Way 19

Give him time to unwind after he gets home from work. Your evenings will be much more enjoyable.

Steve was surprised Danny had just dropped him off and gone on home. Usually after a case wrapped, Danny was in his face to the point where more than once McGarrett had wanted to physically remove his partner from his airspace. He'd never given in to the urge, however, because like he did on everything else, Steve was pretty certain Danny would fight him tooth and nail – it just wouldn't be worth it.

So on the ride home he'd mentally prepared himself for a full evening of the cadence of Danny's voice as it dipped low to a near-whisper when muttering and rose to a near-shout when he hit a topic that pissed him off about as much as his ex-wife's lawyer.

He'd already gotten himself to the point where he could deal with the dizzying effect of Danny's demonstrative hands, the constant motion he was in even when appearing to be at rest. More than once Steve had had to look away when Danny was being particularly animated and more than once he'd had the fleeting thought that the motion sickness part of Hell Week should've included spending an hour in a confined space with Danny's hands.

That was why, when Danny got into the driver's seat of the Camaro rather than following Steve to his front door and bitching about how long it took him to unlock it and turn off the alarm, it threw Steve off his game a bit.

But hey, whatever, maybe Danny was just tired enough to want to fall onto his foldout and sleep the weekend away. Or maybe Danny simply was too mad at whatever Steve knew his partner was mad at him for, even though Steve had managed not to blow anything up in the past few days, or get Danny or anyone else shot.

Truth was, Steve was more than just a little pumped up from the leftover adrenaline, and the further truth to his current state of mind was the fact that because he hadn't been able to shoot anyone, blow anything up or otherwise cause mayhem that always came to a halfway decent conclusion, he was revving like a race car engine at the start line.

He needed to swim.

Ninety minutes later and Steve was finally feeling like he could relax enough to maybe fall asleep tonight. He hauled himself out of the water, swiped a hand over his face to clear his eyes, and made his way to the two white beach chairs, one of which had a towel slung over the back of it.

The other of which had his partner strewn in it.

"Hey, I thought you'd gone home for the night."

"Nah," Danny said. "I just figured I'd let you unwind for a while before I filled up the empty spaces with my exuberance."

Steve huffed out a laugh. "Exuberance, huh? Is that what they're calling it now?" But really, he knew Danny had done the right thing, and when had anyone Steve had ever known taken the time to learn exactly what Steve needed and when, anyway?

Because if Danny had come right into the house with him, Steve would've been wound tighter than a python around a human victim (and no, he did not want to think further about how intimately familiar he was with that particular analogy), and he pretty much figured Danny would've become the victim in that scenario.

Somehow, Danny had known that, too.

"Get the edge off?" Danny asked as Steve plopped into the second chair and took the offered bottle of beer.

"Something like that," Steve replied, and held the bottle out toward his partner.

Danny eyed him and then clinked their bottles together. He took a long pull and settled back. There was a soft sigh and Steve turned to look at him, still pumped enough to be sitting on the edge of the chair rather than melting bonelessly into it like Danny seemed to be doing.

Creeped Steve out a little to have someone be able to know what he needed without a word spoken. Then he thought, you know, maybe it wasn't so bad having a friend read you as well as Danny seemed to. Maybe that right there was just enough to take the rest of his adrenaline and allow it to seep away.

The idea made him smile a little. He drained the bottle of beer, leaned back in the chair and closed his eyes, as the soft sounds of Danny's snores and the softer swish of the waves on his little piece of beach lulled him into restfulness at last.

Way 20

Be creative when you express your love, both in words and in actions.

Okay, yeah, so maybe Danny was a little more expressive than most men. And maybe, just maybe, a little more demonstrative.

The cool thing was, Steve seemed to take it all in stride. So did Chin. And Kono. While everyone at HPD but Meka had more often than not called him a nutjob or even accused him of being soft, his current team left Danny feeling nothing but accepted. Even if the acceptance came with funny looks, sly grins and the occasional shaking of dark-haired heads.

But all things considered, he could be himself with his teammates in a way he couldn't have been even with Rachel. She was all about poise and refinement, while he was all about rough edges and loudly voicing his opinion whether anyone wanted to hear it or not.

