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System Failure: Part Eight
by phineyj and snarkbait
Chapter 20: Foreman
I am so determined to prove House wrong that I spend the rest of the afternoon reading my way through all the reference material on auto-immune diseases and intestinal parasites we have in the office, moving on to the internet to do some detailed research to back up my Guillain-Barr diagnosis. Unfortunately, the more I read, the more I think that House is probably right. The symptoms aren't a great match for Guillain-Barr, and none of the intestinal parasites could do such extensive damage this quickly.
Still, there's the whole weekend to go. Perhaps something will turn up. As I read, Chase wanders off. He says he's going to Peds, and it's only after he's left I realize he hasn't said why. I reckon he fancies his chances with the new nurse who started there this week. She's blonde, pretty, and has an infectious laugh. Thing is, she's a friend of a friend, and so I know she bats for the other team. But I don't think I'm going to tell Chase that.
Cameron is working away on her laptop, making a spreadsheet of all Sam's test results since he was admitted, to see if she can spot anything we've missed. Around six o'clock, she disappears for fifteen minutes, and when she returns, although she's still wearing the same clothes, she's taken her hair out of its tight ponytail so it's loose round her shoulders, applied some eye makeup, and it smells like she's wearing perfume. Interesting.
"Foreman, you don't mind if I go, do you?" she asks, as she puts her laptop back into its case and tidies up her desk.
I shake my head. She's supposed to have gone by now, anyway; my shift officially started at five.
"Okay, good," she says, "I'll see you tomorrow at noon then," and with that, she leaves.
I've never known her to have plans on a Friday night before. I go out onto House's balcony and watch her as she leaves the hospital, but instead of going down into the parking lot, she emerges from the main entrance, where she waits, checking her watch.
After a few minutes, a shiny black Mercedes pulls up and she gets in, and as it drives away, I can just make out Nick Chen, the surgeon, behind the wheel.
Chapter 21: Wilson
This is officially a crappy end to a crappy week. I've lost three patients in as many days, and I'm currently in ICU psyching myself up to tell the parents of Carly Petersen, the teenager who was operated on this morning, that she's unlikely to survive the night.
I walk slowly down the corridor as I rehearse my well-worn litany of comforting phrases - and as I do so, I catch sight of the spiky blonde head of the guitarist's wife, bent over a magazine she's obviously not reading, because it's resting on her lap upside down. I don't make eye contact, but she looks up at the sound of my footsteps, gets wearily to her feet and comes out to the corridor.
She's quite a tall woman - nearly as tall as me, and she's slim, and even in worn-out jeans and a pink t-shirt that could use a wash, she's got an air of authority about her before she even opens her mouth. I would guess she's used to giving orders and having them obeyed. I am reminded of Cuddy of all people, although this woman couldn't be more different from her in appearance.
I don't want to talk to her - God knows, I've had conversations with more than my fair share of traumatized relatives this week, and her husband's not even my patient. But she's standing right there in front of me, so I can hardly walk on past her.
"I'm Cathy, Sam Bedford's wife. You know Dr House, right?" she says.
"Yes, I have that dubious privilege," I say, warily, wondering what I'm going to have to apologize for now.
"Can I ask you a question?" she continues.
I feel like saying, `you just did', but it's mean to be sarcastic to people who haven't slept properly in days, so I nod.
"Is he good? The thing is, I can't tell. I don't know anything about your system here. And he has no beside manner and I couldn't understand what he was on about, the only time he spoke to me. I mean, Dr Cameron says he's the best, but I get the impression she would say anything she thought would cheer me up." She pauses, looking embarrassed, and adds, "Sorry, I'm babbling."
"It's okay," I say, reassuringly. There's no way I can talk to Mr and Mrs Petersen now; I've lost my carefully cultivated gravitas, so I say, "Listen, I was just going to get a cup of coffee; can I get you one?"
Cathy glances over at her husband, who is lying there hooked up to wires and gently-bleeping monitors, as still and pale as a corpse, and says, "I'll come with you if that's okay. I feel like I'm going to get a blood clot from all this sitting around. But I can't just leave him here, can I?"
I buy two coffees from the machine down the hallway, and we sit in the row of chairs beside it to drink them. Against my will - because I feel like if I try to empathize with one more person today, I might just have to drive too fast out of Princeton and never come back - I ask, "Do you have anyone who can come out here and be with you?"
She shakes her head, and says, "Sam's mum has M.S. and she can't travel, and his dad won't come here without her. I've been ringing them every night though."
