Hey guys! Thanks for all the reviews and compliments, I appreciate them so much - and honestly, I'm so so sorry [SYD] I know how frustrating Luddy is, it didn't particularly enjoy writing it but I really feel it's necessary to an extremely key part in the story which is still to come, so I hope you'll forgive me for it. I've been really conscious about losing readers actually, because of all the Luddy content, but I'm hoping you guys will stick it out - if you do, I promise you'll be rewarded.
Shameless plug in the next sentence, but very recently I read the whole of After the Bombs by partypantscuddy , which you should all go and read if you haven't already, and in a couple of the chapters she gave small teasers to the future of the fic that didn't give anything away, but it was just nice to read so I'm going to give it a go. Please tell me if you like the idea and want me to throw it in again, or if you don't like it!
To wet your appetites, I can tell you that although the coming chapters are filled with various arguments and one cliffhanger ending, look out for a familiar face's first appearance and some extreme resolving of tension!
Okay, I've rambled on for long enough now, so I'll let you get on and read the next chapter. I'd be ever so grateful if you could keep leaving me reviews, they make me smile endlessly! :D And also, seen as this is the longest chapter yet by a mile, I think I deserve them! xxxxxxxx
IX
"Morning my little cherubs, I think you will find that during my waking hours when I left work last night, I discovered what was wrong with the patient."
It was very rare that House came in at the time that his contract stated; that was far too early to expect a genius like him to get out of bed, but on the other hand, today he was unusually late, even by his own standards when Cuddy wasn't on hand to berate him. Even if he thought he could get away with flouting every rule she put in place to restrain him when she wasn't here to enforce them, their patient was still dying and usually the possibility of that happening before he diagnosed them would torture him. And if he'd known the diagnosis since last night, why was he so late? He'd waited until after lunch to grace them with his presence only to tell them that the case was over anyway. It was strange, because House was a creature of habit and this was definitely out of character.
Each one of his fellows were mulling over these very same thoughts but with their own inflections on them, but it was Taub who broke the silence and replied to them, bringing everyone back to earth and reality. "…Go on then…"
House had been getting impatient when no one seemed interested in the fact that he'd just solve a medical miracle almost in his sleep without looking at the patient file in hours, without having his team there to bounce ideas off and without having met the patient at all, so he was relieved when Taub invited him to explain this amazing occurrence. "Can you smell the patient's pee from four rooms away?"
At this, the other two members of the team raised their eyebrows, but Foreman didn't react at all. He was too used to his boss showing off and asking ridiculous questions that are supposed to mean something. "No, his urine smells normal, he's barely peeing at all, what's your point?" His expression didn't change at all and he looked thoroughly bored. He especially hated the hospital when Cuddy wasn't around because that meant House ran completely riot and rode him more than ever, and it also meant that he was left to be House's Cuddy. Not the object of his sexual fantasies part, just the conscience and the disciplining part.
"Well, Dr. Foreman, my point is, the patient has a spinal cord abscess." Sitting down at the end of the table, he watched his fellow as expressionlessly as he was watching him.
Foreman clearly didn't agree with this diagnosis and when he replied, his voice was sceptical and sarcastic. "That all the imaging all the other doctors have done has missed, and that the antibiotics haven't cleared? What is this, some super abscess, impervious to drugs?"
Tutting comically, and doing a silent impression of Foreman complaining about his ddx, House answered. "No, that would be stupid, wouldn't it. The abscess could be hiding behind its own swelling, and broad spectrum antibiotics doesn't get rid of all infections, especially not fungal infections as Dr. Cuddy so kindly pointed out to me last night when I called her. Start him on corticosteroids to reduce the inflammation and schedule him for surgery." And with that, House got up to go in to his inner office.
Before he could leave, Thirteen spoke quickly, quite shocked. "You called Dr. Cuddy? I thought she was having a weekend break with her daughter? Surely she wasn't at all impressed by that?"
