(no subject)

[haole_cop]

 He doesn't like the beach, okay?



He doesn't. Not even on a Saturday with nothing else to do, not even when he's actually getting sort of passably okay on a surfboard (enough not to worry about drowning every time he actually goes after a wave, at least). Not even though today's beach visit includes Steve McGarrett in board shorts that cling to his ass and legs, shining with what looks like a permanent glaze of water, hair damp and unruly and eyes squinting cheerfully in the sun.

He's like a goddamned plant, Steve. Soaking up these sun rays as if he needs them to recharge, and, okay, fine, it's a good look on him. Glowing. Active. Needling Danny into coming, instead of letting Danny stay in bed, coaxing him with the siren call of Kamekona's shrimp (which Danny paid for) and beers on the beach (which Danny also paid for).

It'll be fun, Danno.

You'll like it, Danno.

He sounds like Grace.

Okay. Fine. Maybe there's something appealing in how happy Steve is to get out in the sun and the water, and maybe Danny isn't going to begrudge Steve anything that makes him smile like he does when he's coming off a wave and he's flying high with adrenaline and triumph. 

And maybe it's kind of nice, to spend the day together. Catching a few glances slid his way from under Steve's soaked and curling hair, flaking out in the sand until he can feel the beat of sun in his skin, surrounded by the scent of synthetic coconut and pineapple (his favorite kind), and maybe he's feeling decently expansive with the world, coming off a successful turn out in the waves himself, and now contemplating the possibilities of a cool umbrella drink or two from the bar further down the beach in a while.

For now, he sips some water, waves his hand idly, eyes traveling over the yards and yards of white sand, jewel-toned water, bronzed and smiling relaxed people all around.

It maybe does kind of beat dealing with hardened criminals, at least.

"You know what this place could use? A boardwalk."

Comments

[thebesteverseen]

There's something like a rumble of agreement. Or maybe it's just a rumble of sound without a direction or emotion at all. From the mound of Steve, lying on his stomach, arms crossed under his cheek, face tilted toward Danny even though his eyes are closed. Even though his arms and a good half of his legs are on sand more than towel. It's not even like he needs to make the sound.

He could raise his eyebrows and shift his mouth and Danny would keep on talking like that was all he needed, too.

Steve doesn't really care at the moment -- soaking up the sun down the loose, rubbery muscles in his back and his calves from the waves -- what exactly Danny is talking about or complaining about at this point. The important part is that Danny is there, grumbling and bitching. His voice, like an octave in the sunshine. Good week. Good sleep. Good waves. Sunshine, and Danny's here with him. Rumbling away in his ears. Everything perfect.

Making his mouth curve, slow and easy, when he crack his eyes barely, open at the glare of the brillant endless sunshine, toward Danny. "Too much fuss and foot traffic. It'd ruin this being the near-perfect public equivalent of a private beach."

[haole_cop]

It's not a private beach.

If it were a private beach, he could lean over, forget about the fucking sand, and trace first fingers and then lips down the curve Steve's spine makes in his back. Taste the sun right off his skin. Feel the warmth of the island thrumming through every heart beat. Find salt against his tongue.

But it's not. It's a public beach, which means all he can do is grin at the sky, as Steve maligns boardwalks, voice a low rumble against his crossed arms. The sun's painting his body like that's the spot it loves best, and Danny can't argue with its taste, okay, Steve is damn near perfect, on the beach, back sculpted and relaxed, a long sequence of loose lines and tan skin. "Boardwalks keep foot traffic off the beach," he reasons. "Along with all the vendors who otherwise block the way to the parking lot. Plus, gives you a place to walk where you won't get sand in your shoes."

Not that he's wearing shoes right now, or anything other than the shorts Grace -- or, more likely, Rachel -- got him last Christmas.

"Besides, you have a private beach, you goof. So why are we here to begin with?"

[thebesteverseen]

It doesn't actually matter that Waikiki, Wailea, and Wyndym all actually have and are Hawaiian Boardwalks. That there are strips on every island in the chain that cash in big every day and night. Steve wouldn't choose them first on his life. He doesn't need the crowds or the toursits that you can spot simply by the set of shoulders, cant of their head, and hats on their heads.

Danny's been here long enough to find those things if he actually wanted them. He doesn't. At least not enough to find them. Just enough to grouse. To remind Steve hourly that Hawaii isn't Jersey. Like he could have accidentally forgotten two minutes back. Which is just enough for Steve to snort lightly, and leverage his voice toward smugness, even when he's letting his eyes drift back closed, "Home doesn't have these waves."

Because his beach didn't, and he didn't need them all the time. Not every day. Not like Kono who was probably still patched into the network that knew where the best waves were daily, and when exactly each of the peak hours on each of those best locations was. He was good with swimming a few miles in the morning, and getting in some lower grade surfing off the back porch when he was in the mood, had a light craving for it.

Then heading out for a weekend or a day off to some good waves, when he needed or wanted them or had time enough. Between Danny and his weekends with Grace, Cath and the time he still makes, almost more than weekly, for Doris. As fraught as any of those these can be. Are. But aren't today. When the sunshine is a golden throbbing thing taking over all the lines of his body, and there's just Danny and the sun, the island, the continual crash of waves mingling with his voice.

[haole_cop]

"Oh, right."

