Downpour part 5/5
Well, I'd like to thank Live Journal for eating my first two attempts at posting this!
Anyway - thanks for all the feedback, I appreciate it. Special thanks to those of you who said that my Cuddy in a crisis worked, and who used words like rich and complex to describe what I'd come up with.
So anyway - part 5 is up.
Downpour
House / Cuddy
Rating: NC17
Summary: In a storm things get washed away
Disclaimer: oh - and I do know I don't own them
It could have been the start of - something, but as it turns out, old habits die hard. Cuddy takes his advice and disappears for a couple of days and when she returns he thinks about saying something to her, finding a quiet moment to have a conversation about the night of the storm. But it doesn’t happen - he never finds a moment because he can’t find the words and apparently neither can she.
On the day of her return the first thing he says to her is a remark about what she is wearing and the buttons that aren’t done up. He expects a blush and isn’t disappointed, but she snaps back at him about the clinic hours he’s missed - which makes him realise that she’s been keeping track of things despite her absence.
And before he quite knows how it happened it is business as usual. He is trying to dodge clinic duty, she is trying to make him do his job and they are sniping at each other as though nothing out of the ordinary ever happened between them. It bothers him that they slip back into old patterns, without deciding that is what they are going to do. But doing something else depends on him knowing what he wants - and he doesn’t. Which means that it’s easier and safer to rely on the behaviour that has served them well for so long.
He doesn’t say anything to James about what happened after they left the hospital that night. But it seems he doesn’t have to, over the next few weeks he sometimes catches James watching her with a speculative expression and he wonders what is on his friend’s mind and why he is keeping it to himself.
But, of course, he wouldn’t know that James is watching her if he weren’t doing the same. Watching her, wondering if she is all right, but knowing better than to ask. She seems to be doing just fine, back to normal in fact. Yet occasionally he catches a glimpse of something else, something he recognises from their night of unexpected intimacy. He thinks the uncertainties dog her still, but that they are another of the things she has set aside in order to be able to do her job. He admires that about her, even if he can’t emulate it.
Sometimes, when the light catches her in a certain way, or when she smiles he is forced to conclude that she is beautiful and that she has the power to move him. But he knows that she is too wary, or too intelligent to use that power against him.
Time races on. He hears a rumour that she is dating someone and confirms it for himself when he rounds a corner one night and sees her leaving her office. She has exchanged her suit in favour of a soft, dark dress that clings to her in a way that makes him suck in a breath as memories assail him. She meets his eyes for a moment, her expression reminiscent and then she bids him a quiet “good night” before walking away. He hopes whomever she is wearing the dress for is suitably appreciative.
Things get a little crazy after that - his fault no doubt. The Stacy situation explodes and he forgets about Cuddy, except in her role as his boss. She becomes one of the people trying to contain him, stopping him from making a complicated situation worse; someone to be angry at when things don’t go his way.
She leaves the aftermath to James and who can blame her for that? Just in case she hadn’t believed him when he told her he was only interested in her body, his reaction to Stacy is a spectacular demonstration of his emotional unavailability.
So, James stops him from cracking up and Cuddy makes sure he doesn’t do anything that will cost him his job. He wishes it were easier to be grateful to her for that - but of course it isn’t.
And just when things might be getting back to what passes for normal, along comes a case that he knows will haunt him. Now that it’s over all he wants to do is go home and crawl into a bottle of whiskey until he can’t feel anything anymore. Since the Universe seems determined to fuck with him he is equally determined to stay out of the way until the storm passes.
It’s been a horrible case, even now with all the mysteries solved there’s no peace. There is no glory in figuring out the diagnosis when the patient dies anyway, when he might have saved her if only people hadn’t lied to him.
And then there is the jarring suspicion that those lies might just have been deliberate. That the ‘devoted’ and penniless husband might have misled the Doctors about his wealthy wife’s symptoms - on purpose. Can you murder someone by making sure her Doctors don’t treat her properly? It is the thought that is haunting him now.
His team thinks he is crazy - although there is nothing new in that. Even James isn’t sure about this one, though he is making all the right noises. But none of them see the world the way he does.
But Cuddy believes him when he stumbles into her office to pour out all of his anger and suspicions. And then she decides what it is they are going to do about those suspicions. She’s been running interference for him for the last couple of hours, making sure the cops get the full picture and all the information they need without involving him too much. She’s doing her job he knows - but today he is grateful she is so good at it.
They took the husband in for questioning a little while ago. He isn’t sure that he wants to find out that he is right. But he isn’t going to be surprised when it turns out he is.
James is waiting for him when he gets to his car and he thinks that maybe he could use a drinking companion, that surely Mrs Wilson won’t mind if her husband crawls home in the small hours of the morning smelling of too much scotch. But as he gets closer he realises Wilson isn’t alone.
