[H50][Steve/Danno] Res Ipsa Loquitur (1/1)
Title: Res Ipsa Loquitur
Fandom: Hawaii Five-0
Pairings: Steve/Danno
Genre: Humour
Word count: ~4,500
Spoilers: Mild S1, none really
Warnings: None I can think of.
Notes: lazulisong's 2 month belated birthday present. *shifty* Title is Latin for "the facts speak for themselves", because I am a total law nerd. I pretty much came up with the title first and the fic followed...
Summary: Danny is not married to Commander Steve Goddamn McGarrett, despite what the entire island seems to think.
It was not, perhaps, the most shining and stellar day in the life and times of Detective Danny Williams. He liked to think of himself as a pretty stand-up guy; a bit short-tempered, perhaps, and maybe not the most attentive husband ever, which was probably why he was an ex-husband, but he was a good father and a good cop. A cop who, for example, actually believed in human rights and obeying the law and other such minor details.
Being that kind of respectable cop who wore ties and believed in the concept of Miranda rights, usually he liked to leave the police brutality up to his charming partner - which actually, no, point of fact, he did not like to leave the police brutality up to Steve, he wished there would be no police brutality, he was generally a fan of the whole rule of law, following police procedures thing. Steve threw in the brutality for free against Danny’s very sensible and well-considered advice.
But he digressed.
The point was, that was the kind of guy Danny was. Or so he liked to think, anyway. Today was kind of messing with that theory, and he couldn’t exactly say he was proud of that.
The saddest part about the whole thing was that he had been having a fairly average day right up until the moment that he’d hauled off and slugged their suspect in the kisser, which he now felt slightly rotten about. (This had less to do with the specific fact of giving the guy a fat lip - the man was a douchebag and deserved every bit of it - than general principle and the loss of his moral high ground.)
Mostly, though, he was still pissed. And contrary to what one might expect, the fact that it had been a fairly average day was actually the worst part of the whole shemozzle.
“If I hear one more crack about me being married to that lunatic, I swear to god,” Danny announced as he stormed into headquarters, and threw himself down in a chair with all the righteous rage of a man who has been messed with just one too many times. Chin looked up from his computer with a cautious expression.
Come to think of it, Danny had seen a similar look on his face before. Usually when approaching dangerous animals or handling something potentially explosive.
“Everything okay over there, Danny?” Chin asked tentatively.
“No, everything is not okay. This is getting out of control,” Danny said darkly. “Apparently every bad guy on this godforsaken island thinks they’re so fucking funny when they make some smart-ass wedding joke about me and Steve, and it’s starting to spill over beyond the criminal class into the general populace. I, my friend, I am going fucking loco over here. Where the hell are they even getting this from, huh?”
Chin raised his eyebrows. “Uh, not to mess with your rhythm, here, brah,” he said, when Danny broke for air, “But… haven’t you ever heard anyone say ‘the facts speak for themselves’?”
“Have I heard-of course I’ve heard that,” Danny snapped back, exasperated. “What the hell has that got to do with anything?”
Chin gave him a meaningful look. He didn’t have faces the way Steve had faces, but Chin’s expressions spoke volumes when he wanted them to.
“Excuse me? Are you seriously suggesting… what facts? What facts?” Danny demanded, about this far from seriously losing his shit. “I have no idea what you are talking about, Chin Ho Kelly, and I get the feeling that neither do you or else you would not be saying it! Is there something in the water on this godforsaken island that makes you all delusional? Does the sun melt your brains or something? Because this is crazy talk.”
“Sure thing, Danny. All I’m saying is, you’re a detective, right? Detect,” Chin said, and stood up. “Anyway, I hate to cut your personal crisis short, but I got plans with Kono. I’ll see you later, okay?”
He grabbed his jacket and started walking out of the room without waiting for a reply, totally heading off the rest of Danny’s rant. Danny hated wasting a good rant, dammit.
“Oh, well that’s just… Why are you people so eager to marry me off, huh?” Danny yelled after him. “I’ve already been there, done that, donated the crappy t-shirt to charity! Never again, you hear me? Never again! And definitely not with Commander McPsychopants!”
Chin waved over his shoulder, or maybe he was flipping Danny the bird, but he didn’t turn around.
“Facts speak for themselves, my ass,” Danny muttered to himself. It was tempting to just shove this under the pile of things he was never thinking about again, ever, and then forget about it, but the contrary part of him wanted to go out and prove that it was crap. He would present evidence - rock solid evidence, evidence admissible in a court of goddamn law, evidence that Steve so sadly neglected far too often for Danny’s delicate cop sensibilities - and he would show these maniacs surrounding him that they were wrong, wrong, wrong.
Facts, what facts? These clowns wouldn’t be able to interpret evidence with Sherlock Holmes and a For Dummies guidebook.
EXHIBIT A: FAMILIARITY
“Eat your vegetables, Danno.”
“Okay, A, pineapple is a fruit, not a vegetable, and if you put these ideas into my little girl’s head, I will end you. And B - what are you, my mother?”
Steve smirked. “You know how I worry,” he said, fake sweet. “Wouldn’t want you swooning from a vitamin deficiency.”
“Says the man who practically needs a gun held to his head before he’ll agree to eat anything that doesn’t come delivered.”
“Hey, I don’t always get takeout,” Steve protested. “Sometimes I eat out.”
“But do you cook?” Danny said pointedly. “No. No, you do not. So don’t talk to me about vitamin deficiencies.”
“I barbeque,” Steve offered. “Sometimes you cook.”
Danny rolled his eyes. “Is that supposed to make you sound better? Because trust me, babe, it really doesn’t,” he said. “It makes you sound like you take your life lessons from the Neanderthal guide to bachelorhood. Catherine, back me up on this.”
Catherine was watching them with this look on her face - amused, but somehow knowing. “No comment.”