Even his voice sounds lazy, like it can't be bothered to take on his usual energy. Through the crack of his eyelids, the whole world looks painted blue, clear and warm and welcoming, and he can hear the soft hsh-hsh of the waves as they run up sand in a cascade of foam.

It's not so bad, maybe. The beach isn't crowded, nobody's given them a hard time, the waves were decent, and the sun is slowly sinking, meandering towards the ocean like it's got all the time in the world. Danny squints at it, pushes his head back, tucking one arm beneath it, the other resting on his stomach, fingers tapping gently against his skin. Steve will have to go out soon, if he wants to hit the waves one more time before the sun sets, but it's not like either of them are exactly in any kind of a rush.

Everything's easy, slow and lazy. He feels like he could be spread like jam on toast, he's so loose right now. "Those waves you definitely aren't on, right now."

Which is fine. He might not be able to reach out and touch, but Steve's close, has been here all day, was there all night. Isn't moving anywhere else fast, which suits Danny fine.

[thebesteverseen]

He's beautiful like this. That's the though slipping silently through Steve's slow, overly warm, brain.

It's not something he puts words to often enough, even when it fills all the air in his chest, like it is right now.
When Danny's shift makes his eyes open again, trained reflexes that can't be trained out, that he wouldn't if he could.

The arm under his hair, mussed and then ocean slicked, sand salted, half-dried blonde of so many different shades from bleach to gold to brown. But everything isn't even that clear through the slit of Steve's barely open eyes and the cross of his eyelashes. It's more this only half-shaded, only half-focused, water color silhouette of shadows and sunshine. The cut of his forehead and nose, the shadows of his cheek, his jaw, his throat. Hurts through breathing something that isn't pain at all in his chest.

Suffocates him, but makes him want to slip under. To chase it to whatever the end of that road is. To slide under, to give over.

He's lucky his voice is already low and rough, soaked with sun and sureness. It's easy to push it a little more that way. Wiggle his toes in the sand where they are presently half sunk, push his eyelids open, blinding his eyes, his senses, that ball in his chest, on the rare sight of Danny, laid out in the sun, barely clothed. Gorgeous. Golden. Restlessly-relaxed. Pretend he isn't looking, even though he did. Does. Can't help it.

But at least did end up looking at Danny's face. Eyebrows raising. Tone mocking thick. "You tired of my company already?"

[haole_cop]

It makes him grin, wide against the stretch of dried salt on his face.

He'd spent months waiting to be tired of Steve's company. Wondering when it would happen, when the aggravation of being around Steve finally won out, when he'd finally just have enough. He was still waiting when he started finding himself at Steve's house on weekend days, grabbing a bite or a drink with him after work, bringing him along on outings with Grace.

He thinks he could probably wait for years, and it'd never happen.

There's no such thing as getting tired of Steve. Just when Danny thinks he's seen it all, the guy turns around and whips the floorboards out from under his feet. Replaces a stern frown with a transcendent smile. Pulls another bizarre skill or hobby out of his pocket. Comes up with another plan to burn daylight, or lounge in it.

Like now. Steve's flaked out, looking as much like a predator as a house cat basking in a sunspot does. Every inch of him is relaxed to the point of looking damn near liquid. Danny would never in a million years have thought the Steve he first met was capable of this kind of laid-back, simple enjoyment. Of being still for too long. Of taking a day just to waste it.

But Hawaii's down deep in Steve's core, earlier than the Navy, earlier than discipline and duty, and every now and again, he does this: becomes as much one with the sand and surf and sun as it's possible to be without actually letting the gentle lapping waves sift him apart.

Danny loves it.

"What makes you think I wasn't already?"

He says it back lazy, languid, eyes shutting to the perfect blue of the sky, the rich golden glare of a sun starting its downward descent.

It's an easy enough question to answer, probably, considering Danny'd come home with Steve the night before and hasn't actually left yet.

[thebesteverseen]

Danny eyes close, and it's a good third of everything in Steve, not to prop his chin up on an arm, stop the faint strain from his half-lifted position, and just let himself look. Down all the golden skin. The wide stretch of his shoulders and his chest, covered with golden-brown curls. Nipples resting inside them, and the up and down of each and every rib. The way his ribs would narrow to dip of his stomach, solid loose muscles, and then his hips, and tuck, with that slightly finer and finer hair, into his board shorts. To them, to beyond them. The heavy muscles growing leaner down across his legs.

The fact Steve has seen them so much, so close, for time enough now, just the thoughts make it happen in his head, endless detail known by hands, lips, this skin. Golden with sun and sprinkled with sand, in his head, even when he doesn't look anywhere else. Hasn't looked away from those closed eyes and that grin that is stretching across Danny's face warming Steve more than the beating sun.

That smile that's tossing his stomach like the waves tossed him about earlier, will, again, soon enough. Makes him want to lean over and catch the sun right off Danny's lips. Kiss that sass right from his mouth, and drag out the shock-surprised noise that would catch in his teeth with being kissed here. Make him give in entirely for a few seconds. Taste him being happy, amused, relaxed here, on the sand, on the beach of all things. Which is really where that answer would start.

