Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

House didn't consider himself much smarter than the average person. Sure, he could figure things out when nobody else worked hard enough to try, and he certainly liked to act as though it was some genius gift of natural intelligence, but "smarter" wasn't the word. The truth was, he just paid attention. He didn't just see; he observed. He deliberately subtracted unimportant or irrelevant information from his memory in order to make more room for the important things.

James Wilson was an important thing.

In the workplace, Wilson was easy to observe, but only on his time. When House arrived, Wilson might be there waiting for him, or he might not be. At lunch, he might let House steal his food, or he might not. If called in for a consult, he might go the extra mile to help figure out the case, or he might stay just long enough to say, "It's not cancer," and leave. Everything meant something. House had gotten good at learning his tells, learning when he was getting a cold or had stayed out too late the previous night or was falling out of love, again. He had learned to extract as much information as possible from the limited time they spent together every day. This hypersensitivity to Wilson's every idiosyncrasy bordered on obsession, but House couldn't help that his best friend just happened to often be the most interesting person in any given room. It didn’t say anything special about Wilson, rather, it said something decidedly un-special about everybody else.

Now that Wilson had moved in, House was overwhelmed with new information: how he got ready for work in the morning, what channels he picked to watch with dinner, what kinds of work he took home and what he left in the office. The mental database of Wilson-isms was constantly seeing updates, new pieces in the picture that suggested new silhouettes, new dimensions to the man that House thought he knew as closely as he could without unzipping.

This should have been disconcerting. His own best friend, whom he had known for over a decade, was an entirely different man at home than at work. The James Wilson of Princeton Plainsboro Teaching Hospital was the Boy Wonder Oncologist, the man whose patients thanked him for a terminal prognosis, the man who always had time for one more consult, one more patient’s hand held, one more family comforted. Wilson at home was not so selfless. He spent most of his time in the kitchen cooking too-elaborate meals or on the couch watching mindless nonsense. He kept odd hours, too; when House arrived home after a particularly late night of testing with the ducklings, Wilson would still be awake, puttering about in socks to keep the downstairs neighbors happy and noise-complaint-free. He woke too early as well, too early even for his elaborate morning routine. In fact, House wasn’t sure he had ever witnessed the man fully asleep, at least not during the time he had been crashing on his couch.

Indeed, it should have been disconcerting, but to House, it was compelling. Behavioral differences, insomnia, boredom, lethargy…Wilson didn’t seem sick, but House knew by now that “seeming” sick indicated very little about a patient’s actual health. If he didn’t start keeping track of symptoms now, this could develop into something very serious.

During any normal week, House might be tempted to utilize his diagnostic lackeys to help solve the problem, but Wilson was so tetchy whenever House tried to pry into his life further than he was allowed. It was better to keep it under the radar for a while, see if something’s really wrong, and only tap into his resources if absolutely necessary. If it turned out that Wilson was just getting older and moping about, it’d be easier if he never knew he was being investigated in the first place.

Flying under Wilson’s radar was easy in the past, but House knew people never changed. The longer they knew each other, the better they were bound to get at figuring each other out. Besides, if Wilson knew House was investigating him, he might pull further away, exacerbate his own symptoms by adding a psychological component. Or worse yet, he’d try and initiate some kind of meaningful conversation about it, no doubt forcing House to drop the irony and muster up one of his periodic reminders that Wilson was important, that he was a good person and that he mattered. He knew Wilson needed to hear it more than House said it, but he heard it all the time from everyone else. It wasn’t House’s fault that the only person Wilson chose to believe was him.

–

At present, Wilson felt very little. If he focused, squinting into the pebbled ceiling above House’s couch in the dark, he could feel the bruises forming on his knuckles where he had punched his desk earlier, and his eyes and head ached, but the pain was distant, like a light from underwater. The only indication that he wasn’t going completely numb was the sensation of his blood rocketing around his body, in and out of his heart. He had no idea what time it was, but it must have been some time in the middle of the night, because the apartment air was clear and silent, save for a soft, pained snore from down the hall. House.

God, House.

