Hi there, sorry, that it took me so long to update, but I waited nearly two weeks for my beta but she´s really busy right now and still hasn´t finish beta-ing it... so I post this chapter still without beta... If she finished beta-ing it, I´ll repost it... Till then, I hope you like that version as well.

Stave 2: The first of the three spirits

14.02.08; 01 o´clock in the morning

"Greg!" a familiar female voice whispered. "Greg, wake up!" She hummed quietly.

House growled and pressed his eyes together, trying to ignore the disturbance. The voice became louder: "Gregory House, wake up now!" He didn´t move. Suddenly someone pulled on his hair strongly.

"Ouch!" cursing House sat up. "What are you trying to do here, Cuddy? If you truly believe something like that could convince me to screw you once more, you´re more crazier than I..." He didn´t finish his sentence. Uncomprehending and still sleepy he looked at his peacefully sleeping boss right next to him. Behind him somebody cleared her throat.

"Stacy?" flabbergasted House starred at his ex girlfriend.

She stood aside his bed, wearing a bright red costume, hands placed in her hips and smirked at him.

"Don´t you think it´s really crude to sleep if you´re awaiting visitors?" disparagingly she clicked her tongue.

"And don´t you think it´s really crude to just break into my bedroom while I´m in bed with another woman?" House hissed quietly and made a slight gesture with his head to Cuddy.

Stacy only laughed.

"Be quiet, dammit!" House scolded between closed teeth while he stood up carefully and grabbed his jeans, which laid next to his bed on the floor. "Or you´ll wake Cuddy..."

"Oh, now you´re shy?" Stacy smiled in amusement. "Don´t be afraid, she can´t hear me... I´m a spirit."

"Sure!" he glared at her and fled from a woman already for the second time this day out of his bedroom with only his jeans on. In his living-room he caught his cane and limped to his couch. Behind a pillow he found a totally crumpled old shirt, which he pulled over before Stacy entered the room too. But instead to go through the door she just floated through the wall. Close before him she stopped. House was totally sure now that that cup had hit his head... Or maybe Wilson had played with his Vicodin...

"We must go now, Greg" Stacy cut into his thoughts.

"Sure!" He didn´t move.

"I´m serious, Greg. I´m the spirit of the past-"

"Christmas. Got it. But don´t you think it´s a bit to early for that? Why don´t you make a new date for december with me?- Just ask Cameron..." he replied cynically.

Stacy rolled her eyes. "Not Christmas, stupid!" deprecatory she waved her head. "Today it´s Valentine´s day. I am the spirit of the past love and we´re already late!" she grabbed his arm.

"Whatever... But if you´re truly believe that I would follow a mad woman in the middle of the night to-" ungently his ass hit hard concrete.

"What the hell...?" he sat on the middle of a street near his old university. It was bright day and the street was busy. People everywhere who were walking fussy and cars... House only had time to curse and cross his arms in front of his face as one car hit him- and plainly drove right through him. Wilson must have given him real good drugs. Cursing he stood up and grabbed his cane which Stacy offered him grinning.

"You should have stand up as I asked you to!" Stacy defended herself without sympathy as house glared at her.

"But you hadn´t asked me to!" House snapped at her and glared some more.

Stacy didn´t answer, only turned around and walked round the next corner into a side street. She stopped in front of a small cafe cater-cornered to a fruit and veg stall and sat down at a bank. House followed her angrily.

First now he noticed the old fashioned clothes the people around him wore. And then as he arrived at Stacy´s bank he saw himself. Young, with fresh shaved face wearing a Michigan-shirt and an old jeans. And with two healthy legs.

"Why are we here?" he sat down next to Stacy.

Stacy ignored him instead she gestured at the young Greg.

Next to him a bicycle-rider drove over, which seemed hurried. So hurried that he missed the little six years old girl, who was standing a few steps away from her Mother hand the young House and so he nearly crashed the little girl. She jumped backwards frightened, stumbled and fell whereby she hurt her left hand. Crying she ran to her mother. The bicycle-rider not even looked back.

"You should make a wheel-tube out of your brain-then the air within would be useful!" the young House shouted after him and bent down to the little girl.

"Don´t be scared, I´m nearly a doctor." he said to her. "Show me your hand."

One arm hooked around her mothers legs she trust out her hand shyly. Greg smiled encouraging. "It's not as bad as all that." he turned her hand carefully from one side to the other.

House sighed loudly. "Are you telling me now, why we´re here?" he faced Stacy unnerved.

"Do you remember that day?"

"No." he waved his head.

"But she remembers it." she smiled and gestured with one hand to a spot behind House.

As he turned his head aside, he saw a quite young Cuddy who was watching his younger self treating that girl.

Suddenly everything moved frantic fast. People blurred before his eyes, it became night and day again then the time slowed down to usual. In that small cafe he saw now himself sitting on a table with a younger happily looking Stacy, both were drinking coffee. On the table next to him: Cuddy. She wore a pink dress and big sunglasses. She laughed as one of the two guys she was with said something. He remembered. That day was the first day he saw Cuddy.

