Pairing: Starts out Chameron (Chase/Cameron) angst, but turns into Hameron (House/Cameron)

Spoilers: Season 2 Half-Wit and Season 4 No More Mr. Nice Guy

Warning: Not all of the dialog is right. I added what I could remember, but you get the idea. Characters may be OOC, sorry, but Cam seemed a little OOC in the episode, awfuly defensive for someone innocent. ; D

I Slept With Dr. Gregory House And All I Got Was...

...This Lousy Case of Syphilis?

House has Syphilis.

At least, that's what his new fellows are telling me.

Kutner said that while he was running some blood work in the lab, he stumbled upon a vial of his blood. After running it, they discovered that he was infected.

This is terrible. Sure, this is different from him possibly having cancer because Syphilis is curable, but it's still shocking. It would explain the way he acts, I suppose, but I always just assumed it was because of the infarction. I mean, for crying out loud, I would've done the same if someone put me in a drug-induced coma and had half of my thigh muscle removed!

I wonder how he's handling this. Normally he sits in his office or at home and dry swallows a few days worth of Vicoden, chasing it with a nice shot of scotch. Well, they did say that they gave him some drugs for it, but I doubt he's downing those with anything different, either. For such a remarkably brilliant doctor, he sure isn't very health conscious.

"Did you sleep with him?"

Hearing this, I looked up from staring at my shoes in thought as I hugged my knees. I was startled to find everyone staring at me on account of the accusation that was thrown my way. To top it off, it was from Chase. The one person who was supposed to love me and believe me. He knew better, and it amazed me that he was questioning my morals like that.

"What?" I shouted in disbelief. What's he trying to say? That just because I've lo-cared for the man since the day I met him, that I would sleep with him at the first chance I got? Who does he think he is?

"You did, didn't you?!" he spat angrily at me.

I tried to ignore him, hoping he'd let it go. I looked to Foreman for help, but he just looked back at me, skeptically, waiting for me to answer. The circle became drenched in an awkward silence. One of House's new fellows, I think it was Taub, but I'm not sure, spoke up in the attempt to change the subject. Chase stared furiously at me, never once letting his eyes leave mine.

"You didn't answer the question," he growled.

Answer the question? Why should I have to explain myself to him or anyone else?

"Maybe because it's none of their business," I said, referring to the others. "Or yours," I snorted under my breath, thinking he didn't hear me.

I could see his anger rising; his eyes were burning into mine. Suddenly, it was as if everyone else faded away and it was only just the two of us, sitting across from each other while he sat there with his arms folded.

"I think the STD is my business!" he retorted.

I was about to ask him, "What STD?" when I realized that he was saying.

Crap. I was so angry at Chase bringing this up in front of other people, I forgot the possibility that House could've spread it to others. Knowing his love for Hooker Wednesdays not only made it more possible that he spread it, but it was also my suspicion that he might have contracted it that way, also.

"Really, because I thought we were talking about House, not us!"

Just then, my pager went off, requesting me to return to the ER. I stood up from the chair, glared evilly at Chase for practically accusing me of being a whore in front of my co-workers, and stalked out of the room.

When I got there, I stopped by the nurse's station to see what was the emergency. She handed me a file and pointed to one of the concealed rooms, blocking my view of the patient. Looking down at the file, I skimmed through it to find a name.

Laura, Luke N.

The name sounded awfully familiar. Where had I heard that from?

Drawing back the curtain, I frowned and sighed heavily.

There sat House, unfortunately fully clothed, on the edge of the bed in front of me, twirling his cane like a batonist at the front of a parade. He stopped when he saw me and smirked.

"I fell down a flight of stairs, Doc," he said, mocking my usual patients. "I think there's something wrong with my leg!"

"I think the problem's in your brain," I remarked. "What do recommend as a remedy?"

He looked like he was purposely thinking hard. "A Morphine drip would be nice, followed by a script of Vicoden, a Cherry lollipop, and a side order of hooker usually does the trick."

I couldn't help but release a half-smile. "Yeah, you'd love that wouldn't you?" I pointed to the options he mentioned as if they were written in the air in front of me. "Let's see...you're not dying, so no Morphine. Have Wilson write you a script. I'm all out of cherry because the crippled diagnostician upstairs keeps swiping them, and as for the last one, you might want to lay off of that for awhile."

House lowered his head. "Sounds like those nurses have been working overtime at the rumor mill." He must've noticed my nervousness, because he turned the conversation around on me. "Stop clenching, Cameron. I swear, if I had a nickel for every time you worried about someone other than yourself, I'd be so rich that my mansion would make Hugh Hefner and all of his little bunny girlfriends jealous."

"You're not worried?" I asked, unable to understand how he was taking this so well. When I had gone through this before, with Calvin coughing his HIV-infected blood on me, I freaked. House was eerily calm about it. He continued twirling his cane like he didn't care. Just like he did when he "had cancer"...

Then, it hit me. The answer was staring me right in the face all along.

"Let me guess. It just dawned on you that Brad Pitt's not going to dump Angelina?" he asked in amusement.

"What?" I asked, shaking my head, being pulled out of my stupor.

"Epiphanies are usually accompanied by that dumbfounded staring into space."

"It wasn't your blood."

"Well, you didn't come back with another needle, so I think it's safe to say whoever you kissed, his blood won't match mine," he quipped. He cleared his throat and stopped spinning the cane.

"It wasn't your blood," I repeated. It was more than a statement; it was a revolution. And it was evidently true, judging from House's reaction to it.

