Wowwwwww, I've got reviews coming out of my ears! That's pretty sweet, in my opinion. Anyways, just wanting to respond to a few things in depth, but I'd like to say to everyone that I so appreciate that you've been reading and reviewing faithfully! When my inbox is filled with your thoughts, it brings tears of joy to my eyes. Okay, maybe I'm not quite that pathetic, but you get the picture.

Iscariot: I went back, re-read the chapter with your thoughts in mind, and I must admit that you're correct on all counts. A little too commonly worded, definitely. What can I say, emotions are hard to describe, but I want to sound anything but ordinary. I will keep your advice in mind for future chapters and stories, and I appreciate that you're being real with me about this. One question: am I entirely destroying the very essence of the characters, or is it just some of the dialogue that's throwing the story off? I gather that I go very out of character sometimes, and I'd really like to know if you think so too. Thanks for everything!
Reitashnehelena: I'm sorry, I've never heard of any of those shows that you say Jesse Spencer was on – they must be on WB. Haha, sorry, either that or they're soap operas. I don't think anything could ruin him for me, but you never know…
Queen of Blank: LOL, okay, let's send Jesse Spencer a letter and inform him of our arrangement. Coin toss to see who gets him first! I call heads. Also, my dad keeps asking me to drive him places, and I know one of these days I'm gonna have to say yes. I'm trying to learn as much as I can from my mom, but she's terrified to get in the car with me behind the wheel. (I can't be sure, but I don't think I'm quite that bad.) Oyyy, the search for the ultimate driving teacher never ends!
Amber Chase: (Sigh) No more chapters for a while? But you're gonna need something to do once you're back in classes! LOL, just kidding, be a better student than I am and actually pay attention during class! I will be good and wait patiently. You go back to school EARLY! I feel bad for you; I don't go until the…29th? I think…
Mollisk: You know, I don't understand myself. I've never really liked any of the women on the show for a romance with his character, and yet I can manage to let myself get bulldozed into writing something for House and Cameron because people like it. Something to remember for future stories, but I'm glad I could make you enjoy it for a second! I've got to finish this one up the way I started it, but hopefully next time I won't be swayed like that.
Thermy: Yay, you're back! Haha, glad you enjoyed the whole dingo-hunting, horse-back riding, marshmallow-roasting thing! Haha, I really have no idea what's fun to do in the fair continent of Australia, but I'm sure it's much more exciting than what America has to offer. I will gladly accept medical bills. :P Anyways, it's okay to think Hugh Laurie is hot; I'm 16 and find the man irresistible.

Wow, okay, I turned into a real chatterbox this time around, when I really should be writing something. I think I've got the rest of the chapters figured out. I'm going to wait quite some time to post this (at least two days, I think – gasp!) because I want to make sure it's quality work and not just timely. Anyways, as always, thank-you for reading. Chapter 22…

House woke up three minutes before his alarm clock had to do the job for him. He fumbled through his morning routine, awake but nonetheless groggy. He started some coffee and began to flip through the morning paper.

Julia woke up a half an hour later, shuffling into the kitchen noisily. "Morning," she said as she began to load sugar and milk into a mug. House smiled to himself as he watched her try to fit a few drops of coffee into the already-full cup. I'll bet she complains it's cold now, he thought.

She sipped the mixture and sighed contentedly as she sat down at the table with him. "So," she said brightly. "What are you going to do today? You have to work?"

"Surprisingly, the good Dr. Cuddy has given me a few days off, so no, I don't have to work," House informed her. "Not to mention, it's Saturday."

"Good!" she said, clapping her hands. "That means we can clean your apartment!"

He blinked. "Excuse me?"

"It's not gonna be that hard, I promise," she told him. "A little dusting, some dish-washing, laundry, closet-cleaning and organizing – nothing fancy. You have a vacuum somewhere, right?"

"I just remembered," House said nervously. "I have to…ummm…I have to…Talk with Wilson!"

Julia rolled her eyes. "Is that so?"

"Yeah," he said. "We're…ummm…making up."

She stared at him for a moment, thinking that was the most pathetic lie she'd ever heard. Who goes around scheduling times to make up with someone? "I see," she said slowly. "See that you do. Don't screw it up, okay?"

"I never screw up," House told her, downing the rest of his coffee. "But don't let that stop you from cleaning. If it brings you joy, I say go for it! Please, by all means, disinfect the place silly! Tidy up, sanitize, unclutter – however you want to say it."

"I think this is what we call a 'Clean Sweep,'" Julia said, grinning as she referenced the show from TLC that was famous for creating attractive, functional spaces that people could use and enjoy from virtual storage warehouses. "Alright, if you insist. But nothing's getting you out of grocery shopping."

