TITLE: Chapter 4: Haunting House

AUTHOR: new_raven

PAIRING: light House/Chris

RATING: PG

WARNINGS: None

SUMMARY: Halloween party.

DISCLAIMER: House and his pretty friends don't belong to me.

SOUNDTRACK:

"I'm going to wash it off." Chris whined. "People will get the costume without the makeup."

"Don't you dare!" Rachel jumped in between her friend and the door to her bedroom's attached bathroom. "It looks sooo good."

Rachel had spent hours watching webisodes and tutorials on how to achieve a perfect no-makeup, makeup look and exaggerated plump lips. With six different kinds of concealer and highlighter, three shades of nude lip liner, and a pint of liquid eyeliner she had transformed Chris into a pretty convincing Angelina Jolie look-alike. She was beyond proud of herself.

"It looks a little weird." Chris didn't want to hurt her friend's feelings.

"If I didn't know you, I'd think you had your lips done." Rachel was holding up her phone to get a picture.

"That's not a good thing."

"It is when you're dressed like that."

Chris turned back to the mirror. She'd thought this was going to be simple understated costume, when she invested $1.50 on short, brown hiking shorts, with an ink stain on the right pocket. She wore a black tank top with her usual backpack, and her black hair hung in a thick braid over her shoulder. She had spent far too much time fashioning wrist bands and gun harnesses out of electrical tape. She'd even cut out cardboard guns and knives and attached them to the tape circling her thighs.

"You can't even tell you're wearing makeup." Rachel pressed.

"Yes you can."

"Ok the fake lashes and liner are obvious, but it's a comic book character."

"Video game." Chris corrected her.

"Whatever, you're going to make Dr. House wet himself." Rachel was pulling on the red boots that came with her Supergirl costume.

"I doubt he's going to be at a kid's party and I hope he's not that old." Chris made a face and stuck out her tongue at Rachel, in the mirror.

Rachel laughed. "It's not just a kid's party. The whole hospital is invited."

"I thought it was on the Ped's wing." Chris remembered hearing about the party from a pediatric nurse, on the pediatrics floor. Now that she thought about it, she didn't remember her saying where the party would be.

"It's in the lobby. It would be pretty crappy for the kids, who are too sick to dress up or eat candy, if it was right outside their rooms." Rachel stood beside her in front of the mirror. "We look hot!"

Rachel smoothed her hands over the short, red skirt. Her perfectly straight blonde hair completed the look even before she added the red headband. They had found sparkly Superman S stickers to put on everything that wasn't part of the licensed costume. It gave a very detailed effect.

Chris looked at the mirror and frowned. Normally, she didn't bother comparing herself to the perfect creature beside her. It wasn't that she thought of herself as ugly. She knew, based on what she saw in the media, that she was pretty. She knew that men would be attracted to her, even when she didn't have Angelina's exaggerated pout painted on. She looked like her mom. Rachel said she looked like a Kardashian without the spray tan. Except for the scars and a few stretch marks there wasn't anything wrong with her body.

The problem was, that she had learned from TV and fairy tales, that life should be easy for pretty girls. They didn't get raped or go crazy. Because her life had not been easy, she just assumed either she wasn't that pretty, or there was some other flaw, something worse than being ugly, that set her apart from the really pretty girls.

Chris arched her back. "Where is the computer graphics department when I need them?" She pulled up on her bra straps until her breast pointed toward the ceiling.

"Oh wahhh!" Rachel rolled her eyes. "I'm faking a b-cup over here. Do they look even?"

"Perfect. Even Tommy won't be able to tell."

They were both assigned offices to wait in, for trick-or-treaters. They had buckets of stickers, pencils, and toys to hand out. Candy was limited to the refreshment table, to make it easier to monitor what patients were eating. After the trick-or-treating was over they helped with games. A performer was doing magic tricks and Chris was herding a group of young boys away from the exits.

House was at work much later than he liked, and didn't expect to leave any time soon. He was no closer to curing his current patient, than the day she was admitted; now her kidneys were failing. He was walking the halls restlessly. For a moment he thought he was losing it, as Marilyn Monroe and the Green M & M walked past. Wilson was wearing a tan fishing hat and plaid shirt, and greeted House as he stepped off the elevator.

