I had an idea to reboot the ending of "Bombshells" and here it is. I wasn't a huge fan of much of season 7, but I left canon as canon up until "Bombshells" for this fic. And I did think they needed to delve into House's addiction more, so that was the one good thing about that ep for me. How they left it, though… Sorry, I have to go cry a little now.
And I know a lot of you read me for my sexy stuff… Sorry to disappoint, but there is no sex in this fic. Cuddy just had surgery for goodness' sake!
The italics are from transcripts of the episode, which I included to set the scene/rip open old wounds. (Thank you to Poeia at LiveJournal's Clinic Duty.)
[H] [H] [H]
[Cut to House opening his door, smiling.]
Cuddy: You took Vicodin. [House's face falls. He looks guilty and terrified.] When you came to my hospital room that night, you were stoned.
House: [also ashamed. He can't look her in the eyes.] How did you know?
Cuddy: How did I not know? How did I make myself forget for months that you're an addict? My subconscious was trying to tell me you could never get through this without drugs.
House: It was a one-time thing.
Cuddy: It's not about the pills, House. It's about what they mean.
House: I was scared because I thought my girlfriend might die.
Cuddy: No. You don't take Vicodin because you're scared. You take it so you won't feel pain. Everything you've ever done is to avoid pain — drugs, sarcasm… Keeping everybody at arm's length so no one can hurt you.
House: As opposed to everyone else in the world who goes looking for pain like it's buried treasure?
Cuddy: [sad] Pain happens when you care. Y-you can't love someone without making yourself open to their problems, their fears. And you're not willing to do that.
House: I ca–I came to be with you.
Cuddy: But you weren't with me, not really.
House: I wanted to be.
Cuddy: That's not enough.
House: [imploring] I can do better.
Cuddy: I don't think you can. [They stare at each other.] You'll choose yourself over everybody else over and over again, because that's just who you are. I'm sorry.[His face, as he realizes what she's saying is gut-wrenching. She reaches up and strokes his cheek.]
House: No. No, no, no. Don't. Don't.
Cuddy: I thought I could do this.
House: Don't. Please don't.
Cuddy: Good-bye, House. [She leaves. He stands there, devastated.]
House limped out his door onto the landing and yelled at her. "You're doing the same thing!"
Cuddy paused on the steps. "My drugs are currently prescribed," she sniped.
"You're leaving right now because this is hard. And it hurts. And you just want out of it." He studied her face and saw her defiant chin start to stick out. He could practically hear the gears of her mind turning as she prepared her counter-argument. But he pressed on. "You want me when it's easy and fun and exciting, Cuddy…" He paused, trying to swallow the lump in his throat as he articulated the fears he'd harbored since this began. "But when it's hard, you want to be somewhere else. So you give me the silent treatment or don't let me come over." He stared hard into her eyes. "Pain happens when you care… You can't love someone without making yourself open to their problems and fears. Thanks for that lesson as you hightail it for the door." He had to catch his breath. He was unleashing everything so fast, before she got away. "You're just like me."
Cuddy's knuckles were white on the railing. Her expression had softened, but was inscrutable. House couldn't sort through the emotions running rampant in his brain – sorrow, regret, anger, fear, relief, pity – until they all came together into one simple truth that he knew he had to say. He scratched roughly at his head in agitation. "You're sorry." He wasn't angry when he said it. Just flat. "You thought you could do this." His chin trembled the tiniest bit as he looked at her. "I'm the one who should be sorry, Cuddy." He looked at the ground briefly, then back at her. "I thought you could too."
He turned and walked with fatigue back toward his apartment door, drained of the impetus to do anything because he couldn't determine the logical next steps.
"You manipulative bastard!" she shouted up at him. House continued walking into his apartment and dropped himself onto the couch, but he didn't shut the door. He heard her sharp little steps approaching. She paused in the doorway, staring at the back of his head, his slouched shoulders. "How dare you abandon me, relapse, and then try to make this my fault?" He was silent. "You just wanna win this, House? Win the game of who hurts more? Okay. Fine. You win. Be the saddest. Be the angriest. Be the most jilted. Does that make you feel any better?"
"For chrissake, Cuddy, this isn't a zero-sum game. I'm not trying to take any of your hard-earned martyrdom from you." He said it facing the kitchen, his words drifting away from her instead of toward her. "You're the one who thinks you have to win every fight, prove every point, and dot every fucking I to make your life make sense."
"You're deflecting. You're using these vague sweeping statements about me to distract yourself from the situation at hand. Because concretely, House, you fucked up."
