House: Accident Reconstruction (House/Cameron) PG
Written for fated_addiction for the House/Cameron ficathon. We will keep each other sane this season, bb. ♥
Accident Reconstruction
by surreallis
house/cameron, really mild R, spoilers for all of season 4 and vague speculation of season 5. Really vague.
Chrissy wanted a Cameron/Wilson conversation, hot kiss, and some angst, but a definite conclusion to said angst.
accident reconstruction
+
"You still haven't told him you're back."
The voice has a particularly amused tone to it, and Allison only looks up at him so she can quirk her eyebrow. Despite the tone, Wilson is giving her that slightly accusing look.
"Aren't you supposed to be down in the cafeteria buying him lunch right now?" she asks. To illustrate her point she takes a careful bite of her turkey sandwich. Fresh, crisp, green lettuce on it. It's mostly delightful.
He twitches a bit and then admits, "That janitor he dressed up in a lab coat took him to some burger dive. Best in the city. Or something."
She snorts and makes a few marks on the chart she's working on.
He settles in the chair across the desk from her and snags one of her potato chips. "So... you're hiding from him?"
She sighs.
"You still haven't told him," Wilson points out.
She uses her pen to push the open end of the chip bag toward him. "He just hasn't noticed yet."
"So, you're not avoiding him..." He wears sarcasm like a second skin.
She listens to the crunch of the potato chips as he chews, and she stares intently at the chart in front of her. "Nope."
"I told him you and Chase were engaged."
She jerks her head up to stare at him. "You what?"
He pauses in his crunching and holds her gaze.
"Why would you do that?" she asks.
He glances around. "You have anything to drink in here? Those were salty as hell."
She rolls her eyes and pushes her coffee cup at him. He doesn't even blink. He picks up her cup and sips. No boundaries. Either of them.
He shrugs and places her cup back in front of her. "It was fun. And he deserved it."
She doesn't want to think about Chase being a punishment for House. It's skating dangerously close to motivations and recriminations and all manner of complicated things that she doesn't want to examine. She takes a sip of her coffee and presses the point of her pencil onto the paper but doesn't write anything. "So, he asked about me?"
There's a silence then, and she doesn't look at him.
"He didn't ask you to leave, Cameron. You left him."
"I remember how it went. I was there."
"He'd have kept you forever if possible."
She snorts. "Cuddy would have had something to say about that."
"He'd have tried anyway."
She sighs. Again. "Everything and everyone has to change. Even House."
He slumps back in his chair and watches her. “I thought you were good for him,” he says, wistfully.
She studies him and his brown eyes hold her gaze.
“Did you think he was good for me?” she asks.
He opens his mouth and then closes it.
He doesn’t answer.
+++
When House finally does notice, he doesn’t act like she thought he would. He’s antagonistic about it, yes, but he’s also hurt. She can see it there in his eyes, in the lay of his shoulders, in the set of his mouth. She does him a favor and ignores it.
He’s unprepared for the way she creeps out from under his thumb. She can see that he can’t decide if he likes it.
She likes it.
She tries to ignore how being free feels a lot like being lost.
+++
“It’s 86 degrees in Arizona right now,” Chase tells her on the first day it snows.
She glances at the frosted glass of their kitchen window and twists her mouth into a frown. She does winter better than summer. Always has. She doesn’t want to live in the desert.
“Vegas is right there.” He turns and looks directly at her. “We could get married by Elvis.” He smiles.
Her heart jumps nervously and she swallows it back down. She glances away.
“Did you hear what I said?” he asks.
She sighs and doesn’t look at him. “No.”
+++
She keeps staying late after her shifts. She can admit avoidance now, even as it gets easier to just be invisible.
It’s easier to do the charts when she isn’t expected to run. Easier when she isn’t being annexed as part of someone else’s plan. House’s new team flickers around him like warning lights. Like smoke. She can see them coming from miles away.
++++
“I didn’t put three years into you to make you a glorified secretary.” House’s voice is always on the sharp edge of petulance these days.
She lifts her eyes to his as he sits down heavily in the chair across from her. “Doing charts is part of being a doctor. Not that you’d know anything about that.”
“Why would I? I had you.” He reaches out for her coffee.
