Introduction
I love House, especially the first four seasons or so. The idea for this fic was born when I scoured for a good Cameron/House romance and found 'I Do? I Don't' by ColorOfAngels. It's awesome but not exactly what I wanted to read. Eventually, I gave up on the search and got to writing. I hope you will enjoy reading this story as much as I love writing it.
My goal here is something character-driven and fun, so no gratuitous smut, sorry. Ideas are also borrowed from all over the place, and that includes the Vegas wedding trope that was too good to pass up.
I've also shifted the timeframe. The year is 2015, and only the first two years happened in canon, after that I'm taking liberties with behind-the-scenes events.
Disclaimer: I keep waiting for the rights to House to come into my mail, but they haven't yet. I don't own House, and I'm not making any money here.
Let's enjoy ourselves.
You Are My Secret
House woke up and stared at a poster of Sakura Matou surrounded by black flames.
To be more precise, he didn't so much wake up as stop sleeping, because the horrible headache and the condition of his bladder became incompatible even with the fitful rest of the deeply inebriated. The compost heap deposited right on his tongue didn't help either.
He wasn't supposed to be in his Vegas apartment. This was clear to him even through the thick haze of acetaldehyde and alcohol in his system.
He moved a little and became aware that if he didn't go to the bathroom right this instant, he would ruin the mattress. House got up. His leg tried to scream at him for getting up without Vicodin, but said scream was drowned out by the thunder of copulating elephants that have taken up residence inside his skull.
Thankfully, his cane was nearby, and so it took him barely two minutes to walk twenty-five feet, leaning on walls all the time. He hadn't had a hangover this bad since his residency years. It was around that time that he stopped associating self-respect with bodily functions and just threw up if he drank too much. Unsightly? Yes. But still much better than feeling like a sexually violated sea sponge the morning after.
When the toilet came into view, he contemplated catching up on his vomiting but quickly berated himself: it wouldn't do him any good now. The point of emptying your stomach after drinking too much was to keep the carelessly ingested poison from entering your bloodstream. Once it was there, other measures were needed.
Drink. Sleep. Pee.
Yes, that sounded like a good plan for the day. House did his business, thoroughly rinsed his mouth, and limped back to the bed at a much slower pace, testing himself by not using walls for support. When he entered the bedroom, his gaze immediately darted to the nectar of the gods he kept on his bedside table. Then he very slowly turned his head to look at something that caught his attention enough to push through the blanket of chemicals wreaking havoc with his mental faculties.
There was a woman in his bed. He blinked.
Absent-mindedly, he catalogued what he saw. She appeared to be in some pain as she slept, and her skin was dehydrated—signs of a hangover. She also took up more than half of the queen-sized bed, futilely trying to wrap her arms and legs around the mattress or maybe just melt into it. All of this, however, went through his mind on pure auto-pilot as there was something much more important about her.
It was Cameron.
###
When Allison woke, decade-old instincts immediately kicked in. She didn't move and didn't groan, even though her muscles were sore, and her head felt like a mall before Christmas. She was also naked.
Cameron just lay there, tried to empty her mind and waited while sensations slowly flooded into her, registered, and languidly floated to the shelves of her mind library, settling and becoming memories.
She didn't taste bile in her mouth. That was good. The sheets were too coarse—not her hotel room. That was bad. There was a lingering ache in most of her muscles, and she didn't think she had done any exercise after the conference the day before. The evening was a big blob of darkness to her, flecks slowly coming off, but there definitely had not been any sports.
A one night stand then.
And then there came the sound—someone coming—and she really started to panic.
A step and a thump coming immediately after. Step, thump. Step, thump. Pause. All the while she had her eyes squeezed shut. It was juvenile, but she wanted to be able to pretend it was all just a bad dream a little longer.
"Fuck," he said, and the voice made reality impossible to ignore.
She postponed the inevitable by flipping onto her back as slowly as possible, taking care to keep herself covered. There was some more thumping. Then she cracked open her right eye.
The light blinded her momentarily before a familiar shape emerged.
"Why are you standing behind a chair?" Cameron blurted out, wincing at the volume of her own voice.
House grimaced too.
"Didn't your mother teach you to be very quiet after getting hammered, princess?" His invariably sarcastic smile was crooked.
She didn't answer, instead gripping her skull with both hands, willing the headache to subside. Turned out she didn't have magical self-curing powers—go figure.
"For your information, I'm naked," House added. "Close your eyes."
She thought to argue for a moment but didn't have the energy and obeyed. After a few seconds she felt a weight settling on the bed. Suddenly, she was much more awake.
