Title- Life Lines
Rating- T (for mild language)
Description- 15 year-old Marina Zora goes to lunch with her best friend (Cafeteria food was so gross!) when she starts getting chills, and a headache. Next she gets a fever. She is then taken to none-other than Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital, where she meets fresh love, new family, new friends, and new grief. House meets someone from his past he'd rather not, and someone surprisingly new, as well as a new girlfriend.
Disclaimer - I have shocking news…I do not own House (damn!) But I do own all original characters and plot line.
First Word Count - 2776
Fanks!

First fanfic people!
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"Are you sure we should be doing this?" questioned Bella, Marina's best friend.

Marina laughed. "Come on." sighed Marina exasperatedly. "We get all the way to the restaurant and now you want to go back. I always knew you had a thing for one of the lunch ladies! Wait! Don't tell me! It's Gertrude isn't it!"

"Uh. Yeah, right. I think I've heard enough of your crazy antics for today."

"That's all you know! Next minute you'll be on your knees begging for my crazy antics!" she waggled her eyebrows. "Am I right?"

Bella patted her back. "Shh. Don't worry! You'll be in your favorite strait-jacket in no time!" she wringed her hands in mock-worry. "Oh I shouldn't have taken her from her room! With her mental state and what-not."
"Some days you amaze me, Bella, me boy."

"Yeah, I don't know if you've noticed, but I'm a girl. I've been one for as long as I can remember."

"Maybe so, but you, madam are the one whose been complaining of a flat chest and not getting her period yet."

"Hey!" she said defensively, as she crossed her arms over her chest. "It's not my fault I have Miss Hormonal as a best friend." Marina scowled. Now it was her turn to cover up her chest.

"I'll have you know -" she started in a low and menacing voice, but was then interrupted by a server.
"Ma'am? That's been blinking for a few minutes now. Would you like me to seat you now?"
He pointed to the 'little black thingy' as Bella had deemed it and she looked down at it too. It was indeed blinking. She covered up her embarrassment quickly.

"Thank god! It's about time you people got here! I went up and no one was there! Imagine that!"
The poor employee opened up his mouth in shock. "Are you going to stare and drool all over the carpet? Because I'm sure this restaurant makes enough money to clean their floors with liquids other than saliva." Marina sneered.

He looked down and saw that he had been drooling. He wiped his mouth quickly and led the fiery-tongued girl and her sniggering friend over to a prepared table.

"S-someone will be with you shortly." he stuttered quickly, not wanting to invoke the wrath of this girl. She cocked up one eyebrow at him then shot her friend a glance. They both burst out laughing.

"I'm sorry, but I don't see the joke." he said rather coldly. That statement sobered them up, but only for a few seconds. They were howling with laughter now. After a few seconds of laughter, and a couple glares from customers and other employees, her friend managed to choke out "That was a nice one Marina!"
"Whew! Yup! I even, I even got him to stutter!" she said through her laughs. She sobered up once again though and held out her hand to the poor confused server. "I'm sorry for scaring you, it's just a game we play to freak people out. And I got you pretty scared didn't I?" she asked, a smile playing it's way onto her lips while she shook his hand and sat down again. The server chose not to answer her question. "So… Jake," she read his name tag. "You don't want to answer the question? That's fine, I already know the answer. But anyway...Onto restaurant matters!" this girl was one of a kind, and she sort of got stuck in his head. And she could definitely read people. As she was talking to him, he was forced to come out of his musings and listen to their order.

"…I'll take a coke and a Caesar Salad. And my friend Bella here will have…What do you want?"

"I can order for myself, thank-you-very-much Marina."

Her name is Marina. Thought the server dreamily.

"But I'll have the same thing as my friend." Bella ended.

He wrote down their orders and left to register them. Meanwhile in a hospital nearby…

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Dr. Gregory House leaned back in his office chair, throwing a blue and red tennis ball up and down. When he tired of this activity, he pulled out his gameboy, relishing in the peace he had until Cuddy discovered that he wasn't watching General Hospital in his favorite coma patient's room. He thought, that since the most obvious place that he wouldn't hide in, would be the best place to hide in, because Cuddy probably wouldn't look in his office. While Cuddy ran around the hospital burning calories, he relaxed. It was a win, win situation in his point of view. He heard his door open.

"House." said a male voice from the doorway. He didn't look up from his video game.
"Not now Jimmy, I'm busy." he replied as the other man took a few steps into his room.
He grabbed House's gameboy and snapped it shut.

