Chapter 7
When Monday rolled along, Allison Cameron was not looking forward to going back to work. It wasn't because it was the beginning of another week of chaos in the ER. It wasn't because she had a stack of paperwork waiting for her on her desk. And it wasn't because she was having a particularly bad morning because she happened to spill her coffee on the way out of her apartment. It was because she had no idea how to act when she sees Thirteen at the hospital. Even when given an entire Sunday to think about it – to dread it – she remained completely clueless.
It was strange. The way Thirteen acted that night was definitely the least of her expectations. Allison had never seen her like that – more specifically, she'd never been on the receiving end of Remy Hadley's charm. What confused her the most was the sudden change of heart. If she remembered correctly, their day of babysitting began with the both of them disagreeing on most things. And yet the evening ended with such an unexpected twist.
Entering through the hospital's lobby, the ER attending's eyes snapped to every single brunette in her peripheral vision. It may be a little too paranoid of her, but she couldn't help it. She pretty much spent the rest of the day in this anxious fashion when she was not concentrating on a patient. She kept asking herself over and over again, 'Should I smile and talk to her? Or should I not make a big deal about it and act as if nothing happened?' She absolutely hated how her brain seemed to be dysfunctional when it came to personal and emotional matters. Even worse was having them in the context of her workplace – which is a hospital that didn't need any distractions, no matter how much House would argue otherwise.
The only reason Thirteen was not looking forward to going to work on Monday was because of her boss. Her crazy, maniacal, cunning, deceptive, liar of a boss. As she made her way up to Diagnostics with a cup of decaf in her hand, she made a mental note to look as indifferent as possible when he interrogated her. The very moment she stepped inside the office, she made eye contact with him, and she continued to eye him cautiously as she took a seat at the glass table.
"You're late."
"No, I'm not."
"Relative to your boss, you are."
"Well, I apologize for assuming that you'd walk in fifteen minutes later than all of us, like you normally do," she responded, not even bothering to cover up the sarcasm.
Despite the remark, he grinned. "Those are the days when I have morning sex with Cuddy." All three of his employees made a face.
"Ugh, don't wanna hear it," Taub interjected, turning back to the crossword he had been doing.
"He's just upset because he hasn't been getting any," House whispered loudly. As he lazily twirled his cane around his fingers, he looked over to the black doctor, who was sitting stiffly while reading a newspaper. "And homie over here must be in the same boat. Just look at that grumpy face."
"Is it really necessary to talk about our sex lives at work?" Foreman retorted, obviously irritated. It was probably due to the fact that he wasn't getting any action too.
"Don't you want to know about Thirteen's sex life?" House asked back. He leaned forward to face the brunette. "I know I do."
Remy casted him a brief look of annoyance and went back to reading her journal. She tried not to let him affect her too much.
"So..." he began, scrutinizing her with his hawk-like eyes. "...You doing anyone lately?"
At his question, Thirteen didn't even bat an eye. She took a subtle deep breath and flipped a page of her magazine. The only way to keep things unsuspicious was to be totally casual about it. "Just the occasional girl from the bar."
House raised his eyebrows. 'She's hiding. Interesting.'He studied the expression on her face and saw that it was neutral, barely giving away anything. 'She's good,' he thought, although he would never admit to anyone that ever since day one, he had still been having trouble figuring her out. And the blank look planted on her face was not helping at all.
With House remaining silent for a while, Remy began to worry. She would kill him if he ruined anything between her and Allison, especially when it had barely started. No. This was important. She wouldn't have minded if he made remarks about her one-night-stands, or previous clubbing habits. She grew used to them by now, and would probably just laugh it off. But this – it mattered. For some reason, Remy felt the need to take any extra precautions to make sure that nothing would go wrong.
She looked up from her reading and locked her eyes with her boss's in a challenging glare as she waited to see what he would say next. He looked back critically, analyzing her body language and the look she was sending him. She sat, watching him with narrow eyes, waiting – daring him to say something that would either embarrass or infuriate her. The expression she sent him: Bring it.
Now, either her attitude scared off her boss a little, or House's somewhat stable relationship with Cuddy had made him less of a pain in the ass – whatever it could have been, he didn't tell her off like she expected him to. Interestingly enough, he didn't bring Cameron up at all.