She has her hands in her pockets, her head is down even though James is talking to her and she nods occasionally - as though she is listening carefully.
“Conspiring about me?” he asks loudly as he approaches them. James shrugs,
“I called for reinforcements,”
Long, dark hair cascades over her shoulders and even now he can remember how it felt sliding over his skin. The vulnerability in those memories makes him angry - and he is very good at being angry.
“I don’t need to be watched.”
“Go home James.” Her voice is low and authoritative and Wilson waits only for a moment, looking between them, before complying. There is a long silence before he says,
“If you think there is anything you can do to make this better you can forget it. You aren’t that good in bed.”
“You aren’t the only one who doesn’t have it in them to offer comfort,” she says calmly, her eyes flicking over him, assessing his mood without difficulty. “You were right, he did kill her. He used you to do it because the circumstances presented themselves, because if she divorced him he wouldn’t get a penny. Whatever you think, there is no way you could have known that. Even if you are very, very good at what you do - and a complete bastard into the bargain.”
“Is this supposed to be anything I am interested in hearing, because despite what James might have said I don’t need…”
“James didn’t say anything - he’s far too loyal. And you need what I needed one night not so long ago, shelter.”
“And you’re offering that - are you?” She looks angry for a moment, but then she takes a breath and says in the same reasonable tone,
“I’m reminding you it doesn’t have to be pills and scotch. But it’s your choice.”
He closes his eyes, wondering if she has been summoned by his sub-conscious. But when he opens them again, she is still standing there watching him and he knows she is real because he can tell that her patience is running out by the second.
He leans towards her, wanting the warmth of her body, not sure he is brave enough to ask for it and quite certain that he does not deserve it. Is this how she felt that night, uncertain, vulnerable, pulled one way by the storm and another by him? How had she stood it? The non-verbal cue is enough though and she moves closer, her hands snaking up to rub his back.
“I can’t fix you House, I wouldn’t even know where to begin.” As confessions go it is hardly romantic, but it is a reminder of their similarities as well as their differences - which makes him brave in a way he hasn’t been in a very long time.
“Is this going to be like last time,” he asks, “are we going to screw it up tomorrow?” She backs away enough to look him in the eye, her fingertips cup his face, holding him still when his instinct is to break eye contact before she sees too much.
Her expression flickers rapidly between exasperation and anger until finally he sees something he scarcely recognises or has any right to expect; a glimmer of hope.
She sighs.
“Maybe not.”
The End
Anyway - thanks for all the feedback, I appreciate it. Special thanks to those of you who said that my Cuddy in a crisis worked, and who used words like rich and complex to describe what I'd come up with.
So anyway - part 5 is up.
Downpour
House / Cuddy
Rating: NC17
Summary: In a storm things get washed away
Disclaimer: oh - and I do know I don't own them
It could have been the start of - something, but as it turns out, old habits die hard. Cuddy takes his advice and disappears for a couple of days and when she returns he thinks about saying something to her, finding a quiet moment to have a conversation about the night of the storm. But it doesn’t happen - he never finds a moment because he can’t find the words and apparently neither can she.
On the day of her return the first thing he says to her is a remark about what she is wearing and the buttons that aren’t done up. He expects a blush and isn’t disappointed, but she snaps back at him about the clinic hours he’s missed - which makes him realise that she’s been keeping track of things despite her absence.
And before he quite knows how it happened it is business as usual. He is trying to dodge clinic duty, she is trying to make him do his job and they are sniping at each other as though nothing out of the ordinary ever happened between them. It bothers him that they slip back into old patterns, without deciding that is what they are going to do. But doing something else depends on him knowing what he wants - and he doesn’t. Which means that it’s easier and safer to rely on the behaviour that has served them well for so long.
He doesn’t say anything to James about what happened after they left the hospital that night. But it seems he doesn’t have to, over the next few weeks he sometimes catches James watching her with a speculative expression and he wonders what is on his friend’s mind and why he is keeping it to himself.
But, of course, he wouldn’t know that James is watching her if he weren’t doing the same. Watching her, wondering if she is all right, but knowing better than to ask. She seems to be doing just fine, back to normal in fact. Yet occasionally he catches a glimpse of something else, something he recognises from their night of unexpected intimacy. He thinks the uncertainties dog her still, but that they are another of the things she has set aside in order to be able to do her job. He admires that about her, even if he can’t emulate it.
Sometimes, when the light catches her in a certain way, or when she smiles he is forced to conclude that she is beautiful and that she has the power to move him. But he knows that she is too wary, or too intelligent to use that power against him.
Time races on. He hears a rumour that she is dating someone and confirms it for himself when he rounds a corner one night and sees her leaving her office. She has exchanged her suit in favour of a soft, dark dress that clings to her in a way that makes him suck in a breath as memories assail him. She meets his eyes for a moment, her expression reminiscent and then she bids him a quiet “good night” before walking away. He hopes whomever she is wearing the dress for is suitably appreciative.
