One Sort of Resolution: Late Nights, Tea and Videotape. Part one
TITLE: One Sort of Resolution: Late Nights..Part 1
AUTHOR: Waylandsmithy
PAIRING: House/Cameron
RATING: 13
This one got me started...October 2006
The corridors of the hospital were quiet in the small hours. Dim lights showed here and there; the low hum of equipment leaked through ventilator grilles and from time to time hushed voices with an urgent undercurrent cut through the general stillness. A door closure snapped open and shut again, heels squeaked against the polished flooring.
Inside the sterile walls of the clean room a young boy’s life teetered on the edge. A wildly improbable diagnosis had been confirmed; treatment commenced; all that was needed now was that indefinable determination on the part of the patient to cling to life against the odds. That, and maybe the obstinacy of the medical team whose refusal to give up on him was responsible for his survival so far and was still keeping them here when their minds and bodies cried out for rest.
The rigours of medical training and long years of inadequate sleep accustomed them to cope but neither Chase nor Foreman demurred when House nodded his dismissal. A two am departure, following three solid days with little but snatched naps in the conference room and reheated coffee for fuel, seemed little enough to be grateful for, but Cameron was still toiling in the lab and House obviously was going nowhere until the Fates decided: life or death.
Had she been asked, Cameron would have pointed out that this was exactly why House was more than just ‘about the puzzle’. The puzzle was solved but the outcome was not yet clear. He did care about his patients; you might just need to spit roast him over a slow fire before he would admit it. Careful observation revealed his ‘tells’ far more than anything he said. However, House’s reputation as a brilliant but best-avoided (even slightly crazy) s.o.b. meant that no-one canvassed her opinion.
She finished re-checking her results, not bothering to stifle her yawns as she gathered up the scattered printouts to place them in the patient file. Whatever happened to the boy in the next few hours, she was satisfied that her work was above even House’s reproach. Cameron used the elevator to whisk her to the Diagnostics floor. Alone, she generally took the stairs. Not at this ungodly hour; she was beyond exhaustion.
The office and conference room were in darkness. Cameron poked her head around House’s door in case he had fallen asleep but the room was empty. At that moment her pager went off and she immediately retraced her steps to the elevators. Tiredness and thirst seemed to burn a hole in her chest and throat; her legs and feet moved, she felt, as though she were an automaton. Resentment at House for calling her away as she was within reach of the conference room refrigerator died as she saw the man propping himself up against the wall of the clean room.
If she was in dire need of sleep, then he, an insomniac at the best of times, was close to collapse. Exhaustion stripped away what little he used in the way of good manners; without meeting her glance he simply held out his hand for the file, skimming over the carefully-prepared results with eyes as keen as ever despite their reddened rims. “Hmm”. He rubbed his hand across his jaw. “Increase the dosage and risk liver failure or…?”
“It might buy him a few more hours. He should be dead already. What choice is there?”
“Tiredness suits you. Makes you cut to the chase.” He grinned tiredly at the pun and the way she reacted to the extra meaning behind his words. Although he had never explicitly condemned that brief ill-conceived liaison, Cameron knew that in some way it irked him. She and Chase had long ago put it behind them. Why didn’t he?
House directed the intensive care staff to increase the drug and announced his intention to wait around to see if there was any improvement in the boy’s condition. “I need a drink; God knows when I last had one, but first I must sit down before my damn leg makes me fall down.”
Leaning heavily on his cane, he limped slowly and with evident discomfort to the area used during the daytime by patients’ relatives. It had recently been refurbished by Cuddy with comfortable couches and low tables. “The Boss’s sucking up has its uses”, said House, carefully lowering his tall frame into the angle provided by two long couches placed together, and gripping his right leg with both hands, he swivelled around to position it , with a barely audible sigh, along the length of the couch.
He dry -swallowed two vicodin, tilted back his head and closed his eyes as if to sleep; then, with some irritation, said,”Why are you hovering? Surely you have a home to go to? Even I am not unreasonable enough to keep you here any longer. I can take things from here. It’s not worth my going back to the apartment now.”
Unspoken was the knowledge that after the way he had punished it over the last few days, his leg would not tolerate the trip home right now. Cameron was fully aware of this and also that he would resent any sign from her that she understood, so she ignored the last part of his speech and merely said she needed a drink, had been on her way to get one when he paged her and would he like her to get one for him while she was about it?
