(no subject)

[gonna_owe_me]

Steve is really good at avoiding her.

Normally, she probably wouldn't even call it "avoiding."  Normally, she would call it his usual M.O. and chalk it up to being a side effect of being halfway around the world from each other.  There are times they've gone for months with no contact, and two weeks is barely the blink of an eye, particularly when she's busy and he keeps getting high-profile, high-priority cases.

At least, that's what she hears, when she hears anything at all.

But those weeks and months of zero contact, running silent, off the grid: those days aren't exactly applicable when there are extenuating circumstances such as A. they are living on the same island and B. she knows there's something he really doesn't want to talk to her about.

Ergo, avoidance.

She's not an impatient or nosy person, though, so she lets it slide, for a little while.  He clearly needs to get used to the idea himself, and, frankly, so does she.  It's not that they haven't stumbled across a situation where one or the other of them was out of commission for their normal arrangement, but in general, those interrupting factors were not potentially career-threatening.  Not to the extent of sleeping with a subordinate.  Not to the extent of sleeping with a partner.  Not seriously.

And it is serious, whether Steve is admitting to it, or not.  It's splashed across him like someone doused him in paint and sticky sunlight, in the way he'd magnetized towards the door, the way he'd run out after Danny.  Maybe even more because he didn't bring it up until he absolutely had to.

So Steve is avoiding her, and she can sympathize, because this is not a conversation she particularly wants to sit through, either, but it still needs to happen, because, knowing Steve, he hasn't told anyone else and is shutting it back into compartments poorly designed for a situation of this magnitude and complexity.  

Which is why, when she called him on the next weekend inferred to be Danny's weekend with Grace, she's given him the benefit of both giving her the slip for two weeks and the peace offering of meeting at a place with really excellent drinks, one of which she has in hand as she sits at a table by an open window, chin in her hand, looking out at the quietly rolling ocean.  It's early evening, and she's come off a twelve hour shift, so it's nice to sit, let her thoughts unhinge, ebb and flow with the waves and mild breeze.  Wrangling an affirmative had proved to be difficult, but she'd managed it, pointing out that they might as well meet out, seeing as they're definitely going to make it to the restaurant this time.

It strips him of the home field advantage, too, but he's not the only one who knows how to keep a wall at his back and a few tricks up his sleeve.

Comments

[haole_cop]

"Yeah, you look fine, you look like you're about to have a stroke, and I am not hauling your heavy ass inside, so you'll sit and you won't bitch about it."

He looks like he wants to, which is sort of a relief, because it's always a little freaky when Steve shuts down and just lets things happen to him, lets people talk without paying attention to what they're saying, lets himself slide away to the role of distant observer in his own life.

Not today. Not after pulling that crap. Not after taking care of Danny and spending the night on his crappy pull-out, giving him something to hang onto when the world started swaying and spinning, and then deciding to just call it quits.

Steve doesn't quit. He's a SEAL. Danny's pretty sure it goes against every code written in his DNA or on his skin or in his self-defined role of The One Who Takes The Punches. "Do you want to talk to me about it, or are we good?"

They can. As long as Steve doesn't pull any of that shit again, doesn't start it up, with his shouldn'ts and the right thing to do, which might be true, but that doesn't make it any less bullshit, and Danny's sick of the world telling him what he can and can't have, is sick of Steve getting the same fucking message.

But his hands never leave. This crouch is going to play hell with his knee -- he can already feel the ligament creaking in warning -- but he doesn't move, stays where he is, hands on Steve's legs, running up them lightly, like they've done plenty of times before. This time, though, it's not to excite or tease or promise; it's just his palms, his fingers, warm and firm and grounded. Steve might bark, and he might snap, but he hasn't shoved Danny away or off him, and if he needs a reminder Danny's not going anywhere, well, he's damn sure going to get one.

[thebesteverseen]

He doesn't look like he's about to have a stroke. Give Danny an inch and he can drag out any minor winding into something about passing out from cardiac arrest. Which he's not. Passing out. Or having a stroke. Or a heart attack. He's been through so much worse without passing out. Right? So much worse?

When he's got a semi-disgusted, insulted expression sporting itself at Danny's expense for the over exaggeration.

But he's looking at Danny's face still, and everything in his shoulders feels so much heavier, and he feels older than he did five minutes ago. Somehow. When Danny is blustering off along, still not long gone, not driven away, words falling out into questions, while his hands still haven't given up. They are tracing up Steve's thighs. Heavy and insistant and completely different way.

Like the movement is dipping fingers into his abdomen and his back, and tugging gently at all the muscles wound tight as a cement block suddenly. When he wants to tense up even more for it but his muscles are slowly loosening beyond his orders to anything of the contrary. Slowly slipping from his hands to Danny, even though his fingers aren't even touching those muscles.

"I'm not wrong," are still the words that jam themselves out of his teeth. But there's less derision and fanaticism about being right to it this time. Like there are no walls to the words anymore. When both sides look like they're written in a foreign language, and somehow and neither are or aren't right or wrong suddenly. And when he needs to stop looking at Danny's face, and the proof all over it, that discredits every single word that came out of his mouth.

But he can't. He really can't convince himself to look away. It's hard enough not giving in to reaching out and touching him.

[haole_cop]

"Yeah, maybe not."

