Chapter 18 - Pills
...
"Cuddy!" He said coming out of the bedroom, bare-chested and his shirt in one hand "I can't go to the hospital like this!" He added, watching the shirt in his own hand and then her.
Cuddy looked up and put her cup on the table looking at him with a questioning look.
"What's wrong with that?"
House looked at her with an exasperated look.
"It's ironed, Cuddy!" He said giving her a half-scowl.
Cuddy couldn't help but laugh, standing up and approaching him.
"I'll tell Theresa not to iron your shirts," she said, smiling, placing a hand on his chest and the other one on his shoulder "but ... no! You can't use it as an excuse to skip work" she added, looking into his eyes patting his shoulder with her hand.
"It's like shouting in Wilson's face that we're together" he said, embracing her and bending down to look for her lips.
"At best, it's like shouting in Wilson's face that you're with a woman. It doesn't have to be me!"
House looked at her with a look somewhere between exasperation and amusement.
"I was almost two months alone with you. Who else should it be?" He said, raising an eyebrow and wrapping her body with his arm drawing her more to himself and sucking her lip, then finding her tongue.
House's cell phone vibrated in his pocket and he checked the incoming message, taking a sip of beer straight from the bottle.
# Please tell me you left some Ibuprofen here somewhere. C. #
Why the hell did she keep to sign herself #C # ... he knew it was her!
"Problems?" Wilson asked, in turn taking a sip of his beer. House shook his head as he texted back.
# What's wrong? Are you sick? #
He glanced at Wilson and then again at his phone as the display lit.
# It's nothing. Don't worry. Have fun #
Her usual 'nothing'. A nothing that were obviously anything but nothing. She rarely call him while he was out. Ergo. That nothing wasn't a nothing.
# I'm gonna dump Wilson and come there #
"A patient. Problems with the therapy" He said looking up at Wilson and putting the phone back in his pocket.
...
It took him longer than expected to free of Wilson.
He stopped in front of Cuddy door, checking his pocket just to realize that he had used the key she kept under the pot a couple of days before and had then left it in his other pair of jeans.
He used the cane to knock on the door, hoping she could hear it.
The light in the hallway stayed off but it passed less than a minute before he heard the key turning in the lock.
Headache. A bad headache if she avoided turning the light on...
"Hey," she whispered, leaning on the door "Sorry..." she whispered looking up at him.
"Geez, Cuddy!" He said cupping her chin and looking into her eyes.
Pale and dark shadows under her eyes. And by the way she leaned on the door she could hardly stand.
"It's nothing. I just have a headache. And stomachache. And backache. Twelve times a year for almost thirty years... tomorrow I'll be better. I just ran out of painkillers..." she said smiling slightly.
She opened the door wider letting him enter and looked at him as he unzipped his leather jacket to take his pills bottle from his inside pocket.
He poured two in his palm as they went into the kitchen and handed them to her as she filled a glass with water.
"Did you eat something?" He asked watching as she swallowed those pills, slightly shaking her head.
"Thank you" she whispered leaning her head on his chest and embracing his waist with both arms.
"You're welcome," he said, kissing her hair and stroking her back with both hands "but you won't thank me when I'm the responsible of your ulcer" he said feeling her smile against his chest.
"C'mon... let's go to bed" he said still rubbing her back.
"Are you staying?" She asked, looking up and meeting his eyes.
"You didn't got what you've put yourself into yet, Cuddy" he said with the hint of a smile "You'll have to kick me out of your bed" he said, bowing his head down and looking for her lips in a tender kiss as she smiled in turn.
...
Cuddy watched as he unbuttoned his shirt. The pain pounding in her head made thinking difficult, but she couldn't look away from his fingers as he unbuttoned those buttons one by one, letting them slid out from each buttonhole, then letting the shirt slid from his shoulders, tossing it on the chair near the dresser, before beginning to undo his jeans.
"I'm starting to think you're an hallucination," she said looking into his eyes "Maybe actually I'm still in that bed in the Philippines" she added, stroking his stubble and savoring the feeling of his hand on her hip while his thumb stroked her almost imperceptibly. House didn't answer, just continuing to look into her eyes, but smiling slightly, then finding her lips. He felt her lips touching his before she stopped, inhaling deeply and leaning on him.
"...everything spins" she whispered, bowing her head and resting her forehead on his lips.
"Ok... come" he said, holding her as he helped her to lie down, then laying down under the sheets beside her.
He let her close her eyes in the silence of the room, simply laying beside her. He had some experience of pain. Of those moments where the only thing you want is someone near you, not suffocating you. Except that generally he was alone. For how many women had he done that? Being with a woman taking pleasure only from being near her. Nothing else.
