They had some time left before Foreman and Cameron would arrive at the rest area, and while they were slowly walking back to the bench Chase was debating what to do with that time. Then he noticed that Cathy seemed to shift through different moods quickly. "What is it, little lady, that you are thinking so hard about?" he finally asked her, when he could not figure out what had evoked that quick succession of facial expressions.

"There Playground. I can't go." came the despondent answer.

"You would like to go to that playground?" Chase checked back, not sure exactly what to make of her answer. "Why do you think you cannot go there?"

"Too far." Cathy responded without hesitation.

"Well, we have to wait for Foreman and Cameron to get here either way, so we easily have the time to go on the playground." Chase argued, still not sure where exactly the problem was.

But Cathy shook her head: "Too far. Can't walk, can't play. It's rule." She insisted.

Glad, that he finally had figured out what she wanted to tell him, Chase checked: "It was the rule at your old place, that you could only play on the playground if you could walk there on your own?" On her hesitant nod he continued: "Hmm, but you already walked all your steps today, your band is green, remember? All steps from now on are extra steps. The rule should not apply anymore if you have completed your steps."

Doubtful Cathy looked at House who had followed their discussion with slight amusement. While he knew that some rules might be necessary, he was against the strict environment his father always enforced and Cathy would find that out soon enough. So he encouraged her: "If you want to go on the slide, you need to be able to climb up some of the steps so it is better to be well rested. You are no longer living with my parents and we will not have that rule in our house, okay?"

Widely smiling Cathy turned to Chase again and asked: "Slides?"

"Yes, we can go to the slides and maybe the swings afterwards? I always liked the swings best. But let's pack away our stuff first and ask Uncle Wilson whether he wants to see how you are playing as well, okay?"

Slightly confused to be asked for her approval again, she nodded and snuggled into the comfortable place on Chase's shoulder again. Even though he had only one arm free, their impromptu dinner was quickly tidied up. Fetching some water bottles and their small medical bag from the car they slowly made their way over to the playground, where Wilson and House dropped onto the next bench, guarding the supplies. Chase and Cathy made their way to the slides first. They had to wait their turn and Cathy's lip began to quiver.

"What is wrong, Cathy?" Chase inquired.

"You catch me?" Cathy asked shyly.

Not sure how much help exactly was needed, Chase checked: "You want me to be there at the end of the slide and catch you when you are all the way down?" When she cautiously nodded, he assured her: "That's no problem, I did that for my sister all the time. Anything else, that you would like me to do?" Looking closely at the slide he realized that the steps were pretty low, but after her walking he was not sure how well she would be able to handle these. So he inquired: "Do you want to climb up from the bottom or from higher up?"

Obviously relieved that he had not mocked her or told her she could not use the slide, she responded more firmly this time: "Higher up."

By now they had reached the front place. The other kids were starting to make fun of "the girl that behaves like a baby", but Chase would have nothing of that. He set Cathy on the steps at the same height as she was on his arm. This gave her two more low steps to manage and then she had to sit down – which he realized would not be an easy feat for her. So he stayed firmly behind her, steadying her with his hands at her hips, and gave her all the time she needed to climb up the two steps before he helped her to sit down correctly.

Before he made his way to the end of the slide, he instructed the child behind her firmly: "You cannot push her! She will go and slide down as soon as she is ready, okay?" and when he saw the doubtful look he added: "She has a back injury, you can hurt her real bad if you are not careful." Reasonably sure that no harm would come to his little girl – Where did that come from? She was just joining their household today... – he quickly went to the other end of the slide and caught Cathy safely when she arrived beaming with joy.

So he was not surprised when she ordered: "Again!" and they repeated the whole procedure two more times. By then she was pretty wiped out and not sure she would be able to climb up the steps again and then hold herself upright for the slide down. Carefully she inquired: "Swings? Uncle House?"

"You want to go to the swings? Great, I love the swings! You would be doing me a great favor if you would allow me to take you to the swings today. How about we let House have some time with his friend today and the two of us enjoy the swings?" Chase knew that House would agree to go to the swings with Cathy if she really insisted, but one glance in his direction showed him that it would do him no good to do so now. Thankfully Catherine agreed, albeit a bit reluctantly.

"If you like the swings with House so much, maybe you can teach me something? How do you use the swings together?" Chase inquired, and dutifully she answered: "Uncle sits, I lie, we swing." At this point he was glad, the bench that House and Wilson had chosen was near the swings, so he could get a bit more precise instructions if necessary. Quickly deciding that Cathy could use a quick breather and something to drink after all the excitement, he stopped by the bench. This gave him the double advantage of being able to check on House and Wilson as well as finding out what exactly Cathy had meant earlier when she described the swinging process.

He was really glad, when Cathy started to talk like every other kid: "Uncle House, you see? I slided three times! Whole way!"

Seeing the lines of pains on House's face Chase cringed slightly, hoping Cathy would not be disappointed by a typical House response, but to his astonishment his fear was completely unfounded. "You did great, Cathy, you even made it up the steps each time, I am really proud of you!" Then he asked slightly hesitant: "Let me guess, you want to go to the swings next?"

