Archive of Our Own ^beta

"Hey," Holtzmann protests when Patty directs the delivery guys to take her couch upstairs, "I called dibs on that floor!"

"And I told you that wasn't cool," Patty points out mildly. "There's plenty of space for a couch and a bookcase up there. You'll never even know I'm there."

It's not meant to be a challenge, it's not. Holtzmann knows that, but she can't stop herself. This is why Abby has, thus far, remained her only friend. One of the reasons why. She doesn't say anything else, but her mind is already filling up with ways to test that assertion.

She turns up the volume on her favourite playlists and dances around when she should be working. She starts three fires doing various things she shouldn't, although one of them is genuinely accidental. She bashes around loudly at all her latest projects, occasionally swearing at the nuclear reactor when it fails to behave as it should, although by that point, it's just because it's really not behaving how she wants it to and how the laws of physics as understood thus far suggest that it should, damnit.

Patty, meanwhile, sits and reads, curled up on the couch. She's not even wearing noise cancelling headphones, Holtz realises when she looks up in disgust from the reactor and realises with a start that Patty is still there, she just hasn't said anything all day. She hasn't asked Holtz to turn it down, hasn't flapped and rushed around with fire extinguishers, and in the last hour or so (ok, shit, about three hours, according to her watch. Fucking reactor) Holtz really had forgotten she was there at all. She glares over at Patty, wondering about asking her what's so great about - she pulls down her amber glasses and the title springs clear - "Ruins of the World’s Fair: the New York State Pavilion", but decides that might be interpreted as giving in.

"You couldn't have got me a coffee?" she grouses, noticing the cup on the windowsill by Patty's elbow.

Patty looks up, looking dazed, and then shakes herself like she's surfacing from fathoms deep. "Oh, hey, you want one?" She picks up her cup and looks at it speculatively. "You were well away when I made this one but I could totally do another round if you're wantin' a break."

Holtz scrunches up her nose and scoots around the end of the bench on her stool, holding her hand out for the cup. "I'll brew," she offers with a half-smile.

It took six months before she was genuinely comfortable sharing the basement lab with Abby and she would never have got that far if it hadn't been for the fact that she was well aware that they were lucky to have any lab space at all, let alone trying to get separate workrooms. Abby liked to talk about her theories. She liked to ask Holtz's opinion on what the problem with various sets of equations might be. She liked to nose around at what Holtz was working on and make suggestions. She liked to break into Holtz's chain of thought by suggesting that they order Chinese food. She liked to complain, vociferously, about her old collaborator, Dr Gilbert.

Eventually, things settled down, they got used to each-other. Abby learned Holtz's favourite take-out orders and what sort of problems Holtz was likely to make useful suggestions on. Holtz figured out when she really needs to turn down the music and what stage she needed to get a prototype to before showing her workmate would be more fun than annoying. Still, she has missed the peace and quiet of her own private lab more than she'd ever tell Abby and the fire-station has plenty of space for them to spread out.

She's not sure what to make of the fact that she discovers that she genuinely doesn't mind having Patty's reading corner up there with her. They get in to the habit of making each other drinks when they're making their own. Patty brings Holtz back a sandwich when she goes out looking for lunch and leaves it on the corner of the workbench without insisting that Holtz stop what she's doing to eat right now and in exchange, Holtz lets her into the secret of her Pringles stash, in the bottom compartment of the toolbox. Sometimes Patty will let out a bark of laughter or a snort of disbelief at what she's reading but she never insists that Holtz stop what she's doing to listen right now, just pops in a bookmark and shares whatever has tickled or irritated her the next time they both synchronise on a coffee break. Holtz starts to be able to tell when Patty wouldn't mind a little distraction, maybe a dance routine and when she's miles away, fully absorbed in whatever she's reading. Best of all, Patty never nags her about whether she should be going home to bed or comments when she doesn't make it into the fire-station until 11am after a particularly late night.

She might keep pretty erratic hours, but Patty's much more sensible, so when she looks up at 10:30 one morning and realises Patty's still not there, she finds that she can't just shrug and get back to her project. Instead, she leans down through the pole hole to call down to Abby and Erin, who're working on Ghosts from our Present, "hey, where's Patty?"

Erin yelps and nearly knocks over her coffee when she sees Holtz. "Jesus, Holtz," she exclaims irritably, "don't do that!" Holtz isn't sure whether Erin means announcing herself without warning or the way she's currently dangling the top half of her body between floors but she grins anyway and casts a mini salute in Erin's direction.