“Not that sludge from the Nurses’ station. Otherwise, yes. Please,” he added as an afterthought. Cameron returned from Diagnostics a few minutes later with her own and House’s red mug, brim full of mint tea. Coffee had seemed like a bad idea, neither thirst quenching nor needed for its stimulant effect right now. Besides, the entire team seemed likely to suffer from caffeine poisoning after the hours they had worked on this case.
It seemed that House was already asleep when Cameron stopped in front of him. She gingerly perched herself on the edge of the couch away from his outstretched limb and quietly placed the red mug on the glass- topped table nearest to him. She sipped at the steaming hot liquid in her own mug, her thirst making her prepared to risk scalding her mouth in the effort to quench it.
“So where’s mine, then?” demanded her boss, “and what’s that smell? I hope it’s not that stuff you gave me when I had a cold; walnut and whatever.” “Ginger” said Cameron, “and you said it was nice.” “I lied”, he said, struggling to sit upright among the deep cushions of the couch without disturbing his leg from its vicodin-induced somnolence. Cameron huffed with as much energy as she could muster, which was very little by this stage and without further comment handed the mint tea to her apparently ungrateful superior.
While he drank the tea in slow gulps, barely awake, Cameron took stock of the man beside her. Lack of rest as well as the ever-present pain had etched the fine lines around his eyes and across his forehead more deeply than usual and his pallor showed even through the heavily stubbled jaw. The eyes through which he seemed to see everything were almost shut, allowing her to examine him in a way she would not normally attempt, knowing that a blast of sarcasm would push her back to a safe distance, his defensive perimeter intact and the ‘keep off’ signs freshly painted.
Now his trademark fidgeting was stilled for the moment, his cane tucked alongside his bad leg on the wide couch. His tension, which fizzed around him at all times like some kind of electric field (and which, thought Cameron wryly, accounted in no small measure for his ability to mesmerise those around him into doing things against their better judgement) was lowered sufficiently to count him as ‘relaxed.' Not a word one usually associated with House.
The red mug wavered. Cameron leaned forward and removed it from his grasp before the remaining liquid emptied itself down his T-shirt. Sitting back more comfortably on the couch and tucking her legs underneath her, she decided to wait one more hour to see if their patient’s crisis passed before going home. Meanwhile, House could have his nap.
AUTHOR: Waylandsmithy
PAIRING: House/Cameron
RATING: 13
This one got me started...October 2006
The corridors of the hospital were quiet in the small hours. Dim lights showed here and there; the low hum of equipment leaked through ventilator grilles and from time to time hushed voices with an urgent undercurrent cut through the general stillness. A door closure snapped open and shut again, heels squeaked against the polished flooring.
Inside the sterile walls of the clean room a young boy’s life teetered on the edge. A wildly improbable diagnosis had been confirmed; treatment commenced; all that was needed now was that indefinable determination on the part of the patient to cling to life against the odds. That, and maybe the obstinacy of the medical team whose refusal to give up on him was responsible for his survival so far and was still keeping them here when their minds and bodies cried out for rest.
The rigours of medical training and long years of inadequate sleep accustomed them to cope but neither Chase nor Foreman demurred when House nodded his dismissal. A two am departure, following three solid days with little but snatched naps in the conference room and reheated coffee for fuel, seemed little enough to be grateful for, but Cameron was still toiling in the lab and House obviously was going nowhere until the Fates decided: life or death.
Had she been asked, Cameron would have pointed out that this was exactly why House was more than just ‘about the puzzle’. The puzzle was solved but the outcome was not yet clear. He did care about his patients; you might just need to spit roast him over a slow fire before he would admit it. Careful observation revealed his ‘tells’ far more than anything he said. However, House’s reputation as a brilliant but best-avoided (even slightly crazy) s.o.b. meant that no-one canvassed her opinion.
She finished re-checking her results, not bothering to stifle her yawns as she gathered up the scattered printouts to place them in the patient file. Whatever happened to the boy in the next few hours, she was satisfied that her work was above even House’s reproach. Cameron used the elevator to whisk her to the Diagnostics floor. Alone, she generally took the stairs. Not at this ungodly hour; she was beyond exhaustion.
The office and conference room were in darkness. Cameron poked her head around House’s door in case he had fallen asleep but the room was empty. At that moment her pager went off and she immediately retraced her steps to the elevators. Tiredness and thirst seemed to burn a hole in her chest and throat; her legs and feet moved, she felt, as though she were an automaton. Resentment at House for calling her away as she was within reach of the conference room refrigerator died as she saw the man propping himself up against the wall of the clean room.
