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Title: Six Months (ch 4)
Pairing: House/Chase by the end.
Author: alanwolfmoon
Rating: PG
Warnings: ummm... none that I can think of
Summary: Chase quit six months ago because he knew something was wrong with his body, and he didn't want pity. This story covers the six months after he comes back.
Disclaimer: MINE! ALL MINE!....uh, no. Not mine.
Feedback: Reviews and flames are welcome. (They make it look like I'm writing fast)
Notes: Ta-Da! this one's got the diagnosis. oh, and i have a confession to make: hypothalamic disregulation would not occur in prescisely the way i wrote it, at least for chase. i can't remember which way it is, but according to the neurophysiology book i got *after* i wrote this chapter, the heat center and the cold center are in the back and the front of the hypothalamus, completely separate from each-other. so... yeah, sorry any actual MD's that read this, for the incorrectness.
Pairing: House/Chase by the end.
Author: alanwolfmoon
Rating: PG
Warnings: ummm... none that I can think of
Summary: Chase quit six months ago because he knew something was wrong with his body, and he didn't want pity. This story covers the six months after he comes back.
Disclaimer: MINE! ALL MINE!....uh, no. Not mine.
Feedback: Reviews and flames are welcome. (They make it look like I'm writing fast)
Notes: Ta-Da! this one's got the diagnosis. oh, and i have a confession to make: hypothalamic disregulation would not occur in prescisely the way i wrote it, at least for chase. i can't remember which way it is, but according to the neurophysiology book i got *after* i wrote this chapter, the heat center and the cold center are in the back and the front of the hypothalamus, completely separate from each-other. so... yeah, sorry any actual MD's that read this, for the incorrectness.
T
“It’s gotta be Wagner’s,” said Chase, thinking.
“No way. There was no evidence of that on the scans,” objected Foreman.
“He doesn’t know that.” said Cameron.
Chase and foreman both blinked.
“Uh, yeah, I do, 'cause foreman already said it. My idea was wrong, I forgot about the scan,” said Chase, frowning.
“Sorry.”
Foreman went to exchange a meaningful look with Chase, but stifled the urge.
“What about neurofibromitosis?” asked Chase, still frowning.
House looked up from playing with his gameboy to watch—not that Chase noticed.
“No skin symptoms, and they would have presented by now, if it was causing these symptoms. Jeeze Chase, just 'cause you can’t see the patient doesn’t mean you can’t listen.”
Chase rolled his eyes in Foreman’s direction.
“Foreman, that’s not–” started Cameron.
“What about scarlet fever? Could lead to valve stenosis we saw. Cameron could have missed the immune reaction.”
Foreman looked over his shoulder at House, who had switched off his gameboy, watching, eyes narrowed. Chase heard the beeping from the device stop, and smiled a little to himself.
“I didn't miss anything! There was a arrhythmia, but we didn't see any valve stenosis on the echo! If you're so sure it's my mistake, you can do the test again yourself!”
Cameron was standing now, glaring at Chase.
Chase was smiling, broadly.
Cameron covered her mouth.
“Chase... I'm sorry. Sorry. I'm—”
“Finally standing up to me,” interrupted Chase.
House snickered.
“I've been trying to get you to do that for the last ten minutes. Foreman's right, I do have ears. I know there's no rash, no stenosis, no mistake on the ANA. The problem was, you knew that too, but you kept defending me. Stop. The optic nerve chasm and the optic tracts have nothing to do with how sensitive my feelings are. So stop defending me, ok?”
Cameron stared at him for a long time.
Then she ran out of the room.
Chase sighed.
“It wasn't just there. I'm guessing your hypothalamus, given the massive amounts of ice you consumed when the air conditioner conked out.”
Chase turned towards House.
“Uh, yeah. You're right. But that's scarier, less obvious, and telling her that was involved would have made her even less likely to stop pitying me.”
