Chapter 6

House was standing at the white board, after deciding it was time to fire Foreman from having the whiteboard marker.

"It's called the "white" board for a reason," he said as he held out his hand for the marker.

"Would you like this "black" marker?" Foreman bit back. Having his ex boss back was great for the first couple of hours but now House was at his annoying best, he wouldn't let anyone rest on their laurel's and he had made them go over and over every test and detail of Rachael's life with a fine tooth comb. Then he made them redo every lab test on anything relevant in her environment, and now he was running another differential diagnosis. They were all hungry and tired, and getting sick of Houses sarcasm and badgering.

"Why don't we break for lunch and come back and see if any thing has changed." Said Wilson trying to ease the tension in the room. He had joined them in the early hours of the morning as he had been at the hospital with a patient of his own.

"There's no lunch until we at least have everything on the board. Come on people what stays and what goes?"

The next hour past with them deciding what symptoms were relevant to what disease so they could stay on the board, there was nothing that could explain all her symptoms.

Cuddy came around the corner toward the diagnostic's department, she could hear House rant and rave. Somehow it comforted her, she pushed open the door only to have House glare at her.

"Go hold your daughters hand, what are you doing here?"

"My mother and sister are doing that."

House visibly shuddered in an exaggerated way causing Wilson to shoot him a warning glance. "In that case I'll let you stay if you sit down and be quiet, you are having a hard enough time without having to endure their company." Chase lowered his head quickly to hide a smile it always amused him the way House made fun of Cuddy's mother. Cuddy raised her chin to bite back at him but decided against it, she was just too tired and stressed to fight with him. She looked at the board and could see it was full of all sorts of theories.

"Good to see you've narrowed it down." She said her sarcasm was a match for House's earlier rants.

"I said you could stay if you were quiet!" House glared at her. Then his whole expression changed as something outside the department caught his eye, the soft look on his face was so unusual they all turned to see what he was looking at. Dominica House was at the door with baskets and the twins were also carrying containers. House opened the door and Wilson and Sophia went running to their Dad.

"We made muffins'!" said Will loudly

"And cookies" said Sophie shyly

"Yum" said House comically causing the two of them to giggle.

"I made you lunch." Dom said with a smile as House took the baskets from her and dropped a quick kiss on her lips.

"Don't tell this lot! They've done nothing but moan how hungry they are! I'm not sharing!" House said childishly.

"I made lunch for everyone" she said, "There's soup, Irish stew and bread."

House shook his head giving her an affectionate look "as if you didn't have enough to do!"

The team had already started opening the contents of the two baskets and Wilson was munching on a cookie much to the delight of his smaller namesake. The smell of freshly baked bread wafted through the room, even Cuddy was tempted by the vegetable soup, they all tucked in and the mood in the room was up lifted by the food and House toddlers who never stopped talking and laughing.

Dom had a cup of soup at House's insistence, he knew that although the twins had eaten it was highly likely that Dom hadn't, she sat around the table with them all and chattered easily. When they had eaten and repacked the baskets, leaving the cookies and muffins' for later she said

"We'll go and let you get back to work." And she said her good-byes.

"I'll walk down with you," said House taking the larger basket off her, they wandered off with children toward the lifts.

"She looks like "that" and she can cook too." Chase said enviously as he watched them leave.

"House could fall in a sewer and come up smelling like roses." Taub agreed.

"I'm just glad to see him so well and happy." Remy Hadley added

"Now you are starting to sound like Cameron." said Foreman "are you sure your not carrying a touch for your ex boss?"

"I think he's hotter than my current one." She replied giving Foreman a cheeky look. "If he wasn't taken I could totally go there, in fact if Dom wasn't taken I could go there too."

"I get Dom but House?" Chase said, "He's so old. I don't know what it is about him, Alison never really got over him, and they never really dated. Well as far as I know." He conceded.

"The date she made him take her on was the only time they went out and according to House it was a disaster, but I think he set out to make her realize that "they" would never happen."

"He took her to a monster truck rally." Chase told Wilson.

"Only cause I stood him up."

"He could have asked Foreman or me. He didn't"

"If I had the choice I'd have asked Cameron too." Taub chimed in, earning a glare from Chase.