House turned to answer her and did some very quick thinking. "Oh, no, she was grateful I called, she'd been begging me to for hours. Rachel was stressing her out and she needed someone to help her release all that pent up stress…"
"You talked about antibiotics and fungal infections whilst having phone sex? Yeah, that's a real turn on…" Taub rolled his eyes disbelievingly and turned away; resting his head against the glass table and waiting for the conversation to finish so they could actually go and get on with being doctors.
Thirteen personally agreed with Taub, therefore completely ignored their boss' response and moved on to her actual point. "Well, we can't just cut him from neck to tail bone and go searching for an abscess on his spine that we don't even know exists and possibly paralyse him, just because you say so."
Managing to make himself look pleasantly surprised by that fact, House paused for a second as if he were thinking. "Nope, I'm pretty sure you can. All you need to do is explain to the patient that if he doesn't agree to the surgery he will be paralysed, where as if he does agree to the surgery there's only a small chance he will be paralysed, and how small that chance is depends on how good his surgeon is. That sounds pretty simple to me."
"We have to get Cuddy's permission, you know that. So it's going to have to wait until she gets home tomorrow night."
House put his hand in the pocket of his jacket and brought out his cell phone, toying with it in the palm of his hand. "No, it doesn't have to wait. I'll just give her a call and get her to sanction the surgery." And House again turned to walk away but this time managed to get in to his inner office before anyone else started to talk.
"You also know that you can't just get her permission over the phone, she'd going to have to come in and sign the papers, and possibly even observe the surgery. Can't you just leave her be for this one weekend? Surely there are alternatives we can try until she comes back tomorrow. We can even run an actual differential diagnosis rather than taking your word for it that it's a spinal cord abscess, rather than jumping straight in to central nervous system surgery." However, Thirteen got up to follow him and spoke quickly as she caught the door that he let go on her and pushed her way in to the office too. She marginally felt sorry for Cuddy, who was here every possible waking moment she could be and deserved at least a weekend off more than anyone she knew.
Sitting back in his office computer chair and spinning it around so he could rest his legs on the corner of his desk, House looked deeply unconcerned as he answered. "Well, if you insist on me calling Dr. Cuddy and getting her to come in to sign another lot of forms and then even observe the surgery, then okay, that's what I'll do. I'll make sure she's aware of your deep concern for the patient and no qualms about disturbing her weekend of peace." And he picked up the telephone receiver on his desk and began to dial.
Thirteen rushed over to his desk when she saw what he was doing and immediately cut off the call. "No, don't call her and especially don't blame me. I don't think you should and regardless of whether I had told you that or not, you still would have called her. Just leave her be, for once."
"Okay, fine, I'll wait." House put the receiver back in its cradle then sat back in his chair again with his fingers clasped and looked at her perfectly innocently. "You've done your moral duty to protect her from me now; you have no other obligation to stay. Not that I know why you felt like you had any obligation to her in the first place but I can only assume it's a case of women stick together, female solidarity and all that. So go on, go and deal with the patient that you care so much about." And he gestured her towards the door.
Without moving, Thirteen watched him defiantly. "You're going to call her as soon as I leave the room anyway, aren't you?"
"Yes, and unfortunately for you Dr. Hadley, you can't stand there all afternoon, and all evening, so I suggest you don't waste any more time and go and attend to our patient. Go!"
Thirteen tried her best not to scowl because she was afraid she would look like a toddler who hadn't got her own way and stalked back in to their outer office, making no secret of the fact she was highly annoyed. She gestured to her colleagues with a stony jerk of her head and they followed her down the corridor, presumably to the patient's room.
Only then did he once again pick up the telephone receiver and dial his boss' cell phone number – he'd dialled it so many times for inappropriate and annoying reasons that he could recite it off by heart. The phone rang so many times before she finally picked up that he thought for a moment she was going to ignore him completely.
Cuddy's voice was sharp and cold, and she was making no attempt to disguise the fact that she was highly unimpressed by the fact that he was calling again. "What do you want, House? I told you not to call me again."
