Addiction: Chapter ten - recovering

It took him a few minutes to get from Cuddy’s house to his and Stacy had already fallen asleep by the time he stopped the car in front of his.

He walks around the car and opens the door slowly.
“Hey,” he says silent and touches her cheek. “You’ve to wake up.”

She opens her eyes and blinks several times before she faces him without a word. He helps her out of the car and lays his arm around her waist and leads her to his front door, which was quite difficult if you also have to walk with a cane.

Inside, he leads her straight to the bedroom and lays her down on the bed gently. Again, he thinks about bringing her to the hospital. He should’ve already done this, he thinks and sits down on the edge of the bed and watches her for a while.

“I’m sorry,” she whispers.

“What for?”

She lifts her shoulders and avoids his gaze. “It’s just… I don’t know…”

“It’s okay, I’ll be back,” he says and leaves the room to get her some ice for the swollen part of her face.

“Take this,” he says and lays the ice slowly on the hurt part and she shrugs for a second when the cold hits her face.

“What do you thought about going alone there?” he wants to know. “I should kill him!”

“Greg, please…” she says.

“I swear I mean it.”
“And I beg you not to do,” she whispers. “I know you’re furious just like I am, but please don’t do anything.”

“He deserves it.”

“I’m the lawyer and I tell you not to do anything, you understand me? Don’t do anything stupid,” she says and for a moment he thinks to see tears dwell up in her eyes. “I need you here with me. I need you, do you understand that?”

“Yes,” he says and sits down beside her on the bed, with an arm around her. “But why didn’t you say anything?”
“I don’t know, I didn’t expect this to happen!”

“What exactly happened?” he asks her and waits for her answer.

“I just wanted to get my things,” she starts. “I didn’t expect him to be at home to be honest. I went in and than we started to fight,” she explains and pauses for a second to take a deep breath and he knows that she wanted to cry, but she tries hard to stay strong. “I was so furious and it all went out of control and then… he…” she says and stops.

He holds her tighter and asks: ”Are you okay? Although he knows that she isn’t.

“Yes,” she answers. I’m fine.”

He stays silent and than he realizes that she started to shiver and with a closer look, he sees that she’s crying.

“Everything’s fine, right?” he says and she lays her head on his chest.

“It was so awful, “ she whispers tearful. “It was just awful.”

“You don’t have to go back,” he says. “You stay here.”

She closes her eyes and tries to relax a little bit. The point that she will stay with him makes it a little bit better and she manages not to think about the possible consequences that might cause it and than she thinks about the things that she still hides in the house and the thought that he might find it causes pain inside her chest.

“I have to go back,” she says into the silence.

“Why?”

For a moment she thinks about telling him the truth and she decides to tell him a little bit but not the whole thing. It’s not the right time, to reveal everything.

“I still have something there,” she says. “I need these things.”

“Will you tell me what things you mean?” he asks and watches her from the side.

“Mhm, I will, but not tonight,” she answers.

“I’ll have to call Lisa,” he says and she can’t avoid a weak grin.
“What?”

“Nothing. It’s just so nice to hear you calling her “Lisa”, because you hardly ever do so.”
He avoids answering this, because he doesn’t know what he should say.

“I promised to call her once I brought you here to tell her what’s going on.”

“That’s nice, thank you,” she says and he leaves the room.

He sits down on the sofa, because his thigh hurt and he waits for Lisa to pick up the phone.

“Cuddy?” she says when she picks up the phone.

“Hey, it’s Greg,” he answers and asks himself if he should’ve called himself “House”.

“Oh, Hi. How is she?” and by the tone of her voice, he could say that she was probably worrying all the time, but he didn’t even think about making fun of that right now.

“She’s okay I think. Physically,” he starts to explain.

“That’s good to hear,” she says. “Under these circumstances she adds.”

“Yes.”

“What now?” she wants to know.

“Hell, I wish I’d know,” he says. He can’t remember a time when he talked to her like this. Without being mad or fighting. “I offered her to stay at my house,” he says. “Is that okay with you?” somehow he feels the need to add this.

“Of course, why not,” she answers and tries to sound like that.

“It’s just… she stayed with you all the time,” he tries to explain.