What makes him think Danny isn't tired of him already. Things like this. That he doesn't quite understands. Throws himself at, full force, like a wrecking ball, wheedling Danny until he agrees even once, and he does. Agrees to get out of bed, find almost no clothing and come down to a real beach. For someone who isn't Grace. And it isn't simply because Steve made him. Threatened him, black mailed him, asked him in the trace of fingers or lips, in every inappropriate fashion, shorting Danny's brain until everything was a yes.

Not with that smile, not with that tone of voice. He sounds happy about it. Being here, the beach, with Steve. Even though if Steve pointed it out, Danny would explain the fault of every single grain of sand. And himself, of course. It's part of his charm. That mouth. Attached to that body. Unruly and denial laden, ready a second's notice with an endless barrage of sounds and words.

"My mistake." Steve said, flippant and too bright and warm to be angry, delighted derision, even as he was moving. Sitting up, in a too fast spring, and brushing sand off his forearms. Possibly not so accidentally right at Danny. "I'll just get out of the way of you being a beach bum over there. Wouldn't want to block your rays."

[haole_cop]

One eye cracks to give Steve a derisive look, the hand on his stomach coming up to shade his face from the sun so he can glare up at Steve with an appropriate lack of squinting. "Do I look like part of the beach to you?"

Sand sprinkling his leg and stomach, landing on his shorts, that he brushes off with a beleaguered expression. "Yes, go on! Get out of here, you menace. Go be a hazard to someone else for a while."

It lacks bite, though, comes out harmless, too sun-drenched and drowsy to be worth any kind of weight as an insult. It's like waving a mosquito towards Steve's general direction, instead of lobbing fireballs at his head. Any possible negative inference drowned out by easy goodwill and rough affection, because Steve just looks so damn pleased with himself, and that's rare enough that Danny's not going to screw with it.

He looks like he's part of the beach. Made from it. Skin catching the late glow off water and sand, ink standing out crisp and dark against his tan. Faint whorls of hair on his chest brittle from salt and sunscreen, and that smile, curving like the beach, catching the rays and turning them into something blinding. Barefoot, bare-chested, suddenly coiled with energy, like he hadn't just been laid out like his jaw had connected with some heavyweight's fist.

It's worth coming down to the beach for. Worth the sand flies and the itch of salt, the pink sheen to his skin that precedes a burn. Worth leaving the comfort of his apartment or Steve's house, worth spending money on over-priced beach beers and worth bruising his dignity on a surfboard.

It's all worth it, to see Steve smile like that, like he doesn't have a single goddamn care in the world, weight rolled off his shoulders, free and easy and wanting to embrace the world in aloha spirit.

It's beautiful, and Danny would do a hell of a lot more than just come to the beach to see it.

For now, though, he waves a hand at Steve like he's an annoying fly. "Get out of here, go on. Try not to crack your skull on any coral, okay, I'm going to get a drink and I won't be watching your ass to save you from drowning."

[thebesteverseen]

Steve only happens to look more smug. In all of those words, there wasn't one where Danny after rebuke the statement he tossed out even. Like he could choose to insult Steve and completely forgo telling Steve how wrong he was that Danny looked like he belonged, like he was melting into that towel and the endless run of hot, gritty sand. Rubbing it off his stomach and shorts, like it wasn't already there, or he wasn't just catching it or getting more of it everywhere.

Maybe it's good he's getting up. Get in some last waves. Not be struck still further with the want to kiss Danny.

Hot from the sun, stuck all over with sand and salt from his following Steve out earlier into the waves, aggravated but bright with it. Every part of him bright with it. Nothing about him even truly annoyed about the sand, or about being left on the beach in the sun and the sand, or to whatever over priced, rainbow drink he'll find. No, he looks like he's hardly even ruffled by any of these arduous tasks his partner would have hemmed, hawed and sighed at two years back once out of his daughter's hearing.

"SEAL, Danny." Steve stood up, smirking with abject obviousness, before he started brushing the sand from his shins. "If I needed you to save me in the ocean, they take away my club card and I couldn't ever have that." Not that there is one, but the notion is hilarious. Danny checking it through people, toward Steve, who can't even consider the notion of needing rescue in the sea as serious. Ever serious. Not even with Danny favorite new excuse, the mini-boat jacking.

He took the two steps to where his board was, yanking it from being stuck hard in the sand. Tossing a look back at Danny, because how could he ever leave on just that. Not when there's even a second to toss something else at Danny and how he's laid out like a welcome mat in the sun. "You know where to find me when you're done with your froofy, umbrella drink."

[haole_cop]

"SEAL doesn't mean gills, Steven."

But he's up, a sudden surprising height, looming over Danny with a brief shadow before he's turning towards his board, all action, as if he weren't at least part jellyfish two seconds ago, so Danny just waves a lackadaisical hand at him and rolls his eyes at the insinuation that he'll be handed an umbrella drink.




...Actually, he might be handed an umbrella drink. He's got no idea if that little shack serves anything else, considering the number of Buddhas and coconut shells he's seen in the last couple of hours.

It doesn't matter. Something cold, refreshing, and alcoholic will be fine, just something to wash the taste of salt out of his mouth, better than his too-warm bottle of water is doing. "Have fun," he adds, as Steve heads off. "Try not to bean anyone in the head with your board, while I enjoy the peace and quiet I only manage to find when you are not within hearing distance."

