"What the –" Cameron jumped as House pressed his stethoscope to her now-apparent baby bump when they were alone in the boardroom one afternoon.
"You've got terrible gas, Dr. Cameron," he said. "I'd avoid open flames if I were you."
"You're so sophomoric. And that could be the baby kicking."
"Cool." He slid the stethoscope up to the left side of her chest. "Wait for it … wait for it … THUNK!"
"Please don't narrate my heartbeats."
Foreman burst in with a patient file but paused for a moment to survey the scene. If he'd been worried about becoming House, Cameron had it much worse.
"We have two six-week-old infants, next door neighbors, instant deaths within a day of each other. Cuddy wants you on this."
"SIDS and coincidence," House offered.
"No respiratory failure."
"Pulmonary hemorrhage?" Cameron suggested. "Those kids in Ohio during the floods in the early 90s –"
"Were all from lower-middle-class families who couldn't afford to clean the mold out of their water-logged basements." Foreman seated himself at the head of the table. "And besides, there's no pulmonary hemorrhage, edema, scarring, anything."
"Okay, then," House said, "take Kutner with you and –"
"I answer to Cuddy, not you," Foreman reminded him.
"Foreman, go shove your thumb up Cuddy's ass and send Kutner and Thirteen to look for environmental causes. Cameron, you start thinking immunological."
"There's only so much you can do with a dead patient," she said.
"Tell that to the janitor who got fired last month."
Cameron rolled her eyes but cracked a smile.
At four o'clock, after she'd collected tissue samples from the infants, she went downstairs for the ultrasound that Sarah Kishore had ordered.
"No contractions?" Sarah asked, running the probe over Cameron's abdomen and pelvis.
"No, just mild muscle pain in my lower back, and constant peeing. Speaking of which, my bladder is really full right now."
"We need your bladder full to see the uterus clearly."
"Really full, Sarah."
"I'll still eat lunch with you if you accidentally pee on my exam table." Her eyes were fixed on the screen. "You want to know the sex?"
"Sure. You know already?"
"It always depends on the fetus' position," Sarah said. "Right now, I clearly see labia."
"A girl … can I pee now?"
After emptying her bladder, Cameron took a seat in Sarah's office. "You're okay otherwise?" Sarah asked. "With the non-medical aspects of your pregnancy?"
"Wilson's been a huge help."
"Good. And if there's anything else …"
"Can I pick your brain with a diagnostics question?"
"That's not what I meant, but, sure."
"Do you know of any prenatal factors that could lead to the sudden death of two unrelated six-week-olds who live next door to each other?"
"There are environmental factors – mold, bacteria, animal diseases – that could have come into play, but the parents and neonatologists would have noticed symptoms immediately after birth. If it weren't so coincidental, I'd say you have two babies with similar genetic diseases."
"Hm. Thanks … I'll have to look into that."
"Take care of yourself, Allison. Seriously."
Cameron nodded and left Sarah's office to return to the lab. On her way there, she met Cuddy in the hallway. Cuddy had been looking for her.
"Dr. Cameron," she said, "you're needed in pediatrics. There's a third baby."