| FIC: Percussion (Foreman/House, NC-17, 1/4) |
[Jul. 30th, 2007|08:21 pm] |
Title: Percussion, 1/4
Fandom: House, M.D.
Pairing/Rating: House/Foreman, NC-17.
Length: 24 168 words. Ye gods.
Spoilers: Some mythical time, vaguely season two: AU, no specific spoilers, but some meta-references and a side of Cameron/Chase.
Author's Notes: For the ![[info]](https://www.insanejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) foreman_fest, although it was one of my very own plotbunnies. Tonnes of help with this one, y'all. Part one is PG.
Part Two | Part Three | Part Four
Summary: Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much. -- Oscar Wilde
It's the third day of Foreman's fellowship, and his first day on the wards. He spent the first two days touring the hospital, updating his paperwork, and letting Dr. Lee, the head of the department, introduce him to a dozen other neurologists whom Foreman will call his friends while he competes with them for promotions and publication credits. He's found an apartment nearby, a one-bedroom that's far smaller than the place he lived with Marty in Los Angeles. He's called his dad to say he's in town, but he hasn't visited yet. So far, phone calls have been enough. Foreman's more than ready to get started working his way up the ladder at Princeton-Plainsboro, so he's actually eager when Dr. Singh finds him signing in at the nurses' station and hands him a chart.
Singh is a big, hearty guy who likes to clap his subordinates on the shoulder while he doubles their caseloads. He sat in on Foreman's interviews and asked trick questions with a smile on his face, and Foreman answered them correctly and then sat back while Dr. Lee raised his eyebrows, impressed. Singh wears good suits, but he always looks the slightest bit uncomfortable in them, like he's picked the right size off the rack but never had them fitted. He laughs loudly at Dr. Lee's bad jokes, and if half the gossip is true, he's on the tenure-track after just five years at Princeton-Plainsboro. Foreman's read some of his articles in Neurology. He spent most of the time scratching cramped little criticisms in the margins, until there's not much left of Singh's work but cross-outs and red ink.
Foreman plans to have Singh's job by this time next year.
He takes the chart and glances through it, enough to get the gist. "Possible URTI?" he asks, not bothering to hold back his disdain. The patient's been admitted, but it's not even a neurological issue.
"Gotta start somewhere, right, Eric?" Singh smiles like he knows Foreman's the competition.
"Right," Foreman says, and smiles back. His third day on the job, and already Singh knows well enough to be scared. When Foreman was deciding whether to move here or stay in California, he read up on the statistics: this hospital has the youngest Dean of Medicine, the youngest department heads, and some of the highest turnover for a teaching hospital of its size. The message is clear. Princeton-Plainsboro is the place to go to get singled out, to get noticed, to get ahead--and then to get gone.
Foreman definitely chose the right fellowship.
***
He finds the patient's room without much trouble, and he's reviewed the chart more thoroughly, enough to be interested by the apparent anomalies in the patient's presentation. Chris Parker came in to the free clinic downstairs and got kicked up to Neurology pretty quickly, so someone knew better than to tell him to eat a bowl of chicken soup and sleep until he felt better. Foreman has a feeling that Singh would've tossed off a scrip for amoxicillin and had done with it, but he'd rather get Foreman to do the grunt work as much as he can.
Foreman knocks briefly on the doorframe and walks into the room. Chris is sleeping restlessly in the bed, and there's an older man standing over him and holding his hand. "Hello," he says. "I'm Dr. Foreman. Are you Chris's father?"
"Nope. If your next guess was secret lover, then you're going to be disappointed again." The older man drops Chris's hand--actually, it looks more like he was holding Chris's wrist to find a pulse--and picks up a cane that was hooked on the bed's railing. He shifts his weight and grimaces, a pained look that's gone as fast as it appeared. "I bet you go around asking fat women if they're pregnant. Do you get much action that way, or just a lot of knocks to the head with brick-filled handbags?"
