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7 Months 14 Days
by Treacle_A
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"It is a mistake to think you can solve any major problems just with potatoes."
Douglas Adams
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He dreads the mornings after the nights they argue.
Waking alone in his bed, with one traitorous hand outstretched to the pillow on his left, always puts him in a bad mood. He can't eat breakfast without her there: her soft tuneless humming in the kitchen, the shape of her at the corner of his vision - narrow shouldered in spaghetti straps and sweats, eating cereal standing, waiting for the coffee to finish. The idea of slicing a banana onto his own oat-bran seems ludicrous when she isn't around to hand him a spoon. He drinks juice from a carton that she has punched an extra hole in to improve the flow. Replaces it in the door of the refrigerator and watches the tiny light go out.
The bike steers differently without the extra passenger and the tyres skate a little too freely, although maybe the tread just needs checking again. When he shifts his weight back at the lights, he nearly loses his balance. His legs feel strange. His back is cold. The traffic is light at this time of the morning, but all the drivers are assholes.
She is there when he gets in and lifts her head as he enters. He can't interpret her expression [still can't] but he knows enough to let her speak first. There is a warning in her eyes, a wary kind of tolerance that irritates him before she even opens her mouth.
"Foreman's down in IC. You should probably talk to him before he starts her on heparin again."
She is so concise. Not a word more than she needs to use.
"Foreman's a grown-up. He doesn't need me to hold his hand."
She shrugs, turns back to her notes, and, after a pause, he takes his cue and moves away from her into his office. His desk is exactly as he left it on Saturday evening, a scrawled note to himself on the blotter by the 'phone:
"Pick up A - 9.30"
Clawing it up, he balls it in his fist and drops it into the trash, along with the unopened mail she has placed neatly alongside it.
When he returns home alone in the evening, the apartment feels unbearably empty. A thin layer of dust covers the surface of his piano and, pulling up his seat, he runs a hand rustily along the length of the keyboard. The silken ivory feels dull under his fingertips, and when he launches into his favourite warm-up piece, the tone and tempo are leaden, the pace clumsy and ponderous. When the telephone rings he lurches for it with a desperation that surprises even himself.
"Cameron??"
"Greg? It's your mother."
He hates that he must acknowledge the dull gray ache in his chest.
It is late November. A week at work passes and another begins. Ten mornings. Ten nights. On the Wednesday, he finds her alone in the path lab, face pale and ghostly under the UV light, eyes serious. When she looks up at last [she has been waiting] he can feel her loneliness like a perfect echo of his own, her gaze holding his through the night-dark glass.
He stands outside for the longest time, remembering how things were before: the safe, blind fog that used to protect him, protect her, before they broke down and opened their wounds to each other. Looking into her face, he both hates and desperately loves her, wants her and longs for the barriers to return, for there to be walls between them again. For skin to begin covering the raw exposed flesh. It is when her eyes finally drop, returning to her work, that he realises he has missed his chance to speak.
For only the second time in his life, he feels real fear. And fear makes him stupid. Fear makes him clumsy. When he follows her out to the parking lot, they stand facing each other in the first shiverings of snow: her back against the driver's side window of her car, his knuckles bone-white on the handle of his cane. He hisses: "This is fucking ridiculous" and sees the words hit her like a slap.
Her eyes are ice, her lashes wet and ink black: "I agree. So let's just forget it."
"I didn't mean..." [jesus she can make him so fucking angry] "You're making this into far too big an issue. We had another fight is all. People fight..."
"But we never seem to learn anything, we never seem to... "
Her voice hitches, but her hands come up before he can move and close the distance between them. She shakes her head. Soft, small sigh.
"We fight...but we never seem to make up. We never seem to move any closer. You have your life and I have mine. And never the twain shall meet."
Her hands disappear up her sleeves, hugging her body and he longs to hold her. Her face is a pale heart framed by the dark hair curling around it.
"7 months and 14 days," she says, and her lips press tightly together, turning them white. "That's how long we've..."
"I know how long it's been."
Her pupils darken, "Do you? Because sometimes I think it means nothing to you. Sometimes I think..." she takes a short, deep, ragged breath, "I feel like you wish we'd never done it. Like you regret ever letting me in."
A car slides out past them, the headlights turning them both into stark shadows and, squinting, House shields his eyes from the light. It's only when it has passed them by that he realises Cameron still has her face covered with her hands. When he puts his arms around her, she is shaking.
His lips on her hair melt snowflakes, kiss the damp roots of her hairline. His fingers smooth back wet strands of her hair, trace the line of her cheekbone. When he kisses her lips, they are soft and cold, warming slowly to his touch.
"Come home with me."
Her elbows stiffen and she draws back, shakes her head. The movement isn't strong though, isn't 100% certain. Sliding his hands down her arms, he pulls her closer to him.
"Allison. Please."
It's more than he's ever said before, more than he has felt able to. But he feels the shift, the softening of her spine, and he hopes. And then hates himself for hoping, because:
"I can't," she says, and shakes her head again, "Not tonight."
"Tomorrow then?"
He won't let her go. He realises that now, that he's holding onto her for dear life, that, for the first time ever, he's actively stopping her from leaving. She pulls back from him and something [achingly wonderfully] familiar returns to her eyes.
"House, tomorrow is Thanksgiving..."
"You think I forgot?" he frowns into her hair, avoiding her eyes, brushes her ear with his mouth. "The damned turkey won't even fit in the refrigerator, and I have no idea what the hell to do with it. I'm pretty sure I can still remember how to mash potatoes though."
She stills under his touch and, feeling it, he stills too, his forehead against her. His breath clouds in white, mingling with her own. Her fingers, ice-white and freckled with snow, slip out of her sleeves to slowly cover his. She looks up into his face and he feels his heart do something ridiculous, something he knows is physically and medically impossible.
"This is probably going to be a disaster," she says softly.
Her lips open and close against his skin. Her fingers creep inside the lining of his jacket and, when she rests her face against his chest, he feels a peace come over him that he hasn't felt in ten long days. In maybe forever.
"Probably," he replies quietly, "I don't think I even own a ricer."
FIN
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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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