Frank was passing information to; and how Gunther Industries deals in all kinds of merchandise like pharmaceuticals – the legal and the illegal stuff.

I snuggled my face into the pillow and tried to go back to sleep. The nurse took him away and he gave her all the paper. He was going to San Francisco to see Gunther and Bates. He made her promise to read the rest to me.

Mom carefully folded all the paper and placed it on the bureau. Maybe I'll be able to read it eventually.

Right now all I want is for the pain to go away.

The shock came later. I know the doc well enough – he's seen me through other scrapes in the past. I could tell by his face that things weren't all hunky dory in Starskyland. Truth is when I came to for Hutch back there it was such an effort that I sank back into the deep dark hole PDQ. I forced myself to wake up again when I heard the doc's footsteps.

The first thing I noticed was that I couldn't feel pain.

No, start again.

The first thing I noticed was that I couldn't feel anything!

He smiled and sat by the bed. I had that bloody tube in my nose but I could try to speak.

Try…my mouth was drier that a Mormon's wedding. I wanted to ask him but nothing came.

Momma came in behind him. She sat by the bed and smiled that brave 'mommy's here darling everything's ok' smile that mothers all over the world manage to summon up at the worst possible times. She reached under the blanket and took my hand. I remembered then that I could feel something when I was unconscious.

I felt her hand and her kisses.

I felt Hutch's touch too.

But now…

The doc nodded at mom. She stroked my cheek. I felt that; at least I think I did or maybe my memory dragged up the sensation from deep inside my mind.

"Do you want the good news or the bad news David?"

I mentally nominated him for dumb-ass of the year.

I managed to grunt "good."

"The good news is that you survived…."

Gee I knew you had to bright to be a doctor but this guy must have come top of the class!

"You survived four bullets in the back. Two were lodged in your internal organs. One exited through your arm because it was across your chest as you drew your gun; the fourth exited by your groin."

Who was it once called me numbnuts?

"You also survived three cardiac arrests."

Three

"We have already removed the bullets and I'm afraid we had to remove a few other things too."

That's when I noticed the tubes. There was one in my arm; but it was the two coming out from under the blanket that worried me.

"You can live quite easily without a spleen David. Fortunately you don't really need both kidneys either…one of the bullets damaged your right kidney so we had to remove a part of it." He noticed I was trying to focus on that tube of yellow stuff. "That's a catheter; now you are conscious I think we will be able to remove it as soon as…" He coughed and I understood. I've still got the equipment but it might have limited functioning. And momma was always nagging me for a grand child!

"We had to remove a part of your colon and until that is entirely healed you have a colostomy."

Oh great!

But he hadn't finished. I listened as he reeled off the rest of the damage. One of my lungs collapsed and I had an infection in one of the wounds. One of the bullets touched my spine and brushed the spinal cord – they don't know yet if it is bruised or bust; in other words they don't know if I'll walk out of here or not. It seems I also had massive internal bleeding and I dislocated my shoulder when I fell. Strike three and you're out Dave; either they operated on the tendon or that's coming later.

I tried not to cry but I could feel the hot tears behind my eyes. Momma wiped them from my cheek.

So now I'm lying here trying to decide whether I should have gone with the dark angel when I had the chance. I want to sleep.