"I think Cameron actually got to him at some level" Wilson mused "the night of their "date" he was as nervous as hell, he went to a lot of trouble, for him. I think he lost his nerve and probably convinced himself he'd do her a favor and be a jerk so she'd realize he'd never make her happy."

"He has always done that," Cuddy spoke, the others had forgotten she was there, sitting quietly in the corner "when we first got together he tried to warn me off, telling me he was a crazy choice for a woman with a child. I told him he was wrong, but in hindsight…."

"Yet look at him now." Remy Hadley said a little defensively, "It seems he's a great dad and husband." Remy wasn't around when House and Cuddy were together but she knew enough to know how devastated House had been after the break up, she had come back just before things came to a head and House had crashed though Cuddy's house. "She seems to bring out the gentle protective side of him." She added.

"Until things go wrong, then he'll reach for the pills." Cuddy said a little defensively, she too had been surprised just how devoted House was to his family, but when she thought about it he had been that way with her and Rachael too, he wasn't always conventional about it, but he had really tried, even when she had her health crisis. It was just those pills! When it came down to it, he was unable to handle it when there was great emotional strain, he had to be numb, but it wasn't because he didn't care, he just wasn't emotionally equipped to deal with things of that nature. "Lets hope he never gets tested" she added quietly. "I better go and see how Rachael is feeling."

The rest of the day they relooked at every aspect of Rachael's history, until they had drawn a blank in every direction.

House suddenly got up and walked out of the room.

"He's going to wake her up!" said Foreman

"Cuddy won't allow it," said Taub

They all headed down to Rachael's room and arrived shortly before House who was carrying a syringe.

"What's going on?" Cuddy was on her feet looking alarmed.

"Go get a coffee. Take your mum with you." Said House not even looking at Cuddy or her mother.

"You are not giving my daughter anything with out my permission."

"So fire me!" he said as he reached for the tubing of Rachael's I.V. Cuddy snatched it away. Their eyes clashed, it was like times of old and neither was going to back down.

"I need to talk to her."

"I can tell you all you need to know."

"If you could, I wouldn't need to wake her up, something's missing Cuddy, maybe its something you don't know about. You need to trust me here."

"Lisa, what harm will it do?" asked Arlene Cuddy

"She's exhausted Mum, she had this fever for days and her joints are so painful, if we wake her who knows if we will be able to settle her again."

"She was given pain relief an hour ago, so she should be all good." House said insistently.

"I'll wake her, you don't need that." Cuddy said pointing at the syringe. "And you wont badger or upset her."

Cuddy spoke gently to Rachael, who woke and began to cry, Cuddy comforted her and gave her a drink. The she explained that the Doctors needed to talk to her and she should answer their questions as well as she could. Rachael nodded tiredly. House stepped into her view.

"Rachael, I'm Dr…"

"House!" squeaked Rachael excitedly. No one had expected her to really remember House.

"Yeah my hearty its House," He gave her a gentle smile, something the people in that room had rarely seen him do with a patient. "Rachael I need you to think really really hard, have you been bitten or scratched by any animal in the last few weeks?"

"House she hasn't been near any animals, we don't have pets."

House glared at Cuddy, and looked back at Rachael. "No ones going to be mad at you, but we really need to know."

Rachael looked at Cuddy, and then back at House, the guilty look on her face had House giving Cuddy a triumphant look.

"You can whisper to me," he said leaning down to the child. Rachael was speaking quietly into House's ear "Where? Can you show me?" The little girl showed house a barely visible mark on her pinky, House took his glasses out of his pocket and looked at it closely. "Get me a needle and a swab," he asked his team, then he turned back to the child. "Rachael, this might sting a little bit but I need you to hold still, can you do that for me?"

"Good luck" thought Cuddy to herself, Rachael was notoriously hard to do any thing with when it came to needles, and a prickle extraction was usually a major drama.

"You ready" House asked "Really still so I won't jab you. OK?"

Rachael nodded a tear ran down her cheek, she was trying to be brave.

House swabbed the area with alcohol, and then he lanced the barely visible slightly pale area on Rachael's finger. The little girl bit her lip but never moved. House took a swab of the small amount of pale yellow pus that came from around the area. He put the swab in the tube and handed it to Thirteen, go see what that grows, in the rare event that I could be wrong. Rachael you are so brave that I think your mother should buy you a kitten!" He smiled and winked at her.

