A/N: I'm so bored with the current season of House that I'm just doing my own thing now. It makes it hard to even get into my own writing when I just don't care anymore. Oh well, I'm not a quitter and so I will finish this story to the best of my ability.

Enjoy.

As always, I own nothing.

Chapter 11: Pay Attention

"I can't believe House will go this far to humor a child!" Victoria sighed as she sat next to Chase, their patient well on her way to a successful scan with nothing conclusive showing up, as the machine scanned her brain frame by frame.

"What if Rachel is right?" Chase asked. "We've seen stranger symptoms and then a child will have shown up four highly trained professionals! We'll never hear the end of it. House will have a field day."

"And yet we aren't seeing anything," Victoria stated. "Is this punishment for our tardiness?" she asked and leaned back and swiveled in her chair. "We should have just stayed at my place today."

"Probably," Chase answered.

"Alright, but House should have separated us because this just gives us further opportunity to continue our previous conversation. What is he playing at?"

"He might think that we'll sleep together and then there will be more entertaining drama when the relationship falls apart." Chase sighed.

"You think he's looking for a repeat performance? That doesn't seem like his style."

"Maybe he thinks its mine. House is fascinated by anything that is routinely screwed up, including a person's routine." Chase tried to explain.

"You use the same routine all the time?" Victoria asked somewhat intrigued.

"Clearly you find it fascinating too!"

"No, I'm fascinated by the idea that you think House thinks we could make it far enough to make your crumbled relationship with another doctor become a 'routine', not so much fascinated by the play boy routine of another girl every other night, and I doubt that is what House finds fascinating as its his own, or rather, was his own routine up until he and Cuddy hooked up." Victoria explained.

"I'm done with dating doctors," Chase stated, "too much competitiveness. Really what I want I can get on the every other night basis and I don't have to deal with the nagging or the relationship slips and stumbles."

"So a different girl every other night, coupled with alcohol and your need to indulge in carnal lust is better than possibly finding someone that will not have a competitive nature and who could actually make you happy because, pardon me for assuming, but I don't think you are happy at all with what you are doing. You are going to go through life in a destructive manner and then what will you have to show for it?" She asked, "You'll leave behind a legacy of being a gigolo and a better, more brilliant, Doctor's sidekick!"

"Everybody dies, so why shouldn't I live a little first?" Chase asked. "And you're a lackey too!"

"Oh honey, you are so screwed up. That is not living, its simply pacifying one of your many needs, and not really pacifying because it's meaningless. If anything its just killing you a little faster then you would have done naturally. And it's not dealing with your other human needs, which is causing your jaded outlook on life."

"So you're here to be my shrink now, or are you here to save a woman's life?" Chase snapped. "Did House put you up to this? Is he watching right now?"

"I'm not shrinking anything, if I'm doing anything at all its boosting your need for self indulgence because you believe that you don't care what other people think so you're going to go off and do whatever you want, but I'm willing to wager that you sit around drowning in your own self loathing on your off days until you just can't take it anymore and you either try to contact your ex just to have some contact with your past and who you once were, or you self medicate with alcohol and run off to find your next conquest. But, you won't feel any better after it and you know that!" Victoria said as she watched Chase very carefully and his eyes never left the computer screen. "She played with you didn't she, your ex I mean."

"Why do you care?"

"Because it's fascinating," Victoria admitted. "My guess is that sex was the building block of your relationship, the foundation if you will, and it should have never become a relationship if it was simply built on sex. That would explain why sex, for you, is nothing more than a ritual to kill the urges and you are jaded toward women in general."

"You're right." Chase sighed.

"About the sex or the jadedness?"

"Both."

"Fascinating!" Victoria smiled and swiveled back toward her screen.

"Not really, it's kinda messed up," Chase sighed.

"Do you even know how to have a meaningful relationship?"

"Probably not," He admitted. "My childhood was shit, I was non-committal while studying to be a priest and I was wild in medical school because I was away and on my own for the first time in my life without someone breathing down my neck. My marriage failed, I probably failed because it should have never happened in the first place and now I am back to destructive, dangerous behaviors because everything is so unbelievably tangled in my head."

"You see it then?"

"Of course I do," Chase stated and turned away from the computer screen for the first time, "do you think that ill of me to believe me completely heartless and devoid of human emotions?"

"If House can be a kind and gentle father figure to Rachel, you can have a meaningful relationship if someone is willing to take the time to teach you how it ought to be." Victoria smiled, "I know you're not heartless, but I can guarantee I would not be sleeping with you until I knew you could be committal and that you were clean, which I have a hard time believing at this point!"

"My tests have all been negative," Chase smirked.

"I'd like to see that!" Victoria smiled. "Alright back to work!" she stated as she turned back to her computer and jumped.

"What is that?"

"How did we miss that?" she asked and pointed at the screen and a location that looked like swelling in the patient's brain.