Title: The Other Woman
Fandom: House
Summary: House and his new "patient" disappear. Cuddy's more than flustered--she's jealous.
Rating: PG
Pairings/Characters: House/Cuddy
Length: 2,500 words
Genres: romance, humor, a little angst
A/N: This was originally written for a Huddy ficathon on LiveJournal, but the ficathon kind of fell apart... But there's this fic and another one ("Old Scars, Old Wounds") I did anyway. Enjoy!
The Other Woman
Cuddy rolled her eyes and rubbed her forehead where a headache was certainly beginning to form. She mentally but not physically sighed and attempted to flex her hand without dropping the phone in it. She'd gotten tired of this at least half an hour ago and now, she was beginning to get stiff. If only this would end…
"Sir, please—" she attempted to politely interject.
But the man on the other end simply wouldn't have it and launched once again into an irate rant.
Cuddy slapped her free hand to the side of her face with a silent groan. She might've banged her head against her desk as well if the sound couldn't be heard over the telephone.
Just then, the door of her office swung wide open to admit House. He marched proudly in with a folder tucked beneath his arm and his mouth shooting off as it always did.
"House!" Cuddy snapped, momentarily forgetting the phone at her ear.
"What?" the man on the other end asked, for once halting in his tirade.
House grinned. "Good to see you too, Cuddles. I know I may be running a little late for your usual booty call, but traffic in the halls was terrible," he quipped, winking mischievously. Clearing his throat, he took the folder from beneath his arm and waved it in the air. "Oh, got a case."
"Who's that?" came over the phone directed at Cuddy. "Who's there? Tell me who that is! Doctor Cuddy, are you listening?!"
Had this contact been any less important to the hospital, Cuddy would've liked to irately respond that she hadn't been listening since the first ten minutes of the call and tell the man just where he could shove all of his pointless prattle.
But instead, she had to lie and say, "Yes, of course I'm listening. That's just the receptionist." She half-covered the receiver. "Not right now, Hou…sefina, I have an important call," she bit out, eyes boring into House. Then, uncovering the receiver again, "Go on, sir. I've dealt with the receptionist."
House scoffed and continued limping across the room towards Cuddy anyway. "Receptionist my ass. I've got a case," he repeated. "Just need your say-so."
"Not now!" Cuddy mouthed sharply as the man on the phone launched into a string of complaints about how she wasn't listening. "Go away."
Lower lip jutting out, House made a mock-puppy dog face. "No time for me?" he mocked. "No time to do your administrative job? Oh, I bet the board of directors will love to hear how you couldn't give your diagnostician a yes or no as to whether he could take a case—"
Cuddy firmly covered the receiver again and snapped a very quick and sharp, "NO, then."
"No?" House said, raising an eyebrow. "What do you mean 'no'? No is not an appropriate answer! I'm sure the board will also love to hear how you said no to a case without even hearing it!"
Sighing, Cuddy rubbed between her eyebrows where a pain was now sharply throbbing. Why, oh, why did House have to have such terrible timing? Why did he have to be so damn persistent right now?
And why, why, why did Cuddy have to deal with two annoyingly ramblers at one time?
"This could be easy, you know, Cuddles," House sing-songed. "Or it could get even more difficult. All you have to do—"
Apparently hearing House again, the man on the phone exploded furiously and irately demanded that Cuddy listen only to him. Oh, in that moment, Cuddy would have gladly killed both him and House in one fell swoop.
But instead, she made a quick chopping motion in the air. She sort of pretended she was chopping House's head off, but really, she was just trying to get him to shut-up momentarily.
Which, miraculously, he did as he raised an eyebrow questioningly.
"Yes," Cuddy mouthed tartly. "Yes, yes, yes! Now go away!"
House grinned like the proverbial cat that ate the canary and if he could've jumped up and clicked his heels, Cuddy didn't doubt that he would have. Still grinning, he ducked out the door, leaving Cuddy to continue her "conversation" on the phone.
And wonder, off-handedly, why House had been so strangely excited about this particular case.
----------------
An hour later, Cuddy stepped out of her office swearing to herself that she wouldn't take a single phone call for the rest of the day. In fact, she was going to do her very best not to be in her office at all until tomorrow morning.
So she slipped on her white coat and set off down the hall to do… something. Anything. She was sure she'd figure something out when she got walking and got her pounding headache to subside.
Cuddy laughed at herself, wondering what kind of logic that was.
