"So afraid he'll be what they never were..."
Title: No More False Heavens. No More Damned Magic. [6/?]
Fandom: House MD
Pairing: House/Cameron
Challenge/Prompt: 1theme, “The Reason”
Rating: PG-13
Genre: Het
Copyright: Title taken from “Wide Sargasso Sea” by Jean Rhys
Summary: It is a bit like suffocating someone very, very slowly.
Author’s Notes: I’ve done them for lots of other people, why not H/C?
The Reason House Hired Cameron
Reason is itself a matter of faith. It is an act of faith to assert that our thoughts have any relation to reality at all.
G.K Chesterton
It’s easy to tell Cameron that she was hired because she’s beautiful, if only because it isn’t a complete lie. Chase is very pretty in a shampoo commercial, surfer kind of way, and is always a hit with female teenage clinic patients, and Foreman isn’t exactly the most disfigured of people, but it’s true that Cameron is the looker in the diagnostics department, all blue eyes and waving hair and blouses that become steadily more low-cut as the temperature rises (“You’re giving Cuddy a run for her money,” House informs her one day, smirking, and Cameron flushes and wears turtlenecks for a week).
And by telling her that he hired her merely for those cheekbones and the curve of her waist beneath the labcoat, is to get her insecure, and determined to prove herself.
Win-win all round.
Wilson says it’s sadistic, but then Jimmy always did feel too much, and it’s not sadistic, it’s an experiment. Besides, if nothing else, it makes Cameron work twice as hard as Chase, who was hired because his daddy made a phonecall (telling House that Chase would be no good as a fellowship applicant, he should turn him down at the first opportunity, and House was never all that good at following orders, although he’s beginning to suspect it would have saved time all round to have just followed Rowan Chase’s advice), and twice as hard as Foreman, who knows that he was hired for his criminal record and doesn’t really care. Foreman is the arrogant one, Cameron is the insecure one, Chase is the borderline sociopathic one some days.
Hell, House thinks, they could form a girl band with that.
Cuddy doesn’t really like Cameron, and House can’t work out if it’s some kind of female jealousy thing she’s got going on (although he really thought Cuddy was above that, but, just in case, he informs her that he will always like her tits best. And he informs her of this in front of a whole disciplinary board, who are trying to tell him off for making inappropriate comments to clinic patients. He is the King of Timing), or if it’s because Cameron has too much of a sense of right and wrong, and Cuddy is sick of finding out about every single one of his indiscretions.
Whichever way you look at it, from whoever’s point of view, Cameron shouldn’t be working here. It depresses the hell out of her, it saps the life out of her kittens-and-puppies way of looking at the world, and House can see that what he says really gets to her. It is a bit like suffocating someone very, very slowly, only they can’t see the plastic bag you’re holding over their face. He supposes he should fire her, or give her an out. It’s the decent thing to do. Wilson would have done it already.
So he doesn’t.
Sink or swim, fight or flight, House delights in being everyone’s baptism of fire. Like he doesn’t know the nurses are warned to stay away from the fourth floor for their first few months’ work at PPTH, until they feel a little less insecure. Cuddy should have fired him years ago, but she won’t. The problem is that he is really, really good at what he does. And maybe that’s not enough, it certainly wasn’t enough for all the other Deans Of Medicine who amused themselves with writing lists of all the reasons he was fired, and then expected him to read them (House thinks he made paper airplanes out of the last list, and threw most of them at Wilson). But Cuddy is tolerant, even if she is sick of him.
Watching Cameron fall apart is entertaining. House isn’t going to pretend it’s not. They’re all masochistic in diagnostics, to varying degrees, but Cameron is, in some ways, the worst. And House knows this because he can see her falling in love with him.
At her job interview, her eyes skimmed over the cane and his shaking hands (he’d taken a couple too many Vicodin, but at the time, she didn’t know that), her blue eyes filled with pity and some form of cracked understanding (she didn’t understand, and still doesn’t, but then that’s Cameron all over), and then she spoke passionately and confidently about medicine, how she believed it should be practised, her interest in diagnostics - the whole shebang. House has never told her that he didn’t listen to a word of it, and although Wilson offered to summarise what Cameron said for him, House refused. He feels no need to know about her idealism.
It’s faintly unnerving, that she can have been a doctor that long and have lost so much and yet she still has enough optimism to drown a normal person in. It can’t be sane or healthy and it was laughable, when House first hired her, Chase was sulking for days, as though he was the only one allowed to be pretty in their department, but it’s all right because House has never really been all that fond of blondes.
Cameron has been working for House around six months when she first kisses him.
House knows, at first, that she pitied him, but couldn’t see beyond the disability and the stubble. He knows it’s like that for everyone. Then they notice how frighteningly blue his eyes are and realise that his disability isn’t an excuse for anything, and then they stop noticing the cane entirely until he uses it to trip them up (literally; because accidentally-on-purpose bruising his employees is just an amusing perk). And then they either grow to love him, or to hate him.