“Hah!” Danny said, smug in his righteousness. “See? You see what I mean here?”
“She said ‘no comment’, Danny, that doesn’t mean she agrees with you,” Steve argued, because he was a sore loser. Danny rolled his eyes.
“It’s called ‘tact’, Steven,” he said dismissively. “I know it’s not a concept you’re familiar with, but there you go.”
Steve did his scowly I’m-going-to-ignore-you-even-though-you’re-right-Danno-because-I’m-a-stubborn-jackass face and stole one of Danny’s chicken nuggets, because deep inside he was actually about 12 years old. Danny reached out to smack Steve’s hand away from his plate, and then changed his mind. He could be magnanimous about it. He was just a nice guy like that.
Plus it was kind of worth it to see Steve smirking like he’d gotten away with the crime of the century or something, the big goombah.
“Was that supposed to be stealthy, or something?” Danny said exasperatedly. “What kind of pathetic ninja SEAL are you? At least make yourself useful and take the pineapple.”
“It’s good for you,” Steve insisted, obstinate as a mule. “Just eat the damn fruit already.”
“So we’re back to this again? Do you never give up?”
“You know me, I’m like a dog with a bone,” Steve agreed, and stole another nugget. “Maybe you should order something that comes with salad next time.”
Danny turned to Catherine for some back up.
“You see what I have to put up with?” he demanded, and she laughed.
“I don’t know, you seem to be managing okay to me,” she said mysteriously, and then there was this bizarre silent communication thing where she raised her eyebrow at Steve and he rubbed the back of his head like he was being sheepish or something. Danny was honestly baffled by the whole thing.
He was even more baffled a moment later when Catherine grabbed her handbag and pushed her chair back.
“Well, boys, it’s been great, but I’d better split,” she said, throwing down a couple of twenties for her share. “Enjoy the rest of your evening.”
“Roger that,” Steve said easily. “I’ll call you.”
Catherine snorted. “I’m sure you will,” she said wryly. “When you need something.”
Steve gave her a lopsided grin. “Guilty.”
“Anyway, it was nice to properly meet you, Danny,” she said. “I’ll see you guys later.”
She pecked Steve on the cheek, flicked her fingers in goodbye, and walked out the door. Danny stared after her in disbelief, wondering what exactly just happened there.
“Wait, she’s just going? And you’re okay with that?” he said incredulously. Steve shrugged.
“We’re just casual,” he said. “Friends with benefits. When things get serious with someone else, she pulls the plug.”
“So I take it things got serious, then,” Danny concluded. “And she didn’t tell you this beforehand?”
Steve gave him this funny, ambiguous little smile, almost rueful. “Guess she thought she didn’t have to,” he said, making very little sense to Danny, but hey, who was he to judge. “That’s Catherine for you.”
Well, whatever; if Steve was cool with it, it wasn’t Danny’s problem, right?
And he totally wasn’t glad about it, either, because that would be ridiculous.
EXHIBIT B: CO-HABITATION
“Hey, Danny, we’re out of beer, you mind grabbing some on your way over tonight?” Steve asked on his way through the office. “I got this thing with the Governor before I clock out.”
“Yeah, sure,” Danny said distractedly, but then his brain caught up to his mouth and he looked up from his paperwork, suspicious. “Wait, is this like a more subtle version of the wallet thing? Have you devised a cunning system for tricking me into buying all the alcoholic beverages you ever drink from now on, or something?”
Steve made an annoyed noise. “Jesus, I’ll pay you back when I get home if it’s that important to you.”
“No, no,” Danny said, leaning back in his chair and lacing his fingers behind his head. “It’s cool. I just like to know these things, that’s all. If I’m going to be the drinks-provider in this partnership, it helps to be sure just how much you’re gonna owe me.”
Steve rolled his eyes, but there was a fond smile quirking at his lips. “Sure thing, Danno. You buy me beer, I let you control the remote tonight, how’s that?”
“Hm, you throw in the washing up, and that’s a definite maybe,” Danny decided.
“Deal,” Steve said. “I don’t know why you’re always bitching about the dishes, we get takeout most nights anyway.”
“You say that, but then you insist on putting things on plates and using real cutlery, which might make more sense if we were eating at a dinner table rather than on the couch in front of the TV, but whatever, far be it from me to criticize your crazy takeout rituals,” Danny shot back, never quite able to let the last word go. “Now shoo, you’re late for your meeting.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Steve muttered, but left anyway. Kono looked up from her desk, swirling her yoghurt spoon around her mouth, and gave Danny an assessing look that honestly gave him the willies. Kono was a scary little lady, sometimes.
“What, what is that look for?” he said eventually, when he could take it no longer.
“Oh, nothing. Just wondering when you’re planning on telling people you moved in with Steve,” she said casually, and Danny almost choked on his coffee.
“What?” he wheezed, when he got his breath back. “What do you mean, moved in with? Why the hell would I want to live with that maniac? Assuming he even asked, which, might I add, he has not.”
“Does he need to?” she asked. “Seriously, Danny, when was the last time you didn’t stay in Steve’s spare bedroom?”
Danny opened his mouth to retort and then realised he did not in fact know the answer to that question, which was more than a little disturbing. “We work late a lot!” he said defensively. “And hang out, because we are friends, and that is what friends do, especially friends who work together! I don’t like driving home late or after I’ve had a few drinks, there’s nothing strange about that!”
“I’m just saying, you hang out at his place almost every night. Your daughter spends more time there than at your place. Which is a dump, by the way.”
“So?”
“So even if you haven’t noticed it yet, you live with Steve and your own apartment is just a total waste of dough,” Kono said, with an edge of exasperation. “I’m pretty sure if you’d stopped paying your rent you guys would actually be common law married by now.”