“I don't think that's pity,” said House, thoughtfully, “I think that's being extremely uncomfortable about a memory and it's reoccurrence. That is—someone she cares about getting brain cancer.”
“Wait...” said Foreman, frowning and completely unsurprised by the diagnosis, “You're living together?”
“Only in the sense of living in the same place by necessity because my apartment blew up.”
“Half the hospital offered to have you stay with them.”
“I didn't know any of them very well, and I've never been to any of their homes. I would have had to learn the layout from scratch and I'm not very good at that.”
“So you decided living with House would be easier. And he went along with it,” Foreman looked at House, “Why?”
House shrugged, “'cause he showed up at the bus stop but didn't get on the bus.”
Foreman frowned, narrowing his eyes.
“You don't mind.” he said finally, in an incredulous tone, “You seriously don't mind.”
House smirked, and turned on his gameboy.
Foreman turned back to look at Chase, who blinked for a moment, then smiled a little, shaking his head.
After that, House and Chase stopped coming in different entrances, which they had only been doing so no one would start some sort of weird rumor.
Cuddy asked Wilson what was going on, and if House had actually made a second friend.
Wilson had told her that nothing in particular was 'going on', and that, though he had a tentative hope that at least the second might eventually become the case, so far it was just mutual lack of discomfort, and possibly a little well-hidden concern on House's part.
Chase sighed, curling up on the sofa and grabbing the pillow from underneath it, as House turned the TV off and limped towards the bedroom.
Then he blinked, as the sounds stopped short of the door.
He heard a puff sound, of the air being forced out of a cushion.
Chase sat up, frowning.
Then blinked, smiling, as the first few notes reached his ears.
The notes petered out after a while, and he frowned. He liked it when house played.
There was a long silence, until he heard House sigh.
“Chase.”
“Yeah?”
“Come here.”
House blinked, as he entered the living room to find Chase still curled up on the couch, blanket pulled tight around him.
“Uh... we need to leave in negative three minutes. Patient emergency.”
“Go ahead. I can't go anywhere right now. I'll call a cab later.”
House put his hand on Chase's forehead, briefly.
“How cold are you?”
“I don't know, your thermometer doesn't talk.”
“Lemme see.”
Chase handed him the thermometer.
“95.4.”
“Shit!”
Chase pulled the blanket even tighter around himself.
House limped into the bedroom, and came back carrying a quilt and a heating pad. He dumped the quilt on Chase, then went to plug in the pad.
Ten minutes later, the thermometer read 95.7 and Chase was still blue tinged.
House sighed, and poked Chase in the shoulder.
“Move.”
“House, I really need to just stay--”
“You need to warm up. Moving will facilitate that.”
“Getting out from under the blanket won't.”
“I never said get up, just scoot over.”
Chase blinked, hesitating. Then he moved a little bit.
Chase felt the couch dip, then warm arms encircling his shoulders, pulling him towards the dip.
“Seriously?” he asked.
“Just don't want to cause injury to any innocent cabbies.”
Chase laughed, and allowed himself to be pulled on top of the warm, lanky form.
Maybe an hour later, Chase groaned, opening his eyes.
He was still on the couch. On House. The phone was ringing. House wasn't answering it. House was still holding him around the shoulders. He could hear House snoring.
A smile formed on Chase's lips.
He shifted himself into a more comfortable position, and closed his eyes.
At that point in time, he didn't know that the two body heats under the quilt would soon raise his body temperature above 106. at that point, he didn't know he would soon be dragged into House's tub, submerged in freezing cold water, and be restrained to prevent his injuring himself in his delirium. He didn't know that he would soon be rushed to the hospital wrapped in cooling blankets, which would be changed to heating blankets as his hypothalamus stopped not working, and started overdoing it. He didn't know he would soon be lying on a hospital bed, with everyone staring at his unconscious form, not because of everything wrong with his body, but because of the completely and totally shocking actions of the person gently putting the thermometer probe under his tongue for the fifth time in ten minutes, from their positing of sitting behind him on the bed, his head resting back on their shoulder. He knew none of that. Right then, at that moment, everything was as good as it had ever been. And he was happy.
