Torch Songs for Two | By : Veresna Category: G through L > House Views: 4666 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0 |
Disclaimer: I do not own House, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story. |
Disclaimer: House,
the show, and House, the character, are the creations of the brilliant David
Shore and belong to him et al. I am merely writing this for entertainment
purposes, with no monetary gain to myself, and absolutely no copyright
infringement is intended.
Author’s Notes:
First, thanks to ‘lablanche’ for providing me, as always,
with her support, praise, criticism and invaluable advice while acting as my
editor for this story. It was hard to
venture back into the world of fanfiction after being away from it for several
years, and I am thrilled and honored that she agreed to undertake this journey
with me. Any and all errors remaining in
this work of fiction are strictly my own fault.
This House fanfiction was conceived and written during the
barren era of the writers’ strike, in between the airing of ‘Don’t Ever Change’
and ‘No More Mr. Nice Guy’. Although
most, if not all, fanfiction ventures into ‘Alternative Universe’ territory at
some point, the events portrayed in this story are designed to be consistent
with the canon of the ‘House’ universe as it was at this point, near the end of
the fourth season. I state unequivocally
that the story was conceived before I had heard of any ‘spoilers’ for the two-part
cliffhanger. So, any similarities in
plot are completely coincidental, or else prove that there are only so many storylines
available before you get duplication.
Anyone wishing to take issue with any of the diagnoses,
prognoses, or any other noseses portrayed herein is advised to remember that
this is a work of fiction, and that the actual writers of House often venture
into an area where the reality of a genuine disease is stretched to the
breaking point for the purpose of providing entertainment. I speak as a person
with over with twenty-five years of experience working as a Medical
Technologist. What’s a Medical
Technologist you say? Those are the
people who actually staff the laboratories to perform the testing of the
samples and who, along with the invaluable phlebotomists, are the ones usually
drawing the blood. If
Princeton-Plainsboro magically survives without these people (along with a wide
variety of other medical professionals), I hope I can be forgiven for doing my
own stretching of the absolute medical truth in this story.
As to why I’m writing this story: David
Shore created a fascinating
character, but without Hugh Laurie’s brilliant portrayal, I believe he would
never have succeeded in creating a series built around a lead character whose
behavior is so magnificently appalling but at the same time never less than
absolutely mesmerizing. To cap it off,
whenever Mr. Laurie and Ms. Edelstein appear together, the chemistry between
their characters makes the air crackle with excitement. In response to the question of what would
happen should their characters ever end up in bed together, executive producer
Katie Jacobs said: "That’s kinda
interesting.”
I completely agree.
Here’s my version of how it all happens.
As Dean of Medicine at a large
teaching hospital, it was not unusual for Dr. Lisa Cuddy to be awakened in the
middle of the night. Amazingly, the
interruptions to her slumber were not always the work of her brilliant,
impetuous and infuriating head of Diagnostic Medicine deciding that 2 o’clock in the morning was the ideal time to
be ringing her phone, knocking at her door, or tapping on her bedroom
window. There were several evenings when
some actually quite sane and sensible person with a legitimate concern or
question had found it necessary to communicate a problem to her immediately,
regardless of the time.
Though, of course, no one besides
Dr. Gregory House took such a sadistic delight in ruining her night’s
sleep. Anyone else would begin the
conversation by apologizing for the intrusion.
Dr. House was likely to inquire as to what she was wearing (presuming he
was not there to leer at her in person).
On the night our story begins, Cuddy
was having one of her bizarre recurring dreams wherein she found herself
suddenly transported back in time to medical school. She was literally running all over the University
of Michigan campus, desperately
trying to locate a lecture hall where a particularly important final exam was
about to commence. Although she wasn’t
quite sure what class it was for, she was absolutely certain that if she failed
the exam, she would flunk out of the medical program.
But she would arrive at the
appointed room only to find a notice posted on the door announcing that the
site for the exam had changed.
