Chris Taub stomped into the cafeteria and sneered at everyone that found themselves in his line of sight. He made his way through the line but found himself too angry to want to eat and bought only a bottle of water, throwing his money at the cashier irritably. She glared at him, but he ignored her, finding an empty table in the corner to slam his water onto before pulling the chair out with much more force than necessary, then sitting down and putting his head down on the table.

He sat there, his head pounding from anger for a few moments until he heard a chair scraping the floor nearby. No, no, no, Taub thought, hoping and praying that it was just a table near his and not the single chair across from his. He was disappointed to hear a lunch tray snap against the table obnoxiously close to his head.

"Hey, Taub, what's wrong with you?"

Taub glanced up warily, frowning upon seeing the peppiest of his colleagues sitting down across from him.

"None of your business, Kutner," He replied, sitting up and taking a sip from his water.

"Okay," Kutner mumbled, opening a bag of chips, "Whatever, just thought I'd ask."

Taub didn't answer, just took another long sip of his water and glared at Kutner, hoping he'd realize that he wanted to be alone.

"You're not eating anything?" Kutner asked, not seeming to notice that his coworker was attempting to burn holes in him with his eyes.

"I'm in a bad mood,"

"So you're going to starve yourself?" Kutner asked, raising a brow, "Want a chip?"

He offered the bag to Taub, and despite the fact that he was too angry to eat, his stomach growled and he grudgingly took one of the chips.

"I've never been mad enough not to eat,"

"Well, you've never been kicked out of your own house either," Taub snapped, then groaned as he realized what he had just told him.

"Oh, so that's what happened? Fight with you wife?"

"Yes," Taub answered with his teeth clenched.

"That sucks, man. If you need to, you can crash with me until you work everything out." Kutner offered, taking a bite of his salad.

Taub inwardly cringed at the thought of spending any more time than necessary with the sci-fi obsessed Kutner, but realized that he didn't have anywhere else to stay. Sure, he could stay at a hotel, but to get back into his wife's good graces, there would probably be lots expensive gifts in his future… And his salary as one of House's fellows wasn't nearly as munificent as the one he pulled in as a plastic surgeon…

"Maybe," Taub said tightly, "But I'd prefer to negotiate my way back home."

"Cool, just let me know, then?"

"Yeah, I'll do that." Taub replied, getting up.

He walked quickly out of the cafeteria, dialing his wife's number on his cell phone, and then cursing when it went straight to voicemail.

"Please call me back, baby. I'm sorry, just please let me come back home?"

He slammed his phone shut and dialed again; he was not going to spend the night in the bat cave.


"Damn it!" Taub exclaimed and replayed the message that his wife left him.

"Stop calling me, Chris, I'm turning off my phone. I really don't feel like talking to you right now and besides, I'm sure you can find someone to share a bed with tonight; you've never had a problem with it before."

He growled and slammed his phone into the nearest wall, letting all the pieces fall to the floor. He ran his hands angrily through his short hair and kicked the biggest piece of his phone he could see down the hallway.

"I guess things didn't go so well?"

Taub turned to face Kutner, who was bending down to pick up a part of his phone.

"Shut up, I don't want to hear it."

"Okay, okay, chill out." Kutner handed him what looked like a circuit board from his phone, "You might want to keep this, it's got your SIM card in it."

"Yeah, thanks," Taub mumbled, dropping the small piece into his pocket.

"So…?" Kutner said, pulling his keys out of his pocket.

Taub rubbed his temples in frustration; he really didn't want to have to say this…

"So…" He paused, "I guess I'm going to have to stay with you tonight."

"Okay, you need to ride with me?"

"Yeah," Taub sighed, his wife locked the car in the garage this morning, making him take a cab instead.

"Alright, then, lets go."

The car ride was quiet except for the sound of Kutner tapping on the steering wheel to some beat that only he could hear. Taub rolled his eyes and rested his head on the cool glass of the window, watching the passing cars.

"So what are you and your wife fighting about?" Kutner asked, breaking the silence.

"Does it matter?"

"I was just wondering, you seem pretty upset,"

Taub mumbled something under his breath and crossed his arms.

"You want to get a drink? There's a bar down the street from my apartment." Kutner suggested, slowing the car down in front of a brightly lit bar.

Taub opened his mouth to say no, but stopped himself, "Yeah, actually, I think I do."

