Author's Note: A nice, long and, hopefully, not boring update for you…R&R and maybe I'll consider cutting poor old House some slack soon. (I said maybe!) x
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After 2 hours of watching mind-numbingly boring afternoon B movies on TV, sitting in complete silence, Cuddy was bursting to interrogate her patient. She initially busied herself by getting together his next round of antibiotics; her logic being that if she kept pumping them into him, he was bound to get better soon.
'Right now, he looks like death warmed up' she thought as he took the meds from her hand and swallowed them without complaint. She took away the old ice pack which had long since melted and was serving no other purpose than making the waistband of his sweats soaking wet where he'd tucked it in after getting tired of holding it on his ribs for so long.
He took the new one and held it against his side once again – even he couldn't deny the fact that the coolness was easing the throbbing to some extent; although, his shoulder was driving him mad with the injury he'd sustained by dropping onto it like a lead weight in the bedroom earlier. 'Damn Cuddy and her stupid towel…'
She sat back down on his recliner and continued to observe him worriedly; every time he coughed or dared to take a deep breath, he winced and she clenched up, anxiously – it was truly grating on his nerves.
"Sit here" he ordered eventually, without even sparing her a glance, as she hissed sympathetically during another one of his spectacular coughing fits.
"Why?"
"Because I'm fed up with you sitting there staring at me as though I'm going to disintegrate any second now" he offered as explanation, "If you sit here, you can face the TV...and ignore me"
"Oh" Cuddy accepted this as a reasonable request and planted herself to the right of him on the couch; although, she was now even more aware of his apparent fever as she felt the heat radiating off of him. "You're still running a fever" she stated pointlessly, annoying him further.
"Shhh!" he exclaimed angrily, "how am I supposed to watch TV when you're arguing with me every two seconds about whether or not I'm still sick?"
Cuddy took this as a rhetorical question and wisely kept quiet as he carried on his built-up rant. "I know I'm sick, which is why I'm trying to rest – no thanks to you and Wilson sticking your noses in every five minutes!" he paused as he took the time to actually study his boss. She looked...defeated. 'Shit'
"I also know that this is all my fault – and I've got no one to blame but myself...and maybe Jack Daniels..." he muttered, but to no reply from his boss. "Oh God – you're not gonna cry, are you?" now he felt really bad. Or at least he did right up until Cuddy turned and smirked at him.
"House, we're not in High school; I can handle you telling me to 'butt out' without feeling the need to burst into tears and slash the tires on your car!" she laughed; openly amused by his strange concerned streak.
"Thank God – I must have mistaken you for Cameron" he said, finding the relief at knowing he hadn't upset her, slightly disconcerting...maybe she really was immune to his jibes.
He rested his head back on the couch and placed the new bag of ice against his brow in an attempt at quelling the fire in his head; the ice didn't put up much of a fight, and droplets of water began to form and run down his face. It felt pretty damn good to him; it looked pretty damn pathetic to her...in an almost cute sort of way.
"I'd better write this down" she muttered as she retreated back into the kitchen; House frowned, took the pack off of his forehead and followed her with his gaze.
She returned with a little bound black book. "Well, well, well – I hadn't put you down as a black book kinda girl, Cuddy" he grinned lazily, "Got an important appointment set for tonight?" he tried to lean over to see what she was attempting to write – it was actually quite boring. "Antibiotic 3pm"
Cuddy's handwriting, on the other hand, was very interesting; it was as though two spiders had run through an ink blotter and then proceeded to skate over the pages – completely incomprehensible!
"What? I'm not ambidextrous, okay?" she whined as she caught onto him smirking beside her. House simply stuck his hand out, waiting for her to surrender the book to him.
"You want to be my secretary now?" she asked perplexedly, pretending to ignore his outstretched arm; broken wrist or not, House didn't just offer to help unless there was something in it for him.
"Oh yes…" he growled seductively before being reduced to some painful coughing. He groaned and put on his best pleading face to entice his boss to hand over the loot; which she did with a large measure of unwillingness.
The little black book turned out to be nothing more than an hour by hour account of his med intake and frequent bouts of unconsciousness over the past couple of days.
