Title: Five times House made Cuddy Swear

Pairing: House/Cuddy

Rating: T

Disclaimer: House MD isn't mine.

Spoilers: Some from Season 2/3

Summary: One parter. Think the title basically sums up what it's about!

1.

House was bored.

He'd had nothing to do all morning, Cuddy having confiscated his TiVo, his Gameboy, and anything else that brought him joy. He had no patient to diagnose, was avoiding clinic duty, and he couldn't even surf for porn now that Cuddy had called in the computer geeks to block such sites from being accessed within the hospital. Therefore, there was only one thing left that he could do.

Cause trouble.

He'd started off fairly mildly, and childishly, by walking through random hospital corridors and shouting out an A to Z list of rude words as though he had Tourette's. However, by the time he had made it to 'N' for Nipple, Cuddy had been informed, and as she had appeared to berate him, he moved onto his next task.

This was marginally worse in the annoyance stakes, in that he pretended to do his clinic duty, but proceeded to refer each and every patient he saw for further tests. By the time an hour had passed, the various departments such as radiology and orthopaedics were overflowing with patients waiting to be seen. Nevertheless, damage limitation from Cuddy was quickly performed, the various patients who had been pawns in House's game sent back to the waiting room to be seen by a reliable doctor, and House was back to twiddling his thumbs.

He decided to up the stakes.

Standing on the balcony above the clinic, in his hand, he held a jug of water. He knew she'd punish him for this, but it would be worth it, just for the few minutes of entertainment she gave him. Grinning in anticipation, he waited until she appeared to sign some papers, and leaning over the balcony, he tipped it over her head.

She screamed.

Then screamed some more.

Finally she stopped, and as she looked up in his direction, she screeched in a high pitched voice, "House! I am going to fucking kill you!"

2.

Sneaking into Cuddy's house late at night with her spare key, whilst she was in the shower, was most definitely crossing the line. Still, when she'd announced that after years of abuse from him, whatever he did it no longer scared her, he'd taken it as a challenge, and decided to not only prove her wrong, but have some fun in the process.

Knowing that Cuddy being Cuddy she wouldn't lock the door as she was alone in her own home (or so she assumed) he quietly opened the bathroom door, smiling to himself as he saw the drawn shower curtain. Leaving his cane propped up against the door, he quietly made his way towards the bath, stopping when he was just a few inches away. Bracing himself for Cuddy's reaction, he reached out a hand, and in one swift motion, he flung the curtain back.

As expected, she screamed so loudly that he wouldn't be surprised if she'd woken her neighbours. She continued screaming even after she saw it was him, her hands shooting up to attempt to cover herself.

"Hey Cuddy!" House said brightly, leering towards her. "How's it going?!"

"Get the fuck out of here!" She yelled, grabbing towards the curtain and attempting to pull it around her.

Mission accomplished, House did as she asked, and grabbing his cane, he left the room, though not before he winked at her on the way out.

3.

She'd suspected there was something wrong when he didn't turn up for work. She told herself that she was being paranoid, that he was just going further in his attempts to see how far he could push her. Nevertheless, she couldn't help the voice at the back of her head that told her whilst ignoring his clinic duty or turning up late were things that House did on a regular basis, not even making an appearance wasn't in his nature. After all, even he had to be in work, or there was no way Cuddy could justify his employment to the hospital.

Even if by some chance he had decided to take things a little further than usual and grant himself the day off; he would have let Wilson know. Hell, he probably would have forced the oncologist to throw a sickie and keep him company. However, Wilson hadn't heard from him since the previous evening when he complained his leg was hurting more than usual, and this in itself worried Cuddy. He then proceeded to ignore all her pages and calls, and this was why during her lunch hour she turned up to his apartment, intending on making sure he was ok, if only for her peace of mind.

Suspicion turned into a very real fear when she saw that his apartment door was open a crack. Apprehensively, she stepped through, immediately noticing him, eyes closed, lying on the floor in front of her. Quickly, she bent down and shook him, attempting to wake him. It was then that she noticed the bottle of Vicodin lying next to him, a few of the pills scattered around the bottle. He had obviously overdosed, most probably accidentally, but House being House, she couldn't be sure of that. Cuddy felt for a pulse, finding a weak one, and as she breathed a sigh of relief and began dialling for an ambulance on her cell phone, she sobbed hysterically, "You stupid bastard!"

4.

"For fuck's sake!" Cuddy yelled.

House shrank back, thinking she was going to physically attack him when in his eyes, he hadn't done anything wrong. In his defence, he really hadn't known it was going to happen. Whilst the other three times he was arguably to blame in some way or another, he really hadn't realised it this time.

"Honestly Cuddy, this isn't my fault," he protested.

