11.

Idly at times in the past Cuddy had wondered what it would be like, being with House - the man could be impossible, and that was just at work. Sometimes she'd found herself pitying Stacy and the women who'd come before her, for what they must have had to put up with.

Now she was discovering for herself what it involved as she sat in her underwear, surrounded by rumpled bedclothes and Chinese take-out boxes, with him beside her flicking through late night programming in between shovelling lo mein in his mouth.

Of course, even taking into account all his big-boy toys and habits, his more shallow tendencies and comments, House was just such a mad genius it was sometimes hard to remember that underneath the eccentricities and incredible intellect he was really just another man. Give him sex, food, and television, in that order, and he was happy.

And if he was a typical guy, then she was most definitely a typical girl, because while he was happily munching and clicking away, she was sitting here thinking about what it all meant.

Truthfully though there really wasn't any point comparing this to what he must have been like with Stacy, she reflected. That had been a relationship; this was not. She didn't know what it was they were doing, exactly, but it was definitely not dating or anything of the sort. They weren't a couple. That would be insane.

"Completely insane," she muttered down into her carton of rice.

"Not until it starts answering you back. Until then you're only slightly deranged," he said, and she looked over to see him watching her. "Do you always talk to your food?"

"Do you always talk with your mouth full?"

"No." He looked affronted, then stuffed another forkful in. "Aksually, yeph."

And this was going to be the father of her child. Wonderful. They could duke it out to see who was more mature. The kid would start winning once it learned to talk.

She poked unenthusiastically at her rice. Bland, simple food was good right now - she couldn't stand anything that had too strong a smell - but it was also pretty boring.

House had gone back to channel surfing, but spared her an irritated look as she heaved a sigh. "What?"

"Oh, just thinking about how much my life has changed recently," she said morosely. "You know, a few months ago I was at the top of my game, everything was going just the way it was supposed to. I'd just gotten an award telling me how great I was doing. And now look at me. I'm pregnant, about to put my career on hold to be a mother - something I have absolutely no idea how to do. And not to mention," she added with chagrin, "I'm here, in bed with you, eating leftovers at midnight. If you'd told me at the award presentation that night that this is where I'd end up - well, I wouldn't have had that fourth glass of champagne, that's for sure."

Having gotten that off her chest, she relaxed back against the headboard and dug back into her rice.

"You know what might help?" he said.

"What?"

He pointed and spoke with his mouth full again. "TV."

She raised an eyebrow at him. "Jay Leno will solve all my problems."

"He's interviewing Cameron Diaz tonight."

"Oh, well that's different." She rolled her eyes and ate a few forkfuls, dividing her attention between him and the show. "So what is it, the legs?"

"You are so shallow. She happens to be a skilled conversationalist."

At that moment on the screen, the actress was talking about the pains she'd taken to chose her outfit for the show.

"I can see that," she drawled. Setting the carton down on the nightstand, she reached down to the end of the bed and grabbed a t-shirt that was hanging over the footboard. She slipped it on as she got out of bed. "I'm getting some water."

"I'll have a beer, since you offered."

"I didn't."

"Well that was rude of you!" His voice followed her out of the room as she made her way to the kitchen.

It took her longer than expected to find a glass, fill it with water, and then discover that there wasn't actually any beer in the fridge - since she was temporarily distracted by the large cage sitting on the counter. Or more specifically, by what was living inside the cage.

She made her way back to the bedroom and stopped in the doorway. "You don't have any beer," she said. "Do you want something else?"

He put the carton of Mongolian beef he'd been working on to the side and gestured for her to hand over her water instead, which she did after taking another mouthful herself. He finished it off, put the empty glass down, only to turn back and catch her wrist as she climbed back into bed, pulling her towards him.

"I really need to get this off you," he said, tugging at the hem of the t-shirt. "You're getting girl-germs all over it."

She let him pull it off over her head, watching as he balled it up and sent it sailing across the room. "As opposed to the floor-germs it's picking up now?" she pointed out as his hands moved around her waist.

"I'm counting on the dust-bunnies to rise up against the invading cootie hordes," he said as if it should have been self-explanatory.

"You're worried about cooties, meanwhile there's a rat living in your kitchen?"

"Met Steve, did you?" he said distractedly, more interested in kissing her bare shoulder.

"If you mean, did I notice the great big rodent cage when I walked right past it, yes, I did. What are you doing with a rat?"

"I can't have a pet?"

His mouth reached the curve of her neck and she tilted her head to the side, even as she frowned slightly. "You... can. But where did it come from?"

