Thank you Pallada, glad you liked the bits I liked! :) Rei, no...that truce will be over before you know it, I suspect. Hi Koralina, thanks. And don't worry, this fic is all
about their friendship. House's definition of friendship, of course. ;) verlan, me too, so there'll be more of that! :)
In the patient's room, Cameron and Foreman found their patient in the company of two little girls and a boy of about ten. Cameron smiled at the children.
"Hi, guys. Are you visiting your dad?"
The youngest girl nodded.
"I'm Georgie, and I'm five." she said, smiling at the friendly doctor. "When I'm grown-up, I wanna be a doctor too, but I wanna be a horse doctor. And unicorns
are like horses, so when a unicorn's hurt I can help him too. And then maybe he'll let me have a little baby unicorn, because I really want one." The little girl's
eyes lit up at the thought of baby unicorns, and she turned to her dad. "It could sleep in my bed, right, daddy? If it's careful it doesn't poke me?" From the
hospital bed, Jasper chuckled.
"Georgie loves people. Tim, Katie, say hello!" The other two kids waved shyly, while Foreman decided enough time had been wasted.
"Maybe your children would like to spend some time in the play room, Mr. Tannsey?" he asked, barely hiding his impatience. The patient looked at his children
questioningly.
"What about it?" he asked. Georgie whooped excitedly.
"Yeah!" she shouted, grabbing Katie's hand. Her siblings weren't quite as enthusiastic, but encouraging looks from their father made them shrug and nod.
Cameron gestured for them to follow.
"I'll take you." she said, adding to Foreman, "Meet you at the lab."
Chase had watched a few episodes of General Hospital when he first started working for House, thinking a shared interest might make their relationship run a
little more smoothly. Unsurprisingly, his boss had guessed that motivation immediately and spent several weeks happily humiliating him. Since then, the
Australian hadn't dared to watch even a few seconds when he came across re-runs while channel-hopping. Of course, the plotholes, sappiness and frequent
catastrophes made the decision to abstain an easy one. Nevertheless, now Chase found himself sitting in his employer's desk chair and watching the little
screen. He tried to keep from groaning out loud as a patient not only met a long-lost daughter of his wife, but subsequently actually asked her out on a date.
Glancing at his boss, the Australian marvelled. It never ceased to amaze him how transfixed House was while watching his favourite TV show. Two characters
began to argue, and the intensivist turned to his boss.
"Isn't she Dr. Craig's daughter? What's she doing with - "
House's glare made his duckling shut up immediately. Chase mentally scolded himself – he knew better than to interrupt his supervisor's soaps. The intensivist
bit his lip and resolved to keep quiet. Even when the commercial break began, he kept staring at the screen, not moving. House watched his duckling for a
couple of seconds and then snorted derisively, making Chase's head snap around. "Turned into salt?" the older doctor enquired.
"No."
"Glad to hear that. And yeah, she was Dr. Craig's daughter. Muriel."
"Isn't she with that other bloke, you know...what's his name?"
"Francis. She's cheating on him."
"But – they just got engaged!"
"Muriel doesn't love him. She's just trying to please her great-uncle so he'll include her in the will."
"And the great-uncle likes Francis."
"Nope. Great-uncle likes Francis' twin brother. Edmund. But since he's in a coma..." The look Chase gave his boss spoke volumes.
"Anything on your mind?" House asked. The Australian grinned.
"What makes you think so?"
"The dumb grin, for example."
"Come on. You have to admit these soaps all follow the same recipe."
"Wipe the grin. And I think that's enough out of you."
"You know, I'm not even complaining about the medicine. That guy just now, for example. He was professing his love for that blond girl, perfectly happy. With a
white count that high, he should've been – "
"You wanna stop talking?" Chase shrugged, chuckling.
"I'm just saying. It must kill you, I bet for every patient they have, there's fifteen diagnoses on your mind that actually make – ow!" The Australian rubbed his
shin and then looked up at his boss wearily.
"How does Wilson do it?"
"Wilson knows better than to insult General Hospital."
"Rubbish. I've heard him do it. And I haven't seen you bruising him in response."
"He'd pout for a week. Wilson is such a sissy."
Chase shrugged, muttering, "If it works..."
"Like you'd be able to stay away from me for a week." House smirked, and his intensivist mumbled something, inaudible and purposefully so.
"Pardon?" his boss asked but predictably, the Australian chose not to repeat his words.
"Never mind."
An hour later, when Foreman and Cameron returned to the department, everything was back to normal. Chase was sitting at the conference table while House
was busy surfing the internet in his office.
"How come you didn't follow us?" Foreman asked curiously, but before Chase had time to answer, House appeared in the doorway.
"Results, people. Let's go, I wanna be done by two." Cameron frowned.
"That's ten minutes from now."
"Exactly. Chop, chop." Chase had been looking through the chart, going over the test results.
"There's no way our patient will be cured in ten minutes." he observed, glancing at the department head. House shot him a look.
"Thanks to someone, I didn't get a lot of sleep last night." That shut Chase up, as well as making Cameron sympathetic enough to start presenting the results.
When she was finished, House nodded.
"Fine. Check for sarcoidosis." he shrugged on his jacket and grabbed his backpack. "Unless he's dying, I don't want any calls." And with that, House was gone.
The ducklings enjoyed a quiet afternoon without their supervisor. As Jasper was stable, they spent some more time getting a history, but discovered nothing
relevant. By four p.m., the three had finished their clinic duty and were back in the conference room, discussing how to proceed.
"We should call House." Foreman shrugged when his colleagues sighed at that idea. "It's the right thing to do."
"Jasper's stable." Chase pointed out, "We don't call House for patients that are perfectly happy in their room. He's playing with his kids, for God's sake."
Cameron agreed. "House won't even come in."
Chase nodded, adding, "...and he'd still make you regret calling."
Foreman rolled his eyes. "Well, what do you suggest?"
"I think we should check out the home."
"House hasn't – "
"Has he ever not wanted us to check out a patient's house?"
A fruitless search, two hours of testing samples and a subway ride later, Chase was finally climbing the stairs to his apartment. He heard the phone ring from
outside the door and struggled to find his keys while clutching the bag of takeaway he'd picked up on the way home. Having managed to open the door, he
sprinted inside, fervently hoping it wasn't House ordering him back to the hospital. However, it was Wilson's voice the young doctor heard a couple of seconds
later.
"Dr. Wilson, hello. Is everything okay?"
"Everything's fine." the oncologist said, and Chase could hear the smile in his words. "I'm calling to ask you the exact same thing. I hear House has been giving
you a hard time?"
"Um. Well, he was a little stressed, I think."
"He's not listening, Chase. And anyway, he voluntarily told me about all those pranks. He seemed quite proud."
"Figures."
Wilson chuckled. "Yeah. Anyway – I'd like to know whether he's been any better today."
"Oh, right. He told me you were...blackmailing him. He didn't do anything."
"Are those his words, or yours?"
"No, honestly. For House, he was almost polite."
"Meaning he refrained from being a total ass?" Chase couldn't help but laugh.
"Exactly."
"I'm glad to hear it. You guys have a patient?"
"Yes. Stable at the moment, though."
"I'll let you get some rest then. While you can."
"Thanks. And...whatever you said to House...thank you for that, too."
"You're welcome. Good night, Chase!"
"Night, Dr. Wilson."
