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"Kono."
"Steve, God." She's heading toward him, weaving her way through the overly crowded waiting area and he catches her eyes, sees the tension, the exhaustion burning there. The fear. Knows his own are a mirror to the same.
People are everywhere. Crying, moaning. Soothing.
"Kono, where--"
Her hands wrap his shoulders when she reaches him, her body pressing fully to his in a hug that ends with her sort of collapsing against him with a sharp exhale. It isn't hard to hear the relief there. "They're okay, Steve. They're okay. Chin--they're almost finished with him. I was just back there. Malia's there now. He--it could have been so much worse, but he's good. They're okay."
Okay, he thinks, her words like a mantra in his head. Okay. They're okay. He can deal with this. "So Chin--"
"Factured ulna. Two broken fingers. Bruised ribs. Sprained ankle. Scrapes and bruises--a lot of scrapes and bruises. A little road rash, not so bad," she says with fingers tracing down the side of her own face. She's trembling. "He had on his helmet--and his leather jacket. Saved him a lot of misery."
He nods. That's good. Then, "Danny?"
"He's--" She looks around, head whipping around the crowded room. Pointing. "There. Was over there. They told him to wait there--and he--" She looks a little perplexed. "He told them he wasn't so bad off. That he could wait to be seen. I don't--I don't know where--"
He focuses on her words. "Not so bad off?"
She looks so unraveled, and he touches her shoulder. Feels her exhale on a long sigh. "He said he was okay; he was bleeding, though, Danny. Blood. In his hair. On his face. He had a towel. Someone gave him a towel, but he said he was okay. That he could wait until they could see to others who might need more help than he did." She pulls away, looks around. "I just--he was right there."
"It's okay. I'll find him. You--are you alright?" He bends a little, looking into her eyes. She's shaken. More than he's seen before and it makes her look so young.
She swipes her hand across her eyes and then offers up a tremulous smile. Exhales another long, slow breath, gathering herself. "Yeah. I am. I'm good. I got there after it happened. Emergency response was already on the scene."
She drops back to lean her head against the wall, eyes searching the ceiling before closing. "God, Steve. There were just so many people hurt. I saw the truck that started the whole thing, they were taking the driver away with a sheet over his body."
"Yeah, I heard," Steve told her. "They think he had a stroke or heart attack or something--"
"Which caused him to hit the tour bus," she finished for him, continuing, "which then ran into the jersey wall and somehow ended up half on its side. Some cars hit the bus, some hit other cars--and one car, it--just blew up. It was on fire. God. There were all these people, crying and bleeding and--" She looks to him again, her eyes brimming. "I didn't see them at first. Chin and Danny. I knew they were there, right there, right when it happened. Apparently, the truck somehow clipped the bike and threw them sideways, and I saw Chin's bike--just trashed. I thought--God, I thought they were--I don't know how they weren't both killed. I just don't know."
He squeezes her shoulder and lets out his own deep breath. This could have been so much worse. So bad. Jesus. "They're okay, though. Right? They're okay." He keeps telling himself this. He has to find Danny. Needs to see him.
"Yeah," she says, nodding as she rakes fingers through her hair. "Yeah. Okay."
"So, what was Danny doing on the back of the bike, anyway? He's always giving Chin shit when he asks him to ride with him."
She laughs, shaking her head. "I know. I don’t know how he got Danny to ride along with him." She looks at him then, her hand squeezing his arm and he wonders what kind of expression he must be showing as she's then speaking gently to him. Reassuring him again. "He's okay. I've seen them. They really are both okay."
Okay, but he'd feel better if he could see Chin and find Danny. He turns, his hand still resting lightly on her shoulder as he scans the room again. Japanese tourists from the bus are mixed with locals and haoles. People are strewn everywhere, standing, sitting, some lying on the floor. The place is jammed, nurses checking over them, asking things and scribbling notes as they take quick assessments in what has become a mass triage. Somehow, it's controlled chaos, and he can't believe there weren't more fatalities.
No Danny, though, and he wonders if maybe he's with the doctor.
Kono pulls out her phone and then wearily moves to slide into a now vacated seat, but he can't sit and begins to pace, eyes still scanning for a glimpse of bright hair. He's about to go find someone to ask when a light touch taps his arm.
"Commander?"
There's a vaguely familiar face smiling up at him as he turns toward the voice. He thinks he remembers this woman from his last visit.