Foreman scowls. Where the hell did this guy come from? He's scruffy, dressed in jeans and a wrinkled button-down shirt under a blazer, and from the way he dropped Chris's arm like a bag of garbage, he's not a visitor. He's watching Foreman, now, as he takes a bottle out of his pocket, pops off the top, and rattles out a pill that he dry-swallows quickly. Foreman ditches his bedside-manner-for-parents attitude and says, "If you're not immediate family, I'm going to have to ask you to leave while I examine Mr. Parker."
"Just one more ignorant cog in this soulless machine that passes for a hospital, huh?" The guy brushes his finger next to Chris's eyelid, watching for the flutter that will indicate if he has a gag reflex.
Chris doesn't flinch or wake up. Foreman frowns and moves closer, on the other side of the bed. He's not asleep. He's unconscious. This is no cold. Foreman sets the chart down to examine him. The other guy snatches up the file and starts flipping through it.
"Hey!" Foreman wants to make a grab for it, but holds himself back. The guy is grinning and already waving the chart out of reach, like Foreman's a five-year-old whining for a toy, and he's tall enough to make Foreman look ridiculous if he tried. "That's confidential--"
"Sorry, white privilege trumps doctor's privilege." He takes a limping step back, out of reach, and waves the chart again.
Foreman balls his fists. He can't believe the guy was just such an asshole. Foreman wants to strangle him, but the way he's acting isn't like most of the racist jerks Foreman's encountered. It's completely over the top. The guy is laughing at him, waiting for him to take offense. Foreman grinds his teeth and doesn't say anything.
"Headache, trouble with balance, and double vision," the guy reads off the chart. "Think it's sphenoidal sinusitis?" He looks up then and studies Foreman for a moment, a steady, evaluating look.
"No," Foreman says shortly, "I don't. Now get the hell out of here so that I can examine my patient and decide what it is."
The guy pouts, like this time he's the five-year-old deprived of a toy, and tosses the chart back on the bed. "Fine," he says. "Let me know how the malpractice suit goes after you screw up. Oh, wait, don't--I hate listening to stories when I already know how they end." He smirks at Foreman again, leaning on his cane, and then limps out of the room, sliding the door shut with as much of a slam as he can manage.
"Jackass," Foreman mutters, dismissing him completely, and turns to examine his patient.
***
The next morning, Foreman has five more patients in addition to his mystery case, a raging headache, and an appointment with the Dean of Medicine. "Why does Dr. Cuddy want to see me?" he asks Nurse Previn, who handed him the message, but she just stares at him balefully and shakes her head as if he's already too hopeless to bother with.
Foreman sighs and heads downstairs. He met Dr. Cuddy during the interview process, and again when he was hired, and she strikes him as competent enough to be scary, like the best kind of elementary school principal. Still, she's the perfect professional when her assistant shows him in to her office, standing up and coming around her desk to shake his hand, then showing him to the couch in the corner. There are about three minutes of small talk--Foreman has a feeling that Dr. Cuddy has scheduled them in precisely--asking how he's getting along, is he finding everything okay, does he like the city; and then she says, "What can you tell me about your sinusitis patient?"
"That it's not sinusitis," Foreman answers, but he's already suspicious. He's one new fellow in an entire hospital, and no matter how obsessive the Dean is, she's not going to have hands-on knowledge of every single case.
"There were some abnormalities in the original work-up," Dr. Cuddy says. "How are you proceeding?"
"The physical exam showed altered consciousness and ataxia," Foreman says. "I've ordered bloodwork and an LP with count, culture and band studies."
Dr. Cuddy raises her eyebrows. "You think it might be MS? With this kind of onset?"
"We'll know when the tests come back," Foreman says, not willing to commit himself. He's new enough to the hospital that he doesn't want to overstep his bounds, and it looks like he already has. There's no question in his mind that the guy he interrupted in Chris Parker's room yesterday is responsible for this little chat with the Dean. He's certainly stepped on somebody's toes, and he hasn't even been working here long enough to know from doctor-lounge gossip just how bad his mistake was.
