A/N See, I told you I would update again soon :P… anyways… Thank you so much to all of you for still caring about this story… I was pleasantly surprised and overwhelmed by the support you guys gave me after the last chapter so thanks guys!! Also I totally forgot to thank Corn for kicking my ass into gear to start posting again so thank her too for your updates ;)

House was confused when he opened his eyes and was greeted by a dark room. The alarm wouldn't go off for hours and his leg wasn't spasming in pain so there was no apparent reason he shouldn't be asleep. He was about to close his eyes and go back to sleep when he heard Cameron let out a noise that could only be defined as a whimper. He looked over at her to find her curled up in a ball against the side of his body, her small hand clutching his t-shirt as if her life depended on it. He brought a hand up to her cheek and was startled to find clammy skin and tears leaking out from behind her closed eyelids. Quickly hitching himself up in bed, he turned the light on the bedside table onto its lowest setting before turning his attention back to Cameron.

"Allison, wake up, you're having a nightmare," he said as he shook her gently, his voice gruff from sleep, but also soothing.

She jolted awake and House was disturbed to see the sheer panic and terror in her eyes as they darted around the room until she realized where she was and promptly burst into tears. Stunned by her actions and at a loss of what to do, Cameron made the choice for him as she practically threw herself into his arms. He responded instinctively by wrapping his arms around her and hugging his hysterical wife closer as he rubbed her back gently.

"It's okay… it was just a dream, it's over. I've got you… you're safe," he murmured, a bit awkward in his attempts to be comforting, but effective as she calmed down.

"Good lord, your hair is out of control," he joked once her sobbing had been reduced to an occasional sniffle. "One of these days its going to strangle me in the middle of the night."

"Ah well, then my plan will be complete," Cameron returned, allowing House a sigh of relief that she calmed down enough that her sense of humor was intact. "But seriously, tomorrow I'm making a hair appointment for next weekend. I need to get it all cut off."

"Don't," he told her as he gently gathered it all up into one thick bunch, before using his fingers to detangle it while they lay there, "I like it long."

"Well, I at least need a trim and to get my bangs cut, its getting to the point where I cant see," she countered, turning her head and propping her chin on his chest so that she could look him in the face, relishing in the feeling of his skilled hands against her scalp.

"Fine, but just a trim," he conceded, continuing his ministrations silently for a long moment before he spoke again. "So are you going to tell me why we're both awake at," he glanced at the clock, "3:42 in the morning?"

"It was nothing," she replied dismissively, "just a bad dream."

"A bad dream would be like the time I dreamt that I was lost in this huge block of Swiss cheese, and was trying to get out by climbing through the holes. The only way I could get out was to eat my way out. Do you know what that much cheese will do to a man?" House smiled when Cameron laughed. "So lets try this again, what was you're dream about?"

"It was just about something that happened a long, long time ago, it's not important anymore," Cameron insisted.

"Your reaction to it, and the pool of tears on my shirt, would suggest it was a little bit more than just a bad dream," he snarked gently. "And obviously it didn't happen so long ago that it's not still affecting you, so yeah, I would consider that important."

"I really don't want to talk about it," she replied briskly, as she tried to worm out of his embrace and back to her own side of the bed.

"Where do you think you're going?" he asked, tightening his hold on her. "I'm not finished yet," referring to his attentions to her hair. "And I want to know why you woke me up in the middle of the night, so I'm not letting you go back to sleep until you spill."

She looked him in the eye and saw that there was going to be no way that he was going to let it go and sighed deeply. She readjusted her position against his chest so that she wouldn't have to see his expression while she spoke. After a long interlude she sighed once more and began to tell her story, trying to concentrate more on what he was doing with her hair then what she was saying.

"I was attacked-" she began.

"What, when?" he asked accidentally jerking on a knot in surprise.

"Oww."

"Sorry," he apologized rubbing the tender spot for a moment. He had been expecting her to tell him about some kind of killer clown, since that was the only other time that he had ever seen her close to this upset. It had never occurred to him that the situation with their patient might have instigated her nightmare. He then mentally hit himself over the head for it not occurring to him, it should have considering her demeanor in his office earlier, but when he solved the case everything else had been pushed out of his mind.

"I was twenty-one when it happened, almost twenty two. Colin was in the hospital again and he insisted that I go home. He wanted me to get a good night rest for once," she started in short clipped sentences. "We only lived about a mile and a half from the hospital so I figured I would walk home, clear my head some. It was dusk and I wanted to get home before dark, so I took a short cut through the park. And that's when he attacked me…" she said trailing off.

