Hi everyone!

Here's a new drabble - it's set at the end of 5.12 "Painless" (there's a few seconds in the final montage where you see Cuddy at her desk late at night, with her baby beside her). Now I hadn't seen the Baby Rachel Episodes in a while, and forgotten that House was frankly not supportive of Cuddy in 5.13, soooo I guess that makes this drabble a little AU-ish?

I'll let you read now - thank you for the reviews you left last time! I hope you will enjoy this one as well ;)

29. You might like this.

"Cure your patient yet?" Cuddy asked as House opened the door of her office.

"Yup. Abdominal epilepsy. Pain started in his testicles," he explained, one foot still out the door.

"Great," she said, stifling a yawn while somehow simultaneously looking at both her daughter and the paperwork she was working on. "Means I won't have to manage you during the next couple days. I could really use the break."

Much to her chagrin, House decided to actually walk into the room and plump down in one of the chairs facing her desk, dropping his backpack on the table – just for the sake of annoying her, no doubt. "Had an epiphany when I saw my plumber scratch his balls. A pipe burst above my bedroom the other night and this moron claimed it was due to negligence so I tried to – wow," he whistled as she dropped her pen and rubbed her face. "Little Gremlin here is really cutting into your beauty sleep."

"Her name is Rachel," she said listlessly. "And shut up."

He watched her try to resume working, but she couldn't stay focused long enough to make sense of whatever she was reading. She sighed and picked up Rachel instead, gently nestling her into the crook of her arm, and rocked her for a little while.

"I can't do this," she whispered eventually, caressing her chubby, rosy cheek with the back of her finger.

"Well, you technically haven't adopted her yet. You can still –"

"Shut up, she's my kid," she interrupted him, firmer this time. "Nothing will ever change that. Ever."

He let it go and just observed her. In the twenty years he'd known her, he had seen her beaten and knocked down too many times to count. He had seen the promise of a one hundred million dollars donation to her hospital vanish in front of her eyes, seen her recover from several failed IVFs, and the loss of a child not so long ago.

But the woman had always taken a couple of days to lick her wounds, and get back up, ready to face the world again.

He'd seen how hesitant she was when she picked up Rachel, fearing she'd drop her or maybe break her in two, and he thought of all the times he'd seen her pop dislocated shoulders back into place, or insert a spinal needle in between a patient's lumbar vertebrae, like she'd been doing it for a thousand years. It had been over a week, and she'd never looked more exhausted – hell, he even had time to see her eyes mist up with tears, before she got a grip on herself again.

"I'm two days behind on work," she spoke up then, her eyes still riveted to Rachel. "My nanny is sick, my house is a mess. I sleep four hours a night and I still don't have enough time to take care of everything."

"So, it's a challenge. You like challenges. You already liked them back in the day. Always trying to prove me wrong." They shared a tiny smile over the memory of their college days. "You might like this."

She contemplated the soft features of her daughter's face. "Yeah."

"Get some sleep. Get another nanny. Get –"

Her eyes popped open – though he thought it was kind of hard to tell, with that new haircut of hers – and she looked up at him.

"That's right. An interim dean. I just need a few days off."

"I meant a nanny for your spawn. I still need you to say yes to any crazy procedure I ask for." But he could tell she'd already made her decision, the wheels turning inside her head. "Whatever," he mumbled as he stood back up. "Just pick someone I can manipulate."

She called out his name before he could leave, and motioned to a pile of folders with her chin. "Drop these off at the nurses' station."

"Like I said, you want a man to take your crap, you have to marry him first."

"Why, are you proposing?" she said with a smirk. "Like I said, you also have to employ them."

He smirked back, took the files. "See you bright and early tomorrow!"

She gave a light-hearted chuckle. "No, you won't."