Stacy? Yes, with her yes. Falling asleep holding her in his arms after making love... the pleasure of falling asleep together in a mix of endorphins and sweat and tiredness... yeah, but... it wasn't the same now... here there weren't any endorphins freed from an orgasm. Here there was no sweat... there was no sex... there was just her. She was the pleasure. And the pleasure was to be near her. Be there with her. Period.
...
Cuddy opened her eyes.
One of those mornings when you don't know what day it is, where you are and very nearly who you are.
She looked at the alarm clock. 8 a.m. Either the alarm hadn't rung or it was Saturday. But she had the strange feeling that, no, it wasn't Saturday.
She ran a hand on her forehead, turning around in the bed. The bed was unmade and the pillow was rumpled in a way in which only House could rumple it. And she smiled at that thought, reaching for the pillow and hugging him. He wasn't there anymore, but his scent was. And his jeans were still on the chair next to the dresser, along with his shirt.
She sat up on the bed, running her hand again on her forehead. The headache was almost completely gone, but she couldn't say the same of dizziness... God ... how long she didn't eat? She had to get out of bed... but first she had at least to be sure she could do it.
"Good morning"
House's voice made her look up and she met his gaze.
"Are you feeling better?" He asked, with the hint of a smile as she nodded.
He sat down on the bed beside her and kissed her lightly on the lips, then placing on the bed the plate in his hand. Scrambled eggs. And fruit.
"The only thing I found in your kitchen," he said handing her a glass of orange juice and simultaneously letting two Ibuprofen pills fall in her other hand.
He watched as she swallowed them with a long sip of orange juice. And pushed the plate toward her.
"There was cereal in the pantry," she said, taking a forkful of eggs.
"That isn't cereal, Cuddy!" He said with a half-ironic half-amused look "It's sawdust, disguised as cereal!"
She couldn't help but laugh, taking another forkful of eggs but bringing them closer to House's lips, before taking another forkful for herself.
Was it this? Living together? It seemed so natural...
"I have to phone Trisha" She said, looking at her watch "You shouldn't have let me sleep late" She said giving him a half-scowl that, however, turned into a smile.
"Don't be workaholic. You almost passed out last night" he said glancing at her, in turn with a reproachful glare.
"I didn't pass out, House" she replied holding his stare.
"That's why I said almost, Cuddy" she replied with the same tone.
She couldn't hold back a smile and pulled him to herself, looking for his lips and then for his tongue.
"I have to take a shower ... get dressed... and go to work," she said on his lips "And... you too" she added as he smiled.
God! He wanted to join her in that shower! They would have also optimized time. Well, no! Definitely not optimized! He shook off that thought. Better to think of something else. He watched her as she walked out of the bathroom. Brush-haired. Already fully dressed. And he smiled, biting his lip. Why did he have the vague feeling that she had thought the same?
"Are you gonna give me two extra hours in the Clinic for the delay?" He asked with a vaguely mischievous look putting an arm around her waist and pulling her closer.
"Maybe I can make an exception," she said with a smile on his lips.
...
She met his eyes as he nonchalantly entered the front door of PPTH. Blue backpack on one shoulder. Unzipped leather jacket. Very late.
"House!" She called, as the two nurses behind the counter looked up at her and then in House's direction "In my office" she added, glancing at the smug smiles on those same nurses' faces while they pretended to go back to look at their documents.
"Are you keeping up appearances?" He whispered behind her as she opened her office door.
"Yes" she replied, turning and putting her arms around his neck as soon as she closed the door behind him.
She looked for his tongue and he let her explore his mouth in a long, slow, deep kiss.
"I think tomorrow I'll be late again," he said with a smile on her lips and a mischievous look "You... should take a page out of me."
"Go to work!" She said on his lips but unable not to smile as he gently cupped her ass, then walking out from her office.
She shook her head slightly, watching him walking away with the same nonchalance with which she had seen him entering the main door of the hospital.
He continued to surprise her. Always and inevitably.
And she shook her head again, smiling and biting her lip as she took from her purse the still intact blister of twenty-eight small pills where only half an hour before he had made her find yet another note.
He hadn't said anything about that. She didn't even know why she had bought it. She hadn't taken the first pill yet... basically she still had twelve hours to think about it. And... certainly she hadn't forgotten his proposal... Knowing him she knew that he had smiled at that "change" of contraception... but he hadn't comment it. He had simply left that note.
Actually she should have been annoyed because he had rummaged in her purse... but again she wasn't.
* Sometimes it's not so bad to be late, Cuddy *