House fic: lost in paradise outside the city limits 5/?
Title: lost in paradise outside the city limits
Fandom: House, M.D
Characters/Pairings: Cameron, House/Cameron
Word Count: 1488
Rating: Eventually NC-17
Spoilers: Post No Reason. ♥
Summary: She understands that, in these suspended frames of time, she’s lost more of herself to him than she can control. For him, it’s four days to solve it all. For her, well, she doesn’t even know where to begin. It’s time to face the truth now.
Author's Notes: For teenwitch77.
|one| |two| |three| |four|
But she- she heard the violin,
And left my side and entered in:
Love passed into the house of lust.
Oscar Wilde, The Harlot’s House
Crash. And burn.
Three hours and then some minutes, she wakes up to anticipation. Anticipation. Anticipation. Anticipation. To what, she wonders, blinking sleepily. To what? She bites back a groan and tries to burrow back into her corner of the bed.
Sleep, she orders herself. Go back to sleep.
She ignores wishes and wants, moments of reprimand and self-doubt. And yet, here, here she’s confronted by a, b, c, and all of the above.
It happens. She always knew something would. It’s a matter of filing.
She shifts in the bed, her back to the other side. She doesn’t turn. Curiosity is sleeping. She merely glances at the clock. It blinks- one, two, three, one, two, three- and she thinks memories of recitals and moments. It’s 4:42am.
She sighs. Great.
She wonders if she should breathe. Breathing leads to vulnerability. She can’t do that here- is there a point to her defenses? She blinks again and she realizes that they’ve left the radio on- the laughter, the murmur. He refused to listen to the weather and won out when he got her to confess to him that Chicago was a guilty pleasure of hers. (How he managed that, she’ll never know, but she supposes that he’s figured out some of the mechanics of their moments.)
His voice breaks the silence. Clear. Awake. “You’re not sleeping. I can hear you thinking.”
She almost laughs. But doesn’t because there’s something here that she doesn’t understand. Maybe it’s the time. Maybe it’s not. Maybe it’s because the idea of being stuck here, for several days (she made the choice), is daunting.
He already haunts her enough.
“I’m tired.” Unnecessary conversation. She skips a comment or two about the weather. She assures herself that this isn’t some parallel universe. She isn’t dreaming. She’s never dreaming when she’s with him. Although, she wishes from time to time.
That’s their harsh reality.
Her eyes close. And she falls back to the quiet, the comfort of what she knows. She’s just tired of wondering, of the drive, of this. Of being at this standing part.
So, as always, she offers the out. “We need to work on the timing of these conversations.”
It’s about motions and culpability, the silence of responsibility- a clear promise of an admission. The question is always the same, in variation and sound. Can she afford one? Will he- at this rate, there’s nothing, not even an end.
An end. Isn’t this what it’s about? Isn’t that what he wants?
(She doesn’t know her point anymore.)
She nearly jumps when she hears him shift. He’s closer. Closer to her. Her lips part when his fingers brush against her hip. Or so she thinks. Somewhere down the hall there’s laughter, not from the radio. And the wind- the storm’s getting worse, how about some classics to keep the night in warm- hits the window.
They’re in the same bed. And the knowledge of what’s right here before her is terrifying.
The conversation isn’t over (in fact, she’s not quite sure that it’s begun) and yet, here, it’s the first time they’re both quiet. Or maybe there’s nothing to say.
She’s lost to the sensation of his fingers against her hip. The motion- ohgod- is circular and soft, a strange tentativeness. And she can’t think anymore. Rationally. Happily. Here and there, something’s lost and gained.
She wants to figure this out. (Four days?)
He still says nothing. This is his ploy or maybe, she’s looking for someone to blame. She wonders if it’s best. This can’t be-
His hand moves, his palm flattening against her hip. The red of the clock paints the reflection of the time. 4:44am. On the wall. One. Two. Four. Four. Four. She blinks again. And breathes. Tells herself to slow down. Same room. Same bed.