"And I told you not to kiss me again, that didn't stop you, did it? You know, when you just can't help yourself there's nothing you can do about it." He didn't know what made him say it but as soon as he heard her voice again he all the pain he'd tried to forget that she caused him yesterday and the sleepless night last night thinking of her had given him became an urge to make her tick.
She pressed the cell phone tightly to her ear and looked around fearfully, hoping she'd stepped far enough away from Lucas to take the call that he wouldn't have heard that dig. "If you're going to be an asshole, I'm going to turn my phone off. Just because you can't be happy yourself, it doesn't mean you have to make everyone around you miserable. Now was there actually something you wanted or are you just trying to ruin my day?" Her voice became a hiss, and she was clearly speaking through gritted teeth which he knew meant he was obviously pushing all of her buttons.
"As fun as that would have been, I actually have a medical reason for making this call. I want to look for a spinal cord abscess on his spine." He almost winced, even though there was nothing she could do to him from wherever she was, he knew her reaction would at least border on explosive.
"A spinal cord abscess? Have you taken leave of your brain, House? For starters if there was a spinal cord abscess, the antibiotics you've already given him would have treated it. And the ten other doctors he saw before you would have seen it on whatever imaging studies they did." Turning round to face her daughter and her boyfriend, she smiled at them both and Lucas caught her eye. He signalled to Rachel, and then to her changing bag, and then to the sign for the toilets, from which she interpreted that he was going to go and change Rachel's diaper. She nodded gratefully and silently mouthed 'thank you' at him, hoping he could lip read.
Casually spinning back and forth on his chair and tangling the telephone cord as he went, he countered her argument with ease, using the same justification he'd used on Foreman when he objected less than half an hour ago. "We've already established the fact that if the infection he has is a fungal infection; antibiotics are going to do absolutely nothing for him. And any doctor could have missed it on his imaging studies if it was hiding behind its own swelling. Any other objections?"
Cuddy bit down on her tongue hard to stop her making a sarcastic and biting retort because she could tell he was trying to wind her up, so he could watch her go. "Yes, I have a lot of other objections. House you're talking about surgery on his spine; this could paralyse him for life. You can't do exploratory surgery on something that dangerous on a hunch that you have no evidence whatsoever for. You need proof, what makes you think it's a spinal cord abscess anyway?" She braced herself for an extremely pathetic reason that only exacerbated his own ego.
"Erectile dysfunction, something that you probably know quite a lot about." And then House paused for a second and actually thought to himself. "Wait a minute, even my team didn't ask me that. Well that probably means they've just learnt to trust my gut instincts, maybe you should take a leaf out of their book."
Ignoring his comments, she pressed on, determined to keep this conversation as short as she possibly could as to not give him the satisfaction of knowing he was slowly ruining her weekend. "The patient admitted to erectile dysfunction?"
At that, he chose his words very carefully. "Not so much admitted, more like I summarised."
"Let me guess, you summarised from the fact that he's a good looking guy and there's been no female company in his room, therefore the only explanation for that is that there must be something wrong with him – something stopping him sowing his seed." She rolled her eyes – she didn't even need to hear it, in fact he'd become boringly predictable because she'd worked with him for so long.
"You say that like it isn't a valid assumption, Dr. Cuddy. He has a spinal abscess, there is no two ways about it and we can argue about it all you like but you know at the end of the day you're eventually going to agree with me and come back here and brief the patient and observe the surgery so can we just skip all the time in between because trust me I've got much more things I'd rather be doing than sitting alone in my office arguing with you about patient welfare."
He was using that voice that he knew infuriated her – he sounded so arrogant and so overly confident because he was so sure he was right about her, and even worse that she knew he probably was. But she was determined to prove him wrong. "I want proof House. Do the labs – they'll take twenty four hours to come back and by the time I'll be on my way back to Princeton therefore I'll sign whatever papers are necessary and tell the patient whatever he needs to know, providing that you're right." And she felt so decisive and strong at that point she went to hint the end call button when she heard him speak again.
