Chapter Text
Hank Anderson was no matchmaker.
You knew this better than anyone. You had been on more first dates at his recommendation than you could count on both hands, each one a spectacular exercise in awkward silences or fundamental incompatibility. Hank wanted the best for you—he truly did—but his methods were as subtle as a sledgehammer, and you, unfortunately, suffered from a severe lack of a spine.
It had become a strange, unspoken rhythm: a mutual, albeit clumsy, attempt to fix each other. You would slide him the names of new restaurants that weren’t just grease-traps or leave pamphlets for therapists on his desk. In return, he tried to marry you off to every appropriately aged human he encountered. For every morning coffee you shared, there was a new friend you simply had to meet. At this point, you were reasonably certain Hank was inventing relatives just to keep the roster full.
This was the nature of your life, a three-week loop that It usually started when you accidentally let it slip that you didn't have plans for the weekend. Hank would pounce on the opportunity, cornering you until you agreed to "just grab a drink" with a second cousin from Nebraska who "just moved to the city and needs a friend."
You would try to decline, of course. You’d offer polite excuses and attempt to butter him up with triple-shot lattes, or offer to run his reports down to filing—a task that was several pay grades below yours, yet a sacrifice you were willing to make for peace and quiet. Hank was easy to crack if you hit the right pressure points. You knew exactly how to distract him with a well-timed question about a cold case or a comment on the game last night, giving you just enough of a head start to get him off your case for a few more days. But eventually, the coffee would run out, the files would be filed, and Hank would start looking for his phone to call "this great guy from the precinct's IT department."
This may be how you ended up stuck between a mountain of paperwork and an immovable object.
"Listen, kid, I’m telling you—Miller from Forensics is a catch. He’s got a retirement plan, he doesn’t smoke, and he actually knows how to iron a shirt. Rare qualities in this building."
Hank was leaning against your desk, his arms crossed over his chest with the immovable stubbornness of a man who had decided his work for the day was done. You tried your usual gambit, sliding a fresh, expensive-looking pastry toward him as a peace offering. "Hank, please. I’m sure Miller is a saint, but I’m really just focused on getting through these depositions right now. In fact, don't you have a briefing?"
"Briefing's at two. It's one-fifteen. Plenty of time for you to text him," Hank countered, completely ignoring the croissant. He didn't even blink.
The pressure in your chest began to spike. You weren't built for this kind of sustained tactical siege. Somerhing about his hardened gaze was so stressful. Your brain, searching for any possible exit and clearly not thinking clearly– got the better of you.
"I can't!" you blurted out, the words hitting the air with the grace of a falling piano.
Hank raised an eyebrow, his expression shifting from persistent to genuinely curious. "Why the hell not? You allergic to Forensic techs?"
"Because I’m... I’m seeing someone!"
The lie was out before you could even process the logic of it. You froze, your hands hovering over your keyboard as your face turned a shade of red that probably signaled medical distress.
Hank didn't react at first. He just stared at you, his eyes narrowing as he scanned your face, then your desk, then your face again. A long, agonizing beat passed. Then, he let out a short, sharp bark of a laugh that held absolutely zero conviction.
"You're seeing someone," he repeated, his voice dripping with skepticism. "Right. Since when? You haven't left this office before 8 PM in three weeks, and the only person you talk to on your lunch break is the guy at the taco truck."
"It's... it's new! Very new. Private," you squeaked.
Hank sighed, a heavy, tired sound. He pushed off your desk, shaking his head with a look of profound disbelief. He didn't ask for a name or a photo; he just looked at you with the pitying expression of someone watching a very bad magician fail a card trick.
"Sure you are," he muttered, turning to walk away. "And I’m the King of England. If you’re gonna lie to me, kid, at least make it something I can actually pretend to believe. Get those papers done," he tossed over his shoulder, his boots heavy and rhythmic against the linoleum.
"You can meet him!"
The words flew out of your mouth before your brain could catch them. It was a Hail Mary, a desperate attempt to salvage a shred of dignity from the wreckage of your own lie.
Hank stopped dead. He didn't turn around immediately; for a second, he just stood there, his shoulders slumped as if he were silently asking the universe why this was happening on a Tuesday. When he finally did turn, his expression was a mix of genuine bewilderment and deep-seated suspicion.
"I can meet him," Hank repeated slowly, the words sounding foreign in his mouth. "Fine. Give me a name. Where does he work? Does he have a criminal record I should know about?"
Your eyes darted around the bullpen, searching for a face—any face—to anchor the lie to. And then you saw him.
Connor was standing near the breakroom, perfectly still, staring at a tablet with that localized, intense focus that usually meant he was analyzing a microscopic blood spatter or a particularly difficult crossword.
You didn't point. You didn't even say his name. You just looked at the idea of him and let the traits bleed into your description.
