5-0 had been kind of quiet but that would not be for long. Another episode of hijacking of a catamaran with college kids occurred again. They were tasked with getting them back and in the process finding out who did this.
Steve had to contact the babysitters to let them know that he was working a big case. They knew what that meant – sporadic hours and that they have to do more like get the kids off to school and get them ready for bed etc. He managed to have a system of two college students, Laura and Dionne, for babysitting duties. They alternated days because even though they were full time students their availability varied based on their T-TH or M-W-F schedules. The girls were like part of the family now and were like big sisters to the kids. Funny thing is that they knew the rules as well as the kids and made sure they were enforced because they didn't want to have to deal with Lt. Commander McGarrett as much as the kids didn't. Good for Steve that they didn't have any other jobs besides the babysitting. Because this system worked so well he just sent them a code to let them know that he is in case mode. He also contacted the kids by text on the phones that he bought them for emergencies and for him to communicate with them to let them know that he was working this case and to be good for the babysitters ("You know what that means"). They always checked their phones when school was out for any messages from Steve and left them on until the next morning in case he tried to contact them.
Dionne was an African American girl who ended up in Hawaii because her dad was in the Air Force and they never left after he retired. The kids loved all of their new family in Hawaii. Allison, however, especially loved Dionne because she knew how to deal with her thick and curly hair that she inherited from her mother. Steve especially loved Dionne for that, too. Before he had the babysitters in place, Kono would get called often to come and help with Allison's hair and most times Steve made it seem like it was an emergency (in his mind, it probably was).
Laura was a Caucasian girl also from a military family. The kids loved her because she played with them a lot and of the two babysitters they thought she was nicer. She was studying to be a teacher and seemed to really like helping with homework. Again, she was a godsend for Steve because his patience was really short for that.
Today was Laura's day to babysit the kids. She was at the house and figured it was about time for them to come in the house from the bus. When she went to the door, she saw Aaron and Michael from down the street walking up the street with their heads down looking at a handheld video game. She didn't see Allison. She went out to meet the guys and asked where the girl was. Aaron said she was talking to one of her friends and she went the other way. Laura asked him if he knew what friend she was with he said he didn't know and seemed really nonchalant about it. Laura was frustrated with him for his lack of helpfulness and told him to go home "now!". She went back to the house and tried to call Allison but there was no answer and then she sent a text and still no answer. She was beyond frazzled and frustrated. She thought, "Why do these kids pull these disappearing acts on me all the time?" She was not calling McGarrett now. She knew she could not have gone far. So she walked further down the street calling the girl's name. Not surprisingly, no one said anything. It had been about 30 minutes now and she was freaking. She was walking back to the house when she saw a silver camaro pull up beside her.
"What's going on, Laura?" Steve asked. Oh God, Laura thought, he is going to kill me. What is he doing here anyway? He is supposed to be working a big case, she thought. She looked in the car and saw Steve and Danny. She started to tear up. Steve asked, "What's the matter, Laura? Talk to me." She took a deep breath and told Steve that "Allison got off the bus but did not come home." She continued, "Aaron thought that she went down the street with a friend but he didn't know which friend and it's been over 20 minutes and I can't find her. I've called her phone and texted her and she hasn't answered yet." Danny shook his head and muttering while Laura was explaining. Steve did become perturbed and Laura saw this. She was afraid he was mad at her. He sensed that and told her that wasn't mad at her. However, he was upset with Allison for not going straight home like she was supposed to and irritated with Aaron for not paying closer attention.
He asked Laura to send Allison another message saying "your dad is home." By this time they were out of the car and they were watching the street when they saw Allison come out of the house at the very end of the street. She starts running up the street and stops dead in her tracks when she sees Uncle Danny's car and the people standing outside of it. She started walking slower and she dropped her head. She knew there was going to be a problem. McGarrett told her that they did not have all day and to hurry up. Danny and Laura went ahead and drove to the house. McGarrett waited for Allison to catch up to him.
He asked for her phone. He saw that the messages that Laura sent had been acknowledged but he didn't say anything. He asked her what she was doing down the street instead of going home like she was supposed to. She started looking around nervously and she started telling Steve that she had helped her friend from school walk down to her house because she had a lot of stuff in her hands and she needed help. Steve knew she was lying and he was going to catch her in it. "That was really nice of you to help her out. Why did it take you so long to drop off her stuff?"