"It is you," she says, looking at him and smiling. "I thought so--" She glances down at her clipboard, then back to him. "When they brought Detective Williams in, I didn't recognize the name but I was fairly sure he looked familiar, and then when I saw you just now, I put it together. He was the one who'd been glued to your side the last time you were here. Cracked rib, as I recall? I remember you two arguing something about fresh and canned pineapple--which, my two cents here--why would anyone eat canned pineapple? Anyway, you two sounded so much like my husband and me, the memory stuck."
He really doesn't know what to say. He's feeling a bit numb. "Yeah, that was us. So, about my partner, Danny?"
She blinks for a minute, just kind of staring at him, then smiles. "Oh, of course. I'm sorry. He'll be heading to the exam room soon, if you could let him know. So I am right in that he's your partner?"
"Partner, yes. Danny, he's my partner."
She's checking her sheet again, nodding. "I thought so the last time I saw you both here, but didn't want to just assume. So, we do realize he's hurting, but if he can hang on just a little while longer, he'll be seen in just a little bit."
Another quick searching glance around the room, but he knows Danny's not there. "I'll let him know," he tells her.
"Okay, thank you. He keeps putting me off and pushing himself to the back of the line," she tells him. "I'd like to get him back with the doctor soon, though. I have a feeling he's hurting a little worse than he's letting on."
Steve nods. "That'd be typical of Danny, yep."
"Don’t worry." She smiles warmly at him and lays a hand on his forearm and squeezes in some sort of caring gesture. "We'll take good care of him for you. The doctors here are the best--and the nurses, if I do say so." She's smiling at him again--it's becoming a little unnerving, Steve will admit--and then she's nodding, checking her clipboard, turning to call out another name and hurrying off toward a man holding a bloody bandage to his head.
So just where is Danny? He looks around again, fighting the urge to yell out over the mass of people. Barely fighting.
Still, it doesn't make sense Danny's not here. Right here. Where else would he--
"Chin!"
Kono calls out and he looks up to see Malia pushing Chin in a wheelchair toward the door. She waves to him as he and Kono approach, then pulls Kono off to the side to converse. Chin looks a little dazed.
"Hey," Steve calls to him, and Chin smiles the smile of the semi-lucid.
"Steve. Howzit?"
"Better than you, brah." Chin looks more than a little rough around the edges, but enough in one piece that the pit in Steve's belly fills a bit.
"I'm going to get the car," Kono tells them as they pass. Malia is whispering something to Chin, then standing to smile at Steve. "I have to get back, if you could wait with him."
He nods. "Of course--and it's good to see you, Malia."
"Bet you never thought having to meet for lunch with the governor would turn out to be your lucky day, huh?" Chin's then asking, nodding, his words slow but clear, like he's taking extra care to be understood. "Of course, you taking Danny's car meant that he didn't have a--oh hey. Danny?"
Steve gives him a smile, hopes it's reassuring, although it doesn't feel that way. "He's good--he'll be fine. The docs're seeing him next, they just said." Where the hell is Danny?
"Steve, Steve--" Chin's voice is getting softer, like he's going to fall asleep. "Tell Danny, tell him sorry. Okay? That he was right."
"Hey, no. Don't be sorry--you didn't cause any of this. Plus, you know I can't do that. If I start telling him he's right about things, then his head will inflate to--"
Chin's hand grabs his arm. "No, see. I talked him into going with me on the bike. He didn't want to go--said he'd wait for you or Kono to come back. I gave him a hard time, made him ride. We were only going to get something to eat. Just going to lunch. Shouldn't've happened--none of this should have happened."
"Chin. It's okay--Danny's okay. You're okay. It's not your fault."
Chin closes his eyes then, like it's all he can do to make that much movement, and then Kono pulls up and they help Chin to the car. "Call me when you know about Danny, okay?" she asks and he assures her he will, then catches Chin's well past tired eyes and they both share a smile as the car pulls away.
It's a few quick steps back into the waiting area, where he still doesn't see Danny and tries to ignore the anxious churning that's rising up in his gut--and then he knows. Sure.
A push of the door and he pauses, moves quickly when he hears it--hears him. Retching--coming from the last stall.
Danny.
Below the gray door, the bottoms of black soled shoes peek out from under an ass he'd recognize anywhere.
A quick rap of his knuckles and then lets his palm splay flat against the stall door. "Danny?"