"Did he…?" House started to ask, unable to even get the word out.

"No," she replied knowing what he was getting at, "he never got the chance. He groped me pretty good though, ruined my favorite shirt," she chuckled humorlessly. "He hit me in the back of the head to start with so it took me a while to react. But once I did, I fought back, I did learn a thing or two from having four older brothers, and I managed to get away. I ran all the way home."

"Did the police ever catch him?" he asked.

"No, not unless they got him for something else. I never told anyone what happened," she admitted.

"What?! You mean you never reported it?" House asked as an almost frightening wave of protectiveness swelled up in his chest.

"No, you're the first one to hear about it actually," she admitted quietly. "I went home, took a shower and went to bed. The only visible injury he left on me was a bruise on my cheek and I told everyone I slipped in the shower and hit the towel rack. And Colin was sick, so its not like anyone was seeing me naked, so it was easy keeping the bruises on my arms, chest, and thighs concealed until they went away."

She could feel House inhale to speak again, but she cut him off with the explanation she knew he was looking for, "My husband was dying, me being stupid and walking through the park at night and getting myself attacked was not anything that anyone wanted or needed to deal with. I had other things on my mind, it was easier just to forget about it. And for the most part I have, it's just once in a while that I dream about it that it all comes back. Except that in my dreams I don't always get away and he-" Cameron wasn't able to get the rest of her sentence out as her throat closed up in fear and tears.

"Hey, hey, hey, look at me," House interjected authoritatively, pausing until she did what he asked, his heart aching when he saw the tears welling up in her eyes. "You're all right, you're safe, I'm not going to let anything happen to you. And it wasn't your fault. You didn't deserve to get assaulted no matter what time of they day you were walking home. And it was something that was worth dealing with, your safety, health, and well being is worth it, and I never want to hear you say anything different. I have proclaimed it so it must be so. Alright?"

She nodded as she blinked back the threatening tears. "Alright," she agreed.

"Good," he responded.

Satisfied, he turned the light back off and slouched back down into a laying position. Cameron too slid back down in between the covers, but didn't make a move to retreat back to the other side of the bed and House didn't comment on it, other than to continue running his hands through her hair. It had almost put her back to sleep when he spoke again, startling her slightly.

"Have you ever considered talking to someone about it?"

"Talk about what?" she asked sleepily.

"If you really think that orange is going to be the new black this year," he retorted sarcastically. "About what happened to you. You said that you had never told anyone about it before. It might help if you talk to someone about it."

"I just talked to you about it," she replied simply.

"Well, I meant talk to someone sympathetic about it," he returned self-deprecatingly.

"You were perfectly sympathetic about it," she responded, "I don't need to talk to anyone else about it."

"Oh good god!" he exclaimed in horror.

"What?" she asked completely confused.

"Was I really…" he spat out the word, "sympathetic?"

Cameron laughed lightly. "Yes, you really were. But don't worry, I wont tell anyone."

"It must be a symptom of sleep deprivation," he concluded, "there is no other explanation for it. I'm simply not myself. Now hand me that hair rubber bandy thingy on your wrist there."

She gave him her hair-tie, not even thinking about it until she felt him tie off the bottom of her hair, causing her hand fly to the nape of her neck.

"Did you just braid my hair?" she asked incredulously.

"It's a self preservation tactic," he said simply. "I told you its going to strangle and kill me in my sleep."

"Since when have you known how to braid hair?" She didn't know if she was more shocked at the fact that he braided her hair, or that she hadn't even realized that he was doing it.

"Since many many moons ago, when once upon a time I was a boy scout. We learned how to make rope, braiding hair isn't much different."

"You were a boy scout?"

"Yes, and that's privileged information, so if I hear that going around I'm going to know where it came from," he replied threateningly.

Cameron snorted lightly, clearly unconcerned. "I'm sorry, I'm just having a hard time imagining you in the little khaki uniform, earning merit badges and helping little old ladies cross the street."

"Yeah well, I wasn't much one for helping little old ladies or merit badges, and got myself kicked out of the troop," he returned almost proudly.

"How did you manage that?"

"Let's just say that there was one merit badge that I earned that had a direct correlation to my dismissal…"

"Which was?"

"Fire building."

Cameron laughed unreservedly. "I don't even want to know."