"Not your fault?! How is it not your fault?!" Cuddy ranted. She'd been angry the first time House blew up the MRI machine. Livid the second. The third time brought back memories of hot fury, in her eyes, voice, manner; everything. Now that he'd managed it for a fourth time… well she didn't think there was a word that existed to sum up just how mad she was.

"How was I supposed to know that the guy had his foreskin pierced? He had a Jewish name… he's not even supposed to have foreskin!" House defended himself.

Cuddy sighed, willing herself not to get even more worked up and therefore give herself a heart attack. "You still should have checked," she insisted.

"I assumed that his piercings had already been removed! Isn't that the usual procedure when someone donates their body to medical science?" House argued.

"Yes," Cuddy said through gritted teeth. "If procedure is followed, which it isn't always. You are a prime example of that."

House grinned. "Gee, thanks for the compliment, Cuddy!"

"It wasn't a compliment," Cuddy snapped. "Double clinic duty for a month," She doled out his punishment. "And next time you break the MRI, it'll be triple. It's going to steadily increase until you learn your goddamn lesson."

House huffed, and hobbling over the door, he turned to face Cuddy before exiting her office. "You know, if you came back to mine and spanked me I might not do it again."

"Yeah, right!" Cuddy exclaimed. "I could turn up at your place naked with several bottles of Vicodin in my arms and you'd still continue to kill that machine time and time again."

"I can honestly say," House began to speak, "Hand on heart, that if you did that, breaking the MRI machine would be the last thing on my mind. Promise."

As he slammed the door shut behind him, Cuddy couldn't suppress the grin from appearing on her face.

5.

"You're pregnant," House informed her, as he took a seat next to her in the exam room.

Cuddy's jaw fell open, her disbelieving reaction to his words. "No," She shook her head. "I can't be."

"The blood and urine samples you gave me say otherwise," House replied. "And your rapidly expanding ass and cleavage serve as backup evidence."

Cuddy frowned. "Are you saying I'm fat?"

"I'm saying you're pregnant," House persisted, getting impatient with the fact that she wouldn't believe him.

"But I haven't been trying. No implantations, or injections; anything, unless you count the one time last month when we…" Her voice trailed off as she remembered. "Shit."

"Seems Little House did me proud," House grinned. "Of course, he never could have performed the way he did without help from your airbags, so they deserve some of the credit too."

"It was just a one night stand though, I didn't even think about the possibility of getting pregnant," Cuddy insisted. She didn't want House getting angry, thinking that she'd planned this.

"I did," He said quietly.

"You… what?" Cuddy was confused.

House shrugged. "I realised there was a chance. I mean, it's not like we used protection."

"So you're… not mad?" She asked, not believing he was being so calm about the situation, and finally accepting that he was telling the truth. She was pregnant. Wow.

House shook his head in reply.

"You don't mind if I keep it?" Cuddy knew there was no way in hell she was aborting the baby, but she wanted to know what House thought about it.

"Why wouldn't you?" House asked sharply. "It's everything you've ever wanted." He hoisted himself up, and grabbing his cane, made his way towards the exit. "Congratulations, Cuddy."

As House made to pull open the door, Cuddy blurted out, "You're wrong."

House sighed, and once again turned to face her. "Look Cuddy, we've been through this. You are definitely pregnant, the samples both indicated that and…"

"No," Cuddy interrupted. "You're wrong about it being everything I've ever wanted." She rose to her feet and walked over to him, taking his face in her hands. "I want this baby… but I want you too."

House gawped at her, unable to accept what she was saying. "Cuddy… you're just saying that, your hormones are all over the place meaning you don't know what…"

Cuddy cut him off mid speech, crushing her lips to his. She gently bit down on his bottom lip, encouraging his mouth to open, and once it did she pushed her tongue inside. She willed him to respond to the kiss, and after a few seconds, when he finally did, she couldn't help but smile as she pulled away.

"…you're saying," House finished hoarsely.

"I know exactly what I'm saying, House." She said confidently. "I've been pregnant for six weeks, but I've wanted this for a lot longer than that."

He remained quiet for a moment after she said this, worrying Cuddy until he finally nodded, accepting her words. "Fine. But if you think this means I'm getting up at three o'clock in the morning to feed it then you've got another thing coming."

Cuddy began to smile. "I wouldn't expect that of you." Then, as she came to a realisation, her smile faded slightly. "It might not even come to that stage, so much could go wrong, I'm still in the early stages of…"

"Don't," House said firmly, interrupting her. "Don't think like that."

Cuddy still looked worried. "But last time…"

"Last time was different," House waved off her concern. "Last time you didn't have me to look after you."

"What if something does go wrong though?" Cuddy couldn't help asking the question.

"Then we'll try again," He promised, allowing her to melt into his hug, and thinking that maybe, just maybe, he'd have his chance to be less miserable in life.