“And that is one more reason I will not be moving in with Steve McGarrett,” Danny said, “because I do not want to end up his accidental de facto. Are we done here?”
Kono shrugged. “Whatever, brah, just trying to help.”
“Well don’t,” Danny said, scowling. “No offence, Kono, but I really, really don’t want that kind of help.”
“If you say so,” she said smugly, gliding out of the room, and Danny took a moment to mourn the fact that she was so hot, and yet so, so very crazy, just like Steve. Maybe you couldn’t have one without the other. Maybe she was in league with Chin and this whole thing was a plot to drive him insane.
Maybe he was just surrounded by lunatics who not only got him shot at on a regular basis, but also played evil yenta with his love life for kicks.
Fuck his fucking life, seriously.
EXHIBIT C: CO-PARENTING
“Love you, Danno. Love you, Steve-o,” Grace said, pecking them both on the cheek before she thundered up the stairs of Steve’s house like a herd of elephants and ran to the spare bedroom she usually stayed in.
“Steve-o?” Danny echoed after the resounding slam of the door, bewildered and more than a little perturbed.
“Maybe ‘cause it sounds like Danno?” Steve suggested, flipping the page of his book like he wasn’t even fazed.
“Yeah, but why would she…? I mean, not that there’s anything wrong with that, if that’s what my baby wants to call you.”
“Too bad, I was hanging out for Step-Steve.”
“… Don’t even joke about that.”
“Who said I was joking?” Steve said peaceably. Danny righteously ignored him. “So, are we going surfing tomorrow or what?”
“Surfing?”
“Yes, surfing,” Steve said, exaggeratedly slow. “You said Grace was starting lessons, didn’t you? Kono said she’d been teaching you a bit too, maybe I could help.”
Danny wasn’t quite sure how to identify that swooping feeling in the pit of his stomach, so he decided it must be terror at the idea of him, surfing and Steve in the same context.
Nevertheless, Gracie wanted to go surfing, he and Rachel had already told her she could, and if Danny trusted anyone to keep her safe, it was going to be a Navy SEAL who obviously adored her almost as much as Danny did.
He sighed and turned to Steve.
“Fine, what time is it?”
“Ten,” Steve answered, frowning slightly. “Danny?”
“I’ll go call Rachel,” Danny said, resigned, and walked into the kitchen for the illusion of privacy while he called his ex-wife.
“Danny, it’s ten o’clock,” Rachel said when she picked up. “What on Earth could be this important? Please don’t say terrorists.”
Danny rolled his eyes. “No, no terrorists,” he assured her. “I was just checking that you were alright with it if Steve and I take Gracie surfing tomorrow.”
“But Danny, you hate surfing,” Rachel said incredulously. “It took weeks for you to agree to Grace surfing, and even then it was only because she pleaded with you for the whole day.”
“Yeah, but I’ve agreed now, so I can’t exactly take it back, can I?” Danny pointed out. “Look, if Gracie’s going to take surfing lessons, I’d be way more comfortable if it were with Steve than some random beach bum I don’t know, that’s all I’m saying.”
Short silence from the other end of the line.
“You trust him that much?”
“With Gracie’s life, sure. He wouldn’t let a single hair on her head get harmed. With my life? Less so. I half think he gets me shot at for kicks sometimes.”
Longer silence.
“Rachel? Hello?”
“Danny, I don’t need to stage an intervention, do I?”
“Huh?”
“Well, Steve seems like a very nice man, and ordinarily I would never worry about your ability to stand up for yourself, but you never can tell and humans have a way of justifying these things to themselves-”
“Wait, wait, are you seriously asking me if Steve’s wife-beating me, here?”
“That’s very sexist, Danny.”
“To whom, abused men or women in general?”
“Both, I’d imagine.”
“Well, either way, he’s not! Because he is not beating me! I was just joking, for fuck’s sake! And more importantly, I am not his wife! Or husband! Or spouse or partner of any kind other than the police kind!”
“Really? I find that difficult to believe.”
“What I cannot believe is that we are even having this conversation, Jesus Christ. I am going now, Rachel, good bye.”
“Danny? Is everything okay?” Steve called from the lounge.
“Fine! Everything is just fucking peachy!” Danny yelled back, and beat his head against the wall.
It was a sad but undeniable fact that his entire family were fucking crazy.
EXHIBIT D: LEGAL DOCUMENTATION
“Detective, I noticed you filed changes to your next of kin arrangements,” Governor Jamison began. Danny’s brow furrowed, and out of the corner of his eye he could see Steve go carefully still.
“Uh, yeah?” he hazarded. He thought that was supposed to be confidential. Maybe not if you’re the Five-0. Nothing comes without strings attached, especially not the support of the governor. “Why?”
“I assume you are aware that DADT has been repealed?” she continued. Steve was doing that thing with the Aneurism Face where he looked like he was about to start convulsing or maybe perform a ninja disappearing trick, and Danny had absolutely no idea what the fuck was going on here.
“… Yeeeees?” he said, drawing it out slowly in a way he hoped conveyed his complete what-the-fuckery, here. Danny was not in the Army. Steve was in the Army - ‘The Navy, Danny, the Navy’ - but it could hardly affect him much now he was here with the Five-0, right? Not that Danny didn’t think Steve would be happy that the organisation he worked for no longer symbolised the last bastion of institutionalised homophobia, because he did not think Steve was that kind of asshole, but how did the open service of gay men and women affect either of them directly? Or have any relevance to the conversation whatsoever?
“I was simply checking that you were aware that Commander McGarrett is in no danger of suffering from any form of career backlash should you file the rest of your documentation.” The Governor smiled at him, like he was supposed to find this reassuring. Steve’s mental computer had apparently suffered a fatal error and was frozen on the blue screen of death face.
“The rest of my documentation?” Danny repeated stupidly, with a really, really bad, sinking feeling that he knew what was coming next.