"What are you doing, House! We should…"
She turned to him only to see his rather muscular back.
"We should do what? Find a time-machine? There is a bottle of saline on the stand by your side of the bad. Take it, drink it. I'm going back to sleep."
He reached out for an identical bottle on his side and took a few gulps before pulling the covers tight around him. She wanted to ask him a question about his choice of drink but bit her tongue. Of course it would be saline—only getting an IV drip would be more efficient for getting electrolytes back into blood and dealing with dehydration.
"Your bedside manner sucks, House."
He snorted, she took a gulp from her bottle, and they both went to sleep.
###
Cameron woke up to the smell of bacon several hours later. She went rigid and readied herself for the inevitable wave of nausea, but it didn't come. With a grimace, she blindly grabbed the saline bottle and took two more gulps of the revoltingly salty liquid. She shouldn't have been surprised at House being right: the man was a brilliant doctor who regularly got hammered, after all. This was probably just another Saturday for him.
Her head still thrummed softly, but it was being fair now, because as long as she didn't move, the migraine stayed away.
Allison opened her eyes, pleased to find that the dim light filtering through the blinds didn't disturb her anymore. The fact that House wasn't lying next to her was also a boon. She sat up carefully and looked around the bedroom—she couldn't help but feel curious (finding her underwear was also a priority).
She had been right, of course, about the apartment not being her hotel room. It wasn't, moreover, a hotel room at all, as the bedroom was spacious and the open door revealed a large living room. Both were filled with personal items and little knick-knacks that had no place in temporary accommodations.
She noted some sort of Japanese animation poster on the ceiling, a bra on the chandelier, a photo of a much younger House playing lacrosse…
Wait a second.
That was her bra! The memories of her first time waking up were a little hazy, but she was sure there had been no pieces of lingerie hanging up there. She didn't know whether to be angry or impressed. House, with the hangover and his leg, must have silently climbed on top of the bed and set up the undergarments just to annoy her. Cameron snorted; at least he didn't hang her panties. Which were lying somewhere around here. Probably.
Her movements were slow and deliberate as she rose, searched for her clothes, and dressed. Only her underwear survived the night unscathed; her pants were a crumpled mess; her blouse was missing three buttons. In the end, she raided a wardrobe and borrowed a black t-shirt. It was clean and smelled of sea breeze and House.
As Cameron rose, she heard clanking accompanied by the soft hiss of oil. She was happy to find an open bathroom door after walking out of the bedroom, postponing the confrontation at least for a bit. The bathroom surprised her by having a bag of disposable toothbrushes.
She had a hunch and opened a couple drawers.
There they are.
Seeing hygienic products for women in what appeared to be House's apartment was shocking. Moreover so, because she hadn't been quite drunk enough to miss flying back to Princeton, which meant they were still in Vegas or somewhere in Nevada, at least. Where House apparently owned a very much lived-in apartment ready for women to stay over.
What the hell is going on here?
If House were a normal person, she would just walk up to him and ask, but he wasn't one. There have been too many times when an innocent question directed at Gregory House set off some elaborate prank and even more cases when it got simply deflected with hurtful evasion tactics. Still, trying to deduce anything about the apartment was just an attempt to distract herself from the glaring fact that they had slept together (and wasn't that fun?), so Allison took a deep breath and walked back into the living room to confront her boss.
The chime of the front door stopped her in her tracks.
"Coming!"
His voice rang from behind a corner supposedly leading into the kitchen, and House himself soon followed. She had to say, he looked much better compared to the morning. Tight grey t-shirt, jeans, bare feet, slightly damp hair. He stopped for a moment after seeing Allison and looked her over before smirking and continuing toward the apartment door.
I don't like that smirk, she thought.
Her first impulse was to hide, but curiosity overrode it. After all, who would recognize her here, in Nevada? And she was itching to know who was at the doorstep.
House opened the door and a man moved to step in into the apartment, but stopped when he noticed her. He was black, around forty years of age; his clothes could have been called formal if he didn't try to mix yellow and purple.
"Damn, House! Who is the new bird?" And then, without waiting for an answer. "Hello, beautiful! How did the old grouch get someone this stunning?"
The man flashed her a brilliant smile and winked. House sighed in exasperation.
"Paul, you need to be careful with those ties—they look like a gouache kit vomited on them. One day they'll break your gay-meter, and next thing you know you'll really start finding women attractive."
The man made an exaggerated yelp and looked at House in mock astonishment.
