give me evenings and weekends, evenings and weekends

[concluded]

There had been a cookie on Chase's lunch tray. About four seconds ago.

Currently, a third of it is already shoved into Gregory House's mouth, and being chewed thoughtfully from the seat he's taken on the other side of the bench with his own spicy chicken sandwich and large soda. Chase had gotten up for only a moment to leave his food unattended.

House saw it as a learning moment.

Now he waits for Chase to return to that seat in the hospital cafeteria, House still wearing (reluctantly) his scrubs, face protector pulled up into his greying hair. As much as he would eschew the uniform look when he was working a job he could mostly do from an office chair, he has little intention of soiling all of his small selection of screen-printed shirts. He's been building up an array of them from scratch in Darrow. It hasn't been easy.

And it hasn't all been fun.

Comments

[theorized]

Chase heaves a heavy sigh, lifting his hands for a moment to drop his food, his marginal attempt at the dramatic, at venting his frustration, before he slumps back in his chair with defeat. The thing is, he's not lying, not as far as he's been made to believe his input matters — not at all. If House didn't care to bring him into the matter, then that indeed makes this none of Chase's business. They're only colleagues, and this choice wasn't one about work, wasn't one about that environment, but instead a more intimate and personal part of House's life that Chase doesn't believe he'll ever be fully privy to.

So he lets his jaw work for a second before he shakes his head, raising his chin a touch.

"Where are you staying these days?"

[concluded]

House lets a long, low breath slide out between his lips, deciding to relent against Chase's continued, oddly gracious attempts at defusing the start of further arguing. House doesn't want to argue.

He hates that Chase can clearly see what he doesn't want to acknowledge himself. Hates it legitimately. Hates it.

"Dimera apartments," he finally manages, working his way through his sandwich again. He's glad for all the mayo, not just because he likes it and to hell with his health, but because it keeps his mouth from being too dry as he clears his throat. "That's where they stuck me when I got here. Figured I might as well stay. If they can put a picture of my face on an ID card, trying to hide's just gonna make me look like a jackass."

He doesn't ask where Chase lives. He knows already.

[theorized]

He sets all the food down, doesn't make any effort to pick it up again, because his stomach feels like it's being twisted and turned all at once. He knew to expect it. Maybe the fact that he almost always knows to expect it makes the times he doesn't all the more discomfiting. Didn't expect that House was still alive, even if he considered it. (Of course he considered that possibility.) Didn't expect House to show up in Darrow, not really, not in any meaningful way that he could depend on.

Yet here they are.

Chase closes his lips around his straw and drinks, because it's the only thing he can stomach while his skin feels oddly cold and clammy.

"That's one of the places that opened up to newcomers more recently," Chase says quietly, even though there's every chance House already knows. "Hiding does still work against other people, though. Just not the city."

Feels like something House doesn't believe in, Chase is tempted to say. He doesn't.