"Hold My Hand" - Danny/Steve H50

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Title: “Hold My Hand”
Fandom: H50
Characters: Danny and Steve
Pairing: Danny/Steve
Summary: Steve wants something. 
Rating: PG
Spoilers: I'm pretty sure having seen a preview/commercial you've seen enough to read this.
Warnings: slashy
Disclaimer: Who gave me the rights to H50? No one yet. But I'm stilllll hoping.

As always, thanks to my friends, without whom I don't know what I'd do. They know who they are :) Well they'd better, or I'll beat them.

Hold My Hand

Early on in 5-0 days, Danny and Steve saw a lot of each other between work and Kono’s marathon popcorn sessions in front of the big screen in the office (no one blamed her, the TVs at the office were bigger than her apartment). With the exception of time during his weekends with Grace, Danny was always happy to come and have a beer or five on the beach (as much as he said he didn’t like the beach, he sure seemed to enjoy digging his toes in the sand).

Grill-outs became common place and Steve saw more and more Danny. Soon enough Danny was bringing Grace along with the team. Kono and Chin, even Kamekona, reacted to her in much the same way morning glories react to the sun. Steve’s response to her - well if Grace was Danny’s sun then he was Danny’s moon, and that was really all there was to it. Eventually, they spent more time together than apart.

And yet as often as Steve got to see Danny, it never seemed to be enough. He was addicted and he didn’t know how to quit.

Oh he did his best to hide it - he would fuss at Danny when he waltzed into Steve’s house with no knock or warning of his impending arrival, but the truth was it thrilled Steve every time Danny swaggered into his house like there weren’t any boundaries between them anymore. And maybe there weren’t, at least as far as their friendship went.

Danny didn’t have Grace that particular weekend, according to Rachel she had a sleepover at a friend’s but she was willing to reschedule his weekend. Lately Danny and Rachel seemed to be on better terms, for which Steve was both grateful and jealous, but he reminded himself for the seven hundred and fourth time that Danny was at his house, on his couch with him, and not at Rachel’s or out at a bar picking up Rachel look-a-likes. That had to mean something, didn’t it?

Steve didn’t really follow baseball. He’d never played it and he’d always considered it “boring” and wasn’t really sure he could consider it a sport. Danny insisted that it was, that it was a grand tradition, that it was the real beautiful game, though he wasn’t sure why Danny always made that specification, though once he thought he’d heard a grumble about soccer being glorified track. He wasn’t sure about either of those things (he loved football and MMA matches and he didn’t mind college basketball on occasion). Still Danny was trying to teach him to like baseball.

“It’s in the little things. It’s all these tiny moments build up. I mean even a foul means strain on your pitch- you’re not even listening to me, are you?” Danny’s hands flapped in the air, before he settled them on the couch again. “I guess I shouldn’t complain, you let me watch it on your glorious TV.”

“I was listening, I’m watching... I mean yeah, more pitches more... uh... More changes? You don’t want to use your designator pitchers too often.”

“Yeah, something like that,” Danny chuckled. “Why do you have me over to watch this with you if you don’t even like it?”

“I like baseball, really, well, it’s growing on me,” Steve said and Danny chuckled again.

“I like hanging out here too, babe... I mean you’ve always got beer.” He turned back to the TV and Steve let out a breath as quietly as he could. How did this man cause him so much... whatever this was?

Steve laid his hand on the couch close to Danny’s. There were a couple of inches between them, but their hands were close enough that he was sure he could feel the warmth of Danny’s hand waiting to spread through him. How could such a tiny distance, seem so far? How could such a small act as collecting someone’s hand in your own seem so daunting?

Steve was not afraid of many things. Steve was not afraid of knives, guns, sharks, women on shopping sprees, bombs, jumping off buildings, comic con fanboys, biochemical weapons, hostage takers, mothers with single daughters, FBI or CIA or any other Alphabet Soup Agency, careening cars, terrorist cells, tall cliffs, crashing helicopters, assassins or pirates.

But he was afraid of the reason he was so desperate for just a little bit of contact with Danny.

He shifted on the couch, attempting to inconspicuously move closer to Danny, hoping to mask his purpose in casualness, as if he wasn’t bursting to close that minute distance between them.

Getting resettled allowed him to place his hand oh so casually (his aim was perfect if he didn’t say so himself) to brush against Danny’s. He held his breath, and waited to see if the fact that their little fingers were now touching would cause Danny to react. Danny didn’t flinch.

It was stupid, this tiny thing, this centimeter of contact between them, really it was. So why did it have Steve so twisted up inside - so hopeful and so nervous?

Then Danny moved his hand and Steve thought he was going to move away, but he didn’t. The back of Danny’s knuckles rested against Steve’s fingers. Steve never wanted to move.

Except he was dying, aching to weave his fingers through Danny’s, to hold that small part of him.

After a few minutes, he worked up the nerve to angle his hand so that their knuckles fit together like puzzle, holding his breath again.

Danny moved his hand then and Steve thought his heart might stop and he was about to jerk his hand away, a tiny bit embarrassed though he would never tell anyone that - ever when Danny gathered up Steve’s in his own and laced their fingers together.

Steve couldn’t look at Danny straight on, hell, he couldn’t breathe. He kept snatching glances of Danny with his peripheral vision. Danny didn’t overtly look over, but he stroked Steve’s thumb with his own and didn’t let go of Steve’s hand for the rest of the game.