Renelle in Gregory form put the magazine aside and took the candy lollipop out of her mouth.
"If they assign me a boy whose nose is dripping, it will be thirty seconds to examine him and twenty-five minutes with the mother who will not leave until she knows it is not a tumor."
"Yes. Worried parents are a nuisance…" Wilson said with an expression on his face as if throwing an indirect hint at his best friend.
"I am a worried father…" House understood the indirect hint and replied.
"Just tell Cuddy that you have an urgent case."
"That would be lying~" House said with an exaggerated grimace and put the candy lollipop back into his mouth.
"And that would be wrong. Fortunately, the definition of -urgent- is interchangeable." Wilson shrugged and turned around to leave the consultation room.
"But the definition of -Case- is not."
Wilson, who was already leaving, stopped, then took a step backward, and finally turned to look at House.
"You do not have a case? You do not have any case?…" Renelle in Gregory form looked at Wilson sideways.
Wilson began to raise his voice.
"You have carefully selected doctors. Specialists who work for you, and they are sitting there doing nothing?"
"Cameron is answering my email~" House took the candy lollipop out of his mouth again and, looking upward, said.
"It is time well spent… And Foreman and Chase?"
"Research? Hey! Yesterday I solved a case! By the way, you lied to me. In a moment we will talk about that."
"As far as I heard in the hallways, it was your daughter who solved the case."
"You should not listen to hallway rumors."
"And by the way, where is Renelle?"
"At home."
"You left her alone? Again?"
"She is a big and smart girl. She solved a case!"
Wilson looked directly at House. When he was about to raise his voice again, House took out a card and a long white paper from his jacket.
"Ah, by the way. Thank you for buying clothes for your -goddaughter-. Renelle is happy and she says she forgives you, although she did not explain to me why she would have to forgive you…"
"I…" Wilson extended his hand and took the plastic card and the note.
"How much!" When Wilson looked at the note and the total at the bottom until the end, he felt as if he was the one who was going to get a tumor.
"Oh~ it seems I have an emergency… I need to go to the bathroom. If you will excuse me, and thank you very much for buying clothes for your -goddaughter-." House stood up from the examination table, gave Wilson a pat on the shoulder, and left through the open door of the consultation room.
But House did not take many steps before a man approached him.
"Doctor House!"
"I am sorry. I am now going to an emergency, but there are many doctors available to attend to you." Renelle in Gregory form looked at the man for a moment and ignored him.
"But we have an appointment," the man said while following House.
"Ha! I almost fell for it, but this is an open clinic, and there are no appointments. You enter, sign the form, and a doctor sees you. But I do not…" House let out a loud laugh and pointed. Then he hurried forward in the direction of a public bathroom to get rid of the man.
"Your letter says that we will see you." The man looked at a woman who was walking behind him.
The woman took out a folded paper, unfolded it, and handed it to the man.
House, who was about to push the door of the public bathrooms of the hospital, grunted, stopped, and turned around.
"Uhm… I do not like writing letters…" Renelle in Gregory form said.
"Here." The man showed her the open sheet and House took it.
"Wait a moment. As you can see, I have an emergency. Let me resolve my emergency and I will attend to you right away." House, with a smile, said after reading the letter and seeing his -signature- on it.
---
A moment later, in the office of the head of the diagnostic department.
House entered limping with his cane. When he looked toward the conference room he could see how Chase returned to solving a crossword puzzle and Foreman sat down again to read a book.
If House had not made signals for them to stop and sit down, Chase and Foreman would have stood up and followed him to his office.
When Cameron saw House enter, she stood up from her chair and was going to greet him with a smile, but she saw how House raised a sheet of paper and showed it to her.
Cameron remained silent and her face blushed a little. She walked and stepped aside, letting House pass and sit in his chair. Then Cameron placed herself in front of House's desk with the attitude of a young girl who had just done something wrong and had been caught.
"I can explain," she said with her hands held in front and her gaze slightly lowered like a scolded child.
"Do you see that -G-?" House raised the sheet and pointed at his signature at the bottom of the letter.
"I…" Cameron was going to speak but House continued talking.
"Do you see the curve at the top? It does not even resemble my handwriting. Am I sick?…"
Cameron's face blushed a little more and she put a forced smile on her lips.
"… What is the differential diagnosis for a letter in the style of a high school girl?"
"They used the normal channels. They called, they wrote…" Cameron spoke without waiting for House to finish. She released her hands that were held in front of her belly and ignored the burning she felt on her face.
"Perseverance does not make them deserving. When you want my attention, wear jeans at the hip. They are great."
"She has a daughter!" Cameron exclaimed and blushed.
"Oh! Do not buy that type of clothes for Renelle…" Renelle in Gregory form emphasized.
Renelle had obviously seen the two dresses that Cameron had placed in her closet. She could not see herself wearing them.
"Sixteen-year-old male. Double vision and night terrors without apparent cause. He went to two neurologists…"
"Night terrors? It is abuse. By the way, just yesterday we had a patient. How is it that the appointment suddenly got scheduled for today?"
"The patient was discharged today but yesterday she was already visibly improving. I only sent the letter… Wait, abuse? Where are you going?"
"To see the family. Nine out of ten times there is no reason to talk to a patient, but their night terrors give reason to talk to their family!" House, using his cane as support, stood up from his chair and walked toward the exit of his office. And when he said the last sentence he turned around and spoke directly to Cameron while looking her in the eyes.
House reached the elevator, went down to the ground floor and with his gaze found the man who had spoken to him moments before and signaled him to follow.
The man took a young boy and his wife and walked hurriedly until he caught up with House.
House quickly found an empty consultation room and asked the young boy to enter. He turned off the lights and took out an -ophthalmoscope- and signaled the young boy to sit on the examination table.
"There are no lesions. The color is fine. How long have you had night terrors?" House turned off the light of the ophthalmoscope and asked.
"Three weeks," the boy answered.
"He is afraid to fall asleep. He is exhausted. He can barely function," the man spoke and stood beside the young boy.
House then brought his hand close to the young boy and made some movements as if snapping his fingers quickly.
"What does that tell you?" the woman who was the boy's mother asked and also approached.
"Nothing. It is fun to watch him blink," House only answered playfully.
"Name as many animals as you can that start with the letter -B-. Now!" House said again to the boy.
Cameron was standing to the side, listening and paying attention to the reaction of the young boy and the parents, and she looked at House from time to time.
"Ah…" the boy opened his mouth to answer, but nothing came to mind and he remained thinking.
Cameron found the boy's reaction strange.
The parents looked at him strangely.
"Baby elephant…" the boy finally said.
"Baby elephant! That is a good answer. The letter -B- is very difficult~" House spoke again in a playful and mocking tone.
"What does that mean?" the man, the young boy's father, asked.
"It proves two things: there is no neurological damage, and your son will never be a fast-food cook…" House replied to the father.
"… In teenagers there are two probable causes of night terrors. Post-traumatic stress. Have there been shootings at your high school?"
"No," the boy shook his head.
"Then… Dave…"
"Dan," Cameron corrected House on the boy's name.
"… If there is no trauma, the other cause is sexual abuse."
The young Dan was surprised by what he heard and lowered his gaze with an expression of shame.
The father was also surprised and then turned his head.
"Who is abusing you? A teacher? A very kind neighbor? I would ask if any of you are involved but you would deny it." House then looked at the parents.
"No, we would never hurt Dan," the father quickly replied.
"The lack of response matches with abuse…"
"Nobody is abusing me, okay? I swear!" Dan interrupted House.