Disclaimer: I don't own House M.D or any of the characters from it. I'm not making any money from the publishing or writing of this story.
Announcement: I'm still looking for a House M.D. beta for 'Venus Syndrome', preferably someone who enjoys the story as much as I do and who's ready to spend some time beta-ing it.
Chapter 3
House arrived home, more precisely at Cuddy's place, a little after 1 o'clock in the morning. It didn't matter that he left PPTH almost ten hours ago, that he left Wilson over four hours ago, that his trip home usually takes less than thirty minutes form almost any place in New Jersey, by bike at least, or that his phone rang constantly for the last four hours - he just didn't feel like coming home.
He did feel like thinking, so he just hit some more bars after Wilson called it quits. So four hours, a dozen or so shots of scotch and two lap dances later he was still nowhere.
He just couldn't understand what that whole business earlier in Cuddy's office was. It just wasn't normal. Normal was pinning her to the desk, lifting her skirt and fucking her then and there, not backing away from an innocent kiss. Normal was enjoying a lap dance in a strip bar after four or five shots, not getting nothing form it because it wasn't the body that kept popping in his head over and over again. And definitely normal wasn't getting on somebody's nerves just because he simply couldn't say what was truly on his mind when it came to her.
What the hell did you do to me? he tried asking, but nobody answered, not even his mind. So, if it isn't normal, why the fuck am I doing it for? And that was the million dollar question, because he really hand no answer to it.
There were no lights on, he noticed as he got off his bike and strode to the door, and from the uncanny silence of the place; no one was awake either. Not that he wanted it to be. Right now he wanted no one around. Even the thought of slipping into bed next to someone was unappealing, and it wasn't about being next to Cuddy. It could have been Carmen Electra for all he cared and he still didn't want her there.
Nevertheless he had to get in. Cuddy was expecting it of him, hell, even Rachel was expecting it of him. When did the world started expecting things from me? It didn't used to be like that. He used to be alone, in his small one bedroom, one bathroom flat, away from anyone and everyone and best of all away from expectations.
That's not true; Cuddy expected stuff from me then too, and Wilson, and my team. But it wasn't the same. It was work related expectations, or friendship related expectations not 'let's-play-family' expectations and they weren't this many or seemed so hard to fulfill.
House sighed, turned the key and opened the door to his 'let's-play-family' home.
He made his way to the bedroom he had been sharing with Cuddy for the last four months, taking his jacket, shirt and t-short off on the way, trying to keep the noise to a minimum. He didn't need waking Rachel up and hearing her cry, or worse, waking Cuddy up.
He managed it, or so he thought until he entered the bedroom and heard Cuddy's voice.
"You're late!"
House sighed again, as soft as he could trying to hide it from Cuddy and didn't answer. When did I start hiding stuff like that from her? - Oh, yeah, today, when I ran out of her office because she wanted to kiss me.
He made his way to the bed and sat, finishing undressing in complete silence, before slipping under the covers. He didn't want to talk, he was too tired and to pissed off for a talk - or was it 'the talk'? - but apparently Cuddy was having none of it.
"Where were you?"
"Out," he answered matter-of-factly and turned so he had his back to her, covers drawn up to the tip of his ears. He wished they would muffle the sound of her voice enough so he could just ignore it. They didn't.
"I talked to Wilson…" she started to say, but drifted off leaving him to understand whatever he wanted to understand.
God! Isn't the back turned enough of a 'don't wanna talk about it' sign?
"He said he got home right after 'General Hospital'," exclaimed Cuddy. Her voice was starting to get shrill-tongued and he was beginning to feel a headache coming on. "You missed it by the way…"
"I hope you TiVo-ed it," House yawned. "Was it any good?"
"Don't do that!" she piped lifting herself up to rest her back on the headboard.
He sighed and turned again, pillowing both hands under his head, staring towards the ceiling.
"Do what?"
He could have surely gone with a better line, but he just didn't have it in him to master sarcasm right now. Hurry up! I'm falling asleep over here. Plus, he was drunk and cranky.
"That - change the subject, like it doesn't even matter mentioning."
"It doesn't," he replied closing his eyes and willing his brain to just shut down already. Come on, I know you can do it! I need unconsciousness - right now if you don't mind.