There's a grunt. Of affirmation, he thinks. Followed by more retching. Christ, how long has he been in here getting sick?
"Danny, you okay?" Which is a ridiculous thing to ask, considering. Much as he wants to, he can't push the door open without hitting Danny hard in the ass, so rests his forehead against the door's cool metal and watches the bottom of those shoes.
Waits.
The toilet flushes, the shoes shuffle, the ass moves and then the door opens with no small amount of accompanying grunts and groans. Jesus.
"Danny," he breathes, hand lifting to touch Danny's face, but pulling back as he takes him in--takes Danny's face in. Danny's bloody, scraped and more than a little swollen face. Definitely going to have a black eye. Or two.
Danny gazes somewhat blearily at him, even offers up a faint grin that comes across as fairly ghastly under the fluorescent lights of the bathroom, especially as it's accompanied by the blood still dried on his face. Danny then leans back against the stall door and closes his eyes--at least the one that isn't almost closed already--and exhales what sounds to Steve like, well, Steve. His name.
Steve wants to wrap his arms around him and pull him close. Wants so badly, feels the urge to do just that--do something, do anything--but his hands just hover in the air because he's not sure where to touch that won't hurt him.
It's been weighing on him lately, his wanting to touch Danny. Touch him all the time, and it doesn't always help that Danny also touches back. It's their being handsy with one another that is pushing Steve to want to go ahead and start something going between them--or not; he's not truly sure which way Danny will fall. He and Danny haven't yet so much as nudged at the base of this--thing. This attraction. This heated push-pull--this--this whatever the hell this is that's between them.
His attraction to Danny has been there from the start. He just needs to know how much, how far, how hard he can push it before it either breaks wide open, or collapses entirely, and he doesn't want to lose Danny by pushing too hard, too soon. Or make things worse, if he's just flat out wrong about this altogether.
But he doesn't think he is. Wrong, that is.
Not that any of that really matters right this minute--this second, he thinks. Danny looks like hell leaning there crookedly against the bathroom stall door, and Steve feels his heart race with the thought of what could have been. How much worse this could have gone for Chin and Danny, and hell. It's not like he and Danny haven't hugged before. He breathes out a loud, "fuck it", reaches out and carefully draws Danny toward him.
"Fuck what?" Danny mumbles as he just as easily moves into Steve's embrace, lets Steve wrap arms around him without hesitation, as if he were waiting for it, which is as much a testament to how awful Danny must be feeling as anything, and Steve then finds himself smiling over Danny's shoulder at how natural this feels to him. How perfectly they fit together. How much he wants them to fit.
He lets his chin drop to rest lightly atop Danny's head, breathing him in and thanking God that Danny is just banged up and bruised and not something worse.
They stand there a few long beats, and Steve feels somewhat surprised that Danny's letting him keep hold of him for so long, and in the next heartbeat, also feels unsure about how quiet Danny's being as silence is a pretty damned good indicator that something is more than a little wrong.
Just as he starts to ask how badly he's feeling, Danny suddenly pulls away, turning quickly to bend back over the toilet in another round of retching. Steve's stomach offers up a commiserating spasm, Jesus.
Danny's on his knees again, or on one knee sort of as he leans heavily to one side. Clearly his knee is hurting as his weight is mostly on his other, and Steve feels his concern rising. That feeling of wanting to do something is almost overwhelming.
The toilet's flushing again, Danny's moving to stand, wiping at his face and Steve hands him a handful of wet paper towels.
He looks worse than hell.
"You look worse than hell," he says in a suddenly unrestrained burst of concern, words just blurting out without reservation at the same time he thinks them and he mentally tells himself to shut the fuck up because he didn’t mean to say that out loud.
"But you're just as pretty as ever, fuck you very much," Danny huffs with a soft laugh through a soggy wad of wet paper. He's holding the mess to his nose, which seems to still be leaking a little blood. There's a small cut on the bridge, and Steve's pretty sure he's watching the bruising around Danny's eyes darken even as they stand there.
He reaches out and cups a hand lightly around Danny's jaw. "Think your nose is--might be--ah, it's looking a little--off kilter," Steve states, wincing, eyes roving over Danny's face and he hasn't even started yet on the man's body.
Danny peers up at him, squinting with his one good eye. "Uh, yes--I know that. If you're trying to be the silver lining to my dark cloud here, let me just say, it's not working." Then Danny's pointing. "Oh, hey. I think I got--is that my blood on your shirt?"
