Disclaimer: I don't own anything CSI: NYish it belongs to the geniuses that created it. I also don't own the song 'He Didn't Have To Be' it belongs to the oh so talented Brad Paisley

A/N: this is my first CSI: NY fan fiction. So give me a chance please. It will be in Danny's point of view and it will be a DA

Hope you enjoy it!

Brianna

He Didn't Have To Be

He remembered it like it happened yesterday, but it happened twenty years ago. He remembered how John became part of his life.

He doesn't remember his biological father, who ran off on his Mom while she was pregnant with him. His mom says that his real father saw him once and only once, right before the divorce was final.

His mom told him that she had 'job interviews' instead of dates. Not because he was little and wouldn't understand, but because that's how they felt, like job interviews. What's worse is the guys ran the other way when they found out about him. So finally she stopped waiting until the dates to let guys interested in her know about him. It took a while for her to meet guys open to dating a single mom.

But when he was five, they met John. John loved kids; in fact he worked with them at the local YMCA. He was on the baseball team and John was his coach. One day his mom was late picking him up and John stayed with him. His mom kept saying sorry over and over again. John just said that it was fine and took them to dinner and a movie. Six months later they were married.

He remembered how suddenly they became a family and he remembered all the things John did for him as a kid. He realized that John didn't have to let him call him dad; John didn't have to do anything that he did. When he was a teenager he tried to be half the man John was.

Later when he became a CSI, he met the girl of his dreams. It took him a while to get the courage to ask her out but now, three years later, he is glad he did ask her out. He looks across the room at her telling his parents their good news and remembers the conversation they had before they found out. Something was missing and they both knew it. So when they found out she pregnant they knew they found the missing part of their lives.

NINE MONTHS LATER…..

Danny Messer looked at his wife, Aiden, and their six month old daughter Kellie Elizabeth and hoped he could be the husband and father that John didn't have to be.