“Yes, of course. Change of address, registration of reciprocal beneficiary relationship,” she said, totally matter-of-fact. “As of January next year, you will be able to enter into a civil union, as no doubt you are aware, Detective.”
“Civil union…?” Danny echoed, faint with horror. Beside him, Steve’s internal reboot process roared into life and he jumped to his feet, angling his body to create a slight barrier between Danny and the Governor as if he was trying to protect Danny from his own well-meaning employer. It was almost sweet, if a little worrying.
“Thanks for the concern, Governor,” Steve said hastily, in a way that sounded to Danny a little like you are my commanding officer and I respect you as much as I have to but I am afraid I may have to kill you with my little finger if you do not stop talking right the fuck now. “But we can handle it from here.”
“If you insist, Commander,” she said, still smiling slightly. “You can go now.”
Danny had the sudden suspicious feeling that she was laughing at them.
Christ, even his boss thought they were married.
EXHIBIT E: MUTUAL ATTRACTION
The thing was, Steve was hot. Objectively speaking. The fact that Danny acknowledged this did not make him secretly in love or lust or anything in between with his partner. It just meant he had eyes, that was all.
And Steve insisted on stripping off his shirt and parading around his stupid abs at the drop of a hat, so of course Danny stared at him. For one thing, he couldn’t believe Steve’s apparent aversion to proper clothing. Never mind a shirt, Steve could barely keep a tank top on most days.
It had nothing to do with Steve’s smooth tanned skin, or the way the tattoo ink swirled around his biceps and the small of his back, or the droplets of water sliding down his chest in a way that made Danny want to follow their trail with his tongue…
Okay, so maybe he was kind of deluding himself with that one.
But Danny thought lots of people were hot - guys and women - and it didn’t have to mean anything. He wasn’t going to do anything about it; it wasn’t like it was mutual. Danny had yet to see any evidence that Steve even went for guys. It was simple harmless one-sided attraction that had nothing to do with Steve and Danny or their partnership.
“Danny,” Steve said. Danny jerked his eyes up, guilty, trying to pretend he hadn’t been caught looking, only to be caught by Steve’s own gaze, heavy and dark with an intensity that tugged at the heat pooling in the base of Danny’s stomach. There was something mesmerising about that stare, something that made it so hard to tear himself away that Danny knew he had to.
Steve licked at his lips and then parted his mouth slightly, like he was about to speak. Struck by the terrible premonition that Steve was about to say something potentially world-shattering, Danny drained his beer in a single scull, trying to moisten his suddenly dry throat, and slammed the can back down on the bench.
“Right,” he said quickly, unable to meet Steve’s eyes again, awkward and self-conscious of the weirdly thick atmosphere between them. “Well, I better get to bed. Night, Steve.”
With that, Danny all but fled for the spare room, not ready to deal with this thing sitting between them. He was scared of himself, of what he might do if he stayed a second longer; he didn’t want to take the risk and be wrong, but perhaps the thing that terrified him most was the idea that he could be right.
Sometimes, Danny, knew, he could be a total coward.
VERDICT
So Danny had evidence, and it totally proved -
Uh.
Okay, when you combined all these incidents together, he couldn’t deny that objectively it looked kind of bad. He could maybe see how from an outsider’s perspective one might get the wrong idea, just possibly. But that totally did not mean he and Steve actually had a thing. Because they did not, okay? There was no thing. Just because Danny spent more time at Steve’s than at his own crappy little apartment, or because his daughter apparently thought Steve was her new stepdad, or because he’d had Steve listed as his next-of-kin, or because everyone they ever knew apparently thought Danny was joking when he insisted he and Steve were not dating… and okay, so maybe Steve was kind of hot in a not so objective way where Danny wanted to kiss him and run his hands all over bare skin, and in the right light Steve’s smile sometimes made his stomach flip, and every now and then he got a little jealous of Catherine for being about to touch him, but that didn’t mean…
Fuck.
Fuck.
“Oh my god,” Danny said out loud, in that moment of stunned mallet realisation you get when you’ve just been blindsided by the clue bus. “I’m married to Steve McGarrett. When the fuck did this become my life?”
“I don’t know, Danny, but I’ve kind of been wondering how long it was going to take you to figure this out,” Steve said from behind him. “So is the office betting pool, by the way.”
“In my defence,” Danny pointed out, “they didn’t make me a detective for my personal relationship skills. Just ask Rachel and she’ll tell you all about how long it took me to figure out she was interested.” Pause. “Wait, what do you mean office betting pool?”
“Are you honestly telling me you’re surprised?”
Danny opened his mouth.
Danny remembered precisely who he was dealing with, here, and then he closed it again.
“Okay,” he said after a very long moment. “You make a valid point.”
“So back to this whole us being married thing,” Steve said, in a tone of casual so faux it made polyester leopard print look authentic. “Did we totally skip the honeymoon into the boring old couple who never has sex, or-”
“Please, please just shut up,” Danny said, pained beyond all belief. “I swear to God, Steven, if you finish that sentence…”
Steve laughed, warm and a bit goofy. “Sure thing, Danno,” he murmured, and Danny had a moment to wonder how on Earth he’d kept missing that look in Steve’s eyes before he was being kissed with the determined laser focus of a Navy SEAL who’d been kept waiting way too long.
Danny made a muffled gargle of surprise and grabbed for Steve’s collar, more to anchor himself than to hold Steve in place.
It was an almost perfect moment until he heard the applause and cheering from the doorway.
“Finally!” Kono yelled.
“Glad to see you’re finally on board, brah,” Chin added, the smug asshole.
Danny flipped them off and kept on kissing Steve, because much as he missed having the chance to say ‘I told you so’ to all the smug fuckers in his life, he had to admit: being wrong did have its perks.