"Blood on my--" He looks down, fingers half-brushing at the stains on his shirt. "I don't care about that. How are you doing, really, Danny? The rest of you, I mean."
"Of course you don’t care. Let me guess, it'll just blend in with whatever old bloodstains are already there." A return of that ghastly smile, and really, all things considered, Steve's as happy to see it as not.
"Danny--"
"Okay, okay. Overall? I'd say uh, peachy. Just great, really, for being thrown from that deathtrap Chin calls transportation and almost run over. So, y' know, other than hell, how do I look? Really."
Steve gives him a faint grin. "Like you've been hit by a truck."
Danny suddenly turns back into the stall, spitting blood into the toilet, hand braced on the wall above his head and sounding out with a moan that cuts Steve like a knife. Danny's voice is shaky when he speaks. "Thought it was a bus. Hope you caught the guy--tell me you did. Tell me they're nailing the guy's ass. Figure he was drunk, the drunken fucker." Spits again.
Steve rakes eyes over Danny's body as he hovers over the toilet. Definitely a knee problem and it's fairly evident that the cane will be making a return. His shirt is partially shredded on his left side along with his pants at the hip, some degree of road rash visible through the tatters. Steve's also pretty sure there's something going on with his right wrist. He's noticed Danny hasn't been moving it much which is huge given the man's words also come alive through his hands.
"Not drunk," he tells him. "Guy actually might have had a heart attack, they think. Apparently lost consciousness and veered across lanes, which, well--you know."
Danny turns some to look back at him, hand still braced against the wall. He looks like he's going to be sick again any minute.
Concussion maybe, Steve's thinking, staring at Danny's eyes. Eye. Mild concussion. He hopes.
"Heart attack. Shit. That's just--just--shit. Poor guy," Danny says through another sort of growly moan and turns back to staring down into the toilet. He hunches lower and dry-heaves over the bowl before standing and resting his head against the wall of the stall. "Fuck."
"Okay?"
"Okay, yeah, just--can't even get angry about that, right? Heart attack. I mean, I guess I could be angry at myself about letting Chin talk me into--" Danny whirls then. "Oh God, Chin."
Steve steps forward, not that there's any space for him in the stall, and Danny's still braced over the toilet, staring back at him with some measure of anguish filling his features. They're crammed into a small space, almost on top of one another.
"He's okay, Danny. Chin's okay. I saw him. He's banged up and a bit broken, but he's going to be fine."
He deflates some, Danny. Visibly deflates. "Good, that's good. The truck driver heart attack guy. Did he--did he make it?"
Steve shakes his head.
"Jeeze." He's holding himself still, hanging again over the toilet and half mumbling. "God, I feel like shit, and there isn't even anyone to get angry with--"
The toilet flushes and Danny emerges looking paler and pastier under the dried blood that's mapped a tributary down his face.
Steve can't help himself, runs light fingers over hair that's congealed, sees the blood encrusted gash underneath. Danny's visibly shaking and looking like he may drop at any second. He's closed his eyes at Steve's touch.
"C'mon," Steve instructs, and braces arms around him as he begins to walk him to the waiting-slash-triage area. It's both a surprise and a concern at how easily Danny comes along. How suddenly quiet.
"You're next on the list, they said," he tells him. "You definitely need to see the doctor."
"Yeah," Danny sighs, body relaxing more against Steve as they find a couple of chairs empty and waiting. "There were a lot more people a lot worse off--but now, I'd like to get out of here. Feeling kinda tired," he's saying, mumbling and sounding as tired as he says he is, and then Steve feels a sudden weight rest along his shoulder. Danny's let his head fall there. Steve can't even help the touch of smile pulling at the corners of his mouth.
It's a long fifteen minutes during which Steve hopes the nurse will come to get Danny, yet also he hopes she won't. Danny's never been so malleable and agreeable, and now that he's fallen asleep, Steve hates to wake him and lose the warmth of him sleeping on his shoulder. It feels--right, somehow.
The nurse with the clipboard shows up just as Danny's shifted to turn his face into Steve's chest.
"I see you found him," she says. "I hate to wake him, but it's his turn. Can you get him up?"
"Danny?" Steve prompts and Danny raises his head, clearly sleep-muddled. He looks completely confused as he stares at Steve, pushing up to sit and offering up a, "Hey," and Steve can't help but think Danny still hasn't quite registered where he is for a second.