Ten minutes later, all hell broke loose inside his body.
Chase groaned, opening his eyes. Someone behind him, gently worming something under his tongue.
“Mmm... 'm not cold anymore.”
A pause in the wiggling of the object. Then it moved again, and Chase sighed.
“I'm fine, ok? I can tell when I'm cold, and I can tell when I'm warm. I'm fine now.”
No answer, though the probe stopped moving.
“House?”
“Yeah. Right, fine.”
Chase sighed, rolling his eyes, and stood up off the edge of the couch. Except it wasn't the couch. It was two feet higher than the couch, and it was only House's hands under his armpits that kept him from falling.
A long pause.
“What happened?”
“You over-heated. Then you got hypothermic again. Then hyperthermic. Then you had a seizure. Then hypothermic. Then hyperthermic. Then hypothermic. Then your heart stopped. Then hyperthermic. Then your heart stopped again. Then hypothermic. Then stable. Then... I don't know, the next then hasn't happened yet.”
“Uh... oh.”
Silence.
“House?”
“What?”
“Why are you still holding me up?”
“Because.... forget it.”
“House, you're *touching* me. What is it?”
“Shut up.”
Chase sighed.
Then he blinked.
“It scared you,” he said after a while.
No denial came.
A few days later, Chase opened the door after hearing a knock—House was in the bathroom.
“Hello?” he asked, raising his eyebrows.
He heard a truck pull away, and sighed, bending down to feel for the package.
It was small, which irritated him slightly because it made it hard to find, and light.
He walked back inside, knocking on the door to the bathroom.
“House? Package came.”
“Open it,” came back through the door.
“What is it? Can of worms?”
A flushing sound, the sound of water running, and the door opened.
“No. Gimme.”
Chase held out the package, following House to the couch.
“What is it, already?”
“Technically it's a talking biofeedback temperature sensor, but I was figuring it would be more useful in making sure you don't boil to death.”
Chase blinked, as House told him to take off his shirt.
“Why?”
“Because the probe has to go somewhere and I'm guessing you'd rather it not be visible.”
Chase took off his shirt, House clipped the base unit to his belt next to his pager, and Chase stuck the probe onto his side with the medical tape House handed him.
House put his fingers on the buttons, told him what they were labeled and what the instructions said they did, then got up and limped into his bedroom, having hit his limit for humanity that day.
Chase smiled as he heard the door close.
House really did give a damn, he was just terrified of showing it. Though, that wasn't the surprising thing. The surprising thing was that House had let Chase find out
Chase leaned over, quietly asking House what kind of chips he was holding, as they stood in the cafeteria line.
House didn't answer.
“House?”
“Hang on. I'll be right back.”
Limping footsteps going away.
Chase grabbed the edge of the counter.
Dammit, of course House wouldn't think... it had never happened in the cafeteria because House was always with him there, but... it was just as noisy and confusing as the emergency room....
“Chase? Are you ok? You look pale.” Cameron's voice.
He could barely stand up, the noise was all around him, he couldn't orient himself...
“Chase.”
Hand around his, rough, callused.
“It's ok. Calm down.”
“What's wrong?” Cameron again.
“Nothing. Go away.” House.
Offended footsteps.
Still too much noise, still--
Arm around his back, leading him out, unsteady lurches...
Quiet.
He sat down, holding his head.
House didn't say anything, just limped off, presumably to get his cane.
By the time he came back, Chase had regained his composure.
“You know... I'm not actually that hungry.”
Chase nodded, climbing to his feet.
Then he stopped.
“Why are you doing all this?”
He heard House turn.
“Because it's interesting. You're interesting. Why the hell else would I be doing it?”
House sounded completely surprised by the question.
Chase sighed, relieved.
“What?” asked House, confused by Chase's relief.
“Everybody treats me differently than they used to. It's just nice that some things haven't changed.”