(House still hasn’t quite worked out which side Wilson picked.)
So it’s dark and late and there’s rain sleeting down the windows and House wants to go home but he’s taken one too many Vicodin (or possibly three too many, but he can’t remember and it’s not like anyone’s counting) and so is consigning himself to sleeping in his office and driving home when the high wears off a little and there’s less of a chance of him crashing en route, when she walks in.
Dark hair falling around her shoulders, and she’s wearing mascara, which is never a good sign, but House is just the right side of pain-free and slightly high to be amused rather than scornful. And then he wonders just what he’s done to deserve this.
“So you hired me because I’m beautiful,” she says steadily, “And you’re telling me you’re not going to take advantage of that?”
House should tell her to go home. But he’s just not that good a person.
A few weeks later, when she’s angry with him and he’s being an asshole and has made a few too many comments in front of Chase and Foreman, and she’s flushing like a child and House is thinking you asked for this except that he knows she didn’t, not really, she stops him from leaving and says, a little unsteadily:
“Why did you hire me?”
House isn’t going to feed her the-you-were-beautiful line again, nor is he going to tell her that she’s a delicious damaged puzzle that he’s trying to put together, because he put it together months ago and she just doesn’t know that yet, and besides, he thinks that she likes being an enigma, so he looks at her, mascara smudging down her cheeks, and she’s been fucking him for weeks and he wonders dispassionately if she even knows why, so he shrugs.
“I want the truth,” she says.
You really don’t, House thinks.
“You say that everybody lies, and that means you lied to me, and you didn’t hire me because you think I’m beautiful. You hired me for another reason, and I need to know what it is.”
“You don’t.”
“Tell me.”
House is tired of this, and just wants to leave. But that earnest little angry look on her face is annoying him, so he says, in a calm, measured tone that doesn’t have the slightest trace of anything but scorn in it:
“You want to know why I hired you? Because I’d had four Vicodin, and it was a long afternoon, and Cuddy was hounding me to get another fellow, and I wasn’t in the mood to do any more interviews, and you looked like you could do joined-up handwriting. Ok?”
Cameron’s face crumples, but House pushes past her, out into the corridor, and doesn’t look back. She’s got a reason now, a reason that she believes. It’ll be enough for her.
It doesn’t really matter whether it’s true or not.
(House really can’t remember.)
Reason Seven
Fandom: House MD
Pairing: House/Cameron
Challenge/Prompt: 1theme, “The Reason”
Rating: PG-13
Genre: Het
Copyright: Title taken from “Wide Sargasso Sea” by Jean Rhys
Summary: It is a bit like suffocating someone very, very slowly.
Author’s Notes: I’ve done them for lots of other people, why not H/C?
The Reason House Hired Cameron
Reason is itself a matter of faith. It is an act of faith to assert that our thoughts have any relation to reality at all.
G.K Chesterton
It’s easy to tell Cameron that she was hired because she’s beautiful, if only because it isn’t a complete lie. Chase is very pretty in a shampoo commercial, surfer kind of way, and is always a hit with female teenage clinic patients, and Foreman isn’t exactly the most disfigured of people, but it’s true that Cameron is the looker in the diagnostics department, all blue eyes and waving hair and blouses that become steadily more low-cut as the temperature rises (“You’re giving Cuddy a run for her money,” House informs her one day, smirking, and Cameron flushes and wears turtlenecks for a week).
And by telling her that he hired her merely for those cheekbones and the curve of her waist beneath the labcoat, is to get her insecure, and determined to prove herself.
Win-win all round.
Wilson says it’s sadistic, but then Jimmy always did feel too much, and it’s not sadistic, it’s an experiment. Besides, if nothing else, it makes Cameron work twice as hard as Chase, who was hired because his daddy made a phonecall (telling House that Chase would be no good as a fellowship applicant, he should turn him down at the first opportunity, and House was never all that good at following orders, although he’s beginning to suspect it would have saved time all round to have just followed Rowan Chase’s advice), and twice as hard as Foreman, who knows that he was hired for his criminal record and doesn’t really care. Foreman is the arrogant one, Cameron is the insecure one, Chase is the borderline sociopathic one some days.
Hell, House thinks, they could form a girl band with that.
Cuddy doesn’t really like Cameron, and House can’t work out if it’s some kind of female jealousy thing she’s got going on (although he really thought Cuddy was above that, but, just in case, he informs her that he will always like her tits best. And he informs her of this in front of a whole disciplinary board, who are trying to tell him off for making inappropriate comments to clinic patients. He is the King of Timing), or if it’s because Cameron has too much of a sense of right and wrong, and Cuddy is sick of finding out about every single one of his indiscretions.