House laughed bitterly then stood up suddenly and whirled on her. "You deflect. You boil huge issues down to these easily-argued little cases so you can dig in and make me apologize, make me change. So you can try to fix me. And I just handed you the latest one on a silver platter. But here's the thing, Cuddy. The lying was about your professional insecurities, and I apologized eventually. The toothbrush was about you learning how to share your space, and I groveled. Your mother was about you seeing if could care about everyone you cared about, and I did it the way I know how." Clearly he'd been analyzing the hell out of their relationship, but she wasn't privy to any of it and her mind was reeling trying to take it all in and build her defense and offense simultaneously. "So tell yourself this is about my relapse and my inability to handle pain. And feel justified and righteous." His words had been growing angrier and angrier, but now suddenly softened. "But I know this is about your fear of how much you needed me. I know that you're glad I took the Vicodin so I was able to come to you, and that you're mad as hell at yourself for that."
There was a long silence. Their bodies faced each other but they didn't look at each other. Cuddy stared at the lamp on his table. House stared into space, toward the hallway.
"I'm pissed off," he said quietly, "because I tried to tell you that you couldn't handle this. And you convinced me that you could. And now it just hurts more and I don't know which of us I'm madder at."
"I can't handle what, exactly? Your childishness? Your constant disregard for my feelings? Your stubborn insistence on always getting your way?" She was the one getting riled up now. "Excuse me for letting my love for you cloud my judgment of just how fucking intolerable you could be."
House grinned at her. "Why don't you fucking come inside and talk about it, instead of standing in my doorway, ready to bolt? At least I had the balls to risk sobriety to do the scary part."
"Tsss," Cuddy scoffed. "Now who's being the martyr? I'm sure an excuse for one last hit was so upsetting for you." She regretted the words the moment they left her lips. His face fell and he shook his head, just once. He was shocked at her misestimation of him.
"I'm…" She couldn't say it. Dammit, why couldn't she just apologize to him? She took slow careful steps into the apartment. "Okay, House. So I'm not 'bolting.'" She made little quotations with her fingers. "How do you propose we solve this? Apparently I'm not allowed to demand an apology from you or anything."
House was silent and it enraged her. It was all fine and dandy for him to sling arrows at her proactive approach to addressing problems, but when she offered to just stand around and sort through their issues, he was no help. She slammed the door and stalked into the middle of the living room. "I'm, here, House!" She held her arms out wide. "Let's fucking fix this!" She yelled again. Her breath was shallow and fast. "You seem to have figured out all the ways I'm doing it wrong, so tell me what to do instead." He was still silent, still staring into the hallway and it infuriated her. "You won't let me leave, but you don't know what to do either!" she barked at him.
House turned slowly and sat on the couch again, resting his elbows on his long legs and holding his head in one hand. "You'd be a terrible diagnostician," he mumbled.
Cuddy let out a shaky breath. "Yes, you're smarter than me too. I'm just a lowly administrative puppet." She gripped the back of a chair and leaned into it a bit. Her medication was wearing off and her pain was flowing back slowly. There was a hot line low across her belly that was growing wider and deeper by the minute.
House leaned back on the couch and looked up at her, his hands resting on his thighs. "It's not about smarter," he clarified. "You're just in such a rush to tidy everything up. To check it off. To move it across your desk." He grinned sadly at her. "I'm used to this. The puzzle of what the hell to do next when we've made a mess of things." He smirked little. "I even like it."
"Yeah, well, I don't. So where does that leave us?" she asked grumpily. She held her palm flat against her bandaged incision.
"Maybe you should just distract yourself with other tasks while I diagnose and treat." It was an attempt at humor, poking fun at the similarities between their professional and personal dynamics. But Cuddy wasn't in the mood. She shook her head vigorously.
"This was too big, House. I can't risk your addiction being a problem around my daughter. I can't risk - " Her breath caught suddenly as the pain grew exceptionally sharp. "Can't risk my heart. I don't want to be alone when I need you the most."
"It won't be like that, Cuddy. It wasn't something I can't learn from. I was scared and I didn't know what to do for you. I didn't know what you needed - "
Cuddy interrupted him. "I need Vicodin."
"What?"
"My meds are wearing off." She released a long labored breath as she bent over behind the chair, writhing with the growing ache. "I need something for the pain."
House stood up and looked worried. "I, I don't have anything."
"Don't give me that, House," she complained. "This is already so fucked up. You admitting to the stash that I know you must have isn't gonna make it any worse."
"Cuddy, I don't have any Vicodin."
"What did you do with the rest of what you had after the other day?"
"I got two. I…" He looked embarrassed. "I lifted them from a random patient I saw on the pharmacy log. I only got two and I took them. They're gone."