Back to being steady, but his voice lacks the measured, tamped-down quality of earlier, because Steve isn't pushing him away anymore, isn't looking at him like he's standing twenty miles away. It's not an agreement, but it is acknowledgement, and he can't help feeling that's the best way to go about this, because a conversation might be rough, but it solves more than either yelling or kissing. "But that doesn't make you right, either."

It's not that simple. It's not that Steve can give him up for the good of the case, or even for Five-0, whether it's for him or for Steve or for Grace or Chin or Kono. This would still be there, even if Danny weren't in Steve's bed every other night, even if they didn't wind up here more often than they don't. It's not like calling it something different will change a damn thing about how Danny feels, like saying they're not involved will make it true.

He licks his lips, hands nearly at Steve's hips before he slides them back down. "Do you want me to go?"

Honestly, these are the parts he always hated most. The talks that could end so badly, the conversations that could spin wildly out of control and smack him in the face with loss. He hates them. Avoids them whenever possible, choosing to confront everything else that might possibly be going wrong, that he might have either enough control to fix or none whatsoever, because either option is better than feeling like he might crack this like an egg if it isn't handled correctly.

But it needs to happen. If Steve thought it once, he might think it again, and Danny just wants to know, okay, wants to understand, so he can make Steve understand that it's not an option, anymore, that there's no way in hell he's going to back down and let the shitstorm that blew into their lives wreck this, too.

So he asks, and ignores the clutch in his chest that says Steve might say yes. It's a risk he's going to have to take.

[thebesteverseen]

He hates this feeling. This desperate tension somewhere in his center that he has to choose right or left, up or down, yes or no, right or wrong. Like everything that matters at all is hanging on it. Even after Danny already said that he was right. Even after Danny followed it up with saying he was wrong. In this quiet, not defeated, but maybe deflated, sort of fashion.

When Danny's hands are still moving, and the only thought in his head, while those hand are moving, is the most defeated one of all. When has it ever mattered if he didn't want someone to go? What did that have to do with making the right decision in this?

It didn't matter with his mother, when she died, and he had no idea how to even quantify whether anything, or what, matter now that she was alive, but even the two days she was here were full of pits and unanswered case questions. It didn't matter with his father, when he was young enough it changed everything, being shut out, being shipped away, and hardly ever spoken to again. Made him who he was, before he even learned why it happened, or that his father had been a silent spectator to his life at times.

It didn't matter with his sister, who was shipped off away from him, and who he, in turn, shipped off away from himself. Who he never heard from enough, nor remember to reach out to enough, himself, who still didn't know about Doris, and that tangled up everything even more. It hadn't mattered with Bullfrog, or Jameson, or Jenna, or Lori. Why would it play any part, have any point, here?

Things that all happend because they had to. Dominoes in a line. Easier as a case. Harder as a house. Too, too many thoughts, when he's staring at Danny's face, trying to picture any world, any world, ever, that didn't include someone putting a gun to one of their heads, when he actually wanted Danny to leave. He didn't even want Danny to leave when every second living together was torture and sleep deprivation.

How even if he said yes, pushed him away, finally, in the way he has no idea how to do at the this second watching that dark, worried, something that looks like an attempt to be brave in front of gun, they'd still have work. Still have the camaro and cases. He'd still be there. He'd still be incapable of not asking, wanting, every detail. Of holding back if Danny were danger, if Grace or Rachel or anything that hurt him, pissed him off.

Do you want me to go? Whispering in the silence as Steve stared at the only man he seriously trusted.

To have his back. To pull him back from going berserk. To do his job, if he couldn't be there to do it. To always choose the right, best, good thing in ninety percent of his choices. To be the only person who's gotten so far in, rubbing his edges, yelling at him until he's more himself than a SEAL. Like it's all straight down another gun barrel. Maybe even worse for the silence.

Worse because maybe he doesn't see anyway where he'll ever recover from this no matter how it ends. Or when.

When there are so many chances it could be about this, or about the case. But it would leave him blank and barren. When all he can do in the end is reaching up and rub at his own neck, and shake his head, his vision, shifting to he doesn't know, Danny's cheek or shoulder, or anything else, when he says, "No," so quietly it might get lost in the wind even in this little space between them.

Because it shouldn't matter, might not in the longer run, but it was true.

[haole_cop]

"Good. That's good."

He lets out a breath, lifts one hand just to run a palm over his mouth, eyes squinting up at Steve even though Steve's not looking at him directly. He scrubs at stubble a second before that hand goes back to Steve's leg. Warm, firm muscle under cotton; close enough to smell the remainders of sun on his skin, the warmth radiating off him. He's got no idea why sun-soaked Steve would smell any different from Steve the rest of the time, but even in the purple dusk, he can catch a little of it. Smelling like vacation. Like warmth and comfort and a cool drink on a hot day. Like the weekend.

He wants to bury his face in the crook of Steve's neck and just breathe him in, remind himself that he still has this, that Steve wants him here, but he holds off, for now, like he holds off the majority of the relief trying to stop up every logical thought, telling him they're good, he can stop now.

He can't. He has to make sure it won't happen again, has to shore up against it, cut it out and let it bleed dry somewhere it won't pop up again. "Then I'm gonna do everything I can to stay. If people want to bitch about the rules, or Rachel somehow finds out, it doesn't change a damn thing. No one can say it's screwed with our jobs."

Except that once, even though no one caught them, and he sometimes wonders if it was a hallucination brought on by stress and a concussion. It wasn't. He knows that. Steve really did shove him into a wall at a crime scene and kiss him until Danny's disorientation had nothing whatever to do with being hit in the head.