Well, the facts speak for themselves, don’t they?
Fandom: Hawaii Five-0
Pairings: Steve/Danno
Genre: Humour
Word count: ~4,500
Spoilers: Mild S1, none really
Warnings: None I can think of.
Notes: lazulisong's 2 month belated birthday present. *shifty* Title is Latin for "the facts speak for themselves", because I am a total law nerd. I pretty much came up with the title first and the fic followed...
Summary: Danny is not married to Commander Steve Goddamn McGarrett, despite what the entire island seems to think.
It was not, perhaps, the most shining and stellar day in the life and times of Detective Danny Williams. He liked to think of himself as a pretty stand-up guy; a bit short-tempered, perhaps, and maybe not the most attentive husband ever, which was probably why he was an ex-husband, but he was a good father and a good cop. A cop who, for example, actually believed in human rights and obeying the law and other such minor details.
Being that kind of respectable cop who wore ties and believed in the concept of Miranda rights, usually he liked to leave the police brutality up to his charming partner - which actually, no, point of fact, he did not like to leave the police brutality up to Steve, he wished there would be no police brutality, he was generally a fan of the whole rule of law, following police procedures thing. Steve threw in the brutality for free against Danny’s very sensible and well-considered advice.
But he digressed.
The point was, that was the kind of guy Danny was. Or so he liked to think, anyway. Today was kind of messing with that theory, and he couldn’t exactly say he was proud of that.
The saddest part about the whole thing was that he had been having a fairly average day right up until the moment that he’d hauled off and slugged their suspect in the kisser, which he now felt slightly rotten about. (This had less to do with the specific fact of giving the guy a fat lip - the man was a douchebag and deserved every bit of it - than general principle and the loss of his moral high ground.)
Mostly, though, he was still pissed. And contrary to what one might expect, the fact that it had been a fairly average day was actually the worst part of the whole shemozzle.
“If I hear one more crack about me being married to that lunatic, I swear to god,” Danny announced as he stormed into headquarters, and threw himself down in a chair with all the righteous rage of a man who has been messed with just one too many times. Chin looked up from his computer with a cautious expression.
Come to think of it, Danny had seen a similar look on his face before. Usually when approaching dangerous animals or handling something potentially explosive.
“Everything okay over there, Danny?” Chin asked tentatively.
“No, everything is not okay. This is getting out of control,” Danny said darkly. “Apparently every bad guy on this godforsaken island thinks they’re so fucking funny when they make some smart-ass wedding joke about me and Steve, and it’s starting to spill over beyond the criminal class into the general populace. I, my friend, I am going fucking loco over here. Where the hell are they even getting this from, huh?”
Chin raised his eyebrows. “Uh, not to mess with your rhythm, here, brah,” he said, when Danny broke for air, “But… haven’t you ever heard anyone say ‘the facts speak for themselves’?”
“Have I heard-of course I’ve heard that,” Danny snapped back, exasperated. “What the hell has that got to do with anything?”
Chin gave him a meaningful look. He didn’t have faces the way Steve had faces, but Chin’s expressions spoke volumes when he wanted them to.
“Excuse me? Are you seriously suggesting… what facts? What facts?” Danny demanded, about this far from seriously losing his shit. “I have no idea what you are talking about, Chin Ho Kelly, and I get the feeling that neither do you or else you would not be saying it! Is there something in the water on this godforsaken island that makes you all delusional? Does the sun melt your brains or something? Because this is crazy talk.”
“Sure thing, Danny. All I’m saying is, you’re a detective, right? Detect,” Chin said, and stood up. “Anyway, I hate to cut your personal crisis short, but I got plans with Kono. I’ll see you later, okay?”
He grabbed his jacket and started walking out of the room without waiting for a reply, totally heading off the rest of Danny’s rant. Danny hated wasting a good rant, dammit.
“Oh, well that’s just… Why are you people so eager to marry me off, huh?” Danny yelled after him. “I’ve already been there, done that, donated the crappy t-shirt to charity! Never again, you hear me? Never again! And definitely not with Commander McPsychopants!”
Chin waved over his shoulder, or maybe he was flipping Danny the bird, but he didn’t turn around.
“Facts speak for themselves, my ass,” Danny muttered to himself. It was tempting to just shove this under the pile of things he was never thinking about again, ever, and then forget about it, but the contrary part of him wanted to go out and prove that it was crap. He would present evidence - rock solid evidence, evidence admissible in a court of goddamn law, evidence that Steve so sadly neglected far too often for Danny’s delicate cop sensibilities - and he would show these maniacs surrounding him that they were wrong, wrong, wrong.
Facts, what facts? These clowns wouldn’t be able to interpret evidence with Sherlock Holmes and a For Dummies guidebook.
EXHIBIT A: FAMILIARITY
“Eat your vegetables, Danno.”
“Okay, A, pineapple is a fruit, not a vegetable, and if you put these ideas into my little girl’s head, I will end you. And B - what are you, my mother?”
Steve smirked. “You know how I worry,” he said, fake sweet. “Wouldn’t want you swooning from a vitamin deficiency.”
“Says the man who practically needs a gun held to his head before he’ll agree to eat anything that doesn’t come delivered.”
“Hey, I don’t always get takeout,” Steve protested. “Sometimes I eat out.”
“But do you cook?” Danny said pointedly. “No. No, you do not. So don’t talk to me about vitamin deficiencies.”
“I barbeque,” Steve offered. “Sometimes you cook.”
Danny rolled his eyes. “Is that supposed to make you sound better? Because trust me, babe, it really doesn’t,” he said. “It makes you sound like you take your life lessons from the Neanderthal guide to bachelorhood. Catherine, back me up on this.”
Catherine was watching them with this look on her face - amused, but somehow knowing. “No comment.”