"Wilson! You know how neglected he's been since Cuddy loaded me up with a ton of clinical thingies and doctor type duties!" House said, gesturing sadly to his gameboy.

"House! Cuddy's coming! I just wanted to warn you…"

"Why ever would she come to my office?" House asked, feigning sweet innocence.
Wilson rolled his eyes. "Try hiding under the desk," Wilson suggested, "Though I doubt you'll be able too." he added as an afterthought.

"I bet you I can!" House challenged. Then he crouched down and crawled with his left leg dragging his right one behind. Wilson watched with an amused expression on his face as his best friend pulled his cane and his right leg completely under the desk. "I won!" House called gleefully from under the table.
"Shh! She's here!" Wilson said. Then the door opened.

"Wilson…" she said suspiciously. "What are you doing in House's office? Alone?"

"Hello Cuddy! Well, you see. I'm in his office because I paged him to meet here."

"Why would you want to meet in his office? Yours is just a balcony away." she pointed out. She smiled sweetly and Wilson had a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach. "Here," she said. "Let me page him again."
Under the table House desperately tried to turn his pager off. But it was stuck in his pocket, at least he thought. Luckily though, Cuddy seemed to have trouble getting hers out too. But, to his horror, he realized it was sitting one the edge of his desk…

Wilson looked at the desk, where House's pager was sitting. He had to stop himself from laughing when he saw House's hand pop up, desperately groping around on his desk.

House, under the dark of the desk, reached his hand up and started feeling around for his pager. Then he heard a loud beeping sound. His hand froze. Then a series of events happened: Wilson burst out laughing, and he spotted a pair of high-heels walking toward him. Cuddy grasped his hand and pulled him out.
"House! You have two hours of clinic duty to do today! What made you think that you didn't?" she said heatedly.

"Your inability to find me." he replied.

"You have a little girl with a runny nose, a boy who thinks he broke something, a lady with a rash…" House tuned her out. A few minutes later, Cuddy had finished and she handed him about twelve files.

"Have fun!" she said evilly.

"Hey! It's going to take me more than ten minutes to carry all of these!" he whined.
"I'm sure that after a few years of walking with a cane leaves you able to carry a few little harmless files." she said and walked out of the room.

Wilson laughed, "Nice try. You actually going to carry these?"

"Wilson! I'm shocked! And you've known me how long?" he said, as paged the Ducklings to meet him in his office immediately. A few minutes later, Cameron, Foreman, and Chase all walked into the room.

"What's up?" Chase asked.

"I have a task for you." He handed them four files each. "You must do clinic duty from now on, Cuddy's orders." he lied.

"Yeah, right!" said the Ducklings in unison.
"Maybe so, but if you don't , you're fired!" he said.

"Yes, master." Cameron said sarcastically and walked out the door.

"Poor Cameron," said House, smirking. "She can't remember that she's only supposed to say that in bed! But…Well, she's bound to forget sometimes."

The remaining men in the room rolled their eyes.

"Go do my - Er. Cuddy's clinic duty! What did you take up this job for? And now you don't want to help the people? I am so disappointed in you." House scolded, swimming in sarcasm.

"Whatever." Chase muttered as he and Foreman walked out of his office.

"What was that, my dear Wombat?" House called to them through the doorway.

"House, House, House…" muttered Wilson.

"Hey Jimmy," House began. "Ever seen The Little Mermaid?"

"Yes." he said. "About three decade's ago." he added under his breath.

"Well, you know that song in it?"

"Are you being purposefully irritating?" Wilson asked.

"Well, in all likeliness, probably yes."

"Ugh."

"One of those songs reminds me of all your marriages."

"Oh?"

"Yeah, it's called Poor, Unfortunate, Souls."

"You're an ass."

"I know."

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Marina and Bella sat at a table facing the window so they were bathed in sunlight as they ate their much-needed real lunch. Marina had thick wavy just-past-the-shoulder length hair, with one dark green eye and one ice blue eye. It was strange, but she didn't look any less beautiful with different colored eyes. In fact she probably looked even prettier with them. She had a slender body and was slightly gangly.
She was tan/pale depending on how often she went out that week.

