Week Eighteen:

Let's Get Ready to Rumble

Cameron tapped her fingers against the desk. This waiting was beginning to slowly drive her insane; no, wait, scratch that. Quickly drive her insane.

Soon, House would be coming back in. Soon, he would decide whether to rehire her. Soon, she would now whether she had a career anymore.

She'd been going four months without one, admittedly, telling herself that time off was what she really need to wrap her mind around everything that had happened. But she had found herself curled up in the bathroom the other night, crying her eyes out and considering whether or not she'd be able to strangle herself with the shower curtain. It wasn't like she would actually do it, she reminded herself, but the fact that the image had occurred was bad enough.

Admittedly, sitting inside House's office waiting for him felt like a move that House himself would do; maybe that was the genius in it. The man was very good at predicting what other people would do, but Cameron had never seen him be nearly so sure about himself and his own intentions. That must be why he had Wilson, after all – Wilson was that sounding board, the one to tell House what he was really thinking and feeling, even if House himself was loathe to accept that it was true.

She could use a Wilson right about now. Now that she'd messed things up with Chase – probably for good, this time – she was completely on her own. If it wasn't for this ridiculous task she'd set out to perform, saving House's life (how ironic, she thought, I've become the one atheist who believes in miracles), she would go back to Chicago. She had a life there, now, friends and a career and a new husband, if she wanted him. If she could allow herself to put House and Princeton-Plainsboro off to the side for good and just get on with her life.

Easier said than done, of course.

What was she going to do with this kid, for one, once all was said and done? Give it up for adoption? Raise it?

What had House asked her so long ago, when she'd flipped out about his handling of yet another patient?

"Who did you lose?" he had asked. "Was it a baby?" Not for the first time, she had wanted to strangle House, or break his nose, or do whatever it took to get him out of her head with all his sarcasm and cynicism. Until she'd convinced herself he wasn't an evil man but a broken bird. A broken bird that needed to be cradled in her arms until everything was all right.

How stupid had she been? How stupid did she continue to be? This whole thing had been a mistake… unless, of course, it hadn't been.

She was still hanging over the edge, trying to figure out whether it wouldn't be better to just go home and come back later, when the hard part was over, and figure it out then. After all, she could go back to Chicago, have the baby there and then bring the kid back. But she was afraid that once she touched down again, she would never want to return. Then what would she do? Who would she be? It wasn't as if she had any doubts that she could juggle it – being a mom and a doctor. That would be some kind of cheap eighties sitcom plot.

It was that, if she left, the meaning would all fall apart. And Cameron had tried to build a life on meaning, a career on meaning.

The door opened and House entered. She couldn't focus on him at first, could only hear the click-click, click-click of his cane against the floor.

"House!" Cameron exclaimed, and she hopped out of his chair, a little bit too fast.

"No need to get up," House told her dryly. "It looks as if you've been waiting for me. What is it now? Are you going to bring me on the Maury show? Because regardless of the results, I think I can promise that I won't be doing any backflips."

Cameron rolled her eyes at him.

"I want to know that we're doing the right thing."

"That's not why you're here. You're Cameron – to you, you're always doing the right thing, even when you're not."

Cameron snorted.

"What do you mean? Quit giving me riddles, House. I'm feeling like I'm just… doing stupid stuff and thinking it's going to make a difference. But it doesn't make a difference, because nothing does. You're going to…" she trailed off.

"What makes you unable to say it? Why are you even wrapped up in knots about it, Cameron?"

She glared at him.

"I can't be upset that you're terminally ill? What, is that the newest of the House Rules? Are you that bent out of shape if anyone dares show any kind of emotion? Ever hear the phrase 'repressed'?"

"Oh, are we talking about Freud now?" House asked, "Because I'm sure that he would have a lot to say about my long, hard cane."

Cameron let out a snort.

"I don't even know why I bother talking to you at all, House. I can see why Cuddy broke it off with you. She ought to be canonized for putting up with you as long as she did."

"She stuck around because of my long, hard cane. Weren't you listening?"

"Sounds more like a compensatory mechanism," Cameron fired back. "See, I can make snarky remarks about Freud, too."

House moved his hands to her waist. She could hear him breathing in.

"What would Freud say about this?"

She wanted to tell him that he was an idiot, that she had been wasting her time putting up with him again, and that there was no way in hell she was about to sleep with him, right here in his office. She pictured the old movies, where women pushed men away or slapped them across the face and asked things like "What do you take me for?"

Maybe it was the hormones, or maybe it was an obnoxious part of her brain or heart, but she didn't do either of those things.

She pressed her lips against House's and held on for dear life.