"Cool," Kutner said, turning into the parking lot, appearing excited.

Taub rolled his eyes as he opened his door; Kutner was always excited.

Taub wanted to drink away the idea of being kicked out of his home and having to stay with Kutner. He wanted to be drunk enough to not remember why he was in this situation. And he nearly succeeded.

After his sixth drink, Taub was visibly intoxicated and was becoming disorderly. Kutner had never been one to drink and only ended up sipping half of a beer, watching Taub become rowdier and rowdier. At one thirty, Kutner decided that it was time to go, especially seeing as they both had work in the morning. He paid for their drinks and helped Taub out to his car.

"Hey," Taub said as Kutner started the car, "Why do you get to drive?"

"I don't drink much. Besides, I just live right over there."

"Oh, I don't drink much either, my wife hates it."

Upon saying the word wife, Taub's face twisted into a grimace as he remembered why he was there.

"She hates pretty much everything I do," He slurred, "I slip up one time and I get kicked out."

"Here we are," Kutner said, stopping the car, "Home sweet home."

They walked in silence to Kutner's apartment; Taub was apparently lost in thought thinking about his situation at home. As Kutner unlocked the door, Taub spoke again.

"She found out that I've been talking to some woman at the hospital," he said, glaring at the floor, "She accused me of cheating; she said if I'd done it once I'd do it again."

"Sorry, man." Kutner replied, letting Taub step past him through the door.

Taub grumbled something under his breath and turned to face Kutner, who was locking the door back, "If she wants to accuse me of cheating, I'll show her cheating."

Kutner faced him with a confused look on his face, "You're going to sleep with some random woman just to –"

Taub interrupted by pushing Kutner back against the door, then grabbed his face and kissed him. It was rough, sloppy and tasted strongly of alcohol; Taub was aggressive, pressing his lips against Kutner's almost hard enough to make it uncomfortable. Yet, Taub managed to get half of the buttons on Kutner's shirt pulled open before Kutner bothered to think about what they were doing.

"What the hell are you doing?" Kutner asked, shoving Taub away from him.

"If I'm going to get the punishment, I'm going to have the fun."

Kutner allowed himself to be pulled through his own apartment, and then lowered onto the couch. It wasn't until after Taub had climbed on top of him and began to trace his collarbone with his tongue that Kutner realized what exactly was happening.

"Stop! What are we even doing?!" Kutner barked, removing Taub's lips from his skin.

"Well, I was working my way towards third base."

"I'm being serious!" Kutner argued.

"So am I," Taub muttered, placing a kiss on his neck.

"Stop that! We can't have sex!"

"Why not?" Taub asked, pulling Kutner's shirt open.

Kutner grabbed his hand to stop him, "You're drunk and you're married. We're both going to regret it tomorrow and besides that, neither one of us is gay."

"We don't have to be gay to have sex."

"But we do have to be out of our fucking minds."

"Yeah, well, I'm willing to plead temporary insanity."

Kutner looked into the older man's eyes, trying to figure out if it was even worth it. He suddenly was very conscious of the weight pressing down on top of him and the fact that he was still clutching Taub's hand. He cautiously rubbed his thumb over the side of Taub's hand; in response, Taub squeezed his hand gently. Kutner shut his eyes tightly for a split second, just long enough to acknowledge that he was probably making a mistake, before finally giving in to temptation.

He sighed, then defeated, said, "Fine,"

The kiss that followed took his breath away. Actually, everything that Taub did took his breath away; the way that Taub ripped both of their clothes off had Kutner's breath hitching and arching up against him, anxious to press their bodies together again. And after that, as Taub was kissing and sucking and nipping at every inch of skin he could press his lips to, Kutner was panting and grinding their hips together, desperate to be as close as possible to the other man as possible.

Kutner had one last realization as he was flipped over onto his stomach: even though things were going to be awkward between them in the morning, Kutner knew that he wouldn't give this up for anything. And as Taub prepared to thrust into the younger man, he thought, maybe being punished isn't so bad after all.


Authors Note: Finally, I got this finished. Not too sure about some parts but hopefully you liked it. It's an unusual pairing, I've only seen one other Kutner/Taub fic and it was more friendship than anything. I'm glad I'm at least kind of original :] Also, I'm toying with the idea of writing a second half about the morning after, but I suppose I'll just wait and see if anyone's interested. Read and review?