Hello everyone!
I know it's been ages since I last updated this fic but I had no clue what to write :p I had to re-read some of the previous chapters and I think that I'm back on track now :)
Sooo, what you 've been waiting happens in this chapters. Cameron finally lets her parents talk to her. And of course House will have a talk with them but later on ;) Beth is
this chapter as well :)
Thank you all for your wonderful reviews and of course thanks to everyone who reads my story :)
I hope you will enjoy this chapter!
Disclaimer: I don't own House MD...
Chapter 19: Talking with the parents
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House heard the alarm clock going off and groaned. He turned to his left side intending to wake Cameron but instead of her he saw Beth, sleeping peacefully.
He quirked an eyebrow and then he saw Cameron walking towards the bed again.
She saw him looking at her with a raised eyebrow and she smiled. She walked to his side of the bed and lied down next to him, not wanting to disturb Beth's sleep.
"She had a bad dream…" she explained, snuggling close to him.
He nodded and dropped a kiss on her forehead, hugging her close to him.
A few minutes later the alarm started beeping again, waking Beth up.
"Make it stop…" she mumbled sleepily and scooted closer to her father who smiled at her actions.
"It's time to wake up sleepy head." Cameron said, caressing her cheek but Beth buried her head under the pillow.
"I don't want to go to school." Came her muffled reply making both Cameron and House look at her questioningly.
"But you like school!" House commented but Beth didn't move at all.
Cameron went to sit next to Beth taking the pillow so that she could see her.
"Is everything alright at school?" she asked, eyeing her daughter suspiciously.
Beth looked at her but didn't answer.
House rolled onto his side and looked at Beth as well.
"Don't you want to talk to us?" he asked, running his hand down her arm.
Beth sighed and sat up straight on the bed.
"Fine… Brian is stupid and he is teasing me all the time!" she complained, crossing her arms in front of her chest.
"And I don't want to go to school because he acts like a baby and he doesn't let me play with Norah and Peter!" she concluded with a pout.
"Sweety, you have to talk to your teacher about it." Cameron told her, taking her into her arms.
"Peter did last week but after some days Brian started doing things again." She explained.
"Maybe you should tell him that your dad has a cane and he knows how to use it." House said earning a disapproving look form Cameron.
"What did I do?" he asked incredulously, mimicking Beth's stance and crossing his arms over his chest.
Cameron didn't reply. She just turned to look at Beth and caressed her hair softly.
"You should go to your teacher with your friends. And if he doesn't stop then you should talk to us again and we'll see what we will do." She said and Beth sighed.
"But what if he continues?" she asked looking seriously at her mother.
House whistling innocently caught their attention and when they turned to look at him he winked at Beth who giggled.
Cameron shook her head and then turned to Beth again.
"I say you go and get dressed while I prepare breakfast. Ok?" she asked and Beth nodded.
She kissed her on the cheek and then went to kiss House as well before running down the hall to her room.
"If I catch that boy I'm going to teach him not to mess with a House." House said seriously looking at Cameron who smiled.
"I really feel sorry for the first boy she is going to bring at home." She replied with a teasing smile making him raise an eyebrow.
"Don't be. He is going to get very good medical care. If you manage to save him that is." He said with a smirk and she shook her head in amusement.
"Come on, get up. We have to make breakfast." She said, taking his hand in hers.
"Can't we sleep in?" House whined dragging her down so that she was lying on top of him.
"We have to get up…" she reasoned but made no move to stand up again.
They stayed like this for several minutes until Beth's voice caught their attention.
"You said you would make breakfast." She said, looking at her parents who were still lying in bed.
"Oops… You caught us." House said with a small smile.
Beth crossed her arms in front of her chest and raised her eyebrows.
"Are you two gonna start making out?" she inquired with an inquisitive look making both her parents burst out laughing at the priceless expression on her face.
"Your dad wanted to sleep in today. Go to the kitchen and I'll come in a minute to make you breakfast, ok?" Cameron said after they stopped laughing and after giving them a pointed look Beth went to the kitchen as her mother told her.
"Aren't we gonna start making out?" House asked, waggling his eyebrows.
"Breakfast." She replied and after kissing his lips she followed Beth to the kitchen.
