STEP INTO MY OFFICE, BABY
by Mickie; 05.04.09
CHAPTER I: Secret Conversation
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The sticky feel of the doorknob only served to reaffirm House's inductive belief that all clinic patients are stupid and unaware of a syndrome known as the common cold, instead running to a doctor after countless hours of hunting through mountains of mucus with a toy microscope temporarily borrowed from their wide-eyed three-year-old and finding a slight abnormality that actually is a piece of dust. Dr. Gregory House was not in the mood to discuss mucus with impatient patients. Reflecting for half a second, he realized he never truly was in the mood but decided he was especially not today, hence the opening and subsequent closing of the door to Exam Room One. Once inside the small, grey room he envisioned a paradise: relative quietness, a comfortable chair and no other human beings in sight.
"We're alone at last," House muttered seductively under his breath as he leaned on the ever-present cane with his right hand, pulling out a Gameboy from his jacket pocket with his left. No mucus could ever stand between him and Metroid.
His tranquil state was interrupted by the soft screeching of that damn sticky doorknob as it turned in another's hand, one that most likely regretted touching the disgusting item. As if summoned by her own hospital's malady of sanitation, Dr. Lisa Cuddy walked nonchalantly into the exam room, closed the door, distractedly rubbed the palm of her hand on her skirt and with that exasperated expression she puts on, stared at House. He only looked up to meet her gaze when he lost the game.
"I paged you for a booty call twenty minutes ago, what took you so long?" House quipped at her as she walked over to the patient chair he was sitting in, their positions opposite and height now matching, her hips inches away from his knees. She was too close to ignore now but if he pretended to look at the Gameboy screen from just the right angle, he could almost see down her shirt...
"I know what you did," Cuddy had a small smile, one of secret glee that she never showed the board members and her eyes too bright for the treatment of anyone else. He enjoyed these conversations when she looked as if she might like him, if only a little.
"I'm sure everyone knows by now," he replied.
"No one knows," she shot back immediately, the smile widening.
House gave up on the Gameboy-shirt strategy, opting instead to take in this rare side of his boss. She could barely contain her ecstatic delight, despite the calm face, and he couldn't help but share her little smile – she was the only person who could do that to him, change him. "Well?" he asked.
"Well what?" Cuddy raised her eyebrows and looked away.
"Now you're just being coy with me. Well," he stressed this, "do you approve of my methods?"
"As moths approve of mothballs," Cuddy returned. House feigned a pondering stance – a tilted head, a hand on his jaw – and opened his mouth for the escape of another wisecrack before Cuddy amended her statement, "but I love it all the same."
Her words were an echo inside his head though he'd never admit it to anyone, including himself. Oh, yes, he'd already begun dividing his brain long ago into Rational House and Irrational House. It worked amazingly well under normal circumstances but the combination of her amendment, proximity and cordial expression was too much for his well-defined inner lines. He smiled which seemed to surprise her. It surprised him, too.
"I especially loved the execution," she leaned in to add this, her eyes more brilliant than the mushroom cloud of a nuclear explosion and her tone infinitely more conspiratorial.
In retrospect, it seemed fitting to House that his pager was to start beeping moments after this. At the moment, he cursed the blasted device. Cuddy's hypnotic hold over him was broken and she took a step back and collected herself, seeming to re-enter reality, their secret conversation over. House reached for the annoying piece of technology on his belt and mentally noted Cuddy's strange behaviour at the moment. She retracted from him like blood rushing from the heart at breakneck speed, becoming almost mousy. It was unusual. Filing this away for processing by Rational House later, he dropped a corner of his smile and sighed at the message: a clinic patient with some mysterious malady. Thank you, Wilson, thank you so much, House thought, his sarcastic voice ringing in his mind. He looked up and began to put the pager away but paused, only then noticing Cuddy's Houdini tribute – where she used to be was a canister of cotton swabs across the small room on the grey-blue desk. He filed this away with the other unusual attributes about her today for analysis later.
On his way to the exam room his newest patient was waiting in, House ran into Wilson who was without a doubt stalking him. House greeted him with a gruff nod and an annoyed expression Wilson had no point of reference for that day, not knowing of House's desire to remain in that small room with their beautiful boss but then again, neither did House.
"Hey, something's different today. I haven't seen Vogler marching around glaring at everyone yet," Wilson queried with great subtlety.
"Yes, our loving Chairman is absent today. Must have more important things to deal with than the day-to-day goings on of his latest business," House swept his arms around him, indicating the walls of the hospital's clinic hallway where they stood centered.
"When is he coming back?" Wilson had become inconspicuously suspicious of House's suspiciously conspicuous lack of suspicion.
"Oh, who knows these things?" he shrugged, "If you'll excuse me, I have a truly baffling subject for study in the next room." House, glad for the exit from the conversation, limped into Exam Room Three where a middle-aged man in a tracksuit and running shoes awaited him, clutching his calf in mild agony. Baffling.
--------tbc.
A/N: Please review if you liked it or didn't (constructive criticism would be appreciated) because I haven't written that much fic and would like to get better. Don't worry, you'll find out House's devious plot in the next chapter, I'm just teasing for now! Also, I may change the title later because… because. "Step into my Office, Baby" is a very House/Cuddy song by Belle & Sebastian.