"When do we ever get proof? We're doctors Cuddy, not lawyers. If you wait another 24 hours for the labs to come back and I'm right, I hope you have got a lawyer on hand though because I'll bet you he's going to want to sue if he ends up paralysed for the rest of his life because you didn't sanction the surgery in time. I'm as certain as we're going to get, and you've risked your career on madder ideas than this that I've given you." His voice was surprisingly softer as he spoke, completely in contrast to the tact he'd been taking with her only moments ago.
Appealing to her better nature caught her off guard and even though she knew exactly what he was doing – trying to play the guilt card – and she swore that it wasn't going to work, she could feel herself caving. "Fine, you can do the surgery tomorrow morning. I'll come back in the morning rather than in the afternoon, he can last another twelve hours."
Knowing that he'd finally got to her and once he got his foot in the door it would be easier to open it completely, he pushed her a little bit more. "No, he can't. I've already organised a surgical team who can perform the operation the moment you get here and deal with the administration, and the sooner we get this abscess out of him, the better."
"Fine." She said it before she engaged her brain and realised what she was agreeing to, and the moment her thoughts caught up with her mouth she regretted it. And what made her even angrier was the fact that she knew he'd completely and utterly played her, and she'd let him manipulate her even when it was staring her in the face. And now, not only was she going to suffer, so was Rachel, and she was going to have to explain to Lucas that he paid for a second night in the hotel for no reason.
"I knew you knew I was right." With that, he put the phone down before she had a chance to change her mind. He then got up out of his chair with a remarkable speed, with the intention of informing everyone he would need for the procedure that they'd be pulling an all nighter on Dr. Cuddy's say so, so even if she called him back it would be too late to cancel the surgery.
As she stared at her cell phone in her hand after he ended the call, she felt her skin burn hot and she felt tears well up in her eyes, making them prickly and sticky and her vision blurry. She didn't know why she was crying, this was something he did to her on a regular basis and although it more often than not made her extremely irate and angry, it had never once yet brought her to tears. In an attempt to dry her eyes and hide the tears, she dabbed them gently with the back of her hand and blinked a few times, and then saw her boyfriend emerge from the baby changing room pushing the pram with her daughter in, she smiled grimly and walked over to greet them. What made it even more heart breaking was the fact that there was a knowing look on Lucas' face, which told her he knew exactly what she was going to say before she even opened her mouth. It was such a regular occurrence in her life, he'd just got used to it. She knew that wasn't the way things should be, and she was trying to stop it, but couldn't help it. Especially now she felt so in his debt because they kissed, and he now knew she had been dating someone at the time.
Even though he knew what she was about to say, Lucas put his arm around Cuddy's shoulders and smiled gently at her. He wasn't going to say that he wasn't disappointed, because he was, but he knew this was the kind of life she led and if this is what it took to be with her, then he was more than happy to just put up with it.
They had decided it would be quicker for Lucas to drop her back off at PPTH on the way back from the petting zoo and he'd take Rachel and drive back to Spring Lake, repack all their suitcases and hand over their room key before bringing it all back to her house. As she walked into the lobby for the second time during her supposed weekend break, she had never resented the place as much as she did in that moment. Although she knew it wasn't the hospitals fault that she was there, it was House's; it still reminded her of somewhere she shouldn't be right then. This time, she didn't go directly for the elevator but instead into the clinic and straight in to her plush office. Immediately she threw her hand bag down on to her sofa and kicked her shoes off like a teenage girl, but the feeling of the soft carpet on her stocking covered feet was one of the first soothing things she'd felt since her phone call with him. She sat down behind her desk and began rummaging through her drawers, looking for a copy of the form she'd need to fill out detailing the procedure the patient was undergoing, why it was being used for a diagnostic purpose and confirming that she gave her permission for this to happen. However, as she opened each drawer, she noticed things had been moved. Quite subtly, admittedly, but it had still been done.