Abby, being more used to Holtz, barely looks up from her laptop. "She's got flu," she says briefly, "she called in about an hour ago to say she wouldn't make it in today."

Mystery solved. Holtz curls herself back up into her own domain, her lair, and tries to get on with improving the beam strength from their proton packs for dragging ghosts into containment without just making their prime research specimens go poof in the process. She tinkers for a little while and then decides that she should just acknowledge the fact that she's really not getting anywhere right now. She glares over at Patty's empty corner. If she knows when she's not there, that implies she knows when she's there, damnit.

She sits with her chin on her fist, contemplating that for a little while and then, abruptly spins her chair around, catapulting herself out of her seat and into motion. If she's going to spend time considering the implications of this, she might as well multi-task. She rummages in the trash looking for the wrappings from yesterday's lunch, and then does quick bit of internet research before scooping up the three books with bookmarks in from the corner into her backpack and swinging down the fireman's pole. "Later, losers," she shouts over to the other two, but she doesn't head straight out of the door. She heads for the in-case-of-emergencies cupboard.

They'd set it up the day after them moved into the fire-station. It'd been Erin's idea but they'd all agreed pretty much straight away after the whole nearly losing half their team into a vortex to another dimension experience. There's a drawer for each of them, even Kevin, with an envelope for in case of death, one for in case of disappearance and spare keys to their apartments for a whole range of just-in-case's. Holtzmann's not sure that Patty had the flu in mind as an emergency at the time but never mind. Holtz's own drawer has very little in it - name and email address for her sister, to be contacted if she actually dies, a will leaving pretty much everything she has to Abby. She should update that really, now, she thinks and adds it to the mental list for consideration.

She stops off at the deli the lunch wrappings had come from, which had turned out to be only a couple of blocks away from the fire-station. "Tall black woman," she tells the woman behind the counter, "comes in here a few times a week, buys a couple of sandwiches. I'll have what she has."

The woman gives her a somewhat suspicious look. "You mean the other Ghostbuster, right?" she asks, slightly hesitantly.

The recognition catches Holtz off-guard; she doesn't deal with the general public much so she's not used to the idea that she might get recognised, or at least not in a positive way rather than a "not you again, get the hell out of here" kind of way. Still, if this woman's mostly been dealing with Patty, she's bound to have a fairly positive view of them, right? "Yeah, that's her," she confirms. "I'm just collecting for her today; she's kind of busy."

"Well, OK," the woman allows, "but she usually buys five - which two do you want?"

Shit. Patty's been buying for the whole fire-station? "I'll take all of them. Sorry, just distracted there for a moment." She flashes her most charming smile at the woman and it seems to work; she scribbles something down on her pad for her assistant, who starts putting things together and rings up the total on the till. Holtz is just about to pay when an idea occurs to her. "You do soups?" she asks.

"Sure," the woman agrees.

"Throw in some chicken soup to go for me, would you."

"No problem," the woman smiles and hands her an insulated cup to go with her bag of sandwiches.

To her irritation, it takes her well over an hour, more like an hour and a half to get to Patty's Staten Island apartment. She lets herself in the main entrance and looks around, getting her bearings. Patty's apartment, number 308, seems to be on the top floor, so she heads for the stairwell, taking them two at a time.

Outside Patty's door, she pauses briefly, debating announcing herself immediately, versus letting herself in quietly and reheating the soup first. In the end, she decides that if Patty's sick, it's probably best that she doesn't come across a random Holtzmann in her kitchen unexpectedly in case it causes some kind of relapse or something so she opens the door and calls out "Hey, not a burglar, just me!"

"Holtzy," Patty's voice drifts out, sounding scratchy and tired, "what the hell,"

There are shuffling noises, so she shouts "Don't get up!" but obviously not quickly enough because Patty appears in one of the doorways in her dressing gown. "Yeah, see, I said not do to that. You really don't look so hot."

Patty sighs. "Holtzmann, what the hell are you doin' here, hun? You need me? I can dose up if it's end of the world shit, but otherwise…"

Holtz holds up the cup of cool soup and the bag of sandwiches. "Bona fide mission of mercy, see! Just point me at your kitchen then go back to bed."

Patty raises an eyebrow, then points to the door at the end of the hall. "If you blow anything up, you're paying the damage deposit," she warns, and turns around to shuffle away, presumably, back to bed.