A paused, then a snort.
“I never change.”
Chase smiled, walking next to House as they headed towards the elevators.
“Hey.”
House looked up from his computer screen at his friend.
“Yeah?”
“You're completely fascinated by this, aren't you?”
“By you coming into my office and talking to me? Uh, that'd be a no.”
“By Chase.”
“Oh. Maybe. It's interesting, anyway.”
“I think it's a little more than just interesting to you. Cameron said you helped him out of a panic attack. By touching him.”
House shrugged.
“Well, since waving my hands and making weird faces wouldn't have done much, I was forced to do something that might have had a little more effect.”
Wilson laughed.
then he left, firm in the belief that something other than just friendship was going on in house's heart. House never touched anyone.
“It’s gotta be Wagner’s,” said Chase, thinking.
“No way. There was no evidence of that on the scans,” objected Foreman.
“He doesn’t know that.” said Cameron.
Chase and foreman both blinked.
“Uh, yeah, I do, 'cause foreman already said it. My idea was wrong, I forgot about the scan,” said Chase, frowning.
“Sorry.”
Foreman went to exchange a meaningful look with Chase, but stifled the urge.
“What about neurofibromitosis?” asked Chase, still frowning.
House looked up from playing with his gameboy to watch—not that Chase noticed.
“No skin symptoms, and they would have presented by now, if it was causing these symptoms. Jeeze Chase, just 'cause you can’t see the patient doesn’t mean you can’t listen.”
Chase rolled his eyes in Foreman’s direction.
“Foreman, that’s not–” started Cameron.
“What about scarlet fever? Could lead to valve stenosis we saw. Cameron could have missed the immune reaction.”
Foreman looked over his shoulder at House, who had switched off his gameboy, watching, eyes narrowed. Chase heard the beeping from the device stop, and smiled a little to himself.
“I didn't miss anything! There was a arrhythmia, but we didn't see any valve stenosis on the echo! If you're so sure it's my mistake, you can do the test again yourself!”
Cameron was standing now, glaring at Chase.
Chase was smiling, broadly.
Cameron covered her mouth.
“Chase... I'm sorry. Sorry. I'm—”
“Finally standing up to me,” interrupted Chase.
House snickered.
“I've been trying to get you to do that for the last ten minutes. Foreman's right, I do have ears. I know there's no rash, no stenosis, no mistake on the ANA. The problem was, you knew that too, but you kept defending me. Stop. The optic nerve chasm and the optic tracts have nothing to do with how sensitive my feelings are. So stop defending me, ok?”
Cameron stared at him for a long time.
Then she ran out of the room.
Chase sighed.
“It wasn't just there. I'm guessing your hypothalamus, given the massive amounts of ice you consumed when the air conditioner conked out.”
Chase turned towards House.
“Uh, yeah. You're right. But that's scarier, less obvious, and telling her that was involved would have made her even less likely to stop pitying me.”
“I don't think that's pity,” said House, thoughtfully, “I think that's being extremely uncomfortable about a memory and it's reoccurrence. That is—someone she cares about getting brain cancer.”
“Wait...” said Foreman, frowning and completely unsurprised by the diagnosis, “You're living together?”
“Only in the sense of living in the same place by necessity because my apartment blew up.”
“Half the hospital offered to have you stay with them.”
“I didn't know any of them very well, and I've never been to any of their homes. I would have had to learn the layout from scratch and I'm not very good at that.”
“So you decided living with House would be easier. And he went along with it,” Foreman looked at House, “Why?”
House shrugged, “'cause he showed up at the bus stop but didn't get on the bus.”
Foreman frowned, narrowing his eyes.
“You don't mind.” he said finally, in an incredulous tone, “You seriously don't mind.”
House smirked, and turned on his gameboy.
Foreman turned back to look at Chase, who blinked for a moment, then smiled a little, shaking his head.
After that, House and Chase stopped coming in different entrances, which they had only been doing so no one would start some sort of weird rumor.
