(no subject)
Title: All Them Roads Lead to More of the Same Chpt 1/?
Fandom: Hawaii Five-0
Pairings: Danny/Steve, Danny/Rachel
Rating: PG this chapter
Word Count: 2,500 this chapter
Warnings: Break up, divorce, LOTS OF YELLING for this chapter
Summary: In '95 Danny walks into his favorite restaurant and meets the man of his dreams. 11 years later everything falls apart. Everything falls apart again when five years after that he up and moves his daughter and new wife to Hawai'i and Steve McGarrett crashes back into his life, once more.
A/N: THANKS AGAIN TO TOOOOOOoooom dios_os_bendigo **slobbers on your face**
So it's not that life in Hawai'i is boring by any stretch of imagination, it's just that the last time he got a demerit and was put temporarily back on patrol was back in Jersey. And maybe Hawai'i's just having a boring day, but he remembers at least getting a few domestic violence cases to keep him from wanting to tear his hair out of his skull. Which aren't actually fun, but. Well.
His partner comes back, thank god, before he gets too far down that road. He's got a greasy bag and a paper tray with two cups it in and Danny leans over to open the door for him.
"The wonders of stereotypes," Danny says gleefully as he grabs the bag from him, pulling out a sugary confection and popping it in his mouth."Two cops in a squad car eating donuts and drinking coffee. What could get more cliche then that." Meka just rolls his eyes.
"Malasada's, brah," he corrects. Danny shrugs.
"Whatever, it's all deep fried dough to me," and Meka laughs good naturedly and eats.
A few minutes of contented chewing later Danny comes aware of the sound of screeching tires. He turns around in his seat, squints as a blue truck fishtales into view.
"Hey is that, uh one of those normal island things," he asks Meka pointing with his thumb as the guy drives past. Meka grins and pulls the car into gear.
"Braw, that's just a good old fashioned crazy, right there."
"Awesome," Danny says and snaps on the lights. "Think the boss will be happy if we actually bring someone in, here?"
"Maybe she'll even put us back in our desks. With paper work." Meka says wistfully. Danny makes a face.
"Ugh. You can have mine," and Meka laughs.
"Naw," he drawls. "It's funner to watch you squirm in your seat like you've got ringworm or something." Danny makes a face.
As far as chases go it isn't much of one. The guy, girl, whoever, Danny's not misogynistic here, is perfectly aware of how universally bad drivers the sexes can be, anyways whoever it is clearly insane but they roll to a stop agreeably enough when the siren wails. They even pull over a good foot from the road where no one will have to feel like they're about to get broadsided in the middle of the street. Very considerate.
"You mind if I do the honors?" Danny asks, gesturing through the windshield at the truck.
"Naw, it's all yours man," Meka says magnanimously. Danny grins at him and ducks out of the car, stolls leisurely over to the truck, dearly hoping his snail's pace will piss off the occupant even more. He might even get to use his hand cuffs and oh my God he needs to get out more if this is his idea of entertainment. He comes up on the truck and pokes his head around to see in the window.
He almost immediately takes a step back and swears creatively.
"Oh no, no no I am not seeing this right now. I must be hallucinating because I am not seeing you. You are not in that car right now, I am just losing my already fragile grip on reality."
Steve McGarrett looks steadily back at him from behind his sunglasses, hands firmly at ten and two on the steering wheel. Danny's world rocks a little sideways at the familiar planes of his face. Rachel was going to kill him, no, screw that, he was going to kill himself and yeah, maybe he'd been deluding himself a little when he was convincing that little voice in his head that Hawai'i was a big god dammed island and how he'd never even see him after Rachel got tired of Jersey and wanted a move to someplace warmer.
"I grew up on a rainy island, Danny. I think we both deserve a little less misery in out lives." And she'd gestured carefully around his old house where then there was still evidence of failed memories and ugly words.
Her heart was set on Hawai'i. She'd brought up pamphlets, showed him brochures, vouched for a friend she had in real estate here. Danny'd let himself be convinced, didn't look too closely at why leaving the house he'd shared with his ex-husband to go the island where he was born wasn't the most shining of ideas, just hoped it was enough to keep her happy. It had been, too. The tension in their relationship had washed away with sandy beaches and melted in the bright sunlight. Gracie loved it here and between their two jobs they had more then enough to buy a modest house in a modest neighborhood. Not one sign of Steve McGarrett had rolled through his life this whole time, Danny'd been pleasantly surprised by this. Until today.
