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This is the wilderness, and there are bears. They haven’t seen them, but they know they’re out there. House jokes about it, makes light of the situation, says he’s not afraid of them, but at night he stows the food carefully so they won’t be attracted to it. Wilson wonders if it would be better to let them come.
//
“We have to talk about it.”
House looks up at Wilson, then reaches over and spears another marshmallow onto his roasting stick and thrusts it into the fire. “I know you’re upset about TomKat’s breakup, but there wasn’t anything you could have done to stop it. Don’t beat yourself up over it.” He gives Wilson a wide-eyed, sarcastic look. “Think of the children, Wilson.” The marshmallow catches fire, burns. House doesn’t take it out of the fire.
“You know what I mean,” Wilson says softly. “We can’t ignore it forever.”
“Oh, I promise you, I can,” House snaps back. “I’m counting ‘ignoring it forever’ as a personal challenge. A challenge I’m winning, if you don’t count all the times you’ve purposefully made me fail.”
Wilson sighs, barely audible over the crackling of the fire. He doesn’t pursue it further.
They’ve had this conversation before. They will have this conversation again. Until it’s over, and then they won’t.
//
They chop their own firewood, even when it’s against park regulations. House is developing impressive arm muscles from swinging the axe. Wilson is losing muscle mass even though he insists on helping.
They talk about House’s arms, joking that before long he’ll be able to walk on them instead and ignore his bad leg entirely. House even tries it a few times, to make Wilson laugh. He always falls. Sometimes Wilson catches him.
They never mention Wilson’s arms.
//
“You’re not going to do it, are you?” Wilson finally says one night, letting his disappointment run into his voice. “You’re going to let me die without ever telling me.”
“Telling you what, Wilson?” House shakes a charred marshmallow off of the roasting stick, then puts another marshmallow on it and sticks that one into the fire, too. Wilson can’t remember if he’s ever seen House eat one. He just seems to like to watch them burn.
“That you love me,” Wilson answers after a pause. “I told you I needed you to tell me you loved me and you aren’t going to do it.”
House viciously jabs the marshmallow into the glowing coals but doesn’t say anything.
//
They get a motel every once in a while, when baths in rivers and streams stop cutting through the dirt from the road. House always pays in cash and gives his name as Arthur Doyle. No one but Wilson ever gets the joke.
//
“I don’t understand,” Wilson says, almost to himself. They’re camping again, and he stares up at the stars like they’re going to inspire him. “I’m dying and you’re not going to give me the one thing I need to hear to do it peacefully.”
“Are you not paying attention?” House grinds out, not even bothering to pretend he doesn’t know what Wilson means. “Why does it matter so much if I say a few meaningless words?” He lowers his voice enough that Wilson has to strain to catch it. “Especially when it’s so stupidly obvious.”
Wilson lets out an exasperated sigh. “You know, maybe it’s not obvious.”
House raises his voice. Wilson has heard this volume from him before, but out here in the woods it seems especially thunderous. “What do you think this is? A joy-ride? Just another one of my stunts? This is me giving up everything so that I can be there when the only person worth a shit in the world gets to his expiration date. When you’re gone, I’ll have nothing. Not even my job. And yet here I sit, legally dead and in pain while you yammer on about your feelings.”
“This isn’t you saying you love me,” Wilson says bitterly. “This is you being selfish. Like you always are.” He shakes his head. “It shouldn’t still surprise me.”
House struggles to his feet, wincing as he puts a tiny amount of weight on his bad leg. “This is not me being selfish. Me getting myself thrown back in jail so I wouldn’t have to see you waste away in front of me... that was selfish. This is the opposite of that.”
“Then say it!” Wilson yells. “Say, ‘I love you, Wilson.’ You can even add a ‘no homo’ after it if it makes you feel less awkward. I don’t care. I just want to know.”
“No,” House says, curling his lip as he says it. He limps off into the woods.
//
Wilson curls up in his sleeping bag and tries to sleep. He’s cold. He hasn’t told House that.
It’s a lovely warm summer evening and House will end up sleeping in his own tent, lying on top of his sleeping bag with only his underwear on, if he even leaves that much covering him. House will lie there, sweating and grunting unhappily, until he finally pulls out his battery-operated fan and wastes battery power cooling himself off. Wilson knows this. It’s how he should feel, too.
But Wilson is cold. That means it’s progressing. He knows the signs of death better than anyone. He will fight for every moment and he’ll be damned if he doesn’t live for the full five months he was promised, but the cold skin in the warm night is a whispered reminder from the cancer: I’m here. You haven’t lost me. I’m waiting.
He sleeps, and he dreams of space travel.
//
Sometimes Wilson sleeps deep like the dead. House knows this. He wakes up in the middle of the night and holds his breath until he hears Wilson take one of his own. Then he slowly drifts back to sleep.
He does this at least once an hour, every night. Wake, inhale, hold. Relax, exhale, sleep.
Lather, rinse, repeat.
//
“You’re going to die in three months,” House says suddenly. They’re eating corn on the cob that they’ve roasted over their fire.
“Yes,” Wilson answers, drawing out the word.
“I’m going to run out of Vicodin in one,” House continues, then goes back to eating his corn. The juice runs down his chin, cutting trails in the growing stubble there. He stares into the fire and chews slowly.
Wilson pauses, processes this. Grizzlies don’t carry prescription pads. It’s a pretty good joke for two months into a five-month cancer, in Wilson’s opinion, but he decides not to say it out loud. He thinks about asking House if he knew he was going to run out before he made the decision to come on this trip. He decides not to say that, either. House hates stupid questions.
“No homo,” House says after a moment.
It’s the best Wilson is going to get.
Wilson is surprised to find that he’s content with this.
//
It’s dawn. House jerks awake and holds his breath.
Wake, inhale, hold.
He counts in his head. One. Two. Three. Four. Five.
Hold. Keep holding.
Give it a few more.
Six. Seven. Eight. Nine.
He almost followed Wilson into his tent last night. Wilson was cold. He could have kept him warm. He could have at least been close enough to check his pulse.
Ten. Eleven. Twelve.
He thinks about calling Wilson’s name, but that would use some of the breath he’s holding. Wilson will stay alive as long as House doesn’t exhale. He stays silent.
Thirteen. She’s probably dead. Fourteen.
His leg throbs. He reaches for the Vicodin. The bottle’s been empty for months.
Fifteen.
A whisper of a breath from the other tent.
House lets out the last of his breath and sucks in a fresh one. It will be soon. But it won’t be tonight.
House drifts back to sleep. He dreams of space travel.
Lather. Rinse. Repeat.