And he does, too. Enjoys it. The solitude, the gentle white noise of the beach, people talking, waves shhhhhhh-ing, wind blowing, tugging at his hair. It's nice. It's relaxing.

For about five minutes, total, and then it gets boring.

He sits up, squints out to find Steve in the water, paddling out, body long and lean, gleaming like a fish as he cuts through the waves, a sleek dark shape toying with the water like this island doesn't have waves that routinely kill people, like the North Shore doesn't have a body count.

It's something to see; Steve in the water. He moves like it's his natural element, even if it's not just him, slicing through waves, a bobbing, water-logged head pushing stubbornly through. He doesn't have Kono's grace or total ease on the board, but he's smart, athletic, obviously knows what he's doing.

Worth watching, even when Danny's pushed himself up, jogged up to the Camaro and dug inside for his wallet and a shirt to pull over his head. The material feels too heavy, despite being cotton thin enough almost to see through; it weighs and itches on his skin, but he keeps it on, okay, he is not a savage, it's bad enough he's going over to get a drink with bare feet.

Steve's one of a few holding out for the last waves, now starting to glint in ruddy, rich orange, that low-angled sunlight that spills over the whole world like everything's been dipped in 24-karat gold, turns a normal place into a paradise and this beach into something otherworldly. It's all so smooth and peaceful he almost can't believe that just the other day, he was chasing down scumbag meth dealers and kneeling on their heads to keep them still enough to cuff.

Days like this don't come often enough, but when they do, he tries to make the most of them, file them away carefully to be kept in unsullied perfection.

As if it's the beach. As if it's the sun, or the sand, or the water, or his ability to stand up on a surfboard without endangering himself or anyone else nearby.

As if it's not that one figure he can see, outlined in gold, out on the water. Like it's not the chance to wake up to Steve grinning at him from inches away, limbs tangled and sleep-warm, fingers measuring out their spaces on his skin.

Like it's not the fact that it's been months, now, plural, and there's no sign of anything other than that dopey, pleased smile when Steve sees him, first thing in the morning, staying over, again.

Like that's not what's got him smiling to himself, wide and more than a little amused, as he finds an empty stool by the beach bar. It widens when the girl arranging bottles catches sight of him and mirrors a sparkling, uplifting smile of her own.

"You look like you've had a good day," she says, grinning, setting a paper coaster in front of him, and he chuckles, a faint huff through his nose, glances back out at the water.

"You know what? I've definitely had worse."

[thebesteverseen]

It's all good. Steve chuckling, more deep in his chest and through his shoulders than anywhere else.

His lips pressed toward a smile he's not even trying to keep from his mouth really, as he walks away eyes on the slightly darkening skin, the sinking sun. As careful with his board as he ever is with a gun, even without the reminder from Danny. Making his way back to the waves, crashing in the not too far distance beyond the foaming running up the beach toward him, and everyone else there.

The way something calms, something that wasn't even tense to begin with today, when the water rides over the top of his feet.

Cool and warm and bubbling for only the flash of the steps at the beginning, because he's not standing and waiting to feel it. He's cutting forward. From his feet to his calves, until it's far enough he can toss down his board and get on it, spray catching him everywhere, arms cutting water, headed out.

Out where everything is smooth, fresh and clean. Over and starting, again, each second. Merciless to those without respect or understanding. The sting of salt water on skin like a kiss from sea, eyes on the horizon. The taller, crashing waves, and the endless tumult of water, going on until it meets the horizon glimpsed between them. Something both pacified toward sleep and woken up from it in that, both. The endless, endless sea as far as the eye can see.

Sending him further out, toward the higher rises, with long, hard strokes of his arms.

Heading straight for a curve, without a pause, without a looking back.

Getting as lost as found in the way there isn't room to think after that. Only to act and react, following the ocean or fight against it. Carving upward against a wall of water that becomes the only thing that exists, until it's dashes itself on the top of ocean, soaked back into the never still, rocking, body, leaving him dripping everywhere and smiling. Turn right back to another, and another. Blues that are slowly creeping into burnished coppers and blacks.

Chasing the edge of day as it runs away toward dusk, just as much as the ocean itself.

[haole_cop]

"Yeah?"

Her smile presses dimples into her cheeks. She's got dark liquid eyes and skin that glows, a spill of black hair tied back but still slipping out in curling, glossy pieces, and he bets she gets amazing tips. A girl who looks like that wouldn't even need to bother serving drinks.

Hawaii. It's just full of beautiful people. "Anyway I can improve it further?"

You know, it's nice. Being smiled at. Steve's smile hits him like a thousand watts of sunshine, makes him feel like he's been plugged in, like someone hit a switch and knocked him out of the limbo he'd been stuck in for too damn long.

He'd forgotten what it's like. Getting past the first panicky weeks, the initial rush and desperation, the mornings where waking up is awkward, uncertain. Do you stay for coffee? Can you use the shower? Borrow a toothbrush?

It's easy to get lost in, the worries and second-guessing, but then there's this. Whatever it's turning into. Jokes over take-out, stealing each others' food, beers on the lanai until the night spins slow and deep around them. Everything that was already good, that he'd been so terrified of breaking, but here it is, still existing, alongside Steve tracing the path of his pulse up his throat, along with learning every inch of skin and ink on Steve's body.