House smiled to himself and pulled the blanket over his body again, hugging her pillow.
She would return to wake him up again in a few minutes.
xOxOx
Things at the hospital were quiet that day so Cameron spent her time completing her clinic duty and House hiding from everything and everyone as usual.
It was around eleven that Cameron decided to return to her office. There was no new admission to her department so the only thing she had to do was some paperwork.
When she entered her office though she stopped dead in her trucks when she saw her parents sitting on the chairs in front of her desk.
"What are you doing here?" she asked immediately and they turned to look at her.
"Allison, we… we want to talk to you." Her father replied and she sighed.
"Talk about what dad? Haven't we discussed everything already?" she asked tiredly.
"Please Allison… you have to listen to us." Her mother almost begged and although she wanted to run away she decided to stay and listen to what they had to say.
She walked inside the room and went to sit behind her desk. She leaned back, crossed her arms in front of her chest in a defensive manner and looked at them expectantly.
"You can start." She said in a serious tone and waited for them to begin.
"We don't even know what to say to make you understand how sorry we are…" started Helen but Cameron didn't react at all.
She kept her expression neutral and waited for her parents to continue, to explain why they did all those things, to make her understand what reasons they had for acting that way.
"And we believe that you have every right to never forgive us after all the things that we have done to you." Her father continued looking straight into her eyes.
"Maybe you thought that we never loved you but that is not true. We do love you, Allison, you are our daughter. I guess we never had a way to show it to you and it was our fault, we know that now…" Helen said regretfully.
"You were so different than your brother. He was the loud one, always asking and demanding even from when he was a baby. I guess it was our fault. We started spoiling him from the moment he was born and we didn't realize how bad things had gone until it was too late. You learnt to cope on your own… even when you were a little girl you used to act so maturely, so unlike your brother. We thought you didn't need us that much." Her mother continued and Cameron could tell that it was really hard for her admitting all those things.
"I didn't want to need you." Cameron interjected before her mother could say anything else and they looked at her questioningly.
"You always did whatever Jake asked you to, like he was the only one who needed you, like he was the only one you cared about. That's why I didn't want to need you. Because I thought that if I didn't need you it wouldn't hurt so much when you only cared about Jake…" Cameron replied bitterly, averting her gaze.
For a moment they were stunned. They didn't know what to say to that, they didn't know how to react.
"Why didn't you talk to us?" Jason asked, looking at her.
"Talk to you? I thought you didn't love me what did you expect me to do? Frankly, I still don't know if you ever loved me half as much as you loved Jake."
"We do love you Allison and we know we did so many mistakes in the past and we hurt you. But… we want another chance with you." Helen said in a low tone, looking away from Cameron.
"We did many mistakes with both you and your brother. We thought that you didn't need us, you were the perfect kid and we had nothing to do with it. We gave all this attention to your brother and, despite that, look how things turned out! He left, leaving his baby girl to us. We did nothing to help you and look where you are now..." Jason said, looking in Cameron's eyes but she didn't say anything.
"Haley is a lot like you, you know… She is quiet, smart, adorable; she is an excellent student and a great kid. She is just perfect. Having Haley made us understand what we did wrong with you. And we want to fix it… Please, let us at least try to fix it…" pleaded her mother, a desperate tone in her voice.
Cameron sighed and rubbed her hand over her face. She didn't know what to do… Her parents seemed to have regretted everything and they wanted another chance with her but she still didn't know if she could give them that chance.
She was ready to say something when the door to her office opened and Beth stormed into the room followed by House.
She didn't talk, she went straight to her mother and after Cameron picked her up she buried her head in the crook of her mother's neck and stayed there unmoving.
"They called me from school! Guess what our daughter did." He said walking towards them but he stopped dead in his trucks when he saw her parents sitting in front of her desk.
"Oops…" he said, looking at Cameron apologetically.
Cameron sighed and turned her attention to her daughter who hadn't moved at all from her position.
"Sweety, what happened?" she asked Beth but she refused to talk.
"Allison?" asked her father catching her attention.
He had a look of pure shock and surprise on his face. Her mother seemed surprised too but not that much.
"Not now dad…" she said and then looked at House.
