***
Jake opens the door from the garage to the kitchen. He's just coming back from a friend's Christmas party. When he hears his dad yelling "it's about time you got home."
Jake rolls his eyes and replies "Chill Dad, its 10:45. I have a whole 15 minutes before my curfew."
"It's 10:45 in the real world. But out here in preggoland, it's like one in the morning."
"Huh? Is mom okay?"
"Yeah, she's fine. She just refuses to go to bed until her darling son has decorated the Christmas tree—something about family tradition yada, yada, yada."
"I saw the Christmas tree (in the living room) last night and it's already decorated."
"Well, apparently one Christmas tree is not sufficient. She has another one in the family room."
"Oh, I didn't notice it."
Cuddy walks in to the kitchen to greet her son "hey, hon. How was the party?"
"Hi Mom. Party was fine. Dad was just telling me that you have a Christmas tree for me to decorate?"
"Yeah, do you think I'm going to break our family tradition in our new home? Besides, you have triple the amount of stockings to put up this year."
House pulls out a beer in the fridge and asks "triple?"
Cuddy starts naming people "Jake, the twins, mom, Henry, you, me. Oh, I also invited Lina to join us."
House begins arguing "why would the twins need stockings? It's not like that they can see them yet."
Cuddy ignores House and excitedly tells Jake about the specially embroidered stockings she got for everybody.
Jake smiles at his Mom's excitement and waits to see if his parents have finally settled on names for the twins.
***
As Cuddy fusses about the stockings, Jake unpacks his ornament collections.
He individually shows them to his dad and House being House has a comment for each ornament. Jake has quite a bit of a collection, ranging from folksy tin painted ornaments from Mexico, to cutesy Celtic snowmen from Ireland, to charming London telephone booth, but the one that caught House's attention were the yearly ornaments. There was the 1990 Lenox baby's first Christmas ornament and the proceeding yearly ornaments that marked Jake's interest in the past fifteen years. Jake notices that his father becomes very quite when he pulls out a stethoscope ornament. It's a vintage hallmark ornament produced around 1970s, the colors are a bit faded and its one of two ornaments he owns that doesn't come in a keepsake box. Jake picks up the ornament and tells his dad "this one is my all-time favorite. I'm not sure why, but I remember begging mom for it since I was 4 or 5 years old. She finally let me have it when I was thirteen, right mom?" Jake immediately notes that both his parents are just gazing into each other's eyes as if they're having a conversation that he's not privy too.
He hears his dad asks "you kept it after all these years?"
His mom nods and states "yes, it's the only thing you've ever given me."
House smiles and replies "I never gave it to you. You took it from me."
Jake feels like he's in the midst of his parent having a moment but he's just way too curious not to interrupt them. He waves his hand in between his parent and says "ok, are you two talking about this ornament or completely something else?"
Cuddy answers "Jake, that's your dad's ornament. His mother gave it to him when he got accepted at Hopkins, right Greg?"
House simply nods.
Cuddy continues "your dad had it dangling in his car's rearview mirror when we were still in Michigan. One night he took my…well, something from me so, and I took it in exchange for …it. He refused to return my…thing so I kept it ever since.
"What did you take, dad?"
"It's your mom's red thong."
Cuddy yells "House!"
House winks at his son and whisper loud enough for Cuddy to hear "and we weren't even near her bedroom drawer."
Jake's face turns red and says "I think I'm going to just concentrate on putting this up."
"Mom, why do we have two Christmas trees this year?"
Cuddy, who's sitting in the sofa with House answers "I just feel like it, I feel we're doubly blessed this year." House smiles at Cuddy's response and starts rubbing her belly.
She adds "I like the one in the living room because its right beside your dad's piano. I always want to have a family picture taken near a piano and a Christmas tree." She point at the tree that Jake is decorating and says "this one is where we'll be opening our presents."
House interjects "watch out, next thing you know we all have to wear our matching Christmas sweaters."
Cuddy replies "There's nothing wrong with Christmas sweaters. Jake wears them."
Jake retorts "yeah, when I was eight. I don't even own one anymore."
Cuddy asks "what about that nice sweater that your Nana gave you last year? The one with Rudolph the red nose reindeer in front and his nose actually lights up?"
Jake doesn't want to get caught wearing that sweater, so he immediately changes the topic by saying "Oh, did I mention that I've converted to another religion."
House looks at his son and asks "have you decided to join me in my corner? There's always room for one more atheist ready to burn in hell."
Cuddy rolls her eyes and asks her son "what is it this year?"
Cuddy leans over and whisper to House "it's our yearly tradition. Every time he helps put up the Christmas tree, he pretends to renounce his Judeo-Christian faith and proclaim his allegiance to a new church."
"Seriously Mom, I think I've found the one true church. I've decided to be a Pastafarian."
Cuddy starts laughing and asks his son "Jake, I've heard of a Rastafarians but not of Pastafarian. You're just making that up, did you run out of realreligions already?"
"No, I actually got a recruitment flyer from the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster in school."
House snorts and says "I knew there's a reason why he picked Harvard instead of Hopkins. Where else can you get Hasty Pudding serve as a side order to your Flying Spaghetti Monster?"
Cuddy defensively retorts "I'm sure those kids were just having fun."
All of sudden, House asks his son "Do you want to hang out with your old man during your winter break? I'll let you wear my lab coat and play with my stethoscope. And if you're really, really good, daddy will even let you pet his lapdog name Chase."
Jake replies "gee, Dad how can I refuse such a deal. Do you mind throwing in some pocket protectors while you're at it?"
House raises his brows and pretends to think and replies "I think I might be able to convince the king of pocket protector (Wilson) to part with some of his supply."
"Speaking of protector, mom did you know that Dad sent me a big box of…" Jake stops as he notices his mom wincing in pain. "Mom, are you okay?"
Both House and Jake quickly move to the sofa as they see Cuddy's face flushes.
"Lise, talk to me what's wrong?"
"I…the twins are just moving too much. I just felt a tightening in my stomach."
"Braxton Hicks? When did it start?"
"Just tonight. I've been feeling the contraction the whole night but it just got worst when the twins started moving."
"You should be fine. As Keeler said, your cervix is still holding up. But I need you keep track of the frequency of your contraction, okay?"
Cuddy nods and says "Greg, can you help me get to the bedroom?"
TBC