"So," he announced to the whole room. "Since Thirty-One is here now, let me disclose today's agenda. Listen up kids." He whacked the page of crossword off of Taub's hands with his cane. "It's time," he said dramatically.
"Time for what?" the Jewish doctor asked with annoyance.
"Time for me to go watch TiVoed episodes of General Hospital. Duh!"
"Okay... and what are we supposed to do?"
"Oh, sorry, I left out the fun part. You get to do my clinic hours."
Taub scoffed. "No thanks."
"Pretty please?" House begged in a mocking fashion, blinking his eyes at him. Unfortunately, Taub only resumed to do his crossword.
"Fine. Thirteen can do it."
"What?"
"And after that, you can go find us a case... in the ER." He emphasized the last two letters, sending her an over-exaggerated wink. Remy widened her eyes.
"That's not fair."
"Life's not fair."
"Why does it have to be me? Make Foreman do it." As soon as those words left her mouth, she received a glare from the black doctor.
"It's because you are special. Aren't you flattered that your boss thinks you're special?"
"No," she deadpanned.
"Oh, don't be such an ingrate."
Remy rolled her eyes and picked her medical journal back up. "Not, doing it."
"Yes you are."
"Make me."
"I can fire you, you know."
"You won't. I matter too much to this team, and Cuddy won't let you."
There was a brief pause in the air. As Thirteen sat, staring at a jumble of words on a page, she felt House's eyes on her.
"Go do my clinic hours and find us a case. Or else."
"Or else what?"
She looked up indifferently, but when saw a devilish smirk on her boss's face, she grew nervous. She watched anxiously as he pulled out his cellphone from his pocket in a grand flourish. "I shall take advantage of my newly acquired blackmail material." He swiftly shoved the device in front of his employee's face to show her the image on it, and quickly retrieved the phone before she managed to grab it.
Thirteen's eyes were as wide as saucers. 'NO.'
Both Foreman and Taub didn't get the chance to see what was on the cellphone, and by now, they were dying to know what it was that got their colleague so affected. They watched with raised eyebrows when Thirteen jumped off her seat and attempted to snatch the cellular device from House's hand. "Oh my god! The lesbian's attacking!" He tried to keep her away at cane's length, but she only swatted the stick away. As he was holding the phone up in the air, swerving it out of the brunette's reach, a sudden idea came to mind. He quickly turned away and shoved it in his pants – where he knew that she would never dare to go no matter how desperate she was. Remy immediately grimaced in a look of absolute horror.
"Gross..." Taub remarked. Both he and Foreman were still a little stunned by what took place. No one had ever seen Thirteen provoked like that.
House stood there with a smug look of triumph on his face. "Like I said. Do it. Or else."
The brunette shot him the deadliest death glare she could muster, then stormed out of the room without saying another word. The three men carefully watched her as she exited and walked down the hall with a very dissatisfied frown.
"What was on the phone?" Foreman asked, increasingly curious.
House smirked. "Wouldn't you want to know." With that, he spun around and walked into his own office.
Boy, that was fun.
As Remy was doing work at the clinic, she couldn't help but remain deep in thought about personal matters rather than that of the patients. She seriously wondered what her crazy boss would do with the picture of her and Allison. The truth was, the photo itself wasn't that bad. (In all honesty, she found it extremely cute, and wanted a copy for herself.) But what mattered to her the most at the moment was how the ER attending would react if it was leaked out to the public in the hospital. If she wasn't ready, she would only freak out and push her away. And that was the last thing that Thirteen wanted.
After much thinking though, she realized that she should disregard her recalcitrant boss for the time being, and resolved to personally confront the blonde later in the day. She decided that she was not going to let House's little games affect her plan to see if she had a chance at winning Allison Cameron over.
The day had been fairly slow down in the ER. By early afternoon, Allison had become fully consumed with her work, directing all of her attention to her patients and only her patients. After stitching up someone's arm, she washed up and headed over to the nurse's station to see how things were running. Almost immediately, one of the nurses approached her. "Doctor Cameron, could you take a look at this?"
"Of course." She put on her glasses and entered into a discussion about a particular incoming patient.