Things get a little crazy after that - his fault no doubt. The Stacy situation explodes and he forgets about Cuddy, except in her role as his boss. She becomes one of the people trying to contain him, stopping him from making a complicated situation worse; someone to be angry at when things don’t go his way.
She leaves the aftermath to James and who can blame her for that? Just in case she hadn’t believed him when he told her he was only interested in her body, his reaction to Stacy is a spectacular demonstration of his emotional unavailability.
So, James stops him from cracking up and Cuddy makes sure he doesn’t do anything that will cost him his job. He wishes it were easier to be grateful to her for that - but of course it isn’t.
And just when things might be getting back to what passes for normal, along comes a case that he knows will haunt him. Now that it’s over all he wants to do is go home and crawl into a bottle of whiskey until he can’t feel anything anymore. Since the Universe seems determined to fuck with him he is equally determined to stay out of the way until the storm passes.
It’s been a horrible case, even now with all the mysteries solved there’s no peace. There is no glory in figuring out the diagnosis when the patient dies anyway, when he might have saved her if only people hadn’t lied to him.
And then there is the jarring suspicion that those lies might just have been deliberate. That the ‘devoted’ and penniless husband might have misled the Doctors about his wealthy wife’s symptoms - on purpose. Can you murder someone by making sure her Doctors don’t treat her properly? It is the thought that is haunting him now.
His team thinks he is crazy - although there is nothing new in that. Even James isn’t sure about this one, though he is making all the right noises. But none of them see the world the way he does.
But Cuddy believes him when he stumbles into her office to pour out all of his anger and suspicions. And then she decides what it is they are going to do about those suspicions. She’s been running interference for him for the last couple of hours, making sure the cops get the full picture and all the information they need without involving him too much. She’s doing her job he knows - but today he is grateful she is so good at it.
They took the husband in for questioning a little while ago. He isn’t sure that he wants to find out that he is right. But he isn’t going to be surprised when it turns out he is.
James is waiting for him when he gets to his car and he thinks that maybe he could use a drinking companion, that surely Mrs Wilson won’t mind if her husband crawls home in the small hours of the morning smelling of too much scotch. But as he gets closer he realises Wilson isn’t alone.
She has her hands in her pockets, her head is down even though James is talking to her and she nods occasionally - as though she is listening carefully.
“Conspiring about me?” he asks loudly as he approaches them. James shrugs,
“I called for reinforcements,”
Long, dark hair cascades over her shoulders and even now he can remember how it felt sliding over his skin. The vulnerability in those memories makes him angry - and he is very good at being angry.
“I don’t need to be watched.”
“Go home James.” Her voice is low and authoritative and Wilson waits only for a moment, looking between them, before complying. There is a long silence before he says,
“If you think there is anything you can do to make this better you can forget it. You aren’t that good in bed.”
“You aren’t the only one who doesn’t have it in them to offer comfort,” she says calmly, her eyes flicking over him, assessing his mood without difficulty. “You were right, he did kill her. He used you to do it because the circumstances presented themselves, because if she divorced him he wouldn’t get a penny. Whatever you think, there is no way you could have known that. Even if you are very, very good at what you do - and a complete bastard into the bargain.”
“Is this supposed to be anything I am interested in hearing, because despite what James might have said I don’t need…”
“James didn’t say anything - he’s far too loyal. And you need what I needed one night not so long ago, shelter.”
“And you’re offering that - are you?” She looks angry for a moment, but then she takes a breath and says in the same reasonable tone,
“I’m reminding you it doesn’t have to be pills and scotch. But it’s your choice.”
He closes his eyes, wondering if she has been summoned by his sub-conscious. But when he opens them again, she is still standing there watching him and he knows she is real because he can tell that her patience is running out by the second.
He leans towards her, wanting the warmth of her body, not sure he is brave enough to ask for it and quite certain that he does not deserve it. Is this how she felt that night, uncertain, vulnerable, pulled one way by the storm and another by him? How had she stood it? The non-verbal cue is enough though and she moves closer, her hands snaking up to rub his back.
“I can’t fix you House, I wouldn’t even know where to begin.” As confessions go it is hardly romantic, but it is a reminder of their similarities as well as their differences - which makes him brave in a way he hasn’t been in a very long time.
“Is this going to be like last time,” he asks, “are we going to screw it up tomorrow?” She backs away enough to look him in the eye, her fingertips cup his face, holding him still when his instinct is to break eye contact before she sees too much.
Her expression flickers rapidly between exasperation and anger until finally he sees something he scarcely recognises or has any right to expect; a glimmer of hope.
She sighs.
“Maybe not.”
The End