If she was in dire need of sleep, then he, an insomniac at the best of times, was close to collapse. Exhaustion stripped away what little he used in the way of good manners; without meeting her glance he simply held out his hand for the file, skimming over the carefully-prepared results with eyes as keen as ever despite their reddened rims. “Hmm”. He rubbed his hand across his jaw. “Increase the dosage and risk liver failure or…?”
“It might buy him a few more hours. He should be dead already. What choice is there?”
“Tiredness suits you. Makes you cut to the chase.” He grinned tiredly at the pun and the way she reacted to the extra meaning behind his words. Although he had never explicitly condemned that brief ill-conceived liaison, Cameron knew that in some way it irked him. She and Chase had long ago put it behind them. Why didn’t he?
House directed the intensive care staff to increase the drug and announced his intention to wait around to see if there was any improvement in the boy’s condition. “I need a drink; God knows when I last had one, but first I must sit down before my damn leg makes me fall down.”
Leaning heavily on his cane, he limped slowly and with evident discomfort to the area used during the daytime by patients’ relatives. It had recently been refurbished by Cuddy with comfortable couches and low tables. “The Boss’s sucking up has its uses”, said House, carefully lowering his tall frame into the angle provided by two long couches placed together, and gripping his right leg with both hands, he swivelled around to position it , with a barely audible sigh, along the length of the couch.
He dry -swallowed two vicodin, tilted back his head and closed his eyes as if to sleep; then, with some irritation, said,”Why are you hovering? Surely you have a home to go to? Even I am not unreasonable enough to keep you here any longer. I can take things from here. It’s not worth my going back to the apartment now.”
Unspoken was the knowledge that after the way he had punished it over the last few days, his leg would not tolerate the trip home right now. Cameron was fully aware of this and also that he would resent any sign from her that she understood, so she ignored the last part of his speech and merely said she needed a drink, had been on her way to get one when he paged her and would he like her to get one for him while she was about it?
“Not that sludge from the Nurses’ station. Otherwise, yes. Please,” he added as an afterthought. Cameron returned from Diagnostics a few minutes later with her own and House’s red mug, brim full of mint tea. Coffee had seemed like a bad idea, neither thirst quenching nor needed for its stimulant effect right now. Besides, the entire team seemed likely to suffer from caffeine poisoning after the hours they had worked on this case.
It seemed that House was already asleep when Cameron stopped in front of him. She gingerly perched herself on the edge of the couch away from his outstretched limb and quietly placed the red mug on the glass- topped table nearest to him. She sipped at the steaming hot liquid in her own mug, her thirst making her prepared to risk scalding her mouth in the effort to quench it.
“So where’s mine, then?” demanded her boss, “and what’s that smell? I hope it’s not that stuff you gave me when I had a cold; walnut and whatever.” “Ginger” said Cameron, “and you said it was nice.” “I lied”, he said, struggling to sit upright among the deep cushions of the couch without disturbing his leg from its vicodin-induced somnolence. Cameron huffed with as much energy as she could muster, which was very little by this stage and without further comment handed the mint tea to her apparently ungrateful superior.
While he drank the tea in slow gulps, barely awake, Cameron took stock of the man beside her. Lack of rest as well as the ever-present pain had etched the fine lines around his eyes and across his forehead more deeply than usual and his pallor showed even through the heavily stubbled jaw. The eyes through which he seemed to see everything were almost shut, allowing her to examine him in a way she would not normally attempt, knowing that a blast of sarcasm would push her back to a safe distance, his defensive perimeter intact and the ‘keep off’ signs freshly painted.
Now his trademark fidgeting was stilled for the moment, his cane tucked alongside his bad leg on the wide couch. His tension, which fizzed around him at all times like some kind of electric field (and which, thought Cameron wryly, accounted in no small measure for his ability to mesmerise those around him into doing things against their better judgement) was lowered sufficiently to count him as ‘relaxed.' Not a word one usually associated with House.
The red mug wavered. Cameron leaned forward and removed it from his grasp before the remaining liquid emptied itself down his T-shirt. Sitting back more comfortably on the couch and tucking her legs underneath her, she decided to wait one more hour to see if their patient’s crisis passed before going home. Meanwhile, House could have his nap.