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Steve isn’t entirely sure how the whole thing started.
Originally, it was just a way to get Danny out of a bad mood. Even having his partner yelling and ranting was better than the glum anxiousness that accompanied him (and therefore Steve) when it had still seemed Rachel was going to be taking Grace away again. In an attempt to see anything other than that frown - the one that made something churn uncomfortably in Steve’s chest - he’d stolen Danny’s phone, changing the generic background picture to a rather unflattering one of the detective in the middle of shoving a malasada in his mouth.
Danny had yelled at him for seven minutes straight, but Steve figured it was worth it when he could see the hint of something that was almost a smile in response to his own uncontainable grin. Besides, if Danny had actually been serious about ‘boundaries’ and ‘regard for personal property’, then he would have changed the passcode on his phone by now. But it was still the same four digits it had always been - and really, Grace’s birthday was about as predictable as the sun rising in the East. Steve took that to mean that his antics weren’t nearly as upsetting as Danny liked to pretend.
So nowadays it’s more of a habit than anything else. Even on days when Danny’s worry lines aren’t getting deeper by the hour, or he isn’t suspiciously quiet because he’s pondering something over and over in his head, Steve will manage to ‘borrow’ the other man’s phone and change the background to something new. Usually, it’s a picture he’ll discreetly snap of Danny, in the middle of doing something ridiculous. The first time was one of many similar images, though sometimes it’s pizza or whichever sub they’d decided on for lunch that day. Other times, he’ll manage to catch Danny in the middle of one of few rants that aren’t directed at Steve himself, his face contorted and his hands windmilling around his body as he makes a point. Rarely, Steve will turn the camera around and make the most ridiculous expression he can think of before setting his own face on the screen to be the first thing that Danny will see the next time he uses his phone.
“You are not nearly as funny as you think you are, Steven,” Danny says, and Steve looks up to find the detective leaning against the doorframe of his office.
“Oh?” he asks, looking up from the paperwork on his desk, purposefully keeping his face as blank as possible, as though he has no idea what this conversation could possibly be about. He thinks this might be a new record - Danny had left his phone in the office in the fifteen minutes he’d taken to pick up lunch with Chin, so the latest picture has only been there for half an hour at the most. It usually takes at least two for his partner to register the change, and sometimes it’s not even until they’ve left the office for the day. Steve has more than one voicemail of Danny ranting into his phone in the evening after discovering the change Steve had made that day.
“Don’t even try that with me,” the blonde answers, with a sigh that would sound exasperated to just about anyone else. Steve likes to think he can hear other things underlying that though - a bit of resignation, but also something that’s almost like fondness and possibly even amusement. He never lets himself consider that too much though, which is helped by the fact that Danny just keeps talking.
“I’m not even sure when you find the time to be such a shutterbug, and frankly, it’s a little disturbing to see that you’re doing so while we’re supposed to be working.” He holds up his phone as if to prove his point, and even from here, Steve can see a faint hint of the background. It’s from the week before, Danny standing next to an HPD patrol car, covered in glitter from chasing their suspect through an art supply store.
Steve can feel a grin starting to form at the corners of his mouth, and it takes more effort that it should to keep his tone as mild as he can when he responds, “I’m not sure what you’re talking about Danny.”
Predictably, Danny just rolls his eyes. "You know exactly what I'm talking about. I know that you know exactly what I'm talking about, and yet it seems that we are going have yet another conversation about your lack of understanding about privacy and your utter disregard for other individuals’ personal property. Specifically, my phone.”
There is no doubt in Steve’s mind that Danny would have continued ranting for at least the next several minutes if said phone hadn’t started ringing at that moment. Glancing down at it, Danny smiled - the small one that always appears whenever Grace is the one calling - and went to step away, though not before saying, “Do not think this is over McGarrett.”
And really, Steve isn’t expecting it to be. But then Danny is side-tracked by his daughter, and then they have to go out and do their job catching bad guys, and by the time they’re in car on the way back to HQ, Danny’s too busy yelling at him about he isn’t superhuman and injuries being an actual thing that happen to real people and how it wouldn’t kill Steve to wait thirty seconds for back-up. So it would seem that the rant about the phone and whatever else that would entail has been moved down in importance, at least until the next time Steve goes to change Danny’s background once more.
He doesn’t get the chance to do that - doesn’t even think about it, honestly - until Sunday evening, four days since their last discussion (as it were) on the topic. Danny had Grace over the weekend, which the two of them spent at Steve’s house, since Grace has finally convinced her father to let Steve start teaching her to surf. Weekends with Grace always mean that Danny is already in a good mood, so Steve doesn’t have a need to cheer him up or distracted by doing things like messing with the settings of his phone. It’s easier to think about it that way than to concentrate too long on the warm, fuzzy, weird feeling in his chest when he has both Williamses hanging out with him.