Dr. Cuddy nods sympathetically. "Perhaps you're aware that we have a very...unusual opportunity here at Princeton-Plainsboro when cases like this come in," she says.
"Cases like what?" Foreman asks, starting to frown.
"Cases with some odd symptoms," Dr. Cuddy says. "Diseases that aren't easily categorized."
Foreman gives his best you're-the-boss smile. "Listen," he says, "I'm aware you have a department of diagnostic medicine here, but my patient doesn't qualify. I haven't even had time to rule out some of the more everyday explanations. Maybe once I've had a chance--"
"Dr. House has expressed an interest in the case." Dr. Cuddy stares at him neutrally. Her eyes are very bright, and very hard.
Foreman bites back an impatient sigh. So that's who the guy was. He should've guessed. It's probably impossible for a doctor to move from Los Angeles to Princeton without hearing a dozen "friendly" professional warnings about Gregory House. Marty pointed out that a lot of it had to be jealousy, and laughed at the stories. Foreman wasn't so sure. Diagnostic medicine has put Princeton-Plainsboro on the map far more than their staff turnover rate, and Dr. House publishes erratically in the neurology journals as much as anywhere else. Foreman's restless red pen has always been still when he reads House's articles. They're more like the best sort of horror story than any kind of documented case history. He can't believe that any doctor gets away with the treatment plans that House writes about so dismissively, but here's Dr. Cuddy, the Dean of Medicine, telling him that what House wants, House gets. "This is my case," Foreman says, because he has to try. "If I take it to Diagnostics, will I still be the primary?"
"No," Dr. Cuddy says. "Dr. House will be the physician of record. You can present the case to his team, and provide whatever support they require. You can make yourself available for consult."
And there's the final offer. Foreman grits his teeth, feeling like someone's drilling burr holes in his skull. Three days in and he's already been swallowed by hospital politics. He used to have Marty to handle this sort of thing for him. Marty's the one with a talent for grinning and bearing it and then dropping the right word in the right ear to ensure that he gets what his program needs. Of course, part of the reason Foreman moved was to make his own contacts. He couldn't rely on Marty forever. And networking won't be easy if he's at odds with Dr. Cuddy. "Of course," he says.
"Fourth floor," Dr. Cuddy says, smiling like she knows exactly what he's thinking. "They're expecting you."
Meaning, of course, that there was never any choice at all. Foreman should be glad that she even offered him the courtesy of this meeting. He nods shortly and leaves, saving his scowl for when he's alone in the stairwell. This is just great--he gets to work with the hospital's resident racist jackass. Amazing. Foreman takes the stairs two at a time, and by the fourth floor, he's not one bit calmer, but he's winded enough that he has to stop and breathe at the top. He pauses at the door and closes his eyes. It's one case. He's got his own practice here. It's not forever.
And, Foreman has to admit, he's kind of curious exactly how House's methods work.
***
The diagnostics conference room is glass-walled, so Foreman gets a good look at House's staff before they know he's there. There's only two of them, a man and a woman, both of them looking like they've just stepped out of a magazine ad for the middle-class American dream. Coincidence, or just more evidence that House hires the kind of faces he likes? Foreman raises his eyebrow and taps the file against his thigh. There's no sign of House, and that is fine by him. He sighs and pulls open the door, stepping inside and waiting for them to look up.
The woman smiles at him first, and comes forward to greet him warmly. "I'm Allison Cameron," she says. "You must be Dr. Foreman."
He shakes her hand and doesn't ask her to call him Eric. He turns to the man, who offers him a smile and a pot of coffee. "Robert Chase," he says, his Australian accent rounding the words, making them richer. "Can I get you a cup?"
"Sure," Foreman says, still somewhat reserved, but trying to sound at least half-way friendly. These aren't the people he's pissed at, after all. He does kind of wonder how they can stand to work for House, though. "Thanks."
"I hear you've got a case for us," Chase says. "Some kid Cameron saw in the clinic yesterday?"
Foreman rounds on Cameron, who has the grace to look the slightest bit embarrassed. "You're the one who admitted Chris Parker?" Foreman asks. "For a sinus infection? If you thought this was a diagnostics case, why did you drag neurology into it?"