"Your turn," Steve then tells him, helping him to stand, one hand on his shoulder and the other on the small of his back to propel him forward and guide him when Danny just stands looking dazed. They hit the examination area and are joined by another nurse who then helps Danny behind the curtain. Steve's not entirely sure Danny's fully registering what's going on, and is about to duck back there with him when the nurse pulls the curtain shut and tells him: "You can wait for him back in the waiting area. He shouldn't be too long."
"Oh. Uh, okay," he responds. But it really isn't okay. It isn't that he expected to be able to wait back here with Danny, not really, it's just-- he really wants to. Doesn't want to let him out of his sight now that he's found him. Is pretty sure his facial features are shifting into some sort of face that Danny most likely has labeled, and he tries to school them into something more neutral because really, he knows he's just a bystander here.
Then the clipboard nurse is there, folding it against her chest as she looks at him with a tilt to her head that clearly tells him she's noticed the 'face'.
"Listen," she begins with an almost conspiratorial hush to her words as she nods to a chair across from the curtained room. "You just go ahead and wait right there if you like. We're not so busy now as we've seen the majority of folks, and he is your other half. I absolutely get that, I do. It's hard to leave your loved one, but it's too small an area to have you wait in there with him." She smiles. "Just sit. I'm sure Dr. Marlon will be happy to answer any questions you may have when he's finished with your partner."
His ears catch 'sit here', 'other half' and 'loved one', and that's about it, and he starts to splutter, "Oh, hey. He's not--Danny's my partner, yes, but we aren't, he isn't--" and then his brain has some sort of internal eruption and when the thought magma manages to fall back together inside his skull, he thinks, well why the hell not? His mind's been heading along those lines with Danny lately, anyway, especially since the military's recent 'coming to its senses' repeal, so what's wrong about someone assuming that he and Danny are partners and, well, partners.
Kind of likes that she thinks that about them, lets it roll around in his head and knows he's suddenly grinning as he sits down in the chair. "Okay, thanks," he tells her. "I'll just wait for my partner right here."
"I'll let the doctor know you're sitting here for him." She pats his shoulder lightly, giving him a long look as she then walks away.
Partners, he thinks, and thinks again. Partners.
By the time they finish at the hospital, Steve's waited in more waiting areas than he ever knew existed.
Danny's been seen by three different doctors for various parts of his bruised anatomy, been sent to x-ray, had his knee checked, had his wrist checked, had his skin checked, his nose and eyes, been sent back to x-ray, and countless places in between.
After finally having his head examined, and Steve was hard pressed to keep a lid on the absolute shit-boatload of jokes he wanted to let spew--he'll admit he's now feeling a bit punchy--they were leaving. Finally. A total of four hours and thirty-four long-ass minutes from start to finish.
He's beat.
So, too, is Danny.
Who is now resembling one of the walking dead.
Okay, Steve is pretty sure he's holding most of Danny's weight as Danny shuffles the few steps from the ER to the car. He has stitches in his head and on his nose, has two black eyes but not a broken nose, surprisingly. He's got a hard splint bracing his right wrist--badly sprained but also not broken--and bandages over the abrasions down his side. A mild concussion, and the familiar knee brace is back which means, as Steve had predicted, the cane would be making its return.
Danny pretty much falls into the car and shoves the bag he's been clutching in his good hand at Steve: antibiotics, a prescription for the pain reliever he's already been given, and some sort of antibiotic cleanser and lotion that the doctor has prescribed for the road rash.
"What?" Steve asks because Danny's mumbling something. "Danny, what are you saying?"
One glassy eye opens and stares at Steve. "She said that I should give these to you. To you."
"Well yeah, I know, and that's--" Okay, he's not sure why Danny seems so irritated. "That's probably because I was there with you, right? Been with you all this time. Besides, you're pretty much drugged to the gills and they figure I'm, you know, that I'm--that I'll be in charge."
"In charge. In charge of what? In charge of me? You think you're in charge of me?"
Okay, so maybe now Danny's finally found something to be angry about, and Steve shakes his head. "Not in charge of you. They didn't say that. I didn't say that. Just--just, that I'd be able to make sure that you, you know, follow doctor's orders. That's all."
"Oh, is that all."
"Yeah, Danny, that is pretty much all. I was there to help. Been around all day, remember? I'm sure the doctor and nurses just figure I'd keep helping. Help you when you need help." He's glancing at Danny, who's now half slumped in the seat and staring out the window with his one open eye. Looking a bit pissed, and a lot more fuzzy. The good drugs are kicking in, Steve can tell.