On the other hand though, there’s a tightness in his ribs Sunday evening when Danny has left to take Grace back to Rachel’s, and if that’s how Steve’s feeling, he’s sure it has to be at least a hundred times worse for Danny. And of course, he spots his partner’s phone sitting on the kitchen table about two seconds after that thought crosses through his head, and really, by this point it’s almost second nature to snatch it up.
Once he does, though, it takes Steve a moment to realize what he’s looking at. There’s a different picture, a new background that he’s never seen before, and once he understands what he’s seeing, he can’t bring himself to move, let alone start messing around with the settings.
Because although he’s never seen the image that is currently glaring up at him from the phone’s screen, he can remember the moment perfectly. It was yesterday afternoon, when Grace had demanded he read her something, the two of them curled up in the hammock on the lanai - and Steve had felt a little guilty about that at the time, stealing any of Danny’s time away from his daughter, but his partner had just smiled, almost indulgent, with a small wave of his hand that granted permission for whatever Grace had wanted. And by the time he’d finished reading, she’d been fast asleep, curled into his side with her head on his shoulder. Steve hadn’t wanted to disturb her, that strange warm-fuzzies beating with the rhythm of his heartbeat, and so he had stayed put, dozing off to the sounds of Grace’s breathing and the waves on the beach.
He has no idea how long he stands in his kitchen, frozen and staring, trying to figure out what, if anything, it means - dear God, it has to mean something, right? Steve is so lost in his own head that he doesn’t hear the Camaro out front, doesn’t even register the front door opening and Danny letting himself inside until he hears, “I knew that one of these days I was going to catch you in the act.”
Steve spins around, phone still in hand, to find Danny smirking at him from the other side of the room. He opens his mouth to say something, anything, if only he could find words, which it quickly becomes apparent that he can’t. “I…” he manages before giving up with a helpless shrug. There’s too much running through his mind to even attempt a complete sentence right now.
Something in Danny’s expression shifts minutely, the smirk on his face becoming softer as he takes the few steps to close the distance between him, lightly plucking his phone back from Steve’s - admittedly extremely loose - grip. He glances at the screen, and then back up at Steve when he sees that no change has been made.
“I would have thought, that with as often as you like to make my background ridiculous things, you’d have had it down to a fine science that my absence would have allowed for more than enough time for,” Danny teases, a grin still lurking at the edges of his mouth.
He should say something in response, Steve is more than aware of this, something that gets them back to their usual ground of banter and bickering that’s easy and comfortable. But his mind is still stuck on the fact that Danny changed his own background this time, and of all the pictures he has, that’s the one he decided on. And that knowledge has knocked loose the weird unnamed feelings in Steve’s chest and really, he has no idea what to do now.
Of course, Danny picks up on this pretty quickly, his eyebrows coming together in concern as he says, “Hello? Earth to SuperSEAL? What is with Aneurysm Face? Did you concuss yourself in the ten minutes I was gone? C’mon, Steve, give me something here so I don’t think you’ve actually been taken over by a robot this time.”
Steve inhales, and the air he gets carries a hint of Danny’s cologne, and for whatever reason, the fact that he can recognize that gives him the courage to ask the one question that's been on repeat in his head since the moment he first saw the picture.
“Why?”
He would swear that the question brings the faintest hint of a blush to Danny’s cheeks, but Steve is more interested in concentrating on the way one of his shoulders hitches up slightly as he says, “Why not? My two favorite people in this pineapple-infested place.”
Steve can feel the way his breathing catches at that, and when Danny raises his gaze to look back into Steve’s eyes, it seems as though there’s a multitude of things being said in the silence of the small space between them. And words have always been Danny’s thing, everyone knows that, while Steve is more prone to action, which is the only defense he has for the fact that his response is to lean forward and press his mouth to Danny’s.
For half a heartbeat, he’s terrified that he’s made a mistake, that he’s read everything between the two of them wrong over these last few minutes and has subsequently screwed up the best friendship he’s ever had. But then Danny is kissing him back, and everything narrows down to Danny’s mouth opening under his, and his fingers in Danny’s hair, and Danny’s hands gripping the jut of his hipbones as if to keep him from going anywhere (as if Steve ever wants to move from here ever again).
A few seconds, or hours, or years later - Steve really doesn’t know, he can’t think of anything beyond Danny at this point - they separate, just enough for Steve to press his forehead lightly against Danny’s, breathing in each other’s air.
“We’re still going to be having that conversation about your utter disregard for privacy,” Danny says, but he’s smiling.
Steve can feel himself grinning like a loon, and can’t bring himself to care as he answers, “Okay, Danno,” before putting both their mouth back to better use.