Steve McGarrett

There is a seal.

There is a seal sitting - or laying, more accurately - on the beach in front of the hut, and Steve isn't the only one who isn't exactly sure what to make of it. Zulu is pacing anxiously on the front porch, trying to decide if it's worth it to go and investigate more closely. Steve finally stays him with a hand and hops down the steps to walk closer, but he can hear the dog whining from the porch behind him.

"Stay," he murmurs, giving Zulu an urgent look, and then returns his attention to the seal - the seal that looks like it's wearing a - bow?

He tries not to scare the animal away, slowly sinking down to a crouching position until he's almost at eye-level - and then just stares.

He might still be in a staring contest with a seal if anyone happens to pass by.

The days have been busier for them, between Danny's heightened responsibilities at the IPD and Steve's decision to run for Council a second term. Sometimes, the only moments when they manage to locate one another are in bed, asleep, and then waking up in the morning to do it all over again. It might be a taste of what life would be like if they'd gone and done this back home, with work slipping to the forefront for a while until they managed to get their bearings.

It's why, when Danny suggests an early evening game of baseball, just the two of them, Steve doesn't hesitate - though what he sees when he finally gets there is enough to warrant some surprise, and maybe a little teasing. He's only seen Danny in a shirt and tie - and a t-shirt, more often, for sleeping - but he doesn't know what to say when he happens upon his husband wearing a pair of cargo pants - his cargo pants.

"Okay, I'm actually at a loss for words in this moment," he says, holding up a hand. "Did you have an aneurysm of your own when I wasn't looking?"

The day before the wedding dawns about the same as it always has on the island - quiet and unassuming. Steve knows not to rule out the possibility of an otherworldly wrench being thrown into the mix, but for now, he's going to dismiss all of those thoughts from his mind, choosing to use the time he has to himself to spend it doing one of the things he loves most. He doesn't expect Danny to tag along with him - his partner needs the space as much as he does, in a healthy sense - but he's also not expecting that anything about the next few days is going to fall under the category of 'traditional'.

The board he uses is Danny's, technically - it had arrived with Danny, at least, which means it's about a head too short for Steve, but he knows how to shift his footing to compensate for a shorter board once he gets out on the waves. He catches a few until the sun shifts its position in the sky, and then he settles into a straddle on the board, sitting out on the water and letting the waves move him, unrushed and unhurried, the sun beating down on his shoulders and the back of his neck.

Right now, he feels more peaceful than he's ever been - and he knows that while tomorrow is the next big step, he also knows it's the right move. He hadn't expected to fall in love with a loud-mouthed cop from Jersey, but at the end of the day, it's exactly like what he told Danny back at home: he's in this, whether he'd planned for it or not.

And he's ready.

The last few days have consisted of a lot of construction work. Steve realizes he might be tackling more than he can handle by himself, but he doesn't want to approach anyone too early and give the secret away, especially anyone who he considers a mutual friend of his and Danny's. Especially when the secret directly involves the wedding, and making repairs to Danny's shack of a former hut in order to create the perfect honeymoon getaway. It's his way of doing something special, since they won't have anywhere to go when the wedding is all over. But in order to make sure it's ready by Christmas, there's a lot that needs to be done before it can even be considered habitable again.

In his spare time, he's been working on solidifying the foundation, making sure the roof doesn't cave in and taking care of any leaky areas in case one of those fleeting island rainstorms manages to hit. It's there, perched on the edge of the roof and wielding a hammer, that he accidentally hurts himself. The hammer misses the wood and comes down right on his thumb, and at first, Steve's willing to push through the pain, to work through it.

But when the pain starts to get even harder to ignore, he knows he's got to find a way to deal with it without alerting Danny and potentially arousing suspicion. He packs up his borrowed tools for the rest of the day and heads inland, to the clinic, just to get himself checked out. If nothing else, he's probably given himself little more than a swollen thumb, but it's better to be safe than sorry at this point, especially since his inner Danny-voice is telling him he'll lose a finger if he ignores it much longer.

It's been a week since Danny stormed out of the hut in the middle of the night, just after the Mardi Gras party, and Steve had spent the whole night unable to get a single hour of sleep, staring blankly up at the dark ceiling and trying to figure out exactly when everything had gotten so complicated.

He didn't have to track Danny's trail for too long the next morning to figure out he was sleeping back at his old hut, but he'd kept his distance, trying to respect his partner's decision.

Two days later, Danny had showed up again, but even after that everything had seemed to settle into an awkward holding period, the two of them barely making contact or even sharing the hut at the same time except at night. Steve had tried to distract himself with other things for a while - taking the surfboard out to catch some waves, doing a little more construction work on the hut to expand the porch area, but even after that he found himself ending up in places where Danny would likely show his face - the Catscratch, for one, where Steve had overheard him having a very interesting conversation with Rachel.

Today, he wakes up, listening to the sound of the waves hitting the shore in the early morning, and just lays in bed for a little while, trying to work out if he should get up and start breakfast. He doesn't know if Danny even came home last night.

It's a little strange, Steve thinks, as he comes down from the attic with the last of the boxes, to be back in Hawaii celebrating Christmas after so many years of not, but there are probably worse circumstances than these to be in. Especially now that he actually has some company. His father's house had only felt bigger the longer he'd been in it alone, but he doesn't have to worry about that now - at least as long as he and Danny can be around each other without wanting to kill each other.

Which, conveniently enough, hasn't happened. Yet.

The tree itself is fake - it's easier to put an artificial one up year after year instead of trying to scour the islands for a real one, and he's enough of a traditionalist to respect Danny's wishes and go for something that isn't basically a palm tree. He sets the box down in the living room, cracking open the dusty cardboard, and starts rummaging through its contents.

"You're not putting on that suit, are you?" he asks, calling out to Danny, somewhere else in the house.