She rolls her eyes, watching as he sniffs the cup and then drinks. “Which contestant drew the short straw for your charts?” she asks.
He shrugs and says nothing to that, blue eyes falling over her face. He keeps the coffee.
Sometimes it feels like she never left. Sometimes it feels like she’s never been here at all. He’s a hard tangle in her gut, and she realizes suddenly that she has a lot of regrets. And she’s too young for that. Too young.
How do I wash you away? she wants to ask him, and can’t. Because it’s what he wants, and when you touch him he smudges. Just a bit.
She hears the sudden tapping of rain on the window. The sound makes her ache for some reason.
“Why didn’t you leave with him?” House asks. Suddenly. “I mean, really leave.”
“I like it here,” she says.
His gaze drops. “Prophets are supposed to go forth and spread the word.”
“You want me to leave?”
He balances his chin on the handle of his cane. “Yes.”
She studies him. He stares at her coffee cup.
She gets up and starts to walk past him.
He’s half out of the chair, his fingers tight around her forearm, before she can even reach the door. “No,” he says, and his voice is like a gunshot.
She stops, watching him as he rises up, weight settling on his cane. His brow is furrowed, and his hand stays tight around her arm. That’s unexpected. He always touches by not touching, and the feel of his skin on hers is startling.
She can’t look away as he leans in. She can smell him, feel his breath, and he has her wrist trapped between them. Her fingers brush his T-shirt, and then are pressed against his stomach.
It’s a slow slide down that she feels when his gaze holds hers. She can never get far enough, she realizes. She can never get so far that he can’t bring her back again. It’s like the brush of iron against her ankle; the rush of water through her hair; the fast sinking to the sand at the bottom.
She swallows and waits, but he only stands there, line between his eyebrows as he watches her.
It’s his unpredictability that makes her mouth go dry. She can guess, often better than most, but they’ve always been a little blind when it comes to each other. She licks her lips.
He lowers his head and says, against her forehead, “Has he asked you to marry him yet?”
She grits her teeth. “No.”
“He will.”
“I know.” She wants to pull away from him, but that’s too predictable.
He pulls his head back so he can look her in the eye. “How?”
She offers up a defiant smile. “I see it in his eyes.”
He snorts.
“I’m sleeping with him, House,” she says. “Men can’t hide much during sex.”
He studies her, seemingly unsure, and then looks away.
She pulls her wrist from his fingers, and his gaze skates over her shoulders but no further.
He leaves without showing her his eyes.
+++
She waits until the small hours of the night to go see him. He’s lying in the hospital bed, asleep, and she drags her fingertips along the sheet as she stands there. She can see the angry red skin curling up around his palm where the electricity found its way inside him.
She sighs. Sometimes there are people who don’t seem to belong on Earth. Who don’t seem to be built for living. And sometimes she wonders if House is one of them. They all disappear in the end, one way or another, and she won’t be surprised if he melts away one day.
“What, are you a vampire now?” House asks suddenly in a quiet, raspy voice. “I only see you at night.”
She looks down into his tired eyes. In the dim, orange sleeping light there seem to be sparks in his eyes. That current still sliding along his skin…
“You’re an idiot,” she says. It’s less satisfying than she thought it would be.
His arm moves and bumps her fingers. He lets it rest there. He only grunts in reply, eyes closing again.
She’s heard the whole story. There’s just enough uncertainty in her… Just enough.
She leans down. “What did you see?” she asks.
He doesn’t open his eyes, but his lips curve slightly upwards and his slow, sleepy chuckle slips up her spine. The current jumps from him to her.
She touches his hand to give it back.
+++
“I just want to know,” Chase says. “You didn’t sleep with him at the same time you were sleeping with me, did you?”
She rubs her forehead tiredly and sighs. It’s the principle of the thing, not the reality.
If she’d just fucked House, she wonders, would she be able to walk away?
What’s one more regret?
She sleeps on the sofa that night.
+++
He’s leaning against her desk when she walks through the door, and his gaze is steel. As if he’s been watching her through the walls, eyes on hers the entire time. She stops in mid-stride.
“House…”
He stands and steps forward, caneless, hands shoving past her shoulders to shut the door behind her. She falls back with him, her back pressing into the door, his fingers curling around her upper arms.
