At ocean: Aw, that's sweet! No need to be sad, yet, there's still several chapters left. ;-)

Chapter 38: The Swan and the Duck

After almost a year of therapy with Dr. Nolan, House has waded through the worst and darkest hours of his childhood.

His days are becoming brighter, his breath flows more evenly, and he takes an active part in life again.

It is a Wednesday night in December, and they celebrated the kids' birthdays on the previous two weekends: Rachel turned eighteen, John fourteen. Rachel is a Senior in high school and mostly enjoying her final year. They have been discussing potential colleges over the summer, and she is in the process of writing applications. John is in his last year of middle school, and thus far shows no signs of teenage drama.

House is sitting on the couch, zapping through channels, waiting for Cuddy. He spent the evening with the kinds until they went to their rooms about half an hour ago, getting ready for bed. It has been snowing all day, and Cuddy's car broke down on her way home. She had called in briefly when she was at the repair shop, getting it fixed.

He glances at the entrance several times, getting slightly nervous. She should be home by now. He picks up his phone to check his messages when he finally hears her keys turn in the lock.

"Hey," she greets him when she walks into the living room. Her annoyance and frustration is palpable.

"Most wonderful time of the year?" he says in mock cheer.

"Hardly." She shakes out her hat and coat, having brought in snow from outside. "I waited for an hour for that damn tow truck to arrive. In a broken down car. I was freezing!" She rubs her hands together and throws her purse on the sideboard. "The tiny waiting area at the car repair shop felt like it was made of tin and not much warmer, either."

"Why didn't you call earlier?" he asks.

"Nothing you could've done," she utters, walking over to the couch.

"I do have a car with a functioning heating system."

"I didn't think it would take 'em that long. Plus, I figured it was better you stay here with the kids." She sits down on the edge of the couch close to the fireplace, takes off her socks, and starts to knead one foot, to restart the blood flow, while holding the other towards the warmth of the fire. "I see you've had a cozy evening," she says, eyeing him enviously. He is lying on his back under a soft blanket, propped up on several pillows.

"You want me to heat up some dinner for you?" he offers.

"No. I just wanna get warm." She looks him up and down, and seems to come up with an idea, her expression a mixture of hope and apprehension.

He knows what she wants, and raises his eyebrows at her doubtfully.

"I'll keep my hands in check," she pledges, lifting her arms, her palms facing him.

He is more worried about his own restraint if she were to cuddle up to him as if she were his girlfriend, and when he loves her as if she were his wife, but he cannot bring himself to deny her. He scoots to the side of the couch and holds up the blanket for her.

A brief look of delight crosses her face, and she tiptoes to him quickly, possibly worried he might change his mind again. She snuggles under the blanket with him, a contented hum escaping the back of her throat when her body meets his. She briefly rubs her cold nose against his chest.

"You're not wiping your snot on my shirt, are you?" he jokes.

"Could be," she quips, and nestles her head on his shoulder.

He feels the soft curve of her breasts against the side of his torso, and tries to shift his focus. One of her cold hands is wedged in between their bodies; the other is resting on his chest. He has his arm draped around her, his hand, balled into a fist, is lying on the cushion near the small of her back.

"I love you," she mumbles. She had not told him today thus far.

He feels the rise and fall of her ribcage against his while he contemplates her words. "I find that hard to believe," he admits eventually. Lately, he has observed his reaction to her words. Dr. Nolan had asked how he feels to be told he is loved, and he had a hard time responding. He realized that he frequently brushes her words away—that he cannot accept them.

"You think I'm lying?" she asks, slight confusion ringing in her voice.

"Nope. I know you believe it. I'm the one with doubts. The destructive part in me goes 'Yeah, right. No way.' And that part is disproportionately large, as you know."

"So because a big part of you is convinced you're not very lovable, you cannot fathom that someone else could."

He shrugs his shoulders.

"Can't you just change that thought?" She presses her cold feet against his shin.

He shakes his head. "I tried. A lot. But it keeps coming back. Like an imprint: impossible to overwrite. Or a tattoo that needs to be eradicated again and again. Resurfacing, no matter how hard I rub at it."

"Because of how you were treated. As a child." Her voice is quiet and sad.

"You know the story about the swan and the duck?"

She moves her head from side to side, her cheek rubbing against his shirt.

"My grandma used to tell me." He scratches his stubble, contemplating how the story went. "Once upon a time," he says in the voice of an announcer, "in the buzzing springtime, all plumage laid their eggs so their feathery offspring would be greeted with sunshine once they hatched. A fiendish creature managed to switch one egg from the duck nest with an egg from the swan nest—simply out of fiendishness and curiosity—without the duck couples' or the swan couples' notice. No idea what they were doing, probably having another round of fun in the reed bushes." The rumble of her chuckle resonates in his chest. "They obviously screwed each other's brains out, because when their ducklings and swanlings hatched, they didn't notice the misplacement. The swan parents simply thought they had one rather ugly offspring, and the duck parents were surprised and perhaps a bit worried about the neck malformation of one of theirs. So the duck grew up thinking it was ugly, and the swan grew up thinking it was sick. Both were bullied by their brothers and sisters, but they were raised as part of the family. They learned to swim and think and behave like the respective other species."

"That's the story?" she asks when he stops talking.

"No. It's actually the story of the ugly duck who someday sees himself reflected in the surface of the water, realizes he has been misplaced, and goes to find his real family where they look just as ugly as him, thus overcoming his complexes."

"That's still awful." He hears the frown in her voice. "Your grandma used to tell you that?"

