CHAPTER FIVE

House fell silent. The iPod hadn't been turned back on, and he could hear the faint mumblings of his team in the next room. They were arguing about something that didn't interest him. He was far more interested in how hard his boss was working to make it look like she wasn't aware of him staring at her.

He sighed and reached out to his iPod. He felt her eyes burn into his arm and quickly looked over at her. He wasn't quick enough. She'd looked away, but he saw her body tense up. He lowered his arm and picked up a magazine instead. Angelina definitely looked pregnant in that outfit. "Does she look pregnant?" He slipped the photo between Cuddy's eyes and the legal document she was reading. He saw in a brief flash that the question had been a bad one.

"Don't you have a patient to attend to?" Cuddy had a headache to attend to. One she thought would be a lot less severe if House weren't in the room. She rubbed the spot between her eyebrows deeply. It wasn't helping.

"That's why you let me hire a team, so they could do the attending." House poured a medium sized white pill into his hand and held it out to her.

"No thank you." Cuddy appreciated the gesture, a huge one where House was concerned, but she did not want his drugs. "Maybe you should go in there and tell them you've already diagnosed the patient for Wernickes."

"Is that a suggestion, or an order?" He had a feeling it was the later.

"Whichever one gets you off your ass and out of this room." She smiled.

"I think I'll go talk to my team, see how they're doing." He pulled himself out of his chair, relying more heavily on his cane than necessary. She might be able to push him out of his office, but he was going to make damned sure she felt guilty about it.

Cuddy did feel a pang of guilt, but it went away as her headache began to fade. Now maybe she could get some actual work done. She'd managed to postpone most of her meetings for the day. She was not really in the mood to deal with disgruntled employees or dismayed patients today. Dealing with House was more than enough headache for one day. But there was a mountain of paperwork she had to get through for the auditors end of the year assessment meeting next week.

The more she tried to focus, the more she thought about House. She kept asking herself why he'd done this. Why had he moved her into his office? The easy answer was that he knew it would annoy her, and it did and that was certainly part of it but House put a lot of effort into this, and he didn't often put a lot of effort into anything but his cases, and even then one could argue that he wasn't actually putting in any effort, he was just that good.

Cuddy didn't believe that. She knew him. She knew how hard he worked. He didn't like people to think it, but he spent many sleepless nights trying to solve a case. She should know, when he had his midnight epiphanies, he'd call her to brag about it, or bounce ideas off of her. It drove her crazy, but she wouldn't change it for the world.

Was this his twisted way of trying to tell her he was interested? She dared to think about it for a moment before shaking the horrible thought from her head. She did love him, she wasn't afraid to admit that to herself, though she would never tell a living soul such a thing.

A knock on the door disrupted her thoughts. It was followed by Wilson's floppy brown hair and concerned brow. "Where's House?"

"Away," she said it with such a sigh of relief that Wilson tried not to laugh.

"I wanted to see if he wanted to get lunch." Wilson took a few hesitant steps forward. He had been friends with Dr. Cuddy for a while now. Not nearly the way he was friends with House, but enough that he felt he could talk to her about some things, he just wasn't sure if this was one of those things. "So, how are things going?"

Cuddy put down her papers. "Is something on your mind?" Last time he'd tried to talk to her about House he'd asked her on a date. She was hoping this time would go a little better.

"I was just wondering how long you plan on staying in House's office." He nervously made his way deeper into the room.

"Why? Am I cramping your style?" Cuddy wondered if House was out on the balcony listening in, if he'd sent Wilson in here to get her to talk. She kept her guard up, just in case.

"No." Wilson laughed nervously. "I'm worried about House."

"Worried?" She was only half joking.

"He likes you Cuddy." That's when she knew Wilson was acting on his own. House wouldn't have authorized his saying that. "He REALLY likes you. I don't want to see him get hurt."

"You can't keep protecting him Wilson."

"So, you're going to hurt him?" Wilson's brow furrowed further.

"I don't plan on it. I'm not like him. I don't sit around plotting ways to make people miserable."

"You think he did this to make you miserable?" Wilson was still frowning pensively.

"You don't?" She wasn't sure she wanted to hear his answer.