He’d been sniffing around lately, no doubt picking up on Wilson’s declining state before Wilson himself even knew he was less than content. Hell, there’s probably a secret whiteboard dedicated to his symptoms somewhere. It’s a good thing they lived together now, otherwise he would no doubt have a break-in to deal with, too. If only years of friendship could make him any better at working around House’s investigative obsessions. He always found a way, no matter how secretive Wilson tried to be.

After diagnosis comes treatment. If Wilson was lucky, treatment would come in the form of pranks and manipulation, and not in dosed coffee. Almost nothing was beyond House. The only medication Wilson knew he would never prescribe was a real conversation between friends. He didn’t know whether he was grateful or not to get to avoid having to admit any weakness out loud. If he could help it, Wilson preferred to keep his emptiness silent.

As though in attempts to prove him wrong, his stomach rumbled painfully. He hadn’t been eating lately, instead willing to let House steal whatever off of his plate and wait until he inevitably left the table in a hurry after some epiphany so Wilson could throw the meager leftovers away without taking a bite. If he had anything in his stomach, it was alcohol and coffee, and whatever bits of protein he forced down whenever he felt himself getting too shaky. All the cooking he had been doing with whatever House had in his cupboards and fridge went straight to House’s thievery and as Tupperware’d gifts to Wilson’s patients and their families. If he could do nothing for himself, he could always do something for someone else. That’s what mattered.

Miserable, Wilson shifted until he was laying on his side, spine pressed against the back of House’s couch. If he forced himself to forget his focus, to let go of physicality just enough, he could pretend that the solid warmth behind his back might reach an arm around to hold him, hand over his own heart.

–

Sun streaming through pink clouds, a corner of a smile, too quick. He knew that smile. He wanted to be the reason for it. An easy blush. Flashes like dancing, soft brown hair. Big, warm hands. He wanted that smile for himself. He wanted–

House woke to pain. His sleep-addled brain told him get away, panic, there’s danger, go quickly, but House didn’t move. Nearly six years couldn’t erase a lifetime of preservation instincts, but that didn’t mean he had to follow through. There was no place to escape from his pain, anyway. The comforting weight of a new nightstand bottle of Vicodin was enough to quiet the panic, and soon, enough to dampen the pain in his leg as well. As lightness spread through his body, he noticed that some of the pain hadn’t gone away, but it wasn’t in his leg. It was in his chest, right behind his sternum. A tightness, a choking, like his wires had been tangled together in an impenetrable knot. He breathed deeply, knuckling straight into the bone, trying to discern the cause for the feeling. It didn’t feel muscular, nor skeletal, nor was it in his throat or lungs. He’d have to see if it would go away on its own or get worse.

He tried to remember what he had been dreaming about. It didn’t matter. The productions of firing neurons left unsupervised didn’t interest him. They didn’t mean anything, and if they did, the implications of most of his were too confusing to stomach.

Hoping to fall back asleep, House tried to maintain a steady, deep cycle of breathing, listening hard for irregularities. He heard something like a labored inhale, a shaky exhale, but couldn’t feel anything but a smooth breath from his own lungs. It wasn’t him. He held his breath, staying very still, and sure enough, there it was again–pained, forced breathing, from down the hall. Wilson’s breathing.

House bodily hauled himself out of bed and limped to the hall as quickly as he could. If Wilson was in respiratory distress, he didn’t have time to worry about his own pain. As he got closer, the sound grew in intensity, until it sounded nearly like uncontrollable, hitching sobs. Heartbeat in his ears, House tried to pick up the pace, but as he crossed the threshold of the living room, he heard a gasp, and the sound stopped immediately. On his couch lay Wilson, hugging a pillow to his chest, apparently sound asleep and having no trouble breathing whatsoever.

“Wilson?”

No response.

“I know you’re not asleep.”

Still nothing.

“If you were really sleeping, you’d also be really snoring, unless you’ve been Body Snatch-ed and replaced with a clone who lacks your truly characteristic seasonal allergies, in which case, we’ve got bigger issues on our hands than your pretending to sleep to avoid talking to me.”

Silence. Christ alive, he was really committed this time. House would have to add “stubbornness” to the symptoms list. He turned and shuffled, canelessly, back down the hall, feeling the tightness in his chest veer towards pain again.