"What are you supposed to be?" House asked.

Wilson held a small portion of fake picket fence over his mouth. "Wilson."

House laughed.

"What are you doing at one of these things?"

"Wrong floor, I'll be leaving now." House reached out for the elevator button but didn't press it.

"What?" Wilson followed his gaze to the front of the lobby, where a young Tomb Raider stood between any wayward children and the front doors. "Well she's certainly done her research." He just grinned to himself, when House turned away from the elevators and took a halfhearted interest in the refreshment table.

On the other side of the room, Chris didn't mind being sent to the corner to run interference. Dads and male staff had been chatting her up all night. She wished desperately that she had brought a sweater, costume or not. She wasn't used to having this much attention directed at her, especially positive attention. Catcalls and lewd gestures she could handle, but polite conversation and thinly veiled flirting made her skin crawl.

Rachel came running up, her hair and skirt bouncing with each step. "You're going to win the costume contest." She beamed.

"What? I thought that was just for the kids."

"No way. They'd have to give something to every kid here, or someone would feel left out."

"That's why it's called a contest, and not just free stuff."

"Here." Rachel was wielding a lip-gloss wand at her. "You better get over there, in case they call you first." She said, dotting the shimmery goop in the center of Chris's lower lip.

"You go up there." Chris grumbled.

Rachel shook her head. "I'm not Lara Croft."

"And now Dr. Cuddy is going to announce the costume contest winners." The magician announced.

Chris groaned. Rachel nudged her a few times until she made her way to edge of the stage. She was a little afraid she would throw up. She couldn't shake the feeling that everyone was staring at her. As Dr. Cuddy called "Lara Croft" to the stage, for most accurate costume, she realized it wasn't just a feeling anymore. Everyone was staring at her.

She accepted her award and a $20 Taco Bell gift card and scurried off the stage. The only reason she didn't run was to avoid even more attention. She lingered near the stairs, just long enough to be sure no one was watching her now. She backed up the first few steps with her eyes on the crowd and then turned and ran until she reached the next floor.

There were hand sanitizer dispensers posted all over the hospital. Chris ran her hand under the first one that she saw and rubbed the foam over her face, smearing her painted-on cheek bones. She took the elevator to the top floor and another short stairwell to the roof. She was in luck. The door was propped open with a rock. In the night air, she took a breath and leaned against the ledge. Just after she dug her cigarettes out of her bag and lit one, the door opened.

"You're not supposed to smoke up here." House told her. He told himself he'd followed her just to get a better look at that outfit.

"Well I wasn't going to do it down there. The kids who didn't cause their own cancer might see me." She pointed to the parking lot.

"Are you all right?" He asked.

"Fine, why wouldn't I be?" Her voice was sharper than she intended.

"You ran out of there like a vegan at a chili cook-off."

"Stage fright isn't rare enough for your tastes, is it?"

"People who don't like attention don't dress like that." House pointed out. It wasn't actually that revealing. The shorts definitely weren't as short as Angelina's, or maybe it just seemed that way, because the legs weren't as long. There was just something universally hot about a woman with weapons strapped to her thighs.

"I wouldn't wear it to a comic book convention, but I didn't think it would have such mass appeal here."

"Most doctors were once geeks." House explained.

"Yeah, that makes sense. I guess next year I'll wear a muumuu or something." She smiled a little. She wanted to ask if he had been a geek or if he still was.

"It won't matter." House told her.

"Doctors like muumuus too? Is that why they make those gowns so ridiculous?" She liked this. It felt comfortable, hiding behind witty banter.

He was looking out over the parking lot. "You're a beautiful girl. People will always find a reason to look at you. You only notice it when you're dressed like that."

There he went, ruining the fun and throwing her off her game. He might act like he doesn't notice anyone else on the planet, but he never missed a beat. Then he offers up some deep, awkward insight when it's the last thing she expected, and probably just because it is the last thing she expected. How was she supposed to respond to that?

"You think I'm beautiful?" Her voice was soft and earnest. She decided to focus on the compliment.

"You know you're beautiful." He looked at the ground.

