A/N-Thank you to all of you who reviewed since the last posting: IHeartHouseCuddy, JM, KiwiClare, Suzieqlondon, OldSFfan, Guest, IWuvHouse, chebelle, LapizSilkwood, BabalooBlue, LoveMyHouse, lenasti16, JLCH, jaybe61, Boo's House, ikissedtheLaurie, Abby, Alex, freeasabird14, HuddyGirl, bladesmum, dmarchl, BJAllen815, and Huddyphoric.
I extended this fic by a few chapters, so there are probably 4-5 more remaining. The next chapter of this story should be up Thursday/Friday. For anyone who is interested, I have a lighter two shot that I'll be putting up in between chaps of this fic. I needed something less serious to write about for a minute. Have a great week!
-Routines-
Cuddy was on her side, sleeping on the blanket on the floor, breathing so deeply that House could hear her from several feet away. He looked around for a good place to feed the child, finally deciding on the corner of the sofa. He put their meals on the coffee table and stood over her, looking down from a fully standing position to the tiny girl sitting on the ground. He bent at the waist to speak to her and she eyed him suspiciously.
"It's weird isn't it?" he asked. "I mean, we're probably the two people who spend the most time with her, and yet we never really hang out."
Rachel looked up so fully that she began to tip backwards onto the blanket, so House put his hands under the child's arms and scooped her up as he stood. She stared at him and, for a moment, he thought she might cry. Her tiny eyebrows were furrowed and her lips so serious they were nearly frowning.
"I'd be suspicious too. Of people in general. I'm new at this, I mean, I'm around kids, and if there was something wrong with you, I'd definitely know what to do. Really, at work, it's the parents who are the irritating morons, the kids are usually just victims of their parents' insanity and cluelessness. I'm obviously more capable than them, so this should be OK."
Rachel continued to stare and then, almost as if she had processed her situation, she ended the disapproving glare and her face relaxed. House put her in the corner of the sofa and opened the carrots, dipping a white plastic spoon into the mush and holding it out for her. She looked at the food with the same suspicion that she initially regarded him with and then opened her mouth, waiting for the food to be delivered. He had a momentary look of victory when the first bite was in the child's mouth and she swallowed the food.
"OK," House nodded, "this isn't hard."
The child took a second bite, and then, defiantly countering his suggestion that childcare was easy, she spit the carrots out of her mouth in a soupy mess of vegetable and saliva that coated her chin and her top.
"That's seriously gross, Rachel," he nodded. "You liked the last bite but you don't like this bite?"
Her fat fingers reached toward the spoon again and he asked, "You want me to give you more after you did that?"
She grinned up, her feet kicking urgently, but when the food was not offered, she began to whine.
"Don't wake up your mother, sleep deprivation can do crazy things to your brain. If my sleep deprived and Vicodin scrambled brain hallucinates mean jerks, she probably hallucinates some sort of crazy, controlling, administrative psycho-woman, and believe me when I say you and I do not want to deal with that."
He held out the food and the girl hungrily swallowed it down. After that, he offered her mashed potatoes, which she finished with more gusto than he did his own. His food was sitting out on the coffee table so he could grab occasional bites, his meal rapidly cooling while she ate casually.
"It's hard to believe all of this fits in your stomach," he commented, looking at the size of her torso.
She started to look around and gripe, and House said, "OK, take it easy. You want a drink?"
House handed her a bottle that Cuddy had already made and stored in the small refrigerator in the corner of the room, and he sat back down next to the child, feeling like he was making child care look easy. Rachel tipped back, so she was leaning into the corner of the sofa, holding the bottle in her unpracticed hands. "Why did I even doubt that I could handle this," House said to her confidently, until her fingers lost their grip on the bottle and it fell back and hit her face.
There were a few seconds where he thought that maybe she was fine, and then he watched her lip begin to quiver and her chest expand with a deep breath and he knew what was coming. He did not want Cuddy to wake up to an injured child, so he lifted Rachel and went to her room as quickly as he could. He shut the door, and started to walk while he held her. He looked at her and saw the small red mark from where the bottle smacked her forehead. She sniffled a few times and buried her face against him while she complained but, somehow, he prevented an all-out wail.