Chapter Text

The doors to Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital swung open at the same pitch every day, and it always hurt Wilson’s ears, but something in the chill of the air conditioning and the tightness of his shoulders and eyes tells him it would hurt him today whether he flinched away or not. He stepped, heavy, stilted, focused, and let the piercing white line cleave his head in twain, doing nothing to mitigate it. Who was he to be bothered by the sound of a door squeaking? He could think of at least six other people in his department alone who were already having worse days than himself.

He was in early today, because he had promised Cuddy he would be available for the new cancer patient his department was expecting to receive this morning. She was a fourteen-year-old girl whose IHS was beginning to refuse to cover her ever-increasing treatment costs, and whose state was only getting worse. She had been forced to move from home treatment to clinic to hospital, and Princeton-Plainsboro was the fourth hospital she had been admitted to. It was a case where Wilson’s careful talent for sympathy and compassion was certainly going to be necessary. He’s not sure whether treating her was actually the humane thing to do in this case – her family would be suffering the costs and debt long after she had passed, even if she lived another five years. Cuddy was adamant as always in these matters, however, and insisted that the oncology department do everything they can to improve and prolong her life, no matter the cost. Unlike some doctors he knew, Wilson was more committed to following hospital policy than he was to proving his own opinions right, so he was going to do whatever he could for the girl. 

Thoughts of similar cases he’d seen – families run dry by the cost of care, for great-grandmothers, infant sons, adopted siblings – filled Wilson’s head painfully as he tread the familiar path from front desk to elevator to Oncology to the office labeled Department Head. It occurred to him that the hospital might have been totally empty, or more crowded than usual, or under complete construction – he had no idea. He couldn’t remember if he had smiled at any nurses upon entering, made room for anyone in the elevator, or seen any of his department members on the way to his office. It wasn’t until he noticed the empty bottle still sitting starkly out-of-place on his otherwise clean and professional desk that he remembered he was a person, that he had to talk to other people, that he was a department head – he had meetings and schedules and a reputation to uphold as the friendly, empathetic James Wilson. 

He snatched the bottle away from his desk like it had offended him personally, and dropped it into his deskside garbage can. There was a new bag in the can, and the weight of the empty bottle pulled it starkly, obviously downward. That wouldn’t do. Wilson surveyed his office from where he could see – there were, of course, no extra papers. No extraneous garbage. It was clean, smelled nice, was always warm but not unpleasantly so. House often told him his decorating style was gauche, but he firmly posited that the gifts from former patients placed carefully around added to the feeling of safety and comfort he hoped to cultivate. The closest gifts, kept on his desk, were from successful remissions, particularly kids – he needed the reminders close by for delivering the shortest prognoses and declarations of recurrence. The mental image of the empty bottle weighed heavy, tugging insistently at his brain stem; it was the sole object of Wilson’s misery, the undeniable evidence of the instability on top of which this environment, this shrine of warmth and consolation, rested. Wilson often felt like a circus performer with a balancing act: any slip or moment of weakness, and everything would come crashing down. 

His face felt warm. It should have been easy to keep himself in line. The one drink seemed like a minor detail in the darkness and quiet of his office after hospital hours; even with the blinds drawn wide open, the room was dark and the air weighed heavy, warm and soft. Now, those same blinds ushered in the light of the cold white sunrise, and Wilson felt exposed, bared and ashamed. One drink is nothing , the voice in his head that sounded peculiarly like House whispered. Remember how you were after Sam? If that Wilson could see you now, he’d be proud you held yourself back. No bar fights, no shattered mirrors? You ought to be next in line for a Nobel peace prize.  

At some point, Wilson had sunk to the hard carpet-over-concrete floor, head in hands. He didn’t remember doing it. The room was lighter now, the sun creeping over the buildings that obscured it from his windows so early in the morning. The bottle in the trash can continued to burn in his memory. There was no way he would be able to focus this morning with the constant reminder of his failure, his weakness haunting him.