“Hah!” Danny said, smug in his righteousness. “See? You see what I mean here?”
“She said ‘no comment’, Danny, that doesn’t mean she agrees with you,” Steve argued, because he was a sore loser. Danny rolled his eyes.
“It’s called ‘tact’, Steven,” he said dismissively. “I know it’s not a concept you’re familiar with, but there you go.”
Steve did his scowly I’m-going-to-ignore-you-even-though-you’re-right-Danno-because-I’m-a-stubborn-jackass face and stole one of Danny’s chicken nuggets, because deep inside he was actually about 12 years old. Danny reached out to smack Steve’s hand away from his plate, and then changed his mind. He could be magnanimous about it. He was just a nice guy like that.
Plus it was kind of worth it to see Steve smirking like he’d gotten away with the crime of the century or something, the big goombah.
“Was that supposed to be stealthy, or something?” Danny said exasperatedly. “What kind of pathetic ninja SEAL are you? At least make yourself useful and take the pineapple.”
“It’s good for you,” Steve insisted, obstinate as a mule. “Just eat the damn fruit already.”
“So we’re back to this again? Do you never give up?”
“You know me, I’m like a dog with a bone,” Steve agreed, and stole another nugget. “Maybe you should order something that comes with salad next time.”
Danny turned to Catherine for some back up.
“You see what I have to put up with?” he demanded, and she laughed.
“I don’t know, you seem to be managing okay to me,” she said mysteriously, and then there was this bizarre silent communication thing where she raised her eyebrow at Steve and he rubbed the back of his head like he was being sheepish or something. Danny was honestly baffled by the whole thing.
He was even more baffled a moment later when Catherine grabbed her handbag and pushed her chair back.
“Well, boys, it’s been great, but I’d better split,” she said, throwing down a couple of twenties for her share. “Enjoy the rest of your evening.”
“Roger that,” Steve said easily. “I’ll call you.”
Catherine snorted. “I’m sure you will,” she said wryly. “When you need something.”
Steve gave her a lopsided grin. “Guilty.”
“Anyway, it was nice to properly meet you, Danny,” she said. “I’ll see you guys later.”
She pecked Steve on the cheek, flicked her fingers in goodbye, and walked out the door. Danny stared after her in disbelief, wondering what exactly just happened there.
“Wait, she’s just going? And you’re okay with that?” he said incredulously. Steve shrugged.
“We’re just casual,” he said. “Friends with benefits. When things get serious with someone else, she pulls the plug.”
“So I take it things got serious, then,” Danny concluded. “And she didn’t tell you this beforehand?”
Steve gave him this funny, ambiguous little smile, almost rueful. “Guess she thought she didn’t have to,” he said, making very little sense to Danny, but hey, who was he to judge. “That’s Catherine for you.”
Well, whatever; if Steve was cool with it, it wasn’t Danny’s problem, right?
And he totally wasn’t glad about it, either, because that would be ridiculous.
EXHIBIT B: CO-HABITATION
“Hey, Danny, we’re out of beer, you mind grabbing some on your way over tonight?” Steve asked on his way through the office. “I got this thing with the Governor before I clock out.”
“Yeah, sure,” Danny said distractedly, but then his brain caught up to his mouth and he looked up from his paperwork, suspicious. “Wait, is this like a more subtle version of the wallet thing? Have you devised a cunning system for tricking me into buying all the alcoholic beverages you ever drink from now on, or something?”
Steve made an annoyed noise. “Jesus, I’ll pay you back when I get home if it’s that important to you.”
“No, no,” Danny said, leaning back in his chair and lacing his fingers behind his head. “It’s cool. I just like to know these things, that’s all. If I’m going to be the drinks-provider in this partnership, it helps to be sure just how much you’re gonna owe me.”
Steve rolled his eyes, but there was a fond smile quirking at his lips. “Sure thing, Danno. You buy me beer, I let you control the remote tonight, how’s that?”
“Hm, you throw in the washing up, and that’s a definite maybe,” Danny decided.
“Deal,” Steve said. “I don’t know why you’re always bitching about the dishes, we get takeout most nights anyway.”
“You say that, but then you insist on putting things on plates and using real cutlery, which might make more sense if we were eating at a dinner table rather than on the couch in front of the TV, but whatever, far be it from me to criticize your crazy takeout rituals,” Danny shot back, never quite able to let the last word go. “Now shoo, you’re late for your meeting.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Steve muttered, but left anyway. Kono looked up from her desk, swirling her yoghurt spoon around her mouth, and gave Danny an assessing look that honestly gave him the willies. Kono was a scary little lady, sometimes.
“What, what is that look for?” he said eventually, when he could take it no longer.
“Oh, nothing. Just wondering when you’re planning on telling people you moved in with Steve,” she said casually, and Danny almost choked on his coffee.
“What?” he wheezed, when he got his breath back. “What do you mean, moved in with? Why the hell would I want to live with that maniac? Assuming he even asked, which, might I add, he has not.”
“Does he need to?” she asked. “Seriously, Danny, when was the last time you didn’t stay in Steve’s spare bedroom?”
Danny opened his mouth to retort and then realised he did not in fact know the answer to that question, which was more than a little disturbing. “We work late a lot!” he said defensively. “And hang out, because we are friends, and that is what friends do, especially friends who work together! I don’t like driving home late or after I’ve had a few drinks, there’s nothing strange about that!”
“I’m just saying, you hang out at his place almost every night. Your daughter spends more time there than at your place. Which is a dump, by the way.”
“So?”
“So even if you haven’t noticed it yet, you live with Steve and your own apartment is just a total waste of dough,” Kono said, with an edge of exasperation. “I’m pretty sure if you’d stopped paying your rent you guys would actually be common law married by now.”
“And that is one more reason I will not be moving in with Steve McGarrett,” Danny said, “because I do not want to end up his accidental de facto. Are we done here?”