"Dammit, House." Cuddy moved to the front of the chair and sat, but slid down, her legs sticking way out in an attempt to keep her torso as straight as possible. "Why'd you have to pick now to be all clean and sober?" she joked. "A bathroom mirror we could smash?" House shook his head sadly.
"Come on," he said, shoving his feet into his shoes and grabbing his keys. "I'll drive you home."
"I have my car," she protested.
"You can't drive like this, Cuddy. And the longer you argue with me the more you're going to hurt, so just shut up." He took two long strides over to her and helped her stand. They began walking like three-legged racers toward the door, but Cuddy could barely make it. He sighed, then sucked in his breath and lifted her body up against his. She curled her legs around him and laid her head on his shoulder, like a child.
"Oh my God, it's hurting so bad," she moaned into his neck.
"I know," he said, slamming his apartment door behind them and starting carefully down the stairs. "Just hang on. We're almost there."
[H] [H] [H]
House had laid Cuddy across the back seat so she could stretch her belly out while he drove to her home. He pulled into the driveway next to Julia's car and braced himself for the inevitable. He cut the engine and opened the back door, gently scooping Cuddy into his arms again. "I'm sorry," she said. "It just hurts so much." House didn't say anything but just kissed the top of her head briefly and limped to the front door, happily finding it unlocked.
"Lisa?" Julia's voice rang out. "How did it - " She stopped short in the hallway when she saw the scene.
"Not quite as she'd planned," House snarked. "You know that House." He rolled his eyes dramatically as he passed her in the hall. "Always complicating things."
Julia was a flurry of concern. "What's wrong? Is she okay?"
"She just needs her meds," House explained, still limping toward Cuddy's bedroom. Cuddy moaned in agreement. He reached her bed and Julia hurriedly pulled down the blankets. House laid her gently and saw her pill bottle on her bedside.
"I'll get her some water," Julia said, exiting quickly.
"You're gonna feel better really fast," House assured Cuddy, brushing her hair back off her face. He picked up her bottle and spun it around in his fingers like he used to. "It would be faster if you knew how to swallow them dry, like a pro." She opened one eye and glared at him.
"I'll chew it at this point," she mumbled into the pillow.
"Been there," he sympathized. Julia was back with a glass of water and House helped Cuddy sit up a little. He placed the Vicodin on her tongue and she took a swig of water, then fell back down against the bed. The house phone began to ring and Julia left the room to go answer it.
"Have you eaten anything?" House asked her, still smoothing her hair. "I don't want you to throw up the pill." Cuddy shook her head. "I'll go get you some crackers or something." He got up and went to the kitchen, where Julia was talking in a hushed voice that grew even more hushed when House entered. He rummaged around Cuddy's cupboards and eavesdropped, deducing that Julia was talking to their mother. She hung up as House was shaking some crackers onto a paper towel.
"You didn't let her break up with you, eh?" Julia asked him, leaning back against the counter. House looked up at her briefly with a scowl before returning his attention to his task.
"Jury's still out on that," he responded. "But don't worry. I'm sure if you stay a few more days you'll get my head on a platter." He turned to put the cracker box back in the cupboard, knowing Cuddy would want that. He grabbed the little snack parcel and stated toward the exit.
"I don't want that, House," Julia said quietly. House slowed his steps and paused at the threshold, but didn't turn to face her. "I just want her to be happy. And being loved is part of that." They were silent for a moment and House finally took a moment to rub his throbbing thigh, his back still to Julia. "And I know she thinks the opposite right now, but if you fell off the wagon just to do the right thing by her, I know you do love her."
House shook his head a little and looked back at Julia. "You've both got it wrong," he told her. "Vicodin or no Vicodin… I always love her." He limped out of the kitchen.
[H] [H] [H]
Cuddy was roused from her immediate nap when House sat on the edge of the bed. He handed her a cracker and she ate it clumsily, with a dry mouth and lying at a weird angle. She shifted a little and sat up to take another swig of water. Then she burrowed back into the pillows. She reached out and found his hand, which took House by surprise. "Thank you," she told him, her eyes closed.
He nodded, but realized she couldn't see him, so he cleared his throat and quietly said "You're welcome." He set the rest of the crackers on the bedside table, brushed his hand along her hair one last time, and stood up to leave. When his weight lifted from the bed Cuddy opened her eyes and saw him heading for the door.
"Don't go," she said quietly. "You were right… Maybe we can fix this."
House sighed heavily, exhausted from trying to fit their two puzzle pieces together. "Maybe we can't."
Cuddy blinked and tears filled her eyes. She was tired too. She was so constantly vigilant of their status, a weatherman constantly surveying the radar, that she forgot what it was like to just take a walk with him, maybe getting caught in the rain. "I'm sorry we couldn't talk more at your apartment. I just couldn't deal with the complexity of us when I had all that pain."