"Greg," she sighed trying to control her anger, though he could almost feel in the air around them, and was about to say something else when House threw off the covers and got up.
"I'm tired, I'm drunk, I'm pissed and I'm cranky as hell… Let's do this another time." He turned, gave her one of his most annoying grin, and started to walk from the bed. "Tell your agent to call my agent and we'll do lunch."
"Where are you going?" she asked after a few milliseconds of silence. She was using that shrill-tongued voice of hers that annoyed him to hell and back, making him pray to manage to get out of there before he lost his temper.
Grabbing his discarded things on the way, he turned when he reached the door, wearing only his boxers and holding a pile of clothes in his left arm and his cane in his right, and shouted just one word: "Home."
And just like that he was gone. He stopped in the living room to put his jeans on, not bothering to zip and fasten them, but immediately made his way outside when he heard Cuddy's bear feet rushing down the hall.
He was already on his bike, cane perched on its slot, cloths tossed under his seat, and as she opened the door he drove off.
House didn't stopped once to think about what he was doing before reaching his old apartment building, but now that he was here he realized two very important things. One - he didn't actually wanted to be alone right now, he had too many thoughts he didn't wanted to think about just yet; and two - his apartment keys were at Cuddy's.
He sighed, turned the bike abound and started to drive again.
It didn't take long before he stopped again, this time in front of a large modern house, not so different from Cuddy's. He got off the bike, made his way to the door and knowing it was useless to knock, he just rested his head on the buzzer and waited.
House let out a chuckle when the lights started to come on, first upstairs, then downstairs and he heard Wilson's sleep muffled voice.
"This better be a fucking emergency or you're dead."
Wilson gave the door an angry jerk, but as soon as he looked beyond it all the anger disappeared being replaced by new feeling. It was half relief, a quarter panic and the last quarter annoyance. Yeah, that's about the right way to describe House!
"What the …" he started to say, but House wasn't listening. He just passed by him, making his way to the couch where he settled immediately, right leg perched on the back of it, eyes closed - he supposed - and right arm draped over his eyes.
Wilson followed him after closing and locking the door. By the looks of things he was in for a sleepless night and it was only 2:45 in the morning. He sighed and took a seat at House's feet on the couch, picking up the remote control and turning on the TV.
House wasn't the kind of guy to just answer straight questions and Wilson knew it. It was one of the reasons he didn't directly ask him about the whole Cameron situation. Still he talked, but not before he was good and ready to. So, he would just wait for him to feel like talking.
He was shifting through channels, looking for something to take his mind of all the questions he knew would get no answer right now if he dared asking them, when he heard House's hoarse voice.
"It's over," he said letting out a long, loud sighed, which to Wilson's ears sounded more like relief that regret.
"What?" he asked, though he had an idea what 'it' was. Still he preferred asking and not presuming. People seem to presume too much and too wrong.
"It," House said in a low voice. "Cuddy and me - it's over, or I think it's over - I don't really know."
"I'm sorry," Wilson said turning the TV volume down. House was ready to talk and he wasn't going to miss a word of it.
"Well, that makes one of us," House said still in that low, barely audible voice.
"You're not sorry?"
"No - Yes - Fuck, I don't know. It doesn't feel like it did with Stacy," he admitted.
"It shouldn't - It's different from what happened with Stacy. You're different from what you used to be - Lisa's different from Stacy - It's not the same," Wilson pointed out. His gaze never moved from the TV screen until now when he finally looked at House and saw he was staring at the screen too.
"Yeah, but - I don't know - shouldn't I feel more?"
"You're asking me?" Wilson chuckled trying to lighten the mood. "That's a first…"
"Yeah, you're right. What the hell am I thinking?" House laughed. "You know zero about relationships - you've screwed up everyone you had." He sighed and continued. "But then again so did I, though you have to admit I have more style than you're cheating ass."
"I admit to nothing unless under oath," Wilson smirked then turned serious again. This was it, the moment he could start asking questions. "What happened?"