"Where are you from in England?" I ask.
"Surrey," she says, and looks at me for a reaction, which I don't have, because to be honest I have no idea where that is.
"That's one of the best things about America," she says, with a faint smile. "I don't have to apologize for being from Surrey. As far as Sam's band mates are concerned, I might as well be from the moon. Do you know, I've shared a tour bus with those guys for weeks on end, and they still refer to me as `Sam's bird' whenever they think he's not in earshot?"
I imagine they are probably jealous, but I don't say so. As I drain my coffee, she asks, sounding strained again, "So, the famous Dr House...am I safe to be trusting Sam to him, or what?"
I look her in the eye.
"Dr Cameron's right, he's the best there is," I tell her. "He doesn't give up. If there's any way to figure out what's wrong with your husband, he will. I know he's a bit lacking in the people skills department, but if anyone can work this out, it'll be him. He may not be here, but he'll be examining every possible angle on this, looking for leads and making sure his team takes care of Sam in the meantime."
"You make him sound like a detective," she says, and to my relief she does look somewhat reassured.
"Is that how you work?" she asks, and I shake my head.
"I'm an oncologist," I explain. "I nearly always know what's wrong with my patients; that's not the hard bit. And if you'll excuse me, I'm meant to be on my way to see one of them now."
She nods. "Thanks," she says, softly, and goes back into her husband's room.
---
My new apartment still doesn't feel like home in the slightest, and despite the fact I feel dog tired, I don't want to go there. I think over my options. I could stay longer at the hospital, try and reduce my towering pile of paperwork a little. But I know Mr and Mrs Petersen's faces are going to haunt me, and I won't be able to resist going back up there to check on Carly.
Or, I could find a bar and drink until I bludgeon my mind into neutral and I'm just fit to get a cab home and pass out. Great, that sounds like a mature plan; I'm sure the oh-so-tastefully-greige furnishings of the apartment are going to look much better through a pounding hangover. Alternatively, I could drop by House's and see what he's doing. He's probably watching the game while mulling over his case, but at least he'll have beer and there's no chance he'll ask me how my day was. It's definitely the best of the sucky options open to me this evening.
But, when I get to his place, suddenly I don't think I am going to be spending the evening with House, after all, because that's Cuddy's red BMW in the road outside. I don't want to jump to any conclusions...but then, that's actually a total lie, and...Hell yeah I want to jump to conclusions, and I'm going to. Because House never gives me the benefit of the doubt.
So I drive home, alternating between feeling pleased for them and a sensation of complete trepidation about the circumstances which can possibly have brought this about. Surely this can't end well...can it?
Chapter 22: Cameron
Chen's not House, that's for sure. He's clever, but as he asks me about where I trained, and what it's like working here in Princeton, and as I tell him about some of the cases we've had, I start to feel quite clever too. I suddenly realize how much I've learnt in the last year.
He's witty, but I don't feel like I have to put on conversational armor at every turn, and although I never talk about my family, for some reason, right at the minute, I'm telling him a funny story about my dad.
Neither of us have dressed up, the food is good, the wine is better...and so far, I don't seem to have forced him into any awkward conversational corners. I wonder if just maybe, I don't suck at this dating thing quite as much as I thought.
The time goes by so quickly that I almost can't believe it when we're drinking coffee and he's asking for the bill, because he needs to get to Newark in time to return his rental car and check in for the last flight back to Chicago.
He drops me off at my apartment on his way to the airport, and I've thanked him for the evening, and I'm just about to get out of the car, when he leans over and kisses me. It starts out as a peck on the cheek, and then he changes his mind and it turns into a proper kiss. I make the most of it; he tastes good, and I've been thinking about doing this since I first saw him. I remember how he looked, operating on Sam; his fierce concentration and deft movements; everything carried out with the calm confidence of someone who knows exactly what he's doing.
"So, you're free, then, there's no one else?" he says as we pull apart, a slightly anxious look in his dark eyes.
"Because there's a bit of an atmosphere in your team, and I thought, maybe..." he trails off.
I bring to mind the smell of Cuddy's perfume; it's a lot like her, dressy and beautiful with an underlying core of something sharper. I remember how it smelt in the early hours of this morning, filtered through the unmistakable aroma of leather, coffee and prescription strength medication that surrounds my boss.
And I smile, and say, confidently, before he can speculate any further:
"No, there's no one else."
He's not House.
I can live with that.
Chapter 23: House
I wake up well before Cuddy on Saturday morning. I notice one of her arms is draped idly on my chest, and I find the sensation of her bare skin against mine strange. Although waking up next to her is even stranger.