Everything else in the office was important — it all related to someone else. Every paper was a patient, and every piece of information could mean the difference between remission and death. Every trinket and bauble was a gift, from a patient or from a friend, and to use one to cover up his misery was a disrespect he couldn’t stoop to. The only things in the office that could be wasted for such a demeaning, miserable purpose were the things that belonged directly to Wilson. His suit jacket felt tight, suddenly. He remembered buying it. He remembered the price tag, the internal debate as Wilson’s love for well-made, quality clothes fought with his wallet’s weak protests. He remembered his chest full of triumph as he walked out of that department store, suit jacket folded safely into the bag he carried with him, receipt trailing out a mile long. It was, besides Wilson himself, the most worthless thing in the room. He could have donated that money, he could have put it towards a patient or towards House, or back to the hospital. Instead, he wasted it on himself. It was a testament to his selfishness. The jacket went into the trash too, crumpled over the bottle. Wilson grabbed the color-coded files from his desk organizer, shrugged on his white coat, and locked the door behind him. His chest thrummed with shame.

–

Anybody who knew House could corroborate that one didn’t see him until after eleven o’clock on the best of days. He was ostensibly a notorious night owl, committed to being late to bed and late to rise. Really, his sleep schedule varied. The pain that kept him awake one night might knock him out the next, and his damaged systems from years of drug abuse fought digestive and circulatory wars that frequently woke him up in misery. However, cultivating a system of predictability allowed House to take advantage of his unpredictability — nobody expected him until noon most days, and he could swing it a few hours either way with a bizarre enough excuse, so he was free to do as he pleased with his extra time. 

With Wilson crashing on his couch, the options narrowed somewhat. Sometimes, he really did sleep in, only to be rudely awakened by Wilson’s hair dryer. Other days, he laid in bed, warming in the sunlight, listening for the beautiful domestic grumbles of his best friend just-waking-up, waiting for the minute he could grouchily pretend he had been woken up by Wilson’s puttering about. On others still, he pretended to snooze until he heard Wilson’s expensive engine start and pull away, leaving House to his devious machinations. 

It was a morning most closely resembling the very latter, when Wilson made himself all-too-presentable and hightailed it out earlier than usual, that House knew his opportunity to investigate had arrived. Any onlooker, not knowing the bizarre complexities of House and Wilson’s relationship, might have questioned what sort of husband or roommate took immediately to the bedded couch, pulling up wrinkled sheets and sniffing pillowcases. But anything could be a clue. Any irregularity had to be noted — all too often had House’s diagnostic team missed something extremely minor which ended up being the deciding factor in the patient’s life or death. If Wilson had changed shampoos, if he had slept more bundled-up than usual, if he was chewing on his pillowcase, it could be important. 

It was the pillowcase in particular which caught House’s eye. The silver satin — a relic of Wilson’s house, a luxury the man’s delicate constitution could of course not afford to leave behind — held every stain and discoloration, and it often showed streaks of residual hair gel on the nights that Wilson was too tired to wash it out before sleeping. The marks from this morning — still wet, House felt — were splotchy, soaking, and in the evident shape of tear marks. A taste test confirmed: Wilson’s tear ducts were overacting, either by crying or by some other condition. If it had just been his allergies, these marks would be there every morning, and House had never noticed them before. No, these were definitely new, and newness indicated a symptom. He’d add it to the list. 

Whether via the association with Wilson’s suspicious malady or through some other avenue, the thought of alcohol crept into House’s mind. There were beers in the fridge, a new case that had mysteriously appeared the same day Wilson had on his doorstep, a pure coincidence that House had been careful not to mention. Wilson was something of a pet alcoholic, though he was nowhere near the level of addiction he accused House of. House felt his face heat at the endearing memories he kept of a very drunk Wilson — it could be said that he was more prone to physical violence, but a more accurate statement might be that he was more physical in general. More than once, House had found himself on the receiving end of the advances of a very giggly, smiley, cuddly oncologist, and though he wasn’t exactly complaining, he often had to feign too much pain or stress or orneriness to reciprocate, lest the poor man succumb to his overactive sense of guilt in the morning. Ever since he hit the age of thirty, Wilson couldn’t have a single drink without also downing the equivalent fluid ounces in regret later — something about loyalty to his wives, or his morals, or his sobriety, or what-have-you. The only way to mitigate such a breakdown was for House to get drunker than he was, and to be such a miserable mess in the morning that Wilson’s caring, neediness-needing instincts kicked in enough to distract him from himself. 