"Yes!" she responded with conviction, and then continued more haltingly: "Chase want swings."

Hearing that, House sounded relieved: "Chase wants to take you on the swings? That is great, I bet he loves it! Did you teach him how it is done correctly? What do you think, who should be the one sitting?"

Chase just loved watching the interactions between House and Cathy, he hoped he would get many more opportunities to see them chatting that relaxed.

"Silly, Chase sit, he is heavy." she responded giggling.

As often when he talked with Cathy, House wondered about her limited vocabulary. She seemed to have no problem following his sentences as long as he did not use too many medical terms, which was true for nearly everybody but the people he worked with. On the other hand she did only seldom even form a complete sentence, her logic was fine though.

"Oh, you are right, that might be a good idea, otherwise you are squashed at the end and we do not want that. So which way do you want to look?" House now inquired.

He knew that she had never been in school or even preschool despite being seven already, but even only interacting with his parents should have advanced her language skills well beyond the current level.

As expected, her answer was: "This" while pointing toward the bench that her uncles currently sat on.

If he wanted to enroll her in a school, she would definitely need to be in the special education program, even though he was not sure she had a learning disability.

"You want to make funny faces at us? Well, let's see what you come up with." he baited her before checking whether she remembered what he had taught her: "So, which way will you have to look when sitting down?"

For now he would try his best to encourage her to speak more and hopefully that would already lead to an improvement. Maybe it would be better to be homeschooling her for a few weeks to see what her actual potential was?

After only a minimal deliberation she responded "This" while this time pointing in the opposite direction. At her correct answer, he nodded approvingly and encouraged: "Well, then, off you go! And remember to hold on with your legs!"

Chase was slightly surprised about the last instruction, but then he realized what House had done with Catherine. While he usually carried her on his left hip, he now shifted her so that she was right in front of him before he sat down. Thankfully it was a tire swing, so that his whole thighs were laying flat on top of the swing. As soon as her legs were crossed behind his back, he helped her to lie down on his legs before he began to swing slightly, only to be prompted: "Higher!" by Cathy as well as House. Realizing that she was quite secure in her spot he enjoyed moving his body so the swing went higher and higher.

She seemed to enjoy that even though her head regularly was lower than her body, but she held on very well with her legs. Thankfully the other kids preferred to use the other equipment so they were not bothered at all and kept on swinging.

When Foreman finally arrived ten minutes later and Chase slowed down, Cathy was sleeping. Carefully he moved her in a better position for carrying and then they walked back to their bench by the car. He quickly put her in a diaper before laying her down on the backseat of their car.

Then they dug into their food while Cameron told them about the two ladies she had been helping. Slightly surprised Chase observed that House more than once moved some food around so Wilson could reach it easier and later even started to make a game feeding other people.

He often wondered whether Cameron really was that unobservant – he was pretty sure that Foreman had caught on but refused to openly acknowledge what was going on – or whether she was acting that well. Not wanting to disturb the relaxed mood he kept his questions to himself and joined the game whenever necessary. It was no coincidence though that he was giving Wilson a hand getting up from the uncomfortable bench before doing the same for House who for once gladly accepted the support.

While Wilson and Cameron headed for the restroom, Foreman turned towards Chase: "Wilson rides shot-gun with me, Cameron in the back with you?"

"Sounds good to me. Let's try to keep together, then we can simply switch on the blinker to signal when either one want to stop at a resting station, okay?"

House really wished to be home right now, but he knew quite well, that they had at least another two hours of driving ahead of them. He should offer to drive for a while, they had wisely chosen the car with the hand controls so he could relieve Chase, but he did not really feel up to it and thankfully Chase obviously did not expect him to, either. There were days when he felt really lucky to have the younger doctor by his side. Tiredly he went to the passenger seat, pushed the seat all the way back and tried to find a comfortable position before closing his eyes.

"Do you need help getting Cathy in her seat?" Foreman checked before he turned to his own car, which was parked a bit away since he had to use a longer parking spot to fit the trailer.

"I have never done that before, I am not sure." Carefully he lifted her up, considered crawling inside the car, but decided it would be easier to just walk around the car before he placed her in her car seat.

After fastening the seat belts, he gratefully accepted the pillow and blanket Foreman had fetched from the trunk and placed them around her, so she would hopefully stay asleep for a while. With Cameron riding in the back next to her she should be able to adjust anything that might move around too much.

Afterwards he made sure that a regular bottle of water was easily reachable for Cameron as well as the baby bottle for Cathy. "You need some water bottles, pillows or blankets for your car as well?" he turned to Foreman before equipping the front part of the car with two water bottles as well.

It was still warm outside so blankets were not really necessary if you did not need them to be able to sleep, but Foreman took one along for Wilson as well as water bottles. While he kept the usual emergency kit in his car and had brought his overnight bag along, he was not as well equipped as Wilson and Chase were used to.

While Foreman was heading back to his vehicle, Chase made sure to place a pillow under House's leg. On one of their longer drives they had figured out, that placing a squishy cushion there greatly reduced the pressure on his thigh and from then on always kept one or more in the car. In the end he covered House lightly with a blanket as well and as soon as Cameron and Wilson were in their respective seats, they continued their journey home.