"I think he did this because he wants to be near you, but he doesn't want you to know he wants to be near you, so he's pulling your pigtails to piss you off. Being pissed off is better than being ignored."

"We're not in grade school anymore Wilson." She said it dismissively, hoping he would consider himself dismissed, but he didn't. "He's pulling my pigtails because I'm his boss, and I let him get away with it."

"And why do you let him get away with it?" She was about to speak, but he put a finger up to silence her. "Ah, don't you dare say it's because he's so good at his job. I'm not falling for that line anymore."

It was Cuddy's turn to frown. She'd been feeding herself that line for so long now that she half believed it. She looked very vulnerable for a moment, like the grade school girl she claimed she wasn't, and Wilson felt a little guilty about questioning her this way, but it had to be done.

"You like him, he likes you, but you're both too stubborn to do anything about it." Wilson was in shrink mode. But you know House as well as I do. If you want to have a relationship with him, you're going to have to make the first move. He's not going to put himself out there to be hurt again."

"What makes you think I want a relationship with him?" She didn't, not on paper. She wanted to get married and have children and a healthy loving relationship with a man she could trust. That's what she told herself. That's what made sense. She shushed her heart as it tried to explain that love didn't make sense and that she would never be happy without House in her life.

"So, you just want sex?" Wilson wanted to lighten the mood just a bit, realizing he'd walked into a potential land mine.

"I just want to be left alone so I can get my work done." She said each word slowly, hoping it might sink into his thick hair that she wanted him to leave.

"Aren't you sick of being alone?" His comment was so reminiscent of House that she had to stare at him for a long moment to remind herself that this was Wilson, not his harsher, more brutal friend.

"Get out!" She stood up and pointed to the door and Wilson had no choice but to oblige. He only hoped he'd gotten through to her.

Cuddy sat back down in a huff. She fumbled with the papers on her desk but was too irritated to focus on any of them for more than a few seconds. Wilson had gotten to her. Tonight she would go home and she would make herself dinner, and sit down in front of her computer and go through the emails she hadn't been able to get to today.

Wilson was right. She was sick of being alone. She was sick of going to friend's anniversary parties or second weddings and getting fixed up with some guy they thought she'd like but who paled in comparison to… "No," she said out loud, stopping herself from having such thoughts. House was her friend, and her colleague and nothing more.

She looked across to his empty chair. He'd requisitioned that chair the day he started at the hospital. He'd told her the standard chair in his office wasn't supportive enough. Nothing was ever supportive enough for Gregory House. That was the problem.

She would have tried, years ago, to date him, when they hooked up in college, she had fantasies that he was the one, but then she realized how needy he was, needy of her time, her attention, needy for other things that she didn't mind giving him, but she had a career to work toward, she needed to focus on school, on becoming a doctor, and even when she did it wasn't enough for him.

How many times had he told her she wasn't good enough? More than she cared to think about. He was constantly pulling her down, keeping her from getting the things she wanted.

She dropped her head into her hands. That wasn't right. House wasn't responsible for all the mistakes in her life. She was. She just wanted someone to blame. It was easier to find someone who didn't mind taking the blame, who practically invited it in with open arms. She snorted a small laugh. In his own twisted way, he was helping her. How typically like House that was.

She got up and paced, walking past his desk, then hers, then his, then hers. Her hand ran across the smooth surface of his desk. She liked how it felt cool to her touch. Her eyes glanced at the computer screen. His screensaver was now running. A parade of Victoria's Secret models floated across the screen. It made her smile. House was a typical guy deep down, or perhaps that was the surface and something else lurked beneath it.

Her hand slid across the front of his desk as she walked toward his empty chair. It was facing her, inviting her to sit down, so she did. She spun it a quarter turn until her legs slipped under the desk. Her eye caught the glint of a drawer handle. She looked over at the door that separated his room from the diagnostics meeting room.

Her fingers wrapped around the sleek metal handle and she pulled the drawer open slowly. If he caught her, well, she didn't want to imagine what would happen. She just had to be fast. She wasn't sure what she would find, or even what she was looking for, she was just curious to see what he kept hidden away in the back of his desk.