Cuddy asked Wilson what was going on, and if House had actually made a second friend.
Wilson had told her that nothing in particular was 'going on', and that, though he had a tentative hope that at least the second might eventually become the case, so far it was just mutual lack of discomfort, and possibly a little well-hidden concern on House's part.
Chase sighed, curling up on the sofa and grabbing the pillow from underneath it, as House turned the TV off and limped towards the bedroom.
Then he blinked, as the sounds stopped short of the door.
He heard a puff sound, of the air being forced out of a cushion.
Chase sat up, frowning.
Then blinked, smiling, as the first few notes reached his ears.
The notes petered out after a while, and he frowned. He liked it when house played.
There was a long silence, until he heard House sigh.
“Chase.”
“Yeah?”
“Come here.”
House blinked, as he entered the living room to find Chase still curled up on the couch, blanket pulled tight around him.
“Uh... we need to leave in negative three minutes. Patient emergency.”
“Go ahead. I can't go anywhere right now. I'll call a cab later.”
House put his hand on Chase's forehead, briefly.
“How cold are you?”
“I don't know, your thermometer doesn't talk.”
“Lemme see.”
Chase handed him the thermometer.
“95.4.”
“Shit!”
Chase pulled the blanket even tighter around himself.
House limped into the bedroom, and came back carrying a quilt and a heating pad. He dumped the quilt on Chase, then went to plug in the pad.
Ten minutes later, the thermometer read 95.7 and Chase was still blue tinged.
House sighed, and poked Chase in the shoulder.
“Move.”
“House, I really need to just stay--”
“You need to warm up. Moving will facilitate that.”
“Getting out from under the blanket won't.”
“I never said get up, just scoot over.”
Chase blinked, hesitating. Then he moved a little bit.
Chase felt the couch dip, then warm arms encircling his shoulders, pulling him towards the dip.
“Seriously?” he asked.
“Just don't want to cause injury to any innocent cabbies.”
Chase laughed, and allowed himself to be pulled on top of the warm, lanky form.
Maybe an hour later, Chase groaned, opening his eyes.
He was still on the couch. On House. The phone was ringing. House wasn't answering it. House was still holding him around the shoulders. He could hear House snoring.
A smile formed on Chase's lips.
He shifted himself into a more comfortable position, and closed his eyes.
At that point in time, he didn't know that the two body heats under the quilt would soon raise his body temperature above 106. at that point, he didn't know he would soon be dragged into House's tub, submerged in freezing cold water, and be restrained to prevent his injuring himself in his delirium. He didn't know that he would soon be rushed to the hospital wrapped in cooling blankets, which would be changed to heating blankets as his hypothalamus stopped not working, and started overdoing it. He didn't know he would soon be lying on a hospital bed, with everyone staring at his unconscious form, not because of everything wrong with his body, but because of the completely and totally shocking actions of the person gently putting the thermometer probe under his tongue for the fifth time in ten minutes, from their positing of sitting behind him on the bed, his head resting back on their shoulder. He knew none of that. Right then, at that moment, everything was as good as it had ever been. And he was happy.
Ten minutes later, all hell broke loose inside his body.
Chase groaned, opening his eyes. Someone behind him, gently worming something under his tongue.
“Mmm... 'm not cold anymore.”
A pause in the wiggling of the object. Then it moved again, and Chase sighed.
“I'm fine, ok? I can tell when I'm cold, and I can tell when I'm warm. I'm fine now.”
No answer, though the probe stopped moving.
“House?”
“Yeah. Right, fine.”
Chase sighed, rolling his eyes, and stood up off the edge of the couch. Except it wasn't the couch. It was two feet higher than the couch, and it was only House's hands under his armpits that kept him from falling.
A long pause.
“What happened?”
“You over-heated. Then you got hypothermic again. Then hyperthermic. Then you had a seizure. Then hypothermic. Then hyperthermic. Then hypothermic. Then your heart stopped. Then hyperthermic. Then your heart stopped again. Then hypothermic. Then stable. Then... I don't know, the next then hasn't happened yet.”