But it doesn't matter. He's not leaving. He doesn't leave. Didn't leave Rachel, won't leave now. Is fighting to even stay on this island, for Grace, for Five-0. And they've been fine. It hasn't affected the job. They've been good; even Chin and Kono don't know, and if they can hide it from Chin and Kono, then no one's figuring it out.

Nice as it would be to not have to hide. It's not like he doesn't want anyone to know -- though he's really not sure he's up to the teasing he'd have to endure from Kono. He's never been the guy to trumpet his relationship to the world, but...can this even be called that? If Steve is so derisive at the idea of him being a boyfriend, if that word rings panicked alarm bells in Danny's head?

It doesn't matter. He doesn't give a shit what they call it, as long as Steve's not shoving him away. "I said I want to be with you and I meant it. You think I didn't already know about the rest of that crap? Forget about it." Heavy Jersey accent, more mobster than cop, but he doesn't give a shit about that, either. "I'm not giving up the one good thing I've got."

That's not the job, or Grace. Even when Steve thinks it's threatening the job, or Grace. He won't let it.

[thebesteverseen]

God.




He does not know what to do with this man.




This man. Danny Williams. Rambling off words that make Steve's chest ache in a vice, even when that touching is still unwinding him like a top. These words that keep rolling out of his mouth and landing like daggers slitting between Steve's throat and his chest. A line going straight down cutting him open. When it feels like saying one of these words himself would tear that forming slit wide open.

That he'd be scattered to the corners of the world, the wind, from all coherent solidness, and Danny just keeps going. Rubbing at his face. Rubbing at Steve's legs. Catching his eye, until Steve just can't look away. Just can't even determine whether this is a bravery he somehow has failed matching or an aggrandizement beyond anything Danny or he could ever meet, fill out, last through, for. But he can't, still. He can't look away.

Like every word, betraying and refusing the world for him, for this, is tucking tiny hooks into his eyes, into his chest where this infinitesimally small bubble is forming. Slow, tiny, warm. So fragile he wants to pretend he can't even feel it taking shape. Like the breath of a thought toward recognition or acknowledgement could shatter it, would shatter it, is asking the world to just do it, unrecognizably and unrecoverably. Here. Now. Today.

His throat doesn't even want to work when he swallows, because Danny is done. Danny is done with those words about how he's the best thing he's got. Steve. Steve. Not Grace, or Five-0. And it hangs there in the air, like a language he should understand and an idea that makes absolutely no sense. The one good thing, making Steve remember calling this the only good thing since he came home.

Making him try again. Making him shove out a breathe feels like it weighs tons, and caves his chest just to get out. When he does the thing that seems about as hard, but doesn't have words yet. Reaching out and placing his hand over Danny's. Palm resting over the back of his hands. Too large, too long fingers spanning across his and a good part of his forearm. Forcing himself to swallow and say, "Okay."

[haole_cop]

"Okay," Danny repeats, "okay, well, good. Glad we're on the same page."

He can glance at it, now. Allow himself, that, once Steve's hand covers his and he takes a deep breath to steady himself, before letting himself look at the sheer mindless relief welling up like blood from a pinprick.

Not that he can stop, once he's started. Cracking that door gives an inch that's rapidly eaten away and kicked into a fullblown flood, rushing through his veins and chasing away the cool calm that he'd forced himself into after the yelling wore itself out, after Steve tried to burn straight through him with a kiss. But here it is, erasing it all, making his hands firm on Steve's legs so they don't shake with it, making him want to duck his head to press his forehead against the back of Steve's hand, breathe in the scent of cotton and skin and sun, with the air starting to cool against his back and the last glimmers of sunset now nothing but a faint memory. The sky is perfect clear teal, fading darker, and Steve's features are a little harder to see.

He's got no idea if Steve meant to stay out here, if he still does, but Danny's knee is starting to complain, and when he pushes up, it gives a bad-tempered crack that makes him grimace.

He doesn't straighten far, though, just far enough to lift the hand not covered by Steve's, curl it at the base of Steve's skull, and lean in to find his mouth, again, eyes sliding shut, kiss firm and gentle and more longing than he'd meant it to be, because it was supposed to be brief, like punctuation, so this conversation could be over, but instead it lingers. He lingers. Breathing in against Steve's cheek, focused on a kiss that's nothing like the one that almost took him apart just a few minutes ago, that's just this, something to get lost in, something to remind Steve, in case the words didn't stick.

That he's the one Danny wants. That it's enough, in the face of a world continually trying to beat them down, push them around, crush them, kill them.

That Steve matters. That nothing could change that.

[thebesteverseen]

It's insane. Is really what it is. Danny had a hundred words back about forty seconds before all Steve could squeeze out was one, like it was suffocating him for that, and from there, Danny's words seem to fail. Danny, who slips into repeating himself, not that it's new. But repeating something small, seeming almost winded by it. By words it seems like he said only a short time, ago, but Steve isn't placing anything but this second.

This one here where suddenly Danny's shouldesr seem to give like dam bursting suddenly, slumping part of his spine and maybe his will. And Steve knows in some distant part of himself he may never really deserve whatever the hell, however the hell Danny manages to shoulder enough whatever he calls it, they call it, anyone does, to smack him back down when he gets angry, when he gets out of control, when he ---

Suddenly forgets everything in his head, when Danny's knees give a ominous snap that doesn't stop his concerned remembrance, that Danny shouldn't even be stuck in this position so long, from being just as shut up as his head, when Danny's got his fingers on his neck and his mouth back on Steve. When the struggle to remember, and the want to get him going a little haywire on the slow, firm way he's being kissed.

