Broken Bridges

Disclaimer: House not mine.

AN: First chapter fic that I've decided to upload. There's only three relatively short parts and here's the first. Reviews are lovely but flames aren't so lovely. Thanks for clicking : )

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A lot can change in ten years. Plans can be finished, cities can be built, bridges can be broken. Allison Cameron shook her head, trying hard not to believe this fact. She knew that things would have changed as she tugged on her suitcase, leaving the airport terminal with a grim outlook on her trip. Her other hand felt soft as her young daughter towed after her, trying to hold her own suitcase as she sheepishly followed her mother.

"What's the rush, Mom?" The girl tried to shake her head to get her soft tufts of auburn hair from her face.

"There's none," Allison slowed down, forgetting that it was natural to be scared returning to Princeton after all these years, "just keep up. You know I hate being in such busy places."

"Yeah, I know," she looked away, looking over at a screen on the side of the terminal and wondering where her mother was leading her to.

Allison looked around hastily, watching over the crowded room to find a certain oncologist she'd kept in touch with. She'd hoped that after all these years his best friend had remained blissfully unaware that the two had kept in contact. She hadn't even managed an email to her old colleagues whom she believed one to still be working under her former boss, so she found it peculiar yet warming when she'd received an email from someone she'd never really been close to when she worked in the same hospital. She hadn't seen him in seven years since he'd taken the time out to visit her when he'd divorced his third wife. Ever since, emails and the odd letter had been all they had ever done but they both knew everything they needed to about each other. Her daughter had even adopted him as her uncle even though she hadn't seen him since she was three.

"Ellie," Allison turned around to see her daughter standing promptly behind her, "can you see him?"

"I don't remember what he looks like, Mom," she scrunched up her face a little and used her bright blue eyes to scrape the room. Allison looked around a little more before a waving hand caught her attention and a sign that the chocolate haired man beared, screaming 'Cameron's' to the terminal. A grin flew over her face and she tugged on her little girl, running to meet the smiling man.

"Jimmy," she said happily, throwing her arms around the brown-eyed man who patted her on the back in companionship.

"How are you, Allison?" He smiled, his eyes fading over her fragile frame and her gleaming smile to see him.

"Right now, I'm great," she glistened whilst James' face lit up when he caught sight of his niece.

"Ellie!" He said joyfully, picking her up in his arms and she giggled, hooking her arms around his neck.

"Uncle Jimmy!" She screwed up her face and hummed when her uncle put her down, hooking his arm under that of her mother, heading towards the door of the terminal.

"You have grown haven't you?" He reached over a hand to mess up the top of her hair and she stifled a grin.

"She's gorgeous, isn't she?" Allison shivered slightly when the cold winter air nipped at her face as they stepped outside.

"Absolutely." James smiled, looking down at the girl and as she looked back with her astonishingly blue eyes, he couldn't help but think of her father and how he would react to all of this, which has been going on without him.

"So how are you doing at school?" James focused on the road ahead of him, turning a sharp left onto a smaller street.

"Straight A's," Ellie said proudly, tucking her hair behind her ear as she sat in the back of the car.

"She's the smartest in her class, just brilliant," Allison said, the next words she said she wished she could reach out and stuff them back inside her mouth, "just like her father."

James looked over at the now solemn look of her face and knew instantly that she hadn't have wanted to say that aloud. Fortunately, Ellie didn't hear her say anything and didn't question her mother. Allison had shown her the only picture she had of the two of them and this was all she had to go on. She'd been told an anecdote or two and she could vaguely remember her mother and James discussing her father when he visited. Her mother hardly ever spoke of him around her unless she had to and her grandparents never questioned their daughter's choices on the subject.

"What do you want to do first, Ally?" James said, stopping the car at a gas station and she sunk further into her seat relaxing.

"I think it might be a good idea just to rest a little of the jet lag off before sight seeing," Allison lied, she didn't need to see the Jersey she had lived in for three years but only wanted to show her daughter, "have a sleep."