His voice is a mere echo to his touch. “What would you do-” he pauses. Breathes. And inches closer so that she can hear- it’s the perfect excuse. “If I decided to-”
She hopes it’s as standard as that.
It’s a virtual game of fill-in-the blank, the back and forth push and pull between them. He guesses (assumes). And she stays away (runs). It’s simple. Easy. And there’s a formula that can broken down and forgotten.
He breathes. He doesn’t have to say it. She knows. It’s the advantages and disadvantage of endlessness. Moments. Times. Work. Job. Run-ins. It’s a list of things here and there, but her mind falls back. On to the known.
She knows. (Kiss her. Kiss her. Confrontation.) And that scares the hell out of her.
His hand slides up from her hip and he inches closer again- or she leans back- his fingers brushing against her stomach. Against the fabric of her sweater. Motions are still careful. Still slow. Still tentative. As if he was worried if she’d-
(She doesn’t want to stop him.)
Her voice is soft, breathless. “Are you sure?”
But when it comes down it, she doesn’t know who she’s asking. Him. Or herself. The words seem to linger in the room and it becomes the question of the moment, of the practice of them. Back and forth. Up. And spiraling down.
She needs that certainty, like any other. Something tangible. Something that would make it easier to put all of this into perspective. Perspective in opening herself up. They haven’t talked. They will never talk.
It’s the backwards equation.
But it’s as if he didn’t hear her. (She doesn’t need to close her eyes and think really, really hard about the look on his face. She can see it. He’s pushing closer) And she slides closer. Her awareness of him is growing, growing into sensation.
She’s breathing. Softly.
He doesn’t say anything. Not anymore. (Or to begin with.) There’s a solution. Or there was a solution. Cut ties. Move on. But neither of them made any push to move out of the way. To duck. Or walk in the other direction. Things aren’t that simple.
It’s the truth. The vicious truth. His. And hers.
“I don’t know what sure is,” he says quietly. “I don’t know what sure is- except fucking stupid.”
She wonders if he thinks she’s really awake. If the excuse is, he can tell her now. And he can get over this easily.
She turns in the bed, the sheets crinkling under her weight, and faces him in the darkness of the room. She can see him. She can’t see him. Contradiction brings her a strange comfort of knowing that she can hold onto the notion of them in the oddest of moments.
Repetition and confrontation. It’s got to end somehow.
She blinks. And sees him. “What are we doing?”
But it’s not even the we that’s the necessary part of the equation. It’s not the him or the her either. At this point, she doesn’t know what it is. But maybe, maybe she should. Maybe. It’s a lot of maybes. (She craves him.)
“When are we going to talk about this?” He counters. And it sounds as if it tastes awful- he’s throwing out words he won’t say for conversations (he won’t have). And she wonders. She wonders if this really is meant to go beyond what they have. Nobody can do much of anything with the notion of circles.
“I’m not sorry I brought you up here,” he mutters. As if there’s a need for a superficial apology.
She slides closer. Or shifts. It doesn’t matter. Movements have nothing to do with lines anymore, she can’t distinguished which or what is being crossed.
“I wasn’t asking.”
She licks her lips and tries to tone down the aching defensiveness in her voice. She counts in her head, but she can’t concentrate. His hand stays on her hip. Like it should be there. Like it needs to be there. (And then need and should lead to the next step, but she isn’t sure that she’s going to be ready for that.)
“I’m sorry,” she apologizes. Quickly. But it doesn’t seem right.
He shakes his head. “You shouldn’t be.”
Point. End.
There are questions on her lips, questions and answers that provide nothing but leverage against him. He doesn’t know Allison (perhaps, if he did, they wouldn’t be here, in this moment, in this mess) and she’s more than aware that she can hold it against him. She’s never done it completely, there’s never been the chance.
Are they stuck?
Her lips part. And nothing falls. He reaches for her and she flinches- glad, for once, for the darkness in the room- but doesn’t draw back as his fingers brush against her lips. Touching her. Relentlessly pursuing an answer that she was beginning to believe she didn’t have.
And in a series of predictable unpredictability, she thinks (later, much later) she would’ve been able to see this coming.