Chase takes a seat at the table and starts stirring in an ungodly amount of sugar into his coffee. "Told you you should've given it straight to House," he says.
"If I had, he never would have taken a second look," Cameron replies calmly. "Mentioning the ataxia to him was enough. This way he hunted it down himself, which means he's actually engaged."
"Plus he got to yell at you." Chase grins around his coffee stirrer. "You do like giving him what he wants."
Cameron shoots him a quelling glance. "As long as we're treating the patient."
"Oh, of course," Chase says, grinning at Foreman as if he's letting him in on a joke.
Foreman stares at Cameron, putting his mug down on the table. He's quickly revising his opinion that it's not their fault their boss is an asshole. "This was my case," he says, waving the folder. "It's a neurology issue."
"Still trying to kill the patient all by yourself?" a voice says behind him, and Foreman spins around to see House standing in the doorway. He's a sneaky bastard. "Don't you know it works better if you've got backup to help you falsify the medical records--or hide the body. Just FYI, Cuddy's office is so not the place to reenact Weekend At Bernie's."
Now that Foreman knows who House is, he takes a longer moment to study him. House still looks like a guy that walked in off the street and decided to play at being a doctor. He looks like he hasn't shaved since yesterday--or since last week. He's standing with most of his weight on his left side, his shoulders set unevenly because of the cane. Foreman glances at his right leg, wondering just for a second what the story is there, and then deciding very firmly that he doesn't care. House watches Foreman with an amused glint in his eyes. He didn't miss the evaluation of his leg and his cane, but he's still looking very satisfied with himself for getting away with stealing the case.
"Time to share with the rest of the class, Eric," he says, and Foreman wonders when the hell House learned his first name, and what else, exactly, he's found out since Foreman saw him last. House stalks across the room, and despite whatever injury he's suffered, he moves with something like agility. He picks up a marker from the tray under the whiteboard and starts writing up symptoms. "Headache, ataxia, double vision, vomiting--"
Foreman frowns. "He wasn't vomiting when I examined him."
"Lucky you," House says. "Since then, the patient's condition has changed. You can save your shock for another time." He finishes scrawling up the symptoms, under the heading "The NEW GUY in the NEUROLOGY DEPARTMENT with INCOMPETENCE".
"Sounds like hydrocephalus," Chase says.
"Or a dozen other causes of raised intracranial pressure," Cameron says. "Maybe it's vascular."
Chase scoffs. "What's the history? It might just be a subarachnoid hemorrhage."
"He didn't report any head trauma," Cameron says.
"Sure, didn't report any," Chase returns quickly. "We can't be sure without a head CT."
That seems about to set the two of them off on some old debate that already has their positions well mapped out. House is watching them thoughtfully, spinning the whiteboard marker between his fingers like a magician's coin. He glances up at Foreman, over their heads, something almost like a smile on his face, as if he's a parent boasting about his precocious children. Foreman stares back flatly. All of this speculation is pointless until his own tests come back. Of course it's not a sinus infection, but he could very well be right about the MS, despite the onset period.
House tosses the whiteboard marker back in the tray and takes out his pills, shaking them in the bottle once or twice before taking one. Cameron and Chase barely react. Foreman wonders what he's on. From the way he handles the pill bottle, it's chronic, and that suggests it's to do with his leg. Hydrocodone, maybe, but the pain has got to be incredible if it is. House doesn't seem to be following any kind of dosage regimen, from the casual way he swallows the pill without even glancing at his watch. "So what's your theory?"
Foreman realizes the question's directed at him. He raises his eyebrows, surprised to be included. It looked like House's team were going to go through an entire medical textbook's worth of possibilities before arriving right back where they started, needing more information. "Multiple sclerosis," he says. "The double vision, the lack of balance, the muscular weakness--"
"He only came in yesterday," Cameron says.