She scowled at him, obviously holding him responsible for her injury. "Oh, come on," he countered, "it wasn't that heavy and you're the one who dropped it."
She sniffled again and leaned her head on his shoulder, gazing up at him.
"Eh never mind. It was my fault," he added.
He evaluated the child, realizing that the lower part of her face was covered in bright orange, partially-dried carrot and potato paste. He carried her to the bathroom, grabbing a washcloth and balancing her on his knee while he cleaned her up. After scraping the thick-caked mess from her chin and cheeks, she grinned widely and giggled while she waved her hands through the air.
"Doesn't take much to make you happy, does it?" House asked, while she started to laugh openly at him. "It's so weird, people like you have really low expectations. You communicate them pretty well for someone who's largely non-verbal. You're essentially training me. Rewarding me for good behavior, punishing me for letting the bottle hit you in the head…even though, technically, you were the one who dropped it."
Rachel stuck her tongue out and loudly blew a raspberry, and House felt himself chuckle for a second in response. "Everyone has a clean slate with you, don't they? Anyone who understands people, I don't mean the complicated screwed up messes that people become or who they want you to think they are, I mean anyone who really understands people, gets that you aren't that different from them. People spend all these years growing and essentially very little really changes. What do we really want?" he asked while he pulled off the shirt that was now both orange from carrots and wet from the washcloth. He wrapped her up in a thick towel and walked back to her bedroom. "People want to be clean, to be fed, held once in a while, not to sit around in piles of our own crap and, as the bottle incident so clearly demonstrated, we want to avoid being hurt…to avoid pain. All of the complicated thoughts of certain psychiatrists and in the end…humans are remarkably simple."
He found a diaper and clean clothes, dressing her more easily than he thought he would. "I haven't diapered a kid since I was kid. I managed to get the whole way through med school, through residency and doctoring, through my ex-girlfriend's extended family without diapering a single baby…I mean I get the mechanics, but sometimes you wonder if more is involved than what you suspect."
He picked up the fully dressed child and his cane, and started back toward the living room, feeling a shiver prickle on her arms, "You're not actually cold, are you?" he asked.
She shivered again, and he yanked a blanket from her crib and draped it over her. She nuzzled close to his chest and sighed contentedly. House paced for a few moments, discussing the merits of pacing and the fact that it seemed Rachel appreciated it as much as he did because she started to fall asleep. After several laps, he heard Cuddy, "You're talking to her like you talk to Chase."
"There's no point in dumbing the world down. He has to grow up some time," House countered, peering around the sofa to the blanket on the floor where Cuddy was stretching and smiling up at him.
Yawning, she said "You know that you look so hot holding a baby?"
"That's such a cliché. Women don't really think that, do they?"
She said as she pushed herself into a sitting position, "I've never really thought much about guys holding babies until I had one of my own…but sitting here, watching you with her…yea, it's extremely hot. That and…I really needed this nap, so that makes it even hotter."
Cuddy stood, walking over to take the child almost immediately.
"Eat your dinner," House responded, "I've got this."
"She's falling asleep."
"I'm not genius but…oh, wait, I am. I can handle this. I saw the crib, I think I can figure out what to do."
"Are you sure?" Cuddy asked, her hand patting Rachel's back.
"Yes, eat your food."
"You have to tuck her blanket in so it doesn't cover her face."
"I've seen the fluorescent-colored posters in the clinic."
"You're right," she nodded, opening a container of food while she looked over her shoulder at him.
"Do you pull the curtain or leave it open?" House asked as he approached Rachel's bedroom door.
"What curtain?"
"After I get her blankets from the crib, I put her in the bathtub to sleep, right? So curtain open or closed?" House asked with a snicker before he disappeared into Rachel's room.
Cuddy tried desperately to stay glued to the sofa, allowing House to put Rachel in her crib. It was clear exactly what he was trying to do, that he was trying to help, and at the same time she was trying desperately to trust him. Beneath all of it was a very real and pervasive fear: would her role as a mother ultimately be an insurmountable barrier between them? There were plenty of potential issues between them from their professional positions to his status as a man recently clean, but a child was a whole different issue.