"Not unless my birth certificate says I'm Betty Buttkis. Then again, it might; I've never seen it before."

I felt my eyes go wide, and I'm still not sure why. This was coming from House, therefore, it should've almost have been expected. He faked cancer, why not fake an sexually transmitted disease?

"So, you're clean?" I asked, carefully.

"Spotless," he replied, smugly.

I snorted. "I wouldn't go that far."

He narrowed his eyes at me. "You're relieved."

Relieved? I'm jumping for joy on the inside. "Yeah, I'm thrilled actually. I'm so glad that you don't have Syphilis. Is it really that hard to believe that I would be thankful that you're healthy." I paused. "Well, what's normally healthy for you, anyway."

"Huh," he said, dead panned.

"What?" Why is he surprised?

"Nothing. I'm just shocked. I figured once you found out I was even more damaged, you'd be all over me like a bum on a ham sandwich."

"Why do you always blame my concern for you on my 'love for damaged people'?" I asked, bending my fingers with air quotations.

"Because Dr. Chase is the perfect American Eagle model. I'm a walking advertisement for Rehab. I'm damaged. You're down here with me instead of up there with him."

My jaw dropped as I looked at him, incredulously. "You paged me down here!"

"And you're still here. If you wanted him, you would've walked out of here as soon as you saw me, but no. You stayed." He grinned victoriously. He was ruffling my feathers, and he knew it. He reveling in making me angry.

"I didn't stay here because I don't want him," I explained.

He studied me closely. "But you didn't go back because you want him, either," he concluded. "What's happened? You fight about something? The wombat steal your curling iron again?"

I looked to the floor, guilt-ridden. I don't want to talk to him about this. I already told him how I feel about him and he threw it back into my face. Reaching into the pocket of my lab coat, I pulled out my prescription pad, scrawled on it and ripped it off.

"Here," I said, handing it to him.

He took the paper and glanced at it. "Still looping your "G"s, huh?" It wasn't an obvious gesture of thanks, but I could see the appreciation in his eyes.

I nodded, silently conveying "You're welcome" to him, hoping that his fix for pain pills was the only thing stopping him from leaving. He pocketed the paper and turned back to me. I could sense he was unsure of what to say, so I spoke up.

"Why?"

He looked at me, pretending to not know what I was referring to. "Why what?"

"House." I said, warning him.

"You tell me yours, I'll tell you mine."

I groaned. "Fine. What do you want to know."

"What were you and Captain Kangaroo fighting about?"

What am I supposed to say, we we're arguing because he thinks you and I had sex? Hmm. Come to think of it, why not? It wouldn't be any worse than if he found out from his fellows.

"Chase thinks I slept with you."

House's eyes lit up in excitement. To House, learning something new always meant new blackmail and ways to torture people. It was ammunition, and he welcomed it like an eight year old finds out he got a brand new set of Legos on Christmas morning. "So, what did you tell him?"

I shook my head. "I told him that it was none of his business, or anyone else's for that matter."

He frowned. "You didn't confirm it, but you also didn't deny it?"

What did he want me to do? I wondered as I felt my cheeks get warm. "It's not his business."

"It's mine!" he protested. "I think if we're going to let people think we had sex that we should at least make it worth it!"

"Well, great. The next time someone asks me, I'll let them know how you couldn't get it up, when you finally did, it lasted no more than five minutes and that I faked it, just to get you to stop."

He frowned, obviously not satisfied by my suggestion. "First off, I don't have a problem getting it up. Secondly, you'd be lucky if you could walk after a few hours with me, and last, but not least, if anyone's faking anything, it's you, pretending that you don't want me."

"I don't want you," I said, trying to make it sound true.

"You're lying," he said, sure of himself.

"So are you. Everyone does," I said with a frown, turning around to leave the room, when I noticed he didn't answer my question.

"Why?" I asked, turning back around to face him.

"Why what?"

"When I said you switched the vials, you didn't deny it. Why tell me now instead of letting me find out through one of your underlings?"

He climbed off of the bed and limped over to me. He dropped the sarcasm and the bitterness from his voice and replaced it with the rare concern-filled tone she'd heard maybe only once before. "Because one STD scare was already one too many," he said, looking into my eyes.

"You...told me to...protect me?" I asked.

"Or to ruin Kutner's fun of telling you later on. Either way, I'm okay with that."

"Which one is it really?" I asked, hopeful that he would be serious again.

He grumbled under his breath. "First one..."

"Thanks," I said, genuinely surprised by his gesture, smiling at him.

"Yeah, yeah," he said, pretending like he didn't care.

"So, now what?" I asked.

"Now we wait until someone figures out that I switched the vials and then laugh at them for caring."

"I should go," I said, starting back towards the door.

"Hey," he said, stopping me. I turned around to see his face lit up.

House had an idea. I can always tell because it's followed by a mischievous grin. "You really want to thank me?"

I nodded, hesitantly, not sure if it was such a good idea that I did. "Yes?"

"Monster Truck Rally's on tonight," he suggested. "My place. If you can last through it, I'll acept your pitiful thanks. Need a ride?"

My eyebrows shot up into my hairline. "Uh, sure," I agreed, not wanting to see Chase.

"Come on," he winked, grinning wildly at me. "Let's give the wombat something to really worry about."

A/N: For now, this is a One-Shot, because A) I'm updating Everybody Out of the Water, and B) I'm not sure if it's good enough to continue it. Let me know what you think. If you all like it, I'll pick it back up and add on to it. Thanks! :D