Chaos Theory [13/?]
Title: Chaos Theory [13/?]
Pairing: House/Cameron
Rating: R
Summary: They would never dream of breaking this fixation. Proximity can be a dangerous thing.
Author’s Note: I am so sorry for the unbelievably long wait. This chapter is more filler than anything, so it probably doesn’t involve the drama you’ve been waiting for. The next one is the doozy. Or at least it is in my head. Shouldn’t be more than one or two chapters to go, and I'll have them out a lot faster.
Previous parts can be found here.
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and suddenly i become a part of your past
i'm becoming the part that don't last
i’m losing you and its effortless
without a sound we lose sight of the ground
-the fray
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She felt like everyone was staring at her. Like everyone knew.
She subtly examined herself in the reflection of the glass as she passed the clinic, and fixed a strand of hair that had sprung loose from her ponytail. She looked no different. No outward tan that signified a week spent in sunny California, no new lightness in her face or sparkle in her eye that suggested she had done anything out of the ordinary while she was away.
The only thing that betrayed her were the thin, dark lines under her eyes, which could easily be attributed to jet lag.
She had never felt more suffocated by the hospital.
She drew in a deep breath as she entered the elevator, letting herself have the three floor ascent to gather together the last of her composure. A hand suddenly snaked out and caught the door before it slid shut.
For a second, she thought it was him.
The white coat and flashy blue tie quickly killed that impression, and she forced her features to relax as Wilson stepped in beside her.
“Hey, Cameron,” he said, offering her a pleasant smile. “Welcome back. How was the week?”
She gave him a faint smile, reminding herself that the smallest flicker might give her away. And House would just love it if she happened to give herself away to his best friend.
“Fine,” she answered, allowing their eyes to meet briefly before she returned her gaze to the numbers above the door. “A bit long,” she added, shrugging loosely. “Not a lot of time to get outside.”
He smiled depreciatingly. “They just love to keep you cooped up indoors, don’t they?” She could see him give her an evaluating look in the corner of her eye, and straightened her bag self-consciously.
“So how was House?”
It wasn’t unusual for the two of them to discuss House, to share their stories and laugh or worry about him together. But it felt strange now. It occurred to her that she suddenly knew him far more intimately than Wilson would ever realise. She didn’t need his reassurances or consolations any more.
And hiding that fact was going to be very hard.
“You know,” she said carefully, forcing herself to flash a depreciating smile. “He was House.”
Wilson snickered, seeming to understand what she meant. “Right. I can imagine.”
The doors opened, and she resisted a sigh of relief as they stepped out onto the fourth floor. Wilson gave her an amiable nod as he continued to his office, and she slowed her pace, readying herself before she reached the Diagnostics Department.
Wilson might be House’s best friend, but Chase and Foreman worked with them every day. If anyone was going to notice something, it was those two.
She knew things would be awkward and strained, but if anyone else found out what had happened between them, any trust she and House might have established would completely dissipate. She had no illusions about that. If she understood anything now, it was that House and his feelings were unbelievably fragile. He just hid it very well.
Foreman and Chase already occupied the conference room, and she barely wavered before she opened the door, striding inside.
Chase looked up first, and looked genuinely pleased to see her.
“Hey,” he said, offering her a smile. She found herself returning it, scanning the office in the corner of her eye to see that everything was exactly the same as when she left. The familiarity was comforting and disconcerting all at the same time. It reminded her she was indeed back in the real world. Back to their dysfunctional version of normal.
Foreman gave her a nod and his own smile, which was only slightly more strained. Her mouth turned up at the corners, and she realised she had missed them. The tension that seemed to dog constantly at their heels and remind them all why they weren’t friends hadn’t exactly abated, but she thought giving herself a break from them might have been the best thing she could have done.
She was going to try and make things better.
“How was the conference?” Chase asked, following her with his eyes as she crossed to her desk and put down her bag.
She shrugged loosely, fingering the belt loops in her pants as she turned to face the table. “You know, the usual. You’ve been to them. You know what they’re like.”
“Boring as hell?” Foreman supplied.
She laughed shortly. “Yeah. Exactly.”
He eyed her thoughtfully, tapping a pen absently against the edge of the table. “What was it like being alone with House?” he asked, already smirking wryly. “Did he hide in his room the whole time, or what?”