Allison was in the middle of listening to the nurse as she discussed the file...when a brief, routine scan around the area caused her to look twice. The words of the nurse fell into deaf ears as the blonde's gaze fell onto a familiar figure. Her heart raced and she took a deep breath, forcing her thoughts to return to the conversation she was having. Unfortunately, Cameron was hearing but not listening. With failed restraint, her eyes quickly snapped back to the brunette standing over at the other side of the room. And at that very moment, their eyes met for a split second.
Blood rose to her cheeks as Allison blushed intensely. Her face felt so warm, she was sure that she could have passed as someone with a fever. After that brief incident, she dared not to look up again. Instead, she fixed her gaze on the file held in front of her, attempting to block out all irrelevant thoughts and concentrate for once on what the nurse was actually saying. But in her mind, all she was doing was praying for Thirteen not to walk over. It would be the death of her.
Remy actually saw this coming; her reaction was only natural. But she first needed to figure out why Allison was feeling so flustered. Was she embarrassed because of what happened? Or was she just being shy? In any case, there was no turning back now. Thirteen had clearly expressed her interest – what was done was done.
The fact was, Remy had been thinking of approaching Cameron for a long time now. She had always found her very admirable and undeniably attractive. But when they first met, when Allison was introduced as Doctor Chase's girlfriend, Thirteen made a mental note to keep her hands off her. And so she never gave the blonde another thought. She didn't think to pay any attention to her, let alone go out of the way to talk to her. Remy knew that if she didn't set up this boundary, she would've been in big trouble. She knew from experience that crushing on straight, taken girls was not healthy. That was why she remained so detached whenever she interacted with Allison in the first place. She couldn't risk to lose control over herself and go down that road, so she resolved to pushing her away. But after given the chance to closely study the blonde, Remy decided that the mere fact that Allison agreed to let her kiss her was enough justification for a green light.
Even so, Thirteen needed to see how the older doctor would react before she could choose to do anything. Because she wanted to be ready for any possible twist of events that might happen – good or bad – she felt the need to test the waters first. And so her short trip to the ER gave her the chance to do just that. As she walked into the unit, she couldn't help but find it a little ironic – it felt like she was a predator, quietly approaching the prey, hoping for it not to freak out and run off in the other direction. Not a very romantic way to put it, to say the least.
From afar, she could clearly see the flushed expression on Allison's face after they made eye contact. She smiled slightly to herself and looked down. The blonde probably wouldn't be too happy with her presence in the ER, but she had her job as an excuse. House, that devil of a man, had manipulated her to go search for a new case. And she found one. But... in order to be able to take the patient, she needed permission from the ER attending first. Hesitantly, she walked over to the nurse's station. Cameron was still in the middle of her conversation, and Remy politely waited until she was done.
When Allison saw the brunette make her way over, she panicked on the inside. But there was no place for her to run and hide. So instead, she pretended not to notice and continued to stare and the file of the patient that the nurse was holding. She mentally cursed Thirteen's existence.
Eventually, the nurse got whatever information she needed from Cameron, and she thanked her and walked off. Allison had wanted to prolong their discussion as much as possible, with hopes of putting off her confrontation with Remy. But they both knew that that was not going to happen.
"Doctor Cameron," Thirteen greeted timidly, stepping in front of her with a file in her hands.
Allison looked up to meet her gaze and struggled to keep her cool. "Doctor Hadley," she answered similarly.
They stared at each other with shy intent for a moment, before looking away. Thirteen cleared her throat. "Um, House sent me here to look for a case. And I was wondering if I could take this one." She held up the manila folder as indication.
Cameron took it and scanned the contents, involuntarily slipping into doctor mode. "Oh this one... She came in early this morning. We were thinking autoimmune, but recently she's been showing signs of neurological disorder... House would like this."
"Yes, he would." Thirteen watched as the blonde studied the file with furrowed brows. Her eyes drifted from Allison's bright teal eyes behind her glasses, down to her delicate pink lips, up to her blonde hair tied back in a bun, then down again to her neck and shoulders and chest and... 'Stop.' She shook herself out of her thoughts. "So uh, could you sign it off for me please?"
Cameron snapped herself back into the room with Thirteen after having been distracted by the patient's interesting medical history. "Oh! Uh, yeah, of course..." She immediately searched her pockets for a pen, only to come up empty handed.