"The point is: The duck continued to swim like a swan, with it's head up high to compensate for its short neck, quacked like a swan, dived like a swan… So now its real siblings were making fun of it, too."

Cuddy remains far from enthused. "I hope you never told the kids that story," she says drily, and looks up at him briefly with a teasing smile on her lips, gently scoffing him about the fact that his tail keeps on deteriorating.

"Oh, shut up," he retorts. "Obviously I forgot the moral of it—unless it was: You're screwed either way—but what I'm trying to say is—"

"That you grew up feeling like a misfit," she finishes the sentence for him. "That you were brought up believing you needed to change. In order to fit in. To obtain approval."

He nods, feeling understood but helpless. "It's hard to reprogram the core units of the system your early childhood was built upon."

She sighs and takes a moment to consider his words. He realizes that his hand has found its way to the small of her back without him noticing. "Maybe it's impossible to completely reboot and fully restart, but the duck can still learn from its siblings. By observation. Realize that the craning of the neck is no longer necessary… You can do the same. Watch the kids and mimic them. Swim differently."

"You want me to join in their fun game of calling each other 'shit-head'?" he jokes.

"You know what I mean. You could tell them you're proud of them, hug them occasionally, let Rachel know you'll miss her when she moves away for college…" He draws in a breath, about to deny it, but she cuts him off. "I know you will, House."

"She'll think I've lost it for good and that I'd be better off in a mental institution. It would weird them out."

"That's the duck talking," she counters. "You're the one who would feel awkward because you're not used to swimming like you were meant to. Once you get past that initial weirdness, it will turn into a habit."

"I don't believe that a change in behavior changes the way of thinking. Thoughts first, actions second."

"Then ask them about how they think," she suggests. "Maybe you can adapt that as well. Ask them how they know they are lovely human beings. If they know they are loved even when you don't tell them often."

He contemplates her suggestion for a while. "What about you?"

"What about me?" She moves her hand from his chest to his ribcage, wedging it in between the side of his torso and his arm. "Do I know I'm loved?"

"Yeah."

She cranes her head to look at him with a frown. "By you?"

He shrugs, pretending not to care, although he actually feels his pulse climbing as he awaits her answer.

She positions her head more comfortably again, which prevents him from searching her eyes. He wishes he could see her face. After a moment, she whispers: "Yes. Very much."

He is surprised by the conviction he hears in her statement. "How come?"

She draws back from him, a slight smile tugging on her lips. He removes his arm so she can scoot up further on the couch and rest her head on a cushion next to his. She obviously wants to look at him while sharing her thoughts. Her eyes are big and shining. "First of all, you want to know everything about me—"

"Makes it easier to manipulate you," he interjects.

"And you remember everything about me," she continues, ignoring his comment.

"Lot's of storage up there." He taps at his temple.

"You didn't have a girlfriend since me—"

"I was married since you."

"—not counting migrant hookers."

"I think I was busy the day potential candidates were lining up on my doorstep," he says sarcastically.

His rationalizations do not make her waver for a second. Her whole face is beaming. "You always make sure I'm warm."

This is true. He hates the cold, and is big on covering her and the kids up with blankets when they have fallen asleep on the couch. When they go out in the fall or springtime, he has made a habit of taking an extra jacket because Cuddy frequently forgets and always feels chilly in the evening. "You're whiny when you have a snotty nose."

"When you come here and I'm not around, you always look for me. Even when John and Rachel are both in the living room, you ask them 'Where is your mother?' And unless I'm in the shower, you come and say hi. Because you want to see me."

"You're the only one with cleavage in the house. At least one it's appropriate to stare at. And I can add the shower to my search-zone, if you want."

She maintains her knowing smile, neither appalled nor distracted by his words. "No. You don't look at my breasts. You look at me." Her sparkling eyes search his face. "Trying to hide a smile."

House swallows hard and turns his head towards the ceiling. He has the odd sensation of having been caught. He was oblivious of her awareness and insight into his feelings, always determined to prevent others from knowing who or what he cares about. He ponders what he needs to change to better maintain his poker face in the future, when she picks up on his trail of thought.

"No, House, please don't stop." She looks troubled about having unsettled him. "I won't hold it against you."

This is what happened all throughout his childhood. Whenever he showed his feelings or shared his likes and dislikes, his dad used this knowledge to punish him. He could not afford letting anyone know when he was happy, because his happiness would either become crushed or perversely turned against him. So he eventually stopped giving anything about himself away. He suppressed his feelings and ultimately forgot how to feel them at all. Even now, it occasionally takes an entire session with Dr. Nolan to pinpoint what originally upset him in a specific situation. He frequently fails to notice his emotions in the moment they occur.

His vision is getting blurry, and he feels embarrassed about the tears springing to his eyes. This, too, she is aware of, and she drops her gaze from his face. She resumes her position from before, her head resting on his shoulder, and takes his hand.

He chews on the inside of his lip.

Her stomach grumbles.

Lying with her, he worries if too many parts of him are irreversibly broken, damaged, and screwed up, afraid that he will never be able to fix himself. For the millionth time he wonders why she puts up with him.

She waits until he has clamed down before she announces that she is hungry.

"Thanks for the heat," she says, and nuzzles her now warm nose against his shirt in the same way as before. "You want anything from the kitchen?" she asks, getting up.

"Nope," he replies, his eyes following her petite form as she walks across the room. "I'm good."

Author note:

I knoooow, so sappy. Again. But I suppose you guys don't mind. X-D

Have a nice Easter weekend!