“Uh... oh.”
Silence.
“House?”
“What?”
“Why are you still holding me up?”
“Because.... forget it.”
“House, you're *touching* me. What is it?”
“Shut up.”
Chase sighed.
Then he blinked.
“It scared you,” he said after a while.
No denial came.
A few days later, Chase opened the door after hearing a knock—House was in the bathroom.
“Hello?” he asked, raising his eyebrows.
He heard a truck pull away, and sighed, bending down to feel for the package.
It was small, which irritated him slightly because it made it hard to find, and light.
He walked back inside, knocking on the door to the bathroom.
“House? Package came.”
“Open it,” came back through the door.
“What is it? Can of worms?”
A flushing sound, the sound of water running, and the door opened.
“No. Gimme.”
Chase held out the package, following House to the couch.
“What is it, already?”
“Technically it's a talking biofeedback temperature sensor, but I was figuring it would be more useful in making sure you don't boil to death.”
Chase blinked, as House told him to take off his shirt.
“Why?”
“Because the probe has to go somewhere and I'm guessing you'd rather it not be visible.”
Chase took off his shirt, House clipped the base unit to his belt next to his pager, and Chase stuck the probe onto his side with the medical tape House handed him.
House put his fingers on the buttons, told him what they were labeled and what the instructions said they did, then got up and limped into his bedroom, having hit his limit for humanity that day.
Chase smiled as he heard the door close.
House really did give a damn, he was just terrified of showing it. Though, that wasn't the surprising thing. The surprising thing was that House had let Chase find out
Chase leaned over, quietly asking House what kind of chips he was holding, as they stood in the cafeteria line.
House didn't answer.
“House?”
“Hang on. I'll be right back.”
Limping footsteps going away.
Chase grabbed the edge of the counter.
Dammit, of course House wouldn't think... it had never happened in the cafeteria because House was always with him there, but... it was just as noisy and confusing as the emergency room....
“Chase? Are you ok? You look pale.” Cameron's voice.
He could barely stand up, the noise was all around him, he couldn't orient himself...
“Chase.”
Hand around his, rough, callused.
“It's ok. Calm down.”
“What's wrong?” Cameron again.
“Nothing. Go away.” House.
Offended footsteps.
Still too much noise, still--
Arm around his back, leading him out, unsteady lurches...
Quiet.
He sat down, holding his head.
House didn't say anything, just limped off, presumably to get his cane.
By the time he came back, Chase had regained his composure.
“You know... I'm not actually that hungry.”
Chase nodded, climbing to his feet.
Then he stopped.
“Why are you doing all this?”
He heard House turn.
“Because it's interesting. You're interesting. Why the hell else would I be doing it?”
House sounded completely surprised by the question.
Chase sighed, relieved.
“What?” asked House, confused by Chase's relief.
“Everybody treats me differently than they used to. It's just nice that some things haven't changed.”
A paused, then a snort.
“I never change.”
Chase smiled, walking next to House as they headed towards the elevators.
“Hey.”
House looked up from his computer screen at his friend.
“Yeah?”
“You're completely fascinated by this, aren't you?”
“By you coming into my office and talking to me? Uh, that'd be a no.”
“By Chase.”
“Oh. Maybe. It's interesting, anyway.”
“I think it's a little more than just interesting to you. Cameron said you helped him out of a panic attack. By touching him.”
House shrugged.
“Well, since waving my hands and making weird faces wouldn't have done much, I was forced to do something that might have had a little more effect.”
Wilson laughed.
then he left, firm in the belief that something other than just friendship was going on in house's heart. House never touched anyone.
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I'm not gonna be crying at the end of this am I?!?
Liked this chapter. Nice to 'see' all the touching, showing House cares.
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the only fics i write that make people cry are head&heart post-eps, though apparently those do a pretty good job of it....
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