Disclaimer – We do not own House M.D. It all belongs to David Shore and Fox.

~Chapter 27~

Cuddy walked into her home without even knowing how she got there. Her vision was clouded, to the point she could only see shadows, and her heart threatened to strangle her as fear cut deep furrows into her stomach. She was losing it.

She threw her belongings on the floor, peeled all the unnecessary clothes off of her body, and desperately hugged a bottle of bourbon determined to master the art of forgetting; or at least the art of drowning her sorrows when they were so adamant at staying afloat.

A dream. It had all been a dream. The most wonderful moment of her life was an illusion. Pain seared through her body, through her empty womb. No. Impossible. It had been so real. She felt bereft because someone she loved deeply tugged her heart violently out of her chest. No. Was it all a dream? Has she loved at all? She curled on the couch, feet neatly folded under her, as tears started streaming down her cheeks. No, no, no. She huddled there for what seemed an eternity, draining the toxic liquor down her throat, until there were no more tears. A dream, all a dream. Her heart still cried no, but her mind, searching for logical conclusions, had already accepted it. There was no other explanation. It must have been a dream and it was time to wake up and face the reality.

Cuddy sucked in a ragged breath and wiped angrily at her tears. She was behaving like a fool. There was no sense in crying over a fantasy. She wanted it so badly that she projected it as a reality. Her and House's baby, what an illusion. She shook her head trying to crystallize her gaze and her thoughts but the stubborn tears sent her head spinning again. She remembered his eyes as he stood in front of her office, adding gasoline to the flammable surface of her soul. Oh how she wanted to get rid of that feeling; to peel it off, to wash it off of her skin, to reduce her existence to a life without him. Then it hit her like an express train that it wasn't a dream after all; it was as real as it was painful. And while she balanced her thoughts between what she believed had been a dream and what in fact was reality, her body, now almost completely stripped of the work clothes, found its way to the bathroom. Could agony be washed off?

She started the water in her shower and decided, for the first time in the last several days, to look at herself in the mirror. Cuddy was not afraid of what she could see but what she wouldn't. A life worth living.

She raised her bloodshot eyes to the image in the mirror and touched her cheeks, feeling the cold of her fingers penetrate her skin. She stared at the stranger on the other side and wondered how she had gotten there. She felt tormented, almost possessed, all day; she could hear the tearing at her consciousness and separation from reality. Her body felt residual strikes of pain as the scar on her thigh, caused by the arterial catheter, started flaring hot causing her to alternate her cries between animalistic whimpers and tortured screams. She turned around and switched the small radio on, trying to erase the resonating sound of her cries from the confined air of her bathroom with an upbeat tune. Then she dragged her heavy feet along the bathroom tiles and entered the shower, hoping to regain composure and make sense out of the delirium that had enveloped her. Little did she know that the next song on the radio would send her crumpling on the floor.

Cuddy pressed her palms against the cold tiles of her bathroom shower and let the hot, steamy water run over her body like a healing elixir. She closed her eyes, eternally grateful for the feel that the water and soap left lingering on her skin. Maybe it was possible to put all the pieces back together?

However when the first notes of Kelly Clarkson's and Reba McEntire's duet Because of you filled the small shower stall, Lisa Cuddy, the omnipotent administrator, the woman in control of everyone and everything, the Ice Queen of the PPTH came undone in a million pieces, collapsing on the bathroom floor in strained, broken sobs.

Clenching her fists, she felt despair and sorrow well up so quickly that it burnt her inside. And then the world stopped again and what remained alive and kicking in the vacuum of that moment was the peculiar, corroding truthfulness of the song lyrics assaulting her being.

~***~

I will not make the same mistakes that you did

Cuddy shivered at the thought of Gregory House and all the mistakes he made in his life. Yet, she made the same ones; booze, pills, self-pity. Cameron was right, it was leaving a physical strain on her and clouding her judgment but was she, the strong-willed administrator, willing to quit now when nobody gave a damn? Their pity was not going to last long and she had work integrity to preserve. That was all she got left; her job. And if Valium kept her functional and bourbon made her forget, who was she to quit?

