Dead Men Don't Check Their Facebook

Allison Cameron came home from the hospital after another grueling shift. The only upside being they saved the patient. One of her team nearly got arrested for breaking and entering; she found out the wife of the patient might sue for damages, all in all, another life saved, House style. So fuck the law. It only serves to get in the way.

Her boss, Ron Anderson, began having weekly meltdowns thanks to her methods — well, House's methods. Every argument with her boss was won with a little snark, an innuendo here and there, and a reminder that he wasn't led blindly. He was told plainly how her department would work. He was so sure he wanted a team like the one perfected by the great Gregory House. He had no clue what that truly meant in terms of legal overhead, despite Lisa Cuddy's detailed accounts. Nothing Cameron's team did conformed in any way, shape, or form to any regulations the law required of normal medical practitioners. They relied on the results (and great lawyers) to save them from a hospital destroying lawsuit.

Of course, the upside was the rock-star press that goes hand in hand with tackling the big cases. Press which, in turn, brought in the massive cash donations from rich people needing places to funnel their funds. She was long over believe any of them had real philanthropic interest. She wasn't that Allison Cameron anymore. House's death had left a vortex in her universe. Thrown her off balance. Removed the Yin from her Yang. So, she let her own dark side fill the void.

On some level, she supposed, she always understood her mentor better than most. He was compelled to do wrong to accomplish the right. A vigilante of medicine. She once found it charming.

Then sad.

Then infuriating.

Then — for a little while anyway — just wrong.

Now she more than understood it. She felt like her fate was to live as he lived — damaged, miserable, and alone. All healthy life-focus aimed at the solving of puzzles, which in turn, saves lives. Despite it all, she would never be convinced, even in her deeply jaded state of mind, that he had only cared about the puzzles.

Heading straight to the kitchen, she pulled a Cab from the wine rack and popped the cork with the hands of a master. She still bothered with a glass. She wasn't a wino yet, but not in any state of denial of her drinking problem. The ability to care was gone. If her son wasn't with her, she would be found with a glass of wine nearby.

'It is what it is.' She conceded to herself.

No chunk of muscle missing from her leg but her heart sure as hell felt like it was missing a large section.

She was sure she saw House today. Out of the corner of her eye. The limp, the stance, the burn of his eyes on the back of her head. She turned to find nothing. He wasn't there. She wondered if she might be losing her mind like he did when he had started seeing Amber.

'Maybe I need a few months in rehab at the funny farm to get my life back together.' With a snort, she shakes her head at the thought. 'That's a joke. What life?'

Not long into the night, the bottle yielded no more. She gave it a look as if its refusal to fill the glass once more was a sign it was pure evil and with one last swig of dark red liquid from her glass, she finished the last of the Cab and decided Merlot sounded perfectly acceptable next. She had a snack around 5:00 at work, but later, alone in the confines of her apartment, a liquid dinner seemed the best idea.

A loud pop echoed in the room and, a moment later, more dark liquid filled her glass. It was at this point that checking out Facebook seemed like a great thing to do.

Pictures and videos of cats and dogs ran in her feed. Mixed in were pictures of friends and acquaintances from her past, their kids and families. Happy couples, pissed off people who needed to air all their private trash to the masses, pet parents posting the latest antics, political memes, all vying for five seconds of your attention before you scroll on to the next random life event for some person you don't really know anymore. Social media at its finest.

After two more glasses, she opened the messages page and began writing another letter to House. She couldn't stop at that point. It had become an obsession — talking to him this way. Having someone to share her darkest thoughts and secrets with. A non-judging ear. (Yes, she completely got the irony.) And sometimes, it simply provided a way to make getting herself off, just a little more exciting than masturbation alone, without being so torrid as hitting a sex chat room to let a stranger tell her how big his cock is and how now he - rams it up your tight little ass and you're so slutty you love it, then beg to lick my dirty cock clean.

Not that she was above being a random perv's digital slut. Sometimes she did feel like being that dirty and self-abasing, but not this night. It was one of those nights. She needed a release after a week of the case from hell. She needed the release to be with him.

Just as she opened the chat window, she saw something that made her stomach lunge to her throat. '✓ Seen Sun 2:45 A.M.' in light gray, just after her messages.

"What the hell?" she asked herself, and looked around the room for a second as if someone had seen her moment of mortified embarrassment.

Scrolling through the currently online contacts didn't yield his name and image, so whomever it was that logged in and read, or at least glanced at, her messages wasn't logged in now. She could only hope they didn't actually read the messages.

'Oh, God! What if his mom read them!' Cameron thought in horror as she grabbed her half full glass and chugged it in one gulp. Just in case she might still save some face, she clicked on the cog icon and selected 'Delete Conversation' from the dropdown's options, then proceeded to the kitchen to pour another glass and drown her embarrassment.

Ten minutes later her phone buzzed. 'Fuck,' she thought, 'I'm in no shape for work.' But, despite that, she needed to address it. She hadn't gotten as bad as him yet — though she was working toward it at a lightning pace. She still cared enough to make sure that she had someone on her team on it.

Staggering back to the living room, she grabbed her phone from the coffee table and sat on the couch to read the message.

Unknown Number:

Good thing I still have the emails of all your messages

Another buzz.

I like reading them when I need to feel like I'm not the most pathetic human being on the planet.

Cameron's heart rate accelerated to a dangerous level as she typed back - Who is this - and hit send. It could be any sort of psycho that's hacked his account. However, she was just drunk enough to not care if the person on the other phone was an ax murder. She needed, in that moment, for it to be House, and if that got her killed at least for a moment, she could live in a happy delusional state.

A buzz. - Go to your door. I left you something

Now, she was scared. Whoever this was, knew where she lived. The idea there could have been some random perv at her door, recently, while she's been home getting smashed, had her breathing hard. Her pulse pounded in her ears, her temperature felt like it was rising. 'Could just be a prank and there would be nothing there,' she consoled herself weakly. She got up slowly, headed straight for her hall closet and took out the aluminum softball bat she had from playing in a local league a few years ago.

After getting a good grip on it, she headed to the door and peeped out of the peep hole. Seeing no one in the long hallway, of which her apartment door was at the end of, she unlocked the chain, turned the deadbolt and the door handle lock, then slowly opened the door. Glancing down the hall, it still looked empty. Looking down, just to one side of the door she found a brown shipping box. It was about 12 inches square. She poked it with the bat. No idea why, but it made her feel better about picking it up.

Taking it into her apartment, she carefully locked each lock and considered sliding her entrance table in front of the door, but finally decided against it. This whole thing was just a little too scary. But despite the creep factor, she couldn't resist taking each step. She should call the police. She shouldn't open this random box left by God knows who, but she had to know for sure. If she died, so be it. She needed to know.

The adrenaline had mostly killed her alcohol high. She held the box up and inspected the outside. It appears to have had a shipping label pulled off and part of the top layer of cardboard had been ripped off with it to reveal the corrugated layer. It had been opened and retaped with masking tape. It wasn't a heavy box, maybe 3 pounds if even. Placing it in her lap, she picked at the edge of the tape and debated on taking this further or leaving the box for the light of day. Another gulp of wine and her phone buzzed once more.

Open it - the unknown number demanded.

How do you know I haven't - she replied, feeling a little unsure of the entire situation.

I'm me, you're you - she could almost see him smirking.

He always infuriated her. Knowing her better sometimes than she knew herself. 'If it is him', the last remaining sober part of her brain chimed in. Thing is, she wanted it to be him so badly, she decided it was him. And, so, she pulled the tape and opened the box.