Foreman catches Chase's eye, and he thinks he understands the message there. Cameron's too eager to believe the patient. People are usually idiots. They'll ignore intermittent symptoms, thinking that they're cured when they disappear, confident that their relapses won't last. "Maybe he wouldn't tell a pretty doctor that he's been getting weaker for months," Foreman says. "Maybe he didn't notice at first. Or maybe the symptoms finally got bad enough that he decided to do something about them."
"It still doesn't fit," Cameron argues. "If he's been getting progressively worse over a short period of time--"
House is grinning, now, but he's looking down, too, as if he gets a joke that none of the rest of them have clued in to yet.
Foreman wonders what the hell he's thinking, but he's caught up defending his idea. "Not if it's--"
"Balo concentric sclerosis," House interrupts.
Foreman stops short. "Yeah," he says, deflated. It's one of the rarest forms of MS, not one most doctors would think of off the top of their heads. Of course, the whole point of House's department is that he isn't most doctors.
"Would explain the rapid progression and no previous attacks," House says. "Interesting. Okay, Chase, get the bloodwork, spinal tap, run the CSF for the markers, get an MRI of his spine. Cameron, redo the neuro exam and take a better history, then get a culture to rule out sinusitis."
"Hey!" Foreman wants to stop them, but Cameron and Chase are already standing up and gathering their things. "I did order those tests. I'll be getting the results back today-- And it's not sinusitis."
House ignores him completely and leaves the conference room through the connecting door to what Foreman assumes is his office. Cameron smiles at him placatingly. "Tests lie," she says, as if that's an explanation.
"The lab isn't going to screw up a simple gamma globulin level--"
Chase shrugs and sort of half rolls his eyes, as if to say he's sorry, but he leaves with Cameron without a word.
Foreman's left with no one to glare at. House has retreated to his office, where he lifts his legs up to the desk and pulls out a pair of headphones. Foreman sets his jaw and pushes through the door, marches right up to House, and turns off the iPod docking station on the desk.
House looks up at him mildly. It feels like there's a lot more going on behind those blue eyes than he wants Foreman to see. "Are you still here? Aren't you people supposed to be able to blend into the background while you're working for me?"
Foreman is definitely going to strangle him at some point. He doesn't care about hiding the body. He's pretty sure most of the hospital would cheer. "This is my case!"
"Not anymore," House says, putting his headphones on. "Bye!"
Foreman yanks them off his head.
This time, House glares. "Sure, assault the cripple," he says. "That'll go over well during your fellowship evaluation."
Foreman looks at House incredulously. "You've been making racist comments the entire time I was here," he says. "I could take this up with Dr. Cuddy."
"Cuddy won't fire me," House says. "Neurologists, though, are a dime a dozen." He leans back in his desk chair, looking like he's enjoying this entirely too much.
"Look," Foreman says, "I know we have to work together, but we might as well make it as painless as possible."
"Not possible," House says sharply, and Foreman remembers the pills. Through the glass surface of the desk, he can see House's hand gripping his thigh like he's warding off a cramp.
He might be suffering, but that doesn't excuse anything he's has said. Foreman says, "As pleasant as possible, then."
"Try that line on Chris Parker," House says, with a bitter chuckle. "Two LPs in two days, the kid's not going to be very happy."
"I am not going to just go away," Foreman says, keeping to the point. Dr. Cuddy may have wanted him to dump this case on House and get back to Neurology, but fewer than one in two thousand people develop this variant of MS. Foreman is not going to let Cameron and Chase do the write-up while he goes obediently trotting back to do Singh's paperwork. He holds up House's headphones, out of reach, just like House did to him earlier with Chris's chart. "You're going to have to put up with me."
"Fine," House says, eying the headphones. "If you're going to hang around, you might as well make yourself useful. Go start him on a round of prednisone, thirty milligrams over eight hours."
Foreman rolls his eyes. "We don't even know if it's MS yet."
House tilts his head, that almost-grin on his face again. "No confidence in your diagnosis?"
"It's not that--"
"Great," House says. "High-dose IV prednisone. Bye." With that, he snatches the headphones back and turns on his iPod, then starts tapping out a drumbeat on his desk.