And then she realised how he found out about her boyfriend. Just before she left to go to Spring Lake the previous day, she'd spent over two hours policing an incident of a patient's sister stuck in a toilet cubicle on the fourth floor. At the time she had no reason to think it had anything to do with him, but thinking back on it now, it was exactly the sort of thing he'd do if he wanted an excuse to snoop around her office. She'd left in such a rush because the page from the nurses had been urgent, she left her hand bag out in, in fact, the same position it was in right now – lying wide open on the sofa in plain view. The tickets Lucas had given her had been still in there at that point, still in the very same envelope he'd handed them over in. it must have just been a miracle that he hadn't recognized the handwriting – because had he know the identity of the man she was going away with, she was sure the torture and torment and interruptions would have been a million times worse.
That was just another thing that she absolutely couldn't stand about him, the fact that he didn't understand any sort of boundaries and he saw no necessity for privacy inside or outside of a relationship. He didn't respect her, or anyone for that matter, enough to not cross every boundary and then some if he wanted something, or to find out something. Even though she could add that to her mental list of disadvantages of dating him, which was growing longer and longer by the second and had long surpassed the list of advantages, that somehow didn't really make her feel much better.
As she filled in the details on the form in front of her, more than once she managed to make a mistake because she was consumed with anger towards him, so much so that she was physically shaking at points. She had to take a couple of deep breaths before she thought it was safe to slip back in to her high heels, lock her hand bag away in the cupboard under her desk, and walk out of her office, back through the clinic and in to one of the elevators in the lobby. There was a number of confused looks thrown her way as it had clearly become common knowledge that she'd taken the weekend off work therefore she had no reason whatsoever to be there. They all knew however that it was probably a safe assumption that it was something to do with Dr. House and their suspicions were confirmed when she got off when the elevator reached the third floor.
Stalking in to his office with complete contempt, Cuddy forced the signed form in to his hand and spoke in almost staccato. "There's your form, where's the patient? I want this over and done with."
House heard her come in, yet he was laid back in his chair with a blind fold over his eyes and was pretending to sleep, therefore he didn't move, answer her, or even flinch when she addressed him directly.
In response to his ignorance which she most definitely was not the mood for, she walked over and ripped the blind fold from his face, and bore over him angrily. "House, get up and move, now."
"Oh, you're here are you? Come on then, let's go and break the news to a budding young sportsman that he might never score another touchdown." He blinked a couple of times in order to readjust his eyes to the light and then dragged himself lazily out of his chair. Walking straight past her, he left his office before she had a chance to move.
She jogged quickly, and with as much dignity as she could possibly manage in her high heels, after him and managed to catch up with him with ease. She pursed her lips tightly and obtained a demure expression as they presumably approached the patient's room in order to remain professional, even though inside she was absolutely furious with him. Without a word, adopting a stony silence, she followed him in to the private room, where she luckily didn't realise House was also meeting the patient for the first time. She checked the notes left at the end of his bed to make sure she got his name right then plastered on her most convincing fake sympathetic and caring smile as she addressed him. "Hello Mr. Ward - I'm Dr. Cuddy, I'm Dean of Medicine here at Princeton Plainsboro Teaching Hospital. I know your regular doctors have informed you about the procedure we'd like to perform on you, but I have to let you know that it does carry a lot of risks. There is a chance you could end up paralysed for the rest of your life. The procedure should take no longer than three hours and you'll be put under general anaesthetic for the duration. Providing everything goes according to plan and the surgery was a success, everything should go back to normal pretty soon. But considering all the risks that the operation presents, are you sure you want to go ahead?"
The patient, Ted Ward, was young, athletically built and had some sort of distinct charm about him that he even managed to pull off whilst lying sick in a hospital bed. He gave her a cheeky grin even though his eyes told her that he was not as cock sure of all of this as he was pretending to be, presumably for her benefit. "I couldn't feel any safer if I'm in your hands." And he looked her up and down approvingly, clearly trying to convince himself that everything was fine, nothing to get overly stressed about, and flirting with her to prove it.
Feeling rather flattered and pleased with herself because she knew that would annoy House even considering that he was so angry that she had a boyfriend, she reciprocated, but very subtly of course. Her eyes flashed at him as a mischievous smile played across her lips. "Unfortunately, I won't be the one performing the surgery, that's not my area, but I'll make sure you're in the hands of our best surgeons." She then handed over the forms he was required to sign for the procedure to go ahead and took a pen for him to use out of her breast pocket.