“It’s okay Greg,” she answers. “I know she will be safe than.”

“Thank you,” he answers and than, there’s a moment of silence and he can hear her slow breath.

“Liz?” he asks without thinking about it.

Actually she wanted to say something, but the fact that he called her “Liz” made it impossible to speak, because she thought her heart stopped beating for a second and it brought tears to her eyes. The last time he called her “Liz” is ages ago when they were in college, when they’ve been friends.

“Yes?”

“Are you okay?”

“Yes, I already said it,” she starts, but he interrupts her.

“I’m not talking about Stacy, I’m asking you.”

“Oh,” she whispers. “I think I’m okay.”

“You think or you know it?” he asks and he doesn’t see Stacy standing in the doorway who listened all the time.

Cuddy couldn’t help but laugh silently. She felt like being set back in her college time.

“I’m fine, thank you,” she says in a stronger voice.

“Okay.”

“Thanks for calling.”

“No problem, see ya,” he answers drops the connection and suddenly he feels to arms that lay around him.

“Hey,” he says even though he hasn’t seen her before.

“That was very nice,” she says calm.

“What?”

“They way you talked to her.”

“Well, I just told her that you’re fine.”

“But you never did it like this, you were nice and you can’t deny it.”

“You should sleep,” he says and faces her.

“Don’t change the topic.”

“I’m serious.”

She lets several seconds passing by before she answers: ”I know you are.”

He kisses her on the cheek and thinks about asking her what he wanted to ask all the time, but he wasn’t sure if this is the right time. But will it ever be the right time to ask without hurting her.

“What are you thinking about?” she asks and sits down beside him.

“Nothing.”

“Liar, I can see that you’re thinking about something.”

“It’s okay,” he answers.

“Please tell me what’s going on with you,” she says.

“Will you tell me what’s going on with you than?” he asks and she stands up.

“I’ll go to bed,” she says and he watches her back and he could almost feel her disappointment.
“Think about Cuddy,” is all he says and she waits a second before she walks into the bedroom.

He know he hit the right point and he doesn’t meant to hurt her, although no one would expect this, he just wants to help her and even though no one would understand that he does understand it somehow, but he doesn’t care.

He takes his time in the bathroom to give her enough time to think about it.

She walks back into the bedroom and sits down on the side of the bed. This time, she chose the other one. The side that once belonged to her.

“Think about Cuddy” were his words and she looks down on her knees, her hands on each side of her body.

“What about Cuddy?” she asks herself again and again. She doesn’t know an answer, she doesn’t know what to do, all she wants is that it won’t end up in a disaster this time; she doesn’t want this to end up like it did the last time. She feels things that she shouldn’t feel, because Lisa is her best friend and Greg knows it.

How could she think he wouldn’t? He always knew it, he always realized those little things. She doesn’t turn around when she hears his slow steps and the sound of his cane when he enters the bedroom and she turns her head away when she realizes that he’s about to sit down beside her.

Again, she watches her knees and she bits her lips before tears come to her eyes.

“I didn’t want this to happen,” she whispers. “I couldn’t change it.”

He isn’t sure if she’s talking about that one time in college or what’s going on right now, but he tries to be careful what to ask right now.

“Things happen,” he says. “You know that things happen sometimes.”

“You hate me now?” she asks and he wasn’t sure if she really meant it.

“No,” he says and stares into the darkness of the room. “I think I already hated your enough.”

“Things happen, right?” she says and turns her head to look at him.

“Yes.”

There’s silence and she thinks about something to say, but he starts to speak before she could think of something useful.

“Are you okay with that?”

“Hell, what do I know,” she says and laughs bitterly. “I really wish I’d know, I don’t know what to do. What about you? Are you okay with it?”

“We’re talking about you, not about me.”

“But I need to know it.”

“I don’t know, I think so.”

“Seriously?”

“I always knew there was something… something else between you and Cuddy,” he starts. “I always knew there was something more.”

She didn’t expect this, she never thought he noticed it like that and suddenly she feels ashamed and turns her head away.

He touches her chin with his left hand turns her head around slowly to look in here eyes.

“Do we really have to talk about that now?” she asks.

“Yes, I think you have to.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I love you and nothing is going to change that.”