"I'm too drunk to have a good come-back to that," House said mockingly. "Cuddy - the usual stuff, got myself to her place late, drunk and smelling of cheap perfume, after going to two strip joints, having a go at 'Danny's all you can drink' - I really wanted to see how much I could drink for $10.95 - and switching my phone to go directly to voice mail."
"I know - some of those messages are from me," Wilson laughed.
"Yeah? Did you left me…" he got his phone out of his pocket and after tasting the voice mail combination he put it on speaker. A woman's voice came on a second later.
"Welcome to voice mail services. You have now one hundred and sixty-eight new messages. For listening you messages now, press one - For saving you messages for later, press two - For deleting you messages, press three - For contacting one of our operators regarding…" That was as far as the voice managed to get before House pressed the number three key, smirking back at Wilson as the voice announced: "You have deleted you messages. You have no new messages. Thank you for…" Again House cut the voice off, this time by closing the lid on his phone and putting it back in his pocket.
"So, how many of those were yours?" he asked an annoying grin on his face.
"Four or five," admitted Wilson, wondering when exactly did Cuddy have the time to leave him one hundred sixty voice messages. "You could have listened to mine at least," he joked.
"And what, go to one hundred messages from Cuddy to get to yours? Sorry but you don't have a nice enough ass for that," House laughed.
It was silence for a while, while Wilson went to get some beers from the fridge and House took advantage of it. He didn't want to think, and until now he managed to stick with that decision - no thinking equals no trouble, he reasoned, so de didn't think -, but he needed to think, though now that he thought should it, maybe he should way until he wasn't this drunk.
Still thoughts didn't wait for any man and long before he was ready he found himself immersed in them. It all came back to him: Stacy, Cuddy, Cameron, the kisses - he didn't really know which one to stick to, they were just so many - the dates, being an ass, hurting them, letting them to hurt him, being in love with them. Where the hell did that came from?
He knew he used to be in love with Stacy and he could only assume he used to be in love with Cuddy too - probably back in med school - but he was sure he never was in love with Cameron. He liked her, yeah; wanted to get into her pants, hell yeah; maybe have a thing for a while, definitely, though that was a long shot, but he wasn't in love. She'd told him herself that.
"I thought you were too screwed up to love anyone," she'd said to him a long time ago. "I was wrong. You just couldn't love me. It's good."
…and she was right. He wasn't in love with her, he just liked her - that's it.
"… out of chips." He heard Wilson's voice over his thought and buried them again until the next time he would be alone.
"You're kidding me, no chips? What's the world coming to?" he grunted out without taking his eyes off the TV.
"…destruction, I tell you," Wilson laughed throwing a bottle to House and keeping the other one to himself.
They took the first drink in silence, before Wilson started talking again.
"So, why did you did all that stuff - you know, strip bars, cheap perfume, the works?"
"If I have to tell you, I can understand why all you're exes are exes," he snickered.
"Can't you be serious for one second?"
"Of course - …fifty-five… fifty-six… fifty-seven… fifty-eight… fifty-nine… - There you go, one second." He took another sip of his beer and laughed when Wilson turned to him with his annoyed expression. "Can't you be not-serious for a second?"
"Humph!" Wilson sighed resigned.
"I needed to find some answers," House admitted after a couple more mouthfuls of beer.
"And?"
"I'm not telling you; you'll tell mommy," he whined.
"You're helpless," Wilson laughed.
"And you're a cheater. Ah, and I'm an ass too."
"Yes you are…" Wilson said and smirked taking another sip of his beer.
Again they were surrounded by silence, except for the soft murmur of the TV, before Wilson asked one of the questions House, himself, didn't have a straight answer for.
"And a bastard, you know that, especially with Cameron? What did she ever do to deserve you to treat her like that?"
"Dun 'know!"
House took another sip of his drink and left the bottle on the low coffee table next to the couch. He turned with his back to the TV and without giving Wilson a chance to say anything more he added: "I think I'll call it a night. Bring me your best linens and let me be, my loyal subject."
Wilson stared at him for a few moments; he could feel his gaze burning a hole in his neck; and then without a second glance, he disappeared up the stairs.
"Get them you're self you lazy bastard."
"Hey, cripple here," House shouted after him, but there was no answer. He was alone again, alone with his thoughts.