Still, she kept walking idly until she came to the elevator. There, she pushed the up button and waited for the elevator to arrive. It arrived empty, and Cuddy stepped inside, absently pushing the button for the Diagnostics floor.
"Doctor Cuddy!"
Hearing her name echo down the hall, Cuddy reflexively jabbed the button to reverse the almost-closed elevator doors. They slowly slid back open to reveal Cameron hurrying down the corridor towards Cuddy's elevator.
Frowning, Cuddy stepped back out of the elevator and let it leave for the next call without her. "Cameron? What is it?" she asked the younger doctor.
Cameron took a brief moment to catch her breath after practically running down the hallway to catch her superior doctor. Finally, though, she asked, "Did you ok a case for House today?"
Rolling her eyes, Cuddy sighed slightly. "Unfortunately, yes. House bugged me during a business call. I tried telling him no, but he kept on nagging until I had to say yes."
"Do you know anything about the case?" Cameron asked.
Shrugging slightly, Cuddy shook her head. "What do you know?"
"That's just it," Cameron said. "None of us know either. House came in with a file folder, being as quieter than I've ever known him to be, and went straight to his office. When we asked what the case was, he wouldn't answer us. Just grabbed something from his office and walked right out on his own. I figured you would've had to approve the case and known something about it."
"Well, I don't." She groaned slightly. "House is up to something. You didn't happen to catch where he was going, did you?"
Cameron shook her head and Cuddy sighed. "C'mon. We better figure out what it is he's up to before it blows up in our faces."
It took them nearly half-an-hour to finally locate House. Cameron and Cuddy had to scour nearly the entire hospital before they found anyone that knew about House's whereabouts. But finally, they'd found a clinic nurse (the last person they expected) who pointed them towards an exam room where she said Doctor House was examining a patient.
Now Cameron and Cuddy were standing outside said room, preparing to barge in and see what House was up to.
Cuddy took a deep, steadying breath, reminding herself that she absolutely could not to blow up at House in front of a patient. And she wrapped her knuckles sharply on the closed door only once before turning the handle and pushing the door open.
She didn't know what she was expecting to see behind that door, but she slid an emotionless mask on her face in preparation. It went to good use, though even Cuddy's resolve didn't completely stop her eyes from widening.
Inside the room, a woman sat on the examination table. That in itself might be commonplace had the woman looked any different than she did. But she was not at all the average clinic patient.
She sat up tall on the edge of the exam table, giving a clear view of her low-cut, short-rise "shirt" that bared more than a little bit of cleavage and midriff. An impossibly short skirt and stiletto heels accompanied it, showing off the woman's equally impossibly long legs. Her heavily made-up face was framed by platinum blonde hair and her painted lips were curled in a seductive smile.
Had she not had nice jewelry, Cuddy might've thought her a hooker. But, given the shimmering necklaces, earrings, and bracelet as well as the nice shoes, her bet changed to 'model'—which, in Cuddy's opinion at the moment, was only a step up from a prostitute.
House, sitting on a stool placed ridiculously close to the woman's exam table, instantly snapped towards the door when it opened. His expression was clearly one of a kid who'd just gotten his hand caught in a forbidden cookie jar.
With anger boiling inside of her on so many different levels, Cuddy's eyes narrowed and she barely kept from scowling. "House, come. Now." With that, she stepped back out into the hall.
Cameron, having her first look into the room then, had a bigger reaction than Cuddy: her eyes bulged the same way and her mouth fell slightly agape. But, to her credit, she quickly regained her composure.
After glancing back at the woman, House reluctantly stood and made his way across the room to step obediently out into the hallway.
"Uh," the woman pouted in an overly dramatic fashion, "What about my exam?"
Eyes narrowing marginally, Cuddy took Cameron by the arm and pushed her into the room. "Doctor Cameron will complete your examination, Miss." She turned her glare, now unshielded, up to House. "Doctor House will be unavailable the rest of the day."
With that, she closed the door and took a copy of the woman's file from the basket on the back of it. She flipped it open and let her eyes scan over the contents as she walked down the hall to a more deserted area where her voice, if raised, wouldn't be so widely heard. House limped along behind her like the obedient child that he certainly was not.
"'Miss Fifi Fizzle,'" Cuddy read, raising an eyebrow. Eyes narrowing again, she looked up to House. "As in the 'world-famous' model?"
House grinned. "Supermodel," he corrected. "Yes. And yes, she has real symptoms that need real diagnosis." Reaching out, he attempted to snatch the folder away from her.