"You're a scallywag" she giggled weakly, she knew her mother would be angry at him for saying that, and when she looked at her mother as expected she was glaring at House, making Rachael giggle again.

House told the team what they should start her on and told Cuddy that Rachael would need a weeks bed rest so her joints would recover and instructed the team to do an echo of her heart. "I'm confident we got it early enough to have headed off any damage there, but we should check just in case." House went to leave when a little voice stopped him.

"Why are you leaving, are you going to just go, like last time?"

"What do you remember, little one?" House was curious, the last time he had seen Rachael she was roughly the age his own kids are now, and he was interested to know what she remembered.

"You hurt your leg and Mommy and I bought you here, I wrote you a letter but you never came to play."

"I had to go away! Literally." He added under his breath.

"Are you going away again?"

"I hope not!" Rachael had no idea of the double meaning of their conversation.

"Will you come and see me again?"

"Probably not, Rachael. I don't work here anymore. What else do you remember about me?" he said hoping to distract her.

"Well, you're not a very good driver!" she said causing Chase to cough trying to cover up a laugh. Obviously Rachael had seen House's car parked in the dining room of her home, before they had removed it. Arlene Cuddy's face was a picture as she digested what her granddaughter had just said.

"I think you should get some rest now." House wasn't ready to explain "that" episode to her. "Good-bye Rachael"

"Bye House" the little girls eyelids were growing heavy.

House was about to make a quick exit but found Arlene Cuddy blocking the way.

"I hear you are married with children."

"You "hear" right!" House said trying to get past her, but the old girl stood her ground.

"I thought Lisa told me you didn't believe in marriage!"

"People change."

"No they don't"

"No they don't" he agreed, "I think your grand daughter could do with some rest." He gestured for her to leave the room ahead of him; it was obvious she was not going to let him get away without some form of interrogation, so he decided to take it outside.

"OK get it off your chest!" he turned to her in the corridor of the hospital "I'm sure you need to vent!"

Lisa Cuddy came between them. "Mom there's nothing to be gained from raking up the past."

Arlene Cuddy turned to glare at her daughter "Why do you presume I am going to rake up the past. Do you think I want be reminded of, what my stubborn perfectionist daughter, past up? Do you have any photos of your children? Greg."

"Sure" said a surprised House he took out his phone and Arlene her glasses and to Cuddy's surprise he proudly showed off pictures of his wife and kids. Cuddy looked on astounded at the encounter, she was still smarting from her mother's words, even after House had driven through her dining room, her mother had still defended him.

"Are you planning to have more?"

"Dom would like to, me I'm happy with what we have and I'm enjoying getting regular sleep, after two and a half years, I guess I'm showing my age." House put his phone away and said "It was nice to see you again" Weirdly it was true, he had a soft spot for this woman ever since she had schemed to reunite him and Cuddy.

Arlene put her hand on his arm and said genuinely "I'm thrilled how things turned out for you! I have thought of you often, and thank you for helping my grand daughter."

House left the two women standing together. Arlene looked at her daughter but before she could open her mouth, Lisa gave her a withering look and said, "Don't start!" she then turned and followed House who was packing his bag in Foreman's office.

"Where are you going?" she asked

"You know kids to raise, wife to do!"

"You're not going to stay to see if the treatment works?"

"It'll work," he said as he slid his laptop into the bag and put it on his shoulder to leave. "You should really buy that kid a pet and not a dam goldfish, a real pet."

"I'm not an animal person."

"Once you become a parent you have to learn to do this stuff, your daughter obviously loves animals."

"And you know this how?" Cuddy was indignant, how dare he tell her how to parent Rachael.

"I know it because she tried to rescue a dammed rat you trapped, so she could have a pet. Her friends brother has a pet rat."

"Rat bite fever" Cuddy shuddered "She has Rat bite fever"

"It was the only thing that fit, the team know what to do"

"What if it has affected her heart?" Cuddy asked scared.

"We got it early enough, another day it could have been a problem."

"Thanks"

"You are very welcome, I'm going home!"