House rolled his eyes as he kissed the top of her head. It was the weirdest thing he'd ever done, but it seemed right for the moment. "See you later," he said. "Take it easy, and I'm only a phone call away if you start to feel sick."

Julia sighed. "It's gonna happen at some point, Dad. Sooner or later, we've got to get used to it."

"Sorry," he said. "It might not be as hard for you to accept, but I'm still just a little apprehensive about the fact that my daughter's going to die someday. I don't think I can get used to it."

She smiled sympathetically. "I'll stick around as long as I can," she promised, wondering if her words were empty.

"Thanks," House said as he walked out the door. "Bye, Julia."

Julia looked around at the kitchen, then into the dining room and living room area. She'd already seen the state of disarray in the spare room she was using and the hall bathroom, and wasn't at all eager to enter House's forbidden territory. She sighed; it was going to be a long day.

Her eyes caught the telephone, and she grinned. No reason why I shouldn't have a little fun, she thought as she picked it up.

House flipped out his cell phone and dialed Wilson's number as he walked down to his car. "James Wilson speaking," he answered, sounding dry and professional.

"Hey, moron, it's me," House said.

Wilson hesitated, and House could picture the expression on his face. "Well, this is an improvement," he remarked dryly. "How may I help you, Dr. House?"

"Julia's forcing me to have a civil conversation with you," he lied. "How fast can you get away from Julie and the decorating nightmare?"

"It's not a nightmare; I'm actually kind of having fun."

"Answer the question."

"Noon."

"Good. Meet me then at McDonald's. We're gonna resolve this thing."

"Fantastic," Wilson said. "I'm waiting breathlessly." House thought he detected a hint of sarcasm in his voice as he hung up.

Perfect, he thought as he dialed Cameron. "Hey, lady," he said.

"Dr. House," she said, sounding surprised. "How are you?"

"Doesn't matter," he replied, thinking that was the most boring question he'd ever heard. "Look, about last night –"

"Yes, we need to talk about that," Cameron began.

"No, we don't," House told her. "You're not gonna believe this, but today I'm only feeling slightly regretful that I allowed myself to get caught up in a situation like that. Maybe we'll only go back one space instead of two. What do you say?"

"What does that mean?" she asked. "I hate it when you talk in code like that."

"It means we're not going back to the way things were, but they're not staying the way they are right now either," he said impatiently. "You're wasting my cell phone minutes. I'll talk to you later." For the umpteenth time, he felt like a real jerk, but hell, he was merely saving Cameron from the same feeling, which she would surely get if he got monster overage charges on his next bill and it was all her fault.

Bad things come in threes, he thought as he drove to the nearest grocery store, deciding he might as well get the experience over with. I've called Wilson and Cameron. Who else's day do I need to ruin? He snapped his fingers as an idea occurred to him. Chase! Of course! He dialed Chase's number and held the phone to his ear, mindful of the police officer cruising down the other side of the road as he did so.

"Robert Chase speaking," he answered.

"Hey, loser," House said, wondering why he was calling people names today. Normally, a few sarcastic comments were enough to tide him over. "I need to discuss something with you."

"Well, I'm kind of busy right now," he told him. "It's Saturday, remember? Some of us have a social life. We hang out with other people and have fun with them. You should try it sometime."

"Feeling bold because I let you kiss my daughter, Chase?" House asked. "That's exactly what we need to talk about. And who is this 'other people' you plan on 'hanging out and having fun with,' huh? Bet I could tell you."

He heard Chase swallow. "You didn't know? I thought…"

"Thought what?"

"Julia asked me to come by your apartment," he confessed. "She said she needed help with something."

"Oh," House said. "That. She's got it into her head that my apartment needs cleaning. The girl's crazy, I tell you, but hell, if it means I don't have to bother with it, I'm okay. Don't let her throw any of my knickknacks away, understand?"

"Ummm…" Chase stammered. House could tell he was having second thoughts about stopping by.

"I can see that the situation is dire already," House interrupted. "You've said enough. Where are you right now?"

"About thirty seconds from your parking garage."

"Stop there and wait. If you go in, I'll pop every last tire on your car. I'll be there in three minutes." He hung up, tossed the phone onto the passenger seat, and made a sloppy u-turn as he headed back to his apartment.

Chase was waiting when he got there. He was leaning nervously against his car, seeming as out of place as a fish out of water. "House, what's this all about?" he asked, eyeing his cane nervously as he came towards him.

