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** CHAPTER 5 **

House was sitting on his couch trying to clear his mind from all the disturbing thoughts that were invading it. On the coffee table in front of him, where he'd laid his injured leg to rest, there was a half-empty bottle of bourbon and the full glass he was holding in his hand was obviously not the first. Suddenly and quite unexpectedly, he heard a knock on his door.

"Dammit, don't you have a life already? Go get yourself a girlfriend in a bar or something!" he yelled at the door, convinced it was Wilson.

Firmly intent on ignoring his friend's visit, he raised the glass up to his mouth to take another sip of soothing alcohol…

"House, it's me. Open the door."

He stopped the glass at the edge of his lips. There was only one female's voice which he could always identify, no matter what the circumstances, and that very one voice was coming from behind his door.

"I'm off duty," he protested, tilting his head backward against the couch's backrest to direct the sound toward the door. "Go away!"

But of course, it only caused the knocking to start again, this time louder. Fucking hell! he thought, why does she have to be so stubborn and annoying? Unable to disregard Cuddy's conspicuous presence at his door any longer, House resignedly pulled himself out of the sofa, placing the glass on the table and sighed heavily before walking to the door. The safety chain was on. He opened the door without taking it off. Through the small opening, he saw her, standing on his doorsill, looking embarrassed and a little bit impatient at the same time.

"What do you want?" he growled drily.

"Can I come in?" she asked, visibly uneasy to have to ask for permission.

"What – do – you - want?" House repeated, this time pronouncing each word loud and clear.

Cuddy cleared her throat and raised her face to him.

"We need to talk," she said with as much self-confidence as she could muster.

"Need? To talk? Oh no, we don't!" he sniggered, mocking every choice of words in her sentence.

"House! Just open the damn door! Please."

The imploring pout she sent him made her look so damn sexy that House almost felt like an electric shock had stricken his whole body. He griped the door tighter, took a deep breath and stared intensely at her for some long, silent seconds. Then, without a warning, he slammed the door shut in her face so he could remove the safety chain before re-opening it. When he did, she was standing behind the door, petrified.

"Five minutes. That's all you have. So, you better make it short," he muttered.

He turned on his heel and walked back inside his apartment, toward his coffee table where, as he suddenly remembered, a very welcomed glass of bourbon was still waiting for him. Cuddy swiftly walked in, too, and shut the door behind her, as if she sensed she'd better move fast in case he would change his mind. Once inside, she stayed rooted to her spot by the door, visibly feeling uncomfortable with the situation. Not really knowing what the right thing to do was, she decided to put her purse down on the floor and took her coat off.

"Don't make yourself at home," House snapped. "I said five minutes, and now you only have three left!"

Cuddy sucked on her bottom lip, feeling uneasy. There he was again, sourpuss and mean. He'd probably had too many pills, and too many drinks, meaning: He was surely in pain and, as usual, he would try to hide it behind his legendary cantankerousness.

"Ok," he said walking toward her with the glass in his hand. "Tell me what's that boring medical chore you want to assign me to and then leave!"

Her mouth fell agape in surprise. He thought she'd come because of work?! She looked back at him with a bitter smile on her face.

"I'm not here for work," she replied evenly.

The statement was true, and yet Cuddy was becoming more and more incapable of explaining the reasons that had first brought her here. She only knew she'd been thinking about him. A lot. For the past two days, troubling images of him, caring and gentle had been invading her mind constantly, while other thoughts of him, being a total jerk kept coming on top of them. All of those mixed feelings had undeniably destabilized her. She'd tried to fight the feeling and had almost managed to, until earlier that afternoon, when Wilson had come to her with his story about House wanting to date her. And now, she was all confused again and didn't know what to think!

"If it isn't for work then, why are you here?" House asked, curiosity registering in his tone.

He narrowed his eyes at her, intrigued. His curiosity was undeniably piqued. Now, he had a puzzle to solve, and by the lost look on her face, he could tell it was a promising one, as there seem to be something intriguing lying underneath the surface, something that could turn out to be very exciting to find out about, even if for the moment being he couldn't tell why.

The reason, in fact, was simple: Cuddy wanted to understand. She just wanted to have answers. But she couldn't ask him that straightforwardly, not without risking receiving a sarcastic, deflecting response in return. And she was suddenly no longer sure she wanted to ask anyway.

"I don't know," she whispered sheepishly, looking down at her feet like a grounded teenage girl.

"Well, that doesn't help!" House exclaimed, a little taken aback by how puzzled she looked.

"I want… I want you to stop," she faltered out.

"Stop what?"

"Acting like you do, like, one minute you act all sympathetic and caring with me and then the next one, you turn into that mean jerk again."

"And you drove all the way over here just to tell me that?"

Cuddy didn't answer because House was right to point that out: There was no rational explanation to her behavior. Or maybe there was, but it was now sadly obvious that she was wrong about it. How could she be such a fool and hope something nice could actually happen if she showed up here? She kept staring at her shoes instead, becoming more and more uneasy but, most of all, angry at herself for being here, feeling even a little bit humiliated because damn, he really wasn't making things easy for her

"O-kay," House said, taking a pause and squinting at her quizzically.

The more he looked at her, the more he was convinced there was something behind her embarrassment, something he didn't dare to expect from her. Nothing could trigger House's irrepressible need to solve puzzles more than that. He had to know, and he couldn't fight it any longer. He just had to push a button, House's way.

