She rides the bus to his street, and then walks stiff-legged up to his door, checks to make sure she got the address right, and knocks precisely three times.
It cracks open, a stream of light coming from within, blocked only by a head and a pair of staring silver balls.
She doesn't speak, knowing that what she would say would be rushed and nervous, but instead stands and waits with a firm look in her strange, glowing maroon eyes, and he notices the identical dark sparks in each.
He opens the door wider but stops her from entering.
"What's your name?" His voice is rougher and deeper than she remembered, and sounds as if he was not born an American, but answers without hesitation.
"Akaisha Juliet Bryant."
He raises his thin brows.
"An unusual name. Irish?" His voice is cool and detached, but she can see something swimming across his eyes.
She nods.
"You should call me Ruby." She asserts, and he smiles briefly. She guesses that is not a common expression for him.
"Bossy much? It's not that I could call you Ruby, it's that I should." He teases, but she gives nothing away. "Because of your eyes, right? They have a very unusual shade."
Again, she nods, and he backs up, prompting her to follow.
She walks in easily, taking in all that was around her. A single towering bookshelf, full of books, pictures and CD's, lots of clothes strewn sloppily on the floor, the odor of stale boos, old laundry and something distinctly masculine. Her nose twitched. Not a trace of woman.
The living room is spacey and looks desperately decorated, like he felt the room was too barren and bought everything he could afford to fill it.
A large, lumpy leather couch dominates the space, along with a wide coffee table, massive TV and lots of junk all over the floor. Knick-knacks adorn every surface, and she can hardly wait to organize the mess.
"I can see why you hired me." She states, clearly not concerned if he took offense.
"So Akaisha—"
"Ruby." She glares at him with angry little gems, clearly familiar with him game.
"—Ruby," He corrects himself softly, staring at her intensely; surprised that she doesn't look away. "I see you didn't bring any cleaning supplies."
"Man like yourself, figured you already had them." She says simply, and he smirks, opening a pantry full of cleaners, vacuums and rags.
"Make yourself at home." He finishes and limps over to his stereo, turning on the Grateful Dead at a volume that would certainly make them ungrateful.
"What happened to your leg?" She asks, without the least regard for civility.
He ignores her for a moment, and then speaks suddenly. "An infarction in my thigh. I was in the hospital; it took them days to figure out what was wrong with me. Once they did, I decided to wait it out once the clot was removed, see if the muscle would survive." He pauses and glances at her, but she is busy cleaning the dishes and listening. "My girlfriend, I was with her for five years. She was a lawyer; I gave her power of attorney. When I was in a chemically induced coma, she authorized a surgery I had refused, to take out the dead muscle."
He stops then and stands, limping over until he is only a few strides away. "Do you think it was stupid of me to trust her?" He asks point blank, and she knows he is trying to assess her personality. His version of an employment interview.
"I don't know, because I didn't know her. But judging by your distrustfulness now, and lack of companionship, I'd say you thought it was." Ruby answers, and he nods, limping back to his couch with a bag of potato chips.
Once she has successfully tidied the kitchen, she is ready to move on to the bedroom.
"Mr. House—"
"Greg. And I'm a doctor."
"Err… Dr. Greg," She begins, and he laughs. "May I clean your bedroom, or would you prefer a different room?"
"Bedroom's fine."
And boy, is it. The room was probably intended as something else, but it has a king-sized bed with a mahogany frame and plain quilts, two bedside tables and a massive walk-in closet. She starts with the bed, stripping it down and piling up the dirty sheets. She can smell him all over them. She then approaches the closet, pulling out all the dirty clothes and hanging the clean ones that had been dumped on the floor. Finally, she vacuums thoroughly and carried her load into the laundry room.
Once everything except the quilts are being cleaned, she wonders into his living room, the rock n' roll still reverberating in her ears.
She slips back into the bedroom and can't resist nosing through his doors and closet. In the doors all she finds are painkillers, condoms and change, but in the closet, she finds an open box full of stuff.
The box is marked simply: HER THINGS and contains lots of photos of a pretty woman, with dark hair, probably in her thirties. In one photo Greg is holding her, another he laughing while she kisses his cheek, and one of her, Greg and another man, just shorter than Greg and much younger, with light brown hair and boyish good looks.
Beneath the photos are a few shirts, with perfume still on them, jewelry, make-up and a travel brochure to Paris. At the very bottom is a velvet box with a very pretty ring inside, much resembling what a man would buy a steady girlfriend.
"Is this the woman who authorized the surgery?" Ruby muttered to herself, flipping one loose picture to find Stacy & me, 1997 on the back.
"Yes." She jumps at the sound of Greg's voice behind her, and spins, fear and embarrassment all over her face.
"I can see why Mr. Turner sacked you." His voice is angry, but his eyes are sad.
She can think of nothing to say, so she says what she is really thinking. "Her name was Stacy?"
The question catches him off guard. "Stacy Cordell. But she got hitched, now it's Stacy Warner." He replies, and Ruby nods.
"I'm sorry to hear that."
"What? That she got remarried?"
Ruby pauses. "Remarried? You two were married?"
He looks away and blushes, his silver eyes burning with anguish. He shoves his hands in his back pockets.
"No."
"Freudian slip, then?" She is smiling now, and he feels some of the pain lessen.
"Shut up and clean, woman." He then limps out of the room, leaving her to repack the box and carry on.
When the laundry is dried, she hangs it up and then approaches Greg, who is making a turkey sandwich.
"I'd better get going now, Greg." She still feels uncomfortable calling him by his first name.
He looks up briefly and offers her a sandwich.
"Thank you." She takes one and sinks her teeth into it. It's good.
"Here." He hands her a fifty-dollar bill. "That good?"
Ruby smiles. "Yeah. Good-bye, Greg."
She opens his door and steps out, deciding that Greg House is a far superior employer than Mr. Turner.
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Keep voting, folks. Friends or lovers? If there friends, should it turn out to be a Hameron, Huddy, H/W or non-ship story?
