As promised...I'm back. It's just a one-shot but I hope you'll like it! Enjoy! See you soon ;)
Well-Known Unknowns
[Set in the first season]
"House! What are you doing here? I thought Cuddy was looking for you?!" Cameron said entering the clinic room number 3.
"Actually ... I'm hiding from that harpy!" he said looking up from the magazine he was reading.
"In the Clinic? In the clinic room number 3? During your clinic duty time?" she asked snorting and opening her eyes wide.
"Right! It's a perfect hiding place! She won't ever think of looking for me here...right where she wanted me to be" he said looking at his magazine again.
Cameron shook her head and turned to the patient who was with her.
"Let's go in the clinic room 2" she said "This one is occupied"
He saw her coming even before she entered the differential room. She walked wiggling her hips with her fast and proud administrative pace. She was visibly angry.
"House!" she yelled throwing the glass door open and looking him straight in his eyes.
Chase, Foreman and Cameron were discussing a differential and stopped abruptly, leaving the sentence unfinished.
"Good morning Sunshine" House said in a mocking tone as his eyes went from her breast to her legs and back. She wore a tight high-waist black skirt and a sleeveless white silk shirt and of course her high-heeled pumps.
Cuddy didn't get agitated. She stared at him with piercing eyes and threw to him the folder she had in her hand.
"What the hell is this!?" she yelled as House grabbed the folder before it hit him "Are you crazy !? How do you think I can explain almost two thousand dollars in unnecessary tests on a single patient?"
"I know it's hard for you to understand but I save lives, Cuddy!" he replied harshly and mocking slightly "... I'm not sitting all day on my administrative ass!"
"This administrative ass is the one that continues to save your ass!" She replied still staring at him and taking a few steps toward him before continuing.
"From now on I want a daily reporting, written and detailed of all the tests that you're going to do! If you request a CT scan you let me know! If you request an ultrasound you let me know! If you ask even just a glycemic stick you let me know! Is that clear?! "
"C'mon Cuddy!" House yelled raising his arms in exasperation "You know that is not feasible!"
She took a deep breath.
"Do it or make them to do it" she said pointing Cameron, Foreman and Chase "but...DO IT! I never want to see anything like that again!" She said pointing a finger at his chest "... or I swear I'm going to deduct it from your pay! "
"Oh ... I know you won't do it!" He said looking at her with a grin.
"Don't put me to the test, House! Or in my next spending review I'll cut from the budget even the toilet paper of your bathroom!" she said getting closer to him and looking him straight in his eyes "I want that report on my desk this evening!" she hesitated for a second and closed her eyes taking a deep breath before going back to look at him... "I'm telling you just once, House... don't put me to the test..."
He held her gaze staring at her with his piercing gaze. Cameron and Chase watched the umpteenth fight between their boss and their boss's boss almost without a murmur. They've been working with House for a year and they had got used to those arguments and to his sexist jokes.
"Are you particularly irritable today, Dr. Cuddy? ... Are you in that stage of your period or these are just symptoms of a premature menopause?!" he said without moving, so close to her that she can feel his breath. "Anyway ... so close I have an excellent view of the twins!" he said with a mischievous smile looking down at her cleavage as if the words she had just spoken, or rather shouted, had slipped him.
She took a step back and closed with one hand the neckline of her blouse.
They kept to stare at each-other with a look of defiance. Then, again, she closed her eyes for a second inhaling deeply and putting a hand over her mouth before turning and leaving the room without speaking.
He watched her as she walked quickly along the hallway in the opposite direction to the elevator.
"Stop looking at me like that and go to do that trans-thoracic ultrasound to the patient!" he said to Cameron and Chase. "And you" he pointed Foreman "Go to see if the laboratory test results are ready!"
"And where are you going?" Chase asked looking at him as he moved toward the door.
"Bathroom. To hide toilet paper before that she-devil begins with her reprisals!"
He stopped in front of the door of women's bathroom on the fourth floor and leaned back against the wall.
Cuddy exited that door after ten long minutes. Pale.
"I thought I have to come in to get you!" he said looking at her as she settled her shirt with her hands before she heard his voice and looked up meeting House's eyes.
"My legs are trembling..." she said
"You're dehydrated. It's at least the fourth time since this morning." He told her seriously getting close to her "It's almost ten days... a bit too much even for the most virulent intestinal virus." He said moving a lock of hair from her slightly sweaty forehead. "Remember to me... when was the last time I saw you like that?" He feigned thoughtful but left out a smile as he looked into her eyes. He glanced down the hallway before touching lightly her hip with his hand.
"But since I'm on the pill maybe this time it's really a premature menopause" she answered with the hint of a smile
"Don't make me repeat how bad your diagnostic skills are, Dr. Cuddy" he said looking into her eyes and teasing her "... you're 37 years old so it really seems a bit too early to me" he smiled "and since you overworked last month it seems more like you escaped your birth control"
"I have to go ..." she said looking away "... I have to lecture third-year students in less than half an hour ..."
"Yes, right ... great idea! Hope not to pass out or you'll have on you a bunch of enterprising quasi-doctors, anxious to do resuscitation practice! You know they're starving to find some unfortunate one to practice on, don't you? "
She looked at him without answering as if to say I have no choice.
"Ok" he said "I'll do it. But don't take the habit! And... I'll have to tell everyone that that wicked witch of my lady-boss forced me threatening to take away cable TV! I have a reputation to uphold!" he said with a smile and a wink.
"What are you doing?" House asked entering the differential room where Cameron was working on her laptop. Chase was sitting on the other side of the table reading a medical journal.
"Our patient was discharged an hour ago." she said as if to justify herself but without taking her eyes off the screen "Dr. Cuddy asked me to fix your resume for the new web page of the hospital. She lacks just yours...and apparently she asked you to fix it weeks ago."