Foreman watches him for a moment, but House closes his eyes. He's still frowning ferociously and hunched a bit, as if he can't fight off the discomfort, but he's lost in the music, looking almost...peaceful. Even after knowing him for only a day, it's kind of weird to see. Foreman shakes his head, sighs, and leaves to start Chris Parker on a round of prednisone. Maybe this is how the horror stories start.
***
Foreman's hanging the prednisone from Chris's IV stand, next to the saline drip for his dehydration, when he realizes he's thinking about Marty, about home. A month ago it was easy to tell Marty he was leaving because of his mother's condition, even though they both knew that wasn't even close to the whole truth. Los Angeles just didn't offer Foreman the kind of opportunities he wanted, and Marty's program didn't have anything left to teach him. Maybe he should have been happy with what he had. Instead he had to go haring across the country, and look where he ended up--no friends left who care that he's come back, his family a mess, and Marty, back in California, who's not likely ever to forgive him for leaving. Foreman finishes his check of the IV line and sighs. He watches Chase draw a final vial of blood, then press a cotton ball to Chris's inner arm.
"I'm sorry about all the needles," Cameron says, smiling at Chris sympathetically. Foreman snorts. She's leaning forward just enough that Chris must have a great view down her shirt. Chase is just as interested, trying to crane his neck so that he looks like he's labeling blood samples while taking a peek. Cameron looks smug enough that Foreman doesn't think she minds. Foreman wonders if there's some variant of Stockholm syndrome that makes the prisoners fall in love with each other. Fortunately, she's getting close to the end of her questions. "I need you to concentrate, Chris. Any family members with a history of diabetes?"
"No," Chris murmurs, blinking. They've got him on an analgesic for the headache, but it's making him groggy, and he hasn't been fully oriented since Foreman examined him. This history isn't going to tell them much more than they knew before.
"Any cancer?"
"My mom. Breast cancer. Treated it."
Cameron makes a note on the chart and nods. "Is there anyone we can call for you? Any family nearby?"
"No," Chris says. "They're all in Michigan. Can't get here."
Cameron smiles again, and pats his hand. "Okay. That's all for now."
"Do you know what I've got?"
"We're working on it," Cameron says, with such false cheer that Foreman wonders how she manages to fool any patient who's halfway awake. "You just need to rest."
"'Kay," Chris mumbles, and he's asleep almost before they leave the room.
Foreman follows Cameron and Chase into the hall. He should be treating his other patients, or at least checking on them, but he wants to get the results from Chris's tests back first. Chase and Cameron are heading for the labs, and Cameron glances over her shoulder, inviting him to join them with a smile. Foreman falls into step with them. "Is your department always like this?" he asks.
Chase laughs. "You mean, is House always like this."
Cameron mutters, "Mostly he's worse," under her breath, like it's some kind of blasphemy to admit it.
"Yeah," Foreman says. He can't help comparing House to Marty, but maybe that's not fair--he knew a lot more about Marty's good side than most of the doctors who worked for him. There were plenty of people who thought Marty was a snob, arrogant and condescending. So did Foreman, at first. But House is in another league altogether. "How do you stand him?"
Chase shrugs. "Ignore him, mainly."
"Learn how to shut him up," Cameron says.
Chase's eyes are bright with laughter. "And how's that plan going?"
Cameron is at least willing to smile at herself. "I'll let you know. Shouldn't you be off to charm Rhonda?"
Chase raises his eyebrows. "You think I'm charming?"
"I think Rhonda thinks so, and we need to get that spine MRI today."
"All right, all right." Chase hands her the blood samples. "Foreman, are you going to be joining us for a beautiful afternoon spent doing blood tests?"
Foreman stares at him. "You do your own tests? What about the lab techs?"
"They hate Diagnostics," Cameron says. "And House doesn't trust them."
"Well, they did screw up that test for Erdheim-Chester's--" Chase starts.
Cameron shakes her head. "Twelve years ago. Whoever made that mistake probably doesn't even work here anymore."