The bartender's looking at him, he notices, with her head tipped slightly to one side, and a faintly wistful cast to her smile, which has gone a little lopsided.

He's grinning again, must look like an idiot, so he waves her off, leaning back a little, getting comfortable. "I would love a drink. What do you have that doesn't come with an umbrella?"

Her teeth flash white. "Sorry. You see our specials?" Tipping her head back slides her ponytail off her shoulder to show a slim column of bronzed throat. He doubts she's have any trouble getting customers tonight. "All mixed drinks, brah. But if you want to avoid umbrellas, I think I've got just the thing."

[thebesteverseen]

There's no time to question, no time for doubt, for more than a thought and the action that follows right after, where he is.

There's only the curving tube of water, no more solid for it's multifaceted, ever darkening, rainbow walls than it was when he was paddling out on it. Thrumming with life, and moving of its own accord. When a wave is going to just crash, when it's going to form a smooth tube, when it's just going to fall apart on top of you, sending you flying, blind, through a wall of water, keeping your balance or not.

Making you glad a board floats and stays attached at your ankle. Spins you out into water. Darkening by the minute at this time of day. Especially this far out. Reminding him not of getting lost, but of mornings. Morning before dawn. His every day. Holding your breath and focusing on orienting only for up. Panic is not even a thought that sideswipes him like it was forgotten. He has no time or place for it, there is no need for it here.

The only thing to do is listen to the ocean, and do with it. To get back up, back out, and go again.

All of the above sending his blood pumping and drumming in his ears. The only place he can hear it, feel it. Where he isn't preoccupied with weight, with the movement of a foot, or the shift of his body, on getting right back out there, every time, riding a mountain of water as simple as attacking a long stretch of green on foot, or with a rover, a quad bike, anything else he can get his hands on.

Steve breaks the surface a last time, climbing up and wiping dripping water from his face and forehead, looking toward the beach. Some people still laying out, some children still playing, others beginning to pack up. The space where their towels were, still empty of anything but towels, and Danny's board, making him squint against the setting evening, looking down the beach for him. Among group of people, but he really doesn't see what he's looking for.

He really wouldn't be surprised if Danny got side-lined somewhere talking someone's ear off after a single question was shot his way, and it's with that thought that Steve considers the shore, without a breath toward exhaustion, while a wave crashes against his back, midbody and shoulders, rocking him forward on his board, and only causes him to hold his breath and tighten his thighs against the side of his board for staying upright while it charges on through him and past.

[haole_cop]

Danny levels a considering look at her, one corner of his mouth tweaked into the smile that's really going nowhere, honestly, and why should it? It's been a good day, even with the beach. Steve will come in soon, and Danny's drink will give him something to mock, and eventually maybe they'll make their way towards someplace with food, and with just a little bit of luck, the good day will turn into a good night, too.

A man can dream, can't he?

"Alright!" he says, finally, tossing his hands up in defeat and making her grin flash again. "I guess if I'm going to trust anyone on drink selection, it's got to be the bartender, right? You look like a girl who knows how to sling a bottle."

"I've done my fair share," she tells him, reaching down for a shaker and a cap full of ice. "How's your memory for recipes?"

"For drinks?" She nods, adding rum and Midori to the ice, bottles tipped up, liquor pouring in a thin, expert stream. Splashes what smells like peach schnapps. "Terrible. Unless you're talking about beer, which is sort of cheating."

"Which is definitely cheating," she scolds, topping the thing off with a splash of yellow juice. "Just for that, you're getting a tourist trap."

"What, I don't look like a tourist?"

His hands gesture to his own chest, and she pauses to give him a once-over, eye trailing up his chest back to his face. Hey, the girl's thorough. "You sound like a tourist," she says, diplomatically, and starts to shake up his drink. "Where're you from, originally?"

"A magical place," he says, kicking a foot up on the rung of the stool, hands expansive. "A place of wonder and delight and more Italian restaurants than you can shake a stick at."

"New York?"

The expression he gives her is pained, and she laughs. "Jersey. Please, don't lump me in with the Gotham devotees."

"I promise never to make that mistake again," she says, opening the shaker, adding a little red juice, and shaking it up again. The resulting drink, poured carefully into a chilled cocktail glass, is frothy and peach-colored, and Danny's already looking at it askance before she reaches beneath the counter and produces a large-petaled flower, bright red, with a stamen sticking out like a tongue.

He gives her a flat look, and she laughs again. "What? You said no umbrellas." The flower gets tucked into the side of the drink, and she pushes it towards him, teeth shining white against her tan. He taps the glass.

"I can't drink this with a flower in it. Look at the position you've put me in! And here I thought we were getting to be friends."

She leans back, taps her lips. "No, wait. I've got it." Leaning forward, she plucks the flower out of the drink, sucks the liquid off the stem, and quickly reaches to tuck it behind his right ear, fingers deft and light. He can smell her perfume as she stays for a moment, making sure it'll stay where she put it, before she finally leans back. "There. Perfect."

[thebesteverseen]

It's probably been a long enough day out here, all things considered. It never feels long, or long enough.

The Kid would agree. But Danny doesn't, frequently, and Danny's already laid around letting him get in and out most of the afternoon, talking him into coming out once or twice. Getting him on board, being pleasantly surprised about how he's doing, even if Danny just complains and huffs about it trying to kill him.

