Cameron had been lucky. That day in the bathroom, she'd had cervical contractions and bleeding but didn't miscarry. Sarah Kishore ordered a daily dose of progesterone and three weeks' bedrest to ensure that the fetus made it to the end of the first trimester.
Immediately after being discharged from obstetrics, Cameron approached Cuddy about taking three weeks' sick leave.
"I'll give you your three weeks," Cuddy said, "if you let me speak my mind for a second."
Cameron gritted her teeth; her jaw shifted a bit. "Go on."
"What you're doing – what you and Wilson are doing – isn't fair."
"Thank you for the sick leave, Dr. Cuddy."
For the next three weeks, Wilson would stop by every other day to make her two days' worth of dinner so that she wouldn't have to spend too much time on her feet. Some nights, he'd eat with her and they'd talk unmorbidly about dead lovers. House was wrong, she told Wilson one evening: he thought she'd married a dying man because she felt an overwhelming need to take care of sick people, but in actuality, she felt an overwhelming need to take care of sick people because she'd married a dying man.
On weekends, her parents drove in from Central Pennsylvania to be with her. She finally admitted to them that House, not Chase, was the father. They'd suspected that it wasn't Chase, since Chase was already living in Philadelphia with his new wife, whose green card was on the way.
Then, three days before the end of her term of bedrest, she opened the door for House, the one person who hadn't come to visit her in her apartment before today.
"I wish I knew how to short circuit an elevator," she said.
"Some of us cripples can climb stairs." House let himself in and pointed his cane at her. "Bedrest. Why aren't you in bed?"
"You know bedrest doesn't mean –"
"Off your feet."
"Don't order me around," she snapped, but sat on the sofa and curled her feet in under her body nevertheless.
"Because I have no right to order you around?" His blue eyes flared for a moment, but his look quickly softened – as much as House could "soften" – when he sat beside her.
Tentatively, he reached out and rubbed her lower back. "There's a lot of pressure on your kidneys?"
"Hm. Maybe."
"With your low BP, you –"
"Shut up, House."
He continued to rub her back and she didn't protest, until she felt the need to ask him why he was there.
"Consult," he answered.
"Foreman called yesterday about Mr. Brennan. I still think it's an immunological response to something that's not an allergy. You can't have taken on another patient since then. Two patients at a time is way too much of a workload for you."
"We're running a postmortem diagnosis on a forty-eight year-old man who's been dead for months but for some reason still shows up at work every day."
She turned around and lightly touched his arm. He offered her a half-hearted semi-smile.
"Allison?"
"What?"
"You're an idiot." She knew him well enough not to be insulted. "You'll have a hundred chances to have a baby in the next ten years, but you're choosing to have mine."
"It was the right time," was all she said.
He sucked on his lower lip, staring intently at her. "It's … it's mine, isn't it?"
Before she could figure out how (or whether) to answer him, the doorbell buzzed. Cameron sauntered over to the intercom, her long blue track pants sweeping the floor.
Wilson was downstairs. He'd been to see her the day before; she wasn't expecting him today.
House went for the door.
"He's already downstairs, and there's only one way out," Cameron said. "If you have to avoid him, hide in the closet."
"You're still an idiot. You won't –"
Before he could finish that thought, he found himself face-to-face with Wilson.
Wilson set a bag of groceries on the counter. "What are you doing on your feet," he asked Cameron, eyeing House suspiciously.
"I had to answer the intercom," she said.
"I'll see you back at the factory next week," House mumbled, heading for the door. "Thanks for the consult."