"I swear it was an accident," House said in a way that proved it was anything but. "I always promised myself that if I ever had kids I would never make them do something that degrading. In fact, I would have given them the choice between scouting or a paintball gun. Because, no small boy would pick playing Deliverance over a weapon."

"But what if you had a girl?" she asked with a laugh.

House considered this. "Do they make the leader's wear those little uniforms too?"

"No," Cameron replied.

"A pony."

"Do you want kids?" Cameron asked innocently in follow up to his statements.

House tensed at this question and didn't say anything for a long moment, making Cameron think that perhaps she had pressed to far. She was about to retract her question when he began to speak.

"I think there is a time in everyone's life that you just kind assume that you will one day be like your parents, married and with children," be started slowly.

Cameron waited patiently as he paused, formulating his answer. It was so rare that House opened up, she knew that pushing him would only cause him to clam up, so she simply remained silent, allowing him to share as much or as little as he wanted.

"There was a girl I was pretty serious with in college, Amy, an English major, that I assumed would eventually become the mother of my children," he disclosed honestly. "But when I left Maryland and moved to Michigan, we broke up. Then after I graduated, I was too focused on work and my career to really have any long term relationships, so to be honest it was never something that I spent any real time thinking about. Until Stacy that is, and she made it very clear she never wanted kids so I just went a long with that. Which is a good thing since we all know how that turned out."

"But you didn't answer my question," she pressed softly, despite her earlier resolve not to push for information.

"Well now I'm just a grumpy, crippled, old man," he said dryly, "not exactly father of the year material. But," he paused not quite believing he was having this conversation, if asked, he would blame it on the fact it was the middle of the night and as a result he was not in complete control of his faculties, "I suppose if my life had turned out differently, I wouldn't have been completely averse to the idea."

Cameron mused over these new revelations for a moment. She had always thought House would make a good father and was intrigued by the fact that he wanted children and even more surprised that he actually admitted it. She figured she should have more nightmares in the middle of the night if it meant that she got this kind of information from him.

"You know, both Rod Stewart and Paul McCartney were in their sixties when they had their most recent children," Cameron said teasingly, in an attempt to lighten the mood.

"Yes, but I'm not an aging rock star either," he returned in the same tone.

"My dad was fifty when I was born," she revealed, not realizing that she was unconsciously tracing patterns in House's shirt with her fingertips on his abdomen, "and he is just an average Joe."

House took this information and added it to what he already knew about Cameron and the ages of her brothers.

"And how old was your mother?" he asked.

"She was thirty-eight," Cameron laughed lightly, not having to look at him to see the wheels turning in his head.

"Twelve years," House said softly, more to himself than to her, as he had no doubt that Cameron knew the age gap between her parents.

"My mom was twenty and my dad was thirty two when my parents met," Cameron elaborated. "Although, initially my dad lied to her and shaved five years off his age and said he was twenty seven."

"She must have been angry when she found out," House mused.

"She was," she verified, "but more the fact that he lied, than his real age."

House nodded absently as he filed this information away, now able to put one more piece in the 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle that was Allison Cameron.

"You know," Cameron laughed, "I think what we are doing now could be construed as pillow talk."

"And on that note, conversation over," he concluding, making Cameron laugh again. "I am going to sleep."

Cameron rolled on to her back so she could look at the alarm clock, "Urg, its already 4:30, I have to wake up in two hours."

House reached over her to grab the alarm clock on her side of the bed and reset it for eight. "You're going to be late tomorrow," he announced putting the clock back in its place.

"I don't know if my boss is going to like that," she joked, with a yawn. "He's kind of an ass."

"So I hear," he replied, yawning himself. "Now come here and go to sleep."

Cameron did as she was told and resettled herself with her head on his chest and an arm thrown over his stomach as she had been before she had moved to look at the clock.

"We actually had a heart-to-heart," she said teasingly, once she was comfortable.

"No," House scoffed, "we didn't."

"I beg to differ," she contradicted with a smile. "I think we did."

"Excuse me," he said wrapping his arm around her shoulders and hugging her closer, "but Greg House does not have heart-to-hearts."

A/N As always I love to hear what you guys think and always value your feedback but a surprising amount of people gave suggestions of what they think should and shouldn't happen with the rest of this fic in their reviews for the last chapter and while I appreciate it, the rest of this fic is already outlined so I already know what's happening… that's not to say I don't want to hear what you guys have to say, I just thought I should give you a heads up that its already been decided…. So on that note… lol… let me know what you guys thought of this one!