"The patient died, Cameron."
"I know." Cameron sighs. "I do the lab work, don't I?"
Chase pats her awkwardly on the shoulder. "Yeah. Guess I'd better turn on the charm. Short notice. Maybe I'll grab Rhonda a latte."
"Good luck." Cameron smiles at him, then turns to Foreman. "Coming?"
"Maybe later," Foreman says. "I've got other patients."
Cameron looks surprised for a moment, then she nods. "I'll page you when we have some results."
"Thanks." Foreman watches her go down the hall, and heads back to Neurology. Maybe if he discharges a few patients he can get back on time to see the look on House's face when it turns out Foreman was right all along.
***
The spine MRI comes back negative for myelin lesions the next morning. The CSF doesn't show elevated gamma globulin. It's not MS.
"Paralyzed eyeballs" has been added to the list of symptoms on House's whiteboard.
"Chase, were you telling your shark-fisting story again?" House says, balancing the marker on his index finger. "When did you realize he wasn't fascinated, he just couldn't look away?"
Chase looks mildly offended, but he just says, "Shark punching. His blood pressure's up, too, 130 over 86."
"Ooh," House says, with a bright and eager leer at Chase, "was this the naked shark-fisting story?"
"I don't have a naked shark-fisting story."
House pouts. "Well, people might actually be legitimately fascinated if you did," he mutters. Then he drops the disappointed act and goes back to studying the whiteboard, tapping his cane against the floor. "So we can assume that it's not Chase naked that's making him hypertensive," he muses. "What else presents with raised BP and papilledema?"
"Graves disease," Cameron says.
"Kearns-Sayre syndrome," Chase offers.
"Yeah, and so does lead poisoning," Foreman says in disgust. "That would explain the vomiting, too. But there's no evidence at all that he's been exposed. Are we going to go on a wild goose chase for that on top of everything else?"
House grins evilly at that, like he's just played the world's best prank. Chase and Cameron exchange a long-suffering glance. Foreman rolls his eyes. He's stepped in it again, he can tell, although he wasn't even serious about suggesting lead poisoning. They might have warned him what not to say, at least.
"Could be environmental," Cameron admits at last, looking resigned. Chase, on the other hand, smiles as if he's won this round. They're both acting like admitting that an environmental cause is possible only rates just above being on-call for Christmas, Thanksgiving, and their birthdays combined.
"Okay," House says. "Chase, muscle biopsy. Cameron, TSH test."
This time, Chase and Cameron don't move right away. "What about the lead poisoning?" Cameron asks. "Who's going to check the home?"
House looks surprised. "This is Foreman's case," he says, like it's the most obvious thing in the world. "He won't mind a little B and E on the patient's behalf. He's even got the skills for it, right, Foreman?"
Foreman feels like he's been punched in the gut. "What?"
"Don't worry that it'll be like the Felkers'--this time you have a great doctory excuse." House makes a hearty go-to-it gesture with one fist. "Checking for lead contamination! Saving lives!"
"How the hell do you know--"
"Blabby gym teacher," House says. "Have fun. Be sure to use protection. Your dad doesn't need another invalid on his hands."
Foreman freezes. He feels sick, his muscles clenching as he fights not to smash a fist into House's jaw. House knows about his mother. He's using her to see just how far Foreman will let himself be pushed. Foreman tenses his shoulders, glaring murder at House, while Cameron and Chase watch, waiting for the explosion.
"Nosy postman," House says softly, watching Foreman with that testing, evaluating smirk on his face.
"Don't," Foreman says. The rest of the words seem stuck in his throat, Don't you ever talk about my mother, like a junior high kid's threat. He feels helpless, and he hates that.
House's eyes narrow. Foreman wonders what House sees on his face. Whatever it is, apparently it's enough to make him back off, although Foreman has a feeling that House isn't done picking at him over this. "Meet me in the parking lot in fifteen," House says. "I'm driving."
Foreman wants to yell that he's not going anywhere with House, but House is already limping back to his office, grabbing a backpack and stuffing things into it.