"Good thinking," he said, looking back over his shoulder before getting out of the open car door, "do you want an ice cream?"

"I'd love one, thanks," Ellie smiled, sitting back in her seat as the door shut and her mother heaved a long sigh.

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James' new apartment was colder than the one he had lived in before, but he simply accepted it as his lonely home, absent of women and strangely absent of his best friend who liked to hang around, even when James wasn't home. Allison pulled her hands up to her hair, pulling it back into a psuedo-ponytail after she put her bags down by the couch. She looked around the dark apartment, the only light radiating in from the kitchen as James called that the light bulb needed to be replaced and it had blown just that morning. Allison nodded and thanked him for letting her know. Ellie yawned, the flight was starting to get to her so she sat down on the comfortable couch.

"Make yourselves at home," James came back out from the kitchen with two coffees and a chocolate milk and put them down on the dark coffee table, "just let me change the light."

"Thanks," Allison took a tentative first sip, looking at the mantle piece in the corner of the room. From where she sat, most of the photos were unclear in the light but she could see vaguely who was in each of the pictures. The one in the far corner, she knew, was of James and his sister Linda, smiling over the twin birthday cake they shared on their double birthday party their siblings had thrown for them. She smiled softly, meeting Linda was an experience for her but she was a lovely lady. She looked at the next photo and her smile grew a little bigger when she realised that it was of James, herself and Ellie as a tiny four year old tottering around their feet. She took another sip, watching the small vase that sat in the middle of the three photos and she had to close her eyes again when she saw the next photo. Ten years had been a long time, but something still sat inside her, her daughter reminding her almost every day of the mistake she made. She loved her daughter more than anything in the world, but as she stared at the photo of James and his best friend, she still felt that sense of yearning she had for years. Suddenly, the light shined in her eyes and James nodded at the new light.

"You okay?" He asked her, climbing down from the step-ladder and patting her on the arm.

"I'm fine, it's just," she shook her head, pausing in her reverie, "hard."

"I know," he smiled sympathetically, rubbing her cheek a little.

"Ellie, don't you think you should get some sleep?" Allison looked over at her daughter who nodded, yawning again as she stood up to walk to the hallway.

"Good night," she said softly and bid the pair goodnight.

"How've you been taking all of this?" Allison's eyes averted from her coffee to the man questioning her, she simply sighed and pursed her lips.

"Better than I thought," she swayed her head a little and he took another sip of his coffee, she'd been waiting for the opportune moment all day so she bit the bullet and asked him, "you didn't tell him did you?"

He looked up at her, she thought he might have been offended but he simply shook his head in disagreement.

"No, not unless you wanted me to," he pinched his fingers and ran them in circles over the table.

"No, no, thank you." She said, shaking her head. She reached for her purse, feeling through it in haste of a paper object. James lifted his eyebrow in question but as she lifted a string of faded photographs, he suddenly knew.

"I don't know if I've shown you these, but they've helped me a little," she looked at the photos wistfully and handed them over to James, who fed them through his fingers like it was an old friend.

He watched the faded photographs which still showed some of their colour but were obviously worn with dog ears and small tears at the sides. He sadly smirked as the two people who smiled back at him embraced, Allison's long hair fell over her shirt and she gleamed in the arms of the blue eyed man she posed with. They were obviously cramped into a photo booth but they looked happy with dripping ice creams and younger faces. He looked up from the photos to meet Allison's eyes and it hadn't hit him before, but her eyes suddenly looked tired and her skin was pale and worn. She was still as beautiful as she'd always been and if you had only just met her, you wouldn't be able to tell what she'd been through. But as his old-timed eyes scanned her face, he knew that the last ten years hadn't been exactly a dream for her. He looked back down to the photograph and handed it back to her sad hand, the solemn smirk still evident on his face.

"I hadn't seen those before," he lied, they'd been sitting on his best friend's desk near his computer for ten years, "they're nice."

"Yeah," she nodded sadly, replacing them back into her purse and laying back on the chair.

"What are you going to say?"

"You know what," she looked up at the ceiling, "I don't know."