Title: Breakfast with an Orang Utan
Author: Magdala
Rating: M for language and some sexual content HET
Summary: Stacy's return from her point of view.
Disclaimer: All characters are fully owned by the producers of House MD
BREAKFAST WITH AN ORANG UTAN - part one
NOTE: This is my first fanfic so I would appreciate feedback. I have not yet seen Stacy but sharing the common dislike of her character wondered about her impact on House and indeed his upon her. I am aware that Orang Utan can also be spelt as one word. I have chosen to present the name of this wonderful creature as they do in most zoos or primate care facilities.
It is discouraging how many people are shocked by honesty and how few by deceit. Noel Coward
"Why the hell couldn't you have been fashionably late, Stace?" asked James Wilson on that first day back in Princeton. His arm was round me, we were in his office and he was holding me as I dried my eyes with tissues from a box he held in his free hand. It wasn't the first time. I didn't need comforting before the infarction then afterwards everything had changed, first Greg shut me out and then he pushed me out. Jim had held me as I cried five years ago on the day I left the man I loved.
"Five minutes later and he would have started the lecture. Never mind you can't undo it now." he said, giving me a squeeze.
"You shouldn't have to do this"
"It's division of labor, Stacy. Greg makes women cry and I dry their tears."
"Then why do your wives leave you? You're such a catch"
"I guess I fail to notice the tears when I go home. I'm probably as rough on women as Greg in my own way."
My tears had stopped it was clean up time I took another tissue and started dabbing.
"I wouldn't have recognised him if you hadn't warned me."
"Sometimes I just catch a glimpse of him as he was before but no more than that. Sometimes there is a momentary smile or a familiar saying. But he doesn't go there, Stacy."
James was right Greg had changed. It was a shock as I watched him coming down the corridor towards reception. Crumpled and leaning heavily on his cane he could have passed as homeless. He looked fragile, tired as though he was carrying more than the burden of five years, it was more than pain. He was limping terribly but moving so fast the dark-haired doctor almost had to run to keep up with him. He snapped at her and she looked back as him with adoration. He used to hate that look. "Get me away from these people" he'd signal from across the room.
Responding to the memory. I heard myself say his name before I was ready.
"Greg."
He saw me, stopped and his body stiffened, his eyes shut tight as though he'd been hit by an unseen blow and he seemed to slump. When his eyes opened and again fixed on me they had grown cold as the arctic sea. It shouldn't have been like that. He looked unsteady staggered momentarily as he repositioned his weight onto his good leg.
"So what did you two talk about?"
"I know I told him about Mark"
Wilson took his arms away from me and walked round behind his desk. The warmth had left him.
"'Guess what, Greg. I'm married.' That what you said? "
"I don't remember."
"Oh God Stacy. Of course you remember"
That was the trouble I could remember. Every single damned word especially the words "I'm not sure I want him to live." Greg had tried to turn away but I stopped him. I think I touched him. Oh God he felt the same and oh God he smelt the same.
"Jim. He was wearing aftershave."
"Was there a woman with him young, slender, attractive?"
"Yes."
"That's Allison Cameron the immunologist he works with."
"You're trying to hurt me."
"You are married now. Didn't it occur to you that he might have moved on too?"
"Jim you're no good at hurting people. You don't have Greg's talent for it."
"Or yours for that matter." He said icily.
"Jim, he smells the same as he did before the infarction."
"The olfactory sensation is the most effective memory trigger there is."
"He was wearing the same type of aftershave as I gave him in Singapore"
Singapore oh God Singapore. How could I have forgotten that? How could I have shut that out?
"He's never mentioned Singapore."
Jim had managed to hurt me and when I'm hurt I retaliate. And this time I had ammunition something that Wilson had never known.
"Maybe Greg didn't want you to know about Singapore." I said preparing to leave. "Well it's too long a story to tell you now. I have to get back to Mark." I opened the door of the office.
"But I'm surprised he didn't tell you about how we had breakfast with an Orang Utan."
"Orang Utan?"
It was a relief to close the door on Wilson's questioning look before again succumbing to tears as the events in Singapore came flooding back.
I had blocked Singapore from my mind completely. Now I had remembered I had another problem. My husband, Mark.
Now, like Greg, I wasn't absolutely sure that I wanted Mark to live.
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I'll go through life either first class or third, but never in second. Noel CowardThe heat of Singapore with its spiced air enfolded me in the few steps from the exit door of Changi Airport to the airconditioned limosine. The uniformed chauffeur handed me a sealed envelope. I opened it as the car moved forward.
"Darling," Greg had written. "I am delighted you are here. Everything is organised for the next three days. I will meet you in the Long Bar at Raffles. I love you beyond all, Greg" Spontaneously, I smiled and kissed the note.
"Where are we going?" I asked the chauffeur.
"Raffles Hotel, ma'am." He replied.
"Could we stop on the way?" The suit I was wearing had been fine for the conference I had been attending in Sydney Australia but would smother me in Singapore. I needed to buy something light to wear quickly.
"Doctor House said I was to bring you directly from the airport. No stopping. My apologies, ma'am."
"Did he now." Typical.
"Sorry, ma'am."