She found herself rising from the sofa finally, not to check on him as much as see with her own eyes evidence that maybe the insurmountable obstacle was not actually insurmountable. She peeked through the small opening in the door and saw a wide-eyed Rachel in her crib babbling happily up at House.
He was leaning against a table next to the portable crib and said to Rachel, "She's watching us, isn't she? She's worried that I actually left you in the tub."
Rachel squealed out loudly and Cuddy said, "I wasn't worried, I was just curious."
"Well, she seemed to be asleep, and then I put her down on her back," House turned and made eye contact over his shoulder, "that was on the fluorescent baby safety posters too," he turned back to Rachel, "but the second she was down her eyes popped open and she started talking."
"What's she talking about?" Cuddy asked.
"You. She's giving me the rundown, telling me all of your secrets."
"She knows stuff that you don't?"
"Oh yea. And she's in a talking mood."
Cuddy joined them, looking down into the crib at the child whose face lit up the moment Cuddy came into sight. "She has a routine. That might help settle her down."
"You're kidding," House retorted, "you even plan and ritualize the steps for the kid to go to sleep? My god, Cuddy."
"It works."
"If she doesn't fall asleep within the allotted time, do you give her clinic hours?"
"Well, yea. She already owes me thirty."
House directed his gaze to Cuddy, saying confidently, "She could use someone to show her how to do things like sleep without a set of approved steps."
"So this…isn't the only time you're putting her to sleep?" Cuddy asked.
There was a momentarily piercing stare that accompanied thought, and he said, cautiously, "I guess that's up to you."
"It's also very much up to you. You surprised me. Thank you for watching her while I slept."
"Too bad I screwed it up," he replied while Rachel continued to vocalize.
"Looks like you did pretty well for a first timer."
"Did you not notice that the child is awake?"
"She likes her routine."
"Fine, just for tonight, what's the routine?"
Cuddy reached into the crib, ready to take over, to fix the situation and demonstrate the correct way to do it. Just as she pulled the baby close to her, she saw House's face. "Here," she said, stepping close, extending the baby held within her arms toward him.
"You can do it," he answered, turning to walk away.
"Do you want to stay? You can see what I do in case you ever feel like trying again."
House pondered, finally nodding.
"Don't make fun of me, and you can stay," she added.
"I've been mocking your insane obsession with structure forever. Why stop now?"
"Not that," Cuddy answered.
House nodded while he sat on the edge of a twin bed next to the portable crib. Cuddy picked up a thick cardboard book with textured places on each page and read it while the baby finished a bottle. After reading, Cuddy stood next to where House sat. She held the baby in her arms and began to sway lazily back and forth. Then she turned away slightly, so that she did not have to watch him watching her, and she began to hum as she moved. It was a song that House was completely unfamiliar with, and Cuddy's voice was shy and uncertain but the child began to relax.
He watched while Cuddy, the powerful dean, ran her index finger along the child's fat cheek to chin, then curving back up to the baby's forehead and down the bridge of her nose. Cuddy continued to hum the haunting song while the notes were recorded in House's mind. Rachel's eyes began to flutter shut. Cuddy turned back to House and saw him watching her without judgment. After several cycles through the same calming song, she placed Rachel carefully in the crib, tucking the blanket tightly around the edges of the mattress and waiting until the little girl seemed completely asleep.
"Which part did you think I'd mock you for?" he whispered, baffled.
"I don't know. The song, the book…"
"I liked the song. What was it?"
"I don't really know, my grandmother used to hum it all of the time."
When they went out to the living room, carefully closing Rachel's door behind them, Cuddy was looking at him with a look of such enamored appreciation that he felt like he should search the room for the real intended recipient.
"Do you pay all of your babysitters like that?" he asked confidently.
"Like what?" she countered knowingly.
"Well, you look like you're about to pay up with some of the hottest sex ever experienced."
"I don't pay them all like that. Some of them just get regular weeknight sex."
"For most of the mortals, that's still the hottest sex they've ever experienced," he complimented shamelessly.
He watched as she grinned, and he thought about how much he loved watching a speechless Cuddy try to react to such a blatant compliment.
In the very early hours of the morning, Cuddy woke to the sight of House pacing as he leaned against the wall. "Are you alright?" she asked.