Wilson was also conversationally uninhibited while drunk, prone to sharing details out of whom a sober man could not be waterboarded. It made for great fun, even when he wasn’t being a manipulative bitch and hiding the most asinine things from House. It would work just fine as an investigative tool. House knew what he had to do.

—

The day passed in a blur. Wilson’s headache never waned; it seemed to grow in intensity every time he thought surely it couldn't get any worse , like his body was only trying to spite him. The new patient’s family had taken it upon themselves to camp outside her clean room — she was severely immunocompromised, but that wouldn’t stop them from trying to get in every ten minutes, refusing to understand that a cough or sneeze from any of them could mean death for her. To make matters worse, they had taken an immediate liking to Wilson, who couldn’t really hear what he was saying as he was saying it. The script came so easily, and he had been counting on a quick “Hello, I’m the head of Oncology, and we’re going to do everything we can for your daughter”. Instead, they had asked if he would personally oversee all of her treatment, a request which he was incapable of refusing. Even if Cuddy would allow it, his conscience never would, so he scrubbed up and sterilized every ninety minutes just to check up on her. 

By the time he felt he had done enough to earn the trip home, it was dark outside, and the temperature was dropping. He couldn’t walk out with his white coat — it’d be an obvious invitation for question-asking, something he was not prepared to deal with now — and the trash had already been taken out of his office, so he rolled his sleeves back down and buttoned them at the wrist, then grabbed his things and began the walk home. To House’s place. Home. Whichever. 

The air bit at his cheekbones and snuck down the collar of his shirt, but Wilson reminded himself staunchly that you deserve this, it’s the least you could put yourself through, at least you’ve got clothes at all. He passed a tent near the road, and saw two figures silhouetted dimly against the flimsy plastic, one adult-sized, the other clearly a young child. His throat hurt. He had no cash on him, nothing to give, no way to help. 

He rolled his sleeves back up and walked on.

Chapter Text

It was shaping up to be a perfect night to snoop around. House had driven his bike home, and Wilson had shown up on foot a few hours later, so the car they now shared was still at the hospital. The fact that Wilson had walked, sans fancy jacket, was troubling — he clearly had something on his mind, probably his imminent severe illness that he was hiding for unknown reasons — but not so troubling that House found it difficult to celebrate that they now had no choice but to spend the evening together. It had been difficult to get Wilson to spend willing time with him since he had shown up miserable on the doorstep, and if House had been a different man, he might have regretted that their first real chance for quality time was undermined by the ulterior motives which necessitated it in the first place. House was not, and had no intention of being, a different man. Not even of any kind. So he, carefully, two at a time with his cane, extracted four beers from the fridge — he only planned on drinking one, but bringing an odd number to the coffee table invited suspicion, and it was better in matters like this to be safe rather than sorry — and set them down on the coffee table, arranging them casually, just-so.

Wilson was on the couch, sheets and comforter drawn haphazardly over the back so he could sit normally, following House’s motions with quiet, tired eyes. He was pushed back against the cushions, shoulders strung up tightly, and it was clear he wasn’t feeling well. However he thought he’d hide this from House, he wasn’t doing a very good job. In what appeared to be a subconscious motion, he dragged the fingernails of his left hand across the thigh of his wool dress pants, back and forth, back and forth. The gray skies outside had begun to open up and drizzle, a stark contrast from the morning’s cold sunshine, and the red band that scrolled along the top edge of the muted television declared that a thunderstorm watch was in effect for the area, until 3 AM the next morning. God, it’d be a drag if the power went out. Nothing was more useful for manipulative conversation than a constant avenue for distraction. 