House turned to her, meeting her eyes. "Do you hear yourself?" Cuddy thought about the words she'd just uttered. "Can't I have just a little of the same slack?" Cuddy bit her lip, accepting his point. He did things every day that many people couldn't handle on top of that kind of pain. His addiction was real, and dangerous. But it was also rooted in very tangible, real pain. And she realized she'd dismissed that, unable to go to that intimate place with him, much like he'd feared holding her hand at death's door.
"I do need you, House," she whispered. "And it does scare me. Because I don't know if you can do it." She took a hand and brushed away a tear that had trickled free. "But that doesn't make me need you any less."
"It's not all me, Cuddy," he said at her carpet. He put his hands in his pockets, then looked at her face. "You'd be upset about messy bathrooms and sick mothers with anyone you were with. Cuz you're a control freak. I'm not the cause of all your bad feelings."
"I know," she admitted. "Honestly, you're right. I don't know if I can do it either. But that also doesn't make me need you any less." She sighed. "But you helped me tonight. When I needed you - "
"When you let someone help you - " he interrupted.
"When I let you help me," she relented, "you came through. So stay. And I'll distract myself with paperwork while you diagnose and treat us." She grinned at him half-heartedly.
He offered an almost undetectable smile. "Will you sign off on amputating Julia from the relationship?" he asked, taking a small step toward the bed.
Cuddy smiled. "If you can show me test results that show it's necessary." She watched him bite his thumbnail, still thinking. "She's actually on your side for once, you know. She thinks I'm being rash."
"Makes sense," he nodded. "You're the hot sister, so she's probably the smart one."
Cuddy laughed, then moaned and clutched her abdomen. "The laughter," she whined. "It hurts."
He really couldn't stand to see her in pain. That's the reality that spawned the whole fucking fight. He didn't like it and he had trouble dealing with things he didn't like. But he'd told her he could do better. And she'd told him she didn't want him to change. So maybe if they could find some sweet spot in the middle of those two impossible proclamations…
He toed off his shoes and limped over to the other side of the bed. "You forgot your cane," Cuddy observed.
"Yeah," he groused. "Maybe we can get some sort of little bell to call for Julia when we need things." He pulled back the covers and got in, spooning up next to her and closing his eyes while he inhaled the scent of her again. He felt her relaxing against him and wanted to just drift to sleep with her, but he couldn't help massaging his thigh a little, since it was screaming out for attention.
Cuddy felt him and the Vicodin bottle was right in her line of vision as she lay there, pondering what would become of them. "Do you want me to hide the pills?" she asked him suddenly.
House opened his eyes, reached across her, and picked up the bottle. He shook it back and forth a few times. "There are eight in there," he informed her, setting it back down and wrapping his arm gently around her.
"You can tell that from shaking it?"
"Just remember there are eight. You can count them again in the morning."
"I trust you," she told him.
"That's nice," he told her. "But you shouldn't."
Cuddy reached out and grabbed the bottle, opened in and manipulated the pills with one finger. "There are nine in here."
"Good girl, Cuddy." He held her closer, but Cuddy shifted to her back to look at him.
"Are you saying we're always going to live with this? With the threat of you relapsing?" House propped himself on his elbow and looked down at her soberly.
"Yes. I'm an addict. There's nothing you can do about that."
Cuddy nodded, the plain fact finally penetrating her stubborn brain.
"But it doesn't mean we'll always live with me actually relapsing. I'm gonna save it for special occasions. Like when you're dying." Cuddy narrowed her eyes at him. "And it means I can't get mad at you for checking my pockets, or studying my pupils, or counting the pills." Cuddy bit her lip, contemplating this. "You saved me once, Cuddy," he told her. "You're probably gonna have to do it again."
"And you carried me home on a bum leg."
"And I'll do it again." He looked her in the eyes. "You've never really understood, in your steadfast striving for perfection… You can't get rid of the infarctions. Or the oncocytomas. Or the addictions. Even if you keep your bathroom sink really, really clean."
She smiled shyly. He knew her better than she knew herself. "But we have to resist the messes and the tragedies or they'll take us over," she whined, truly letting her fears see the light of day.
House smiled gently at her. "I'm a mess. I'm a tragedy. And I think I've already taken you over." He kissed her lightly on the lips, then nestled his head next to hers on the pillow again, running his fingers up and down her arm to soothe her constant worries. "It's all gonna be okay, Cuddy."
She sighed. "It might not."
"It might not."
"But it is right now."
"Let the chips fall where they may," he rumbled next to her. "And we'll do it all again."