Work Text:
Wilson pinches his brow between thumb and forefinger. This is the third night in a row he’s borne witness to this same argument. And the second hour of the current session.
“I’ve said it once, I’ll say it again - home by eleven,” Amber scowls into House’s face. “Not budging.”
“You can say it as many times as you like, doesn’t make it any more true,” he responds, pacing around her like a fretful animal. She follows him with her eyes, seeming mere moments away from baring her teeth.
They really are a bit like dogs, Wilson muses.
And he does not want to get bitten, not in this fight - considering the two highly dangerous individuals circling each other in front of his dining table - but it really is getting a bit old now. Besides, it’s oddly unlike them; House and Amber are both intelligent, sharp, witty, and yet they seem to keep circling around to the same points again and again, unable to reach a conclusion. He ponders how many sessions of this argument it would take for one of them to pounce on the other, and who would strike first.
“Can I say something?” Wilson asks, gently setting down his newspaper, and almost regrets it when two icy blue gazes turn upon him with all the fervour they were just aiming at each other. He puts his hands up placatingly before continuing. “I was just going to suggest - you both want some form of, um, joint custody , right?” He suppresses the urge to roll his eyes.
“Obviously,” Amber snaps.
“Have you not been listening to this entire discussion?” House snarks, near-simultaneously.
“Okay, okay! I just thought - why do your allotted times with me have to be separate?” He ventures. Both raise their eyebrows, but don’t immediately rip his head off, which he takes as a good sign. “Of course I like to spend time with both of you independently, but… I like both of you. Is there any good reason why we can’t, I don’t know - go bowling as… a trio?”
He tilts his head, imploring them to seriously consider the possibility. They turn to each other, and seem to have a conversation communicated entirely through the eyebrows - what? How is that possible or fair when Wilson has no idea what they’re even saying - and then whip back around.
“We’d still have to organise which days are mine and which are hers outside of the group dates,” House proposes.
Quickly brushing aside the way his heart jumps when he refers to it as a group date , Wilson shakes his head. “Uh - my idea was that if we all get enough quality time together , the overall… jealousy level of the group would go down. We wouldn’t need to plan out specific days to belong to specific people.”
Amber is looking more and more curious, which is a very good sign. On the other hand, House’s brows seem to be creeping lower on his face by the moment. You win some, you lose some, Wilson supposes. At least he has more experience dealing with grumpy House.
“It sounds interesting,” Amber admits, her steely eyes sparking. She turns to House and offers a hand to shake. “You in?”
House shrinks back into himself a little, slouching like a pouting teenager. Wilson can see he’s uncertain; House has never liked change.
“If you don’t like it - if any of us don’t like it, we can go back to you two arguing in the kitchen for hours on end,” Wilson says gently, levelling his eyes at House. “But it might just be worth a shot. You’re the one always insisting on diagnosing by treating the problem, right?”
House wordlessly glances between him and Amber once more. Then, with a highly put-upon sigh, plants his hand in Amber’s and shakes it vigorously. “Fine. Let’s treat it.”
-
Wilson spends the next few days frantically Googling “unique date ideas”. His instinct would usually be dinner, or a movie, or lunch, or something, but a part of him fears the kind of scene his two companions might make in that kind of normal-person setting. It wouldn’t be giving them a fair chance; like taking two bulls on a walk to the china shop.
The idea he settles on is apple picking - a local orchard has a pick-your-own event every year. He hopes it’ll be relaxing, enjoyable, and with plenty of open space for the two of them to go and cool off should they need it.
Amber takes the idea well. He pitches it over dinner one night, and she bursts into pretty smiles and sharp laughter and looks at him quite incredulously. “That’s a new one.”
He looks at her pleadingly. “I was trying my best to find something that wouldn’t make you both rip each others’ heads off.”
She shrugs and smiles, returning to her meal. “It’ll definitely be interesting.”
House… takes it like only House could. He’s already barged into Wilson’s office, told him the details of his last two bizarre cases, and stolen half of his lunch.
“Do you not own bread and peanut butter yourself?” he asks.
House ignores him. “Cuddy’s wearing a new shirt today,” he says through a mouthful of sandwich. “I think she has a date.”