He's careful not to talk about it, but he still thinks about Danny ranting up a storm in the dingy. About Billy, and absolutely hating the ocean, and Danny still follows him out. On to the boat, that got jacked. To the ocean and beach for days like today, for nothing more than a little goading, and he's not sure what it is, but he must be getting something right outside all the times he has not a clue what to do or say where it comes to Danny still being there at months later.

To the fact he doesn't want Danny there any less. If anything, it's actually more, every single day it's more.

He wants more days and more weeks, more nights and more mornings, and they're still playing a game they could lose.

Steve pushed the thought away, and started paddling for the shore. Long, clean strokes. A little harder between waves, and with them, when they buffeted through, pushing him further faster with their force. Headed in and directing himself diagonally, even if it was more like forward and then over, as he went, toward the beach in front of the empty towels. Picking up his board, when his hanging feet brushed the sand and gravel of beaten shells.

It's easy to stick his board back in, a new place, where the sand hasn't been disturbed and give the two directions of the beach a long, but swift look. He wasn't really for leaving his board places for long, but he doubted it'd be too long, really. Picked up his own towel, aimed for drying his hair and wicking some water off, but spending the first ten or fifteen feet, walking toward the shack Danny'd mentioned earlier, just shaking the sand off the towel first.

[haole_cop]

He stares at her until her resolve cracks and she starts laughing, back of her hand to her mouth, making him duck his head and laugh, too, eyes crinkling, shaking his head. "Oh, come on. What did you do, huh?"

She shrugs, feigning innocence, but he's seen it all before, every time Grace has ever wheedled him into anything, and the look he gives her is exaggerated resignation. "Why is there a flower behind my ear?"

"Because you didn't want it in your drink?" she offers, still cheerful, and pushes the drink towards him again. "Tell you what. Keep it in, and this one's on the house."

He's already reaching for his wallet to pay for the abomination, but her words stop him in his tracks and he looks up, giving her narrow-eyed consideration, before putting the wallet away. "Okay, deal."

She leans closer, holds out her hand to shake, and he takes it, notes a firm grip, the faint scent of perfume again. "Meilan," she says, lips curving into that smile again.

"Danny," he tells her. "Thanks for the drink."

She shrugs when he lets go of her hand and picks up the glass to peer suspiciously at the contents. "That one would've been free, anyway."

He raises his eyebrows at her, smile going lopsided and amused. "It looks that good, huh?"

It looks ridiculous. Of course it does. Steve will never stop making fun of him; it's a huge freaking flower on the side of his head, and he looks more like a tourist than ever, but what the hell? Maybe it's worth it, to get that surprised, delighted grin Steve sometimes gets smacked across his face, like he had no idea it was coming and can't even begin to deal with what's in front of him. It'll be like eight Christmases rolled into one. Danny's relatively sure Steve won't let him forget it for at least the next month.

So he tilts his head at Meilan, until she's grinning again, and he's grinning too, thinking of Steve's face, his rough teasing. The way he's starting to feel at home here, just in time to have to worry about leaving again -- but that's not for today, or tonight. It's a good day, he's got a free drink, and Steve will probably show up sooner or later. He's always drawn like a magnet to things Danny wishes he wouldn't see.

[thebesteverseen]

He gives up shaking it out after the handful of steps, because as much as he cares, he doesn't at all.

Because he's already got salt, sand, bits of seaweed, shell and ocean water, drying on his skin, like it's a part of him. Which it might as well be. It's been here as long, if not longer than everything else. It's as much a part of his day, his breathing as that house, and HQ. As much as certain dots of ocean, far out to sea, where nothing but water and sky exists for leagues in every direction.

Steve's toweling his head off, as he's making his way across the sand, toward a path worn in by all the customers, people walking back and forth entertaining themselves, children screeching and running for shave ice and happy cakes. He's got a nod for those people he passes, headed back, with that kind of professional polite smile of someone who's both recognizing there are people and not even seeing them at all while headed somewhere.

It's not hard to pick Danny out of a crowd, though. Not after two years of doing it, with and without his daughter.

The whole world falling away as he lets the towel come down around his neck, hands catching the ends, as he's already talking as soon as he's close enough, without even a glance to people nearest him. "Yo, D. You forget your way back to the stuff already?"

[haole_cop]

Meilan's mouth is opening, and she's leaning forward on the bar to say something, that smile turning weirdly coy, but she's going to have to give him a second, because speak of the devil, right?

A familiar voice instantly recognizable anywhere, through any amount of low-level conversation, and he swivels to see Steve wandering towards him, barefoot, minus a shirt but flaunting a thin sheen on his still-damp skin, flushed from sun and cool water and exercise, and, Christ, he's something else. Okay? Maybe it's stupid, sappy, but Jesus, Steve is beautiful. The kind of stunning photographers pay millions of dollars to try and capture, and he just wanders into it, droplets of water clinging to his skin, hair rumpled, sun-kissed and loved by the ocean.

There are times Danny thinks maybe Steve's got the right idea about the water, of only because it seems impossible that the waves would ever do anything to harm him. "Hey."

If he thought he'd been smiling before, he was dead wrong, because here it comes, kneejerk and impossible to hide, flashing teeth, creasing his eyes, and it lifts something in his chest he'd had no idea wasn't already floating.

