TITLE: Full Circle: Her
Life
AUTHOR: Danielle
PAIRING: Cameron/Male, House/Wilson
mostly implied, Chase/Foreman implied
RATING: PG for character
death (future stuff)
WARNINGS: Death, angst, vaguely slashy hints,
future!fic, probably OOC moments (especially Chase, I think)
SUMMARY:
A life can come full circle if it really tries, from beginning to
end. And no matter how things go wrong, it'll be solved if you wait
long enough or forever.
DISCLAIMER: Not mine! Really. If they
were, Cameron would be in Africa, Chase and Foreman would be having
sex every episode and I'm pretty sure Wilson and House would be
married.
NOTES: Semi-beta-ed by Jeff, who told me it was a
reasonable story. I hope it is. Try to enjoy it?
They mock her at the office, mutters in the lab and smiles exchanged in the hallway. Chase laughs as they talk about patients behind sound proof glass, wondering aloud how she possibly love a bastard like him. And Foreman just watches. He smiles, sometimes. But the words are rarely his, rarely voiced at least. They're mocking, yes. But Chase is the one who laughs, the one who shakes his head at her. And when they leave for the night, Foreman's the one who holds the door open for her and hands her her bag.
Drunk in the middle of the night Chase laughs at her, sneering from a barstool he's barely balanced on. Foreman smiles and watches them over a half-filled glass of beer. He's never drunk, watching their antics. She cries sometimes, ignoring Chase's drunken mocking and Foreman's eyes. But in the end Chase is the one crying, staring at his glass and weeping. He never talks then. Just stares down and sobs until Foreman leads him away.
Back in the morning and no one looks hung over, not even Chase. They sit around the table and exchange something like apologies, silent glances that remind them they have to work together. Chase laughs at something she says and Foreman smiles. When House comes in with a new case, it's all back to normal. The soundproof glass protects the patients from mocking diatribes and Foreman just smiles.
Years pass and nothing changes. She dates other men, marries a man who's never going to be well. Leaves House's team and Chase is laughing behind her back. Foreman just smiles and shakes her hand. They part on good terms, promising to meet for drinks whenever they have nights off together. And House rolls his eyes from his doorway, just watching as she goes. There's no love in his eyes, no loneliness.
And time doesn't stop for a broken heart or a dying soul. The drinking dates trickle out, Chase stops showing up and Foreman doesn't drink anymore. She's had three children and there's nothing left in common. But they still meet up in the park. Chase's gray and seems sadder, never laughing and just watching. She comes with her husband and Foreman's always got a new girlfriend. They talk, reminisce, she asks about House. He'd never come to these, not even when they ask.
Sometimes Wilson'll come, smiling at them. He talks about House more than they ever would. Tells them what's going wrong with their mentor, tales of love and adventure. No mentions of anything else until the day Chase rings her doorbell. He'd been the last to stay on, still working below the man he mocked for so long. And his words burn her soul, telling her there's nothing left but a shell. Foreman's standing behind him and there's something she sees in his unsmiling eyes.
The funeral never happens. House didn't want to be buried, Wilson says. He's crying but the words are still clear. Nothing ever comes out jumbled when he talks. Chase is silent as they board the boat, jacket clutched around his shoulders. Foreman follows, offering her his hand. They share a smile, sad and lonely. The ashes are scattered in the sea and Wilson breaks down again. No one tries to touch him, not even Chase. And when they're back at the dock, no one speaks.
Wilson knows on her door the next time, staring above her head and speaking in a whisper. He looks too old for who he is, gray and wrinkly. But Chase is the one who's gone. A shotgun in the middle of the night and a few too many of the beers he swore off so long ago. Foreman refuses to come to the funeral, snarling into the phone and slamming it off. She has to wonder, trying to ask Wilson. He just shakes his head. Her husband takes her to the funeral. The coffin's closed and no one's crying.
Foreman disappears not soon after, falling off the face of the planet. His phone is disconnected, his apartment filled by an elderly couple who never have to pay rent. No one knows exactly where he is. She tries to find him, searches the phone book in desperation. Even Wilson gives up before her, shrugging his shoulders and sighing. His eyes are sad and say that everything is gone. No one stays by his side.
No one comes to her door when he dies. It's a letter in her mailbox, stamped by a lawyer. She has something in his will. His funeral is beautiful, filled with weeping patients and parents and a litany of Hebrew chants. The will is simpler than she knew. All she gets in two boxes, Chase's ashes and a portion of House's. The containers are simple, names and dates and a single jewel on House's. The rest goes to the hospital. Nothing was left, not really.
The last letter she gets is from her son, a promising medical student at the beginnings of his career. He'd passed the exams but something had been off. He described the body, old and thin and black. The name was at the bottom, sad and lonely beyond all the text. It was over, she knew. She was alone then, the last remaining one. And her husband had left her the year before.
The police found her after the scent tipped her neighbors off. Natural causes, they said. She'd just died, sitting on the couch, reading a letter from her youngest son. Nothing could have been done and there was nothing more to be said. She left the apartment on a stretcher, her remains placed in the morgue at Princeton-Plainsboro Teach Hospital.
And she finds herself sitting in a glass-walled room, staring at familiar faces. House smiles at her, something real and true. Wilson laughs and places an arm around House. It's comfortable and warm, something she can barely remember. Chase enters with a smirk and a laugh, throwing himself into the chair next to her. The words flow around her, over her. Foreman steps in, smiling and settling beside Chase, hand on the other man's shoulder. And it's all so right she can't help but laugh.