Holtzmann had finished her descriptions showing off the ghost pagers to everyone present before handing each of the females in the building their own beeper. "There. Now if any of us are out for lunch or gone gallivanting through the city for some reason and we get a call...BOOM!" She loudly clapped. "We'll all know about it."
"Well, uh...not me." Kevin raised his pencil in the air, pointing out that he didn't have one.
The blonde looked over her shoulder at the receptionist behind her. "That's because I may have something else planned for you, my dear Kev."
"Oh." The man smiled. "Is it something cooler?" He basically tried to wink, but failed.
"Uh, yes." She lied. "Something much, much cooler."
"Awesome." He bit the center of his pencil. "What is it?"
"It's a surprise." She faked a grin before turning to look back at Abby, Patty, and Erin fussing with their pagers.
"Nice work, Jillian." Yates nodded, clipping the device to her pants.
"Yeah. Great job!" Patty gave her an encouraging touch on the arm before heading back to her desk to finish reading a book on all the first manufacturing companies of New York City.
"I'm impressed, Holtz Machine...As always." Abby also returned to the chair behind her desk.
"Thanks, Abster." Holtzmann placed her ghost pager inside her pants pocket. She didn't even hesitate to walk over to the lined up massage chairs and sat down in the farthest one from the group. Putting the feet up and leaning the head back just a bit, she closed her eyes, loving the fact that she could relax now. Normally she would move on right to the next project, but for some reason she felt that she didn't need to and she told herself that for the rest of today, she would just chill. Once she felt the total sense of relaxation, she let out one of her loud groans with a smile.
"So, what were you doing up there for over an hour?" Abigail quietly asked Erin while she typed and the particle physicist stood by her desk with her arms folded across her chest. Yates teased her. "Were you up there smooching?" A small chuckle escaped the woman's lips.
"No." Gilbert's arms unfolded and she fixed her posture a bit, feeling annoyed at everything today. "I was just-" Suddenly she remembered that Holtzmann's sofa was supposed to be kept a secret and she attempted to lie. "We were talking, that's all. And I took a shower after the coffee incident."
"So, which is it? Were you talking or did you take a shower?"
"Both." Erin raised her eyebrows.
"Really? You take pretty long showers." Yates continued to pester her long time friend. "If you did take a shower, you probably wouldn't have gotten out until about fifteen minutes ago or so. Your hair would still be wet." She never stopped typing. "What were you two love birds really doing?"
"Nothing!" She snapped. "Alright?! We weren't doing anything." Everyone in the room, beside Holtzy, turned to look at Erin. "And would you please stop calling us love birds?" Jillian's eyes opened and she slowly lifted her head, turning to look at the bunch.
Kevin's pencil was in between his teeth and his hand was midair as if he were about to remove the utensil from his mouth just before Erin snapped. Patricia's eyes were wide and looking just over the book she was reading as she held it up over her nose, wishing the others could not tell she was looking at the annoyed physicist. Abby sat at her desk, looking up at the woman in front of it with her mouth slightly open and her hands stopped mid-sentence on her keyboard.
"Erin?" Holtzy broke the awkward silence and oddly enough, the only one to look to the blonde was Dr. Gilbert.
"I'm sorry. I'm sorry." Embarrassed by her sudden outburst, she uncomfortably looked around at the other ghostbusters who finally averted their eyes from her. Each continued with what they were doing and pretended nothing had happened. Feeling the warmth in her cheeks, Gilbert tried to speak. "I just...I need a min-" Before even finishing her sentence, the heated woman ran up the stairs as fast as possible.
Jill had begun to put the feet of the chair back down just before Gilbert had run away and once she had reached the top floor, Holtzy stood. Feeling embarrassed herself, she bit the inside of her cheek when looking to Abigail for advice. Unfortunately, Yates slightly shrugged her shoulders and went back to focusing on her computer screen. Holtz turned her gaze to Patty who had a hard time keeping her brown eyes on the book in front of her. When Tolan shook her head no, Jill slouched even more than she already was and she hated the confusion that buzzed throughout her head. She was used to having a solution to a problem and even if she hadn't, which was very rare, someone else in the room did. But not this time. She would've looked to Kevin, but she knew he wouldn't be much help, especially when he was the first one to speak after Erin had left. "Did she say she needed a mint?" The imbecile wondered aloud, causing a groan to come from both Patty and Holtzy.
"No, honey. She said she needed a minute." Abby instantly looked down at her keyboard the moment she realized she called him 'honey' and Tolan accidentally dropped the book, with a loud slam, onto her desk.
"Oh. Okay." Kevin didn't seem to catch it as he began to doodle some cartoon characters on the paper in front of him.
Ignoring all instincts to stay downstairs and give Gilbert some space, Holtzmann left the group of her disoriented colleagues and ascended the staircase to the second floor. She looked around, unable to find her, and it occurred to her that she might be back in her secret corner. But when she looked back there, it was empty.
After walking around the large beam, she grinned at the staircase behind it. Doing the running man in place, Jillian now knew where her date from the night before must be. She finished the silly dance move and headed up to the roof of the former fire station.