Like a reminder. Like the pin in a point. Like...like Danny can't stop after a second. Even once this moment is continuing to inflate the space in Steve's chest too far. When Steve's fingers tighten across Danny's, and all he can do is give over to this one. Not stampede it, not take over, not force it any deeper, or harder, or more intense. Not even to do more than put a breath out through his nose, that might related to snort only by coming from a breath of air.

There's no fire, no point, when Steve pulls back barely. Only from Danny's mouth. Not from his face, not from that hand cupping his neck and not away from Danny. Just enough to have his mouth back. Enough to be able to open his eyes and see Danny's face. This washed out something, exhaustion and relief so bright it's almost blinding. To reach up his free hand for Danny's shirt without an aim.

"We get should get you up," It's quiet. Maybe as much a comment about some point, as it is distraction, as it is just common sense. Maybe it's the closest he come to saying he's sorry for this, any of this that is smashed across Danny features and his eyes and that kiss, like it's fragile and for a moment it was breakable and, even worse, gone. As close as he can come without taking it back. Ever being able to.

Fingers catching up from there to Danny's shoulder, even without pushing him. Solid, there. Just like he's re-equating himself with Danny being solid. Real. Like he could push it and make him move, but he doesn't. Doesn't push him, doesn't move him, doesn't look away, or pull away any more than that quarter of an inch, half an inch between their mouths. Letting his voice roll out too rusty to be sharp enough for the mocking he may be trying for yet. "You'll be bitching all night if you stay like this."

But, at least. At least he's giving that Danny's going nowhere? That's. Something, right? That he's a damn idiot sometimes, but that he does understand Danny isn't going anywhere, is putting it out there, that he does, that Danny doesn't have to go anywhere, if he isn't.

[haole_cop]

"Yeah, well, you and your lawn chairs, they're not exactly bad-knee friendly."

Not when he's crouched in front of them, anyway, and even with all the tricks he knows -- put his weight on the other leg and let that one bend more than the right, keep shifting it around -- it's really not a good idea for him to even do this sort of half bent over sort of deal. Not like there's any danger of wrecking his knee just by crouching down on it, not if he hasn't had to have surgery thanks to the shit they pull every week, but it's not exactly comfortable, either.

Except Steve's not pushing him back with anything other than words, and even those are low, quiet, anything but confrontational. Almost an apology, lacking any seriously sharp edge or arrogance, and that sucks, too, that Steve's unable to even mock him the way he always does. To call Danny a wilting flower or rusty Tin Man, like a bad knee is some kind of personal failure on his part instead of something he can't do shit about, something he should just go ahead and change, already, what is he, lazy? But Steve doesn't. Is just looking at him, with this something written across his face in broad strokes Danny can't translate. Fingers warm on Danny's shoulder, more like he's steadying himself than Danny, like all the light's gone out and he needs to navigate by touch.

Which is fine, but in Danny's experience, navigating with touch is a whole lot more enjoyable if they're both on the same piece of furniture.

"Okay, fine." Most of his weight right now is on Steve's thigh, anyway, the hand there balancing him, and he presses down again as he leans forward, erases the half-inch of space for a kiss that's almost as casual as the ones he presses to Steve's damp salty post-swim pre-coffee mouth in the mornings, before he has to go. Easy. Like any other touch. Like he can, just because he wants to. Like he owns Steve's mouth and kisses and it's a totally normal thing to do, which it seems to have become, over the last month, and that's strange enough. "Come on."

Pulling back, fingers sliding off Steve's skin, out from under his hand, stretching his back as he straightens, shifting his weight to his left leg by conditioned response. "You wanna watch a game, or something, or stay out here?"

[thebesteverseen]

Danny kisses him. Again. A third time. It's crazy that he can count them tonight. It'd be impossible most other days, to try to figure out how soon after waking that line had already been cross, or after arriving here, or tugging wach other somewhere, anywhere, safe and theirs. When all the angry voices and willingness to snap Steve knows is really only a breath and a wall away.

Which isn't quite as close as Danny is now. When he's agreeing, but he still has to kiss Steve again. Casual and light, and like it's a last check on whether it's still there. His mouth. Or maybe Steve. Or maybe the fact he's allowed to be kissing Steve, without it being angry or overwrought. Or, god, fuck, if Steve actually knows. It's a press and slide of skin, soft and smooth, easy and fast before he's standing.

Done before Steve can swallow or take a breath or hold on or pull him closer. Making his chest ache, making him want to grab Danny and pull him in. He doesn't even know if it would be to kiss him. Just to be sure Danny is there. Even when Danny isn't looking anywhere else, doing anything else. Is still focused on him. But is standing up, is pulling away, is further away than a foot and half. Still looking at him. Talking sense. Like Steve cares about that.

Except he does. He just said. Needs to remember. But he just. Feels like a mountain caved in over his head, and there's just this mess everywhere around him suddenly. When he doesn't want to be that far from Danny, much at all. Maybe for a while. Which has him pushing back up from the chair, without thinking about it. Just agreeing. "Yeah, sure. A game, or movie, sounds good."

There's the roll of a shrug that comes along with that. Because he could get behind the couch. He could get behind noise filling up the too quiet, and somewhere Danny can sit without being in pain. Somewhere he can sit and turn off his head, for something that doesn't require much focus. Somewhere he can pretend he isn't spending half of glancing at Danny, wondering what the hell, and how, or why. Like those words aren't all caught on the hooks in him still.

