Valerie Wells

   "Starsk! Stay with me, Starsk, they called! They called!"

   Hutch never knew how he did it, but somehow he got Starsky up into his arms and staggered back to the house with him. He called the hospital to send an ambulance and they told him the transplant team was standing by, waiting for their arrival.

   Time seemed to simultaneously speed up and stand still while Hutch waited, terrified, holding Starsky's wrist and feeling his pulse getting weaker, watching as his color got more and more gray and his features seemed to sink into his skull.

   "Starsky!" Hutch whispered urgently, over and over again. "Don't go, buddy. They're coming. They're coming."

   Once or twice, Starsky moaned a little in answer, but he was far from conscious and couldn't speak. Hutch had read somewhere that even in a coma, the patient can recognize the voices of loved ones, and that sometimes those voices can keep them connected to life even when all seems lost. Hutch clung to that thought and kept speaking to Starsky, nonsense most of it. Calling his name, urging him to hang on and keep breathing and not let go.

   And finally, finally, he heard the siren coming. The next couple of hours were a blur as the attendants took over, stabilized Starsky, got him in the ambulance and roared away. Hutch followed in the car; they wouldn't let him ride with Starsky because they were going to have a lot of work to do to keep him going until they got him to the hospital.

   Hutch broke every traffic law on his way to that same hospital, praying that he wouldn't get stopped. He no longer had a siren or mars light or badge to convince fellow officers he was driving like a demon with good reason. Miraculously, he made it in one piece and without getting stopped, and by the time he got to the surgical floor, they already had Starsky in OR.

   The nurse at the desk couldn't tell him anything except that Starsky was in surgery. Hutch was worried that he was too weak to withstand the operation, but she couldn't answer that question, either, and the cardiologist hadn't left any information.

   So Hutch paced and swore and drank coffee and called Huggy and Dobey and their other friends...and waited.

   Huggy arrived at last. He took one look at Hutch's wild eyes and took the coffee away from him. "You don't need that, my friend. You're wound up tighter than the high E on a fiddle already. Sit down."

   "I can't..." Hutch reached for the coffee, but Huggy held it out of reach.

   "Come on, Hutch. Sit."

   Hutch sat, but he fidgeted and squirmed until Huggy sighed and took his arm.

   "Look, Hutch, this isn't helping. Try to calm down, for crying out loud."

   "Huggy, he damn near died in my arms! I thought he was dead! He barely even made it here, and he could still die!" And Hutch finally broke down and buried his face in his hands. Huggy silently put an arm around him and squeezed his shoulder and kept his mouth shut.

   It was many hours before anyone came to tell them any news. But finally a doctor, still wearing a bloodstained gown, stopped in the doorway and said, "Mr. Hutchinson?"

   Hutch shot out of his chair.

   "He made it through surgery. Now we have to wait and see if he rejects it or not. It's still touch and go."

   "When will we know something?" Huggy asked. Hutch seemed to have lost the power of speech.

   "The next 24 hours are very important," the surgeon said. "But I've known transplant patients to reject organs even months later. I'm sorry I can't tell you more right now."

THE END