"Oh, imagine the horror." He then turned back to her. "Anyway, pretty bird, I'm Paul. Pleasure to meet you."
She tried to hold it in, but being complimented on her looks never sat well with her.
"My name is Allison Cameron. Doctor Allison Cameron."
When the Paul's jaw dropped this time, there was nothing theatrical about his expression.
"Cameron. The Allison Cameron? House, what the hell?"
The doctor in question just moved to push the man out of the apartment.
"Later, Paul. I'm a little busy here."
"Ah, ok. Are you up for playing later today? Weird seeing you here not on your usual date, but—"
"I'll message you. See you, Paul."
He closed the door and turned toward Allison.
"Nice t-shirt, Cameron. Looks great with your nipples."
It was an obvious deflection, but she still blushed and covered herself with her hands. It was chilly.
"Explain, House."
"Okay." He took a deep breath. "In the beginning there was the great void, but then God grew bored—"
"For God's sake, House! This is no time for joking!"
"Au contraire, Cameron, joking is the only thing we can do at this point. Wait here."
She reluctantly obeyed, and House limped back into another room before returning with what looked like a framed photo.
"Look, I'm not interested in your childhood—"
Then he gave her the golden frame.
It held a marriage certificate, proudly sporting their names and signatures.
###
"No-no-no…"
Cameron was sitting at the dining table, her face in her hands, muttering mostly indiscernible denials. House sighed, walked to the kitchen counter, and grabbed two servings of scrambled eggs.
"Hey, Cameron?"
No reaction.
"Allison? Puppy-eyes? Princess? Damn. Did I break my immunologist?"
He waved a hand in front of her face. She twitched but didn't look up.
"Cameron? I never noticed how short you are, what with you wearing those ridiculous heels to work."
Allison startled and her gaze met his. She kept her head down, and the expression in her big blue-green eyes reminded him of Bambi.
"Eat," he ordered.
"House, what the hell are we going to do?"
He rolled his eyes and chuckled.
"This isn't funny!" she said.
"I don't see why this is a problem, dear. Don't you love me no more?"
He lathered an extra portion of sarcasm on his words just in case she decided to take it seriously. Cameron snorted.
"You wish. Be serious."
House sat down and started on his eggs.
"Seriously? We'll annul it, obviously. I've already called my guy while you were busy pretending being in a crystal coffin. It will take up to half a year." He grinned at her. "Or were you going to marry someone else in the next six months?"
"What?"
It was good that Cameron didn't start eating yet as she would have sputtered the food all over him.
"Thought so. There is no harm then. And think of how much fun we can have with this! Now dig in. The eggs are getting cold."
She took a fork tentatively, found the smallest piece possible on her plate, divided it in two, and only then put it into her mouth. He found fascinating the transition from suspicion to wonder that followed. Her face was incredibly expressive when she didn't try to suppress her reactions. Which she always did around him when not hung over. He couldn't be sure, but maybe a couple years of constant jibes and mockery made her weary. Nah, she was probably just strange this way.
"This is good."
"You sound surprised."
"Well, yes. I somehow didn't picture you as a cook."
House snorted.
"Please. Scrambled eggs don't make me a cook. And did you think I survived on Vicodin and whiskey?"
Allison was polite enough not to answer, deciding to eat instead. It took her ten minutes to finish a third of her meal while House destroyed his entire serving. Both of them might have been equally hung over (although the jury was still out on that), but he had much more experience with alcohol.
"I think I'm done." Cameron said.
"What's wrong, princess?
"I haven't got this drunk since my husband died."
"Well, everyone can't have the loving relationship with booze some of us enjoy. Although now that we are married, I suppose you will contest for my attention."
Allison looked like she was about to take the bait for a second, but unfortunately it didn't last. She shook her head—it was weird to see her normally perfect hair so dirty.
"So what's the story with the digs, House?"
"Digs?"
"I've been hanging out with Foreman. I think he gets his kicks from encouraging the stereotype. Anyway, don't think you can simply brush off the fact that you have an apartment and friends in Vegas." She stopped for a moment. "Strange. 'House has friends'. Yeah, definitely weird on my tongue."
House chortled and took a sip of water, gathering his thoughts.
"Oh, you are insufferable. Can't we just stove this little fact into a dark closet and never open it? How about it? I've got a Playstation, bet I can kick your pretty ass at Halo from here to New York."
She just continued looking at him expectantly.
"I come here every month, okay? Would be pretty stupid to go to a hotel every time. Which reminds me."