"He’s... he’s extremely intelligent," you stammered, your hands performing a series of meaningless, frantic gestures over your keyboard. "Intimidatingly so, actually. He’s very analytical, always looking for the most logical solution to everything. Honestly, Hank, that’s why I didn't tell you. I just didn't know if the two of you would really get along in a social setting. I didn't want it to be... a clash of worlds."
You watched the gears turn in Hank’s head. You wanted him to think this mystery man was some pretentious academic who would bore him to tears.
Instead, you saw Hank’s eyes narrow. "Not get along?" Hank barked, his skepticism briefly replaced by sheer, grumpy offense. "What the hell is that supposed to mean? You think I can't hold a conversation with someone just because they’ve got a high IQ? I've spent half my life dealing with people who think they’re the smartest person in the room."
"I just meant... your personalities are so different," you dug the hole deeper, feeling the sweat start to prickle at your hairline. "He’s very precise. You’re more... instinctual. It would be like mixing oil and water. It’s probably better if we just keep work and life separate so nobody gets frustrated."
Hank let out a sharp, indignant huff, crossing his arms tightly over his chest. "Precise. Right. You bet your ass we’d get along. In fact, I’ll make it a point to be the most charming bastard he’s ever met."
Hank’s heavy footsteps echoed as he marched toward his desk, looking like a man preparing for a tactical social strike. He was already muttering to himself about something definitely not polite.
You, meanwhile, had entered a state of pure, unadulterated fear.
Your vision blurred slightly at the edges. Your lungs had seemingly forgotten how to operate on autopilot, forcing you to manually calculate every inhale and exhale. In. Out. Don't die at your desk. In. Out.
The shame was a physical weight, a cold, leaden feeling in the pit of your stomach. If you confessed now—if you stood up and shouted, "Wait, Hank, I made him up because I’m a spineless coward who can't say no to a date with a forensics tech"—you would have to pack your bags, change your name, and move to a different hemisphere.
You literally did not have the metabolic capacity to survive that level of embarrassment. You’d be the girl who invented a boyfriend to avoid a conversation. You’d never hear the end of it.
"Great," you whispered to your flickering monitor, your voice trembling at a frequency only dogs could hear. "Just great. I’m dating a ghost. I’m a crazy person."
You began to aggressively type nonsense into a spreadsheet just to look busy, your mind racing through every possible solution.
Your mind, now untethered from reality by the sheer weight of your lie, began to spin a web of increasingly frantic exit strategies.
Maybe you could fake your own death. It wouldn't have to be anything messy—just a quiet disappearance. You could leave your badge and a single, cryptic note on your desk, catch the midnight train to the outskirts of Quebec, and start a new life as a woman named Monique who sold handmade goat cheese and never, ever spoke to anyone named Hank. Yes, Quebec sounded safe. No one in Quebec would ask if your boyfriend was a forensic technician with a retirement plan.
Or, perhaps, you could simply crawl under your desk. It was a sturdy desk. If you tucked your knees to your chest and pulled your chair in close enough, maybe you would eventually become part of the office furniture. A permanent, sentient footrest. It was a career pivot you hadn't considered, but it felt remarkably more achievable than whatever the hell you had lied about.
You took a shaky breath, attempting to regain some semblance of professional dignity, and dared to peek over the top of your monitor.
It was a mistake.
Across the office, Hank was sitting at his desk, but he wasn't working. He was leaning back in his chair, his arms still crossed, staring at you with a look of pure, unadulterated challenge. He looked like a man who had just been told his favorite bar was closing and was personally blaming you for it. He caught your eye and tapped his temple with two fingers—the international sign for 'I’m watching you, and I still think you’re full of it.'
Just behind him, the object of your false affections, Connor, chose that exact moment to look up from his tablet. He didn't have the decency to look away when your eyes met. Instead, he simply blinked, his LED flickering a calm blue as he observed your heightened respiration and the visible tremor in your hands. To him, you were probably just a biological anomaly in need of a sedative. He ended the glance with a small greeting of a smile before looking back down at the tablet.
The walls were closing in. You didn't have a plan and you certainly didn't have a boyfriend. All you had was a mountain of paperwork and a very real possibility of a spontaneous cardiac event.
Slowly, with the deliberate care of a person accepting their fate at the guillotine, you reached out and turned off your monitor. The screen went black, reflecting your own expression back at you.
"Okay," you breathed, the sound muffled as you leaned forward and let your forehead hit the cool, hard surface of your desk with a dull thunk.
You didn't move. You just stayed there, face-down against the wood, listening to the rhythmic clicking of keyboards and the distant sound of Hank’s skeptical grumbling. Maybe if you stayed like this long enough, the Earth would stop spinning, or at the very least, someone would come by and declare you legally deceased.
You shot up a few literal prayers, you hadn't believed in a high power but at the moment you really needed the lady upstairs to do you a solid.
How much are train tickets to Quebec again?