“You miss me,” he states, eyes holding hers.
She stares back, surprise slowly leaking away. His grip softens.
“Why does it matter to you so much?” she asks. It’s a challenge, she knows.
His breath whispers across her cheek and she feels the brush of his lips as he talks. “You miss me,” he repeats. The words are quiet but they echo in her ears.
She tilts her head back and her lips brush his chin. “So?”
He stares at her, and then his gaze moves past her to the wall. Hiding… His eyes close as his mouth suddenly slides across hers. Her breath stills in her lungs.
He’s heavy against her, hard, and his long fingers press up against her chin until she fits against him the way he wants her to. Until she opens her mouth and his tongue is soft against hers. She hears him exhale, feels it against her skin, and he breaks away for a moment only to come right back, mouth warm and wet. He makes a low sound.
She curls her fingers in his shirt and he leans against her. His hand slides up under her head and she’s breathing his air. Breathing in as he breathes out, each time he pulls back just that little bit before he kisses her again.
It’s hard to think.
It’s hard not to.
When he stops and finally just looks at her, she can hear her own heartbeat in her ears.
“You miss me,” he says, and his voice is softer but his eyes are not.
She pauses, letting her head rest back against the door. It’s late. She’s tired.
“Don’t tell Chase,” she says.
He doesn’t.
+++
She dated a cop once, when she was still an intern. After her husband died. Before House. Police were always at the hospital. In the ER.
“Accidents,” he told her. “Start the moment you get up in the morning. The moment you walk out the door.”
Each decision you make, each decision the other guy makes, all of them come together until it’s inevitable. Every action brings you closer and closer until, eventually, your fate is decided. It’s no longer under your control. Events pick you up and carry you along, and you just go. Each decision. Live or die.
Go to work or stay home. Turn left or turn right.
Drink or stay sober. Drive or call.
Get on a bus or walk.
Take a pill the moment before your kidneys are destroyed.
Feel regret.
Watch your best friend’s girlfriend die and know there’s nothing you can do about it.
It’s a bad week. For everyone.
+++
"I don't want to hear it." Wilson stands in the doorway, barring her entrance.
"Then you can talk. I'll listen."
"House sent you."
"No." She softens under his dubious gaze. "He will, eventually. We both know that. But not this time. This is the time before that. The time he'll never know about."
He stares at her and doesn't move, but his eyes water.
"This is the time where I tell you that I know how you feel," she says, quietly.
He blinks back his tears and opens the door.
+++
“The hardest part is the way the world keeps going and you stop.” She touches his shoulder.
He blinks and rubs his knuckles against his mouth. He stares at the floor silently.
Welcome to the ranks of the damaged.
“It’s like a scar,” she tells him. “A missing limb. You struggle and you limp and you always favor that side, for the rest of your life. But you learn to live around it. The pain fades and eventually you only hurt when you think about it. And you really don’t think about it so much.”
“So you deal with death the same way you deal with House? That’s… comforting.” His sarcasm is laced with anger.
She squeezes his shoulder but doesn’t answer. You struggle and you limp and you always favor that side… But you learn to live around it. There’s a pull there, a scar, a part of you that can’t be erased. But you learn to live around it.
“Yes,” she finally says, and she’s suddenly weary again.
His voice shakes. “I can’t even look at him.”
“I know,” she whispers. “It was inevitable.”
He doesn’t even question her.
+++
It’s the middle of the day when she sees House.
He’s staring out the hospital’s window, white gown hanging from his shoulders. He hasn’t shaved in a long while, and the silver is starting to take over his beard. The fog hangs low over the day. He’s staring into mist, but she knows what he’s seeing.
He doesn’t look at her as she stands next to him. He’s so still…
“It’s all going to change,” he says.
She doesn’t answer. It’s already changed. She wonders at how she sometimes feels unanchored, and how no one seems to reach for her to pull her back. Except House.
“It’s just going to take time,” she says.
He says nothing. It feels like he’s slipping.
Her hand brushes his, and she slides her fingers over his knuckles, across his palm. She takes his hand.
She feels a little like she’s in a speeding car, rushing forward, and she isn’t quite sure what will be there when she stops. If.
House’s fingers curl around hers and stay tight.