He got up and went to his office where he had stashed the loot in the morning. He could feel Cameron's stare one his back. When he returned, she looked shocked.
"This one visit a month. Is it your 'hooker weekend'?"
House grimaced.
"Seems like Wilson was a bit overenthusiastic with spreading that rumor." He moved her plate and put a thick wad of cash on the table. "By the way, here is your cut, dear."
###
Allison looked at a stack of one-hundred-dollar bills that was thicker than House's forearm. She shuddered; it was still too early to think about any part of her boss neutrally. She couldn't remember anything, yet she was sure that while it had lasted, the previous night had been fun.
Instead Cameron focused on the money. She picked up the stack and counted, taking this time to think.
"House, there is more than thirty thousand dollars here."
"Very mathematically-inclined of you."
By this point in her day she was extremely tempted to slip into incoherent swearing. Nothing made sense anymore.
She knew she still held some feelings for House, because, in all honesty, no woman could tolerate the verbal abuse he subjected her to without some sort of an emotional attachment giving the bastard leeway. She was sure Dr. Cuddy also held some amount of work-inappropriate affection for the hospital's favorite most hated diagnostician.
Sleeping with House while drunk would have been understandable. Even now, stone-cold sober, she was a little bit curious as to what it would feel like. Marriage, though, was another thing entirely.
"—so as I was saying… Cameron, you still with me?"
She jerked and looked at him. His Cheshire cat grin was disturbingly familiar.
"Thinking about the night?" he asked.
He turned away from her and moved to pull off his shirt.
"House, what the—" She froze. "Wow."
His back was a jigsaw puzzle of shallow cuts. She looked at her nails, examining them closely for the first time since waking up. Only one of them was broken, but there was a bit of dried blood under most of them.
"What the hell were we on?" The doctor overtook the sensible person in her. "Once the alcohol started fading we should have crashed, and not done this… I'm on the pill, by the way."
He pulled his shirt back on and sat down.
"Way to state the obvious, princess. If annullable marriage freaks you out, you'd explode from a possibility of pregnancy."
She nodded. She still couldn't believe they had been able to pull off a drunken night, a wedding, and a night of wild sex all while being guttered.
"Anyway, I'm sorry," she said.
"It will heal. In a week or so."
"And you can't remember anything either? Damn." She blushed. "It must have been good. I'm like that only when I really lose myself."
She shouldn't have tried to tease him. Anything she could hope to reasonably embarrass him with made her embarrassed in turn, and House was far more jaded. As proven by his current cat-got-the-mouse expression.
"Oh, do tell."
Well, she wasn't about to indulge him anymore.
"There should be no secrets between spouses, you know," he admonished.
"Weren't you the one who always says best marriages are all founded on lies?"
"Touché."
She turned her attention back to the stack of bills and gestured toward it. It took House a couple seconds to realize that she was still waiting for an explanation. Normally he was faster-than-light fast when it came to hints; she blamed his sluggishness on their mutual hangover. The throbbing in her temples had subsided somewhat, but she would still take another day or so to recover fully.
"As I said, it's your cut," he said.
She eyed the money with suspicion.
"That word is normally used for robberies, you know."
House laughed an open, sincere laugh—she didn't remember him ever laughing like that.
This was when she finally realized what that nagging feeling she'd had since waking up was about. House was different from normal. He leaned on his cane less, smiled without irony at times, and she didn't see him take a single Vicodin since she woke up. He normally gobbled those things up like candy.
"We didn't rob anybody, don't worry. We just hit one of the major casinos. I'm sure it's thanks to you I got let in, so you get half of the profits. Was going to give you a third, but since we are husband and wife now, each of us should get half—I'm pretty sure that's how the law works."
Her eyebrow twitched.
"What do you mean, 'thanks to me that you got let in'?"
House rubbed the back of his head and looked away.
"You know how people say they have a gambling problem?"
"Yes?"
Please don't let my not-really-husband be addicted not only to drugs but also to gambling.
"Well, in my case it's more like the major casinos have a problem with my gambling. I have ridiculous luck," he said with a face as straight as can be.
She raised an eyebrow, prompting him to continue.
"I've never lost a game of chance. Not on purpose, anyway."
He sounded almost embarrassed saying this, so, naturally, she tugged at the string.
"Never?"
House nodded.
"Ever played strip poker?"
Hearing House huff was weird too.
"No girl would be insane enough to play against me back in med. Anyway, I'm barred from most major casinos in town. The guards must have been too occupied with you to recognize me, so that is your share."