“What made you change your mind?” she wants to know. “I mean, I already know you for such a long time and you’ve been a real jerk the past years and now you’re sitting here and you tell me that you think it’s okay that I have feelings for Cuddy without making fun of me?” she asks a little bit suspicious.

“Sounds like a miracle, doesn’t it?” he asks and he has to say that she’s right with her thoughts. It might sound suspicious, but he has reasons for that.

She wants to say something else, but he already chose the perfect words.

“Yes, it does.”

“I know.”

“So what made you change?”

“You did,” he said and leans forward to kiss her softly on her lips. “And the past years did it. I once made a big mistake and I don’t want to loose you again, do you understand that? I don’t know if I can hold you the next time,” he says and she feels very touched. To hear those words out of his mouths is more than surprising and she waited for such a long time to hear them.

“Why now?” she asks and watches him.

“I’m afraid that I will loose you again, that’s all and I’m tired of fighting.”

“Wow…” she says silent.

“And Cuddy is a part of your life, so she’s a part of mine too,” he answers. “She has too,” he adds.

“Don’t act like you don’t like her,” Stacy says. “First thing is that she’s your boss and she’s always been a part of your life and the second thing is that you called her “Liz” on the phone, I heard it!”

He couldn’t help but laughed because of this and although this day was one of the worst ones in her life, she’s thankful to hear him laugh.

“Okay, okay,” he says and actually, he didn’t know why he did it. “Will you talk to her?”

“I’m afraid that I don’t know what to say.”

“Give it a little time,” he says and lays down beside her.

“I love you,” she says silent and lays on the side to kiss him once more.

“Does it still hurt?” he asks and points at her head.

“A bit,” she says and touches the still swollen part.

“Want some?” he asks and shows her his pills beside the bed.

“No thank you,” she says and smiles.

“Will you come in for a check tomorrow?”

“On Sunday?” she asks. “You never work on Sundays and I’m fine.”

“We’ll discuss that tomorrow.”

“Yeah,” she says and lays her head on his chest.

“Greg?”

“Mhm?”

“I have to get back once,” she says.

“You want to do it tomorrow?”

“He probably won’t be there than,” she says more to herself.

“I don’t care if he’s there,” he throws in and she rolls her eyes but smiles.

“Okay, so let’s do it tomorrow,” she says. “I’ll just get it and we’ll leave again.”

“Am I allowed to destroy something?”

“No,” she says and hits his arm. “At least not obviously.”

“Okay, we’ll see.”

The next morning he wakes up, because he hears noses in the kitchen that sounds like cups and whatever she does there.

With a look at his alarm clock he finds out that it’s 9am and to his mind, it’s way too early to stand up at a Sunday morning when you don’t have to work.

He tries to ignore her and after a while he thinks that she does that on purpose just to wake him up and so he gets out of the bed and walks on the cold floor with bare feet and finds her in the living room with a cup of coffee in her hand.

“How long are you already awake?” he asks when he walks by.

“I don’t know. Forgot to check what time it is, but it was still dark outside. Maybe 7am or 8am,” she says. “You want some coffee?”

“Yeah, I’ll get myself a cup,” he takes a cup out of the cupboard. “We don’t have to do that today,” he tells her. “We can do that whenever you want to.”

“No, I want to do it today. I want to get through it.”

“Okay,” he says and leaves the room to take a shower, not knowing how the day is going to end.

The only things she hears is the sound of the water from the bathroom and she sees the phone that he left on the coffee table yesterday evening and she thinks about calling Cuddy to tell her that she’ll go back again. Somehow, she feels like telling her this, but she changes her mind, because it’s probably too early to call her.

She feels nervous, but she wouldn’t tell him so. She really wants this to be over.

Almost two hours later, and she actually doesn’t know what took them such a long time to leave, she sits in his car with him and she tries to figure out what she will do if he’s there.

He watches her several times, he sees that from the corner of her eye, but she doesn’t turn her head around.

“He won’t be there,” he says into the silence.

“You say that so easily.”

“I’m with you.”

“If that was such a good idea?” she says without looking at him. Beside all the worries about what is going to happen, she worries about House and what he’s going to do, because she doesn’t want him to do something stupid.

“I’ll try to behave well,” he says and smiles.