House didn't answer and just continued to look at her.
"Your resume is more interesting than I thought, House"
"I know it's hard to believe, Dr. Cameron, but I really attended Medicine School." he said with a wry smile.
"Yeah. Like Cuddy ..." Cameron said looking at him.
"Well, here ... For her it's even harder to believe it! ... But ... yes ... she really graduated in Medicine School too" he added with a fake laugh
Cameron smiled back.
"That's not what I meant... I meant that ... well... I just didn't know that you two attended the same University ... "
"Michigan" House replied sharply "but even though this may seem incredible ... she's younger than me."
"I find it hard to imagine Cuddy as a young student!" Chase said "I mean ... how have I to imagine her?
"With half her age." he answered
"Right, of course ... but I mean ... was she a kind of nerd? Or was she ... let's say ... hot ... a chick that liked to have fun?" he raised an eyebrow and did a mischievous smile
"I repeat ... she just had half her age. Nerd ... pain in the ass ... hot ... just like now."
[Flashback]
"I didn't think you'd call back after last night ..." she said hugging him tighter as he stroked her arm that wrapped his chest.
He thought back to when, less than twenty-four hours before, they had left in the middle of their University party and had made love for the first time.
"You know... you're not so bad, Lisa Cuddy?" he said with a mischievous smile lifting the sheet to peek again her naked body as she let out a smile
"However, Gregory House ... by the way ... I generally don't sleep with the first one that comes along"
"Well" he laughed "Do I have to feel honored then Miss Cuddy?" he asked looking mockingly. "Women gave me many titles but never ... the first one that comes along!" he said in mock offended but giving her a light kiss on the lips.
She didn't answer and just smiled.
God! How much he liked that smile!
They entered in a row in Cuddy's office. House was already sprawled on the floral couch in her office with his legs resting on the small wooden table. Cuddy was sitting behind her desk and watched them entering one after another. Foreman. Chase. Cameron. She lowered her laptop's screen and watched as they stood arrayed in front of her desk glancing at House on their left.
"Here boss! Ready for the firing squad!" House said removing his feet from the small table.
"Shut up, House!" she replied without looking at him but suppressing a smile while continuing to stare at the three in front of her.
"Do I need to remind you that you are a team? and that Dr. House is your boss, but I am, however, your boss's boss?" She looked at them in the eyes one by one while ignoring House to her right.
"You're adults...so if you have any problem with each-other...I want you to discuss about it. You are colleagues but you don't have to be friends. I don't want to see any reprisals or issue in front of the patient like today. Ambition is a talent" she looked at Foreman "but this don't justify low blows, especially when these are detrimental to your patient's health. I don't care if you make good impression to your patient ... I care that you can do your work at your best. In principle I don't even like spies" she looked at Chase "although sometimes they can really give me very useful information" and she turned to glance at House. "And yet ..." she looked at Cameron "Try to keep your work separate from your personal feelings. Identifying yourselves too much with the patient made you lose your objectivity. This doesn't mean to be a misanthropic bastard as the boss of your team, but losing objectivity means losing the ability to assess the patient and can lead you to really lose the patient. "
"I remind you that the misanthropic bastard is here at your right side" House interjected pretending to be extremely offended.
Cuddy ignored him.
"Fine." she said "You can go, see you tomorr..."
She was interrupted by someone who knocked on the door as she saw one of the paramedics overlook.
"I beg your pardon, Dr. Cuddy ... I know you're busy but it's urgent ... I think I have something here that belongs to you..."
Cuddy looked at him quizzically before seeing behind that man's legs two pairs of blue eyes she knew very well. And a shiver ran down her spine.
"Oh my God... what happened?" she exclaimed standing up from her chair "Madeline? William? Where is Martha?" she approached the two children crouching down to look into their eyes.
"Nothing serious, Dr. Cuddy. Don't worry. Their babysitter is in the Emergency Room but she's fine now. I thought the kids shouldn't stand there alone ... and they made your name Ma'am..."
"Sure Marcus, you were right ... but what happened?"
"A piece of food ...she, the babysitter, could have suffocate... the kids has performed the Heimlich maneuver on her and called 911. Unbelievable ... these little guys are really smart! It's good that you have taught them the first aid maneuvers, Ma'am"
"I didn't ..." Cuddy looked stunned and turned to her nine-years-old twins "The Heimlich maneuver?"
"Dad taught me!" William said as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
Cuddy glanced at House out of the corner of her eye.
"And Maddy called 911. She didn't even cry, Mom" he said with satisfaction watching his sister.
"Fortunately, you are fine." Cuddy kissed them on their forehead and looked back at the paramedic "Thanks Marcus"
Chase, Cameron and Foreman had watched that scene in awe without speaking.
They didn't know that Cuddy had kids. It was weird to see that maternal side of Cuddy. They didn't even know she has... or maybe she had (past tense) ... a boyfriend ... but that kid had just said dad taught me ... so those twins certainly weren't the result of in vitro fertilization! That boy had the same blue-gray eyes of his mother, but the girl ... her eyes were a piercing ocean-blue ...
"Let's go and see how Martha is!" she said to her kids glancing again at House out of the corner of her eye.
"Is Daddy coming with us?" Maddy asked innocently to her mother but turning toward House.
Cuddy suddenly stopped, lowered her head as if to declare defeat and bit her lip. Their coverage was definitely skipped.
"Daddy?" Foreman asked raising an eyebrow as if he were convinced that he had heard wrong.
House stood up with feigned nonchalance and took Maddy by hand.
"Sure. I'm going to come with you" he said glancing at his team with a smirk and putting an arm around Cuddy's shoulders.
"Never contradict your wife!"
The end