In the blink of an eye his surrounding changed once more. He was facing now cold white walls and even the bank he sat on felt different. Confused he looked around. Stacy and him were in the Princeton-Plainsboro-hospital and sat in a vacant floor on two visiting-chairs. As he wanted to ask Stacy, what they wanted here he saw himself through a door lying in a clinic bed in a room. A bit younger Stacy sat next to his bed. His leg...

"Are we here to watch the beginning of the end of our relation-ship or is this just for fun?" stalwart he starred at the scene in front of him. His younger self seemed asleep while Stacy was holding his hand. In the floor near the door stood Cuddy watching the scene as well.

"Why did you break up with me?"

He lifted his brow cynically and faced Stacy. "You left me, if you have forgotten that little detail."

Stacy nodded and replied calmly: "Yes, but it was over long before I left."

He kept silent. The scene around him changed again. Now he sat on a cushioned chair at a corner table in a huge hall. The room was full of men in suits and ladies in expensive dresses. On a big banner which was stretched through the whole room stood in black letters:'The children of the cancer-station are grateful for your help'. Near two years Cuddy had forced him to show up here together with Wilson.

House beheld his younger self at the bar, some whisky in one hand his cane in the other... Some minutes he watched impassive.

"Once again." Stacy said after a short while.

"Excuse me?" he asked confused.

"You haven´t noticed it so we must start at the beginning once more!"she rebuked him.

The people around him started to move backwards, stopped then and behaved normal again.

"Now try harder!" she ordered him crudely.

"And what should I notice?" he demanded to know unnerved. "Nothing is happening!"

Stacy rolled her eyes. "You´re pretty slow for a genius.-Now!" she grabbed his arm. He looked in the same direction as Stacy. Cuddy was just entering the huge hall.

"Cuddy in a dress even a hooker would be ashamed of. So?" he wasn´t impressed at all.

Stacy ignored him just gestured with one hand at the House at the bar.

"What about me? I havn´t even moved!"

"Like I said!" Stacy triumphed.

House pulled a face. "You say that 'nothing' had happened? Wow, really weird that I missed that fact... You´re right, I am pretty slow for a genius..."

"Right." she grinned. "Like you stand there, you´re weren´t able to see her and you didn´t turned around as you said!" she grinned some more. "So wherefrom did you knew she came in?"

"I knew what?"

"Your body gave you away, Greg. Every muscle of your whole body grew tense right after Cuddy made her first step into the hall."

"I didn´t know-"

"Greg!" warned Stacy. "Don´t lie to me!"

House snorted unbelievingly. "What do you wanna hear?" he asked testy. "That I always know when I´m near her because we have a spiritual bound? Something like that?" his voice was drowned in sarcasm.

Stacy nodded relaxed. "And now tell me why you broke up with me."

He looked on the floor. "You know the reason."

"Yes, but I wanna hear it from you."

He concentrated on the wood grain of the parquet floor. "Course you were so unhappy."

"Bullshit!"

The structure of the floor turned. He felt cold tiling under his feet. Due to the high humidity he knew he must be in one of the bathrooms of the hospital. He still refused to look up.

"It´s a good thing you failed to become a mom because you suck at it!"

His own voice sounded strange to his ears. Cuddy sobbed quietly.

Then silence surrounded him once more and he sat on his couch in his living-room next to Stacy.

"Tell me why you broke off." she dared him. "Tell me why you sent me back to Mark last year. Say it!"

He bit his lower lip.

"Fine, then I will do it." she sounded angry. "You broke up with me for the same reason you screamed at Cuddy-"

"Because of my leg, satisfied?" he cut in furious. "Because I´m a cripple. Because I´m in pain and because I was a heartless bastard my whole life. Got enough?" They starred at each other for a few seconds

"You love her." she was totally calm again. He wanted to object but she closed his mouth with her hand. "You do, Greg. Don´t even try to deny it. That´s why you broke up with me. Not only why I was unhappy. No, also because you couldn´t stop thinking bout her. And that´s why you screamed at her, Greg. That was about her pain, not about yours." she stressed every single word. "And. Her. Pain. You. Cannot. Bear."

He wanted her to leave.

"Are you scared for her, Stacy?" he smiled evilly. "Worried bout your friend? Afraid that I could break her heart of stone?" his voice was cold as ice. "No need to, Stacy. She´s much smarter than you. She knows what a jerk I am."

Pitifully Stacy looked at him. "You dumb-ass!"

House woke up in his bed. Cuddy was still sleeping next to him and his clock turned to 01:59. Grumpy he stood up pulled his jeans on quietly and hobbled into his living-room.

Hope you enjoyed that part... Next part will be with Cuddy as the spirit of the present love...

Please review (and tell me if you want it), cause reviewing makes my day!