"Hey…" he announced playfully, "someone's been spying on me"
"I think 'medical research' is a better term" Cuddy stated as she attempted to grab the book back; House had a very dangerous weapon in that and the pen he was also brandishing.
"Hiding behind potted plants in the clinic, concealing listening devices in my office – you weren't in disguise as that intern yesterday who wanted me to check out the rash on his-"
"No!" she cried, "I haven't been spying on you – no one has."
"I'm sure Cameron has…but that's something completely unrelated" he snorted, apparently amused at the thought.
"I don't think she'll be spying on you much longer – especially after you traumatised her in the clinic."
"I think 'aroused' is a more accurate term to describe what my fluffiest of subordinates was feeling in the clinic yesterday" House said, whilst busily writing in her little black book, "definitely not traumatised..."
"What are you doing?" she questioned, craning her neck to catch a glimpse of what libel he was committing her to. He didn't break in his writing but he placed his free hand over where he had written in a childish attempt at keeping her from reading it.
After a few more sentences, he surrendered the book into his boss' wary hands. She read the first line, and already had a complaint. "Dear Diary – House! Someone could read this!" she fumed.
"If you're getting upset about 'Dear Diary' – I suggest you read no further…" House winced in anticipation as she carried on regardless of his warning.
Cuddy skimmed through the rest, trying to ignore the various stick figures that were drawn in the margin – one particular stick woman was very well endowed in the cleavage area Cuddy noted, trying not to laugh.
She started again. "Dear Diary, my sadistic nature surpassed even my own expectations today, as I successfully managed to K.O my patient 3 minutes after he'd gotten out of bed'…House – that was an accident" she moaned half-heartedly.
She continued. "I did have some good points during the day, one particular high was when I managed to indulge in my cross dressing fantasy – although this was cut short by the patient regaining consciousness and putting a stop to that game…" Cuddy shot him a menacing look. "To top off an already unbelievable day, I managed to fit in yet another glimpse of the patient's urine – bonus!" she groaned as she read the conclusion – "I can only pray that tomorrow brings as much excitement."
"You haven't read the last bit" House reminded her.
"The bit that's in a speech bubble coming out of the stick man with the cane's mouth…" Cuddy confirmed warily.
"Yep" House grinned, more than happy with his handiwork; he fancied himself as quite the 'stick man artist'
"Err, 'Antibiotic 2 per 4 hour interval…Vicodin 2 per 4 hour interval…Score so far – Cuddy 1, House 3' three?" she frowned, "What's my one point for?"
"The accidentally making me collapse in complete agony this morning…"
"…and your points?"
"For getting you semi naked and into my pants all in the space of an hour…"
"You can't get three points for that" Cuddy pouted, completely oblivious to the fact that she knew nothing of how House's scoring system actually worked.
"You don't know what the other points are for yet…" he mumbled mysteriously after hacking out a few rib achingly excruciating coughs.
"You're hardly in any shape to be earning points" she chastised, watching his face go from a deep red blush, back to pale with a hint of fever on his cheeks. "Want some water?" she asked, which was quickly translated into 'are you okay?' by the guarded diagnostician.
"I'm fine – just watch TV now, would you?" he mumbled sleepily, "done my sociable bit for the evening; I've moved onto my anti-social bit…" he focussed on the television, his eyes drooping as the realisation that he was pretty exhausted hit him like a ton of bricks.
"Yeah – it was hard to distinguish between the two" Cuddy smirked as she pulled the blanket off of the floor and over herself. There was no point in even asking her patient if he wanted a share of the cover, he was already asleep. After an hour of watching TV, Cuddy was too.
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Cuddy awoke suddenly to the sound of her patient coughing roughly, she kept her eyes closed and savoured the moment between waking up and drifting back off to sleep.
After about ten minutes of snoozing gently, she opened her eyes; it was getting dark outside – the clock on the mantle piece clearly showed that it was coming up to 7pm.
She glanced across to the other occupant of the couch to find him back in a subterranean slumber.
