A/N: I own neither House, M.D. nor the characters associated with it.
"Does your friend have a history of epilepsy?" Cameron asks as she walks briskly beside the moving gurney.
"She never said."
She looks down at the hazy young woman Thirteen's just brought into the ER with her. "My name is Dr. Cameron, you're in a hospital. We're going to take care of you," she says gently before turning to the off-duty brunette doctor who is clutching the side rails of the mobile bed tightly, "What's her name?"
She looks up at Cameron with wide eyes, as though she's suddenly had a fearful realisation. "I don't know."
Whether it's inadvertent or not, the blonde ER head shoots her a disapproving look, and she inwardly cringes in humiliation.
She sits alone in the locker room, angry and ashamed. It's been over a week since the incident and her one-night stand has since been diagnosed and discharged from the hospital. It's been a week, yet she can't seem to forget the way Cameron looked at her that night. She feels as though somehow she's disappointed her. She doesn't know why, given she and House's old fellow have exchanged little more than a few words and she's sure the older woman barely acknowledges her existence when House hasn't sent them to pester her in the ER. She wonders if it's because out of everyone at Princeton-Plainsboro, Cameron is the only person she can see herself actually maintaining a proper friendship with. Or, at least, Cameron is the only person she would want to be friends with out of choice. But Thirteen's too screwed up for friendships. Nobody wants to devote time and care to someone who's terminally ill and purposely self-destructive.
She rests her head in her hands, massaging her temples with her thumbs to try and ward off the headache she can feel slowly creeping over her. She stands - a little too quickly - and a sudden surge of dizziness strikes her. She braces her forearm against the locker unit and fishes her key from the breast-pocket of her lab coat to open hers with. She finds her supply of aspirin underneath a crumpled pile of pale blue scrubs and washes the pills down with the bottle of water left in there from the day before. She closes the locker door gently despite the desire to slam it shut to relieve some of her anger, and leans her forehead against the cold metal surface. She decides the soothing chill will suffice until the aspirin kicks in.
She wishes she possessed the power to turn back time so she could transport herself back to that night. Perhaps stay in and read a book or watch a film instead of heading out to the club to get intoxicated and pick up some random stranger to bring home the fourth night in a row. If not that, then at least ignore the advances of the one she did end up taking home and find somebody else. Perhaps if she'd been paying more attention she might have picked up on the girl's underlying illness and avoided all the trouble. Or at the very least, she might have escaped having her personal life become the centre of attention at the hospital. Now everyone knows she's a potential liability and her personal life is no longer as private as she would like it to be. She hates how she practically handed House the opportunity to analyse her on a plate, too. She doesn't like being dissected emotionally, and it makes her feel exposed in a way that makes her skin crawl. The less people know about her, the better off she is.
When she's sure the aspirin is working and she isn't going to have another spell of dizziness, she decides to head to the clinic and take a few hours of House's duty. Even though the rest of the team left a good deal earlier, she doesn't quite feel like going home just yet and she doesn't have anything better to do. Maybe House will lay off the jokes and jibes for a while if he sees she's done something for him without being told to. She returns her locker key back to her lab coat, unconcerned by the jagged indentations she's left in her palm from gripping it so tightly, and heads for the clinic.
She's just about to walk into the elevator when she hears a thud and an exasperated cry in the form of a curse behind her. She turns around to see a scrub-clad Cameron stooping to pick up the mass of files she's just dropped on the floor. Thirteen moves across to help her and starts gathering the folders furthest away from the older woman. She doesn't feel comfortable getting too close to her, though it's never seemed to bother her before and she wonders why it is now.
"Dr. Hadley. Hi," Cameron seems surprised by Thirteen's help, but smiles at her regardless and brushes a loose strand of blonde hair behind her ear. "How are you?"
I'm dying. "Fine," she replies listlessly.
"You know," Cameron begins. She appears somewhat coy and keeps her eyes trained on the folder-strewn floor. It's clear that whatever she's going to say next is a delicate matter. "If you need to talk to someone-"
"I don't need to talk to anyone," the brunette interjects harshly, her eyes narrowing. What she's going through isn't something that can simply be solved by talking, and since she's certain Cameron isn't terminally ill like her, she will never understand what it's like, no matter how hard she tries.
"I was just saying-" the blonde starts, but Thirteen swiftly interrupts her again.
"Leave it alone, Dr. Cameron, it's none of your business." She feels a pang of guilt after the words come out of her mouth, and she sorely wishes she had just taken that elevator. It would have been better for the both of them.
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to pry. I just thought-"
"Look," Thirteen says in a dangerously low voice as she struggles to stop herself from completely losing her temper, "I get that you're trying to be kind and all, but I really don't need your charity. So don't try to pretend like you know what I'm going through, because you don't. And you don't know me." She pushes the stack of folders she has onto Cameron and walks away with her fists clenched at her sides.
She refuses to look back. She's angry again, though she isn't sure if she ever stopped being angry in the first place. She wishes Cameron would have just let it go. That way their conversation wouldn't have ended so horribly and she wouldn't have come off looking like a total bitch. The blonde doesn't care, though, much as she pretends like she does. How can she? They aren't friends and never have been. It's not right for her to act as such. She's never bothered with her before, and that's probably what annoys Thirteen the most; she's doing it out of pity.
Poor Dr. Hadley – she's only got ten years left to live. But don't worry, Saint Cameron to the rescue – to make those ten years that little less lonely.
She's gone through life without anybody to lean on; she's learnt to live for herself and never to rely on anyone else, so why should she need to now? The diagnosis hasn't changed anything. She's grown up knowing there is a strong possibility of having Huntington's, so when the blood tests confirm it she isn't so surprised. She's already accepted it; seeing the piece of paper with her result on it is simply a reminder, an affirmation of who she is; what will happen to her when she begins to lose control.
She doesn't feel like doing House's clinic duty anymore.
She heads back to the locker room, hoping she won't run into Cameron on her way there. Thankfully when she gets there it's empty, and she stuffs her lab coat carelessly into her locker, grabs the bottle of water, her leather jacket and her bag and leaves. She's distracted in the car and almost runs three red lights on her way home, but she manages to get back crash-free and in one piece. Her spacious apartment is cold when she gets in, but she's not staying there for long.
An hour later she's sitting in a bar with her third Vodka Martini. And it's certainly not going to be her last.