Chase grimaces. "Sorry about that," he says. He shuffles from foot to foot, as if he isn't really sure how much comfort he should try to offer. "That's House for you. Made my life a living hell when my dad dropped by."
"I'm just glad my family still lives three states away," Cameron says quietly. She's staring at Foreman like she might start crying on his behalf any second.
"A different continent, and it didn't help me," Chase mutters.
Foreman doesn't want their sympathy. He turns on his heel and leaves the diagnostics office.
***
Dr. Cuddy waves off her assistant when Foreman stomps into her office without an appointment. He has a feeling she's been expecting him. "Dr. Foreman," she says. "What can I do for you?"
"I want to file a complaint against Dr. House," Foreman says, keeping control of his voice even though he's still seething. It's the only way he can think to put it that doesn't involve saying that House was being mean to him. He feels enough like a child already, coming to Dr. Cuddy because he can't solve his own problems.
Dr. Cuddy purses her lips, studying him. "Sexual harassment?"
"What?" Foreman asks. "No!" He has no idea how she knows, even though he and Marty weren't exactly discreet, but California's on the other side of the continent and he's barely met Dr. Cuddy. A second later, Foreman gets it, and he blurts out, "House is gay?"
Dr. Cuddy drops her eyes to her desk and mutters something that Foreman incredulously makes out as, "More like omnivorous."
Without quite believing it, Foreman chuckles bitterly. "He's the most intolerant bastard I've met in the whole hospital."
"Surprisingly, he manages to combine intolerance with not giving a damn for what anybody thinks about him personally," Cuddy says. "He's not exactly waving a flag at a Pride parade, either." She pauses and sits down, waving him to the chair in front of her desk. "I shouldn't have said anything, but House and harassment lawsuits aren't exactly uncommon. What's the problem?"
Foreman settles into the chair across from her, most of his anger drained away with that burst of laughter. "How do you deal with him?" he asks. Just this morning, he wouldn't have dared to talk back to Cuddy, accepted her decisions without a second thought, but House is such an obvious sore spot with her that he's curious.
Cuddy gives him a sardonic stare. Foreman's suit might be bad publicity for the hospital, but House has weathered worse over the years. Foreman's not in any kind of position to be making demands. Still, Cuddy sighs and answers. "I give him enough rope to run with, then I haul him back when he goes too far."
"Why put up with him at all?" It's the same question he's been trying to frame for Cameron and Chase, but they both seem so resigned to their lot--even happy, when House gives them a pat on the head.
Cuddy spreads her hands on the surface of her desk. "He's an ass, but he's good," she says. "I think you know that by now. I told you to give him this case two days ago. Why are you still involved?"
Foreman sits back and considers. If Chris hasn't got Balo's, then it's something even rarer, and Foreman's not going to give up the chance to find out what. He's caught up in the puzzle. Even if House drags him along on his break-and-enter scheme. House is right, anyway, that at least they'll be able to tell the police they were there legitimately. "I want to know what's wrong with him," Foreman admits.
"Don't suggest it's the leg," Cuddy says tiredly. "He'll eat you alive."
"I meant the patient," Foreman says flatly, and he's gratified by Cuddy's startled look.
It quickly turns calculating. "If you're volunteering for some shifts in Diagnostics, knowing Dr. House's methods--"
"Then I don't have any room to complain," Foreman finishes for her.
"Exactly." Cuddy smiles, a little dangerously.
"Fine," Foreman says. "If I'm going to be working with Diagnostics, it might be best if someone let Dr. Lee know." As long as they're wrangling concessions, Foreman might as well get out of his neurology obligations for the next few days.
"Of course," Cuddy says, and stands to shake his hand. Foreman accepts, carefully, still a little afraid of her smile.
When he reaches the parking lot to see House pull up on an orange monstrosity and hold out a helmet to him, shouting, "Hop on!" over the clatter of the engine, Foreman rolls his eyes and realizes what Cuddy's smile meant.
She is the Dean. She will always win.
***
to be continued |
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