Steve was slumped on the sofa in Deb and Leonard's living room looking out at the night sky in LA. Deb and Leonard were asleep in their room and Joan was sleeping in her portacrib. The family court hearing last week had confirmed him as Joan's guardian and Steve had spent the time since then getting used to what taking care of a small child entailed, with Deb's help and instruction.

Danny and Steve had spent a great deal of time on the phone during the time Steve had been gone. After the family court hearing, Steve had been panic stricken and Danny found himself talking his friend off the ledge more than once with reassurances that everything would work out fine.

Today had been the small memorial service for Mary's LA circle of friends. Disappointingly, but not surprising, he had heard from neither Joe White nor his mother. So, Mary was memorialized the way she had lived most of her life, without her mother in the picture.

The day had been tough for Steve, but it had been torturous for Deb. She had always been a strong woman, but her cancer treatments were taking a toll, as was the cancer itself. Losing Mary had really broken her spirit and it had taken everything she had to get through the memorial. Where Steve had been questioning Leonard's involvement with his aunt when he first met him, today he was thankful that she had Leonard. He had been a real rock for Deb to lean on. He wasn't sure how she would have coped without Leonard and Joan.

Tomorrow he and Joan were checking into a hotel near Deb and Leonard's place. The plan, devised by Deb, was that the two of them would spend the next two days on their own. This would give Joan a chance to get used to Steve without Deb and Leonard being around, but they would still be there if it were a complete disaster. Deb hoped that Steve would actually believe he could successfully raise Joan before he left California.

They were all going to have dinner together Sunday night and then Steve and Joan would head to the airport on Monday morning to go back to Hawaii.

A despondent Steve desperately wished he could talk to Danny, but it seemed much too late to call. His need to hear his partner's voice made him feel a little bit like a pre-adolescent schoolgirl, but as his partner kept telling him, a good life didn't just consist of gunfights and blowing things up. There was another side to him that he had kept buried all these years, and now caring for Joan had started to bring that side more to the forefront.

Despite Danny's curmudgeonly attitude, he was the best friend Steve had and he could get to the heart of his troubles with a few probing words. Danny had a way about him that made Steve comfortable with opening up and sharing his feelings.

Steve's phone vibrated on the side table. He looked at the screen and activated the call with a small smile.

"Can't sleep, Danno?"

"Just checking on ya, babe. How was the service?"

Steve shared with Danny what had happened during the day. The different friends of Mary's who had shared things with him about her and her life in L.A. How he was able to take some small comfort that at least during her last year of life, she seemed to have been doing well and was enjoying raising Joan.

Danny shared the news from Hawaii. He filled Steve in on the cases he was missing and what had been happening with the different task force members. He told Steve about how things had been going with Rachel and gave him the Grace updates. A couple of times he mentioned spending time with Charlie, which surprised Steve, but he thought Danny sounded happy. Well. As happy as Danny ever was.

During the conversation, Danny referred to Steve as Joan's Daddy. There was a silence at the other end of the line before Steve responded.

"No, Danny. I'm her Uncle Steve and I always will be. If I start calling myself Daddy, then how can Mary be her Mommy? She was my sister. It would be too confusing for such a little kid for a brother and sister to be her Dad and Mom. I don't want her to ever forget who her Mommy was and how much Mary loved her."

At that Steve's voice broke and after a startled moment, Danny quickly began a long soliloquy of how Max had recently annoyed him, in order to give Steve a chance to pull himself back together. After a few moments, Steve's breathing evened out and he interrupted Danny.

"Sorry, man. I'll be doing pretty good, but then everything begins to seem pretty overwhelming. Deb keeps telling me I can do this, but I don't know, Danny. How can I raise a kid by myself?"

"Once again, Steven, if I were there, I would clip you on the side of the head. You are not by yourself. How many times do I have to say it before it sinks into your thick skull? Are you sure the explosions you've been through haven't damaged your hearing? Maybe you've just been reading lips all this time? How would we know?"

At that, Steve finally started laughing. It had been pretty much the same thing every night since he'd been gone. Sometimes twice a day. He and Danny would talk. He would do true confessions, telling Danny how nervous he was about raising Joan. Then, he would sit back and let Danny's rant wash over him in soothing waves.

Because he was nervous about being Joan's guardian. He thought at times that he should record Danny's reassurances on his phone so that he could replay them when Danny wasn't around. His aunt could reassure him all she wanted, but he didn't depend on her opinion the way he did on Danny's. Because he trusted Danny to tell him when he had screwed something up.

Danny had already been through this. With Gracie. He may not have raised her all by himself, but he definitely was involved in every moment in that child's life and she had turned out perfect, as far as Steve was concerned. In Steve's opinion, there was no better example to follow on how to be a good father than Danny Williams.

For his part, Danny was worried about Steve. Not that Steve couldn't do this, because Danny knew he could. His worry was that Steve wouldn't give himself the chance to do it. He also worried that just when Steve had been beginning to open up a little bit and let go of that McGarrett Man reserve, that he would start to put the clamps on himself again. He hoped that Joan would be able to further open Steve's heart rather than close it off.

Danny's own heart broke for his friend and for that little girl. He would do everything in his power to help Steve cope.