She glanced at the ring, suddenly realizing where it must have come from. Her boss noticed and nodded.
"Unless you paid for the rings yourself, they came out of the money we won."
She glanced at his hands, and there it was—a gold band.
"Can I look?"
House just shrugged, took off the ring and tossed it to her. Cameron examined the wedding band, and then it was her turn to laugh.
"Oh, this is simply too good."
"Cameron?"
"G and C, together forever."
She laughed again, and House snorted.
"Yeah, sounds like something your fairy-tale-filled mind would come up with."
She tossed the ring back to house and gripped the table with both hands to steady herself while laughing.
"It's your handwriting!" she blurted out.
"No, can't be." House blanched.
Her laugh cut off. Pieces of the previous night drifted back to her. The conference had been dreadfully dull, and they were more than a little tipsy on the complimentary drinks by the end, which was the point at which they decided that hitting the Strip would be a good idea. She huffed another laugh.
"You proposed, House."
"That is ridiculous, Cameron. I resent the idea."
There was no conviction in his voice. She had never been able to convince House into something he didn't want himself—
She cut that line of thought, because that way led to feelings and madness.
"So let me get this straight. Once a month you tell all your colleagues that you lock yourself up with two hookers for two days—"
"Wilson knows."
"—and you fly to Vegas where you win obscene amounts of money."
House smiled and shook his head.
"You have an overactive imagination, princess. I usually just win enough to pay for the tickets."
"And you are friendly with people here?"
"I wouldn't say 'friendly'. More like gaming buddies. None of them live here."
"Like you?"
"What can I say, it's a club."
Thankfully, the day was Saturday and their flight was leaving on Sunday. House cancelled the rest of his plans that day, telling her that they had a duty to each other as hungover newlyweds. She'd been meaning to get back to her hotel room immediately, but shut down the idea when House didn't kick her out. It would have been the right thing to do, probably, but his place had all the facilities to keep her comfortable, and walking for more than five minutes still caused her head to spin.
By the time they were having dinner, she had showered and got herself more or less in order. House ordered Chinese.
"So, dear, will you be spending the night?"
Allison cocked her head.
"Do you want me to?"
House looked stupefied, and she cherished the rare moment when she could get the upper hand in their verbal spars.
###
A little over a year ago.
House wasn't entirely sure how Wilson had managed to convince Cuddy, but he didn't care. Two hours of this and he would be free of two weeks of clinic work. It would be worth it even if he weren't curious about the guy.
The door was simple in design and had only a number on it—42.
He thumped up to it and rose a hand to knock when it opened.
The shrink was a head shorter than him, well-built, and dressed in dark-grey slacks and a deep-blue shirt he didn't bother to tuck in. Brown eyes peered at him, and the man broke into a grin.
"Gregory House, I presume? I'm Matt."
Matt offered his left hand without missing a beat, and House rose an eyebrow. Normally he couldn't be bothered to shake hands. Nobody knew where those hands had been since their last washing, and people never noticed he had his cane, which meant handshaking had to involve redistributing his weight, passing the cane to his left hand, and then back—all for something he didn't want to do in the first place.
Reluctantly, he took Matt's hand.
"Come in, come in!"
House walked into the office and looked around. His powers of deduction turned out to be unnecessary when it came to his host.
"Where is the couch?" he asked.
Matt smiled a carefree smile and shrugged.
"In front of the TV and my Playstation, of course. Why? Do you need a place to lie down and tell me of your deepest fears and childhood traumas? I'd much rather play against you, to be honest."
He gestured House to a comfortable-looking chair in front of a computer with a 27-inch monitor.
"This doesn't look like a therapist office. Do you live here?"
"What gave it away?"
"Socks hanging off the pull-up bar you have bolted to that wall. And the bar itself, I suppose."
The man laughed and sat down. House joined him on the adjacent chair and admitted to himself that yes, it was surprisingly comfortable. It was one of those pro-gamer ones, keeping in theme with the rest of the room.
"So, you aren't going to ask me about my childhood."
"Nope."
"Why?"
"What would be the point? Your friend probably bribed or blackmailed you into coming here, and I doubt he can do it every week or so. It would be much more pleasant and useful for both of us to just have some fun instead of pretending you are about to start a therapy course."
"So, no couch, and your office doubles as your apartment. Are you sure you are a licensed therapist?"
Matt scoffed, pressed the 'power' button on his PC and motioned for House to do the same.
"Dr. House, I graduated top of my class and this practice is as official as can be, with doctor-patient confidentiality and the price tag to match my degree. But I don't view myself as a therapist, that's true."