"What happened?" she asked him this time, expecting to get an answer.
"Her teacher called me. She said that Beth punched her classmate because he was teasing her and her friends." House explained.
"And if it was me I would have done it a long time ago. Do you know what this kid has done?" he asked incredulously, sounding very proud of his daughter but Cameron didn't seem to agree with him at that moment.
Cameron rubbed Beth's back in a soothing manner and after some moments she finally looked at her.
"Do you want to tell me what happened?" she asked softly and Beth nodded.
"We were playing with Peter and Norah and Brian came where we were playing and he started making fun of Peter because he wears glasses and then he started messing with our toys and teasing me and Norah." Beth explained to her mother.
"We told him to go away and that we would tell our teacher but he said that he didn't care and he continued doing stupid things!" Beth complaint.
"And you punched him?"
"He was trying to get Peter's glasses!" she protested.
"I think that daddy and I told you to go to your teacher. Even if he did get Peter's glasses your teacher would have given them back to him, right?" Cameron asked caressing her daughter's cheek.
House moved in order to go next to Cameron and took a chair to sit next to her.
"Yeah, but he would continue to pick on us after that…" Beth replied, her big blue eyes locking with her mother's.
"It's not right to punch the other kids though, is it?" asked House and Beth shrugged.
"I guess it's not…" she agreed and averted her gaze.
"But I'm not going to apologize!" she said defiantly after a few moments making House smirk.
"What you did is not right though." House clarified but Beth didn't seem to listen.
"What he did wasn't right either but he didn't apologize! If he apologizes I will too." She said stubbornly reminding Cameron so much of the man sitting next to her.
"But I'm not really sorry." She said seriously.
Cameron knew that there was nothing she could do to change her mind at the moment.
"Ok, why don't you go with your daddy because I'm a little busy right now…" she said and Beth looked at the other two people who were in the room.
"Oops… I'm sorry." She said apologetically, looking at them.
"It's ok sweety." Helen replied with a smile.
"We'll go…" Beth said looking at her mother again.
"Are you mad?" she asked cautiously and Cameron smiled at her.
"I'm not mad angel." She said surely and Beth grinned in relief.
"I love you mommy!" she said hugging her tightly and giving her a kiss.
"I love you too." Cameron replied, dropping a kiss on Beth's forehead.
Beth got out of her embrace and exited the office followed by House who stopped at the door when he heard Cameron's voice.
"Greg… I know you are really proud of her but please don't say it to her right now." She said knowing him full well.
"Damn, you can read my mind." He said with a smirk and she smiled at him.
"Go." She told him and although he really wanted to stay there and have a word with her parents he did as she told him and followed Beth out of the office.
She let out a sigh and then turned to look at them again.
Her father had the same shocked expression on his face.
"Was that…?" he started and she cut him off.
"My husband… yes." She said seriously.
"And you have a kid too…" he stated the obvious because he didn't really know what to say.
"Yes dad, I have a kid." She replied with a small smile.
"She looks just like you when you were little…" whispered Helen.
"Greg says the same thing, that's why he can't say no to her." Cameron commented making her mother smile.
"He seems…" Jason started but she interrupted him before he could complete his sentence.
"He is a great man, a great husband and a great father. I couldn't ask for anything more because he has everything. And he loves me more than anything. So, I suggest not getting on his bad side if you want that second chance…. Something really hard since he knows everything that has happened." Cameron said looking straight into her father's eyes.
He nodded reluctantly and didn't say anything. He knew that she was right and that he had no right to judge.
"Does that mean that you'll give us another chance?" Helen asked hopefully.
Cameron stayed silent for some moments, contemplating everything.
"We are going to do this on my terms…" she said finally making her parents smile.
"Ok, we just want a chance…" her mother replied.
Cameron nodded and was ready to say something but her pager going off interrupted her.
"What now…" she mumbled and retrieved her pager in order to see what was going on.
When she saw the page she immediately pulled out her mobile phone to text House and then stood up immediately.
"You'll excuse me but I have an emergency." She said apologetically to her parents.
"Is everything alright?" they asked simultaneously.
"My best friend is in labor." She replied and moments later she was running out of her office and to the Maternity Ward.