Chapter Text
Evening winds were relentless during October in the Big Apple. The temperatures, frigid. Limbs, consistently numb. Yet, it's beautiful nonetheless. At least Erin Gilbert thinks as much.
The doctor's wrist watch read 2:30 AM as she stood motionless on the rooftop of the firehouse. Her legs, dangling weightless over the edge of the stained brick ledge.
It has been five hours since Holtzmann had left for her flight in an exaggerated hurry, throwing all bags of clothing over her shoulder as she went; caring not for the tie she left behind. The tie that was now safely strangled within the tight grip of Erin's fist. The fist that now threatened to release the garment over the edge. Along with the body it was permanently attached to.
The Ghostbusters weren't good enough for her. If they were, why would she have taken that job offer at CERN so eagerly? Why would she have left without a second thought? Left her work. Her life. Erin.
Memories faded in and out of the doctor's painful childhood as she questioned whether or not to stay. The years of torment she bore through, the therapy, the tests. The dumpster dumps, toilet plunges, one sided fights in the back alley of her High School. The fights that left her violated and broken; not just physically. The name calling, room locking, dark endless abysses that was her mind.
What was keeping her here? On this earth?
Nothing. Not anymore.
"Gilbert?"
There was a word spoken behind her- in a tone painfully familiar -but it was muffled. Everything around her was muffled now.
"Why me? Why is it always me?" She mumbled in no particular order.
Erin didn't connect with people much, or even socialize with them for that matter. After a while it all seemed nothing if not useless and counterproductive. Years of misery, trauma, and torment will do that to a person. Though with Holtzmann, it was different. Somehow it just was.
"What's a pretty girl like you doing up here all alone?" Holtzmann could feel the seriousness of the situation in her gut, but she tried her best to keep things light hearted as she lurked closer.
Erin was certain she'd gone mad now; edging her way impossibly closer to her immediate death.
"Dammit!" the eccentric scientist swore under her breath as she ran in the other woman's direction.
"I'm sorry I'm not the person you wanted me to be." With that, Dr. Erin Gilbert of particle physics, took a terribly confident leap forward, into what she hoped would be the end of all her pain.
A brief glance was taken of the streets below before Erin shut her eyes tightly, bracing for impact.
She wasn't given the satisfactory though. A strong grip and a painful yank was given to her waist and before she could conceptualize her whereabouts; warm arms encased her whole.
Disoriented and unsatisfied, Erin Gilbert began crying. Refusing to open her eyes.
"It's okay, it's alright," Holtzmann whispered through labored breaths, "I'm here".
Apparently all Erin was physically capable of at that moment was desperately grasping the opening of Holtzmann's trench coat; her knuckles white.
"Everything's going to be alright, Erin. I promise."
A pause in which no breaths are taken.
"Don't make promises you can't keep," came a small wavering voice.
Holtzmann pressed a kiss to the top of Erin's head, "I would never."