"What do you view yourself as then?"
"A social prostitute."
House blinked. The line was delivered with nonchalance and good humor one would expect in a conversation that didn't stray from the topic of weather. Matt noticed his confusion and decided to elaborate just as he pulled a gamepad from under the table and fired up Mortal Kombat.
"Don't get me wrong, what I and my colleagues practice is a legitimate medical discipline. What some of us preach is often different, though. Tell me, House—can I call you 'House'?
He nodded, and they started a match. Sub-Zero versus Jax.
"Can your leg be fixed? All its function and aesthetics?"
The question made him twitch and miss a jab that launched his favorite blue-clad ninja up in the air and into a corner combo by Jax that cost him a third of health. He decided that deciding how to evade the question would cost him the match.
"No. Ketamine treatment worked to block the pain for a while, but the lag was still weaker than before."
Matt nodded, finally chipping away the last sliver of health from House and starting the second round.
"And yet some therapists will tell you that they can miraculously heal the mental equivalent of a disfigured or even amputated leg. I don't make that claim."
While Matt explained, his concentration wavered, and it was Sub-Zero's turn to dice his opponent into a mass of crushed bloody ice. Third round started, and the proclaimed not-therapist paused the game, inviting House to ask the obvious question.
"Then what the hell do you get paid for?"
"I can be a very special friend." Matt smiled. "The guy that tells you not what you want, but what you need to hear. The guy you can't afford to ignore, because at a couple hundred bucks an hour you'd be insane to do that. The guy who has the professional qualifications and experience to give you some advice you wouldn't come up with yourself."
"And this bullshit pays your bills?"
Laughing, Matt shook his head.
"Only sometimes. I also teach classes and consult. The fact that my uncle Fred died and left me a fortune in shares also helps, I'll admit. All of this allows me to take only the cases I'm interested in, and isn't that what every doctor's dream is?"
House wouldn't have called his own life a dream, but he had to admit that the man had a point. He pressed the start button and they continued playing. He'd be damned if he let someone who wasn't even a shrink beat him.
When it was time for their 'session' to end, Matt handed him his card.
"I have only three other patients at the moment, so we can meet whenever you feel comfortable. Unlike this freebie, real sessions take three hours. I will not see you more often than two times a month unless it's some sort of emergency."
House chuckled.
"Why would I come back? We just talked. I can have that for free and with much prettier company."
"That would be doctors Cuddy and Cameron, right?" Matt punctuated each name with a gesture that approximated the size of each woman's breasts with uncanny precision. "Wilson says they are fascinating conversationalists. But tell me, while we talked about why my profession is one big hoax, did you pop a single Vicodin?"
House stared. He hadn't touched the bottle in two hours.
"I cannot fix you, House. I don't think even you can fix yourself, not completely. But I can help you reduce suffering without losing your edge."
"Is that what you do for yourself?" he gestured to Matt's feet.
"Oh, this?"
The therapist pulled up his trousers and threw off one of the sneakers he was wearing. His toes were gnarled and spread wide, and there was some inflammation around all the joints. House thought it would be worse.
"Congenital arthritis. Not much can be done except manage the symptoms as any movement becomes accompanied by more and more pain. Or, at least, that's what the official stance on my condition is."
"It usually manifests in puberty. You are what, thirty? You shouldn't be able to move this freely."
The fellow cripple laughed at that and wiped a tear from under his left eye.
"You are the first person in my life to say that as if it's a bad thing. Medicine still has a long way to go when it comes to rehab and managing chronic conditions through lifestyle in addition to medication. I've experimented a lot and asked some good friends, but I have every chance to make it to a point when a more effective treatment will become available." Matt smiled the brilliant white smile of an insurance agent. "And, of course, should you continue our sessions, my resources and experience will be at your disposal."
He put his sneakers back on and led House to the door. The infectologist knew he would be back.
Chapter end notes
Here we go. If you liked it, follow for more—I find this fic ridiculously easy to write. Already have the second revision of the second chapter, in fact.
I would like to again thank ColorOfAngels. I know she didn't invent the Vegas trope, but without her fic I would have never got to writing this one. And I promise, that while the first chapter is similar, my story is different.
A word of warning: I'll be borrowing medical stuff straight from the show, because I'm not a doctor. Also, expect original characters, more background for Cameron, and severe deviations from character in House's case that I'll try to keep believable (that shrink isn't just for show).
This is my first pure romance character-driven fic, and reviews are more than welcome.