That had been one of the things she'd been attracted to most in the beginning, he knew – that he was so polar opposite of her to the very core of his being. And she, she was like nothing and no one else he'd ever known on the streets of Weehawken, Newark, the Shore. She'd been something soft and delicate for him to treasure and yet it'd turned out she was just as fierce and could get just as nasty as he could underneath that cool exterior.

So they had collided, exploded spectacularly, created a perfect, beautiful baby girl and then ripped themselves away from each other, leaving open, gaping wounds in their wake.

He'd never fallen out of love with her. He knew this. Because he knew his heart. And yet having had to go so far away from the only home he'd ever known, so that he could be near Grace, Danny was surprised to find that there were more people he could love, and right here in Hawaii.

He joked with Kono that he loved her. She punched him in the arm and rolled her eyes, but they both knew the affection was real. That if something happened to the other, they'd hurt because they were family now.

And he and Chin? Well, there was never a doubt that either would go to the mats for the other, have each other's backs. Danny had known from the time Chin knelt with that goddamn bomb strapped around his neck that the thought of losing the quiet, fiercely intelligent man cored him right in the gut. Chin had been through so much shit and yet was still Chin, and the amusing looks the islander sent his way, and the friendly jibes Danny directed right back at him, sealed the deal. Yeah, they were family now too, no matter how unlikely of a family they might be.

And then there was his partner. Okay, yeah, so maybe Danny was a little more expressive than most men. And maybe, just maybe, a little more demonstrative. No, he wouldn't walk up to Kono and lay a hand on her arm. She'd take him down with a Jiu Jitsu move or some shit if he did. And Danny certainly would not, in due course of normal conversation, lay a hand on Chin's back no matter what sort of excuse his mind dreamed up.

But the one thing that mystified Danny was that he did those things and more to his very own partner, and not once had Steve flinched or pulled away or even so much as given him a sidelong glance for it.

For one of the first times outside of the Williams clan, Danny had found he could actually touch someone else without it getting blown way out of proportion, or making the other person so uncomfortable they'd request a fast transfer to a precinct in the next county (and no, he did not even want to hear his own mind retell that story or all the ones like it).

Christ, Danny knew it was his downfall in life, to be this guy who was so uncontrollably touchy-feely it was like he had hand-Tourettes or something. Danny thought how unfair it was that he didn't come lock, stock and barrel with a blinking neon sign that said: Spontaneous darting-out of limbs, beware.

And then he'd go and do things like draw hearts in the air in front of Army guys and Chin Ho and feel not one ounce of remorse for it. Or he'd check Steve's entire body from head to toe after a nasty bust just to make sure the idiot wasn't hiding injuries. Or he'd lend Steve a hand patching bullet holes and replacing dry wall after an old SEAL buddy decided to use the McGarrett house as target practice.

Well, Danny maybe wasn't altogether always that creative at demonstrating how he felt about people. Unless you called blustering insults that meant the opposite of what he truly felt as creative, or maybe the way his hands always moved.

It was more the little things that counted here, in the body language and in the brushes of arms and fingertips and in the way knees bumped together, and the looks from eyes to eyes. And really, Danny tried to hold it in but sometimes it was more subconscious than anything. He supposed he wouldn't hold it against his new team if they eventually shipped him back to HPD citing borderline sexual harassment.

But as the five of them stood around the computer table in the bullpen, each poring over separate files…as Danny made a small hum that meant he'd locked onto something he thought was a valuable piece of information…as Steve leaned closer and put his hand on Danny's shoulder so he could look right over Danny's body down to the piece of information in question…Danny thought, maybe he wasn't the only one who liked to be expressive.

It was a breath of fresh air, like his world had just gone from Kansas to Oz in the blink of an eye. And to a feeling of 'safe' that hadn't warmed Danny's insides since the day he'd left home. A quirked grin up at Steve, and the mirror of it he got back from his partner, confirmed it.

In the privacy of his own mind, Danny admitted he was finally home. Hand-Tourettes and all.

'Course, he'd never tell Steve that…