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  Grace 
 by Ishafel  

 Grace

He gets in the car and his mother is in the seat next to him, and his
father is in the back (his mother who died when he was sixteen, his father
who died when he was twenty-six) and he doesn't scream. He's reasonably
certain they aren't really there: that they're a product of exhaustion,
stress, and the drugs he did in college. He's seen them before, after all,
though never together (they weren't together for most of his childhood.)
He sees his mother at the bottom of the glass every time he finishes a
drink. He sees his father in the mirror and wishes he were becoming
someone else.

 "You didn't save me, Dr. Chase," his mother says. Her face is monstrous,
as it was before she died, bloated, red, framed by matted blond hair. (He
prefers to remember her when she was beautiful, or not at all.)

 "At least he tried to save you." In the rearview mirror, nothing shows
but the yellow gleam of his father's eyes, but Chase imagines a grinning
skull floating over his shoulder. "He didn't care enough about me to try."

 This is unfair, but not untrue. Chase doesn't respond. He never once won
an argument with either of them when they were alive. He pushes his car
door open and winces as it hits the Mercedes on his left. 

"That will leave a mark," his father says, sounding pleased. He always
liked to see Chase fuck up. Chase admires the dent he's left in the shiny
silver paint for a moment before he pulls his door shut and backs
carefully out. He's lucky he doesn't have an assigned parking space. They
might suspect him but they'll never know.

"Make a left at the light," his mother tells him, and Chase muscles the
Rover out of the right turn only lane. He won't ask where he's going. That
would be acknowledging what's happening-and besides, he doesn't really
want to know. It must be his imagination that the car smells faintly of
gin. He's never driven with his parents in the car before; his mother was
dead by the time he got his license and his father was gone. The chaplain
at school taught him to drive and took him for his test. (He wishes, for a
moment, he was back there, back then: Australia, sunny and green, seminary
straight ahead and not another missed turn. He's always hated failing.)

The house they direct him toward is small and tidy, little bikes in the
driveway, wreath on the door. There's no name on the mailbox but he knows
whose house it was. She was his only real mistake, and his only act of
kindness; of course he remembers. "Do you pray for her?" his father asks.

Chase shakes his head. "I don't pray for any of them," he says, forgetting
that he wasn't going to answer. "I don't even pray for myself." And then
he's fumbling with the door handle again, vomiting in the street outside
Kayla's house. It was House's fault-House's and his father's, and his own
for allowing himself to be blindsided. His mother's hands are cool on his
back (something else to not think about.) 

He wipes his mouth on his sleeve and presses his face against the cool
leather of the steering wheel. It's nearly midnight and he's due back at
the hospital at eight. "Why are you doing this to me?" he asks.

"Because we can," his father says. Chase turns the key in the ignition and
heads for home. By the time he gets there he's alone. He remembers now why
he prefers it.	
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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 Fox Television, 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.