It’s when he kisses her that she finds herself not caring at all.
+
Fandom: House, M.D
Characters/Pairings: Cameron, House/Cameron
Word Count: 1488
Rating: Eventually NC-17
Spoilers: Post No Reason. ♥
Summary: She understands that, in these suspended frames of time, she’s lost more of herself to him than she can control. For him, it’s four days to solve it all. For her, well, she doesn’t even know where to begin. It’s time to face the truth now.
Author's Notes: For teenwitch77.
|one| |two| |three| |four|
But she- she heard the violin,
And left my side and entered in:
Love passed into the house of lust.
Oscar Wilde, The Harlot’s House
Crash. And burn.
Three hours and then some minutes, she wakes up to anticipation. Anticipation. Anticipation. Anticipation. To what, she wonders, blinking sleepily. To what? She bites back a groan and tries to burrow back into her corner of the bed.
Sleep, she orders herself. Go back to sleep.
She ignores wishes and wants, moments of reprimand and self-doubt. And yet, here, here she’s confronted by a, b, c, and all of the above.
It happens. She always knew something would. It’s a matter of filing.
She shifts in the bed, her back to the other side. She doesn’t turn. Curiosity is sleeping. She merely glances at the clock. It blinks- one, two, three, one, two, three- and she thinks memories of recitals and moments. It’s 4:42am.
She sighs. Great.
She wonders if she should breathe. Breathing leads to vulnerability. She can’t do that here- is there a point to her defenses? She blinks again and she realizes that they’ve left the radio on- the laughter, the murmur. He refused to listen to the weather and won out when he got her to confess to him that Chicago was a guilty pleasure of hers. (How he managed that, she’ll never know, but she supposes that he’s figured out some of the mechanics of their moments.)
His voice breaks the silence. Clear. Awake. “You’re not sleeping. I can hear you thinking.”
She almost laughs. But doesn’t because there’s something here that she doesn’t understand. Maybe it’s the time. Maybe it’s not. Maybe it’s because the idea of being stuck here, for several days (she made the choice), is daunting.
He already haunts her enough.
“I’m tired.” Unnecessary conversation. She skips a comment or two about the weather. She assures herself that this isn’t some parallel universe. She isn’t dreaming. She’s never dreaming when she’s with him. Although, she wishes from time to time.
That’s their harsh reality.
Her eyes close. And she falls back to the quiet, the comfort of what she knows. She’s just tired of wondering, of the drive, of this. Of being at this standing part.
So, as always, she offers the out. “We need to work on the timing of these conversations.”
It’s about motions and culpability, the silence of responsibility- a clear promise of an admission. The question is always the same, in variation and sound. Can she afford one? Will he- at this rate, there’s nothing, not even an end.
An end. Isn’t this what it’s about? Isn’t that what he wants?
(She doesn’t know her point anymore.)
She nearly jumps when she hears him shift. He’s closer. Closer to her. Her lips part when his fingers brush against her hip. Or so she thinks. Somewhere down the hall there’s laughter, not from the radio. And the wind- the storm’s getting worse, how about some classics to keep the night in warm- hits the window.
They’re in the same bed. And the knowledge of what’s right here before her is terrifying.
The conversation isn’t over (in fact, she’s not quite sure that it’s begun) and yet, here, it’s the first time they’re both quiet. Or maybe there’s nothing to say.
She’s lost to the sensation of his fingers against her hip. The motion- ohgod- is circular and soft, a strange tentativeness. And she can’t think anymore. Rationally. Happily. Here and there, something’s lost and gained.
She wants to figure this out. (Four days?)
He still says nothing. This is his ploy or maybe, she’s looking for someone to blame. She wonders if it’s best. This can’t be-
His hand moves, his palm flattening against her hip. The red of the clock paints the reflection of the time. 4:44am. On the wall. One. Two. Four. Four. Four. She blinks again. And breathes. Tells herself to slow down. Same room. Same bed.
His voice is a mere echo to his touch. “What would you do-” he pauses. Breathes. And inches closer so that she can hear- it’s the perfect excuse. “If I decided to-”
She hopes it’s as standard as that.