It doesn't change a thing.

I said I want to be with you and I meant it.

I'm not giving up the one good thing I've got.

He may not get why or how, or have any idea what. Not in comparison to like the entire section of his plans where this was all about Grace. But he can. Stand. Reach up and rub at his jaw, let his hand smooth to his neck and the back of his own close clipped hair. When he can step through jostle Danny shoulder and his side, like he's not thinking about Danny's knee or his colossal fail of the last however long that was,

Just jostle him and turn toward that house, that isn't any friendlier at this second than the beach and say, "Inside."

[haole_cop]

"Yeah, works for me. I need something to clear away Grace's latest G-rated favorites, anyway."

Bluffing, because there's something he loves about what used to be family movie night and what is now just him and Grace's movie night, heavily featuring Disney characters and the newest tween heartthrobs, none of whom he ever recognizes. He loves settling her in a nest of blankets and pillows on the couch, balancing a bowl of popcorn between them, making Grace laugh when he tries to determine the usually vague and inconsistent motivations of the various characters.

It's worth it all to see the smile on her face, feel the way she tucks into him when she gets sleepy.

So he's okay with the whole idea of relaxing on the couch for a while, letting some stupid movie or game wash over him. If they're lucky, something like a James Bond marathon will be on, and he won't even have to get worked up about terrible calls by refs who must be blind or brain-damaged, can just sit there and finish his beer and let the exhaustion stealing over him fade itself out.

Because it's tiring. The panic and the fear and the anger. He doesn't feed on it, the way Steve seems to think he does; not when it's like this, not when it means something. When it hasn't even been a fight, but he still feels like he'd been tossed into a cage match and had to grapple with a monster three times his size. It's just draining, okay? And right now, he doesn't want to relive it, think it over, second-guess himself or Steve. He wants Steve next to him, or draped over him, and he wants a beer, and he wants a mindless action film with an eyebrow-raising premise and unlikely, tacked on love interest, and that'll do him just fine for a Sunday night.

So when Steve nudges him, he goes, bending to grab his beer, the other hand fitting against the small of Steve's back like it was never going to be anywhere else, even as he's nodding to the abandoned bottle of earlier.

"You gonna pick that up, or am I gonna have to issue a citation for littering?"

[thebesteverseen]

Steve has to look back, even though he knows what it is before his gaze even gets there. The bottle he dropped when he was kissing Danny. When the only thing left in existence, not even on the planet because the planet was gone, in all of thought and touch, was kissing Danny. Which makes his stomach clench in a vague sour fashion, when he's looking back.

Half distracted by the hand pressing a palm and fingers into the small of his back over his shoulder, while he says, a little more mocking than blank, "Private property. I could have given my permission."

It's a load of trash, because Steve would never. Not for any place on the island, and certainly not for his home, but it is something to throw out to Danny. That could be true, if it were anyone else, in some ways. People did choose to permit dumping in the oddest places. Something to leave him with when Steve it stepping away from that hand, and leaning down, with a swipe of a land toward the ground to pick up the bottle.

Wet down the side, with grass and dirt clinging to the half beaded, half spilled, with tenacious fragility. He absently goes about wiping it off with his hand, wiping his hands off on his pants. He's held worse, had worse on him. He could give up the grate of reminders to minutes ago. At least for a second. Stepping back around the chairs and nodding, gesturing his head toward the house and the direction he's headed with faster, focused strides, for Danny to keep up already.

[haole_cop]

That deserves exactly the kind of snort Danny gives it. "Yeah, maybe."

Because Steve's regimental neatness would allow it. Like one dropped bottle wouldn't probably drive him crazy, just like an unmade bed or hair that's gotten too long. But that's all Steve says, and it's still better than the pulled-tooth no or okay of earlier, the low blank erasure of Steve that left Danny talking to a statue that sort of looked like his partner.

Anything's better than that.

The quick steps towards the house are a good sign, too; the faster they're inside, the sooner he can park his ass on the couch and not move for the next few hours, just keep Steve nearby and let some stupid movie or show drain over him, finish his beer and ignore the way his nerves keep jumping, twitchy and uncertain that this is the last of it, that Steve won't choose to be stupid again.

Hopefully not. He'd really rather just spend the night without having to point out the fact that he has no plans to fold under pressure and let threats push him away, and it's another little triumph when they get inside and no other sinkholes have opened up under his feet.

That leaves just making his way through the dining room and kitchen, headed for the spot on the couch that somehow became his normal one, after two years and change, without bothering to wait and see if Steve's getting a new bottle, in favor of grabbing the remote and flipping the TV on as he sits with a sigh. The idea of even going through DVDs seems pretty pointless, so he just flips through channels, waiting for something to catch his eye.

[thebesteverseen]

Walking back to the house, and into it doesn't exactly make him relax. The whole house itself grates like glass that got caught under his skin so long ago it's slipped into bone, build years of muscles and skin over it. But it's low grade. Dull. Throbbing. Constant. Something he can usually, almost, ignore. Tune out. Like a sunburn, or head wound. But ripped raw by, well, whatever, it smarts at all the edged, tattering and tearing, tugging at everything else, tensing the muscles in his neck.