It feels inevitable.
~e~
These two. They make me ache so.
Accident Reconstruction
by surreallis
house/cameron, really mild R, spoilers for all of season 4 and vague speculation of season 5. Really vague.
Chrissy wanted a Cameron/Wilson conversation, hot kiss, and some angst, but a definite conclusion to said angst.
accident reconstruction
+
"You still haven't told him you're back."
The voice has a particularly amused tone to it, and Allison only looks up at him so she can quirk her eyebrow. Despite the tone, Wilson is giving her that slightly accusing look.
"Aren't you supposed to be down in the cafeteria buying him lunch right now?" she asks. To illustrate her point she takes a careful bite of her turkey sandwich. Fresh, crisp, green lettuce on it. It's mostly delightful.
He twitches a bit and then admits, "That janitor he dressed up in a lab coat took him to some burger dive. Best in the city. Or something."
She snorts and makes a few marks on the chart she's working on.
He settles in the chair across the desk from her and snags one of her potato chips. "So... you're hiding from him?"
She sighs.
"You still haven't told him," Wilson points out.
She uses her pen to push the open end of the chip bag toward him. "He just hasn't noticed yet."
"So, you're not avoiding him..." He wears sarcasm like a second skin.
She listens to the crunch of the potato chips as he chews, and she stares intently at the chart in front of her. "Nope."
"I told him you and Chase were engaged."
She jerks her head up to stare at him. "You what?"
He pauses in his crunching and holds her gaze.
"Why would you do that?" she asks.
He glances around. "You have anything to drink in here? Those were salty as hell."
She rolls her eyes and pushes her coffee cup at him. He doesn't even blink. He picks up her cup and sips. No boundaries. Either of them.
He shrugs and places her cup back in front of her. "It was fun. And he deserved it."
She doesn't want to think about Chase being a punishment for House. It's skating dangerously close to motivations and recriminations and all manner of complicated things that she doesn't want to examine. She takes a sip of her coffee and presses the point of her pencil onto the paper but doesn't write anything. "So, he asked about me?"
There's a silence then, and she doesn't look at him.
"He didn't ask you to leave, Cameron. You left him."
"I remember how it went. I was there."
"He'd have kept you forever if possible."
She snorts. "Cuddy would have had something to say about that."
"He'd have tried anyway."
She sighs. Again. "Everything and everyone has to change. Even House."
He slumps back in his chair and watches her. “I thought you were good for him,” he says, wistfully.
She studies him and his brown eyes hold her gaze.
“Did you think he was good for me?” she asks.
He opens his mouth and then closes it.
He doesn’t answer.
+++
When House finally does notice, he doesn’t act like she thought he would. He’s antagonistic about it, yes, but he’s also hurt. She can see it there in his eyes, in the lay of his shoulders, in the set of his mouth. She does him a favor and ignores it.
He’s unprepared for the way she creeps out from under his thumb. She can see that he can’t decide if he likes it.
She likes it.
She tries to ignore how being free feels a lot like being lost.
+++
“It’s 86 degrees in Arizona right now,” Chase tells her on the first day it snows.
She glances at the frosted glass of their kitchen window and twists her mouth into a frown. She does winter better than summer. Always has. She doesn’t want to live in the desert.
“Vegas is right there.” He turns and looks directly at her. “We could get married by Elvis.” He smiles.
Her heart jumps nervously and she swallows it back down. She glances away.
“Did you hear what I said?” he asks.
She sighs and doesn’t look at him. “No.”
+++
She keeps staying late after her shifts. She can admit avoidance now, even as it gets easier to just be invisible.
It’s easier to do the charts when she isn’t expected to run. Easier when she isn’t being annexed as part of someone else’s plan. House’s new team flickers around him like warning lights. Like smoke. She can see them coming from miles away.
++++
“I didn’t put three years into you to make you a glorified secretary.” House’s voice is always on the sharp edge of petulance these days.
She lifts her eyes to his as he sits down heavily in the chair across from her. “Doing charts is part of being a doctor. Not that you’d know anything about that.”
“Why would I? I had you.” He reaches out for her coffee.
She rolls her eyes, watching as he sniffs the cup and then drinks. “Which contestant drew the short straw for your charts?” she asks.