He briskly shook his head while he continued to try to pace, but he collapsed onto the edge of the bed, both of his hands gripping into his thigh. She scooted forward to his side, "What can I do?"
He looked up at her, and she could see the desire in his eyes, the desire for Vicodin, for the bottle itself, the consumption of the pill, the feeling that followed, but, above all else, the desire to end the pain. The look was so apparent it was as if he had screamed the actual words in every single language that he knew. She knew what she felt and it was fear, sadness and concern that swelled like an angry growth her chest.
"Can I rub it for you, run a bath?" she asked.
"I don't know," he said angrily.
He did not know what to do, the pain was so intense he could taste it in his mouth. Sweat bubbled along his forehead before running down his face like tears. "It hurts," he finally said.
This pain, this ache was not about surviving a craving for a drug, it was about withstanding pain. "If we can find a way to get through the worst of it…"
"We?" he spat.
"If we can find a way to get through the worst of it…it will get better."
He couldn't even concentrate enough to explain why her words frustrated him, but in the back of his mind there was a truth to it. While there was always pain, it was seldom this intense. Any inkling of comfort was quickly whisked away at the realization that he still had to survive the present moment.
"Let's find James," Cuddy suggested.
"It's the middle of the night."
"He comes in at four. By the time we get there, he'll be coming in."
"And Rachel?"
Cuddy disappeared down the hall, finding her friend and bringing the still sleeping helper to the sofa. The babysitter stared at House, clearly shocked by the sight of someone in such agony.
Cuddy helped him to the stairs because the home had no elevator, the two of them nearly stumbling down the steps several times before they successfully made it. Once outside, Cuddy wanted to run for a wheelchair, but James, who was just walking into the medical facility, heard her call his name.
Once Cuddy and James had him inside the building, they wheeled him up to the PT room. James quickly and roughly kneaded House's thigh, alleviating a small portion of the worst of the spasms. Cuddy and James helped to lower House into the hot tub. "I'm fine," House said after sighing with both relief and pain, signaling to the others that he wanted to be left alone.
When James and Cuddy were back in the PT room, James was gathering towels from a closet when he saw Cuddy try to quickly brush tears away from her face. "You OK?" James asked.
Cuddy nodded, stoically, trying to hide the fact that she had feelings about what was going on.
"Tell me what happened," James said.
"His leg acted up and…neither of us were quite sure what to do. I think his pain just clouded his head so he couldn't even figure out what would help. And me…I just didn't know what in the hell to do."
"I'll help him find a routine that he'll be able to follow without thinking about it. I can show you stuff with counter pressure, massage, a few acupressure techniques too, that may help a bit."
"He does not want me touching him when he feels like that."
"When you aren't used to it, it takes some getting used to."
"I was just trying to help. I just wanted to help and I need to figure out how to convince him to let me."
James stood still for a moment, "Why'd you try to wipe away those little tears while my back was turned?"
Cuddy looked startled, but still tried to hide it, "I think you've misinterpreted-"
"Oh please," James countered, "don't lie to me. You didn't want me to see you in pain. If I would have, you didn't know what I'd do. Maybe I'd offer advice or give you a hug…if I did that you'd have to acknowledge that you were in pain. You'd have to let someone else see that. You seem uncomfortable with that."
"I don't know you."
"You didn't want him to see that either. You hid it from him and you know him," James responded certainly.
"Because…because I didn't want him to feel bad."
"See this is a cycle. He doesn't want to look weak, doesn't want it to look like you need to take care of him, so he tries to handle it. Then you hide how much it matters, he doesn't let you help him, you eventually learn not to offer to help him…this is dysfunction."
"You're getting all of this from some tears that you think you saw?"
"We talk during his sessions. Little bits and pieces, enough to paint a pretty clear picture. Enough to know that you both hold your cards close. Enough to know that neither of you wants anyone to see their vulnerabilities. I don't know you well…but I know how he looks when we talk about you. This thing between you is massive to him and you can hurt him like no one else."
"I've already hurt him."
"Sounds like that's probably a two way street. The past should be addressed…and then once you move on from those conflicts, once you reach forgiveness, you have to close the book on the anger or resentment from those times and move forward."