Whichever way you look at it, from whoever’s point of view, Cameron shouldn’t be working here. It depresses the hell out of her, it saps the life out of her kittens-and-puppies way of looking at the world, and House can see that what he says really gets to her. It is a bit like suffocating someone very, very slowly, only they can’t see the plastic bag you’re holding over their face. He supposes he should fire her, or give her an out. It’s the decent thing to do. Wilson would have done it already.
So he doesn’t.
Sink or swim, fight or flight, House delights in being everyone’s baptism of fire. Like he doesn’t know the nurses are warned to stay away from the fourth floor for their first few months’ work at PPTH, until they feel a little less insecure. Cuddy should have fired him years ago, but she won’t. The problem is that he is really, really good at what he does. And maybe that’s not enough, it certainly wasn’t enough for all the other Deans Of Medicine who amused themselves with writing lists of all the reasons he was fired, and then expected him to read them (House thinks he made paper airplanes out of the last list, and threw most of them at Wilson). But Cuddy is tolerant, even if she is sick of him.
Watching Cameron fall apart is entertaining. House isn’t going to pretend it’s not. They’re all masochistic in diagnostics, to varying degrees, but Cameron is, in some ways, the worst. And House knows this because he can see her falling in love with him.
At her job interview, her eyes skimmed over the cane and his shaking hands (he’d taken a couple too many Vicodin, but at the time, she didn’t know that), her blue eyes filled with pity and some form of cracked understanding (she didn’t understand, and still doesn’t, but then that’s Cameron all over), and then she spoke passionately and confidently about medicine, how she believed it should be practised, her interest in diagnostics - the whole shebang. House has never told her that he didn’t listen to a word of it, and although Wilson offered to summarise what Cameron said for him, House refused. He feels no need to know about her idealism.
It’s faintly unnerving, that she can have been a doctor that long and have lost so much and yet she still has enough optimism to drown a normal person in. It can’t be sane or healthy and it was laughable, when House first hired her, Chase was sulking for days, as though he was the only one allowed to be pretty in their department, but it’s all right because House has never really been all that fond of blondes.
Cameron has been working for House around six months when she first kisses him.
House knows, at first, that she pitied him, but couldn’t see beyond the disability and the stubble. He knows it’s like that for everyone. Then they notice how frighteningly blue his eyes are and realise that his disability isn’t an excuse for anything, and then they stop noticing the cane entirely until he uses it to trip them up (literally; because accidentally-on-purpose bruising his employees is just an amusing perk). And then they either grow to love him, or to hate him.
(House still hasn’t quite worked out which side Wilson picked.)
So it’s dark and late and there’s rain sleeting down the windows and House wants to go home but he’s taken one too many Vicodin (or possibly three too many, but he can’t remember and it’s not like anyone’s counting) and so is consigning himself to sleeping in his office and driving home when the high wears off a little and there’s less of a chance of him crashing en route, when she walks in.
Dark hair falling around her shoulders, and she’s wearing mascara, which is never a good sign, but House is just the right side of pain-free and slightly high to be amused rather than scornful. And then he wonders just what he’s done to deserve this.
“So you hired me because I’m beautiful,” she says steadily, “And you’re telling me you’re not going to take advantage of that?”
House should tell her to go home. But he’s just not that good a person.
A few weeks later, when she’s angry with him and he’s being an asshole and has made a few too many comments in front of Chase and Foreman, and she’s flushing like a child and House is thinking you asked for this except that he knows she didn’t, not really, she stops him from leaving and says, a little unsteadily:
“Why did you hire me?”
House isn’t going to feed her the-you-were-beautiful line again, nor is he going to tell her that she’s a delicious damaged puzzle that he’s trying to put together, because he put it together months ago and she just doesn’t know that yet, and besides, he thinks that she likes being an enigma, so he looks at her, mascara smudging down her cheeks, and she’s been fucking him for weeks and he wonders dispassionately if she even knows why, so he shrugs.
“I want the truth,” she says.
You really don’t, House thinks.
“You say that everybody lies, and that means you lied to me, and you didn’t hire me because you think I’m beautiful. You hired me for another reason, and I need to know what it is.”
“You don’t.”
“Tell me.”
House is tired of this, and just wants to leave. But that earnest little angry look on her face is annoying him, so he says, in a calm, measured tone that doesn’t have the slightest trace of anything but scorn in it:
“You want to know why I hired you? Because I’d had four Vicodin, and it was a long afternoon, and Cuddy was hounding me to get another fellow, and I wasn’t in the mood to do any more interviews, and you looked like you could do joined-up handwriting. Ok?”
Cameron’s face crumples, but House pushes past her, out into the corridor, and doesn’t look back. She’s got a reason now, a reason that she believes. It’ll be enough for her.
It doesn’t really matter whether it’s true or not.
(House really can’t remember.)
Reason Seven