Chapter 5
Pairings: I haven't decided yet.
A/N: I'm too impatient to finish a chapter, then send it off for beta-ing, then wait for them to send it back with problems, then me fixing it…so all mistakes are mine. Except the really bad ones, they're my friend's…
I also should have said this before, but thanks to Daphne Queen for coming up with my title.
For those who don't know…Crow's feet: A wrinkle at the outer corner of your eyes.
An uneventful 20 minutes passed in almost complete silence.
"Can we do something?" Cameron burst out suddenly. The three people around her looked up. Cuddy had been twisting her hair around her finger; House had been staring at the ceiling with a dangerously bored expression on his face; and Wilson looked like he had been doing some serious thinking.
"Ya," House encouraged her. "Please. Think of something."
"Must you always treat your staff like dirt, House?" Cuddy barked.
"No. Sometimes like earth, sometimes like soil. Not always dirt," he said, with a smile that didn't quite reach his eyes. Today, Wilson noticed this feature particularly.
"You know, House, some people get crow's feet when they age. You won't have that problem, will you?" he said moodily.
"And what's that supposed to mean?" House said, firing up immediately.
"They call them 'laugh lines', you know," Wilson smirked.
"I'm trying to conjure up a picture of a laughing House," Cuddy said, also smirking annoyingly. "It's not working."
House looked…almost hurt, Cameron thought, but she waved away the feeling. House had no emotions, therefore technically could not get hurt.
"I can laugh," he said sulkily.
"Yeah?" Now Wilson was looking very amused. "Show us."
"I don't laugh on command," House said irately.
"Admit it, House," Cuddy said, now laughing herself. "You don't laugh at all."
Scowling heavily, House suddenly produced a high pitched giggle.
"Happy now?" he said grudgingly. He received no answer, though, as the others were all falling about, clutching their stomachs.
House sighed deeply, and leaned against the wall behind him, waiting for his colleagues to catch their breath.
"Done yet?" he asked irritably, when they calmed down, and sat up. Small chuckles escaped the lips of each of them from time to time. They had almost forgotten what a horrible situation they were in.
"I need to remember that," Cuddy said. "I don't think I'll forget it in a hurry."
"Everyone at work's gonna hear about this!" Wilson chuckled.
"No!" House pleaded. "Not Chase! Please, not Chase!"
They all laughed. At House's expense. It was the best time to laugh.
"How long's it been?" Wilson asked after a moment.
"Since…" Cameron prompted.
"Since we got stuck in here," he said, completing her sentence.
Cameron checked her watch in the candle light.
"No!" she moaned. "It's stopped working!"
Wilson pulled up his sleeve to check his watch. He sighed wearily.
"It's only 11 o'clock."
They all concurrently slumped down.
"What time does this place open?" Cameron asked.
"Around 6," Cuddy said dolefully. Trust Cuddy to know. Wilson noticed this too.
"What time does it close tomorrow?" he asked off-handedly.
"6," she said absent-mindedly.
"How about Saturday?" Cameron had realised what Wilson was doing, and joined in.
"Earlier on weekends, about 5, I think," Cuddy replied. She was staring at the floor, and looked like she was thinking about something. "4 pm on Sunday. They like to get home early, I suppose."
Cameron and Wilson playfully continued their game, until Cuddy realised what they were up to, and slapped them both lightly on the arm.
"Do you mind not exploiting me in my vulnerable state?" she said, eyes narrowed.
House cleared his throat.
"I can think of a much better state to exploit– Ow!"
Cuddy had given him a hard smack on the back of his head.
"Why do I feel like I'm being abused?" House complained glumly.
"No idea," Cuddy said. "Because you're not. We're making sure you respect us a little in future."
Cuddy thought for a moment.
"When I say us, I mean me," she said. The disbelieving looks she received from Cameron and Wilson were squashed by,
"Next week, you two have double clinic hours," she said evilly. House, for once, actually looked sympathetic. He couldn't think of a worse punishment.
"Don't be too harsh, Cuddy," he said sorrowfully.
"You," she said, through gritted teeth, "can have triple."
House, for once, was speechless, while the others looked on gleefully.
"Why am I getting so heavily punished?" he asked after a moment.
"Because you owe me a hundred million dollars worth of clinic hours," she said stiffly. "You might as well start now."
A/N: Ok, I'm suffering very much from writer's block, due to the recent two shows of House, that have made me fully realise how much better it is than my pointless story. I'll continue, though, it's fun.
And the two shows – well, they're just 16 and 17 of season 1. I hate not knowing what's happening.