Back in the present Danny pinches the bridge of his nose against the feel of a headache blossoming behind his eyes.
"Take off the fucking glasses, Steven. You're in Hawaii, not Hollywood. Jesus Christ." He scrubs a hand hard over his face, callouses catching on day old stubble.
"Danny," Steve says, quietly, doing as he's told. "It's uh, interesting to see you here."
"Yeah interesting, look are you even aware of what you just did? Of all the laws you were just breaking? When the hell did you get to be such a menace, huh?" Steve's lips perse like he's eaten a lemon. "Get out of the car and give me your license and registration." While Steve goes to do this, he continues ranting.
"I mean I counted no less then two, two times you missed crashing into another car by less then a millimeter. You also took it upon yourself to just, I dunno, make up a new lane to pass those nice people who were going the speed limit because clearly you, Steven have gone even farther off the deep end then when I last saw you." Steve hands him his paperwork and military ID stiffly. "Thank you." Danny says absently. Meka's gotten out of the car by this point and is making his way towards them.
"Everything alright here," he asks. Danny waves him off.
"It's fine just, it's fine, Hanamoa." He irritably pushes past him to run the ID even though he knows exactly what he'll find, wonders why he even bothers. He enters in the numbers back in the squad car and surprise surprise Lieutenant Commander Steven McGarrett (he must have gotten another promotion. Danny vaguely remembers getting some kind of invitation in the mail, but he never went.) of the Navy SEALs, perfect record, never been convicted of so much as a parking ticket in either Hawai'i, where he grew up, or Jersey, where he lived during his leaves for some 13 plus years. Of course no one was perfect and part of that came from the fact that his father was a cop but there was absolutely jack squat that Danny could do about it, now. He climbs back out of the car maneuvering around Meka who probably thinks his hovering is helpful right now.
"You know, all of these things are really good reasons for me to just say 'hey Danno, let's just throw him into the god dammed drunk tank for about a year and a half', so why I am I about to go over there and let him off once again?" he gripes at him. Meka blinks.
"I- Actually, yeah I don't have any clue, Danny. What's going on? You look like you've seen a ghost." Danny feels his teeth grind.
"God, I wish," Meka puts a hand on his arm.
"Hey, if you want me to do this-" Danny shakes his head.
"No, no, we'd both have to show up in court, anyways. No. Just, let's just pretend this never happened, alright, buddy?" He may be pleading a bit now, but he just really doesn't care. He has no idea how he's going to explain this to Rachel, has been trying to explain it to himself for years, now and hasn't gotten even an iota closer to why even after they've been divorced for five full fucking years Steve McGarrett can get under his skin without even being in the same country. So he's just going to give him his ticket and pretend it never happened, hope to god he's just taking his leave here and not something more permanent. Good plan.
Yeah, right. Like that's gonna happen.
Meka gives him one last strange look and goes to lean against the squad car where he can pretend he's not watching everything going on like a hawk. Nosey gossiping bastard. Steve is watching him steadily from where he's stiffly standing by the door to his Chevy.
"Well wouldn't you know, boy scout Steve McGarrett has a perfect record," Danny says when he's close enough, shoving his ID into his chest. He doesn't even stumble, the jackass, just takes it wordlessly. "It's standard operating procedure to let first time offenders go, but I get the feeling even if I didn't follow that fun little unspoken rule your father would just wave those charges magically away, anyways." A flinch goes through Steve's entire body when he says this and Danny frowns, lets himself really look at him.
". . . Just get out of here, you look like shit," he says. Steve's eyes are red rimmed and his face is sunken in its hard lines. No wonder he's been so dammed quiet, he looks like someone steam rolled his puppy. Danny rolls his shoulder and turns his back on it. "And stop driving like a fucking asshole," and he goes to leave, but Steve takes a short step forward.
"Danny," he says. Danny twitches turns back half-way to face him.