"So, which one would you prefer me to be?" he asked in his trademark, provoking fashion that always eventually led him to the truth.

"What?"

That last question made Cuddy jerk her head up, her eyes meeting his with obvious bafflement.

"I mean, which one would turn you on the most? I bet you'd go for all sympathetic and caring rather than mean jerk, am I right? Something tells me you wouldn't be here otherwise, would you?"

Cuddy immediately felt destabilized by this assumption. Yes, she'd come here to be honest and to open up to him. She wanted to tell him how she felt. Because she thought he deserved to hear it and that it was time. Things could have been so easy. But no, instead, he had to mock her and turn that into another one of mind games, just as exhausting as every other.

She stared angrily at him but couldn't resolve herself to giving up. She first needed to know whether or not her being here was completely worthless because then, it would probably be the last time she'd ever allow herself to hope for anything honest and genuine from him if it wasn't.

"I want you to be you. That's all. I want you to be House."

"What does that mean?"

"I don't want you to change," she whispered hesitantly.

"But?" he added, gesturing for her to complete her sentence.

Cuddy shook her head in dismay, feeling sad and hurt. Why does he needs to fight that so hard? Why is he incapable of letting go and accept what I have to say?

House took a few steps toward the piano and put his glass of bourbon atop the black, glossy surface. Then he slowly turned around to face her again and, leaning against the instrument, he smiled ironically at her.

"Because obviously, there's a but. You claim you don't want me to change but then you've come here, so that means you expect me to, nonetheless. What is it? Is it about being less of a jerk, more caring? Something else?

"What is wrong with you?" she snapped to stop the uncomfortable feeling of being unfairly besieged.

Why are you here, anyway? Why do you have to endure that?

"Nothing. What's more interesting is: What is wrong with you?"

Cuddy's eyes widened in astonishment. She found herself unable to reply and just stared at him, bewildered.

"Something's different" House went on. "You act differently. Tell me why? What do you want?"

"Why do you care what I want or don't want anyway?" she said tiredly, annoyed by his cryptic innuendos.

Now she really wished for it to end.

"You're the one who doesn't know what he wants," she whispered, almost to herself.

"No. I don't get what I want. there's a slight difference here, see? That's why I'm still waiting for you to tell me why you're here. Except you're not-"

"Just forget it," she sighed, exasperated.

"Forget it? Now, that would be too easy! You're the one who came to me-"

"No. You're the one who came to me."

Cuddy straightened up a little and squared her shoulders challengingly because he had just given her a point, and she intended to use it to force him to address this in forthright terms. She allowed herself to walk into the living room and approached House by the piano. She clearly registered in his gaze that what she'd just said had taken him off guard.

"What are you talking about? Last time I checked this was my apartment here-"

"You came to me first," she said coming closer. "Last night, you went to my house-"

"What? I… But-" House looked away, briefly and sighed resignedly, before looking at her with a smirk. "Wilson?"

"Told me everything about it, yes," Cuddy confirmed his guess. "So, tell me House, what did you want?"

Her question unexpectedly seemed to embarrass him, and it almost relieved her. She was right to assume there was something going on.

"I, err, I just wanted to check on you… see if you were ok-"

"And?" she asked hopefully.

"And I did!" he exclaimed to cut the conversation short. "I saw you. You looked fine. Like you didn't need any help or… anyone."

"Is that how you see me, House?"

"You sure act like this is how I should!" he snarled.

"What!"

Cuddy felt like he'd slapped her. It was impossible: House had built that huge, insuperable wall between him and the rest of the world, to prevent anyone from coming near him and she, naïvely and stupidly, she'd come to him thinking she would easily tear it down because she was not just anyone to him. But she was wrong. He was behaving with her just like he was with everyone else. Wilson was wrong. She felt the urgent need to leave before she would make a fool of herself and start crying.

"Fine," she said dryly.

"Well, fine. Geez, finally! That was one hell of an endless talk! Are you taking some extra class for that I'm unaware of because if you are, then the game isn't really fair anymore?" House mocked with a disingenuous pout.

"This isn't a game," she said disheartened.

"Who said it's ever been one?" he muttered under his breath, his hoarse voice barely above a whisper.

"What?!"

Cuddy stared at him, incredulous. She wasn't sure she'd heard him right or that it meant what she hoped it meant. But immediately, she was ruthlessly jolted back to reality.

"I said games should be fun. But this one has become anyhing but."

That was it. Nothing right could come out of it. The whole conversation made her feel sick to her stomach, as if she was trapped in an endless rollercoaster. And House's behavior was even more incomprehensible than it usually was. She just couldn't understand why the hell he was behaving like that with her.

The tension between them was electrifying. For a few lingering seconds that felt like an eternity to her, Cuddy sustained his gaze, studying his reactions, unconsciously imploring him to say something that would help her understand the confused feelings she'd had all day, but she couldn't decipher what was hidden behind his eyes.

House seemed focused on something else. He was studying her, squinting at her with his piercing, blue gaze as if seeking for some truth himself. As he stared more intensely at her, Cuddy felt shivers ripple through her body. She averted her gaze, unable to hide her distress.

"I'm sorry. This is my fault. I probably shouldn't have come here in the first place," she said turning on her heel.

And with a determined pace, she started walking toward the door to House's appartment.