"It isn't the past, it's right now. I talked him into the detox and now he's paying the price. Every time he's in pain, he'll realize that it's because of me."
James' mouth was slightly open while he shook his head, "That sense of guilt is without foundation. You can't take that on you."
"I was his doctor when his infarction happened. I talked him into detox. I'm involved in every aspect of why he's in pain."
"See, a few small words added or removed from a sentence make a huge difference. According to him, he knew he had no choice but to detox. You talked him into trying rapid detox instead of traditional. Guilt is toxic too. Talk to him about this."
"That isn't who we are," she said sadly.
"No, it isn't who you were."
"So what do I do? When he hurts like this, once we're back home? We can't call you at three in the morning every time it acts up."
"I'll show you both some things that can help. He needs to feel worthy of your support. You need to stop feeling so nervous and guilty because that doesn't help either of you. Do you want to sit in this morning? We'll go over a routine for pain management."
"I don't know if he wants me there."
"He feels unworthy of your help. Like having to deal with his disability is an unnecessary burden on you that you shouldn't be forced to deal with."
"It isn't a burden, it's just part of who he is." Cuddy stood in front of James, her mind worming deep into thought.
"I can the cogs turning in your head," James commented.
"Tonight, he took care of my daughter for me while I took a nap."
"And?"
"And what? I didn't expect him to. I don't want him to decide that a child is too much. I'm trying to make sure he doesn't feel like he's stuck with kid duty."
"You know what's interesting, if you try to keep the responsibilities of a child from him, one possible outcome is that he will appreciate it and see it as your willingness to shoulder those duties since the choice to have a child was solely your own."
"Exactly," Cuddy nodded once emphatically.
"Of course, you haven't told him that directly, so it's also possible that he will assume it's because you don't trust him."
"It isn't that."
"He might see it as that. Or that you see him as a horrible person that should be kept away from children. That you see him as a drug addict or you fear for your child's safety."
"That isn't true."
"I hear you telling me that. Which gets you points with me and nothing else. You've known him longer than I have, but I think if given two options, he's going to assume it's the one where you think he's an asshole."
"But it isn't," she protested.
"Dr. Cuddy, it doesn't matter what you tell me or what I think. I believe you, but that's meaningless."
"I want him in her life. But then…I don't want her to get hurt either."
"Oh," James said, trying to mask the undercurrent of concern.
"I don't want her to grow to love him, only to not have him. Wanting something you can't have…really starts to hurt after a while," she said sadly.
James walked closer, standing right in front of her, "This is bigger than just events spread over the last year or two, isn't it?"
Cuddy nodded. James smiled and he said, "If you don't want to lose him and you don't want Rachel to lose him, it shows how much he means to you. This is worth it to both of you, but again, it doesn't help if I know it. You both need to stop trying to play one or two moves ahead in the game and talk about the things you're thinking. After you tell him how you feel, ask him how he feels. He might not tell you right away, but he'll get there. You guys have to start somewhere or you'll both leave this experiment a lot worse for the wear. I don't think you want to hurt each other, but if you aren't careful, that is exactly what is going to happen."
Standing there with the stirrings of complete worry on her face, she began to think about what to do next when James said, calmly, "If you want, I'll show you how to help him survive the bad moments. Pain and urges to use aren't so different. Both hurt, both require action and neither last forever if you can just find a way to make it through the moment. If he's in pain or feels the urge to use, don't feel like it's a failure on your part or on his, it's all part of the process. It will help if he feels he can discuss those feelings with you openly without guilt or negativity. The feelings aren't where the problems lie, the problems are always in the reactions to those feelings. He'll develop a set of steps to help him survive when he wants to use. I'll help him come up with a set of steps for when his pain becomes unmanageable that you can help with if you'd like."
"Yea, I can try."
"Trying implies that you feel there's a strong possibility that you will fail. Now, let's go get him out before he boils."
Cuddy thought while they walked back to get House and she asked, "Why did you lie to him about Rachel?"
"What?" James asked.
"Why did act like you didn't know that I adopted Rachel on my own?"
James smiled, picking up his pace toward the therapy room, "Well, well," he said victoriously, "I guess you guys do talk about things sometimes, don't you?"