Futures and Pasts
Title: Futures and Pasts
Pairing: House/Chase, various other slash and femeslash pairings.
Author: alanwolfmoon
Rating: PG
Warnings: not much
Summary: Sequel to Waiting, There, Here, Interlude, Everywhere, and Forward
Disclaimer: MINE! ALL MINE!....uh, no. Not mine.
Feedback: Reviews and flames are welcome. (They make it look like I'm writing fast)
Notes: Set after Forward. As always, may or may not be the last installment.
T
Futures and pasts
House smirked, sitting next to Taub on the front stoop, as they watched their respective lovers.
Chase was kneeling on a gardening pad, digging a hole for a… plant with spiky leaves. House wasn’t that up on his botany.
Kutner was sitting just on the plain ground, planting something with small, yellowish leaves.
Taub looked at House, briefly, then away, “Cameron’s pregnant.”
“I know.”
Taub looked at him, “when did you find out? She only told me yesterday…”
“When she asked Chase to be the sperm donor.”
“Oh.”
Taub looked back out at the two working in the garden.
“Rachel never wanted kids.”
“You’re not with Rachel.”
“I know. But… I mean, look at him… he’s practically a kid himself…”
House snorted, “which only means he’ll probably get along well with kids. Have you asked him if he wants them?”
Taub shook his head, miserably, “no.”
“Then stop agonizing over it with no information to go on.”
Taub looked at House, “since when did you grow up?”
House shrugged, “a woman I lived with for five years… she wanted kids. She got pregnant, we made up a nursery… but then she miscarried, before the fetus was viable. But… it was… nice. It would have been nice if it had worked out. ‘course a few months later she screwed me over completely, so maybe not…”
Taub sighed, shaking his head.
Kutner smiled, standing outside the delivery room.
House had been in there since pretty much the beginning, because Cuddy had been so freaked out by Cameron freaking out that she’d asked him to be there.
Chase was out there with them, as well as Foreman.
Wilson was stuck working.
Kutner turned, as a hand gripped his arm.
Taub was there, back from getting coffee.
“Hey. It’s over. It’s a-“
“Do you wanna have a kid?”
Kutner blinked.
Chase and Foreman made small sounds, and then focused very intently on the window into the delivery room.
Kutner looked at Taub, being serious for once, “not before I’m married.”
“…oh.”
Chase and Foreman looked at each other, and silently agreed that now would be a very good time to refill their almost full coffee cups.
Just then, though, the door opened, and House emerged, holding the door open for them to all file in.
Cameron was propped up against the head of the bed, looking sweaty and exhausted, a bundle of blankets and tiny baby held in her arms.
She and Cuddy were both almost literally glowing.
House smirked, as Chase crawled into bed with him.
“Tired?”
Chase nodded, pretty much collapsing against the older doctor’s side.
House gently ran his fingers through the younger man’s hair, “happy for Cameron?”
Chase nodded again, as he nestled against House’s neck, “mmm-hmm. She’s really happy.”
“Yeah.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
“Right.”
House kissed the top of Chase’s head, still absently running his fingers through his lover’s blond hair.
“It’s really nothing. Just… memories.”
Chase nodded, sighing a bit, and settling in a little closer.
“You okay?”
House nodded, “yeah. Just a little bothered.”
Chase smiled.
House yawned, opening his eyes, as Chase crouched by his head.
He was lying on the grass in the backyard, a pillow from the couch under his head.
Chase smiled down at him, “enjoying the sun?”
House nodded, smiling.
Chase sat down, smirking, next to him.
“Kutner and Taub were, uh, having a conversation.”
House snorted.
Chase smiled at him, “you ever think about it?”
“Having a kid? Well, yeah, but only to think what a god-awful idea it would be.”
Chase laughed, quietly, “no.”
House looked at him, frowning, then looked away, uncomfortably.
Chase sighed, “me neither, really.”
House looked at him again, and cracked a smile, “yeah.”
Chase laid down, perpendicular to the older doctor, resting his head on House’s stomach.
House smirked, stroking his lover’s blond hair.
Ten minutes later, the door opened, and Taub came out, sitting on the edge of the patio.
“Hi,” he said, practically glowing.
Chase snorted.
House didn’t react.
Chase sat up, looking at the older doctor.
House was blanked out.
Chase frowned, shaking his lover’s shoulder.
House didn’t stir.
Taub frowned as well, coming over.
“Is he okay?”
Chase glanced up, then looked back down at House, “I don’t know. This is weird…”
House blinked a bit, then his eyes cleared.