She paused, crossing to a spare seat beside him, giving herself a moment to decide if there was any extra meaning to his words. When she detected none, she moved to get their questions out of the way as soon as possible.
“I think Cuddy might have ensured that was basically impossible.”
They accepted her answer without comment, and she thought maybe she wasn‘t the only one trying to make an effort. “Well if it’s any consolation, we had a great pain-free week without him around,” Chase offered, quirking an eyebrow at her and leaning back in his chair.
She rolled her eyes. “Glad I could take him off your hands.”
Foreman chuckled. “Yeah, we actually got some work done. Maybe Cuddy should send him away more often.”
“Aw,” House’s voice piped pitifully from the door. “But then who would I call to baby-sit you guys?”
The jolt in her chest was instantaneous, and for a moment, she forgot how to breathe. She swallowed, forcing herself to draw in a deep breath and lift her gaze from the table.
Beside her, Foreman was rolling his eyes, immediately straightening at the sight of their boss. Cameron had noticed there was a stiff tension in his shoulders whenever he was around House, like he was in a constant struggle to assume the role of alpha male. Chase, on the other hand, just scoffed at his comment, keeping himself out of the line of fire. She licked her lips, remaining carefully silent. If she spoke, she knew the waver in her tone or a flush in her cheeks would be sure to give her away.
They had agreed. They had agreed, and nothing he had said or confessed in a single, split-second moment of intimacy could change that.
Things had to be this way.
House walked into the room, his cane making a soft thumping sound against the carpet. He circled into his office without looking at any of them, and she deflated slightly.
She had been half-asleep when he said it, but she still remembered exactly what he had murmured to her. The answer to her last, horribly stupid question. Stupid, because not only was it everything she didn’t want to be to him, now she couldn’t make it disappear. Every time she looked at him, or spoke to him, or sat in the same room with him, she would remember that he had feelings for her. Feelings he would never admit to again.
She couldn’t just forget.
God she wanted to.
A moment after the door clattered shut and the blinds rattled in his absence, he threw open the door again, and fixed his glare on Foreman and Chase. She didn‘t miss the way he carefully avoided looking in her direction.
“Either one of you is a very frisky little doctor while Daddy is away, or you’ve been rearranging the furniture,” he said tartly. “My desk is out of alignment.”
Foreman and Chase exchanged a quick, surprised glance, and Cameron couldn’t help lifting an eyebrow.
Chase craned his head back to look into the office. “No it’s not.”
House gave him a pointed, knowing glare. “First rule of denial - don’t. You are so busted.”
Chase shifted uncomfortably, linking his hands on his knee and tapping his thumbs agitatedly.
He was silent for all of five seconds.
“Don’t blame me,” he insisted defensively. “It was Wilson’s idea to have the poker game in your office.”
Cameron snorted out loud, hiding a smile behind her hands. She saw House glance at her for a second, before returning his attention to the others.
Foreman threw his hands up in defeat. “Two minutes,” he said, rolling his eyes at Chase. “You couldn’t last two minutes.”
“I saw through your pathetic charade,” House retorted, jabbing his cane at them both. “Don’t worry. I have lots of ways you can make it up to me. Only a few of them are dirty.”
Chase sighed, folding his arms dejectedly. “It wasn’t like we touched anything else.“
“I don’t know that,” House said.
His gaze drifted over the table for a second, and almost unconsciously connected with hers. She knew the ease and comfort between them was gone immediately when the awkwardness surfaced between them again. The sudden tension and heat and discomfort in the air had to be palpable, because she could feel it in every last fibre of her being. His eyes pierced her intently, giving nothing away. She felt caught, frozen in place, unable to do anything but return his stare. She wanted so desperately to understand what he was thinking, now that the ability had been ripped away.
Then he turned, and disappeared abruptly back into his office. Cameron swallowed, awkwardly flicking her hair behind her ears and returning her attention to her co-workers, who seemed completely oblivious to what had just taken place.
In that moment, she had seen what she hadn’t wanted to. That things had returned to the status quo. That he was going to pretend it hadn’t happened.
Nothing had changed at all.
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He wasn’t out on the balcony because he wanted to think.
They didn’t have a new case yet, and Cuddy was not pestering him about the clinic. His mind had no new puzzle to mull over, no mysterious illness to occupy his attention.