“Thanks,” she answers dry.

“It’ll be alright, you hear me?” he says and tries to cheer her up a little and she takes a deep breath.

Around 12am, they reach the so well-known street and for a moment she sees herself, kneeling on the street with all her things spread on the way around her. Crying and hurt. She takes another deep breath and closes her eyes to push the pictures away.

They walk up the way to the house and he notices that she doesn’t feel good. She became silent the last minutes and they almost reached the door when she takes his hand.

“Do I have to break in?” he asks.

“No, I still have my keys.”

“Okay.”

She feels more than relieved when she notices that the front door is locked which means that he isn’t at home, because he’s probably never lock the door at daytime when he’s at home.

“Seems that he’s not there,” she says and closes the door behind house. “You wait here,” she orders him and walks to her ex-bedroom.

Of course he wouldn’t just stay at the same spot and wait until she’ll be back and so he starts to walk around, maybe he’ll find something interesting.

Although she isn’t alone, she feels uncomfortable and she tries to ban the voices out of her head that repeat their last fight, the one they had in here.

She goes down to her knees in front of the open wardrobe and frightens when she hears a loud noise from the living room.

“Hell, would you please be quiet,” she yells out of the room.

“Sorry,” says his silent voice and for a moment she asks himself what he does there, but if she thinks about this twice, she doesn’t want to know it.

Carefully, she lifts a piece of wood that lay on the ground of the wardrobe and tears come to her eyes when she sees the little box still there where she’d left it.

She lets her fingers wander on the smooth surface and a shiver runs through her body, because it’s dusty.

She thinks about opening it, but she thinks that it’s better to get out of here first. She puts the little box in her bag and fixes the piece of wood and goes back to the living room where she finds House standing by the window, obviously eating something.

“Want a cookie?” he asks and holds out the cake.

“No, thanks,” she says and rolls her eyes. “Let’s go,” she tells him and throws her key on the coffee table. She never needs to go back. Now she has everything that she needs.

She turns around and her heart stopped beating when she hears a soft “click” that came from the door. She looks over to House who almost stood beside her by that time and a second later, Marc enters the room with an unbelievable look on his face. Stacy couldn’t say if it was also a mixture of fear and shock.

“What-“ he wants to say in an angry voice, but House cuts him off by beating in his face and Stacy frightens by the ugly sound that it made, he nose would probably be broken.

“Sorry,” he says and tries to smile innocent when she faces him. “Let’s go,” he says and heads toward the door.

“Can we just leave him-“ she starts and looks down to Marc.

“Yes, come on, we’ll leave, “ House says again and she follows him out of the house without looking back.

A few minutes later when they sit in the car, she says: “You needed that for you ego, don’t you?”

“Yes,” he says with a grin and she shakes her head. She couldn’t even be mad with him anymore although she told him so many times before that he shouldn’t do it.

“Thank you,” she says. “For everything.”

This time, she felt better than she ever did before. She feels that she has everything she needs right now, everything she needs to start again. Maybe she needed this, this mess that her life had been the last weeks or better said the past weeks to start all over again. Maybe this is the right time to give it another try in her, sometimes not so bright, history with Gregory House. There are still a lot of unsaid things between her and Greg and also between her and Cuddy, but together they’ll get through this.

It’s time to start their new life and discover the secrets she now carries with her, hidden in the black bag that she keeps so close to her body and she fees so happy that she wants to cry and without carrying about it, she lets her tears flow.

Her addiction turned into something more comforting and maybe it won’t do her as much harm as it did before.

So my dear readers,

First of all, I’m sorry that it took me such a long time to post! I like to thank you all for keeping me writing and for all of your wonderful reviews. I feel a bit sad about telling you now that we reached the end of Addiction. I don’t want to exaggerate this too much so I thought it’d be better to finish it at this point before I’ll spoil it…

… but it would probably break my heart to stop at this point with continuing in some way!!

It’s not really over; it’s just that I finished the storyline of “Addiction”. There will be a sequel called “Little box of secrets” and it’ll continue where we left “Addiction”. It’ll be about the whole House/Cuddy/Stacy thing, but in another way!
Please be patient and nice with me! I hope I’ll “see” you again than!

Bye,

Marcia