As long as they’re in the business of starting every sentence barely related to the last, Wilson adds, “I had an idea for our… arrangement with Amber.” He winces as the sentence comes out of his mouth - somehow in his attempt to de-romanticise the whole situation, he’s made it sound more salacious.
House, for all his faults, doesn’t needle him for that, just gestures for him to go on.
Wilson steeples his fingers. “Apple picking?”
House raises an eyebrow. “...Apple picking?”
“Yeah. There’s this orchard near-”
“Am I going on a date with your grandma?” He asks, then snaps his fingers. “Oh, wait, no, that was last week.”
“Hilarious.” Wilson says, unamused. “Come on, it’ll be fun.”
-
The argument about who gets to sit in the front has the legs to go for multiple hours. Wilson, once again, finds himself desperately pinching the bridge of his nose as a stress headache threatens to set in.
“I already called shotgun,” House insists, leaning casually on the side of Wilson’s car. “The rules are eternal and immutable.”
“Are you twelve years old?” Amber snorts derisively. “I’m not sitting in the back seat of my own boyfriend’s car.”
House taps his cane pointedly on the ground. “It’s bad for my leg.”
“Wh- how on Earth is it bad for your leg?!”
“I need the extra space!”
“I’ve seen the positions you sit in in your desk chair, you do not need the space-”
“Both of you, shut up,” Wilson sighs. “Please.”
Two pairs of piercing eyes round on him again. He does wish they’d stop doing that.
“I’ve decided. You’re both sitting in the back,” Wilson says, spinning his keys around his finger as he strolls around to the driver’s door, ignoring the sounds of indignance and complaint he leaves in his wake. After he gets in and closes the door behind him, there’s a few more moments of muffled bickering before his companions join him, getting in the back as they were told.
“Have you kissed and made up?” He deadpans, glancing at the two of them in the rear-view mirror. House is slouched and tucked into himself like a tantruming child. Amber is staring him down with cold fury. Wilson swiftly breaks eye contact with the mirror.
“Just for the record, I’ll remember this, Wilson,” she says coolly.
“Yeah, me too,” House grumbles.
“Well, at least you have that in common,” he sighs, turning the keys in the ignition.
The date is off to a fantastic start.
-
To its credit, the orchard is beautiful. The foggy autumn sunlight streams through fiery-coloured leaves, highlighting the low-slung boughs heavy with ripe fruit. It’s almost enough to let Wilson ignore the quiet bickering following close behind him.
Almost.
He cuts them off by whipping around and bundling a small basket into each of their arms. “Be quiet. We’re going to have a nice time picking apples,” he says. The statement comes out a lot more pleading than the declarative command he’d intended it as.
House and Amber are still simmering, both at each other and at him, and he feels himself deflate a little. Maybe this wasn’t a good idea. All he’d wanted was to not have the two most important people in his life at each other's throats constantly, but maybe that was a pipe dream.
Amber catches his eye, and seems to ponder for a moment. Then turns her cunning gaze on House. “What say we make this a little more interesting?”
House tilts his head, ears practically perking up at the implication of a competition. “Go on.” Wilson’s heart sinks.
“Whoever picks more gets sole custody for three days.”
House narrows his eyes cannily. “A week?”
“Five, and don’t push it.”
This time, House is the one insistently proffering forward a handshake which Amber gleefully accepts. “You’re going down.”
“Whatever you say,” Amber says with a smirk, and then whips on her heel and truly takes off. House can’t quite make the pace that she does, but he limps away at quite the lick anyway. All Wilson can do is watch on in horror, wondering desperately which of them is going to come out of this alive.
It does almost feel like watching a nature documentary, though. As Wilson has a very relaxing stroll (notably lacking in the endless squabbling that’s shadowed him for days on end) and calmly picks apples, he watches House and Amber weave in and out of trees like foxes. Amber has the obvious edge when it comes to speed, but House’s cane gives him an unprecedented advantage in terms of reach - he uses it to stretch up and strim apples off of branches too high for Amber to get to. Of course neither is afraid to play dirty, either - a swing of House’s cane sends Amber’s basket tumbling to the ground here, a well-placed kidney jab lets Amber dart in and pluck some apples right out of House’s grasp.