It's stupid. It's sensitive. But, God. Who couldn't? Who could keep themselves from wanting to revel in this, huh? Who's got the willpower? Every person in here would love to get closer to Steve, sneak into that tight circle he keeps drawn around him, make him smile, go home with him. And Danny gets to. Is that person. Who Steve wants, keeps wanting, still wants.

It's insane the way it still makes something idiotic crash around in his chest like someone put a blindfold on a three-legged moose.

"Give me a break, I haven't even had one drink yet."

[thebesteverseen]

Hey. That was the word that came out of Danny's mouth.


He's sure he heard it. A second ago. When he was turning? After he turned? Somewhere right on the cusp of Steve's blood sloughing into frozen slush just as his throat instinctively closed up like the towel was inside its walls, and not inside his fingers. Because the thing in front of him is not right. It's confusingly not right.


Digging sharp claws into his stomach without warning. Amping high voltage straight through his chest.


The kind of not right that draws up principle parallels his mind is batting away with a baseball bat. Maybe the same baseball bat that just connected with his jaw. With his lungs. With his brain. Because. That's. He's. Danny's. Not. And sure he'd laughed or smirked probably a half dozen or dozen times in his life next to someone with that there. Even Cath put them. But Danny isn't.



They aren't.




He doesn't even like Hawaiian customs.




But it's not vanishing. It's still that. Vibrant, brilliant color.



Red. Like a buzz word, more than a color. When he's staring. At the flower against Danny's hair.
That flag, sign, symbol, he's known since he knew what to do with the funny feelings you got from a girl.

Tightening his throat, and narrowing his eyes, when all Danny gets is, pointedly, "You've got a thing on your head."

[haole_cop]

"Oh, yeah."

He glances to the side without moving his head, as if he might possibly be able to see the flower from there, but it's out of his view, and he shrugs, tips his head towards the bar. "From my new friend Meilan, here. I don't know, she seems to like it."

Turning towards the bartender, he gives her a winning, crooked smile. "Right?"

Her eyes go to the side of his head, back to his face, and her smile's not far behind. "Definitely a good look."

"There you go." Hand on the bar, like it's a done deal, but he's already turning back to Steve before the girl can say anything else, if she was going to, or not. He's not really sure, but it's hard to focus on anyone else, even a pretty girl being friendly and giving him a free drink and a flower, when Steve's right there.

Except Steve's not. He's staring bulletholes at the flower, making Danny try to look at it again, with the same lack of success as earlier. "What, you don't like it?" Grinning, joshing, leaning forward to tease Steve a little further, to eek out that smile that's got to be lurking there, somewhere, because, come on, this is too good to pass up. One hand flat on the bar, the other waving genially towards Steve, who looks like he's swallowed glass, and Danny's got no clue why.

"Aren't you the one always telling me I need to learn to embrace the local customs, huh?"

Poking. Prodding. Half-turning when Meilan laughs, and nods. "This is a good one to try out," she says, cryptically, and winks when the look he gives her turns bemused.

Whatever. It's a flower. He leans closer, slaps Steve's shoulder with the back of his hand. "You want to drink something, or just keep standing there like you forget how walking works, huh? Come on."

[thebesteverseen]

Steve vision cuts in clip. Taking in the girl leaning on the bar. Danny's new friend. Dark eyes, long curling hair, lean curves, and that smile, too, gets just a little clearer every time Danny is asking her to back him up. Having not a damn clue what's coming out of his mouth. What he's saying. What it's saying. But she does. With that smile, that's bright and winsome, sided by that laugh that makes Steve's blood stay cold.

Of course, she thinks its a good look. Of course, she'd want him to try it out.
Steve doesn't even care if she means it as a haole joke, or seriously.

Steve can't even work out words for the new wave of emotion, quite sharp and piercing like anger, shoving into the ice, hot and burning. When Danny is smacking his shoulder, that burst of color, every time he turns back, not helping the red in his vision, and he wants to reach up and tackle, lock, the man's wrist. Because the contact is getting all the wrong responses.

Tensing his muscles, locking his bones. The want to grab that wrist to both stop him and drag him bodily back.

Want to reach up and tear that flower out of his hair and stomp it under the boots he's not even wearing.

Because Danny isn't sale, like that half laugh, and the way she's hanging around, on this part of the bar, going nowhere else, seems to be questioning. He doesn't give a fuck if there isn't anything else written on the tin about it. He's not. Even when Danny's bumbling along blind and played, with that too wide, too charmed smile, making Steve more annoyed, like he's walking on burning, broken glass without any warning.

He wants to say no. Hard and firm and callous. He wants to just drag Danny out of there. Away from his untouched drink.
"A bottle of water." Because the last thing he actually needs in his hand is a glass that could be so easily broken.

[haole_cop]

"Living on the edge, I see," he says, as the bartender searches through an icebox for the requested water. "There's water in the car, you know."

Maybe not as cold, maybe not right here, but he suspects the appeal of this water is that Danny has to buy it for him, because it's not like Steve has the presence of mind to ever bring his wallet, and Danny's willing to bet he didn't go searching for it when he came back from the water either. He tugs a couple of bills out of his wallet and puts them on the bartop in exchange, getting another smile. "Aren't you nice?" she asks, and he shrugs.