He hummed thoughtfully against her skin. Apparently the question required some deliberation. Finally he shrugged. "Pet store?"

"You don't know where it came from?" She drew away, ducking to catch his eye but he just pulled her down beside him with an arm around her waist, burying his face in her chest.

"It's a long story," he mumbled eventually.

"Fine, I don't really care anyway." She sighed, fingers teasing idly through his hair. "You know, just last year I was thinking about getting a cat. But then I decided it was too much responsibility."

He didn't say anything and there was quiet for a moment. Then her shoulders began to shake, and the hands in his hair went to cover her mouth.

"A cat!' she gasped out. "A cat was too much responsibility." She rolled away from him, overtaken by a wave of helpless laughter.

Sitting up beside her, he watched her warily. "You're getting hysterical. That means I get to slap you. The question is, where?"

She was only half listening to him, pressing her lips together tight, trying to stifle her giggles. But she caught the gist of it, and it occurred to her that if she didn't do something, she was going to get hysterical. Or possibly burst into tears.

Her amusement fading, she rolled over towards him, managing to catch his hand just as it was aiming for her ass. "I'm fine. Thank you."

"Just checking," was his unapologetic response.

She used her grip on his wrist to push him down onto his back, and draped herself across his chest as she kissed him long and deep, enjoying the way his hands moved up her back and into her hair. Maybe this wasn't the smartest, most responsible way to deal with her problems, but it certainly wasn't unpleasant.

The sound of the audience laughing uproariously drew his attention momentarily, and his mouth slid away from hers as he glanced up at the television. "You don't mind if I call you Cameron, do you?"

"Yes. I do. A lot." She raised up to swing her leg over his body and straddle him, then leaned back down to return her mouth to his.

"Kind of an awkward name," he reflected as she pressed kisses along his prickly jaw.

"You think?"

His hands retraced their path down her back, coming to settle on her hips, where she covered them with her own.

"Hope they're not to bony for you."

"My dear Miss Diaz, all the best bulimic stars have bony hips."

"Do you want me to leave you two alone?" she demanded.

"Cameron's a wild child - she'd definitely be up for a threesome. Hang on, which Cameron are we talking about now?"

"I think this would go a lot better if you'd stop talking altogether," she said, and then, once she'd located the remote and switched off the TV, she set about making him far too busy to speak.

Later, she moved to lie beside him as her breathing slowed and the sweat began to dry on her skin.

She suspected he was starting to fall asleep as she stared up at the ceiling and the silence stretched out between them. With nothing else to occupy her attention, her thoughts began to crowd back in on her.

"This isn't going to be a thing, you know," she said into the quiet. "It can't be. We'd have to be crazy, right?"

"Guess that depends what your definition of 'thing' is," he muttered. "Also your definition of 'crazy', 'this', and 'right'."

"I mean we can't get involved. And I know you're going to say that this is fairly involved already, but you can't tell me you're looking for a relationship here. It would just be too easy to confuse the issue."

He dug the heels of his hands into his eyes. "Listening to the wheels grinding around in your head all the time is very annoying and un-hot."

"That's all you have to say?"

"All right, yes, we're making a grand effort out of not dealing with the big scary issue here, but you're the only one confusing things. It's not a big deal. It's just sex."

"Just sex?"

"Yep."

"'Just sex' is how we got into this mess in the first place."

"Well some people just never learn. We should stop this right now or you might get even more pregnant. You just said yourself you don't want to be involved," he reminded her.

"I don't."

"Good. You'll be surprised at how well I can do the just sex thing. Tell you what, I'll roll over and pretend to sleep so you can do the walk of shame out of here."

She sighed and pushed herself into a sitting position. "You don't have to pretend to sleep. I should go, anyway."

He just watched her for a moment. "I'm hardly going to beg you to stay - that would violate the terms of the official just sex guidelines - but..." he hesitated, lifting his eyes to the ceiling, "you know, if you wanted to..."

"I know." She smiled ruefully as she started gathering her clothes together. "But I won't want to drive home first thing in the morning when I will most likely be feeling nauseous as hell again."

"Good, I don't really want you hurling in my bathroom. I was just being nice."

"Twice in one day? You're getting soft in your old age."

"Excuse me, soft? Wanna come back over here and say that?"

She grinned at the challenge in his voice, and found that she did want to. The thought of climbing back into bed was a far more appealing prospect than the drive home along empty streets, back to her empty house.

But practicality won out. It was late and she had morning sickness and work to look forward to when she woke up in just a few hours. Still, it was tempting.

Almost too tempting, she thought as she finished getting dressed and saw herself out.