They ended up nose to nose, glaring at each other, leaving Chase with no choice but to fight back should House decide to get violent. There was no escape path.

"Listen," he growled. "You might think this is all fun and games, but if you break my little girl's heart, I will hunt you down like a dog. I will rip your heart out with my bare hands and throw it on the floor and stomp on it until you die. I will hang your bloodied entrails on my balcony so that all young men like you know not to make the same mistakes that you did. What I am telling you, in simple words for your simple mind, is this: Do not make her cry. Do not make her angry. Do not make her confused. Do not make her bitter. You will regret it. Understand?"

Chase nodded fervently. "I have no intention of doing any of those things, Mr. House," he said, amazed at how terrified he was of the man. He'd gone from slightly scary employer to terrifying father of the girl he was seeing just like that. He was vaguely reminded of Robert De Niro in Meet The Parents, although he considered De Niro significantly less frightening.

"If you are feeling the least bit doubtful about putting yourself in harm's way like this, I will allow you to call Julia now and tell her that you can't make it," House told him. "Then I will proceed to beat you within an inch of your life. But I assure you, it will be healthier for you in the long run to accept this offer now rather than lie to me and tell me that you are willing to run the risk of breaking Julia's heart."

"I understand," Chase said, scarcely able to breath. "Thanks for the offer, but I don't feel I need to take it. Really, House, I'm not gonna break her heart. I give you my solemn promise."

"I mean it, Robert Chase," House fumed. "If I find out that Julia is less than ecstatic to know you, you will spend the rest of your life, which will only last about five minutes, in fear of me. Have I scared you?"

Chase nodded.

"Good. Now you two have fun." House got back into his car and drove off to Safeway.

After five minutes Chase had been brave enough to go up and knock on Julia's door. She, having no idea what the poor man had just been through, welcomed him in immediately. She first offered him the only decent food she could find in the pantry, which was a half-bag of potato chips and some unopened French onion dip. He politely declined, and she put him to work checking expiration dates on everything in the refrigerator while she started scrubbing the floor. "Aren't you glad you stopped by?" she asked, grinning.

"Oh yeah," he said, wrinkling his nose at some cheese that was beginning to turn an remarkable shade of blue. "This is great fun."

"Do I hear sarcasm, Rob?" Julia asked.

"No way," he replied, tossing the cheese into the garbage can. "Me? Sarcastic? Never." He began to inspect some stalks of celery. "How does he live like this? It's unhealthy."

Julia shrugged. "I don't know. You wouldn't have thought someone so picky would let the place go like this."

"He's lucky you came along," Chase told her as he decided the celery would be good for another day or two. "He needs a keeper."

"He needs to learn to be self-sufficient," Julia corrected him, crawling towards the cabinet under the sink to get some more soap for her mop bucket. "Although it could be worse…" She screamed suddenly and launched herself backwards, crashing into the leg of the table.

"What's wrong?" Chase asked, alarmed. He jumped away from the fridge, sidled up next to her, and gave her a perplexed look. She pointed at the cabinet. "Oh my God…" he said. Baby mice were scurrying around inside of it, trying to avoid the light.

"I can do bugs, and I can do reptiles. But I absolutely abhor rodents," she said, feeling faint.

Chase began to laugh. "Figures, the one parasitic creature he'd have in his kitchen would be the one you hate. Poor Julia," he said, patting her back as he moved to shut the door. "Give him a call and tell him to pick up some mouse traps while he's out. I have a feeling they're breeding, though, from the looks of things. You may want to call an exterminator."

Julia nodded slowly, eyeing the cabinet as if it might suddenly explode and out would come the mother of all mice, looking dirty and menacing as hell. "Okay," she said. "Ummm, how about if we give the kitchen a break and move onto the bathroom?"

House had all of his groceries piled in the backseat of his car, perilously close to obstructing the view of his rearview mirror. He pulled into the McDonald's parking lot, not particularly desiring anything to eat at the moment. He'd seen quite enough of food for the day. House parked and shuffled into the greasy atmosphere of the restaurant frequented by masses of ignorant people that had no idea what kinds of crap went into those French fries. He looked around for Wilson and saw him in a table by the door to the playground. He sighed, hoping he wouldn't scare any of the little children.

"Let's make this fast," Wilson said. "I promised Julie I'd pick her up some things at the Safeway before I came home."

"I get the picture," House said irritably. "You're happily married now. Whoopee. Kindly be sensitive to those of us that haven't quite reached that level."

"You're the one who asked me to come," Wilson pointed out. "If you're going to act like everything's my fault, I have better things to do. So get on with it."