Cuddy was far too quick for him, though, and quickly yanked it out of his reach. She went on reading. "'Patient admitted on…' blah, blah, blah. 'Symptoms. Patient complains of stuffiness, itchy eyes, sleepiness, aching joints, and… "feeling hot and then cold like really fast"…'" Cuddy stopped and looked up at House again, incredulous. "Oh, my God, House. The woman has a cold and is just too stupid to know it." She swatted him with the folder. "This is not a case!"
"But what if it isn't a cold?"
"It is a cold, because I say it is," Cuddy retorted. "House, you are one sorry-ass doctor, not to mention person. If you can't diagnose a cold, or worse, you can't admit that it's a cold, there is no hope for you."
"I had my reasons," House defended.
Cuddy's anger was reaching new heights. She couldn't pinpoint exactly why, but this escapade of House's got pricked at her harder than any had in a very long while. "Oh, I saw your reasons," she snapped sharply.
"She has a great bod, does she not?" House said almost wistfully whilst wiggling his eyebrows playfully. He was grinning again. "Hate to say it, Cuddles, but I'm afraid her funbags out do yours."
The anger simmering in Cuddy viciously exploded.
"Oh, is that it, House?" Whatever shred of control she continued to maintain kept her voice barely below a shout. "Because some famous model comes waltzing in here with her implants and fancy push-up, she automatically takes top priority and gives you permission to break hospital—and ethical!—rules? I think not! In case you've forgotten, you answer to me and my 'funbags', House, not Fifi Fizzle's!"
Eyes wide, House blinked at her for a moment, and an anger-driven Cuddy pounced on the pause of silence.
"Tell me, House, what did you get out of that little visit you were getting with her? Hmm? Did she go, 'Oh, Doctor House, you are so hot,'" Cuddy asked mockingly. She shoved House the few steps backwards into the wall and stalked across the space between them, mocking a model's ridiculous strut. "Did she say, 'Oh, take me here and now, you sexy man.'"
Mouth now falling slightly open, House was looking down into her face—mere inches from his—in sheer disbelief. As the anger slowly drifted away, released by her outburst, Cuddy quickly realized her proximity to House and a huge blush threatened to rise to her face.
Resisting the blush, she quickly cleared her throat and stepped back. "Yeah, I thought not," she bit out. Turning away, she started to walk back up the hall.
House's laughter stopped her after a few steps, and she raised an eyebrow over her shoulder at him.
"You are so jealous!" he said, still laughing.
Her mouth fell open. "Jealous?" she asked incredulously. "Jealous? You think I'm jealous?" She forced out a laugh that came out with more bitterness than she intended. "House, what am I jealous of?"
"The attention I gave FiFi," he responded. "Of what you think we did."
Laughing again, this time with real amusement, Cuddy turned back to face him and crossed her arms firmly. "Yeah, right, House."
"You know it's true," he shot back. "You are so jealous." He forcefully limped across the space between them until Cuddy was forced to back up against the wall. "Like you once said, there are only two reasons for someone to do that. Either they actually care for my well-being, or they want me for themselves." He was inches from her again, in her face, daring her to defy her own logic.
His nearness froze the words in her throat for a long moment, but, determined, she cleared her throat and forced the words out. "Well, then, I can promise you it's the former, House. Not to mention the fact that I also care for the rules of the hospital."
"Oh, how touching," House said sarcastically. "But that's a total lie, and you and I both know it." He smirked devilishly. "You want me and you know it. Admit it."
The retort that came to Cuddy's mind was, "No, I've been there and done that. Not interested." But her lips didn't see fit to form that particular reply, but instead stammered a simple, "N-n-no…"
"Y-y-yes," House mimicked. He jammed an indicting finger in her face. "You want me for yourself. Admit you were jealous of 'the other woman'."
Suddenly re-empowered again, Cuddy's eyes narrowed. "I thought you had more sense than that, House. If I did want you, you know damn well that I'd have no reason to be jealous of Fifi Fizzle."
House's eyes widened and his mouth opened but no words came out.
Smirking with utter satisfaction, Cuddy brushed past House—purposely brushing her shoulder gently across his chest—and set off down the hallway again, and this time she wasn't stopped. There was a little extra pep in her step as she walked away, and she threw in a certain special sway in her hips especially for House.
And definitely reminded him that she would have no reason ever to be jealous of some half-brained supermodel.
END
Please review!