I will not let myself cause my heart so much misery

It was too late for that; there was no place left for misery simply because there was no heart anymore. There was a muscle pumping blood in her chest, keeping her from resting, from giving up completely the way she secretly wanted to.

I will not break the way you did

You fell so hard

She thought she was better than him. She thought he had handled his situation the worst way possible, playing stubborn and not giving up on his leg, almost killing himself to save it. She told him to amputate, suggesting the easy way out, just the way she was suggesting it to herself right now. She was, in fact, worse than him, because she didn't even put up a fight.

I've learned the hard way, to never let it get that far

Lisa Cuddy overestimated herself. She thought she could have it all; she thought she would make it. She listened to him to try one last time, and she willingly exposed herself. She dared to dream, to hope and yet life had just put out her sweetest reverie, like a playful kid putting out candles on his birthday cake. With gusto. She pushed the boundaries like he did everyday, and now they were broken, and she was on the floor. Helpless.

Because of you, I never stray too far from the sidewalk

She never could love him, believing he would never let her. She never could ask him for his sperm, believing he would never agree to such insanity. She never could work up the nerve to ask him to father her child naturally, believing he would ridicule her until the day she died. Yet her baby became the fruit of her inconfessable and unwise love. And both of them were gone. Her unwise love and her precious son, who would have grown up to have his dad's beautiful eyes. Probably.

Because of you, I learned to play on the safe side so I don't get hurt

In this life, she counted on being just his friend and his boss. She learned to be there for him, every day, seeing his sad and gorgeous eyes, feeling his admiring gaze all over her body, desiring her, longing for her, fantasizing about her. She fought for his place in this world but every time he managed, somehow, to hurt her with his words, stabbing where it hurt the most. Yet his simple boyish smirk and obnoxious presence always ended up healing the wounds. She admired him and secretly loved him for more than 20 years, and yet he never hesitated ripping that away from her.

Because of you, I find it hard to trust not only me, but everyone around me

What the hell did she do? What was she thinking treating Cameron and Wilson like that? It was not her fault. Cameron was an ambitious yet sentimental girl, a lot like Cuddy a decade ago or so. She had always considered her a successor of sorts; she even planned to put her in charge during the maternity leave. What maternity leave? She would never have to worry about that again. Ever. But her coworkers were a different story. Would she ever apologize? Would she ever have the strength to face the pity in their eyes?

Because of you I am afraid…

Afraid? Of what? There was really no reason to be afraid. There was nothing left to lose. At least nothing she cared about. Life was currently a protocol she had to follow through, nothing else; an empty shell to be polished on the outside to fool the spectators with its shine. Because the meaning of life had already had a full name picked out, but no one would ever find out or attend to it. Love was stolen from her twice, by death and by retribution.

I lose my way

How could she have done that? Lisa Cuddy had disrespected the hospital Board, fired a valued colleague, terrorized her staff in the ER, cut House's paycheck and alienated Wilson who had only tried to help her. All in one day! And for what? Her own personal revenge? Who was she? She couldn't recognize herself anymore. She had certainly lost her compass.

And it's not too long before you point it out

How would the infamous Gregory House react? Which evil comments would leave his poisonous yet honey-sweet mouth? Would he ever regret his actions, even if only for a fraction of a second? Would he consider her pain or would he simply laugh and make a cruel joke about her despair, claiming that hope was for sissies? Would he show his human side or shove his 'humanity is overrated' right into her face? She didn't know, and probably would never find out but she was certain of one thing, she wouldn't be able to stop him whatever he decided to do.