Sends him into the kitchen. Grabbing a cup from one of the cabinet's and upending the rest of the beer into it. Not tossing out the last inch or two left, even after most of it was lost by dropping it in the back yard. Even with the small bits of dirt and grass that go with it, floating in the liquid. Listening to Danny shuffle around in the house like he's hyper sensitive to the sound of it.

To Danny, and what he's doing even more than normal. To this idea he might vanish, and the confused way part of him says thats good and part of him that seizes the ends of his stomach, his nerves, egging him to jog the less than fifteen steps towards the closer door and makes sure he isn't leaving while Steve is in here. While he's not. Moving. Is only standing still, doing this. Pour his beer into the glass. Listening.

To the sound of steps followed by some kind of friction followed by the sounds of voices. Of channels being cut into and out of each other, when the tv is being changed. Steve dropped the bottle in the trash, with a clattering clank, and took his glass with him toward the living room. Where Danny had decide to fall on and sprawl on part of his couch, like it could just start dragging him in. No war necessary. Slouched shoulders and hand out with the remote.

Tossing out "Anything?" as he's sitting down on the other side of the couch. Placing his beer on the table and looking up some point between Danny and the television screen. Already waring with the urge to reach out and take it from him. Check five or ten specific channels instead of this constant shift, shift, shift. Not even because he cares, but because it's something at least. Something to throw this rolling, thundery, pensive, feeling at.

[haole_cop]

"Not yet."

He glances up as Steve comes in, already feeling like he's just about soaking into the couch, which is fine, which is great, except that this is sort of like being in two separate chairs all over again, which is annoying in this superficial, buzzing in his ears sort of way. He's just about made it through the first fifty channels, and there's nothing, so he gives up, tosses the remote at Steve in a careless arc. "Knock yourself out."

He doesn't care what they end up on, as long as it's nothing that makes him have to think too hard, or crushes this carefully cultivated beginnings of relaxation, where he toes off his shoes and follows the remote over to lean his back half on Steve's shoulder and half on the couch back, kicking up his feet and nudging his way into a comfortable spot. Like Steve's part of the couch. Like Steve and the couch are both his to take over, expanding his personal space to a bubble that includes them both.

What the hell's the point of getting back inside and watching something stupid on TV if he can't be comfortable? And it's not like he's got any desire to keep any kind of space between them.

[thebesteverseen]

It's not like there's a manual or pattern for everything that's going on here. They just proved that outside. Very loudly, and very quietly. So maybe it's all that strange either that Steve looks sharply, and a little surprised, at his shoulder being conquered like a continent or a couch cushion that won't defend itself with five hundred spikes against even the air touching it. When Danny's not even settling for just flopping back half on him like it's an accident.

Danny's nudging his way into figure out how to make Steve's arm and shoulder comfortable, like he'll just stop being solid, somehow, which really wasn't all that comfortable for Steve. Nor was the wiggling, and pushing Danny's spine, ribs, shoulder against that part of his body. Which all just sort of cemented a spike of confusion at the whole fact, aside from certain points, they really didn't always, or even usually, end up tangled together in a way that didn't have to do with sex or waking up.

As awkward, unsettling and annoying as that could all shove up under his skin already, it felt like his chest was going to revolt if he shoved Danny right here, anymore than he could outside. He didn't want Danny on the other side of the couch either. So he settled for doing the only thing he could even think of, and just running straight to it, through it, focused and direct and confident in a way he did not feel but wasn't giving up. Making an annoyed noise while roughly jerking his arm up from under Danny, and shoving it out, across Danny's shoulder, to grab his far shoulder.

Manhandling Danny into his side, under his arm, instead of against it and over, with a peevishly annoyed tone. "Settle down already. If you burrow holes in my couch, you'll have to replace it."

Not that his hand actually lifts or loosens from Danny's far shoulder yet, or his arms stops sort of being a bar across the top of Danny's shoulders, behind his neck and head. If he's not even looking at Danny after his words. Already pulling up the guide, typing in the numbers for the movie channels and skimming the titles available. Not at all shifting his head, warily, with the barest peripheral glance every few seconds, watching out for where Danny's own head was ending up.

[haole_cop]

That's another snort, as he settles back, head tipping against the arm that's suddenly been introduced between him and the couch. Far less squishy than the leather, but firm and warm and it fits to support him just right, so he's not gonna bitch about it.

Not when Steve's dragging him in closer, and not pushing him away, even if Danny can feel him tensing before he decides to just roll with it. "Calm down. I'm not a rodent, I'm not burrowing anything in anywhere."

Nowhere except against Steve, and he's not even doing that now that Steve's gotten with the picture and moved the arm that was in the way. It's still not perfect, but it works fine, and is about a thousand times better than pretending he doesn't want to be touching him, pressed against him and sharing body heat along with the couch that they definitely don't really both fit on without this sort of arrangement.

They ended up on the couch the last time Steve talked to Catherine, too, but this isn't anything like that, feels almost awkward, as if there's been any time in the last two plus years that he's been uncomfortable touching Steve.

It's just reassurance. Keeping him under his hand, under his shoulder, against his back and side, watching idly as Steve flips through the available titles. Anything's fine, when he's sitting here sipping a beer and not thinking about the fact that fifteen minutes ago, this almost never happened, at all. Ever. That they would probably have gone back to opposite sides of the couch, if they even were alone together. That something this simple would have been just erased.

It's not like he didn't already know how easy this would be to lose, okay? He could have done without the reminder.