It’s a virtual game of fill-in-the blank, the back and forth push and pull between them. He guesses (assumes). And she stays away (runs). It’s simple. Easy. And there’s a formula that can broken down and forgotten.
He breathes. He doesn’t have to say it. She knows. It’s the advantages and disadvantage of endlessness. Moments. Times. Work. Job. Run-ins. It’s a list of things here and there, but her mind falls back. On to the known.
She knows. (Kiss her. Kiss her. Confrontation.) And that scares the hell out of her.
His hand slides up from her hip and he inches closer again- or she leans back- his fingers brushing against her stomach. Against the fabric of her sweater. Motions are still careful. Still slow. Still tentative. As if he was worried if she’d-
(She doesn’t want to stop him.)
Her voice is soft, breathless. “Are you sure?”
But when it comes down it, she doesn’t know who she’s asking. Him. Or herself. The words seem to linger in the room and it becomes the question of the moment, of the practice of them. Back and forth. Up. And spiraling down.
She needs that certainty, like any other. Something tangible. Something that would make it easier to put all of this into perspective. Perspective in opening herself up. They haven’t talked. They will never talk.
It’s the backwards equation.
But it’s as if he didn’t hear her. (She doesn’t need to close her eyes and think really, really hard about the look on his face. She can see it. He’s pushing closer) And she slides closer. Her awareness of him is growing, growing into sensation.
She’s breathing. Softly.
He doesn’t say anything. Not anymore. (Or to begin with.) There’s a solution. Or there was a solution. Cut ties. Move on. But neither of them made any push to move out of the way. To duck. Or walk in the other direction. Things aren’t that simple.
It’s the truth. The vicious truth. His. And hers.
“I don’t know what sure is,” he says quietly. “I don’t know what sure is- except fucking stupid.”
She wonders if he thinks she’s really awake. If the excuse is, he can tell her now. And he can get over this easily.
She turns in the bed, the sheets crinkling under her weight, and faces him in the darkness of the room. She can see him. She can’t see him. Contradiction brings her a strange comfort of knowing that she can hold onto the notion of them in the oddest of moments.
Repetition and confrontation. It’s got to end somehow.
She blinks. And sees him. “What are we doing?”
But it’s not even the we that’s the necessary part of the equation. It’s not the him or the her either. At this point, she doesn’t know what it is. But maybe, maybe she should. Maybe. It’s a lot of maybes. (She craves him.)
“When are we going to talk about this?” He counters. And it sounds as if it tastes awful- he’s throwing out words he won’t say for conversations (he won’t have). And she wonders. She wonders if this really is meant to go beyond what they have. Nobody can do much of anything with the notion of circles.
“I’m not sorry I brought you up here,” he mutters. As if there’s a need for a superficial apology.
She slides closer. Or shifts. It doesn’t matter. Movements have nothing to do with lines anymore, she can’t distinguished which or what is being crossed.
“I wasn’t asking.”
She licks her lips and tries to tone down the aching defensiveness in her voice. She counts in her head, but she can’t concentrate. His hand stays on her hip. Like it should be there. Like it needs to be there. (And then need and should lead to the next step, but she isn’t sure that she’s going to be ready for that.)
“I’m sorry,” she apologizes. Quickly. But it doesn’t seem right.
He shakes his head. “You shouldn’t be.”
Point. End.
There are questions on her lips, questions and answers that provide nothing but leverage against him. He doesn’t know Allison (perhaps, if he did, they wouldn’t be here, in this moment, in this mess) and she’s more than aware that she can hold it against him. She’s never done it completely, there’s never been the chance.
Are they stuck?
Her lips part. And nothing falls. He reaches for her and she flinches- glad, for once, for the darkness in the room- but doesn’t draw back as his fingers brush against her lips. Touching her. Relentlessly pursuing an answer that she was beginning to believe she didn’t have.
And in a series of predictable unpredictability, she thinks (later, much later) she would’ve been able to see this coming.
It’s when he kisses her that she finds herself not caring at all.
+