Hi everyone! New story from my 'Translated Italian stories'! This one is by •° .o°• and MaRtA H&Conly (thanks for giving me the thumb up to translate your story :) ). It's an AU story, and it's a bit explicit, so I hope you'll be with me in this journey anyway :) Hope you'll like it!
CHAPTER 1 - Good morning Princeton!
"...Sometimes I feel like I am sailing on a sunken dream..."
'Grace', Robbie Williams (I've been expecting you, 2000)
Toc toc toc toc toc toc toc
"Just a moment, I'm coming!" he turned to yell at the door, returning immediately to his main goal. He smiled, approaching it with caution "Ok, Joshua, we have to find an agreement: you tell me where is your brother and give me back that cane, and I won't say anything to mommy".
The little kid looked at him amused, remaining well hidden in his corner between the living room door, a short distance for a getaway in the garden.
"So, Joshua?".
Drinnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn
He turned abruptly, for a moment, to the front door to yell again at a not calculated on a Sunday morning host "I said I'm coming! Shit!" he stopped immediately after, seeing the kid smirking with his hands in front of his mouth.
"I say to mommy!".
"Me too!" he turned to the other pair of hazel eyes just behind him "Jess! Now why you two don't go to play with your blocks? And Joshua, give me that right now. Tell me, why don't we play with canes?" he said to the twins with the same shirt just in a different color, waiting for an answer.
Jess rubbed his arm, reflecting.
"Because you may be hurt, so now give that cane to daddy, okay?".
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"I said that I'm coming!" he didn't have time to bring his attention back to the children that they had already fled, cane in hand, in the direction of the kitchen "Damn! Joshua! Jess! Mommy will be here in a moment and then you two will have to explain why you'll be in time-out!".
He closed his eyes and opened them again when he heard a crash followed by a mad rush towards the door of the garden...
'Enough is enough, they're exaggerating now...'.
He quickly reached the kitchen, rubbing his had in despair at the sight of a number of dishes broken because of the cat on the counter, that in all probability it had been threatened by the two pests. He rolled up his sleeves and approached the front door, sighing, resigned when he saw the scene in front of him...
"And which J are you?".
Joshua stood motionless in front of the door (Jess must have been holed up somewhere in the area), with his eyes upwards towards the blue ones of his interlocutor, of which, each time, he was intimidated. He had more effect on them than their own father (it was because of him that Jess was holed up somewhere).
He stared at the kid, he did it with everyone, young and old, but watching someone a meter shorter than you is satisfying, especially to him "You know it's rude to stand still as a microcephalic when a question is asked?".
The kid's nose wrinkled angrily (it would have been even more If he had known what was a microcephalic), then he changed his expression, smiling in the direction of the lollipop-man talking "Can I have one?".
"And what will you give me in return?".
The kid thought about it, biting his lip, before handing him the cane. The man grinned amused.
"Thank you, impeccable timing, J. A cane for a cripple, you'll have a future in medicine" he grabbed the cane and pulled off a lollipop from his pocket. Joshua turned away quickly, but stopped immediately.
"Another?".
"Will you keep it for yourself or give it to your brother?".
He thought about it carefully, pondering what the best answer could be "I keep it for me!".
He pulled another lollipop from his pocket, pleased, and came into the house "Your children are idiots, Wilson" he passed him, hitting him on the shoulder and limping to the kitchen.
Wilson sighed slowly "House, come in, please" he walked through the archway of the living room, sighing in resignation.
House was sitting in his chair, tapping his cane "As If they didn't know that you should not take candy from strangers" he snorted as Wilson sat on the couch, since his seat had been occupied.
"House".
"And then what's this thing about that they go around with canes?" he said, throwing a piece of wood in the fireplace as Wilson rubbed his temples, breathing slowly, and House identified the signal as a silent request to be silent.
"What are you doing here? Have you noticed that it's Sunday?".
House grinned amused as If it was obvious why he was there "You said it the first time:'Always at your disposal'".
"Yes, but I was referring to office hours and the hours dedicated to our sessions, it seemed obvious to me" Wilson snorted impatiently, crossing his legs "Or at least to all my other patients...".
House began to gesticulate amused "Oh come on, even your wife knows that I'm your favorite. She's jealous, she even scratched my bike!"
"Eric, wake up!".
Eric Foreman turned on the bed, putting his head under the pillow, firmly convinced that the voice yelling to get up for a good five minutes belonged to one of his very strange dreams...
"Hey, will you get up n your own or do you want a hand?".
Eric narrowed his eyes, looking around. The first thing he saw was the face of his daughter from about five centimeters away from his face.
"Explain to me what the heck is wrong with you this morning?".
Eric decided it was time to wake up completely, and with an inhuman effort, he sat up on the bed, stretching and rubbing his eyes "Annie, are you crazy or something?".
Annie gave him a wide toothy smile "Absolutely not. Hurry up, we're already late".
Eric watched her daughter going happily to the kitchen.
'What the hell...'.
He glanced at the clock and realized that it was nearly half past eight in the morning...On a Sunday. He stood up, clearly irritated, he hated being woken up early on Sunday, it was the only day he could rest. He came into the kitchen and saw her daughter busy preparing pancakes decidedly...burnt.
