STEP INTO MY OFFICE, BABY
by Mickie; 05.04.11
CHAPTER II: A Diagram of His Guilt
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His desk was moderately organized, he noted, as he sat down in the chair and stretched out his sore leg while popping a Vicodin. It was four-thirty meaning he could go home in half an hour. The clinic exhausted him, not physically but mentally, though he wouldn't give Cuddy the satisfaction of knowing that. The cases in the clinic were mostly un-alarming and tedious but it was the constant contact with other human beings that got to him. After his leg infarction, he had spent six years in isolation before Cuddy had confronted him and forced him to catch up on his missed clinic hours.
He supposed she figured six years was recovery time enough. It wasn't. Most of the clinic patients didn't ask about his leg, cane and limp or didn't even look at him oddly, just accepting him for him, but the paranoid part of him deep inside thought they were asking, silently, and looking. Rational House told him they weren't and he was just looking for an excuse to continue to be in his self-imposed exile. Irrational House told him that everyone was mocking him and would secretly talk behind his back, only tolerating him in his presence out of pity. He tried to push his insecure thoughts away but it was too late now. Which House was right?
His temples began to throb, the beginning of what he classified as a 'too-much-thinking headache'. He scoffed softly when he realised he'd prefer the world's most obnoxious clinic patient to self-analysis. Cuddy would be proud. No, he wouldn't go to the clinic but he had to get out of his office, its silence and isolation lending itself too much to introspection. It was decided: he would eat pie.
Hospital cafeterias are not usually known for their fine cuisine, its patrons too distracted to care about taste, but House found that on Tuesdays the apple pie in the western-most shelf was edible if not sixty percent of the time delicious. Chance was on his side today as the pie was well within the sixty percent boundary, affording his stomach precedence over his body instead of that constantly mulling brain of his. It afforded fifteen minutes of precedence, anyway.
Luckily for House, he was so preoccupied with thinking up something new to do, unrelated to the clinic, to keep Irrational House at bay that the opportunity walked right up to him in mid-ponder.
"Hey, where have you been for the last hour?" Wilson met up with his friend near the reception desk and walked with him as House continued his journey down the hall to his office once again.
"In my office, then pie, then office," House summed up.
"Pie?"
"Tuesday."
"Oh, right."
House reached the swinging glass door to his office and almost had it open before Wilson stopped him, meaning to grab his arm but got the cane instead. "You've got to stop doing that, people are going to think we're involved," House whispered conspiratorially. Wilson half-rolled his eyes, expecting this, and laughed despite himself.
"Cuddy wants to see you in her office. Something big is happening," Wilson informed.
"Big like penicillin or big like lawyers?" House inquired while popping a Vicodin.
"I'd guess the latter. I don't know what's going on but she's pacing back and forth so that can't be good. Remember the last time she did that? No more coffee breaks in the surgeon's lounge," Wilson replied.
"I remember. That woman can pace like nobody's business," House noted.
"Well, I think you should make it your business before you get fired," Wilson prodded.
"I'm going, I'm going! Damn you," House scowled and changed direction toward Cuddy's office. Wilson was pleased.
House pushed open the glass door to Cuddy's luxurious office to find her pacing and three men in dark suits and matching expressions perched on her couch. Cuddy was in mid-rant when he entered, stopping to look at him. She was attempting to glare at him scornfully but he could see the difference in her eyes. Vogler had been her sickness and now she was cured. He decided to play along for her sake.
"Dr. House, these are three of Vogler's lawyers – Sampson, Thompson and Venn," Cuddy pointed at each in turn, their expressions shifted slightly in greeting, an almost imperceptive smile of mere acknowledgment.
"Three of? What, does he have a whole team of them? Did they have a little game to pick who would come visit us? Oh, if there's seven of them, that would work out perfectly! They could each have their own little bed. Heigh-ho, heigh-ho…" House snarked.
"Dr. House, I assure you, we are all qualified to handle this case," Thompson said.
"Oh, that's too bad. I'd prefer the defense be inept, but that's just me," House replied, popping a Vicodin. He saw Cuddy attempting to control a small smile out of the corner of his eye. That made him glad for some reason.
"Dr. House, Vogler is suing us for defamation and wants his job back," Cuddy told him. This was moderately surprising to House; he had entertained the idea that Vogler may sue but never put much stock in it. He thought Vogler's ego would be above that. Interesting.
"And what does that have to do with little old me?" House shrugged and put on his best innocent face.
"Dr. House, we have evidence right here that implicates you as the sole party in this malicious attack on Mr. Vogler," Venn interjected matter-of-factly, holding up a wrinkled letter in a plastic bag that House indeed recognized.
"What is that, a diagram of my guilt? Oh, look, he is both guilty and handsome at the same time!" House mocked. Venn's grimace deepened. Again, Cuddy unsuccessfully tried to suppress a smile. House's heart felt a bit lighter for a second time in the last five minutes. Stop it, he ordered himself.
Cuddy sat down in the chair opposite the couch. "May I see that?" Venn handed her the bagged letter. It was actually a mini-poster, she noticed. She also noticed that it had a small puncture in the top centre, the perfect size for a thumbtack. With great dread, she turned over the paper to see the front, to make sure Vogler's lawyers really did have the so-called evidence. House fidgeted nearby. Even with all of her focus on control and knowing what to expect, Lisa Cuddy could not stop the burst of laughter rising in her as she saw House's handiwork once again. The black and white paper had a large photocopy of a large, greyish leech with a staff photo printout of Vogler's head pasted on top. Vogler's head had a large red circle around it, complete with horns. At the top left was a printout of her staff photo. A bold, red arrow linked her photo to the sentence written neatly at the top: "My boss is better than your boss". At the bottom was written, "Sincerely, Dr. House".
She turned to look up at House who was standing a few feet away from her chair and hadn't moved since he entered. House met her look and recognized her expression as the same one from earlier, in the exam room. She smiled at him and handed the poster back to Venn.
"Please read through this promptly and be expecting further notice of a pending trial date. Thank you for your time," Venn handed Cuddy the necessary legal documentation and the three lawyers got up and left the room, their exit down the hallway ominous, even some of the nurses stopped to look quizzicly in their departing direction.
"So, pie?" House suggested cheerfully as he turned back to Cuddy.
"Of course," Cuddy got up from her chair, straightened her skirt and rewarded House with another smile as she passed him on the way to the door. He smiled back, though she didn't see, and caught up with her in the hallway.
---------------tbc.
A/N: I had the best pie today in a university cafeteria. I was there to return books for my essays, but it called to me. We had met before. I didn't think it could be the same again but it was. Thank you, pie. Also, the whole Venn diagram thing was inspired by Eddie Izzard in "Dress to Kill". If you haven't seen it, you should. Yeah, so I was in a weird mood today, hence this chapter. Okay? Okay. Thanks for reading, I will try and update again soon.