Title: You Were the One (Chapter 1)
Author: Sassydew
Rating: T
Disclaimer: The characters belong to David Shore, et. al. I'm just borrowing them so that I can satisfy my desire to know what happened with House and Stacy BEFORE...
Note: Includes dialogue from the episodes "Three Stories" and "Acceptance"

This is a work-in-progress and the chapter lengths vary. It is my very first attempt at fanfiction and feedback would be greatly appreciated.

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Greg has just been put into an induced coma to alleviate the unbearable pain caused by the toxins ravaging his body. Stacy cannot believe he has outright refused to consider having his leg amputated as his doctors recommended. She has exhausted herself trying to convince him. She hesitates for a fraction of a second, thinking she should have discussed the middle ground option with him, but she is positive that he would have refused. Though she knows that this is not what Greg wants, she tells Cuddy that, as Greg's medical proxy, she will sign the paperwork permitting the hospital to remove his damaged thigh muscle.

"You're saving his life," Cuddy tells her.

"He won't see it that way," Stacy replies quietly.

Now she sits in the surgery waiting room while large chunks of Greg's thigh are being removed without his knowledge or consent. Finally alone, she permits herself to cry, and large tears darkened with mascara slide down her cheeks. She knows some will view her decision as selfish. Indeed, she made the decision to have the thigh muscle removed because she loves him too much to watch him die, to save herself that agony. But she's also fairly certain that their relationship will end as a result of this decision, that he will not be able to forgive her. And that, too, will be agony. It's agony for her either way. She loves Greg more than she ever imagined she could love anyone. And she wants him to live, even if it won't be with her.

Wiping the tears away from her cheeks, she smiles to herself as she remembers how they met. Whenever people ask them, Greg takes great pleasure in telling them, tongue-in-cheek, that they met at a strip club. They share a look and Stacy plays along, adding, "You were the worst two dollars I ever spent!" It's a little joke they have. But it is partially true…

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(Flashback…)

It's a Friday night and Stacy is sitting at a table in the packed Gentlemen's Club, a slightly upper class strip joint. She's with three senior partners from her law firm and one potential client. The firm – Merry, Laurie, and Lowe – specializes in corporate law, as does she, and she's been working tirelessly to get Hudson Manufacturing to sign on as a client. She's also been trying to make senior partner. Merry, Laurie, and Lowe have announced that they are going to promote one of the junior attorneys. She's in the running; her only real competition is Brian Jensen. They both began at the firm five years ago, both just having passed the bar. They worked their way up at the same pace. In recent months, however, Stacy has, in fact, surpassed Brian; she's landed more clients and won more cases. But she's almost certain that Brian will get the promotion; Brian has a penis.

Two strippers approach their table and one begins to give a lap dance to the Hudson representative while the other dances suggestively in front of her employers. She feels uncomfortable and excuses herself to use the restroom, but no one hears her. The music is loud and they are captivated by the entertainment.

In the dark hallway where the restrooms are located, she notices a cigarette vending machine. She's irritable and craving nicotine, so she stops to buy a pack of Camel Lights. The cigarette machine is of the older variety, where you put money in and then pull out the knob underneath your selection. She laughs humorlessly as she thinks that things never really change that much anyway.

She leans against the wall next to the machine, lights up, and closes her eyes as she takes a deep drag and exhales. She does everything she can to make her employers think of her as an attorney rather than simply a woman, even if it means hanging out at strip clubs with potential clients. Brian is out of town and this is her chance to shine. When she announced earlier in the day that she would be joining them for drinks at the Gentlemen's Club, Merry turned bright red, Laurie scoffed, and Lowe said, "Honestly, Stacy, that's really not necessary…" She remembers how she argued calmly that Brian would have been invited had he been in town. "Well, that's…that's just…different, dear," Merry, the eldest of the partners at 63, said as he patted her on the shoulder. She worked her ass off to get where she is and she is not about to give up now, she thinks.