Kono shrugged. “Whatever, brah, just trying to help.”
“Well don’t,” Danny said, scowling. “No offence, Kono, but I really, really don’t want that kind of help.”
“If you say so,” she said smugly, gliding out of the room, and Danny took a moment to mourn the fact that she was so hot, and yet so, so very crazy, just like Steve. Maybe you couldn’t have one without the other. Maybe she was in league with Chin and this whole thing was a plot to drive him insane.
Maybe he was just surrounded by lunatics who not only got him shot at on a regular basis, but also played evil yenta with his love life for kicks.
Fuck his fucking life, seriously.
EXHIBIT C: CO-PARENTING
“Love you, Danno. Love you, Steve-o,” Grace said, pecking them both on the cheek before she thundered up the stairs of Steve’s house like a herd of elephants and ran to the spare bedroom she usually stayed in.
“Steve-o?” Danny echoed after the resounding slam of the door, bewildered and more than a little perturbed.
“Maybe ‘cause it sounds like Danno?” Steve suggested, flipping the page of his book like he wasn’t even fazed.
“Yeah, but why would she…? I mean, not that there’s anything wrong with that, if that’s what my baby wants to call you.”
“Too bad, I was hanging out for Step-Steve.”
“… Don’t even joke about that.”
“Who said I was joking?” Steve said peaceably. Danny righteously ignored him. “So, are we going surfing tomorrow or what?”
“Surfing?”
“Yes, surfing,” Steve said, exaggeratedly slow. “You said Grace was starting lessons, didn’t you? Kono said she’d been teaching you a bit too, maybe I could help.”
Danny wasn’t quite sure how to identify that swooping feeling in the pit of his stomach, so he decided it must be terror at the idea of him, surfing and Steve in the same context.
Nevertheless, Gracie wanted to go surfing, he and Rachel had already told her she could, and if Danny trusted anyone to keep her safe, it was going to be a Navy SEAL who obviously adored her almost as much as Danny did.
He sighed and turned to Steve.
“Fine, what time is it?”
“Ten,” Steve answered, frowning slightly. “Danny?”
“I’ll go call Rachel,” Danny said, resigned, and walked into the kitchen for the illusion of privacy while he called his ex-wife.
“Danny, it’s ten o’clock,” Rachel said when she picked up. “What on Earth could be this important? Please don’t say terrorists.”
Danny rolled his eyes. “No, no terrorists,” he assured her. “I was just checking that you were alright with it if Steve and I take Gracie surfing tomorrow.”
“But Danny, you hate surfing,” Rachel said incredulously. “It took weeks for you to agree to Grace surfing, and even then it was only because she pleaded with you for the whole day.”
“Yeah, but I’ve agreed now, so I can’t exactly take it back, can I?” Danny pointed out. “Look, if Gracie’s going to take surfing lessons, I’d be way more comfortable if it were with Steve than some random beach bum I don’t know, that’s all I’m saying.”
Short silence from the other end of the line.
“You trust him that much?”
“With Gracie’s life, sure. He wouldn’t let a single hair on her head get harmed. With my life? Less so. I half think he gets me shot at for kicks sometimes.”
Longer silence.
“Rachel? Hello?”
“Danny, I don’t need to stage an intervention, do I?”
“Huh?”
“Well, Steve seems like a very nice man, and ordinarily I would never worry about your ability to stand up for yourself, but you never can tell and humans have a way of justifying these things to themselves-”
“Wait, wait, are you seriously asking me if Steve’s wife-beating me, here?”
“That’s very sexist, Danny.”
“To whom, abused men or women in general?”
“Both, I’d imagine.”
“Well, either way, he’s not! Because he is not beating me! I was just joking, for fuck’s sake! And more importantly, I am not his wife! Or husband! Or spouse or partner of any kind other than the police kind!”
“Really? I find that difficult to believe.”
“What I cannot believe is that we are even having this conversation, Jesus Christ. I am going now, Rachel, good bye.”
“Danny? Is everything okay?” Steve called from the lounge.
“Fine! Everything is just fucking peachy!” Danny yelled back, and beat his head against the wall.
It was a sad but undeniable fact that his entire family were fucking crazy.
EXHIBIT D: LEGAL DOCUMENTATION
“Detective, I noticed you filed changes to your next of kin arrangements,” Governor Jamison began. Danny’s brow furrowed, and out of the corner of his eye he could see Steve go carefully still.
“Uh, yeah?” he hazarded. He thought that was supposed to be confidential. Maybe not if you’re the Five-0. Nothing comes without strings attached, especially not the support of the governor. “Why?”
“I assume you are aware that DADT has been repealed?” she continued. Steve was doing that thing with the Aneurism Face where he looked like he was about to start convulsing or maybe perform a ninja disappearing trick, and Danny had absolutely no idea what the fuck was going on here.
“… Yeeeees?” he said, drawing it out slowly in a way he hoped conveyed his complete what-the-fuckery, here. Danny was not in the Army. Steve was in the Army - ‘The Navy, Danny, the Navy’ - but it could hardly affect him much now he was here with the Five-0, right? Not that Danny didn’t think Steve would be happy that the organisation he worked for no longer symbolised the last bastion of institutionalised homophobia, because he did not think Steve was that kind of asshole, but how did the open service of gay men and women affect either of them directly? Or have any relevance to the conversation whatsoever?
“I was simply checking that you were aware that Commander McGarrett is in no danger of suffering from any form of career backlash should you file the rest of your documentation.” The Governor smiled at him, like he was supposed to find this reassuring. Steve’s mental computer had apparently suffered a fatal error and was frozen on the blue screen of death face.
“The rest of my documentation?” Danny repeated stupidly, with a really, really bad, sinking feeling that he knew what was coming next.
