Chapter eleven- Spring.

"Oh, come on!" House was really starting to get annoyed. Cameron had realised that she had 'special things' left in her car, and she had darted off leaving him to 'watch out for her'. He had no idea what Cameron thought was going to happen to her in the five minutes it would take for her to accomplish her mission, but he stood outside in the freezing cold air anyway, watching as much as he could of his employee as she reached a little car he couldn't see. He was annoyed, not because he had been instructed to be her bodyguard for the next few minutes, but because snow had started to fall and his leg hurt like hell.

Sure enough, a few minutes later Cameron came wandering back; clearly still not quite the full quota as it took her a few moments to remember where House was.

"It's snowing!" She exclaimed as she approached her boss.

"Your powers of observation astound me. Get in the car."

As they sat together, House started the heating but not the engine in his corvette. They remained silent for a moment.

"I love the snow. It's so romantic" She said absentmindedly, staring out of the windscreen as the cars headlights illuminated the falling flakes.

"Great. I thought you said the cool air cleared your head."

"It does, can't I express my thoughts about romantic situations when I'm with my boss? Is it some sort of office taboo?"

He didn't answer, but instead asked:

"So what was so special that you had to make me stand guard whilst you went to get it?"

She rolled her eyes at him and sighed.

"CDs and stuff. They're in my bag now"

"Stuff?"

"Nothing you'd be interested in."

"Everything interests me."

"Not this. And not EVERYTHING interests you."

"Everything about you interests me."

She went silent, slightly taken aback, but he didn't say anything more. He just started up the engine and sped out of the parking lot.

As they approached the turning to her apartment, she came to the realisation that she would need her car tomorrow, pretty early on. House informed her that there was no chance in hell that he would be getting up early to collect her from her apartment AND drive her across town for her to get her car. This was how it came about that Allison Cameron packed a small bag and wound up on the way to Houses townhouse with him. They had decided that she would sleep on the couch, he in the bed, and he could drop her off near Hansen's a little later as he didn't need to make a detour to her apartment first.

Neither understood why they felt uncomfortable. Cameron had spent many a night round at Chases, or vice versa, crashed out on his sofa until late on a Saturday morning. It wasn't like House was a stranger to having a friend on his sofa, either. Both doctors sat having a silent inward debate, that if they were just friends then there was no problem. House couldn't help but think that Wilson would be eating his words right now. This just proved that House could handle his emotions, without resorting to sleeping with the very object of his affections. Showing ten times more self control than his best friend ever did.

He knew she was asleep pretty much as soon as she lay down. Her breathing became far heavier and deeper. He couldn't help but smirk at Steve when he heard her mutter something incoherent in her dreams. He walked through to the living room, and sure enough, the hot cocoa he had made for her had been finished and her toiletries bag and clothes were strewn across the room. He sure wasn't going to pick them up. He looked at her, snuggled under the coverlet, eyes smudged with black makeup which she hadn't completely removed.

Why the hell does she look so at home? He thought. Damn that girl, even I think she looks sweet. Pathetic. What am I going to do now? Go to bed. But, what if she wakes up and pukes? Well, she can clean it up.

By the time the townhouse was completely silent, the snow was thin on the ground, but rising. Biting cold wind whipped stray icy flakes around the buildings of Princeton, and the sky as a midnight blue. Outside, the weather signified the epitome of winter, but inside the only season the mood could have represented, was spring. A long awaited awakening from a long sleep. Both doctors dreamed of the other.