"Okay, okay, okay. You're so damn pushy," House said, trying to buy himself time. Mostly, he'd just wanted to have his friend back and forget anything had ever happened, but Wilson wasn't playing along. He had to act like he had something meaningful to say, and House knew he wasn't very good at that. "Okay, ummm…maybe I let my anger get the best of me that day. Maybe I shouldn't have hit you as hard as I did, or yelled as loud as I did, or said some of the things I did. You were wrong to do it, Jimmy, but maybe I wasn't right either."

"You can say that again," Wilson scoffed.

House glared at him. "You know, I don't do this very often. Perhaps it wouldn't kill you to be a little more discreet in your amusement." Wilson become appropriately somber. "Anyway, I'm…sorry, I guess. Specifically, for splitting your lip and…that's it."

"Apology accepted," he said, feeling like he could breath again. "And in case you've had a memory lapse and can't remember, I'm sorry too."

"It's cool," House said. Wilson eyed him warily. "I picked it up from Julia. She says weird things like that all the time. And, contrary to your consensus, she doesn't think I'm a sweet dad. What's up with that?"

"She doesn't know it, House, but you're epitome of sweet," Wilson said, hiding a smile. "If you were my dad –"

"And thank God I'm not," House interrupted. See, it could always be worse, he told himself. "If I was…oh, boy. I'm not sure I want to go down this line of conversation."

"Good choice," Wilson said. "Say, where have you been for the past few days? I haven't seen you at the hospital."

"Cuddy gave me a few days off," House informed him. "She said she thought I needed it. She said she had been worried for a minute that I might give her the same treatment I gave you…care to explain?"

Wilson rolled his eyes. "I said I was sorry!" he said. "What more do you want?"

"You're right," House said. "I'm…not going to say that word that begins with an 'S,' ends with a 'Y,' and has 'O-R-R' in between. I loathe that word. I detest it. Can't we just talk about something that won't provoke unwarranted apologies?"

"That might take a while," Wilson said. "So…we're, ummm, we're cool, right?"

"We're pretty sweet," House said.

"Julia's going to get so mad at you if she realizes you're trying to pick up her lingo," Wilson said, squirming uncomfortably in the hard, sticky seat. "Look, don't get me wrong, I'd love to hang out with you, but this is not the ideal place for it and I'm running short on time. Maybe tomorrow, while Julie goes to church and gives our family a good name."

"Sounds like a plan," House agreed, and they both got up to go outside. When House got to his car, he noticed a strange pink substance coming out of the crack of the trunk. "Wilson," he said. "What is that?"

"I don't know," he replied, running a finger through it. "Sticky. Smells like fruit." He reluctantly licked his finger. "Tastes like…strawberry ice cream?"

House donned a sheepish smile. "Oops."

Wilson popped the trunk and stared in amazement at the items in the car. "House, you never cease to amaze me," he told him, stunned. "You went grocery shopping before meeting me, entirely forgetting that cold things melt and spoil in the heat?"

"What can I say? I haven't been to a grocery store in a long time," House said defensively. "So I take it we won't be having my soon-to-be famous homemade smoothies tonight for dessert?"

Keep it together, Wilson. "Not with this stuff, you won't," he said, taking the melted ice cream carton to a nearby trash can. "Are there any other perishables that might have already bitten the dust while you were sitting in the McDonald's picking your nose?"

House considered the question. "Vanilla ice cream, chocolate ice cream, frozen yogurt, regular yogurt, neopolitan ice cream in case we ran out of the rest, eggs, Pillsbury cinnamon buns, and milk."

"Christ, House, you're a walking dairy disaster!" Wilson exclaimed as he picked through the bags. "It's over ninety degrees out here! You'll be lucky if anything's okay at this point! Let's see…the eggs are alright…the milk is almost boiling…the cinnamon buns exploded all over your back window…ugh. You might want to have this carpet professionally cleaned."

House sighed. "This homemaking stuff is hard work," he commented. "Care to walk me through this whole shopping thing? You said you had to go by the Safeway anyway."

Wilson mentally crossed himself, feeling the situation warranted a little extra security. "I don't know if I'm ready for this," he said. "I'll meet you there in ten minutes."

So I woke up this morning and discovered I have a huge bruise on my arm from sitting in the same position in front of the computer all day, typing and clicking the mouse and staring at the screen. I seriously need a hobby, like collecting rocks or…something. I need to get some fresh air, catch a few rays while the sun's still shining for the summer, be more social. (Shiver) Scary thought. But anyways, I hope that was to your liking. Even if you loathed and detested it, I'd like to hear it in a review rather than have to figure it out for myself from the silence! Thanks for reading!