[thebesteverseen]

"Don't think I believe that for a minute," Steve said, shifting enough to jostle Danny just a bit in return, since he couldn't actually just nudge his shoulder like this. "I've seen the places you live." And what he calls 'living' in them, or the lack of. Which everyone saw more than they'd ever really expected while moving him in and out.

"If you don't think you have things in your wall, you're denser than I thought."

Maybe there's something to it, thought. Not the living in that apartment, or the one before, or the strange new nicer apartment or house he was searching for now. On the list of doing things to fit a list for Grace, that somehow didn't involve letting Steve shake him free. This. Not that. The whole Danny sitting so close he could smell his skin again, and the stuff he uses in his hair. The way his hair tickles against Steve's forearm in one spot, when Danny so much as shifts his head a little.

The way there's a glance toward where it's touching him, before he just flicks another set up and down and just clicks on the box for the last half of Kill Bill, Vol I., which at least ran across to the second part after it, in the next box on that line. He doesn't know how long they'll be here, and it's mindless enough he won't hate watching it and he might not even hate Danny deciding to talk right over the whole thing.

He tucked the remote on the other side of his thigh and scrubbed his face, relaxing a little, by increments, as he let a breath out and sunk into the the cushions more than for show, and with a little less 'at attention' awareness. Letting his head roll a little toward the direction of Danny, and the sound of Danny breathing, even as he flicked his focus toward the tv screen.

[haole_cop]

"So now you're equating me to things living in the wall? Thanks, buddy."

Whatever. As long as Steve is fine with the way things are working out, here, he can say whatever stupid thing he wants. He's kind of shifting, slightly, but when Danny waits to see what he'll do, all that ends up happening is that Steve picks a movie and slouches down.

Which means Danny can relax, letting out a breath and sipping his beer, eyes on the screen even as every nerve in his body is hyper-aware of the loose pile of Steve next to him: what he's doing, whether this is weird, wondering if Steve really did get the point earlier, or if he decided to make a tactical retreat, only to bring it back up when Danny least expects it. "I guarantee, the next place will be pest-free."

It'll have to be. His rat-trap of an apartment is as damning a piece of evidence as any night spent with Steve; maybe worse. At least Steve's got a house that isn't infested with mold, or bugs, with a private beach and some nice land attached to it. He might be complicated, but no one could argue this isn't a nice piece of property.

But Grace doesn't stay here, Grace needs a better place than the shoebox he's currently got, because if he gets shared custody, she'll be there a lot more, will really be living there, and he cares too much about his baby girl to let her try to live in the same conditions he's gotten used to over the last couple of years.

Whatever; there are a couple places to look at this week, in all his massive amounts of free time, so why worry about it? At least that's something constructive he can do.

"You know, I think Tarantino's almost as obsessed with gratuitous violence as you are."

[thebesteverseen]

Relaxed is not the thing Danny is. Settled next him, somewhere toward half on him. Under his arm, against his side. Settled in one place, definitely. Sitting and not looking like he's aimed to going anywhere. Drinking his beer, watching the movie, as they both start picking up on the middle of the vendetta in progress. But he isn't relaxed, or relaxing. Steve's touching too much of him not to notice so far.

Or it's that Steve's had too much of him limp, loose, and limber to not know the difference.

Not that he's surprised, but it's a little focusing. He's not sure it's anywhere to concerning or worrisome, given Danny is there. Rambling off his mouth, while Steve shifts glances at Danny between the flick and the side of Danny's face, and in the instance of certain seconds just the movement of his mouth while he's saying things somewhere between his beer bottle and watch the tv screen.

But it's not like Steve doesn't get why. Or can take it back. Or maybe can, but won't. Not the words that came out of his mouth at the beginning or end. All of it was still true, We shouldn't be doing this, stern and pointed, and No, so thin the wind could overrun it. Like the way Danny's voice in his head keeps saying, I'm gonna do everything I can to stay. Everything. I can. To stay. Having no idea how to hold on to any of that.

While he's complaining and half-slandering Steve, layering his voice everywhere on Steve, while Steve's noticing this lack of any kind of calm in Danny beneath appearance. When the only thing to do with that seems to be to hold it, and to push at the same second. Rib at Danny at least in a normal way. Letting his face fall toward a unsurprised, distracted time-worn and expected exasperation of insult.

"You don't like Tarantino?" Scoffed almost, with a heavy hand, like he was implying Danny knew just as much absolutely nothing about good movies, as he did about good music on the radio. "All of his stuff ended up being cult classics."

[haole_cop]

This is normal. It is. Mostly. Even with the added difference of having Steve half under him, instead of a couch, while he waves the hand hold his beer a little lackadaisically. "Pulp Fiction is a cult classic," he corrects. "The others are just Tarantino movies, made popular by Tarantino fans. And that's beside the point, I never said I don't like Tarantino, I said he fetishizes violence, which is definitely true."

Particularly in these movies, and though he's got nothing against watching Uma Thurman single-handedly take on all comers and emerge blood-spattered and victorious, it's also not exactly his usual fare. "If I want to see a real brawl, I'll watch old hockey videos. And that couldn't be called pretty by even the most brain-dead of fans. Besides, swords seem so inefficient. I get that it's a personal touch, but wouldn't it be easier to just shoot them?"

At least this is easy enough to fall into; his complaints riffing off a throwaway comment, eventually meandering so far from Steve's original point that they aren't even recognizably connected anymore.