She shook her head with a smile as a Playboy Playmate stared back at her. She removed the siliconed, bleached girl and put her on the desk, face down. Next up was an unmarked envelope. It wasn't sealed. Inside were two tickets to Woodstock. She reread it. It indeed said Woodstock. There was also a receipt in the envelope. She pulled it out and nearly gasped at how much House had paid for two authentic, unused Woodstock tickets. She put them back in the envelope and moved on.

Assorted pens, one of which was hers, with her monogram on the case. She'd wondered where that pen went. Should have known. She put that pen in her pocket. The rest she just sifted through, looking for something good.

That drawer wasn't going to give away anything else, so she moved down to the next one. "Can I help you with something?" House was standing in the doorway. Cuddy froze. Her hand was clutching the handle.

"I was looking for a pen." It was a bad lie, and they both knew it.

"Most people look in the top drawer, or maybe in that cup over there in the corner; the one with all the pens sticking out of it." He was smirking as he walked toward her. "Or perhaps you could use this one." He reached down into her pocket and pulled out the monogrammed Mont Blanc she'd just stolen back from him.

Cuddy felt him close, the heat of his body combating the chill that had rushed up her spine on getting caught. He was lingering closer than necessary as his hand sunk down slowly into the pocket of her tight suit jacket. He didn't have to dig that far into her shallow pocket, or let his breath fall that close to the nape of her neck as he bent over her, but he did.

She quickly overcame the rapid beating of her heart and spoke. "I found my pen. I was just looking to see what else you'd stolen from me." Like my heart. The thought flashed so quickly across her mind that she wasn't sure she'd even thought it, and feared she might have said it out loud. His face showed no signs of having heard her, so she finally breathed again.

"Get out of my chair." He nudged her shoulder with the end of his cane.

Cuddy did as she was told. She realized she was getting off light considering this was House, and wondered why. "You're not going to do anything?"

"What for?" He sounded completely nonplused about finding her snooping through his things.

"I was going through your personal things House. That would have sent you over the edge before…" She stopped herself.

"Before what?" He dared her to say it.

Cuddy bit down on her lip before replying. She hadn't meant to say that. "Just…before."

"Before the kiss?" He spoke accusatorily.

She'd lost. "You've been different, House. Ever since we kissed, you've been…" She was searching for the word.

"Different?" House said, unhelpfully and blankly.

She moaned. He was still as exasperating as ever.

"I just don't understand why House. It's not like…" she stumbled over her words. "We've had sex before and…" she was struggling to not ask the question that could drive him away for good. "And it didn't change things."

"It's different," House mumbled as quietly as he could.

"What's different House? Why is it different? Just tell me." She wanted to know. She wanted things to go back to the way they were. She hated not knowing if he was going to be his usual prickly self or this guy who lets her get away with snooping through his desk and agrees to her demands instead of standing up for what he knows is right. She wanted her House back. "Did I do something wrong? Did I offend you?"

"Maybe I'm just an ass," he mumbled again. He didn't want to have this discussion with her now. He needed a way out.

"You're not just an ass." She grabbed his arm as he tried to retreat. For a long, lingering moment they looked into each others eyes, deep into each others eyes, searching for answers.

He could see how hurt she was that he wasn't opening up to her. His mouth opened slightly as he willed himself to tell her, but the words stuck in his throat. They refused to leave the safety of his mouth. He chocked on their bitterness.

Cuddy was screaming inside 'tell me House, say it, say you love me' she wanted so desperately to hear it from him, the way she'd imagined it when she was all alone in her perfect house in her beautifully made bed, touching herself and moaning his name. She gulped anxiously, hoping her thoughts weren't reflected in her face.

"I need to go check on my patient." It was a flimsy excuse, given the man saying it, but House had to get out of there. He was finding it hard to breath without taking in her sweet fragrance. Her perfume was making him dizzy, at least he told himself it was her perfume.

"Don't walk out on me House." She made it sound like a threat, but they both knew she would never follow through.

"Patients always come first, isn't that what you keep telling me?" Bitterness dripped from his words. He pushed his way past her, though he could easily have walked around. The force of his body pushed her into the desk and she slammed her hand down on the pile of papers in its corner to steady herself.

"Damn," she cursed as the door swung shut behind him. "Damn!" She pushed the papers off the desk in frustration.