all things end - house md

1. 8 years

When Gregory House's niece showed up at his doorstep the question wasn't how she got there, it was why she was there.

"Evelyn." She didn't respond. "What happened? You piss daddy off?" He just now realized her nose was bleeding and her knees were scraped and bloody.

Evelyn's father, Dennis Miller, was Gregory House's younger brother. He was also the police chief in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. He hardly let her leave the house, only for school. She couldn't have a job or friends. Her mother Monica was an addict and left Eve after she was born, not before dumping her with her Uncle Greg. She ended up living with him for 15 years before her father ended up finding her. They hadn't seen each other since.

"Can I come in?" Her voice was low barely audible and for once House didn't have a snarky remark but moved aside allowing the girl to walk in.

He waited till she sat down on the couch before speaking again. "What happened Eve?" House knew his brother wasn't a good person but he didn't know the full extent of what Eve had been through.

"I don't wanna talk about it." Her hands were linked together as she stared forward, partially trying to ground herself and partially trying to stop her hands from shaking. House knew something bad had happened but at least she was here now.

House sighed, relocking the door. "I didn't touch your room. It's the same as you left it. Be ready to leave at 8- no 9 I need my beauty sleep." She nodded blankly. House passed her as on the couch patting her shoulder. "Get some sleep. We'll talk later." He was about to his door before she decided to respond.

"Thanks for not forgetting about me."

"Please, you're far too annoying to forget." Her lip turned up in a half smirk.

Progress.

—

Her room was the exact same as she had left it when she left 8 years ago. Piles upon piles of medical books filled a corner of the room.

After living with House for a while she ended up taking an interest in the medical field, it definitely wasn't due to the fact the first book he had her read was Taber's Cyclopedic Medical Dictionary. Sometimes if she was lucky he would bring a case home and let her read it, testing out what he had taught her to see if she could reach the same conclusions he had. And when she got good at that he starting bringing her to the hospital with him to help out in the office.

Looking around the room she noticed each of the little things in her room she had forgotten about: the Foo Fighters poster on the back of her door, the anatomy poster that hung next to her twin sized bed, the knick knacks on her desk and dresser collecting dust. The globe Wilson had given her for her 8th birthday, and the swiss army knife House gave her the same year.

It felt nice to be back where she belonged.

Eve was up at 7am the next day, unable to sleep. When she was younger she loved going into the hospital with House, being his assistant when he needed something done.

Today was no different except for the fact she was 8 years older, 8 years wiser and had 8 more years to get fucked up. She looked through her bag and realized in her haste to leave her house she didn't pack any clothes besides the ones she had on. House didn't bother knocking on the door before entering.

"Hurry up or take your time. I really don't want to go in today anyway." He was still in a tee shirt and jeans, very obviously not ready to leave yet.

"I could've been changing House." She was rifling through her closet looking for anything that would fit.

"But you weren't. Your bag isn't big enough for more than one pair of clothes and based on how upset you were when you arrived you weren't thinking clearly meaning you didn't pack clothes. Which is why you're looking at the clothes you had when you were 15."

House noticed how her face has changed from the last time he saw her, she was only 15 when he last saw her after all. Her face had thinned out and her eyes had gotten a darker shade of blue. Her brown hair was black and down to her shoulders. She had to be at least in her early twenties by now.

"Go get some clothes from my room. I'm assuming Clink-182 isn't your style anymore?"

She smirked as she passed him on the way to his room. "It's Blink -182 and if I remember correctly you used to love it."

Her clothes for that day consisted of a gray tee shirt with words that are barely illegible and her jeans from yesterday. The shirt was too big for her, and the jacket on her arms was House's biker jacket.

When she emerged from his room he asked her the question she was dreading. "What happened?"

"I don't want to talk about it House." It was still too fresh for her. The abuse she put up with for so many years finally came to a head and she knew she had to leave, faking her own death in the process.

"You'll tell me eventually."

"Can we go now?"