Bella was slightly shorter than Marina. She had her dark brown hair a little bit past her ears. She was skinny and tan with big, deep hazel eyes. She was a little worried that they had sneaked out of school to go have a nice lunch, but didn't worry that much. Her best friend was extremely adventurous, she would risk everything to do what was right. The cafeteria was serving horrible out-of-date foods, and she couldn't bring lunches to school. Bella could bring lunches, but on days she forgot… Well, her friend had some health concerns. So they picked a close-by sandwich shop so they could have a decent lunch. Yes. Her friend would risk suspension for skipping out on lunch if the welfare of her body was at stake. And Bella did not want to know what they put in the food there.

Jake, their lovesick waiter, sat staring dreamily at Marina. Some day… He thought hopefully. His boss then yelled at him to get back to work, bringing him out of his reverie involving white dresses, romantic sunsets, and passionate kisses. He was truly infatuated.

Marina was enjoying herself. But was starting to get the chills. She was getting really cold. 5 minutes later her teeth started chattering, and she got a headache. She pushed her sandwich away. "Ugh. I don't feel good." she was sweating. "Its all cold and my head hurts." an instantly alarmed Bella got up and felt her forehead. "You're burning! You definitely have a fever. There's a hospital down the street with a walk in clinic."

"O-kay" she answered shakily. Her muscles were starting to hurt. Jake ran over.

"Is something wrong?"

"She just came over with a fever. I don't know what's up. Were going to the walk-in clinic down at Princeton Plainsboro."

"Need a ride?"

"Yeah, thanks."

So they piled into Jakes back-seat as he drove them up the street. Bella was worried about Marina. She held her hand and stroked her head. While Marina moaned a bit about how all her muscles were achy and how her back hurt really badly. They pulled in.

"Thank you." she said to Jake.

"Here, let me help you." he offered. Then they each wrapped one of her arms around their shoulders and dragged her in. When they got to an exam room she lay down in the fetal position. Bella hovered over her in anxiety and Jake stayed to one side. The door opened and an old looking man came in. He walked with a cane. "Hello! I'm Dr. House and I'll be your attending-physician for the day. I see you just came in here. And I'm going to assume that she," he points to Marina. "Is the sick one." Bella and Jake nod. "Okay, best friend and boyfriend here right?" he asked.

"Um, I'm Bella and I'm her best friend, this man over here is Jake. We don't really know him, he was just a server at the restaurant we were eating at and he offered to drive us to the hospital since neither of us are old enough to drive yet." Bella supplied.

"How old are you guys?" House asked, somewhat interested.

"I'm 14, and Marina here just turned 15 this November sir, on the third. Were freshmen at the public High School two blocks down the street."

"What are your symptoms, and don't give me your life story for this one." Ha! That's a first. She called me 'sir'!

"Oh, well we were just eating and she said she was getting cold and had a headache. I felt her forehead and she had a fever. She was also saying that her back was hurting. Is this just the influenza type thingy?"

Now this case was getting interesting. He silently got up and rummaged around a drawer. He pulled out a thermometer and stuck it in her mouth. "I assume you know to put this under your tongue and keep it there?" he asked.

"Aye, aye captain…" she murmured.

Bella was delighted. She's well enough to make a joke! A few minutes later, the thermometer beeped. House checked her temperature. "105.4" he said. Bella clapped her hands over her mouth. Suddenly, Marina rolled over and threw-up all over House's jeans and shoes. "Perfect." he spat. "Well, your gonna have to miss school a little longer kiddies, I'll have a room in the ICU ready in 5min."

"Okay." said Bella mournfully. Well, it looks like were going to be suspended fighting for Marina's health. Just for different health concerns.

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So my fabby readers(should I get any;)) How did you like it? I didn't think I botched it up too badly, eh?
Oh well. If I did tell me, If I didn't praise me.
Or just give me a review that bears good tidings! (but if it's bad, I don't care)
I've reposted this chapter so that it will be easier to read. And, just to make you smile, heres a little story that happened to me!

We went to Ti'huana Flats for lunch. They had all thes hot sauces and a scale fore hotness: Sissy Sauce, I can't remember, TearJerker, Deathwish. There was only 1 Deathwish, it was called Endorphin Rush, supposed to be 1000 times hotter than a jalepeno. So, my older brother gets this, and tries it. His face turns all red and splotchy and tears start coming out, and Roman never cries. I try a tiny bit and my throat burns, but that's all. So, as we were leaving, my brother sticks his finger in the hot sauce and shoves a huge glob of it in my mouth. It was not pretty. But most of it got on my lips, so I thought I would be okay. Wrong! Now, as I type this, my lips are burning. So, I hope I made you smile telling you my story, and hopefully enough smiles to give me a review! Thanks!

Paige/ ilovgregoryhouse