Chapter II

Couples

"He wants us to what?" Suzanne asked disbelievingly.

"Have Zach's skull plate removed." Cameron explained placatively.

"We suspect brain cancer." Chase added. "If so then he's going to need an MRI to confirm the diagnosis." He made a gesture towards the comatose teenager. "The MRI machine works like a giant magnet. If we don't remove the steel plate first, the MRI will rip it out from under his scalp."

"Dr. House hasn't even checked in on our son once since he was admitted," the father complained. "What makes him think he knows what's wrong with Zach?"

"Dr. House is taking a special interest…" Cameron helplessly tried to reassure him.

"Then why isn't he visiting our son?" John interrupted belligerently. "We don't donate $100,000 each year to this hospital so that the attending we request can ignore us!"

"He isn't ignoring you." Chase said firmly, irritated at the way Cameron was being spoken to. "You want to know why Dr. House hasn't come to visit Zach? It's because he hates your son. He hates your son, and he hates you and he probably hates everyone in this damn hospital! If you wanted a doctor to hold your hand, you chose the wrong diagnostician. Now do you want your son to get better or not?" Taking the clip board with the release from Cameron, he pushed it into John's hands.

Utterly speechless, the father slowly penned his signature on the page.

"Thank you," Cameron said kindly, trying to make up for Chase's forcefulness. Turning, she gave Chase a nod that clearly said 'follow me', and the two stepped out into the hall.

"Think you could have been a little more obnoxious there?" she groaned as they walked down the hall.

"I get so damn tired of families whining that they aren't getting enough attention!" Chase vented. "Especially the ones with that annoying sense of entitlement, they're the worst!" He sighed, having completed his tirade and looked at his fiancé as they walked. Robert smiled, as though he'd only just been made aware of what he'd said in the last five minutes. "I'm sorry."

"Treating patients is what makes doctors miserable?" Cameron said with a chuckle as she paraphrased House. Her anger melted away. "You know, when you proposed to me, part of the reason I said 'yes' was because you didn't behave like House." Allison grinned. "And now here you are being rude to people and bashing the human elements of medicine."

"Everybody lies!" Chase dramatically mocked his boss in his best American accent. "Now let me just go fill five or six proscriptions of Vicodin and we can get out of here."

"Don't start up your motorcycle too quickly, we've still got to schedule the removal of Zach's skull plate," she reminded him.

"Then I think we just passed the elevator," Chase said, turning to look back at the open doors to the lift.

Cameron rolled her eyes, amused, and turned, walking to the elevator with Robert.

"So what's going on with your grand scheme to reunite House and Stacy Warner?" her fiance asked conversationally.

"Just what you saw," she sighed. "We set them up, left them, then the next thing we knew he was at the white board diagnosing lupus."

"Sure it didn't progress from there?" Chase asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Doubt it." Allison replied defeatedly. "He would have…" she paused, barely believing how naïve she'd been to think that her boss would volunteer anything about his personal life.

Stacy sighed contentedly as she drifted in and out of consciousness. It had been a long day. Dealing with her case load had always been challenging, yet invigorating work, but ever since the divorce proceedings had begun, she had started to find herself exhausted at the end of each day.

The proceedings weren't going all that well either. Mark was disabled, afterall, and she had cheated. It also didn't help that now she had to list her place of residence as House's apartment. It was worth it though, for moments like these; snuggling up with Greg in front of the muted TV, his arm resting languidly around her back, her feet curled comfortably beneath her and his shoulder gently cradling her head.

Restlessly, she slowly shifted her head and looked around. Greg was intently watching 'The New Yankee Workshop' next to her, clearly hoping to see Norm Abram dismember himself with the table saw he was using.

"What else have you got Tivo'd?" Stacy asked, yawning.

"General Hospital and Blackadder," he responded, his attention still locked on the TV.

"What is with you and that show?" she inquired curiously. "You never used to watch Black…whatever it is."

"Huh?" House asked absently, mesmerized by Abram's hand moving ever closer to the spinning saw blade.

"Oh, give me that!" she said, both frustration and amusement evident in her voice. Grabbing the remote, she flicked a button and the TV instantly switched off.

"What the hell do you…?"

"You spend too much time watching that thing anyway." She looked into his frustrated eyes in a way that not so much begged as demanded attention.

"If Norm kills himself while I'm away, I'm never going to let you forget it!" House threatened mockingly.

"Oh…come here, you." Stacy grabbed him, her voice full of that same happy frustration. They began kissing playfully as she pulled Greg on top of her.

"Admit it, this is so much better than morons with power tools." Her voice was lusty as she looked up at him.

"I…admit…nothing!" House mocked defiantly between kisses.

Stacy smacked the side of his arm as she smiled.

"Careful, want to…ruin that limb too?" It was difficult to joke with his tongue intermittently probing her mouth.

"You…and your guilt…mongering" she laughed through the kisses.

Their caressing was interrupted suddenly and annoyingly by a knock on the door to Greg's apartment.

"I'll get it," he sighed. Disentangling himself from Stacy, House grabbed his cane from the arm rest and made his way over to the entrance. Opening the door, he was irritated to find Cameron's hopeful, smiling face waiting behind it.

"Dr. House," she said amiably. "I was thinking about how lonely you must be, spending all your evenings alone, and I thought…" she was never able to finish her sentence, as House quickly slammed the door in her face.

"Who was that?" Stacy asked from the sofa.

"Wrong address." House replied assuredly, as he began limping back over to her. Once again though, he was interrupted by a knock on the door. Rolling his eyes, he turned around and hobbled back over to the door.

"Dr. House," Cameron began again as the door opened. "I only came over here to keep you company because I thought you had to be lonely." There was a certain knowing look in her eyes.

House could only stare at her, incredulity and annoyance playing on his face.

"Of course, if you have company, I could come back later," she said, craning her neck in an attempt to see past him into the apartment.

Greg shifted, blocking her view. "I've got Vicodin, and scotch. What other company could a man want?" he asked rhetorically.

"Well I just believe that people need people," she responded with conviction.

"What's going on?" Stacy asked as she stepped forward and stood next to House in the doorway.

"And I think you just proved my beliefs right," Cameron finished triumphantly, an overjoyed smile gripping her lips.