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Greg House is also at the Gentlemen's Club that same Friday night, sitting at a table with his friend Wilson and Wilson's brother and cousins. It's Wilson's bachelor party; he is about to tie the knot for the second time. House is happy for his good friend. He is also envious, though he won't admit this even to himself. It doesn't escape him, though, that Wilson is several years younger, and he's found love twice.

House jokes about hookers and strippers, but really he thinks at 36 he's too old for this shit. He's tired of one-night stands and brief flings that inevitably end with an accusation that he is selfish and indifferent. He knows deep down that this isn't true, but he simply isn't equipped with the right words to explain; hell, he doesn't quite understand it himself. It's a self-protective measure that he can't abandon. He doesn't trust people; he hasn't allowed himself to become attached to anyone in a very long time. People lie. And then they leave.

Bored with the strippers and the groomsmen's shouts of "Take it all off!" he needs a smoke. He remembers having seen a cigarette vending machine when he went to take a leak earlier. As he approaches the machine, he pulls out his wallet. The cigarettes are $2.25 but all he has is a quarter and a fifty dollar bill. He swears under his breath and slams his fist onto the front of the machine.

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The sound interrupts Stacy's train of thought and her eyes fly open. She sees a tall, lanky man in a Rolling Stones t-shirt and faded jeans cursing under his breath. "Vending machine steal your money?" she asks.

Slightly startled, he turns toward the direction of the voice to see an attractive brunette smoking in the shadows of the poorly lit hallway. "Nah! I forgot that I shoved my last few dollar bills down Candi's panties!" he retorts.

"Nice," she says, sighing. She's about to walk past him and rejoin her coworkers when her eyes meet his. She is momentarily mesmerized by his impossibly bright blue eyes, so, instead, she offers him a cigarette.

He looks at the pack of cigarettes proffered in her outstretched hand. "Don't smoke lights. Suppose you'd take pity on me and float me a couple of bucks?" He raises his eyebrows hopefully.

She sighs and rolls her eyes, but then opens her wallet and pulls out two dollars, which he quickly snatches from her hand. As he feeds the money into the machine, he smirks and asks, "So, what's someone like you doing in a place like this?"

"That's an original line," she replies sarcastically as she takes another drag of her cigarette.

"Just curious," he shrugs. "You don't see many women in here who aren't working the floor, and they certainly don't wear navy power suits buttoned up to their necks," he says, looking her up and down.

She studies him without responding as he fumbles in his pockets for a book of matches, lights his cigarette, and takes a long drag. "You're an executive of some sort, and you're out with the bosses so they'll think of you as promotion material," he states matter-of-factly.

She looks momentarily surprised, then figures he must have seen her at the table with the men from her firm. "Astute powers of observation, you have," she replies. In no hurry to get back to her colleagues, she continues to lean against the wall smoking.

"Smoking can kill you, you know," he tells her, as if this is breaking news. "You should quit."

"I quit last year. This is the first cigarette I've had since November. Anyway, what are you? A doctor?" she retorts.

"HA!" he exclaims with a loud laugh.

Just then Wilson comes down the hall to use the restroom and stops when he reaches House. "I was wondering where you --" he begins, but then he sees Stacy in the shadows, stops in mid-sentence, and continues to the men's room.

House moves so that he is standing directly in front of Stacy. He is much too close, and she can smell the alcohol on his breath. "Can I buy you a drink?" he ventures. When she eyes him coolly and doesn't respond, he looks down at the floor and continues tentatively, "you know, to pay you back for the cigarettes?"

At that moment she realizes that he isn't quite as self-assured as he first appeared. Head still down, he lifts his eyes to hers and, again, she is taken with their intensity. She feels oddly drawn to his strange mix of cockiness and vulnerability and a part of her wants to concede. As she's mulling this over in her mind, she hears herself decline. "I really should get back to my colleagues…," she says, not unkindly. "Don't worry about the two bucks."

He nods at her curtly. She puts out her cigarette in a standing ashtray and walks past him into the sea of tables and dancers. He watches her until Wilson comes out of the bathroom. "Who's the beautiful brunette?" he inquires.

"Nobody," House says gruffly, and he and Wilson begin to make their way back to the rowdy group of inebriated groomsmen.

(To Be Continued…)