"Help. Uh-huh." Definitely sounding a little belligerent, too.
"What, uh-huh? You don't believe I'm here to help? Or you don't believe I can help?"
Danny's doing his best to sit upright, but his movements are becoming sluggish and he's starting to list to one side. Towards Steve. "I don't believe for a minute that she told me to give these to you because of your grand delusions of help."
"Grand delusions of help--what does that even mean?"
Now Danny turns to face him. He looks exhausted. His one eye is still swollen shut, the other swollen enough to notice. His face is bruised and while he looks like he feels terrible, Steve can tell by the glassy look to his one open eye that he's not feeling too much pain. Not at the moment.
"What it means is that the antibiotic wash should be used in the shower."
Steve nods. "Makes sense."
"While I'm in the shower. With the wash. On me. In the shower."
"Um, okay--"
"And the lotion should be applied after I'm out. Out of the shower. The shower she said might be soothing."
Steve nods, not quite following Danny's rather odd conversational direction here. Why was he sounding so perturbed about using the stuff in the shower? "Okay, well, that all sounds good. A shower would probably make you feel better. I get that."
Danny's nodding now, too. His splinted hand remains still in his lap while the other waves around from time to time. He's still staring at him with his one eye, leaning on his left shoulder with his face now pressed to the seatback. Kind of glaring, actually.
"Yeah. She said a shower would be soothing, and that you should help me. In and out. Of the shower."
That makes sense. "Okay, I can do that."
"And then apply the lotion and bandages after I'm dry." He pauses a few beats, then: "After you've helped me dry off. After my shower that you've helped me in and out of. She said."
"Oh." And okay, Danny's becoming a little hard to follow given there's now slurring and words running together, but he gets the gist. He's supposed to help. He was planning on it anyway. That's why he's driving them to his house. Where Danny will be staying. So he can help him.
Danny's now kind of shooting little dagger glares outright at him, though. He can't figure out why.
"Yeah--oh--Steve. Oh is right. She--she's apparently very enamored with you. With us."
"Oh, yeah?"
"Yeah," Danny continues, shifting a bit. His eyes close and his voice softens. "Yeah. And she thought you should help me wash my hair to make sure I avoid getting shampoo in my stitches." He rolls his head, and Steve glances over at him as he continues. "My hair. Washing it. When you're helping me. In the shower."
"Oh."
"That would be in the shower, Steve. In. In with me. Before you help me out and dry me off. Dry me off. That's what she said to me, that you would dry me off to be able to dry around the abrasions. Something about patting not rubbing."
Steve nods. "Okay."
"Patting, Steve."
"Patting," Steve says. "Okay."
Silence for another long beat. Danny's back to staring at him, then, "Okay? That's all you have to say? Okay?"
"Well, Danny--"
Danny shifts to sit higher in the seat. "So, it's okay with you to help me shower. Wash my hair. That's fine with you. Just a-okay, perfectly normal, wash-me-and-dry-me-and-bandage-me-up--and that's all just peachy-sparkly-fluffy-fine with you. The patting and the--the all."
Steve nods. "Well, yeah. Yes, I can say I am okay with all of that."
"You are."
"Did I not just say I was?"
Danny makes a funny noise, one Steve hasn’t heard him make before, then softly says, "Okay, see. You don't get it."
"What? What don’t I get? Get what? Danny, you're my partner, and--"
"Okay, see. No. She said that, too. The nurse. The one with the uh, the thing. That thing--that clipboard thing. She said she remembered us from before, and that you told her that yes, we are partners."
This is maybe not going quite like Steve hoped it would when the actual push came to shove time happened, and he throws a hand up in the air. "Well, Danny. You know. Yes. We are partners."
And then Danny's hand makes its appearance. The splinted one tagging along best it can. "Partners, Steve. Partners. Partners. Not partners. Partners!"
"Okay, you do know you're just saying the same thing over and over and--"
"No. No. You know what I mean. Partners. Partners as in partners who wash each other's hair and bodies in the shower and--and--and dry off--and lotion--"
"And help pat around skin rashes."
"Yeah," Danny agrees and he's still staring at him. "Yeah. Patting. That. And, well, that."
