FIC: Balconies are not just for Standing On.
Title: Balconies are not just for Standing On.
Author: peace-and-war
Disclaimer: I do not own House.
Summary: Summer rain leads to a broken TV, which in turn leads to an argument.
Pairing: House/Cameron. DUH!
Warnings: Language.... Bad language, not OTT, but not something you want your 10 year old reading….
Word Count: Approx 1000.
Written for imissimissyou as part of the 2008 ficathon.
The prompts were:
1) A broken TV
2) Summer rain
3) An argument.
***
TV.
The one part of life which actually brought him some joy. The fact he could spy on people's lives, and not be harassed to leave, or worst be sued. Until today, when his beloved TV decided it couldn't handle being switched on.
It was wrecking ball time. Except for the slight hiccup, that he did not own a wrecking ball, neither did Wilson, and he'd be damned if Cuddy ever did.
So he decided to improvise, by chucking it off the balcony. Piss off a passerby, and get rid, of a shitty TV at the same time. Better yet, he could say that one of his team went on a mental rage and decided to get back at him, by throwing his TV off the balcony, and he could get a new one.
Cuddy'd never fall for that, He thought, Actually, it's so stupid she might..
'Oi!' House called into the conference room.
Thirteen rolled her eyes, and Kutner almost jumped out of his seat.
'Need some help in here!' Kutner got up off his chair and went to investigate the so called needy House.
'Help me move this.' House pointed at the TV.
'Only if you uh, tell me where 'we' are moving it to.'
'The balcony.'
'Oh no. Not me.'
'Yes you. Thirteen will drop it before she gets it off the stand.'
'But it's already broken.'
'Just help me move it, or you can do my clinic hours for the next thirty years.'
Kutner just grabbed the TV and moved it out onto the balcony platform, he rested it on the balustrade, just so the centre of balance was in the middle.
House unfortunately slipped on the wet balcony, due to the sudden summer shower which had just occured. He skidded about a metre and a half, and in an attempt to regain stability he grabbed the balustrade, but in the process accidently knocked the TV off the balustrade, and heard it make a loud CRASH on the ground below.
'HOOOUSE!' He knew that shrill scream. He had heard the voice that emitted it for three years.
***
Shit.
He looked over the balcony, hoping to God, if there was one, that he did not just drop a TV of a balcony, onto Cameron's head.
He glanced over the ledge, trying to spot the carnage. He found it, and it was a good metre away from where Cameron had stopped. She was standing there, hands on her hips, glaring, no, death glaring at him.
'What the fuck House?' He heard her scream up to him.
'Are you trying to kill someone?'
He didn't think the question was rhetorical, yet he chose to ignore it.
'Not rhetorical House!'
'I wasn't trying to kill anyone, just merely trying to get rid of, an already broken, TV, in otherwise perfect condition.'
'Yeah,' Her voice dripping with sarcasm, 'Mint condition.'
He felt it safe to lean over the balcony balustrade.
Cameron was still standing with her hands on her hips, her hair was blowing gently with the summer breeze, her t-shirt slightly wet due to the light shower that had graced Princeton about five minutes before.
'Wet t-shirt competition is not for another three weeks, are you practising?'
'Screw you.'
'Blondie has attitude.'
'Blondie is pissed because a TV almost rendered her unconscious! Blondie has every fucking right to be pissed.'
'Aw, relax. It was a good metre away from you.'
'I thought I was going to walk home today, then BAM!'
'Bus?'
'No, a TV rains itself off a balcony, and right in front of me. It could have killed me.'
'It's a TV! How much damage could it do?'
'I studied physics in high school. It's called GRAVITY!'
'Well, you shouldn't have been standing there.'
'Oh,' Cameron was starting to look angry. He wouldn't be surprised if she started chucking up pieces of the TV to try to hurt him. 'So it's all my fault? I shouldn't be walking home? Become a walking billboard for childhood obesity? 'Don't walk home kids, TV's could start raining out of the sky and kill you!''
That managed to get a slight chuckle out of House.
'I'm going home now, try not to kill anyone else today. The ER is stretched to the limit.'
He watched her walk away, just becoming a fading dot in the distance.
***
Remorse.
It wasn't a feeling he had felt in a while, the only real time he had felt it was when he left his mother to go to college, leave her with him.
'Stupid, stupid, stupid...' Was what he was muttering when he was driving his motorcycle home. Except he wasn't heading home. He didn't actually know where he was heading consciously. So, naturally, when he arrived at Cameron's apartment, he was surprised.
From that point, logic and reason both flew out the window. Instinct and hormones took over.
He was at her door.
He stood there, his arm raised about to knock on the door, just like it had been for the whole five minutes he had been standing there, contemplating going in.
The door opened.
'Do you know how to knock?' Cameron stood at her door, leaning gently on the doorframe. Whilst she was only wearing black track pants and a pink tank top, House thought she looked... 'Wow.'
'What?' He didn’t realise that he had said that out loud.
'Nothing.'
'Look House, if you are stalking me, go away, if you are here to torment me, rack off..'
'I'm actually here to um, apologise.' His head lowered, his gaze avoiding hers.
'About the TV incident?'
'Um, yeah.'
'Well, thanks. It means a lot that you are apologising after almost possibly killing me, actually means a lot.'
'Now we have gotten that out of the way, I was also wanting to know.. um. If-if, you uh- may-maybe wanted to go foradrink?' Cameron laughed, House stuttering and going mute were two of the things she never thought he was capable of.
'Maybe later.'
'Okay.' She sensed his disappointment, and she watched him begin to walk away. She quietly began to close the door.
Just as she closed the door, she heard a knock.
'It's later.' House grinned.
'Fine. Gimme two minutes.' She laughed as she closed the door, but this time there was no sense of disappointment, rather a sense of new beginnings. Maybe. How could she know? It was House after all.