Chris still didn't know what to say, but she stepped towards him. When he met her gaze she felt her heart thud in her chest. She let the cigarette drop from her fingers. He stepped on it with his sneaker, moving ever closer. She was hyper aware of her barely parted lips and took a deep breath as she looked into his big blue eyes.

When House looked back at her his usual coolness had been replaced with something else. Was it bashfulness, bravery, desire, or all three? She wondered if he could be as nervous as she was and leaned towards him just enough to bolster his courage. He tilted his head toward hers, and then the shrill beep of his pager pierced the silence.

They both jumped. The moment was gone. House looked at the tiny display and cursed.

"Maybe next time." He winked at her and turned to leave. He paused at the door and looked back over his shoulder. "Happy Birthday."

Chris stood in front of the third floor vending machine pressing buttons and mumbling curses under her breath. Chase walked into the little corridor where the machines were housed.

"Are they giving you trouble?" He asked.

"It took both my quarters, but it will only give one back." She hit the coin return again.

"I'll show you the trick, but you can't tell anyone." He smiled and dropped two quarters into the machine. "What's your choice?"

"Root beer."

"Same as House." Chase noted. He pressed the button and grinned proudly as three cans of root beer rolled out. He picked them up and handed all three to her.

"How much did you put in there?"

"It was just seventy-five cents, including your quarter. It's a computer glitch. It only works on root beer and Sprite."

"What would you have done if I'd said Coke?"

"I knew it had to be one of those, or it wouldn't have taken your quarter."

"Tricky. You've been working with Dr. House too long haven't you?"

"Entirely too long, and how long have you been working here?" He looked at her name tag, clipped over the word "Cowabunga" on her teal blue Ninja Turtles t-shirt.

House watched from behind a pillar as his employee chatted up their former patient. He could recognize Chase's flirting body language a mile away. He could almost hear his charming, Australian accent telling a far-fetched story. What he couldn't see was how Chris was responding, until he saw her body shake with laughter.

"Can I buy you a drink sometime?" Chase asked leaning towards her.

"Uh, you just bought me two." Chris pointed out.

"I meant a real drink, somewhere outside the hospital, perhaps?"

Chris barely stifled a laugh. "I don't really drink. I just turned twenty-one, actually."

"Coffee then?"

"Are you hitting on me?" Chris laughed and covered her mouth. She didn't want to be rude, but she couldn't fathom why a guy like Dr. Chase would be asking her out. Surely he just wanted to get laid, but he was a hot doctor with an accent. He could score a date anywhere. She couldn't wait to tell Rachel.

"Why is that funny?" Chase mistook her amusement for interest.

"It's not, really." She composed herself as best she could. "I'm just not… thank you though. I'm just really busy… with school and things… right now."

"No problem." Chase looked confused more than hurt.

Chris just nodded and tried to keep a straight face as she walked away.

"Congratulations!" House bellowed as he walked into the office the next morning. His team sat looking over files. They all looked at him expecting a crude, insulting joke. He narrowed his gaze to Chase. "I assume this means you've slept with every nurse in the building. That's quite an achievement"

The rest of the team looked from House to Chase. Chase looked as confused as any of them.

"Where will you turn when you run out of candy stripers?" House poured himself a cup of coffee.

Realization flashed across Chase's face for just a second, but he didn't speak. He wondered how House knew. Had she told him? Why would she tell House? He hadn't actually done anything. They'd only talked.

Thirteen and Foreman were intrigued now.

"Did you take her somewhere nice?" House asked.

"I don't know what you're talking about." Chase finally said. He wanted to know what House knew, before he admitted anything.

"You're denying it?" House asked. "Either you feel guilty or … she turned you down." A wry smile erupted on his face. Chase got rejected and Chris wasn't just scamming single doctors. If House were a man that believed in luck, he might have gone out and bought a lottery ticket.

Chase sighed.

"Are we talking about Rachel or Chris?" Thirteen asked.

"Christaline." House couldn't take the smirk off his face.

"Why are we talking about my sex life?" Chase asked.

"You hit on a patient?" Foreman asked.

"I asked her out. She declined. Can we drop it now?"

"That's awesome." Thirteen laughed.

"She's in high school." Foreman pointed out.

"Wait, let her talk." House turned to Thirteen. "Awesome? Are you going to ask her out too? If you do I'll fire Chase and give you his salary."