Chapter Text
You didn’t think your next job would be a delivery girl at a Chinese restaurant. You’d had your share of low paying customer service jobs, and you were hoping you’d finally found your way out. Unfortunately, since the last place you worked had fired you, you were between jobs at the moment and you needed the money. At least the place was close to your apartment.
It was your first real day today, and you were sitting around waiting for your first delivery. Your time came when you heard one of the waitresses call you over.
“We’re gonna start you off with something easy, okay?” She said, handing you the food. Her ponytail swished as she turned to point to the stairs at the back of the room. “Your first customer is Abby Yates. She and her friends own the place upstairs.”
“Oh, uh, okay. Isn’t that a bit too easy? Why did they even order takeout when the restaurant is a floor down?”
The waitress shrugged.
“Dunno, I don’t ask questions. They order food, you bring it to them. Good luck.” She turned and walked away, leaving you very confused. But, you supposed, it’s better than having to bike halfway across town.
You made your way up the stairs and walked into what you guess you would probably call a lab? There was junk all over the place, blinky lights, contraptions of all sizes. There was a receptionist desk to your right, but there didn’t seem to be anyone there.
“Hello?” You called out. “I’m looking for an… Abby?”
“Think you’re in the wrong place,” came a woman’s voice from around the corner. “Haven’t seen any nuns in here for at least a couple of days.”
You rounded the corner to see a woman with messy blonde hair, wearing a baggy jacket over some overalls. She was tinkering with some device but looked up when you approached.
“Nuns, abbeys, get it?” she said, grinning toothily. Oh no, she was really cute. When you didn’t say anything, her face started to switch from glee to confusion. Oh god, were you staring? How long were you staring? You let out a strangled laugh.
“Nuns, I get it! Because abbeys live in nuns- I MEAN, nuns live in abbeys! Yeah, I get it, that was really funny!”
The blonde woman just chuckled, looking slightly concerned for your wellbeing, and held out her hand. You stared at it for a second before realizing she wanted you to shake it. You shuffled the food around to your other arm, and went to grasp her hand. She shook it with a surprisingly firm grip.
“Dr. Jillian Holtzmann,” she dropped your hand to give a little bow, “at your service.”
You stood there again, staring like an idiot.
“This is the part where you tell me your name,” she said, before going back to work on… whatever it was she was working on. You babbled a bit, but you think you managed to get out your name with minor embarrassment.
You watched her tinker for a few moments longer when you realized you should probably ask where Abby was, when another woman began talking behind you.
“Sorry, we’re not taking any new clients today you’ll have to make- is that my food? Well look at what we have here, a delivery person who actually knows how to be on time. It’s some kind of miracle.”
The woman (presumably Abby) put the plastic bag down on the counter, looked through it, and gasped when she found that… the food was all there, you guess? She handed you the money with a smile.
“Tell Bennie he’s fired.”
“I don’t… think I can do that,” you replied.
“Congrats, delivery girl,” Holtzmann said as she slapped you on the back. “The way to a woman’s heart is through her stomach.” The heat from her hand between your shoulders felt like it was burning through your shirt.
“Oh woops, love to stay and chat but I think I heard them calling my name,” you lied, knowing fully well none of you had heard them call your name. You removed yourself from the hand on your back, and started making your way to the stairs. You glanced back. “See you next time, I guess?”
“Look forward to it,” Holtzmann said with a wink.
You felt heat rise in your cheeks and hurried down the stairs, hoping your new coworkers would be polite enough not to ask you why your face was all red.
Disheartened and somehow a little inspired, you vowed next time you had to deliver upstairs, you would actually talk to the cute engineer. The cute engineer with the wild blue eyes and messy hair and baggy clothes and dimples and just completely kissable lips that you hadn’t stopped thinking about since yesterday when you met her.
Unfortunately, the next time you delivered food to Abby, Holtzmann was nowhere to be seen. You did, however, get to meet two more members – Patty and Erin – and the group’s… interesting secretary.
“Hey guys?” the man at the desk shouted. “I think there’s someone here to see you! Looks like she has some kind of… plastic bag for you.”
“Uh…”
“Ignore him,” came a voice from the booth a few steps away. The woman – Patty, you assumed, based on her necklace – rolled her eyes and continued. “He’s still in ‘training’.”
“There’s my girl!” You turned to see Abby walking towards you with another member of the team. As Abby handed you the money for the food, you heard the other woman stage whisper to Patty.
“Is this the cute delivery girl Holtzmann was talking about?”
“Erin!”