"What kind of doctor are you then?" He took the form and pen from her hands but didn't take his eyes off her at all as he signed his name and handed them back.
"I'm an endocrinologist. I deal with the hormone system of the body." Tucking the pen back into her breast pocket she consciously became aware of where she was drawing his attention to and where he was looking and she tried not to cringe. She hid her face as she pretended to busy herself with the copious sheets of paper in her arms that would have to be verified before the surgery could go ahead.
He watched her, aware that he'd been marginally too obvious in his staring so decided to tone down slightly and go for some careful flattery and compliments. At the end of the day, he was going in for possibly life changing surgery in a while, and that could leave him wheelchair bound and unable to do anything for himself for the rest of his life so he knew he might as well have a little fun and flirt a little while he still could. "Well you're certainly good with hormones; you've got me filled with testosterone."
At this point House, who had remained unusually silent during the whole exchanged, decided enough was enough and that, being one of the worst pick up lines he'd possibly ever heard, was abruptly the end of the conversation. "Sorry to interrupt, but you might want to stop before you get together a surgical team. By the way, she isn't really an endocrinologist, I wouldn't get excited. She hasn't been a real doctor for as long as I can remember, she spends all her time behind a desk and lapping up the shit that the board's demand. For example, she's such a terrible doctor that she's just given you that form to sign and that very lengthy and extremely boring lecture for absolutely no reason. You haven't got a spinal cord abscess and you don't need the surgery." He moved closer to the patient, the look of intense concentration on his face as he did so. Since they had entered the room House had known there was something not right about this case. The patient was black – a very basic human fact of appearance that his minions forgot to mention. Either they forgot, didn't want him to know or didn't think it was relevant. Either way, he would inform them later how abysmal they were at doing their job and how their patient being black was actually the most vital piece of information about solving their case.
When she heard his words, Cuddy did a double take and attempted not to explode with anger. "Not a spinal cord abscess, how do you work that one out by just sitting there? Do you have x-ray vision and can look at his spinal cord without using imaging studies?" In fact, in reality she wanted to scream and shout and rage as much as she possibly could at him because if he was right this time and it wasn't a spinal cord abscess, the likelihood was that it was in fact something she didn't even need to give her permission for him to investigate or even treat, whatever he saw fit. Therefore her ruining her romantic weekend with her boyfriend and missing out on the bonding and family with her daughter was actually for no reason what so ever. But she knew it would be possibly one of the most irresponsible and unprofessional things she could ever have done and therefore temporarily restrained herself while there was someone else in the room.
"What is one of the only symptoms that is difficult to identify or even notice in black people? Oh, I'm sorry; I must be politically correct – African American people." But when House spoke it was with that voice where he was something; he was clearly distracted and he was slowly moving closer to the patient and examining intently.
"Dr. House, please don't play ridiculous guessing games and just tell the poor young man what's wrong with him." She knew her voice was becoming increasingly short, snappy and irate the longer they talked but she hoped the patient wasn't paying as much attention as he should be.
Completely ignoring his boss' comment as if she hadn't said anything at all, he continued and began addressing the patient directly as he pulled out his otoscope, using it as a light source to stare intently at his eyes. "Have you been to anyway hot or exotic in the last 6 months?"
The patient looked marginally startled by the interruption, and fumbled in the back of his mind for the answer to the question. "Erm, well, yes, I went to Egypt about a month ago. A couple of friends decided they wanted to see the pyramids and all that so I just tagged along for the ride. Has that made me sick?" It was obvious by the expression on his face that for some reason he was marginally more worried about that possibility than the possibility of being paralysed for life that the surgery presented. Presumably it was for the simple reason that he was worried that he'd done this to himself.