He shrugs and says nothing to that, blue eyes falling over her face. He keeps the coffee.
Sometimes it feels like she never left. Sometimes it feels like she’s never been here at all. He’s a hard tangle in her gut, and she realizes suddenly that she has a lot of regrets. And she’s too young for that. Too young.
How do I wash you away? she wants to ask him, and can’t. Because it’s what he wants, and when you touch him he smudges. Just a bit.
She hears the sudden tapping of rain on the window. The sound makes her ache for some reason.
“Why didn’t you leave with him?” House asks. Suddenly. “I mean, really leave.”
“I like it here,” she says.
His gaze drops. “Prophets are supposed to go forth and spread the word.”
“You want me to leave?”
He balances his chin on the handle of his cane. “Yes.”
She studies him. He stares at her coffee cup.
She gets up and starts to walk past him.
He’s half out of the chair, his fingers tight around her forearm, before she can even reach the door. “No,” he says, and his voice is like a gunshot.
She stops, watching him as he rises up, weight settling on his cane. His brow is furrowed, and his hand stays tight around her arm. That’s unexpected. He always touches by not touching, and the feel of his skin on hers is startling.
She can’t look away as he leans in. She can smell him, feel his breath, and he has her wrist trapped between them. Her fingers brush his T-shirt, and then are pressed against his stomach.
It’s a slow slide down that she feels when his gaze holds hers. She can never get far enough, she realizes. She can never get so far that he can’t bring her back again. It’s like the brush of iron against her ankle; the rush of water through her hair; the fast sinking to the sand at the bottom.
She swallows and waits, but he only stands there, line between his eyebrows as he watches her.
It’s his unpredictability that makes her mouth go dry. She can guess, often better than most, but they’ve always been a little blind when it comes to each other. She licks her lips.
He lowers his head and says, against her forehead, “Has he asked you to marry him yet?”
She grits her teeth. “No.”
“He will.”
“I know.” She wants to pull away from him, but that’s too predictable.
He pulls his head back so he can look her in the eye. “How?”
She offers up a defiant smile. “I see it in his eyes.”
He snorts.
“I’m sleeping with him, House,” she says. “Men can’t hide much during sex.”
He studies her, seemingly unsure, and then looks away.
She pulls her wrist from his fingers, and his gaze skates over her shoulders but no further.
He leaves without showing her his eyes.
+++
She waits until the small hours of the night to go see him. He’s lying in the hospital bed, asleep, and she drags her fingertips along the sheet as she stands there. She can see the angry red skin curling up around his palm where the electricity found its way inside him.
She sighs. Sometimes there are people who don’t seem to belong on Earth. Who don’t seem to be built for living. And sometimes she wonders if House is one of them. They all disappear in the end, one way or another, and she won’t be surprised if he melts away one day.
“What, are you a vampire now?” House asks suddenly in a quiet, raspy voice. “I only see you at night.”
She looks down into his tired eyes. In the dim, orange sleeping light there seem to be sparks in his eyes. That current still sliding along his skin…
“You’re an idiot,” she says. It’s less satisfying than she thought it would be.
His arm moves and bumps her fingers. He lets it rest there. He only grunts in reply, eyes closing again.
She’s heard the whole story. There’s just enough uncertainty in her… Just enough.
She leans down. “What did you see?” she asks.
He doesn’t open his eyes, but his lips curve slightly upwards and his slow, sleepy chuckle slips up her spine. The current jumps from him to her.
She touches his hand to give it back.
+++
“I just want to know,” Chase says. “You didn’t sleep with him at the same time you were sleeping with me, did you?”
She rubs her forehead tiredly and sighs. It’s the principle of the thing, not the reality.
If she’d just fucked House, she wonders, would she be able to walk away?
What’s one more regret?
She sleeps on the sofa that night.
+++
He’s leaning against her desk when she walks through the door, and his gaze is steel. As if he’s been watching her through the walls, eyes on hers the entire time. She stops in mid-stride.
“House…”
He stands and steps forward, caneless, hands shoving past her shoulders to shut the door behind her. She falls back with him, her back pressing into the door, his fingers curling around her upper arms.
“You miss me,” he states, eyes holding hers.