“What!?”
You think they said something after that but you’d stopped paying attention. Holtzmann had called you cute? She talked about you? You couldn’t fight the grin that threatened to spread across your face. You were about to ask what exactly she’d said, when a voice came from behind you.
“Hey, it’s the delivery girl!” You tensed as you felt an arm drape across your shoulders and you turned your head only to come face to face (literally) with none other than Holtzmann herself. “What’s cookin’ good lookin’?”
Was it hot in there? It felt really hot. It must’ve been the steam from the kitchen downstairs.
“Hahahaha, you know what? I just remembered I have another delivery to make! We’re suuuper swamped right now gottagobye!”
You ducked under Holtzmann’s arm and all but ran back down the stairs, to be greeted by a decidedly un-busy restaurant (as well as a couple of stares). Talking to a cute girl was harder than you anticipated.
Okay, today was the day. You were going to talk to Holtzmann. You’d dressed up in your third cutest outfit (outfits one and two had been wasted on the last two days at work, since you had no idea to predict when Abby would order food again). Third time is the charm, right?
Your shift was winding down to an end and you were starting to lose hope that Abby would ever order food again, when you got called over to finally make another delivery upstairs. You grabbed the bag and practically sprinted up the stairs, and then stopped just outside the door to collect yourself when you realized how you must’ve looked. Once you’d fixed your hair about two or sixteen times, you turned the corner and knocked on the open door.
“Knock knock!” You called out.
“Who’s there?” the receptionist asked.
“Uh, delivery,” you replied with a confused chuckle.
“Delivery who?”
You… didn’t really know how to respond to that.
“Wow, that was quick, even for you,” Abby said as she walked up to get her food. She gave you a once-over before handing you the money. “You’re all dressed up today, what’s the occasion?”
“Um, no reason really… Just felt like looking nice,” you replied.
“To deliver Chinese food?”
“Yo, listen,” Patty interjected from across the room. “You never know when you’re gonna run into someone cute at work. I got you, girl.”
“Haha, yeah… Someone cute…” Your eyes drifted over to Holtzmann. She was looking over at you with an expression that said she definitely appreciated your outfit, and you quickly whipped your head back to look at Abby. Had she been looking at you the whole time? Your brain told you to run back downstairs, but you fought the urge. You told yourself you were going to talk to the cute engineer, so you were going to talk to the cute engineer, god damn it!
“Sooooo…” You looked around, searching for something to talk about. If possible, there were even more gadgets and junk all over the place compared to the last time you were here. There was a wall with weapons, maybe? You also saw what you assumed were some uniforms hanging up nearby. “What do you guys do up here anyway?”
“You haven’t heard of us?” Abby said incredulously. You shook your head apologetically. “We’re only the most famous ghost hunters in the whole city!”
“Oh yeah, I think I might have heard of some of my friends talk about you guys actually…” you said quietly, but the damage was done.
“We got Patty over here on history,” Abby continued, dragging you around the room. “Me and Erin are on top of the theoretical stuff, and Holtzmann here makes the toys.”
“I prefer mad scientific genius, but I’ll take what I can get,” Holtzmann said with a smile. Her leg was resting casually on the workbench in a position you probably couldn’t make your body do in a million years, and she was once again messing with some little device in her hands. There was a slightly too-long pause before you spoke up again.
“So… what are you working on?”
“It’s a death ray,” Holtzmann said, as if it was nothing. “But a really tiny one. It kills ants.”
“I…” you looked over at Abby, who shrugged, and left to go eat her food. “Okay, tiny ant death ray. Cool.”
Holtzmann snorted, and looked up at you.
“I’m kidding, I’m just doing some upgrades on Abby’s PKE meter. When I’m done this baby will be able to detect ghosts with a waaaay bigger range than before. You ever heard of radio telemetry?”
“Um, no.”
“Should work kinda like that. Except without the radio waves. Or the transmitters. Or the huge receiver antenna.”
“So nothing like radio telemetry?”
Holtzmann just gave you another one of her grins, and swung her leg down from the workbench. She leaned over the table to get exceptionally close to your face, and you could hear your heartbeat way too loudly in your ears. Could she hear that? You swallowed nervously and hoped she couldn’t.
You were staring into her eyes, gaze darting down to her lips, wondering what would happen if you just kissed her right then and there. Would she kiss you back? Would her lips be as soft as they look? You watched as her lips said something you couldn’t hear over the pounding in your ears and the fantasies that were running through your head.
“W-what was that?” You asked. She smirked and you swore your legs were turning to jelly.