Feeling like a housewife getting an evening of TV dinners and cellophane ready for her emotionally absent husband, House pulled today’s Vicodin bottle out of the pocket of his jacket and set it upright on the table, next to the beers he had laid on “his” side. The rattle seemed to awaken something in Wilson, who sat up and reached for one of the beers — reached across the way, grabbed the open bottle in front of House . So he was expecting some trickery, after all. He should know at this point not to believe that House would be so simple as to set the (likely secretly dosed) beverage that he wanted Wilson to drink right in front of him — but in this case, it didn’t matter. All four of the present beers were dosed in some way, but he didn’t think the alcohol in beer counted as much of a secret. As he mused on a world where alcohol was treated like caffeine, House watched the bend of Wilson’s wrist as he brought the glass rim to his lips for a short pull — heard the sound of his throat working — heard the sigh and the clink as he set it down. The silence in the room forced him to meet Wilson’s gaze, which was directed right his way, much more alert and awake than it had been a moment ago. 

“What?”

Wilson blinked, cleared his throat, but didn’t say anything.

Trying to be sly, to start the conversation off right, House said, “Something wrong with your drink? There’s more in the fridge, but since that one’s open already, one of us has to drink it, and if it’s not going to be you, it’ll have to be me. And I know how you feel about lip-to-bottle-to-lip contact.”

Wilson sighed, finally breaking eye contact to look somewhere far behind House’s left shoulder. “House, you didn’t drug it. I know you didn’t.”

“I take offense to the implication that you’d be able to tell either way! I’ll have you know I studied at the Harvard for acting.” Not his best, but the small smile that tugged at Wilson’s lips and the way he unsuccessfully tried to fight it meant it had landed perfectly anyways.

“The Harvard for acting ?”

“ Yes , and I’ll show you my degrees if you ask very nicely.”

A soft huff, maybe a chuckle, then the smile disappeared and the moment was over. Wilson looked down at the beer in his hand with a mild surprise, like he didn’t know how it had gotten back in his grasp. The corner of his mouth was tugged now at an angle that suggested a mild guilt — but this was only his first drink. The only reason Wilson would already be feeling guilty about it so early in the evening was if it wasn’t his first drink — had he been drinking last night? This morning? At work, heaven forbid? Or was it simply just on his mind? Or was the guilt a side effect of a craving? The most abundant vitamins in beer were B-complex vitamins, and a craving could indicate a deficiency — but the chance that a riboflavin deficiency would manifest as a craving for fermented grain was small, and Wilson was known to drink when stressed. It’s much more likely that his miserable substance-use guilt complex was overacting. Still, this early in the game, no theory could be discounted. 

Finally, after a silence that felt unintentionally weighted, Wilson cleared his throat. “Did you want to watch something?” He asked, nodding his head towards the television. 

Not looking away from Wilson’s face, House said, “We are watching something.”

“No, you’re watching me watch something.”

—

Wilson was tired. His outer calves were roundly scolding him for having walked home, and the hair on the back of his neck was beginning to stand up from the proximity between himself and his best friend. It was obvious that House was attempting something — some meddling, investigating, manipulation, or other. He always was. Wilson didn’t care. He recognized the beers that lay before him; they definitely were from the ones he had brought alongside his suitcase that day she decided she didn’t want him anymore. And why would she? Look at him. He was on his friend’s couch, a sagging, rough-hewn relic that doubled as his current bed, holding a beer already slick with condensation from the fevered humidity that was beginning to fill the room as the skies split open and thunder crashed, feeling sorry for himself, about to get drunk. Dealing with said friend’s obsessive manipulative tendencies, playing into them, even, because it was an easy excuse to get a little too drunk and pass out, messy, where no one could blame him for it. 

Still. The beer was cold, and went down painfully, and settled warmly in the guilty tangle of his chest. He could feel bad about it later, maybe wear a more expensive suit jacket to work tomorrow to throw away and make up for it. Maybe if he wastes a thousand dollars he can earn himself two beers. Or the right to not feel so bad that it doesn’t feel so bad to have House in his face, talking to him, giving him all his attention like this.