“Yes, of course. Change of address, registration of reciprocal beneficiary relationship,” she said, totally matter-of-fact. “As of January next year, you will be able to enter into a civil union, as no doubt you are aware, Detective.”
“Civil union…?” Danny echoed, faint with horror. Beside him, Steve’s internal reboot process roared into life and he jumped to his feet, angling his body to create a slight barrier between Danny and the Governor as if he was trying to protect Danny from his own well-meaning employer. It was almost sweet, if a little worrying.
“Thanks for the concern, Governor,” Steve said hastily, in a way that sounded to Danny a little like you are my commanding officer and I respect you as much as I have to but I am afraid I may have to kill you with my little finger if you do not stop talking right the fuck now. “But we can handle it from here.”
“If you insist, Commander,” she said, still smiling slightly. “You can go now.”
Danny had the sudden suspicious feeling that she was laughing at them.
Christ, even his boss thought they were married.
EXHIBIT E: MUTUAL ATTRACTION
The thing was, Steve was hot. Objectively speaking. The fact that Danny acknowledged this did not make him secretly in love or lust or anything in between with his partner. It just meant he had eyes, that was all.
And Steve insisted on stripping off his shirt and parading around his stupid abs at the drop of a hat, so of course Danny stared at him. For one thing, he couldn’t believe Steve’s apparent aversion to proper clothing. Never mind a shirt, Steve could barely keep a tank top on most days.
It had nothing to do with Steve’s smooth tanned skin, or the way the tattoo ink swirled around his biceps and the small of his back, or the droplets of water sliding down his chest in a way that made Danny want to follow their trail with his tongue…
Okay, so maybe he was kind of deluding himself with that one.
But Danny thought lots of people were hot - guys and women - and it didn’t have to mean anything. He wasn’t going to do anything about it; it wasn’t like it was mutual. Danny had yet to see any evidence that Steve even went for guys. It was simple harmless one-sided attraction that had nothing to do with Steve and Danny or their partnership.
“Danny,” Steve said. Danny jerked his eyes up, guilty, trying to pretend he hadn’t been caught looking, only to be caught by Steve’s own gaze, heavy and dark with an intensity that tugged at the heat pooling in the base of Danny’s stomach. There was something mesmerising about that stare, something that made it so hard to tear himself away that Danny knew he had to.
Steve licked at his lips and then parted his mouth slightly, like he was about to speak. Struck by the terrible premonition that Steve was about to say something potentially world-shattering, Danny drained his beer in a single scull, trying to moisten his suddenly dry throat, and slammed the can back down on the bench.
“Right,” he said quickly, unable to meet Steve’s eyes again, awkward and self-conscious of the weirdly thick atmosphere between them. “Well, I better get to bed. Night, Steve.”
With that, Danny all but fled for the spare room, not ready to deal with this thing sitting between them. He was scared of himself, of what he might do if he stayed a second longer; he didn’t want to take the risk and be wrong, but perhaps the thing that terrified him most was the idea that he could be right.
Sometimes, Danny, knew, he could be a total coward.
VERDICT
So Danny had evidence, and it totally proved -
Uh.
Okay, when you combined all these incidents together, he couldn’t deny that objectively it looked kind of bad. He could maybe see how from an outsider’s perspective one might get the wrong idea, just possibly. But that totally did not mean he and Steve actually had a thing. Because they did not, okay? There was no thing. Just because Danny spent more time at Steve’s than at his own crappy little apartment, or because his daughter apparently thought Steve was her new stepdad, or because he’d had Steve listed as his next-of-kin, or because everyone they ever knew apparently thought Danny was joking when he insisted he and Steve were not dating… and okay, so maybe Steve was kind of hot in a not so objective way where Danny wanted to kiss him and run his hands all over bare skin, and in the right light Steve’s smile sometimes made his stomach flip, and every now and then he got a little jealous of Catherine for being about to touch him, but that didn’t mean…
Fuck.
Fuck.
“Oh my god,” Danny said out loud, in that moment of stunned mallet realisation you get when you’ve just been blindsided by the clue bus. “I’m married to Steve McGarrett. When the fuck did this become my life?”
“I don’t know, Danny, but I’ve kind of been wondering how long it was going to take you to figure this out,” Steve said from behind him. “So is the office betting pool, by the way.”
“In my defence,” Danny pointed out, “they didn’t make me a detective for my personal relationship skills. Just ask Rachel and she’ll tell you all about how long it took me to figure out she was interested.” Pause. “Wait, what do you mean office betting pool?”
“Are you honestly telling me you’re surprised?”
Danny opened his mouth.
Danny remembered precisely who he was dealing with, here, and then he closed it again.
“Okay,” he said after a very long moment. “You make a valid point.”
“So back to this whole us being married thing,” Steve said, in a tone of casual so faux it made polyester leopard print look authentic. “Did we totally skip the honeymoon into the boring old couple who never has sex, or-”
“Please, please just shut up,” Danny said, pained beyond all belief. “I swear to God, Steven, if you finish that sentence…”
Steve laughed, warm and a bit goofy. “Sure thing, Danno,” he murmured, and Danny had a moment to wonder how on Earth he’d kept missing that look in Steve’s eyes before he was being kissed with the determined laser focus of a Navy SEAL who’d been kept waiting way too long.
Danny made a muffled gargle of surprise and grabbed for Steve’s collar, more to anchor himself than to hold Steve in place.
It was an almost perfect moment until he heard the applause and cheering from the doorway.
“Finally!” Kono yelled.
“Glad to see you’re finally on board, brah,” Chin added, the smug asshole.
Danny flipped them off and kept on kissing Steve, because much as he missed having the chance to say ‘I told you so’ to all the smug fuckers in his life, he had to admit: being wrong did have its perks.
Well, the facts speak for themselves, don’t they?