I cannot cry

Because I know that's weakness in your eyes

He was standing there in front of her office, watching her, his sapphire gaze scotching her skin like a torch. She was coming undone, and he was there, silently observing the fruit of his vengeance. Or maybe not. What did she see in his eyes? Did he smile? Would he have offered her his shoulder to cry on? Would she have accepted? Would she have listened to him if he had tried to apologize? Would she have let him take her back to his home and nurture her back to health? She would have, no need to lie to herself, because that would have brought her the love of her life back and she would have gotten another shot at survival. But that was a beautiful lie to believe in. House didn't care. He never had.

I'm forced to fake, a smile, a laugh

Every day of my life

Lisa Cuddy was not allowed to cry in public, where everybody could see her. She was not allowed the luxury of showing her emotions, especially not in front of him. Instead she had to keep pretenses, wear professional masks and hide behind the cold administrator suit even when her heart was bleeding. So she was turning into a puppet, a true comedian of sorts trying to please everyone. Yet most people failed to recognize one thing about comedians and puppets - the more they made people smile, the more pain that they usually felt inside.

My heart can't possibly break

Her heart had been in his hands for the last two decades, she had given it to him that one night he touched both her body and her soul, that unique occasion when the two of them were one, those few hours when she felt more loved and desired than she could have imagined possible. And she never got it back, not even the morning after when she couldn't decide whether it was sorrow or indifference in his eyes, not even in the worst moments of their professional arguing and bickering all these years. However, he gave it back to her only three days ago, shattered in pieces.

When it wasn't even whole to start with

He tried to make love to her in his apartment. He saw her crying, eternally sorry that he would never be the father of her baby, and yet he didn't even bother mentioning he actually had been all along. She just had to feel it one more time, his taste, his smell, his touch; she desperately wanted to belong to him but she also had to protect her baby. And from what? From his dad? He could have told her, they could have made love; he would have slept by her side and looked out for her while she slept, and he could have noticed the pulmonary embolism earlier. Her baby boy could have had a shot in this life. Those tears would have never left her eyes and those bitter words she had said to him would have never left her lips. That was the beginning of an end.

~***~

Crumpled on the floor, in fetal position, Cuddy cried her heart out as she relived each and every word of that song. She shivered violently even though the water was still hot; the truth however was colder than ice. The chorus echoed in her brain. All, because of him.

~***~

I watched you die

So many times. He was always in some kind of trouble, and Cuddy was always alert. The infarction, the shot, the bus crash and the brain stimulation. She had always been there, always by his side, always willing to help. Why did he do this to her? She never asked anything in return.

I heard you cry

If he only knew, damn it, if that son of a bitch knew that every tear that had ever left his blue mesmerizing eyes tattooed yet another deep scar on her heart. If he only knew that she would have gladly shared his pain if she could, and that she had never let go of his hand all those days at the hospital.

Every night in your sleep

Cuddy saw every single expression on his face when he was in pain, even when his brain lapsed into coma. And she was there, his long-life companion, by his side, holding his hand, like it was the most natural thing to do.

I was so young

You should have known better than to lean on me

She tried her best to save his leg and his dignity given her young years and sparse medical experience. There had been absolutely no reason to feel guilty. The doctors before her had failed him, not her. It was in her nature to do something, to fight against death, to do the damn surgery. She had to convince Stacy. She had to ignore his will, because Lisa Cuddy couldn't bare the thought of losing Gregory House. She had to be selfish.

You never thought of anyone else

You just saw your pain

House never hesitated blaming her for his own pain. The way he looked at her after he had woken up from anesthesia, the hatred in his eyes got her instantly frozen. Did he, in that moment, swear he would get his revenge one day? Had he waited ten years, yearning for it?

And now I cry

In the middle of the night

For the same damn thing

With the last sound of that torturing melody, Cuddy's body went into a series of violent spasms as she finally realized how Gregory House had felt all these years. Defeated by life.


A/N

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**This version of Because of you can be found in Miss Cuddles' True Lies Music Library.

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