"What do you mean?"
"Why has it been over a half hour since the bus dropped you off and you are just now coming home?"
"She had a lot of stuff, Daddy," Allison whined.
Steve's patience had run out very quickly. They stopped walking and he turned to his daughter and said, "Allison, you know that I know you are at the very least not telling me the whole truth and at worst blatantly lying to me. Let's just say that your friend had tons of stuff and you were helping her drop it off, that still would not explain why it was a half hour from the time the bus dropped you off. The thing that has me ticked off is that you were called and sent text messages by Laura and it was not until she sent my message that you decided to come home. I know that you saw that Laura called and texted you and you ignored them because you were set on doing what you want to do. So do you want to tell me that's not what happened now?" She shook her head. "So what were you doing?" Allison sighed. "Le'ani was telling me about her new kinect game and I wanted to try it out and then the time got away because I was having fun…" Steve interrupted her, "What about the call and text that Laura sent you. I know that you saw them because if you weren't able to see them as they came in how did you get the last one that you did respond to by coming out." Allison could feel she was sinking. He had caught her. All she could do was whine, "Daaaddyyy…"
They finished walking home and when they entered, Danny and Aaron were sitting in the front room while Laura was fixing dinner. Steve told Allison to go to her room and that he would be up in a minute. He turned to Aaron and was getting ready to say something when the boy cut him off and said, "Dad, I know that I was wrong by not paying attention to Allison and not knowing where she went." Steve was somewhat amused by the confessional and tried hard to suppress the smirk that was starting to emerge. Aaron continued, "Dad, I know that by not paying attention we both could have been in danger and I won't let it happen again. I'm really sorry." Steve said, "I appreciate you admitting that you slipped in your responsibility and I will take that into consideration for your punishment." "Punishment? Dad, come on. Please, no." Steve wasn't sure why he found Aaron's reaction funny but he just chuckled softly to himself and shook his head as he went upstairs to deal with Allison.
Allison was in her room and understandably upset. The last time her dad sent Aaron upstairs and said he would be up, he got spanked. If she got sent to her room other times, she was told how long she had to stay up there. This was not looking good, she thought, and she started to panic. But then she started to become upset with her dad. Steve came into the room and asked Allison if he was ready to admit that she ignored the calls and texts that Laura sent. She admitted that she did ignore the messages. Steve asked her, "How do you think it makes me feel when you lie to me? How would you feel if I lied to you?" She replied, "I don't think it makes you feel good. But Daddy you lied to us because you sent us a message saying you were working a big case and that normally means you won't be home."
"First, I did not lie to you guys. We are working a big case. I was coming home to pick up something that I needed for work. When I was driving up the street, I saw Laura out looking for you and she was worried because she did not know where you were and you were not answering her. Second, my not being home does not mean that you can do what you like and not follow the rules. What do you think were the rules that you disobeyed today, Allison?"
She just sat there and was becoming defiant because she felt like she was tricked because her dad was supposed to be gone for the case. If he was gone, she thought, she would never have gotten caught. So when Steve said that he was waiting for an answer, she told him she couldn't think of the rules that she disobeyed except for not answering the calls and texts that Laura sent her. Steve detected the shift in her mood to defiance and now was becoming angry himself. He told Allison that he would be back and not to go anywhere until he told her she could.
He went down stairs to cool down and Laura had completed dinner. He called Allison down to eat. They all sat down to eat the tacos that Laura had fixed. As they were finishing, Steve got a call from Kono. They had a lead in the case. Kono and Chin Ho were going to check it out and would get back to Steve. It was time to go, but Steve needed to get some things settled with Allison. Steve asked her to come out on the deck with him and asked her to sit down. He started by saying, "Look Allison, I don't like what happened upstairs with the attitude that you had. You were wrong for lying about going down to your friend's house, for going to your friend's house in the first place when you were supposed to come straight home, and for ignoring Laura. So you becoming defiant with me and refusing to answer me when I asked you a direct question was not the right way to go. So you are still in trouble and I will deal with it when you come home from school tomorrow. In the meantime, no TV for you and you need to go to your room and stay in there tonight. After you finish your homework, you are to write a letter of apology to Laura for being disrespectful and …" She interrupted almost screaming, "I was not disrespectful to Laura." That was it. Steve had had with Allison at this point. He didn't know what was going on with her but he planned to get to the bottom of it, literally. He told her to go to her room and she turned around to protest at which point he smacked her on her butt and told her, "NOW!" She went right away. Now she was scared because she knew she had gone too far.
