A/N: Thank you to pucklove.
This contains spoilers for Hunting and clearly House nor the lyrics are mine. I lack all talent for creations that fantastic.
The Decontamination
I knew it would hurt you but not like this
We all make a mess from time to time, dear
But it'll take me a lifetime to get this cleared
Somebody muttered something under their breath
But I let on like I was a little deaf
Nobody's perfect, that's what I say
No one has hurt me so much you say
I'm sorry
Cameron had been padding around her apartment in bare feet moving from room to room trying to displace her restless energy ever since she had gotten in from work. Despite the side effects of her HIV cocktail she had a lot of built up nervous energy. Her mind felt cluttered with fears and emotions as if someone had taken her mental filing cabinet and dumped it on the floor. Frustrated, she stalked into her bedroom and changed into her shorts, tank top and tied her trainers painfully tight before harshly pulling her hair back and tying it into a strict, tight ponytail. She headed back into her living room and stood in front of her cd player and collection of cds. She knew exactly what it was she was looking for to help resort her emotions.
Everyone had a certain song or certain artist in which they identified with most. Her sister for example found comfort in Snow Patrol and particularly their song Chocolate which she also related to.
What have I done it's too late for that
What have I become truth is nothing yet
A simple mistake starts the hardest time
I promise I'll do anything you ask...this time
For Cameron however her artist was the melancholy tones of Fiona Apple. She had always been a fan of her music but over the past year she had become to identify with her songs more and more. There always seemed to be a song that pinpointed a certain period in her life. She placed her Fiona Apple cds on random and turned off the lights. Her apartment was enveloped in darkness except for the beautifully haunting mix of the moonlight and street lamps that bled through the window as the music started.
I was staring at the sky, just looking for a star
To pray on, or wish on, or something like that
I was having a sweet fix of a daydream of a boy
Whose reality I knew, was a hopeless to be had
But then the dove of hope began its downward slope
And I believed for a moment that my chances
Were approaching to be grabbed
But as it came down near, so did a weary tear
I thought it was a bird, but it was just a paper bag
Hunger hurts, and I want him so bad, oh it kills
'Cause I know I'm a mess he don't wanna clean up
I got to fold 'cause these hands are too shaky to hold
Hunger hurts, but starving works, when it costs too much to love
Cameron turned and began her nightly run on her treadmill. She began to remember what she'd never been able to forget.
I tell you how I feel
But you don't care
I say tell me the truth
But you don't dare
"Everybody likes you."
"Do you? I have to know."
"No."
You say love is a hell
You cannot bear
And I say gimme mine
Back and then go there
For all I care
"Maybe I should just quit?"
"Maybe you should."
Cameron pounded harder and harder on her treadmill as the song progressed. As she remembered quite possibly the most hurtful thing he had ever said to her.
I have never been
So insulted in all my life
I could swallow the seas
To wash down all this pride
"You live under the delusion that you can fix everything that isn't perfect. That's why you married a man who was dying of cancer. You don't love, you need. And now that your husband is dead, you're looking for your new charity case."
"Fuck you." She whispered thickly. He didn't know her. He claimed he did, he claimed that he could label her but he didn't know her at all. She turned up the speed of the treadmill, she wanted to sweat out her emotions and to ache with a painful burning. To burn all her memories, all her emotions until they were nothing.
I was staring out the window
The whole time he was talking to me
It was a filthy pane of glass
I couldn't get a clear view
As he went on and on
It wasn't the outside world I could see
Just the filthy pane that I was looking through
So I had to break the window
It just had to be
Better that I break the window
Than him or her or me
"I thought you were too screwed up to love anyone. I was wrong. You just couldn't love me."
I was never focused on just one thing
My eyes got fixed when my mind got soft
It may looked like I'm concentrated on a very clear view
But I'm as good as asleep
I bet you didn't know
It takes a lot of it away if you do
"It's good. I'm happy for you."
She had to let him off the hook, she had to do the decent thing and claim she was happy for him because that's how she was brought up. Though, on the inside she wanted to scream at him. She wanted to hate him and she tried. But she just couldn't hate him the way he wanted her to. Despite the things he had done and said to her. She still couldn't hate. And she hated herself for that.
I'm gonna make a mistake
I'm gonna do it on purpose
I'm gonna waste my time
"You should get changed, there's this new place on campus that." Cameron pushes him up against the wall and kisses him. Chase looks very confused. "Are you high?"
"Uh huh." She strips off Chase's jacket.
"I thought the lab disposed of the drugs."
"Not all of it." They start stripping each other.
"Uhh, slow down... your pupils are dilated!
"Come on Chase, don't turn into a good guy on me now."
'Cause I'm full as a tick
And I'm scratching at the surface
And what I find is mine
And when the day is done, and I look back
And the fact is I had fun, fumbling around
All the advice I shunned, and I ran
Where they told me not to run
"It's a big mistake."
"Yeah, why would you want to be in a relationship with someone that's so obviously only going to lead to pain?"
She smiled bitterly to herself as pain began to surge through her legs and up her body. Mistakes. They seemed to be the only consistent thing in her life. House, Chase, listening to a patient. Her biggest mistake though was never making the one mistake that would have made her happy. Joe.
She turned up the speed of the treadmill even more as her chest began to burn in protest. She didn't stop.
One man, he disappoint me
He give me the gouge and he take my glee
Now every other man I see
Remind me of the one man who disappoint me
"I was twenty-one and I watched my husband die."
Next one up, a contemptible snob
He live to put things in their place
He did a commendable job
He put himself so low
He can hardly even look me in the face
"I'm twice your age, I'm not great looking, I'm not charming, I'm not even nice. What I am is what you need. I'm damaged."
O, he made my blood just burn
I flipped so far, I thought that I would not return
Her body is aching, burning but not as much as her heart not as much as the hot tears that stream down her face. She didn't chastise herself for crying. She wanted to bleed herself of all the memories, of all the emotions. She needed to purify herself.
I've been a bad bad girl
I've been careless
With a delicate man
And it's a sad sad world
When a girl will break a boy
Just because she can
"There are only two ways I can deal with things. One is in my control and that's to leave. Goodbye House."
Let me know the way
Before there's hell to pay
Give me room to lay
The law and let me go
I've got to make a play
To make my lover stay
So what would an angel say
The devil wants to know
"I'm over you. I've jumped on the bandwagon. I hate you, ok?"
But he had never believed it.
"Great. Let's treat her."
He had mocked her. He always mocked her.
What I need
Is a good defense
'Cause I'm feelin'
Like a criminal
And I need
To be redeemed
To the one
I've sinned against
Because he's all
I ever knew of love
Cameron felt dirty. As dirty as the song that was playing. She stopped and began to strip herself of her clothes as she made her way to the bathroom. Her muscles were burning and her breath was coming out in short painful stabs. The combination of moonlight and street lamps caste an eerie glow over her bare sweat soaked skin. She looked at herself briefly in the bathroom mirror as she roughly tore her hair out of its ponytail letting it fall in a solid mass around her shoulders.
She walked over to the shower and stepped in standing directly under the shower head as she turned it on. The warm water cascaded down her shoulder and back. As she tilted her head back the water began to flow down her soft neck and over her soft perked breasts. She smiled contently to herself as the torrent of water decontaminated her.
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A/N: Lyrics in order of use.
Snow Patrol: On/Off
Snow Patrol: Chocolate
Fiona Apple: Paper Bag
Fiona Apple: Sleep to Dream
Fiona Apple: Window
Fiona Apple: Mistake
Fiona Apple: Get Him Back
Fiona Apple: Criminal