dr_robchase | (no subject)

By now, six years and counting, Chase should have been ready for whatever he had to come up against. He should have been expecting the worst and thought -- stupidly, stupidly thought -- that whatever this place had for him, it couldn't be worse than what he'd already lived through. It was bad enough to see both your parents leave you again (whether by death or disappearance), bad enough to have a near-death experience, to constantly lose everyone you ever loved, but the one thing this place had never done was take him back to the harrowing moments he had growing up.

At least, not until today.

He'd been downstairs, in Gwen's old room, trying to figure out whether they could shift the space around. One moment, it was the spare room with its dusty floors and the empty bed. He blinked, only closed his eyes for a second, but when he opened them, he knew that smell. He knew the feeling of being closed in, and he swore he could even smell the faint aroma of gin in the air. Chase felt a sick lurching in his stomach.

"No," he begged, terrified that he was right back to where it all started.

What if, behind this door, his mother was drinking herself into a stupor. What if his father has left for months? What if he finds his baby sister, what if -- what if what if. Chase slams both palms against the door, feeling a stricken with panic as memories filter back and he remembers, all too well, the begging and the shouting and the pleading he did to get out of this room. The books were the same, the leather armchair still had the cigar burn in the arm, and the carpet had that same old musty smell from too many glasses of scotch and gin spilled on it.

"Let me out!" he shouted, his voice catching. "Let me out of here! Let me..." he trails off, a weak and frustrated exhalation of 'Mum, please' on his breath before he slams his palms harder against the locked door, struggling with the antiquated copper knob.

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Chase glared at House, wishing that he could give him a shove -- but knew that he'd feel bad for it, considering he'd already managed to nearly up-end them with a well-timed stagger. He bit his lower lip firmly to avoid saying something that he'd regret, but he only managed to get so far. "Look, you rescued me," he said, his tone curt. "If you're just going to make disparaging comments about the room, you can go, too."

Fucker, who had apparently been scratching at the door outside and finally managed to nose it open, came bounding down the hallway.

"He was worried about you," House said dryly as the dog barked and pushed insistently at Chase's legs.

Chase let out a soft laugh, bending down to scratch behind Fucker's ears, bending forward to press his forehead to the fur. "House has been taking care of you, I hope," he murmured to the dog, glancing up at House. "It's just a room," he said, trying to convince himself of the same.

"Yeah, right," said House. "A hysteria-inducing room. Is there a chair in there at least? Because I really need to sit down."

"There's my Dad's chair, yeah," Chase all-but-mumbled, gesturing to the waiting leather chair with a hand, heading inside to collect the half-glass of scotch from the table beside it, like Rowan had been there until about a moment ago.

House limped in and dropped into the chair, hand immediately going down to rub his leg. "So that's what this is about. I have to say, as far as random shit from home goes, this is pretty elaborate. Hey, at least you get booze."

Chase hurried to the side to take the glass, setting it away. He had no idea how old it was or whether or not it was tainted with something. He didn't want to risk it, basically. "It's not -- I don't want this room here, House," he said, staring at the bookshelf out of the corner of his eye. "Listen, do you want a gift? I'll give you a gift. I'll give you every book on this shelf."