She's lying on her stomach, which is a shame; her naked breasts are inches away from me and I can't see them. This is unfair.
Whether what we're doing is right or wrong, waking up next to a naked Cuddy is actually a pretty good sight. I doubt she'll feel the same way though. Waking up next to a naked me, is probably not something she's had on any of her `to do' lists for quite some time.
I suddenly notice that I can smell her perfume all over me; she must choose stuff that sticks to men when she screws them. It's probably such a rare occurrence she feels the need to mark her territory.
I look across and observe the great Cuddy at rest, relaxed, hair messily strewn all over my pillow. The pillow's probably going to smell of her shampoo long after she's gone, and the silence in the room is broken by the squeaky little snore that catches in her throat as she exhales slowly. I suppose I'd find it cute if I were as feminine as Wilson. But I'm not, so I don't; I just find it's annoying me really.
Her arms and legs are at angles and she's occupying at least two thirds of my bed.
Typical.
She doesn't change even when she's unconscious. She's still completely in control of everything around her; sounds, space, smells and any thing else that begins with S.
It's going to be weird when she wakes up. She'll probably hate herself like she did yesterday; in fact I'm sort of surprised she didn't creep off in the early hours so she could bypass the gracelessness of waking up naked in my bed.
I stare up at the ceiling, and it suddenly dawns on me that I don't know what the hell we're doing; it seems inevitable in one sense, but dangerous and stupid in another. The hospital is her life and mine too. The way things are between us may not be ideal, but it works.
Neither us can stand to have things change, surely?
This right here, and what we did last night is what I would call rocking the boat, asking for trouble. And I get the sense of my being the one to come out of this worse if it clouds or changes the relationship between us at work.
I carefully remove her hand and place it by her side, then I ease myself out bed; she's practically kicked me out of it anyway. I have no idea where I left my Vicodin but I need to find it quickly. My leg is pissed off, I suppose sex counts as physical exercise and it's not had this much to put up with in quite some time.
And that is not a thought I'm going to dwell on, because the last time...the last time was with Stacy. Getting laid regularly is great, I suppose, but when it's with your boss...potentially not so great.
I get out of bed and the first thing I notice is my nakedness and the fact that it's very cold in here. Okay so I need to find clothes first and then Vicodin. I really don't think Cuddy wants to wake up to see my bare ass wandering around the room while I try and find my drugs.
I head for my closet, carefully avoiding the trail of clothes we left on the floor last night. I slide it open and grab a t-shirt and some boxer shorts then go to the living room. My Vicodin is sitting on the table next to the empty beer bottles. I take two and crunch them both and then sit still on the sofa until the ache in my leg becomes something closer to bearable.
After I have a quick shower and get half dressed I make a strong coffee and it's then I realize there is no food in the house; well nothing I can expect another human being to eat. There is some left over pizza in the fridge I might chance if I was on my own.
But I'm not, so I move it into the trash. If Cuddy wants feeding when she wakes up we'll have to go out. That's if she doesn't dart out of here like a spooked rabbit freed from a trap.
That visual - bizarrely - leads me to thinking, and then I get an idea and have a look for my spare bike helmet.
---
I take Cuddy a mug of coffee and place it by her on the bedside table; I'm chewing my lip in quiet deliberation: should I wake her or not? Then, she quietly clears her throat and opens her eyes.
She jumps a little when she notices me standing by the bed. I quickly point at the coffee so she doesn't think I've just been randomly standing watching her sleep.
"Hey," she offers gruffly. Maybe even a little hint of embarrassment in there.
She sits up, pulling the sheet from the bed around her body and I back off and stand awkwardly between the door and the bed.
"You got any plans today?" I ask, unsurely, rapping the fingers of my left hand against my leg as I tap my cane on up and down on the carpet.
She thinks about it. "I don't think so," she replies cautiously, while rubbing a tired hand across her eyes. Then she's giving me her schoolteacher look. Well this is my apartment and she's not in control here. So she can just cut that shit out, now.
"Good, we have plans," I say assertively; although I really don't feel as confident as I sound.
She frowns at me. "We do?" she replies uncertainly, and then reaches for the coffee.
"Yeah," I reply then leave her to get ready.
I find some jeans in the bathroom, put them on and then head into the living room and sit on the sofa. Cuddy takes a shower without asking, but I'm kind of glad she hasn't run out of here yet.