"Annie...But are you crazy or something?".
The girl increased the flame and then turned to his father "Am I wrong or I have already answered this same question about...40 seconds ago?".
Eric stood for a moment in silence "For what absurd reason you came to wake me up at 8:30 on a Sunday morning? !".
Annie looked at him with an innocent expression "Come on Eric, did you forget?".
Eric stood in the kitchen, scratching his belly.
"You have to take me to Cindy's. Today we all go together to the mall. I'll be back tonight...".
Eric thought for a few seconds about the information given him by his daughter "And am I wrong or in front of our house there's a ridiculous shiny metal box on which I spent all my savings in recent years?".
Annie snorted. She hated how his father held her car against her still then. "Yes, Eric, but my beautiful pink car is in the shop, you were there when it started to have problems...".
Eric shook his head, sitting, waiting for breakfast.
"And so this morning I need a ride. My God, you're making a tragedy for nothing! "Annie put a plate full of toasted pancakes with jam on the table.
Eric slipped the first bite in his mouth, trying not to show how much they were disgusting "Honey, I told you a thousand times, why don't you let me serve breakfast?"
Annie swallowed the result of her efforts as If she hadn't tasted anything so good "Is it possible that you always have to complain about everything? Instead of being happy to have a sixteen year old in the house so phenomenal..."
Eric chose to remain silent.
Annie, who had finished breakfast in a flash, stood up and walked over to her father, kissing him on the cheek. She looked at him gently for a second, before taking an authoritarian and arrogant tone "I'm going to take my bag, Eric, I want you ready in five minutes flat".
Eric sighed loudly then headed to the bathroom, regretting not being able to shave. In front of the mirror, with the sound of water gushing from the tap open and the voice of his daughter singing loudly in the next room, he was lost for a few seconds in his thoughts.
The more time passed the more he realized that he and Annie were pretty much opposites. Sometimes he found himself even with the doubt that she was his daughter for real...But then he always managed to calm down because everyone said that they looked alike.
Annie was thin and short, with black hair which she had recently decided to mess with horrible blue and pink shades, two big, dark and very deep eyes...Her skin was much clearer than his and she was really beautiful, not just because he was the father, but he had noticed several times that boys looked at her, even men...
'Fortunately, she doesn't look like her mother'.
Not because her mother was ugly, of course. Simply because he'd not have been able to make it If his daughter had been the portrait of Alice.
Alice, the beautiful French girl with whom he had lived for three years...Until, about sixteen years ago, Annie was born...And Alice, his Alice, the pale-skinned and green-eyed, had gone away.
He tightened his hand around the sink, around that still open wound, still burning...
"Are you ready or noooot? !".
Eric sighed deeply and, after responding to his daughter annoyed, he got ready as quickly as possible.
In the hall he glanced at Annie, who was in front of the mirror fixing her make up.
"Are you sure you want to go out looking like that?".
Annie turned around, being skeptical of his father's eyes fixed on her: she wore a flouncy electric blue miniskirt, black collant and her beloved pink converse (that was just the base color, lettering and stickers now had completely changed color), a low-cut pink tank top which showed the huge red rose that was tattooed on her shoulder in secret, less than a year before.
"Tell me, Eric, when you'll be tired of trying?".
Eric, with his usual frown printed on the face when they talked about her style, went down the stairs and finally reached Annie in the car.
"It's my style, and it's great, you'll see that sooner or later you will end up to like it".
Eric smiled sarcastically "Of course. You know by now that I begin to think that I'd like you dressed more like a normal person instead of a...".
Annie sighed, not really angry "Drug addict homeless. Yeah, I know. Eric, stop it, you're going to see me like this at least until the end of my school carreer".
He sighed, resigned, throwing a quick glance at her daughter's hair and then at the road again. Suddenly, he found himself thinking of Alice. He didn't know why, he didn't think about her a lot, at least not lately...
Alice was gone, and he didn't want to use a delicate term to say that she was dead, she was gone in the true sense of the word. She had run away.
At the very moment when he returned to think about her, her perfect body and her blue eyes, he felt the anger in his bones. The fact that she had wanted to leave him didn't create him any problem...The problem was why she had decided to do it when Annie was three months old.
It had been hard, really hard, taking care of an infant daughter on his own and moving on without Alice, without the only woman he ever loved...
He hadn't had a serious relationship since then.
He had slept with a few women, but they had been one-night stands, and lately he had done it less and less. He realized that sex without love made him feel even more dissatisfied...
None, however, had managed to make him forget Alice and, unfortunately, he feared that no one would ever be able.
He was tired, so tired of having to go to bed early in the evening, tired of having to work hard all day to earn the right amount of money for not being in the middle of the street, tired of spending every night alone in his big and cold bed.
Tired of his life.
But there was one thing, one thing, he was not tired of and was not sure he would ever be: Annie, the little girl with weird hair and rude ways.
He lowered the deafening volume of the radio before looking at her.
'Thank you'.
"Eric, can you stop staring at me like an idiot? I already told you that you need a woman".
He looked at the road, unable to suppress a smile.
TBC...