Inevitably, the latest testing venue would be on the other side of the
campus, so she would set off on a run in a new direction. As if that weren’t bad enough, it would
periodically occur to her that there was some very important chapter that she
had somehow neglected to study. So she
would stop for a moment and paw frantically through her textbook, trying to
cram some data into her brain even though the words swimming in front of her
eyes seemed maddeningly meaningless to her.
Then she would set off on a run again, wobbling slightly on ridiculously
high heels and pushing through crowds of laughing, oblivious students as she
continued on her journey towards her increasingly elusive objective.
So it was actually with some
relief that she found herself suddenly jolted awake and sitting half-way up in
bed. She opened her eyes for just a
moment, assuring herself that it was still dark, and that she had not been
awakened by either the ringing of her cell phone, or the buzzing of her alarm,
and then shut them again. She felt cold,
physically drained and emotionally exhausted.
Her body was shaking and her breath continued to come in ragged gasps as
the last remnants of her nightmare slowly faded away.
Startled, her eyelids flew open
again and her heart, which had just started to return to a normal rhythm, began
racing wildly again. There was a warm
hand squeezing her right shoulder and the voice had been unmistakably male.
“What?” she sputtered, sitting up
completely and moving her head in the direction of the speaker.
But the man had already removed
his hand and was turning over in the bed, facing away from her.
“You were having one of your
nightmares,” he said, bunching the pillow under his head and settling back down
to sleep. “Hey, stop hogging the
blankets,” he murmured, reaching back to tug at the bed clothes.
The voice sounded tired, irritated and frighteningly
familiar.
Dumbfounded, she allowed him to
pull the quilt over to his side of the bed while keeping the sheet wrapped
around herself.
Automatically, she turned her
head to the left to check the time on her clock and found herself blinking in
surprise. Although there was a
nightstand to her left, it was covered in stacks of books and compact disks rather
than her familiar lamp and clock.
She swallowed and tightened the
sheet around her body, finding herself shivering again from a combination of
cold and fear as she attempted to make sense of the situation.
She was not in her own home.
She was naked.
And she was in bed with-
“House?” Her
voice sounded strangely thin and shaky.
She heard him sigh.
“You were having a nightmare,”
he repeated, sounding increasingly grumpy.
“Go back to sleep,” he commanded.
Now, it has to be understood
that Lisa Cuddy, as she had once actually mentioned to House, liked sex. Liked it a lot, actually. And there were times when her libido had
driven her to some spectacularly hasty and, in retrospect, awful choices in
lovers. But if she had occasionally
awoken harboring immediate regrets regarding what she done while in the throes
of passion, she had never before found herself in someone else’s bed without
the slightest idea of how she had gotten there.
It was, to say the least,
unnerving. And, since the man in question
was House, her immediate relief that she at least recognized her bed companion
was more than counterbalanced by the knowledge that she had inexplicably
ventured into extremely hazardous territory.
She heard him sigh again.
“You’re not going back to sleep,
are you?” This verdict was delivered in
that resigned, deprecatory tone he reserved for anyone, be it a patient,
colleague or employer, who was too stupid or stubborn to follow his eminently
sane advice.
She opened her mouth, but not a
single word came out of her throat as her mind continued struggling to
comprehend the situation. She could only
stare, dumbly, as he turned onto his back and yawned, his tall, thin body
arching languidly as he stretched.
For some reason, her body seemed
stubbornly unwilling to comply with this quite direct and sensible command
being issued by her mind. Instead, she
remained frozen in position, watching as he closed his eyes and grimaced, his
hand moving down to massage his right thigh through the layers of blankets
covering it.
“Well, since we’re both awake, I
guess we’ll just have to think of something to do,” he said, suddenly opening
his eyes as a decidedly rapacious grin replaced the scowl.
“Uh,” she managed to croak, her
eyes widening in terror as she realized his intentions.
“Oh, it’s okay, honey” he
assured her, a teasing yet undeniably lusty tone creeping into his voice as he
rolled towards her. He waggled his eyebrows roguishly. “I’m up anyway.”
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