"Here." Cameron looked up to see one handed to her.
"Thanks," she responded, tentatively reaching for the pen. The proximity of the brunette was making her ridiculously nervous. She deliberately avoided eye contact, fearing that she might not be able to control the raging butterflies in her stomach.
Remy, however, was quick to catch on to her diffidence. She purposefully held on to the pen as Cameron tried to take it from her. When Allison realized that her colleague wasn't letting go, she looked up. Two pairs of blue eyes met, both exchanging looks of intense curiosity. Satisfied with the connection, Thirteen finally released her grip. "Thanks..." the blonde muttered again, this time in a quieter tone. Allison quickly looked back down and fumbled with the folder a bit, then signed whatever she had to sign, all while blushing profusely.
Unable to bring herself to meet her gaze again, Cameron handed back the folder and the pen while she stared off elsewhere, pretending to be distracted. Being as persistent as Remy was, she decided to test her again. She stood there, refraining from taking the file and pen. This realization caused Allison to look up in confusion once more. When she did, Thirteen took a step closer and reached for her things. Now, Cameron was all too aware that that extra step towards her was not necessary at all. Nervously, she looked into the younger doctor's eyes to try to read her. Remy, however, acted as if their closeness was nonexistent at all. They stood there in silence for a moment, eyes searching, hands still clutching onto the file held between them.
By now, the blonde seemed to have gotten the message and maintained eye contact. Pleased at this, Remy finally spoke up. "Are you busy tonight?"
That simple question alone managed to make Allison's heart skip a beat. She widened her eyes and swallowed, stumbling over her reply. "Um... I uh..." What should she say? Her eyes darted to the side several times as she struggled to continue to meet Remy's gaze. "Well... I-I don't think so..."
Thirteen tried to suppress a smirk. My god she has got to be the most adorable thing on the face of this planet. "Well," began Remy slowly. "Are you free enough to have dinner with me after work?"
Cameron looked at the other woman with a bit of surprise. She knew this was coming, but she would never have guessed that Doctor Hadley was so bold when it came to pursuing women. It made her feel a little weak in the knees. And all of a sudden, it began to feel really warm in the ER.
It took a while for Allison to compose a decent reply. She still wasn't sure what this was, or what Thirteen was trying to do. Despite trying to think everything through, she found it hard to read the reasons behind her motives. But what puzzled her the most was that she actually found herself wanting to say 'yes'. Well – not necessarily wanting to say 'yes', but definitely unable to say 'no'. She couldn't find it in her to turn the younger doctor down. Right now, Doctor Hadley was rendering her judgement skills to be completely irrational. All she wanted to do was to agree and comply no matter what. But because she was so nervous, she had to think twice, or even thrice, in order to untangle the jumble of words caught in her throat. Thirteen, however, waited patiently, amusedly almost. She nearly laughed out loud though when Cameron finally settled for a few nods of her head in response to her question.
Remy smiled at her genuinely. "Great. So...do you get out at 7 too?"
Another timid nod.
"Okay... Well, I'll meet you outside the entrance then. Sound good?"
Allison nodded again, unable to find anything to say.
At this, Thirteen finally took the folder out of her hand. She stepped back. "Alright, I'll see you then." And she walked off, hurrying back up to Diagnostics, ready with a case in hand.
Still standing at the nurse's station, Cameron was honestly stunned by what just took place. After her eyes followed Remy until she was out of sight, she immediately turned around and grabbed the closest file on the counter with hopes of distracting herself and appearing to be working. All this time she was biting her lip nervously. Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted several nurses looking at her direction, whispering into each others' ears; they couldn't have been more obvious.
Allison's face turned even redder now that she realized that other people had witnessed her and Thirteen's exchange. Half of her wanted to take advantage of being the head of the department and snap at them to get back to work. And yet... despite feeling very unsure of what she was doing, the thought of Thirteen asking her out for dinner left a small spark of excitement.
- end of chapter -
Hey, sorry for the late update guys. But see, this chapter was extra long to make up for it. It is also written particularly long because...well, spring break's over, back to school, and I won't be able to update as often as I had been doing. So. Just a heads up and an apology in advance. I sawryyy. D:
But I shall have you know that I'd never abandon an incomplete camteen story. Fo realz.