It was to get away from her.
She was everywhere he was, all the time. He knew it was ridiculous to assume that she wouldn’t be- she worked for him, of course she was going to be there. There was just something different about deciding to ignore something in theory, and going about it in practice, when it was right there, haunting him with what they had done. How far things had changed. The fact that they knew each other far more intimately than he had ever wanted them to.
And he hated that he missed her warmth.
So his solution, naturally, was to pretend the problem didn’t exist. And that involved hiding.
“What are you doing out here?” Wilson’s voice sounded from the other side of the wall. House turned, bracing his hands against the rough brick edge, rolling his eyes when he realised Wilson had emerged on his own balcony. “You’ve only been back for half a day, I can’t imagine what you need to sulk about already.”
He narrowed his eyes. “I can’t believe you thought I wouldn’t notice that you defaced my office.”
Wilson frowned a little too easily. “What? I did not.”
He scoffed. “Poker? Seriously? Is this revenge for all those times I wouldn’t let you in? I thought we resolved that issue, Jimmy.”
Wilson rolled his eyes. “Actually, I think it was Foreman’s idea, but no, I wouldn’t call it that. It was a late night. We were bored.”
He snorted. Somehow he found it ridiculously absurd that while he and Cameron were off having sex and getting involved in whatever pseudo relationship they had in San Diego, the rest of his team were having a grand old time with Wilson in his office.
This was why he didn’t go on conferences.
“Yeah, bet I find out you stole half my scotch as well,” he grumbled. “That’s primo stuff, you know. You’re paying for it.”
“Right, I’m sure I’m going to let you con me into paying for scotch that you drank yourself.”
House shook his head. “I don’t even want to know what else you got up to while I was gone. Honestly. Kids these days. Turn your back and there goes half the liquor cabinet.”
Wilson opened his mouth, then shut it wearily. There was something in his face that indicated his switch into ‘gossip mode.’ House kept his attention fixed on the ground below to prepare for whatever inevitable question came out of his mouth next.
“Speaking of ‘getting up to,’ how was your trip? You seem oddly intact, so I’m assuming you didn’t completely piss off Cameron.”
House rested his weight on his good leg, skimming the top of his cane over the wall. “Oh, we got on like a house on fire.”
He could see Wilson tick an eyebrow, and wondered if he was being too nonchalant about the whole thing. He wasn’t in the mood to deal with an interrogation from his friend. He knew what he had said to Cameron that night, and his only possibly comfort was that she was too tired to remember it. They hadn’t spoken about it the next morning. They packed, and caught a cab to the airport, and exchanged a few casual words between them. Neither of them had wanted to talk about things or consider how awkward their relationship was going to be. They were experts at denial.
But if she remembered, then that was going to be a problem. That was not a clean break.
He didn’t want to hurt her. But he didn’t want to deal with her either.
“Uh huh.” Damn. There was that knowing, suspicious tone in Wilson’s voice, the one that meant trouble. A low breeze ruffled the trees nearby, and the summery scent of flowers assailed his nostrils from below. It reminded him of Cameron’s shampoo, and he had to close his eyes for a second, fingers tightening around the ledge.
“So you two didn’t fight?”
House turned, squinting at Wilson disbelievingly. “You have met Cameron, haven’t you? That feisty temper bows to no man.”
Wilson sighed in exasperation. “Forget it. You’re going to evade me, as usual. I’m going to get frustrated until you say something really insulting to distract me, and then I’ll leave. I think I’ll just skip all that this time.”
“Good plan,” House said, mock seriously.
Wilson shook his head, rubbing a hand absently against the back of his neck. He stepped back to the sliding door, disappearing into his office.
House’s shoulders sagged as soon as he left, and he stared down at the parking lot morosely. People were coming in and out of the hospital, and the differences between them were obvious. He let his eyes trace their movements, the way sick partners clung to the arm of their companions, the way children slowed their pace as they came upon the foreboding building, or hovered just behind their parents, as much as their fledgling pride would allow. People in a world he had never wanted to be a part of. A world he just preferred to just analyse and unravel from afar.
She was threatening to drag him into it. He remembered the way her eyes skittered over his when he came into the office that morning, the longing and sadness and regret that passed between them for a millisecond before he looked away. He didn’t want to be a part of her world.
He couldn’t.
So he would hide.
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