It's the work of a moment to stick the soup into Patty's microwave and then she has three minutes to explore the apartment while waiting for the timer. It's not a huge place - kitchenette, sitting room and presumably bath and bed rooms, although she leaves exploring those for later on - but it's like a miniature library, with no surface which could reasonably be covered in books left un-utilized.

The microwave bell brings her back to the immediate task and she rummages in Patty’s kitchen cupboards for the necessaries. She can’t see any trays so she sticks the bowl of soup, the sandwich and some orange juice she found in the fridge together on a chopping board and drapes a tea-towel over her arm, the better to play the role.

“Lunch is served, madam,” she says grandly, pushing open the door to the bedroom. Patty has propped herself up in bed and starts to laugh a little before it converts into a cough. Holtz places the improvised tray on Patty’s knees and drapes the tea-towel over her front in imitation of napkin before perching herself on the corner of the bed and unwrapping her own sandwich.

“Mmm, that’s good,” Patty says, tasting the soup.

“I’m surprised it wasn’t in our regular order,” Holtz comments, waving her hand at the bag still holding the other three sandwiches that she’s left lying on top of her rucksack.

“Yeah,” Patty replies awkwardly, “well I wanted a hand free so I could read while I walked back, so I kind of didn’t tell Abby there was a soup option available.”

Holtz snorts with laughter and places her hand over her heart. “Your secret’s safe with me,” she swears in a faux-solemn tone before going back to her sandwich.

Patty gives a sigh of satisfaction when she’s done, lifts the tray off to her bedside table and snuggles down again under the covers. “Thanks,” she says, tiredly, before breaking off to start coughing again.

Holtz eyes her, dubiously. “That does not sound good. Should I be getting you some sort of medicine? Hot toddy? Taking you to the doctor?”

Patty subsides and replies huskily “I’ll be fine in a day or two, girl, it just always goes to my chest, y’know?” Holtz shrugs because she doesn’t really – she rarely gets sick, certainly not often enough to say that it always acts in any particular way on her. On the other hand, over the past five years she’s barely been in close contact with anyone besides Abby and Benny so maybe it’s not that surprising that Patty, in daily contact with half of New York until recently, is a little more experienced than she is when it comes to this sort of experience.

She fishes the books she brought with her out of her backpack and piles them awkwardly on the bedside table, taking her improvised lunch tray back to the kitchen to rinse out the bowl. When she comes back into the room, Patty hasn’t opened them, though she’s propped up on one elbow, turning one over in her hands with an expression Holtzmann finds hard to read. “I wasn’t sure if you’d want to carry on with those or pick up something lighter while you’re not feeling great,” she disclaims. “Do you want me to find something for you in the other room?”

“Well, I’m not sure about these two, but this should be about the right speed for today,” Patty smiles, gesturing with the book she’s been fiddling with, a medium weight paperback with a skyscraper on the front. “Thanks, honey. You take those other ones back with you though, you’re not sneaking me out of my corner one bagful of books at a time.”

“Of course not!” Holtz replies, a little too quickly, stuffing the other two books back in her bag. “Is there anything else that you’d like, that I could take to the firehouse for you?”

Patty lies back on the pillows and blows out a breath. “Holtzmann. It was a joke, girl. We fine. I got everything right where I want it. And thank you, by the way, for schleppin' yourself all the way over here with my stuff. Now you take the rest of them sandwiches back for the others and don’t do any structural damage while I’m not there.”

Holtz relaxes into a grin. “I am distracted by your absence,” she proclaims, and it's barely even a joke and she's not sure if it's not more surprising than the whole "ghosts are real" adventure they've been going on. Well, perhaps that's a slight exaggeration, but there's not as much in it as you might expect. It's odd and slightly unnerving to be discovering new sides of herself at this point in her life, but, she figures, why not embrace it? “Who knows," she continues with a wink, "what could happen without the calming influence you have on me!”

“Calming influence, my ass,” Patty snorts. “You started three fires last week!”

“But only one this week,” Holtz points out, with wide innocent eyes.

“It’s only Tuesday,” Patty replies firmly. “You go, get out of here, let me rest in peace and keep out of trouble.”

Holtz salutes, a gesture whose formality is probably slightly marred by the fact that she also sticks out her tongue, and turns to go. She checks she’s left everything tidy in the kitchen, throws away the wrappings from their lunch and is just headed out of the door when a thought strikes her. “They do ham and pea and tomato soups as well as chicken,” she yells down the hall, “what do you want tomorrow?”

There’s a pause and then Patty shouts back “Tomato. And don’t tell Abby!”