“I asked if you wanna help me with this.”
“I’m not sure I’m qualified.”
“I’ll walk you through it. Worst thing that happens is you lose a finger.”
A shout from across the room made you jump and startled you from whatever trance you’d been in.
“Holtzmann don’t hurt the delivery girl, I need her!”
She just laughed wildly, making her curls bounce over her face, then walked around the table to stand next to you, plonking the device onto an empty space on the workbench.
“All right, let’s get this party started!”
Holtzmann reached into her pocket and pulled out a handful of some tiny parts that were probably going in the PKE meter, along with what you think was part of a soldering iron, some wire, a screwdriver… how much room did she have in her pockets?
“Okay, here’s what we’re gonna do. You’re gonna take one of these,” she held up one of the tiny parts, “put it over here,” she pointed to somewhere inside the device, “you’re gonna solder it on there, and then you’re gonna do that three more times. Got it?”
You gave her a look that said you definitely did not get it. She laughed, and pat you on the back like she was consoling you.
“I’ll help you with the first one, m‘kay?”
What you were expecting was Holtzmann correcting you as you went. What you were not expecting was Holtzmann holding your hands, guiding them gently to where they had to go. Her hands were scarred and calloused from years of building and creating and you really, really hoped she couldn’t feel how sweaty your own hands were getting.
After guiding you through soldering two of the parts, Holtzmann let your hands go so you could do a third on your own. Much to your dismay.
She crossed her arms on the workbench to lay her head down, and watched your hands go to work.
“Not too bad,” she said as you were mid-way through soldering the final part in place. “You sure you don’t have some engineer in you?”
Not yet… you thought. Or, you thought you’d thought it. Glancing over at Holtzmann’s (very, very excited) face indicated otherwise. You dropped the tool like it was on fire. Oh god. You hadn’t said that out loud had you?
“I MEAN UH. Youknowwhat I just remembered I should clock out! They’re gonna get really mad at me if I don’t hahabye, see you next time!”
With all eyes on you, you made it back down the stairs that day in a record time. A couple of your coworkers gave you some annoyed looks, but luckily didn’t ask any questions about how you were sweating like you’d just run a marathon.
The next day at work, you were both hoping for and dreading another delivery upstairs. Abby probably wouldn’t order delivery two days in a row, right? Maybe by the time she does you’ll be able to look Holtzmann in the face again.
You heard your name being called, and saw a coworker beckoning you over to the phone. You walked over and looked at him in confusion. Usually people wait until the food is done to give you delivery instructions.
“Someone on the phone for you, said she’s… your long lost great great aunt?” He handed the phone to you, which you took reluctantly.
“Hello?”
“Hey, great great grandniece! How’s it hangin’?” You sighed. You knew that voice.
“Holtzmann, I’m hanging up on you.” You said it as a joke, but it took all your willpower to not do exactly that and avoid the conversation forever.
“Is that any way to talk to your great great aunt?”
“Why are you calling me when you’re literally upstairs?”
“It’s easier,” Holtzmann replied. Maybe it was just the phone, but there was a waver in her voice that sounded almost… nervous? “Actually, I have a question for you.”
Your heart dropped into your stomach. Your mind raked through a million questions, filtered through the fact that she was calling you instead of asking you face to face. Maybe she wanted to ask you to send Bennie next time. Maybe she never wanted to see you again after what you said last night. Maybe-
“Hey, you still there?” she asked, cutting off your thoughts.
“Y-yeah, I’m still here. Um… what did you wanna ask me?”
You heard a noise that sounded like Holtzmann was anxiously clearing her throat.
“You wanna go out sometime? Maybe get a little engineer in you?”
Whatever sound came out of your mouth next, you weren’t quite sure it was fully human. The manager looked over at you, giving you a stare that said “that better be work related”.
“You’re gonna get me in trouble!” you whispered loudly into the phone.
“So is that a yes?”
You swallowed thickly before answering.
“…Y-yeah. I’ll go on a date with you.”
Holtzmann’s victory shout was so loud you could actually hear it from upstairs. You could feel the butterflies build in your stomach already as you laughed giddily.
“I’ll see you after my shift, okay?” you said.
“I could blow up part of the restaurant. Get you off early. If you know what I mean.” You could practically hear the wink.
“Holtzmann! Do not blow up the restaurant!” you heard Patty yell in the background.
“I’ll talk to you later,” you said with a chuckle.
“Can’t wait,” said Holtzmann. You definitely heard a smile.