Chase was frowning down at him, “House. What happened?”
House sat up, shakily.
“What happened?” asked Taub.
“Uh,” said House, slightly sheepishly, “got confused. Stacy… used to put her head on my stomach like that.”
Chase looked relieved.
Taub looked like he didn’t know who Stacy was…which was understandable, as he didn’t know who Stacy was.
Chase personally thought he was lucky, in that regard.
Five months later…
Kutner sighed, pausing, before pushing the door open into the flower shop.
An inordinately cheerful woman came over, “can I help you?”
Kutner looked at her, sadly, “what do people usually put on graves?”
Taub sighed, tapping his fingers on the steering wheel, thin golden band clicking against the plastic, as he waited for Kutner to come out of the shop.
This was definitely not how he wanted to be spending his day, and he didn’t see what should take so long about picking out a few flowers, but Kutner had cared for Amber, in a way that he had not.
So he would wait as long as Kutner needed him to.
Foreman sighed, picking up his coat.
This was awkward, to say the least.
But he would go through with it, if only because he was too stubborn to back out.
He walked down the steps, and got in his car, driving to the older doctor’s apartment.
Wilson was already sitting on the steps out front when he arrived, coat held tight around himself.
Foreman guessed that a lot of the chill he was feeling was probably internal, rather than from the elements. It wasn’t *that* cold out.
Wilson got up, and got in the car, rubbing his hands together.
Foreman looked at him, raising an eyebrow, “how long were you out there?”
Wilson blushed slightly, “uh… an hour.”
Foreman frowned, checking his watch, to make sure it was still ticking. It was.
He looked at Wilson, eyebrows scrunched together.
Wilson looked away, “I… I just kind of wanted to be cold.”
Foreman shook his head, giving up on understanding, and pulled away from the curb.
Wilson was clearly still freezing cold, and the heat hadn’t come on yet.
Foreman drove, though, figuring the sooner they got there, the sooner they could get out.
Twenty minutes later, they arrived at the cemetery.
Foreman followed Wilson, as the pediatrician walked slowly between the rows of graves, finally stopping in front of a low, curved one that already had flowers in front of it.
Foreman wondered who had put them there…maybe it had been Kutner, or Taub, or a relative of hers.
He stood, silent, as Wilson knelt, placed the red lilies he had brought beside the white ones that were already there.
He stood, as Wilson started to cry.
Two months previously, he had been the one kneeling in the grass.
He would stand here as long as Wilson needed him to.
Chase sighed, a little, as he sat, lightly tracing circles on House’s back with his bad hand, while the older doctor laid with his upper body across Chase’s lap.
He hadn’t been there all morning, but Chase knew why, a glance at the calendar was all he needed.
The entire house was subdued, with even Kutner barely saying a word all morning, and when he had, it had been to ask Taub to drive him somewhere.
He hadn’t said where, but Chase had a pretty good guess.
House stirred a little, but only to burry his face in Chase’s hip.
Chase sighed again, and continued to sit with the older doctor, for as long as House needed him to.
Cuddy didn’t call any of her missing employees, that day.
“Why are we here again?” asked Foreman, rather irritated.
“Because we promised we’d meet everyone.”
“Did you seriously drag House to stuff like this?”
“No, usually he was the one dragging me.”
“House actually likes fairs?”
“He likes cotton candy and demolition derbies,” said Wilson, with a bit of a shrug, “and deep fried Twinkies… and running over people’s toes with a rented wheelchair.”
Foreman snorted.
“So this whole thing was his idea?”
“No, it was Kutner’s, and Chase agreed, and called Cameron, who called me.”
“Now that figures.”
Wilson laughed, “come on. It’s not that bad. It’s a fair. It’s supposed to be fun, you’re being more grouchy than House ever was.”
Foreman shook his head, and followed Wilson to where they were meeting everyone else.
The pediatrician was definitely more cheerful, these days, to the point where it got a bit grating.
But at the same time as he was annoying, his dorky, awkward happiness was incredibly endearing.
By the time they got to the showing pavilion that was the designated meeting spot, everyone else was already there-Cameron and Cuddy, with stroller and baby in tow; Kutner and Taub arguing about something, as usual; and House and Chase, House using a rented wheelchair as Wilson had described, attempting to run over a laughing Chase’s toes.
It was altogether too much happiness for Foreman’s comfort…but it was also…kind of….
He had stopped, but Wilson kept right on walking, so he gritted his teeth, and decided that maybe his dignity *could* survive a day at the fair with these people. Maybe.
…But probably not.