"You would have thought my team would have figured out what was wrong with him the moment they set eyes on him. You know, the clue is in the name. Mr. Ward, you have yellow fever. Can I see the palms of your hands please?" When Mr. Ward obliged, House took one look at them and turned to Cuddy. "You can cancel the surgery. Every single one of my fellows failed to notice that this man has jaundice – so his liver is failing. The final diagnostic requirement for yellow fever. I mean, I know it's harder to see in black people but it doesn't mean they should get a lower standard of care. But don't worry about it, I'll sort it out – I'll fire every single one of them for racial discrimination. Yes, even the black one." And then he made to leave the room, as the other two occupants looked as if they were completely stunned into silence.
Before House managed to leave the room however, Ted spoke up. "If I've got this, yellow fever thing, will I get better?" The strength was back in his voice again and it was clear he was trying to make up for his moment of fear and impress Cuddy again.
House shrugged his shoulders carelessly. "There is no cure, there isn't even a treatment. Once you get to the toxic phase, which trust me, you're already in, it's hit and miss whether you survive or not. You've just got to hope your body can manage to fight the infection. There's nothing more we can do." And with that he did leave, attempting to shut the door behind him if only for dramatic effect but found he couldn't, as his boss was squeezing out of the door behind him. He knew exactly what was coming next so he let out a huge sigh in preparation.
"If you'd even bothered to go and see the patient you would have spotted that hours ago, maybe even days ago. You wouldn't have needed to make me cancel my vacation to sign off a procedure that you've decided he no longer needs, and you wouldn't have needed to put him through major surgery when you found absolutely nothing." Cuddy's voice was shrill and infuriated – her hands were almost shaking with anger. He'd put her through hell this weekend and ruined one of the first things that had made her happy in a long time because he was an arrogant and interfering son of a bitch.
"And Dr. Cuddy, if you weren't having doubts about your relationship you never would have walked away from a weekend with him whenever I told you. That's life." And he walked straight down the corridor and in to his office, locking the door behind him to ensure she couldn't follow him. But what she found was, she'd usually find a way to get in, and pursue the argument, but now she didn't want to. She just wanted to be as far away from him as possible.
It wasn't intentional, but when she walked through her front door that evening, she slammed it behind her. She still had anger seething through her body and as much as she tried not to think about him – what he'd done and all he'd said – everything was just going round and round in circles in her mind. She hated him for it. She hated him for getting so deeply under her skin and she hated herself for letting him do it. Because what was worse, she knew she had something good with Lucas, something that could be amazing, but she was letting him intrude. And there was only so much Lucas would, and should, take. She dropped her hand bag carelessly by the front door and kicked off her shoes. Then she walked towards the living room where she could here Lucas was playing with Rachel.
Lucas smiled upon seeing her walk in the door. He set Rachel carefully down on the floor and walked over to give her a kiss. "You seem stressed and up tight – what's happened? Or should I say, what did House do?"
It seemed like just another nail in the coffin for her. She knew he hadn't done it intentionally, in fact she was pretty sure he'd done it to make her feel better, to know that he knew her well enough to know what was wrong straight away, but it was that fact that he immediately jumped to House being the problem showed her really how much influence and input he had on their relationship. But instead of saying all that, she gave Lucas a weak smile. "Do you really want the list? The reason he told me I had to come back was completely invalid anyway, which he would have known before we came home had he bothered to do what every normal doctor does and visit his patients. He then humiliated me in front of said patient when he did bother to go and see him. And on top of all that, he knows about us." The whole explanation came out slightly faster than usual but she flopped down on to the sofa once she had finished, thoroughly exhausted and in short, sick of all the stress House caused her.
"Okay okay, let's take this one thing at a time. First of all, calm down. I know it's stressful and I know he makes you upset and angry but I can loosen you up as soon as little Rachel goes to bed. But until then, you're going to take deep breaths and be calm." He sat down next to her on the sofa and put his hand on her knee but smiled slightly so she knew he wasn't actually being patronising, he was only winding her up. "I know it's crappy that we had to come home, but hey, we had a good time anyway and we're home now, there's nothing we can do about it. And we can still make the most of the weekend because there's still the rest of tonight, and even if you have to go in tomorrow, you've booked the day off so no one's going to object if you spend the morning with me. Also, when does he ever not humiliate you in front of a patient? So what. If that's what makes him feel better about himself then let him do it. It doesn't hurt you – you're a damn good doctor, and you're damn good at what you do, everyone knows that. So let him say what he likes. And if he knows about us… It's too late now isn't it, there's nothing we can do about that either. But does that mean we can have sex on your desk if I'm no longer a secret?" He gave her a cheeky grin but he was half serious, even though he was mainly trying to lighten her spirits.