Stretching out, she was alarmed to find that her cast had been attacked by a graffiti artist at some point during her four hour nap – she sighed as she saw his weapon of choice, her ballpoint pen. Several games of 'Tic - Tac - Toe' had been undertaken, as well as many more stick men and a bold statement of 'Property of G House'
"I suppose I can only blame myself for falling asleep in your company" she directed to the still figure beside her. Surprisingly, he didn't stir at all. Not even when she slapped him on the arm.
"House?" she said loudly, allowing a worried frown to envelope her features. She jumped up to face her, now apparently comatose, patent; she gently slapped his face in an attempt at getting any response. It worked.
She was rewarded with a groan as he seemed to snap out of his deep sleep; he opened his eyes, blinked a few times, then settled for glaring at her through heavy lidded eyes.
"What?" he croaked perplexed by her anxious look, but still not fully awake yet; he could just about feel the intense pain flooding back to him, his other unsolicited companion for the weekend.
He found it increasingly difficult to keep his eyes open with all the staring they seemed to be doing at each other at that particular moment; he let his head drop forward as he waited for her to continue.
Everything seemed to be a little blurry and distorted from his point of view; Cuddy watched as he swallowed, wincing as the burning in his throat magnified tenfold.
"I'm taking you back in" she stated as she reached over and put a hand to his head, feeling the uncomfortable heat radiating off him; something wasn't right, and she didn't need the extra hassle of an even sicker House to deal with.
House attempted to straighten up a little on the couch, trying to muster up enough energy to argue. He was alarmed to find that he couldn't even get the strength to sit up without support. 'This cannot be good' he thought as he gingerly threw the melted ice pack onto the floor in front of him, wincing as he found any movement was killing his back… 'Oh fuck – don't panic…oh shit!'
"You're not arguing" Cuddy noticed, which for some unknown reason, House felt the insane need to shake his head in confirmation of this – so he did, making himself look even more vacant.
"I think it's ruptured" he gasped in explanation as he made the mistake of pressing his fingers against where his right kidney was currently mutinying.
"What? Just like that?" there was no denying it from her incensed tone and angry expression; this was going to be his fault, no matter what he said to defend himself.
"It's been steadily getting worse since you ran into me this morning…I think the last fit of coughing did something – dislodged the ribs further…" there was more, Cuddy could see it coming. "I can't stand" and that wasn't even the half of it.
"You can't move, can you?" House gave her his version of a withering look in reply. "Are you having trouble breathing?"
"Yes" he sounded irritated now, not worried in the least.
"Why didn't you wake me?"
"Err, probably because I was on the verge of unconsciousness, or because it only just happened - pick one!" he snapped back; 'How the hell did you let it get this bad' he chided himself silently.
"Should I call Wilson?"
House seemed to think about this for a while; weighing up the pros and cons of calling his best friend apparently taking a lot of effort. "Yeah…but call the ambulance first"
"Sure" Cuddy managed to keep her cool all the way up the point where she entered the kitchen to retrieve the phone; she took a few deep breaths before she dialled the hospital switchboard, her heart racing like a freight train.
After organising the ambulance she dialled through to Wilson's office, hoping that he hadn't left for the day yet…he hadn't.
"Wilson – it's Cuddy"
"What's up?" he sounded apprehensive, probably imagining that she was ringing to let him know that she was quitting her babysitting stint.
"He thinks he's ruptured his right kidney" she said quickly, not even needing to explain who 'he' was.
"Are you coming in?" now Wilson sounded worried. "Do you need me to come and get you?"
"No – he's asked for an ambulance" Cuddy replied, hearing her words for the first time. 'He asked for an ambulance…that's got to be bad'
"So, what do you need me to do?" Wilson wasn't sure that he knew the course of action he was supposed to follow from here. Neither did Cuddy.
"I – uh…I'll see what he wants you to do" she said as she gathered up her bag on the crook of her elbow and returned to her patient. "House, do you want Wilson here?" she asked the unresponsive man on the couch.
He tried to reply but found the words wouldn't make it past his dry throat; he shook his head weakly as he put all of his concentration into breathing – although the prospect of being unconscious when the EMT's arrived was not without its appeal.
The last thing he wanted was to be put through the agony of a transfer with his boss looking on and moaning at him for being a stubborn idiot for about the eighth time that weekend…
TBC…