Chapter 2
Po'ipu
The blue Mustang had cruised with the top down through the sleeping town of Lihue in the briefest of moments, past a row of low buildings and under the rusted conveyor belt of the now-abandoned sugar mill, and Danno was still bitching. Steve was half listening, glancing at his partner every now and then in amusement. By the time they reached the darkened Kilohana Plantation, Steve had had enough. He took one of his hands off the wheel and slowly lowered Danno's gesticulating hands.
"Whoa there. You can't discover Kaua'i if you're too busy shouting at it. Drink this in, Danno."
He paused for a brief moment, and in a calculated move, brushed his thumb over Danno's knuckles before letting go. He knew Danno was getting ready to start again, but he was quickly shut down with a quick head jerk and a deflating look.
"Drink this in." Steve repeated. "Look at the moon, the mountains, and those perfectly illuminated clouds. And this."
The click of the turn signal was the only sound as Danno's gaze was transfixed by the tree tunnel looming to their left.
"Wow." Danno said in awe. "Why—who does this? Just a tunnel of trees? Is this natural?"
"Well, like many things in Hawai'i, the tree tunnel has more than one story. Nobody really knows if their version is completely true, half true, or not at all true. What I do know is that these are eucalyptus trees, which is why they smell so good."
"Mr. Wizard." Danny smiled; arching back to take in the towering arbors, their knotted interlocking fingers interspersed just often enough to illuminate the tunnel with moonbeams bright enough to read by. The Kaua'i countryside shone brighter as the clouds had moved on, leaving the moon to shine directly upon the now fallow fields that once nurtured a waving sea of sugar cane. The rolling hills that undulated into steep peaks flickered by like an old fashioned picture show as the car lumbered past the measured interval between each trunk. The fauna of the underbrush hummed a steady chorus of a warm tropical evening as Steve wondered after a few miles and the end of the tree tunnel if Danny had fallen asleep, but a furtive glance confirmed his eyes were still open if half-lidded.
Submission. A minor victory.
Po'ipu, literally translated, means "crashing waves" and with the moon as full as it was the waves could be heard even over the nighttime din of the underbrush as they approached the shore.
"You know you way around here pretty well eh?" Danny mused.
"Mom grew up around here. In that town we passed two miles back. Koloa."
"Oh yes. The place that looked like something out of the Grapes of Wrath."
Steve ignored the bait and chuckled to himself. He had a special weapon in store that he wasn't ready to reveal just yet.
There was nobody in sight as they pulled into the porte cochere of the Sheraton Kaua'i Resort.
Danny was impressed. "Now this—this is nice. You've surprised me. What are we bunking with the pool boys? Sharing a maid's closet with five of our new best friends?"
Steve bristled at the word closet. That was another complicated mess to tackle.
"Nah, just a garden view room. I'm not that rich."
"What you—you paid for all of this?" Danny's voice trailed off.
Steve, a step and a half in front of Danny, cringed, knowing he couldn't see.
"Department budget." He backpedaled. "The Department Budget is not that rich. The Governor doesn't just give us blank checks." He glanced back at Danny.
"This is nice. Definitely nice." Danny said, giving the lobby a once-over.
"Aloha. Reservation's under McGarrett." Steve smiled at the pretty young girl behind the front desk. Even at 11 PM, undoubtedly near the end of her shift, she still seemed as "on" as she should have been for such a nice hotel, smiling broadly as she pecked away at her keyboard.
"I'm so sorry gentlemen, we're booked pretty full this week and I'm afraid we're all out of double bedded rooms. However, I can offer you an ocean front suite with a king in the master bedroom and a pull out couch in the sitting room at the same rate for the five nights."
Well that's a mixed bag, Steve thought. A king bed, but we'll be sleeping in separate rooms.
"Works for me if it works for you McGarrett." Danny said. "I'm sure a pull-out sofa bed in this fine establishment would be an immense upgrade from the pull-out sofa bed I sleep on at home."
The girl was quick to sell the arrangement. "and if the sofa bed doesn't work for you, just call us and we'll have a rollaway sent up instead. They're a little bigger and they can be more comfortable. Just let us know." she said, with a reassuring smile.
The walk to the room through the labyrinthine corridors seemed endless, even with the clearly marked directions they'd been given at the front desk, but to Steve's relief the rooms were far from the elevators, at the end of a long corridor. Kaua'i was in general silent enough, but the whirring and dinging of elevators was not his idea of a getaway. He could tell Danno was tired. There hadn't been much discourse on the way up to the room, and he knew Danno was looking forward to a bed, any bed, where he could get horizontal and sleep for a couple hours.
"Definitely an upgrade." Danny observed as he walked into the room and flicked on the lights. The sitting room was comfortably but not outlandishly furnished in a nondescript, vaguely island style, but what immediately caught his attention was the four poster bed in the adjacent bedroom, upon he which he flopped face first, arms out as though he hoped to float onto the layers upon layers of crisp clean sheets.
"Five minutes, detective. I'll be out of the shower in five minutes and I want my bed." Steve said. With you still in it. He finished the thought to himself.
"Right on it Commander." Danny mumbled into the sheets.
"Right on it is right where I want ya." Steve mumbled under his breath as he shut the bathroom door.
Steve took 15 minutes in the shower, because, after all, it was a great shower. Nothing refreshed him like a good shower at night to wash the tedium of the day down the drain, although he wouldn't really have classified this day, at least not the last few hours of it, as tedium. Just him and Danno traveling—two guys on the road, facing a journey ahead as unknown to either of them as the blindest corner on the most narrow road in the worst weather. Steve impatiently waited for the next moment to come, knowing it could bring an acquiescing, reciprocating Danno into his arms, drive a freaked out Danno completely away, or worse, maintain the tense status quo that Steve knew was untenable moving forward.
I've got to know. He thought to himself.
Moments later he stepped back out into the bedroom with one of the hotel's plush, oversized cotton towels wrapped around his waist when he noticed Danno hadn't moved from his position on the bed at all. Well, almost. He'd kicked off his shoes.
Steve tiptoed toward his sleeping partner, turning off the sitting room lights as he went. He bent over and studied Danno for a full half minute, realizing he'd fallen into a deep sleep.
He's not going anywhere.
Rather exhausted himself, and rather hungry but too invested in the opportunity to share a bed with Danno for the night to think about anything else, he inhaled, turned out the bedside lamp, and in a momentary flicker of modesty dropped his towel and deftly slipped underneath the sheets next to his sleeping friend.
God that feels good. He though, not entirely knowing whether he was thinking more about the fresh linens or the fact that he'd slipped under Danno's outstretched right arm, which was still sprawled across his side of the bed, now resting heavy upon his mid-thigh. Steve adjusted the pillow and thought that it wasn't near enough, but if that was all he was going to get, it would have been enough just for that one night.
"Good night Danno. I love you." He whispered, dropping his guard in the creeping drowsiness as he lay on his side, turned toward Danny, watching him sleep. It didn't take long for Steve to join him.
I've got to know.