No matter how miserable, tired and furious she felt, she couldn't keep the smile off her face and she punched him playfully in the arm. "We are not having sex on my desk, okay? I'm a respected woman in that hospital and if anyone caught us I'd never hear the end of it. Besides, he doesn't know it's you, he just knows there's someone."
"I love how out of every point I made, you seemed to think that was the most pressing one. But you do know, he is going to find out some day. You can't hide me forever, especially if we're going move in together and get married and have another baby. I mean, you might even get away with the first two but I think the most observant person we know is going to notice if you turn up to work with a pregnancy bump." It wasn't that he was getting bored, or resenting being the secret, he just didn't want her deluded in to thinking that House would never find out they were dating. Because that would only result in her illusions being shattered and her getting hurt and that was the last thing he wanted. He just wanted to make her aware of and prepared for the future because he wanted their future to be together and that wasn't something they were going to be able to hide forever.
"And I love how you're just assuming I want to move in with you, marry you and have more children with you." She teased him, feeling in much better spirits than she did when she came in, but the worry was still plaguing her. "I know he's going to find out at some point, I just don't want him to find out yet because I don't think he's ready. He finds it difficult to make connections with people as it is then to find out the woman he fantasised about is dating one of the only people in the last millennium that he managed to sustain, dare I say it, a friendship with… That might crush him. And I don't want to do that."
His hand still on her knee, he put his other arm around her shoulders and pulled her in close to lay her head on his chest. "I know, and neither do I particularly. But I just want you to remember that it might not go any smoother, no matter how long you leave it. Because if you're waiting for the day that you know he's going to be okay with it, you're going to be waiting for a very long time. Because he's never going to be okay with it, because he wants you for himself."
Sometimes she hated how well he could read her, but other times it was a real blessing. He was exactly right – that was exactly what she wanted. But what he didn't know was that she didn't know if she was ready for him to know yet. She knew that dating Lucas would be as close to a betrayal as House would ever admit, and she knew that once he found out, any relationship there ever had been or could ever be would be well and truly dead. Even though she had Lucas now and she would never dream of putting herself through the guilt that she was still living with since kissing him, again, but after years of foreplay she wasn't quite sure she could kill the fantasy. She wasn't quite sure she was ready for him to hate her as much as he would. But that was something she kept to herself. "I know, I know. Just, give it a little longer, I don't want to rush in to it and regret it because it was too quick…"
"I'm not pushing you to tell him, I just don't want you to delude yourself. He's going to have to know at some point, unless you plan on getting rid of me." He didn't know why, but he was still slightly insecure about that subject so as soon as he touched on it, he regretted it and tried to steer conversation in a totally different direction as soon as feasibly possible. Part of his insecurity he knew was down to the fact that he was a slightly immature and socially inept private investigator with no real ambitions or no real success in life, and she was a gorgeous and desirable dean of medicine at a wealthy hospital who could have had probably any red blooded man she wanted. And he couldn't help but wonder why, out of all those red blooded men, did she choose him? He also knew it was marginally depressing and pathetic that he couldn't even answer that himself, but he knew she spent her days surrounded by influential and charming doctors and executives, and some, namely House, were falling over themselves to date her, yet she chose him. It didn't make any sense to him. So instead he presented her with a change of subject that she couldn't refuse. "Now, if you're refusing to have sex on your desk, I think I might have to remind you why you wouldn't say no… So go and put Rachel to bed."
Obediently, for a change, she got up from the sofa and squealed in surprise when she felt him smack her ass playfully.