CHAPTER 32: FIRST DATE
The restaurant is forty minutes from Princeton—far enough that we're unlikely to encounter anyone we know, close enough that the drive doesn't feel like a statement. Cameron chose it: a small Italian place called Lucia's, tucked between a dry cleaner and a law office. The kind of spot that survives on regulars and word of mouth.
She's waiting at the bar when I arrive. Dark blue dress, hair down instead of pulled back, and the realization hits me that I've never seen her outside of work clothes. She looks like a different person. The same warmth, but less armor.
"You found it." She slides off the barstool.
"Your directions were better than last time."
"I practiced."
The hostess leads us to a corner table. Candlelight, white tablecloth, the quiet murmur of other couples having their own private conversations. I pull out Cameron's chair before I can stop myself—old habits, reflexive rather than performed—and she gives me a look that's somewhere between surprised and amused.
"Chivalrous."
"My mother's influence." Not entirely true—I'm drawing from Robert Chase's fragmentary memories, his mother who died when he was fifteen. But the habits feel genuine now. "Though she'd be horrified by my wine knowledge. I order things because they sound fancy, not because I understand them."
"That's more honest than most people." She opens the menu. "I usually just ask for 'something red that won't embarrass me.'"
"We should do exactly that. The sommelier will love us."
The first few minutes are stiff. Both of us hyperaware this is different from coffee shop meetings, that the word date has been spoken aloud and can't be taken back. Small talk about hospital gossip feels forced. We order appetizers and the aforementioned embarrassment-free wine, and there's a moment where neither of us knows what to say next.
I break it with the first thing that comes to mind. "House thinks I'm hiding something."
Cameron's eyebrows rise. "That's an interesting conversation starter."
"He cornered me after the Marcus case. Wanted to know how I figured out the personality issues before surgery." I take a sip of wine—surprisingly good—and set it down. "I told him I'm just observant. He didn't believe me."
"Are you? Just observant?"
The question is light, but there's genuine curiosity underneath. Cameron isn't stupid. She's noticed things—the way I sometimes know what patients are hiding before they admit it, the headaches that appear at strange moments, the efficiency that Cuddy praised weeks ago.
"I'm very observant," I say carefully. "ER training, mostly. You see a lot of people lying about symptoms. You learn to read the tells."
"That sounds exhausting."
"It can be." More than she knows. "But it's useful. Patients lie about drug use, about compliance, about symptoms. If I can see through it, I can actually help them."
She nods, accepting this. "House reads people too. But he does it to prove they're terrible. You do it to help them."
"House isn't wrong about people being terrible. He's just limited in his responses."
Cameron laughs—real, unguarded. The sound releases something in the air between us.
"That's diplomatically put."
"I've had practice."
The appetizers arrive. Bruschetta for her, calamari for me. We share without asking—another intimacy that feels more significant than it should. The conversation drifts from House to medicine to the cases that stay with us.
"Do you ever wonder if we do more harm than good?" Cameron asks. "House pushes patients, breaks into their homes, violates their privacy. We cure them, but we also..."
"Destroy their illusions?"
"Something like that."
I think about Marcus—the sociopath with the perfect life, the wife who doesn't know who she married. The anonymous tip I sent. The destruction that might follow.
"I think truth is usually better than comfort," I say. "Even when it hurts."
"That sounds like something House would say."
"Maybe I'm learning from him. The better parts."
Cameron sets down her fork. "Can I ask you something personal?"
"You can ask anything."
"Your father. You've mentioned him a few times. What was he actually like?"
The question lands in territory I've mostly avoided. My memories of Rowan Chase are borrowed—fragments of distant disappointment, of a man who saved thousands of lives and couldn't make time for his son's school events. But Cameron is sharing her history, her dead husband, her guilt and grief. I owe her something real.
"Distant. Brilliant. Completely incapable of emotional connection." I pause. "He was a famous surgeon in Australia. The kind of doctor who gets buildings named after him. My mother died when I was fifteen, and I don't think he ever processed it. Just... kept working. Surgery was the only emotion he could handle."
"That sounds lonely."
"It was." The memories are Robert's, but the feeling is genuine. "I went to seminary for a while. Partly because I thought I wanted meaning, partly because it was the one thing that would disappoint him. Spiritual calling isn't exactly the family business."
"But you came back to medicine."
"I came back to helping people. Medicine is just the tool." I meet her eyes. "What about you? What made you choose House's madness over somewhere safer?"
"I needed to feel useful." She says it simply. "After my husband died, I spent two years being careful. Safe jobs, quiet life, nothing that would challenge me. Then I realized I was just waiting to die too. House offered challenge. I said yes."
"Do you regret it?"
"Not anymore." Her hand crosses the table, fingers brushing mine. "I'm starting to think it led somewhere good."
We talk through dinner and dessert—tiramisu we split because neither of us can finish a full portion. The conversation flows easier now, natural in a way first dates rarely are. Music and travel dreams and the eternal mystery of why hospital cafeteria Jell-O only comes in one color.
"You're not what I expected," she says as the check arrives.
"What did you expect?"
"Someone pretending to be whole. Playing the charming Australian doctor, keeping everyone at surface level." She tilts her head, studying me. "You actually are whole. Mostly."
"Mostly." I smile. "Still working on some parts."
"Which parts?"
"The ones I'm not ready to talk about yet."
She nods—accepting rather than pressing. "That's fair."
We walk to the parking lot. The autumn air has teeth tonight, winter approaching in the early darkness and the crunch of dead leaves underfoot. Her car is four spots from mine.
We stop between them, and the night feels suspended.
"I'm glad we did this," she says.
"So am I."
"Same time next week?"
"Absolutely."
She steps closer. I don't move away. Her hand rises to my collar—adjusting something invisible, or maybe just wanting contact—and then she's leaning in.
The kiss is tentative. Brief. The question-mark version of an answer we haven't fully found yet.
She pulls back, smiling. "Goodnight, Chase."
"Goodnight, Cameron."
She gets in her car and drives away. I stand in the parking lot for another minute, processing.
She's choosing me for real reasons—competence, warmth, stability. Not because I'm broken, not because she wants to fix me. This is healthier than the original timeline. A better foundation.
But it also means more to lose if my secrets explode.
I get in my car and start the engine.
Worth the risk. I have to believe that.
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