The blonde was satisfied when she saw Erin standing by the edge of the building, looking out at the city. She slowly walked over to stand beside her, leaning her elbows against the ledge. Turning her head to the woman on her left, Jill admired every feature on her face. The way her lashes moved with every blink, they way her eyes sparkled with the reflection of the morning sun. The brunette's adorable button nose caused Jillian to scrunch her own with adoration before she carefully examined the scholar's soft cheek bones that led to her naturally pink lips.
The inventor snapped herself out of her daze, remembering the reason for being up here with her in the first place. She opened her mouth, about to ask Erin if she was upset with her when the other woman spoke instead. "No."
"No?" Holtzy replied.
"No." Gilbert closed her eyes, softly continuing with a hint of sadness in her tone. "I'm NOT mad at you." She hated being a person who kept things bottled up. Abby had tried to break her out of the habit for years, but it never really worked. "I'm just..." She turned so her body was facing Holtzmann and the shorter woman copied the action. "I get very nervous in relationships. Especially when I start to really really like the other person and after last night, you know, the um..." She blushed with an anxious smile, referring to the kiss before heading home. Holtz nodded with an intense look as she listened carefully. "I realized how much I-" Erin looked down at her fidgeting hands while biting the side of her bottom lip. Deciding to not finish her statement, she looked back into Jill's sea blue eyes. "I would love to go on a second date. I mean, that is...if you want to." She sighed, turning back to face the city. "You probably don't NOW."
"No, Erin..." Holtzy touched her shoulder and Gilbert looked down at the contact. "I want to."
They maintained eye contact for awhile before Erin spoke again. "Really?"
A bit uncomfortable in such a serious situation, Holtzmann responded with a lighter tone. "With you? Are you kidding? Of course!" She finally let go of the physicist's shoulder and looked out at the city as well, leaning against the ledge yet again. "You're one of my best and only friends. You're smart and you make me nervous, but in a good way. And you're really pretty." She playfully clicked her tongue. "I'd have to be bonkers not to go on another date with you."
"For real? You really mean that?" Gilbert stared down at the blonde in front of her.
"Absolutely!" Jill turned so her body faced the other woman again, but she leaned even further onto her elbow on the ledge so she was looking up at Erin from a slanted angle.
The brunette tried to hide her smirk as she looked down at the street beside her. Unaware of what to say, she just looked out and enjoyed the weather. Taking in a deep breath, she told herself she wouldn't bring it up...but her mouth got the best of her, as it often did. She looked to the woman on her right and asked, "You took Abby to Extreme Indoor Competitive Sports?"
Jill awkwardly turned to face the ledge again, still leaning her stomach on it. She gulped before answering. "I did. Yes."
"I, um..." Former Ghost Girl uncomfortably giggled before letting curiosity kill the cat. "...what's that about?"
"Huh?" Holtz tried to hide the weird glance at Erin through the side of her eye, but the taller woman caught it.
"Abster? Holtz Machine?" Both of them faced their bodies toward each other now and Erin shrugged, waiting for a response. When she didn't get one, she nodded. "Right? So you and my best friend?"
"It was nothing like that, it was just a little bit of crushing. Never even got too serious." Holtz took her yellow glasses off for a moment to clean them on her shirt, but she immediately returned them over her eyes.
The particle physicist squinted at the shorter woman with pursed lips before looking back out at the view. "I just can't believe she hasn't told me."
"She didn't..." Jill's eyes awkwardly flicked to the right before looking back to the side of Gilbert's face. "...exactly know."
Quickly turning with a hand on her right hip, Erin replied. "Oh, so it was just you?"
"Yes. I swear." She pulled a chunk of her own hair before continuing. "She was going through some stuff at the time as well. So...timing was another factor." Seeing the woman in front of her looking down at her own nails while she was speaking, caused Jill to add onto that. "Also, I never liked her as much as I like you, soooo..." She looked down and to her right again, hoping Erin would feel a little better.
"Hm..." The brunette rested her elbows on the ledge, turning away from the engineer once again. "Glad to see her and Kevin noticing each other a bit more." The tone in her voice had finally lightened up a bit.
"Yeah." Holtz turned her body as well. "Although, it might take some time for them."
"You think so? I have a feeling they could be dating by this time within the next couple weeks or so." She stared at a speck of an airplane flying thousands of miles away.
"It'll be a while before Abby's ready." Keeping her overworked hands on the bricks in front of her, Holtzy pushed against the wall and stretched her right foot way out behind her. Lunging, she looked down at the blacktop below her and switched feet, stretching out her other calf, her arms straight out in front of her on the sill of the building.
"Oh, I think she's ready." Erin chuckled. "I'm pretty sure her last boyfriend was one of our ghost puppets back in high school. She's ready."
Jillian stood up and cracked her fingers while she responded. "Hm...we'll see."
"I've known her for a while. And trust me, when she finally gets asked out, she will not hesitate to say yes." Gilbert argued.
"Mmm..." Holtz briefly tilted her head to the side with squinted eyes. "There's some things you don't know about Abigail."
"I'm pretty sure I know my best friend."
Before either of them could speak again, their pagers went off in their pockets and they looked to each other, taking them out. They read the address before heading back inside to go to their next bust.