Once or twice Wilson even catches one caging the other in against a tree, pushing their faces and legs a little too close to be platonic while one hand sidles toward their victim’s basket. He finds himself not feeling anywhere near as jealous and upset as he thinks he’s supposed to about that.
House darts out from behind a tree right in front of Wilson as he’s wrapped up in his thoughts, clearly charging as fast as possible. Amber skips up beside him and deftly swipes an apple right from his basket. House growls, whipping away from him to swat at her, and Wilson frowns. It’s starting to feel a little unfair.
“Amber, maybe - this doesn’t have to be taken too seriously, you know?” He suggests mildly, glancing deliberately at House. Apparently that was the wrong thing to say, judging by the second double-team icy stare of the day.
“I’m not taking it easy on him just because of his leg,” Amber says, narrowing her eyes at him. “That would be discriminatory.”
Wilson blinks rapidly. That wasn’t at all what he wanted to mean.
He’s distracted by a sudden thwack to his ankle - House’s cane on the offensive.
“ Ow, ” He complains pointedly.
“She’s right, you ableist,” he says good-naturedly as he hurries after her again in pursuit of his pilfered apple.
House is being… good-natured ? He doesn’t think House has ever been good-natured in all the years Wilson’s known him. The throbbing in his ankle doesn’t seem anywhere near as bad now that he’s watching them, really paying attention, and noticing just how much they’re both smiling.
An hour or so of watching them chase each other and play passes easily. When they leave the orchard, all three are brimming with contentment and apples.
…Really a lot of apples. Wilson tries to calculate how many apple pies he’s going to have to make.
“...Thirty-seven, thirty- eight! By my count,” Amber announces, all smug and self-satisfied, while House tips his head back and groans. “That puts me three above you, Greg.”
Wilson chuckles and presses a kiss to Amber’s hair. “Well done, dear.” Instinctively, he goes to do the same to House and then wait, what, no, he’s my friend, what , so he diverts it into a slightly too affectionate hair ruffle at the last second. “And, uh, good try, House,” he teases. House’s hair smells of sandalwood shampoo. House and Amber exchange a look that only barely registers to him.
“Yeah, yeah, well - make the most of me, I’m not gonna be around for five days , apparently,” he says, levelling a glare with no vitriol at Amber, who responds with a taunting beam.
-
“I’m not going to enforce the sole custody.”
Wilson rolls over in bed to face her, quirks one eyebrow. “You aren’t?”
“No, don’t think so.” She stares thoughtfully up at the ceiling. As always, her face is unreadable.
“House won’t like that. You won it fair and square,” he reminds her.
Silence greets him. Before he can prompt her for a response -
“You’re in love with him.” It’s a statement, not a question, and Wilson feels his mouth start to hang open as his girlfriend rolls over to look at him. Everything is starting to feel hot, dry, suffocating.
“B- I’m. That doesn’t make sense, I’m not gay,” he says, too beseeching to be convincing.
Amber shrugs, her eyes softening. “I don’t think it’s quite that clear-cut, no.”
He can’t think of what to say. He can’t think of what to think except for the sinking certainty that his black, ugly insides have finally spilled again and ruined another relationship.
“I’d never act on it,” is what he ends up saying, voice hoarse. “Please. I promise I won’t let it affect us .”
Amber’s beautiful, impenetrable eyes scan his face. All he wants is to know what she’s thinking. Where she’s going to go.
Her next question is simple and stated very carefully. “Does your love for him preclude you from loving me?”
And that makes something click for him. His eyes widen slightly and then he shakes his head.
She smiles slightly and shuffles closer to him, rests her head on that comfortable part of his upper chest. He’s frozen, as if moving will make this fragile love shatter.
“That’s all I needed to know.” She says through a kiss to his bare skin.
They’re quiet together, for a moment.
“It’s okay,” Wilson asks, then, almost silently, almost disbelieving.
“Mm-hm.” Amber nods against his shoulder. “You really should invite him over for dinner sometime.”