Steve's smiling now. He can't help it. There's some measure of hope underlying all of this--hope that Danny will quit the freak out and maybe just go with the whole partner thing that's now been shoved to the forefront by the well-meaning nurse with the clipboard.
It's not like he and Danny haven't edged around each other all these months anyway.
"Showers. Hair washing. Lotion. And patting you. Honestly, Danny. It just doesn't sound so horrendously awful."
And Danny's looking at him, totally confused. "It doesn't?"
Steve shakes his head. "Nope. Not to me."
"Oh," Danny says and gets quiet. "Well, then, I…just…Oh."
Steve watches him look out the windshield for a while. Watches as Danny then turns to look at him.
Watches and waits. Hopes.
Danny doesn’t say anything for quite a long stretch, which has Steve's gut twisting, then:
"So like, okay with lotion. And patting? With hands on, you know, skin?"
Steve nods. "Okay with skin."
"And showers?"
"Okay with showers. Tonight, tomorrow. Danny, I have no problem with my hands being on your skin in and out of the shower, trust me on this."
The incredibly heavy silence about kills Steve, because there's really no mistaking what he just implied and his gut is twisting into knots while awaiting Danny's reaction which takes a bit longer than he hoped. Then again, there are painkillers aboard; Danny's moving slower than usual.
"Oh. Oh. Oh! So you're--because--and partners. You and me and-- Partners?"
"Yeah, Danny,," he says softly. "Partners." With that, Steve lets his heart hang out there, his head and stomach a whirling mass of internal chaos as he holds his breath without thinking, not at all sure of the path of the next two minutes. Not sure whether he will be making the turn to drop Danny at his place, or heading them both home to his.
Steve glances at him then, that word still just hovering over their heads like an open thought bubble. Smiles outright, actually. Has a vision of Danny in the shower. A vision of him washing Danny's hair, Danny's body. Spreading the lotion and slowly, gently, massaging it into Danny's skin--and okay, the man is hurt, but it's not a bad way to get this thing between them rolling. Hands on flesh.
Doctor's orders and all.
Danny looks up at him from where he's shifted himself even lower in the seat, trying to find a comfortable position. "So you--I didn't think--I wanted, but never--y' know, because Navy and SEALS and--and all that--" He's stumbling over words, but Steve can now see what he hoped he'd be seeing in Danny's eyes. Or eye, anyway.
Danny's eye closes slowly, and when he opens it again, his voice is barely there. "So really? Partners?"
"Yeah," Steve answers, and reaches over to take a hold of Danny's good hand. Intertwines their fingers, and lets his thumb lightly rub across the back. Pulls that hand slowly to his mouth to press lips against the skin there.
Danny will now pull away and punch him, he thinks. Or not.
Danny--who's watching. Who's staring at their hands--staring at Steve, then back to their hands. Back to Steve. Back to hands.
"Okay," Danny then says softly, clearing his throat and then saying louder, "Okay, I can-- Okay, then," as he gingerly shifts around in the seat.
Steve's watching Danny, or watching best he can given that he's also driving and sure as shit doesn't want to get Danny in another accident. It's hard, though, as he'd rather stare at Danny than watch the road.
Still, when Danny lets his head drop against the seat back with one long last look, and then lets his one open eye fall closed, looking as tired as he most surely is, Steve can't help but disentangle their hands to reach over to touch him. To let his fingers gently play with the hair at Danny's nape. Let his thumb brush along the smooth skin there at Danny's neck, along his jaw, caressing while also relishing the feel of the warmth there as Danny begins to fall asleep.
The light changing from yellow to red at the next intersection has him braking gently. So much so that Danny opens his eyes, voice low and gravelly. "Where?"
"Almost there," Steve tells him, using the stop to throw the car into gear while he leans over enough to turn Danny toward him.
A slow press to the lips, Steve holds Danny's face in both hands, drawing him forward and kissing him with just the beginning of all he'd like to share.
They pull apart, Danny looking not just a little bit stunned, his eye at half-mast yet focused enough on Steve, licking his lips and smiling. Smiling.
"Okay, that. So. So, what? No tongue?" Danny asks, eyes crinkling at the corners, looking exhausted and disheveled as he's poured there in a relaxed sprawl.
Which makes Steve shake his head, laughing. "Toothbrush--toothpaste?"
"Whatever makes you happy," Danny says, eye now fully closed. "Partner."
"Partners," Steve states, smiling in return, stepping on the gas as the light turns green.
Driving them home.