It wasn't worth pursuing. If I demanded to stop if I told him to drop me at the nearest dress shop and I would complete the journey by cab it was the driver who would suffer. Either he would get a lecture from Greg or receive more serious repercussions from his employers. I could see from the tightening of his shoulders the Singaporean was worried.
"It's alright. I won't force you to stop," I said and he visibly relaxed. "Don't let Dr House frighten you."
"Doctor House is a very important man." Obviously Greg's conference here had really gone well. Greg hadn't said anything about it but Jim Wilson had sent me a couple of emails in Sydney with articles from the Straits Times lauding the brilliant American Nephrologist and diagnostician Gregory House. Apparently Greg hadn't told Jim that we were meeting up in Singapore before going onto London and home. I smiled to myself. It was good to have something that Wilson didn't know about. Sometimes that friendship seemed as stifling as the heat in Singapore.
How could I have forgotten my first sight of Greg in the Long Bar? He was wearing a light tropical weight suit with a crisp white shirt and the silk tie I had given him hopefully before he left the States. I didn't imagine he would ever wear it. He looked so right in the earthy splendour of this most famous of all colonial bars. Seeing me he stood a smile lighting up his face. I didn't notice anything or anyone as I went to meet him. In the time he had been here the sun had highlighted his hair and his skin had turned to honey. He had never appeared so handsome. He looked golden.
"Hello, you." he said and then his arms encircled me and we kissed. He guided me into the big cushioned rattan chair beside his and for the first time I noticed the two untouched pinkish red drinks on the table in front of him.
"It's not?"
"It is. You have to have a Singapore Sling in the bar where it was invented," he said handing me mine. Then we raised our glasses and clinked them. Then he looked at me very seriously "I love you, Stacy"
"And I love you" we drank. The Singapore Sling was not as wonderful as I had expected. Greg laughed.
"Leave it. You don't have to bow to every tradition"
"You are wearing a tie."
"That is because I choose to. I happen to care a lot for the person who gave it to me. Want to go up to the room?"
"Yep. I can't wait to get out of these clothes."
"I can't wait for you to get out of them either."
"But our drinks"
"Darling, couples have left unfinished Singapore Slings in this bar since 1913"
We stood and he took my hand. Then he held me with his extraordinary blue eyes.
"I hope you enjoy the honeymoon I've planned."
"But Greg we're not married."
"We don't have to do everything in the right order. We aren't like other people Stacy."
He placed his hand in the small of my back and guided me out of the Long Bar. I'd hardly sipped the Singapore Sling but I felt giddy and intoxicated just being so close to Greg. But of course that's how you should feel on your honeymoon.
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"Success took me to her bosom like a maternal boa constrictor." Noel Coward
It wasn't just a room, it was a suite. Noel Coward had stayed in that suite and it was named after him. I was astounded by it's fourteen foot high ceilings and amazing antiques and small items that had belonged the amazing British writer, composer, actor and wit. There was even a piano, which I assumed had belonged to Coward but discovered later the hotel had put in at Greg's request.
I unpacked all my private stuff and put it away and the valet was unpacking and hanging my clothes in the dressing room wardrobe when I noticed there were a lot more clothes than I had brought with me.
Greg explained "I put a couple of your favourites in my luggage and had them copied in different colours and weights here. I think customs thought I was a cross dresser"
"You'd make someone a good wife"
"It was the 'good wife' of one of the doctors I'd been corresponding with here who made the suggestion and organised the tailors."
"That suit. The one you are wearing now?"
"Tailor down in Orchard Road. You'd better like it. I've got six more."
"I love it."
There was nothing mean about Greg but I wasn't used to him splashing money about quite like this. He always knew what I was thinking. And answered my un-asked question.
"Everything yours and mine cost less than my Armani, and that thing you are wearing, I got a good deal on the suite and that is the last time we will mention money on this honeymoon. Understood?"
"Understood."
Picking up my toiletries and duty free bag I headed for the bathroom.
We were in the spa when Greg started reaching into my duty free bag I was massaging him with soles of my feet. I started with his right leg kneading with my toes following the lines of his well-defined muscles. God I loved his legs. They were so long and strong. An athletes legs. Just as he was expecting more I transferred my feet to his left leg.
"Chivas. Nice, thanks" he said referring to the duty free scotch.
"You're not having that on your own."
"And a boomerang"
"That's not for you. You know I don't trust you with sharp objects, That's for Jim"
'Wilson throws like a girl."
Greg flicked the boomerang to one side.
"I thought they were supposed to come back?"
"Guess you must have thrown it like a girl"
Then he came to a smallish gift wrapped box he looked at me his head on one side "For me?"
I nodded wishing I had got him something more interesting than aftershave.
My feet reached the top of his left leg and gently moved between his legs. Then suddenly the jet lag that had not hit me in Sydney combined with the jet lag I had accumulated on the flight to Singapore. I slipped down in the spa a little and Greg let out a yelp.
"Careful"
"Sorry"
"It's okay. I moved in time" Greg pulled me out of the spa, wrapped me in a huge fluffy white bath towel and carried me to the bedroom.
God how I loved him. How was it that this perfect, beautiful and clever man was mine and loved me as much as I loved him?
"This is the biggest bed I have ever seen in my life" I mumbled as he dried me off and covered me with the softest coolest linen I had ever felt in my life. His lips touched my shoulder and I fell asleep.