Steve told Danny to go ahead back to headquarters and he would get there after he was done. Danny could tell that Steve was really mad and he told him that he should calm down. Steve said to Danny, "Don't tell me to calm down. If Grace popped off at the mouth like she just did, you would be responding the exact same way. I'm not going to have it and if I don't nip this in the bud right now, I will have a hellion on my hands as a teenager." He looked at Aaron and told him to go and start his homework. Laura was in the kitchen trying to stay clear of Steve and his anger. Danny told him that he understood and went on to say (of course with lots of hand gestures), "I'm just saying that I know you are going to do what you feel is best for your kid in this situation, but I do think that you need some time before you go in to do what you had planned. You should calm down. I'm just afraid that you might hurt her now because you are very angry. She is a preteen and this is what they do. I am not looking forward to this age with Gracie but I know it will happen and I hope that I am able to keep my cool with her. I say, let's go to work on this case and give you some space and time from what's happening right now." Steve knew that Danny was right. He took a few deep breaths and went upstairs.
He went into Allison's room and saw that she was crying. He sat on the bed and he asked her come sit next to him. He put his arm around her, wiped her tears, and started by saying, "Look Allison. I love you very much and I would be devastated if anything happened to you. I have rules to try to keep you guys safe and to help provide you with structure to help you grow up being respectful and responsible people. Having rules are not popular but they are necessary. So that is the first thing. The second thing is that the way we respond to being caught in violation of the rules is very important. It tells us something about our character. Whether you admit or not, Allison, you were caught wrong and you don't even have to think hard about it. Becoming defiant and angry with me when you're upset because you were caught wrong is not cool and is unacceptable." She started to interrupt. Steve stopped her saying, "Let me finish. Now, I am going to go with Uncle Danny so we can try to bring this case to a close. When we finish, you and I will need to finish this up." Allison said, "Daddy, I'm really sorry for getting mad with you. I was just scared because I knew I lied to you and that I was in trouble. I'm really sorry." She started crying again. Steve hugged her and told her that he accepted her apology. She said, "Daddy, I know you were planning to spank me but can I ask one thing?"
"Go ahead."
"Well if you're gonna spank me can we just do it tonight because I don't want to worry about it all day tomorrow at school? Please?"
This was an interesting turn of events, Steve thought. He told her that he was proud of her for eventually admitting that she was wrong. He wanted to get this over too and he was easier on her than he planned. He gave her about 10 smacks on her bottom with his hand. You would have thought he had really beaten her. He told her to go wash her face and when she came back he told her that she needed to write that letter of apology to Laura. He also told her that she was banned from video games of any sort for two weeks and she was grounded to her room for the next two days. "Do you understand me, Allison?" "Yes, Daddy," she replied. He told her to go downstairs say good night to Danny. He went over to Aaron's room and told him that had no video game privileges for two days for not paying attention to what was going on with his sister on the way home and that he expected for them to look out for each other. He said, "Aww, Dad. That is not fair." Steve said. "No it's not. Three days with no game privileges. The two days was taking your confession into consideration. Anything else to say?"
"No sir."
"Good. Danny and I have to leave to work on this case. Come on down and say good night."
They went downstairs together and the kids said good night.
When they got in the car, Danny just cracked up. He was laughing at the dad that Steve had become, especially dealing with Allison. Steve smirked, nodding his head, while Danny ribbed him. All Steve could say was, "I can't wait until Gracie starts giving you that kind of attitude. Then we will see who will be laughing." Steve paused and then that smirk was ear to ear and he said, "Oh yeah, it will be me, so laugh now, Danno. Your turn is coming up soon."