— 

“So… have you been getting into anything new lately?” House asked, leaning forward onto his elbows, close enough to smell his aftershave. It would be easier to start small and find a handhold, something he could dig into that would reveal more information. Wilson only glanced in his direction, took another swig of beer, and shrugged, returning his gaze to the television, still muted. There’s that stubbornness. While a trait House normally adored in the other man, Wilson’s stubbornness sure was hard to love when it got in the way of a good old-fashioned all-American secret invasive diagnostic investigation of one’s best friend. It might take a more delicate approach to get Wilson to open up tonight — he was clearly strung up about something. His eyes were glassy, and reflected the light from the TV; the image was striking, Wilson’s profile equal parts stern and graceful as always, and House’s thoughts were immediately interrupted by the return of that lancing ache behind his sternum, like his xiphoid process had been snapped off. Hm. Xiphoidalgia could be the result of chest trauma, but acid reflux was more likely, especially at his age, and he hadn’t had any inexperienced CPR performed on him lately, to his knowledge. 

He shook himself mentally. His own symptoms could wait — he knew from experience they wouldn’t subside, whether he wanted them to or not. Besides, his pain was hardly a diagnostic mystery — he was old, disabled, opioid-addicted, and probably slept with too many pillows, or didn’t drink enough water, or eat enough celery, or any other miscellaneous infinitely nuanced thing people loved to blame his pain on other than the huge mass of muscle missing from his leg. 

Wilson still seemed entirely uninterested in conversation, and his first beer was nearly empty by now. Fine. If that’s how he wanted to do this, House would have to cut straight to the chase. “How have you been feeling lately? You know, after…everything.” 

Wilson didn’t turn to face him, but the vein popped in his forehead, and he downed the rest of his beer. “I’ve been fine.”

“Just fine?”

“Well, did you expect me to be worse or better than ‘just fine’? ‘Cause I’ll know what answer to fake to end this conversation if you tell me what you’ve predicted.” Sakes, he was sensitive. Maybe he was in pain — B-complex vitamin deficiency could cause nerve issues. Time to prod.

“I honestly thought you’d be better, since this is your third divorce and all. You’re basically a professional at this point. You ought to write a memoir.”

Nothing. Hm. Keep going.

“You could call it The Married Man’s Guide to Unmarriage. Or Tales From the Doghouse . Or, no, Awake on the Couch. Huh, you sleep on my couch now, don’t you? Does that make me your fourth w—”

“Could you quit?” Oh! There it is. House blinked, twice, cartoonishly, wishing he could make a “dink dink” sound to accompany it. 

Accompanying it with an air like a confused dog and a corresponding head-tilt, House said, “I thought you were doing fine? ” 

“House, I’m obviously not fine! My wife, my third wife, because I couldn’t keep the other two either , kicked me out, after telling me she’d been cheating on me the whole time! How am I supposed to feel, other than pathetic and—, and—, and unworthy?” He broke off, chest heaving, breath beginning to stutter. Damn it. That wasn’t how this was supposed to go at all — House was concerned with how Wilson was feeling, sure, but not emotionally . The guy was a romantic, hopelessness and all , and the whole rigmarole that followed every divorce was beginning to get repetitive. He’d get sad, buy a new cookbook, get an ill-advised haircut (and still look good, somehow) and a different sleep medication. He’d pick up more hours and join a new hospital admin committee. He’d cry, too — he claimed he “wasn’t a crier”, but everybody lies. It was boring. Predictable. And most importantly, it was irrelevant to the differential. 

Wilson picked up the second beer, the one in front of himself this time, and shot a glare at House when he realized there was no bottle opener in reach. He moved as if he were going to get up, but quickly sat back down, head bowed, hand to his stomach. Nausea. Added to the list. House picked up his cane with a theatrical toss from hand to hand, and braced himself to standing. 

The floor creaked under House as he walked to the kitchen. The wind was louder now, whipping the curtains against the kitchen window back and forth. Why was the window open? House quickly latched it shut, scrambled in the silverware drawer for the bottle opener, and made his way back to the couch. Wilson hadn’t made any noise the whole time, and now, House saw why:

He was asleep, perfectly still, second beer still unopened in his hand.

