Chapter 3

Chapter 3

They arrived at the local Japanese restaurant about fifteen minutes after having left the parking lot of PPTH. They decided to just take one car to save gas. House won the "battle of the driver" since Cameron just gave up. She didn't really care if she drove or not anyways.

At the restaurant House and Cameron were the first to be seated at their Teppanyaki Grill waiting for the rest of the grill to be filled with people! They were seated on the side with House next to the corner of the grill and Cameron to his right. She was looking at her menu when she decided to speak up.

"So, you want me to explain yourself to you? What exactly do you want to know?" she asked placing her menu down above her plate.

"Well, can't we at least get to eating dinner before I slice open my soul and hand it over to you?"

"You have a soul?" she said mockingly.

"Hey, I resemble that remark," he replied feigning hurt. Cameron laughed in response.

"Resemble it? Yes, yes you do. Yeah, we can talk about it after we eat if you'd prefer," she said relenting. At this time the waitress came by to take their drink orders.

"What would you like to drink?" asked the waitress.

"Diet coke with lemon," said Cameron.

"Nah uh. No you don't," he said to Cameron. "You'll at least get something a little more fun while I'm here." He looked over at the waitress and said, "Two Saki Bombs, for now!" He looked over at Cameron and she gave him 'the eye.' He then turned back to the waitress and said as though conceding, "And two diet Coke's with lemon as well; One of each for the two of us."

A group of four people, at this point, then joined them at the grill. There was a younger couple holding hands, an older woman, in her sixties and a young kid that appeared to be about ten. The kid sat next to House, in the corner while the rest lined up down the grill.

House and Cameron continued their conversation unmoved by the new company. "Thank you, House," she said with a smile. "What's a Saki Bomb? I've never had one!"

"Oh, you'll see!" he said with a maniacal smile on his face.

"Oh God, I haven't seen that look on your face before. I don't think that's good news for me," she said half laughing yet still concerned.

"You can call me House at the Hospital and you can call me Greg while we're outside the Hospital but I'm only called God in the bedroom! I know I'm 'God like' in other ways too but I don't want it to get to my head." Cameron placed her head in her hands and shook her head in response.

"I can't take you anywhere, Greg… now can I?"

"I just need a sign that says, 'Make friends with me at your own risk' and that way it's out of my hands."

"I think the positives may, may outweigh the negatives but I'll just have to wait and find out. I haven't taken the beast out in public very much so I'll have to see if I can control him," she said with a smile.

"Control this beast? I think not! No one can whip me; no one I say!" he said dramatically.

"We'll see," was all Cameron said in response.

After a few moments of silence between them, she decided to attempt to keep a conversation going. "So what's your favorite item here?"

"Ahhh, small talk? Come on?" he said whiningly.

"Well, I don't want to just sit here and twiddle my thumbs," she said exasperated from his lack of a desire to socialize with her.

"Okay, simma down; I'll talk! Let's see, my favorite item here is the lobster and filet meal but with the Dynamite in close second. I don't think I'd have room for the Dynamite today though. I plan to supplement my meal with plenty of Saki Bombs. How about you? Have you been here before?"

"Actually, I haven't been to a Japanese restaurant since I was maybe twenty-two. It's been a while but I usually stick with the chicken. My favorite part of the meal at a Japanese restaurant though is the salad before the main course. I just love the dressing they put on the salad."

"Ahh, that is so lame. You love the salad?" he said as he looked up at the waitress approaching them with their drinks. "Ah, and the fun begins!" Cameron then looked over as the waitress set their drinks down.

"What can I get you to eat?" the waitress asked.

"I'll take the lobster and filet mignon," stated House.

"I'll go with the chicken and scallops," Cameron added. The waitress then took the orders of the rest of their table.

"So what is all this?" asked Cameron.

"This is your beer," stated House pointing towards the large glass of amber liquid. "And this is your saki," he said holding up the shot glass. "What we're going to do is place these chop sticks on the glass of beer. Place the chop sticks with enough distance apart to stably place the shot of saki on top." As he spoke he demonstrated by placing the chop sticks on the glass and showing where the shot would go but refraining from placing the shot on the chop sticks.

"Okay, like this," Cameron said while placing the chop sticks on her glass of beer and slowly attempting to place her shot on the chop sticks.

"Looks good," he said while looking at Cameron as he stated this and not once glancing at her drink. "When we're ready we're going to slam our hands on the table near the drink and when we do that, the shot of saki will fall into the beer and when that happens we chug. Technically you're supposed to use your head and not your hands but I'd rather not injure the ol' cabeza. It's a race to see who can finish first. Loser pays?!"

"Hmmmm, how about we do a test run and see how that goes and then on our second run we'll have the actual competition?"

"O'ooo, I'm glad you're planning on having more then one. You're turning out to be a fun date!" he said quickly regretting his words; cringing inside. 'This is not a date,' he thought to himself.

Cameron just ignored his comment and said, "Okay, let's try this."

"Alright, on the count of three" he stated placing his shot on the chop sticks. "Oh, and be careful the shot glass doesn't go slamming into your teeth as you chug your Saki Bomb. You wouldn't want to ruin that gorgeous smile of yours." Cameron blushed slightly at his comment.

"Oh, yeah, I didn't think of that. I'll try to be careful. Thanks!"

The other people at their table turned to watch as he started a count down.

"One," he said placing his hands on either side of the drink; Cameron following his lead.

"Two," he raised his hands to about the height of the glass of beer as did Cameron.

"Three," the both slammed their hands down on the table next to their drinks causing their shot to fall into their beer. Quickly they both grabbed their drink and started to chug. House had a good lead on Cameron. The boy next to House chuckled in response to their race. After House finished the last of his drink, he slammed the glass back down on the table and looked over at Cameron who was maybe three quarters of the way done. "Ha, you'll have to be quicker then that to win. This was a good practice round though." She finished and placed her glass down.

"Wow, that was… wow!" was all she seemed capable of saying.

"Good, huh? Here comes the waitress with our soups! I'll order us our second round!"

The waitress placed their soups in front of them and House quickly ordered their second round of Saki Bombs.

"I'm so going to be wasted if I do too many of those. I'm already starting to feel it," she stated. "What will we do if we get farshikkert?" House was intrigued by her use of Yiddish.

"Eh, we'll call a cab. Wilson's got nothing better to do anyways," House stated with a smile.