"Some people never learn that they need to bring actual funds with them."

But it's no big deal, he's not hurting for the cost of a bottle of water, even if it's over-priced and too small. Steve smells like ocean water and sunshine, warm skin and salt, and Danny bets his skin is cool to the touch, still partly damp.

It makes his drink seem even sweeter, when he finally picks it up to take a sip: fruit and sugar and a belated smack of alcohol that makes him make a face, but it's cold and refreshing and best of all, free, so he's not going to look a gift horse in the mouth, here.

Besides, Steve's standing around like he's got sand in his suit, or like the glass it looked like he swallowed earlier was followed by pickle juice, and Danny wants to nudge him back into the breezy delight of earlier, make that smile flash. The flower was supposed to help, but maybe Steve swallowed too much seawater or got beaten out of a wave he wanted, who knows? "You gonna sit, or just drip-dry there like somebody put you out to hang with the towels?"

[thebesteverseen]

He's pretty sure someone, with dark hair and dark eyes and probably incredibly soft well-tanned skin, already did.

It's not like Danny's going to say he's taken. It's not like Danny's had to tell anyone. Ever. It's not like Cath, or Doris, was his problem, even when they were happening. Not that he's had anyone to tell. Who blundered into it needing to know what was going on. Not like there are even specific words to tell. Not like it's public thing to be told even. Like they aren't recognizable enough, publically, already before this.

Not even like Danny, with his crackerjack smile and goading going on, has the faintest clue what she's done. He's done.
Or. There's the tiny, sliding, sharp thing in his gut wondering if he does know. If she explained it beforehand and he does.

"Yeah, sure," both are like words that sort of fall out, more than are even chosen. Because he's not going anywhere.

Even if he would prefer both the water, and Danny, already in the truck. But Danny's already just sitting there, drinking his drink, being talked to by a beautiful woman, looking so pleased Steve wants to smash the stool more than consider sitting on it. But he will. Sit on it. Because he isn't leaving Danny. So he does. Sit down. Arms resting on the bar, eyes following her instead of looking toward Danny. And that thing.

[haole_cop]

Steve's acting like a socially challenged robot, which is nothing new, but it's such a departure from his earlier good mood that Danny eyes him speculatively over his too-sweet, too-fruity cocktail.

"What happened, you get a faceful of sand instead of water? Someone steal your wave?"

Meilan's looking between the two of them, lips pressing against a curve of amusement, leaning back against the shelves of liquor. "You surf, Danny?"

"Me?" He waves it off, hand passing easily through the air, relaxed. "No. Well, yes. But under duress, only."

She seems to think that's funny, but that's obviously only because she's never met Kono, and Steve isn't exactly giving a good account of himself. "I'm told it's what everyone does, here."

There must be other people at the bar to serve, but she just tosses her hair back over her shoulder again, and shakes her head. "They tell you right. But there are plenty of other ways to spend your time. Plenty of things to do, places to see." Her teeth are really blindingly white. "People to meet."

"Yeah, I hear that, too." He takes a sip of his drink, winces. It's almost tooth-achingly sweet, but she seems like a smart girl. He can appeal to her better nature, maybe. "Are you sure you don't have any beer back there? I'm begging you. This is about to give me a cavity."

"Well..." She gives the icebox under the bar a considering glance, shrugs. "I've got Bud Light." When his face twists, she laughs. "Lime."

"Terrible," he agrees, looking to Steve for his input, but it's like squeezing water from a stone. It's bizarre; it's been a good day, and the sky's starting to turn slow and deeply blue, and Steve got to go in the water again, so he ought to be happy, right? "But beer."

She gives that same considering look, this time lingering on his face, like she's weighing some odds. "You don't seem like a Bud Light Lime kind of guy."

In response, he lifts his cocktail, skeptical. "But I seem like a Sex on the Beach kind of guy?"

Her grin widens, because he doesn't, and that's obvious to everyone who's ever spoken to him for more than twenty seconds, or even just seen him around, and it's hilarious even to consider. "Maybe."

[thebesteverseen]

Steve kind of hates this. The way he kind of hates international thieves, killers, slavers.

The way Danny keeps drinking that colorful drink, even when he's wincing. The way Meilan is gravitated toward Danny like he's the only light in a blacked-out room. As though she probably doesn't have her pick of the room, any day or night she wants to use that power on some poor sap, foreign or domestic.

And she's decided that's Danny. With her flower, and her cute smile, and her jokes about his drink, like it's not a lead.
Like it's not the kind of show you could find at every one of those stores up and down Danny's boardwalks.

But her last smile, the one where Danny's gone good-hearted skeptical, but she only looks like he finally hit the nail on the head. Drug himself into her joke. Caught on to the drink name, if not what the game is at all. That she's looking for more, or looking to see if he might be, with that bright grin that is everything her non-committal, come and get me answer is, burns down into Steve's stomach and up into the muscles of his jaw.

"Not even if you paid him," Steve remarks, dry and without any intention of covering its directness. The words falling out of his mouth at her, more than Danny, before he even knows what his mouth is doing. Cool, smoothness, more like metal being run against by fingers than amusement of any kind. "He'd fold under the challenge."

Under being shown the sand, no less the concept of getting it everywhere, in the middle of everything.