And he can roll his head back to glance at Steve, too, which is sort of nice. He can't watch the guy more than the TV, but it's not like they're both pretending that there's a non-existent stretch of couch between them, which is, Danny thinks, a step in the right direction.

[thebesteverseen]

"Seriously?" Steve snaps, but the bite there is light, prodding and flash bright, more than steel and razor sharp.

"Reservoir Dogs." After all, the point isn't to have another fight over it, but bickering, shoving at Danny's buttons till he decides to relax and unwind, too. So that, at that point, Steve can. That's different. "It was totally a hit before Pulp Fiction, and got bigger even after it, when it broke out of independent movie hell."

Which was how he found it, but he'd had a lot of more important things going on than movies at the time.

It doesn't hurt anything that Danny's turning his head, rolling the back of it on Steve's arm, and looking up at him. That screwed up face like Steve has absolutely no idea what he's talking about and his head is made of rocks and broken bits of beach glass. Or more aptly, broken bits of weaponry and rocks, if Danny's conversation was anything to go on. But it lets him look at Danny again. Hair still half a mess, but his lips aren't half-swollen, and his eyes are blue and not as.

Scared. Scared is the word, and it tries to run away, melt away, slip away even in a thought. Danny, scared of him. Pleading. Terrified, and so damn pissed off unmoving stubborn. Not scared now. Maybe. Tired. Maybe wary? That makes his stomach sour, but he doesn't look away toward the movie even for the screaming. When he feels like it would take some kind of heavy weight, razor sharp object like a katana slicing between them to make him look away for this second.

Even if it's easier to furrow his brow and push back at Danny bitching, while gesturing a hand at the tv. "And make it into every other American shoot 'em up? I know you can be blind, but did you actually miss the whole chinese, martial arts, western mix-up it was going for the first time?"

[haole_cop]

"Fine. Reservoir Dogs." He waves his free hand, which knocks against Steve's knee as it makes a circuit. "I'll give you Reservoir Dogs. I had no idea you were such an aficionado, Roger Ebert. Are you going to tell me how Inglorious Basterds is a seminal film, now?"

Talking works, except he's not really sure of anything he's saying even as it drops out of his mouth, because Steve is looking at him, and not just looking. Watching. Studying. Like he's waiting to see if something else is going on behind Danny's bluster; gesturing at the TV, but not looking over at it.

And, actually, neither of them are, because whatever is going on onscreen is nowhere near as attention-grabbing as this thing crossing Steve's face, forehead crinkling in a way that shouldn't make Danny want to run a finger along those lines, erase them with the pad of his thumb. Watching him like he's waiting to see what Danny will do next, like he thinks the next thing out of his mouth might actually mean something other than that Danny can find something to bitch about in pretty much any situation.

Like maybe part of him still thinks Danny's going to make a break for it, even after everything he said, everything he argued against. It draws a mirroring frown between his one eyebrows, beer bottle balancing against his leg.

"What?"

[thebesteverseen]

Danny's hands start moving, in the air. Which somehow ticks some of the muscles in Steve's back to relax. Somehow. The free hand that actually bounces against Steve's own leg, smacking it for the note of a point, and the one with Danny's beer, that he shifts but doesn't go throwing about as cavalierly. And it's easy to toss a blase, disinterested comment out to the last one.

Which might be good because anything past that point is Danny looking at him suddenly very closely. Not spacially. He doesn't get any closer. But the world Danny is focusing on seems to winnow down suddenly to Steve's face. When he doesn't even look back to the movie and Danny's face is shifting. When he's getting that intent look he does when he thinks he knows what's going on. Or that something is.

And really nothing is. Nothing at all. Letting Steve face scrunch up in faintly suspicious, entirely dismissive question of what's what? that did not not need any words to be said. Especially, when he's still asking the question Danny tossed out at him before. Not that it was a question. It was just another volley at his taste. "The ending to Basterds ruins everything that was good about it."

What. He's got a beef with movies that are all real, all hands on, and then drop kick themselves off a cliff historically. Sue him. He doesn't give a damn. Some good scenes, not a movie he'd really watch except maybe when he can't sleep or swim or run at two or three in the morning. Better than nothing, but not in the running for much else.

[haole_cop]

The look Danny turns on him is nearly pained. "It's fiction, Steve. Fiction. Besides, it's not like all his movies don't take place in some bizarre alternate universe, anyway. I saw that somewhere, once. I mean, you think this is in any way a realistic portrayal of the break-up of a group of assassins and the subsequent personal vendetta?"

Does that shit ever really happen outside the movies? He's seen both, sure, but not together.

And, really, who the hell uses a katana?

Steve seems to be finally starting to relax, slightly, and that's enough to make a few of the knots clumping up his vertebrae start to loosen, which is nice, because leaning against Steve is actually pretty comfy, when he lets himself get used to the idea. The further they drift from the conversation outside, the better; the last thing he wants to consider is whether or not he's going to have to keep an eye out for a resurgence in the future.

Nope. Better to gesture towards the screen, even if his eyes only glance off it before looking back at Steve, who might not be nearly as interesting to watch but is definitely higher on the list than scenes of unimaginable violence.

Besides, Danny still hasn't quite figured out what that look was, before. The one Steve wiped off without even a second's hesitation, replaced with derision and a scornful frown, complaining about a movie Danny's not even sure he fully remembers. Nazis? Right? And someone killed Hitler?

That's the gist, isn't it?

It doesn't matter. None of it does, except that Steve is talking about something other than shouldn't or going back down that rabbit hole.