I suppose I can admit that her current state of mind is my fault, so it's only right I have a go at chilling her out. I'm bouncing my cane up and down on the floor when she comes in; I offer her an awkward half smile.
"What's this plan of yours? I could use breakfast and I really need to brush my teeth," she says. She looks crumpled, probably because she's wearing clothes that were not so neatly discarded on my bedroom floor all night.
"We can pick up a toothbrush on the way, and breakfast," I say.
"Where are we going? Your surprises are normally unsettling and / or scary," she comments, doubtfully.
I look away from her; I'm trying to do something nice, Cuddy, can't you just let me try? It only takes a little faith.
"Go home then," I say - way too defensively. I almost wince at the sound of it. She stands in the doorway and stares at me for a few moments. And I notice that not once since she's been here has she seemed relaxed.
"I just want to know where you want to go, that's all," she says, more softly.
"And I'd rather you wait until we get there, and if you can't have a little bit of faith in me, you may as well go home," I return.
"Fine," she says, sighing. "Come on, you grumpy bastard," she continues, heading for the door.
This sudden bitchiness makes me smile; that's more like it.
"You'll need this," I say, standing, and tossing her my spare bike helmet.
She only just catches it, stooping and holding it inches from the ground. She finds a humorless smirk and shakes her head from side to side.
"No, no way, we'll take my car," she says strongly.
"Wimp," I say. This is my plan; we're doing it my way, or not at all.
---
"Be careful," comes the muffled warning from behind me.
"Don't you trust me?" I ask innocently.
"No," she shouts, I turn and knock her visor down so any more complaints will be suitably muffled even more.
Turns out my plan involved going to her place so she could get changed, 'because she's not getting her Manolos muddy.'
"When I lean into a corner, you need to come with me, or the bike won't corner so well because it will have fallen over and we'll fall off...which will be very messy and spill blood all over the road," I say, matter of fact. It's important to get these little details into the brains of pillion passengers.
I feel her start to get off, but I grab her by the wrists and pull her arms around me.
"It's easy; I'll go slowly until you get the hang of it, all right?"
There is a great reluctance in her arms; eventually she claps her hands together in front of me.
I zoom out of my road, just to wake her up, but then I drive it 30 mph slower than I ever have before.
Cuddy needs to get that bug out of her ass, what better way to do it than this? She follows my body when I corner; she's a fast learner. And I can feel her relax as we leave Princeton and arrive at some countryside. The mist is still low on the ground and I know she's watching the horses as we pass a large field with a picket fence around it.
It's Saturday; no need to rush anywhere. Not much traffic on the roads. The morning air is exhilarating when it hits you at 60 mph. I wait until I get a nice stretch of road and then carefully open it up, not quickly because this thing can jerk suddenly when you speed up and I don't want her to notice.
I manage to get it to 90 before she realizes we're speeding and I receive a tight chest squeeze for my law breaking ways.
I ease back down to 60 before she squeezes all the air out of me.
Chapter 23: Cuddy
I would say it's like a recurring nightmare, but so far I've only woken up in House's bed once this week, so that wouldn't be true.
I'm tired and sweaty, I have a crick in my neck and my mouth feels like someone crawled in and fitted wall to wall carpet while I was asleep. And when I notice the man himself is looming over me, I'm not overly delighted, because I could have done with a minute or two to pull myself together.
Still, he brought me coffee, something it occurs to me he used to do, when we were students. That is, before one of us doing anything for the other became an automatic admission of guilt.
As he tries to stop me leaving - and how weird is that, that he's even trying - I'm trying to reason with myself, going through a mental list of all the reasons why this is fucked up and I should cut my losses and run right now. But against my will, I'm intrigued by what he's got in mind, and why he won't tell me what it is.
Also, if I'm really honest with myself, I have thought about what it would be like, having a ride on his bike. There's no way I would ever have asked, but when I realized he'd taken Allison Cameron on it, I felt...
Tell it like it is, Lisa, I say to myself, as I hold onto him, watching buildings and intersections speed by, then trees and fields; you were jealous.
And I still don't know where we're going, but I'm definitely enjoying the ride.
Continues in Part 9
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Legal Disclaimer: The authors published here make no claims on the ownership of Dr. Gregory House and the other fictional residents of Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital. Like the television show House (and quite possibly Dr. Wilson's pocket protector), they are the property of NBC/Universal, David Shore and undoubtedly other individuals of whom I am only peripherally aware. The fan fiction authors published here receive no monetary benefit from their work and intend no copyright infringement nor slight to the actual owners. We love the characters and we love the show, otherwise we wouldn't be here.
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