"Yeah what, Steven, what do you want?"
"You moved to the island." It's not a question. Danny answers it, anyways.
"Yeah wife got sick of Jersey. I'm here for her, Steven. For my wife."
"I hear Gracie came with you, too, then, huh." Danny's jaw goes tight and he finally turns to face him fully, again, crosses his arms and waits for whatever glorious bullshit he's going to pull out on him.
"You couldn't even tell me in person," he says quietly, as if they're in some sort of opposite competition, Steve's voice so low he'd have to practically shove his ear in his face to hear him, Danny loud enough to wake polar bears in Antarctica. "You got Tina to tell me." And of course he remembers his divorce lawyer's first name, that is just so like him. Alright, if that's how they're gonna play it, Danny can roll with that.
". . . You didn't see her last time, Steven," he bristles. "Not even once. I've been here for four months, okay. I woulda told you then myself but you didn't fucking show."
Steve's head is nodding throughout his explanation, but not in agreement.
"Okay," he says, finally. "Okay, officer," and Danny could arrest him for that tone alone if it was worth the paper work. Steve gets back in his car and is almost immediately on his phone. Danny throws his arms up and stalks away where Meka has sensed the end of this fiasco and settled back into the driver's seat.
Two days later he get a summons to court and Steve gets his visitation rights changed to weekends. Danny also feels pretty bad right before the fiasco because he learns why Steve was in town at all when a funeral is announced. He'd barely even realized they had worked in the same precinct before Jack retired. He stops feeling so charitable, though between court and how a half a week after that Meka gets a call to transfer to the newly created Governor's Task force.
But, right now Danny does not sense this impending doom hovering over his head, at least not in so many words. No, for now he simply slides wordlessly back into the partrol car next to Meka, folds his arms up on the dash and lets his head thunk between them feelingly.
"Whoa, whoa, okay, calm down. You trying to give yourself a concussion there, brah?" Danny just groans.
"So, you gonna tell me what that was all about or are we still not talking about it?" Meka asks and Danny shoots him a grimace around his folded arms.
"I dunno, I don't think it's something we should get into, I mean it's kind of a delicate subject-"
"Only see I'm remembering this time when I was using the pretense of going to the bathroom to snoop around your house," he barrels over him, noisily. Danny lets out an incredulous laugh and Meka slants him a grin.
"Yeah yeah, you know me, never knew how to leave a good mystery alone, mama always said I was a gossip, not gonna stop now," he says cheerfully and Danny sits back enough to elbow him in the side. "Oof. Anyways, well I happened to find an old shoe box shoved way in the back your storage closet while I was washing my hands in there and inside, right on top I found a picture with you, Grace, and what could have been a smiling Mr. Tall Dark and Accident Waiting to Happen back there, but I couldn't get close enough to see. Plus, you know, you were kinda yelling enough I heard you back in Jersey. So. I'm just going out on a limb here guessing that's our man, yeah?"
"My life," Danny says, after a heart-felt groan, gesturing expansively. "This is what it's become. First you get me in trouble with the brass and then I learn you are stalking me, actually stalking me." Meka just raises an eyebrow at him, let's the minor accusation slide, not one to be detered. Danny rolls his eyes.
"Fine, fine, yes, that is my ex as you so illegally extrapolated," he wags a finger at him. "And believe you me we are going to have words about that later, mister, but for now I think I've satisfied your curiosity enough. I mean what's there to tell? You saw us, we're terrible for each other. Now, I'm sure Danny's mysterious explosion is going to be floating around the office for awhile, yet and I'm sensing I don't need to be adding fuel to this fire of the homosexual marriage kind, no I do not." Meka shrugs.
"Alright. As long as you know I don't have a problem with it, brah. Who you bone's your own business. I mean unless, uh, Rachel's your what's that called? That thing gay guys have with women? Mustache?"
"Beard, Hanamoa don't be obtuse, and watch it, that's my wife you're talking about." He says mildly but when he sits back and Meka laughs and starts them back up on their patrol some of the tenseness has leaked out of Danny's expression. He's back to cracking stupid jokes and his laughter never even got a chance to stop meeting his eyes, so Meka's counting it as a win.