She stares back, surprise slowly leaking away. His grip softens.
“Why does it matter to you so much?” she asks. It’s a challenge, she knows.
His breath whispers across her cheek and she feels the brush of his lips as he talks. “You miss me,” he repeats. The words are quiet but they echo in her ears.
She tilts her head back and her lips brush his chin. “So?”
He stares at her, and then his gaze moves past her to the wall. Hiding… His eyes close as his mouth suddenly slides across hers. Her breath stills in her lungs.
He’s heavy against her, hard, and his long fingers press up against her chin until she fits against him the way he wants her to. Until she opens her mouth and his tongue is soft against hers. She hears him exhale, feels it against her skin, and he breaks away for a moment only to come right back, mouth warm and wet. He makes a low sound.
She curls her fingers in his shirt and he leans against her. His hand slides up under her head and she’s breathing his air. Breathing in as he breathes out, each time he pulls back just that little bit before he kisses her again.
It’s hard to think.
It’s hard not to.
When he stops and finally just looks at her, she can hear her own heartbeat in her ears.
“You miss me,” he says, and his voice is softer but his eyes are not.
She pauses, letting her head rest back against the door. It’s late. She’s tired.
“Don’t tell Chase,” she says.
He doesn’t.
+++
She dated a cop once, when she was still an intern. After her husband died. Before House. Police were always at the hospital. In the ER.
“Accidents,” he told her. “Start the moment you get up in the morning. The moment you walk out the door.”
Each decision you make, each decision the other guy makes, all of them come together until it’s inevitable. Every action brings you closer and closer until, eventually, your fate is decided. It’s no longer under your control. Events pick you up and carry you along, and you just go. Each decision. Live or die.
Go to work or stay home. Turn left or turn right.
Drink or stay sober. Drive or call.
Get on a bus or walk.
Take a pill the moment before your kidneys are destroyed.
Feel regret.
Watch your best friend’s girlfriend die and know there’s nothing you can do about it.
It’s a bad week. For everyone.
+++
"I don't want to hear it." Wilson stands in the doorway, barring her entrance.
"Then you can talk. I'll listen."
"House sent you."
"No." She softens under his dubious gaze. "He will, eventually. We both know that. But not this time. This is the time before that. The time he'll never know about."
He stares at her and doesn't move, but his eyes water.
"This is the time where I tell you that I know how you feel," she says, quietly.
He blinks back his tears and opens the door.
+++
“The hardest part is the way the world keeps going and you stop.” She touches his shoulder.
He blinks and rubs his knuckles against his mouth. He stares at the floor silently.
Welcome to the ranks of the damaged.
“It’s like a scar,” she tells him. “A missing limb. You struggle and you limp and you always favor that side, for the rest of your life. But you learn to live around it. The pain fades and eventually you only hurt when you think about it. And you really don’t think about it so much.”
“So you deal with death the same way you deal with House? That’s… comforting.” His sarcasm is laced with anger.
She squeezes his shoulder but doesn’t answer. You struggle and you limp and you always favor that side… But you learn to live around it. There’s a pull there, a scar, a part of you that can’t be erased. But you learn to live around it.
“Yes,” she finally says, and she’s suddenly weary again.
His voice shakes. “I can’t even look at him.”
“I know,” she whispers. “It was inevitable.”
He doesn’t even question her.
+++
It’s the middle of the day when she sees House.
He’s staring out the hospital’s window, white gown hanging from his shoulders. He hasn’t shaved in a long while, and the silver is starting to take over his beard. The fog hangs low over the day. He’s staring into mist, but she knows what he’s seeing.
He doesn’t look at her as she stands next to him. He’s so still…
“It’s all going to change,” he says.
She doesn’t answer. It’s already changed. She wonders at how she sometimes feels unanchored, and how no one seems to reach for her to pull her back. Except House.
“It’s just going to take time,” she says.
He says nothing. It feels like he’s slipping.
Her hand brushes his, and she slides her fingers over his knuckles, across his palm. She takes his hand.
She feels a little like she’s in a speeding car, rushing forward, and she isn’t quite sure what will be there when she stops. If.
House’s fingers curl around hers and stay tight.
It feels inevitable.
~e~
These two. They make me ache so.