Chapter Text

In the thirty-two seconds between the first sound of House’s cane within earshot and the violent opening swing of the door to her office, Cuddy steeled herself. It had been a long morning already, what with the power going out in the dead of the night and the phone calls and the text messages in the immediate scramble to utilize the emergency generators to keep the hospital running. It was just her luck that even her administrative maintenance staff felt the need to ask her opinion on every little thing — she was certain that the question “Should we keep all our patients who are reliant on electrical machinery alive?” had a simple enough answer that she didn’t need to be consulted, but what did she know? Still, having this momentary total control over the energy allocation to all of PPTH gave her the opportunity to mess with House, which was always welcome. He had taken his last altercation with a clinic patient as an opportunity to skip clinic hours for the past few weeks, citing a desire to not “cause any more fuss” as the reason, and on top of that, Cuddy could swear he had been moving the furniture in her office ever-so-slightly every few days. The bruises on her hips and shins from running into polished wooden corners fueled her ire, and she was certain the results of that ire were exactly what House was now barging into her office to complain about — she had figured he could stand to diagnose in the dark. His office and adjoining meeting room had large windows, anyways, and with all the money she set aside to cover his legal issues, it’s essentially a fair trade, isn’t it?

She struggled to suppress her amusement at House’s anger as he stood in the door, observing that the lights were working perfectly well in this room. “Was there something you needed, or did you just want to stare at me while I’m working?”

House huffed, but it lacked the usual petulance. “Don’t feign ignorance! You know exactly what you did. The cane means I can’t walk; it doesn’t mean I can’t see. Isn’t it workplace discrimination to power every department besides mine?”

Cuddy smiled patronizingly, eyebrows arched. “If you’re not blind, then you should be able to see just fine without the lights. Bye, House.” It always took a few attempts at a goodbye for him to actually leave; better to start sooner rather than later or he’d be here all day, and while that appealed to a deeply buried unprofessional part of her, she really did have work to do.

Instead of planting his feet and arguing further like she had expected, House’s brow furrowed, and his hand went instinctively to his thigh to massage the missing muscle there. His grip on his cane was white-knuckled, and it occurred to her how deep the bags under his eyes were getting. While House didn’t look particularly “kempt” on the best of days, he seemed worse today somehow. He was staring, not down the front of Cuddy’s shirt, but out the window behind her, at the continuing storm. 

“...House?” 

At the sound of her voice, he seemed to remember himself, and cleared his throat, ripping his hand from his thigh in a motion that he clearly thought was subtle but was anything but. He looked back at Cuddy, searching her face, then opened his mouth like he was going to speak, closed it, and turned and stalked out of the room. 

Huh. She hadn’t even had the chance to explain her reasons for keeping his lights off. She hoped he didn’t take it seriously, or as anything more than one of their usual pranks. He was only supposed to be left in the dark literally, not figuratively.

–

In retrospect, House might have come on a little strong so early in the morning. First, he had opened the door to Diagnostics far quicker and more loudly than he had anticipated, and startled his fellows, who sat in the dim room talking casually, clearly not expecting him in the office so early. Then, he had taken straight to the whiteboard without a word to assuage the wide-eyed, tight-mouthed stares they were giving him, practically boring a hole through the surface of it in his haste to write down the list of symptoms. He had offered no explanation for the lack of power, and no declaration of whose symptoms these were or what they were doing on the whiteboard. Evidently, the slow turn and raised eyebrow at his fellows was not a clear enough indication of “get to diagnosing”, and House took a moment to sigh and massage his temples. He breathed through his nose and out of his mouth, more to attempt a clearer head through the pain than anything, and tried again. 

“Patient is white male, mid-30s, history of infidelity, romanticism, panty-peeling, poor fashion sense, and a heart that bleeds so indiscriminately it might as well not bleed at all. Presents with sleep issues, behavioral differences, lethargy, shortness of breath, stubbornness, nasolacrimal duct overactivity, reduced appetite, and weight loss, likely from said reduced appetite. Go.”

“Wait, what? Who’s this? Cuddy got you a new case?” Chase piped up, always the first to speak. 

Cameron scoffed lightly and shot back, “Don’t you think he’d have told us if he wanted us to know? All of those symptoms can be attributed to stress, except the shortness of breath and tear ducts. So, what links lungs and tear ducts?” 

“Almost every kind of cold, allergy, or sinus infection that’s possible? That tells us nothing. Besides, you can’t just ignore every symptom besides the ones you want to look at.” Foreman shifted in his chair, leaning forward to read the board better, backlit as it was by the windows behind it. “But you’re right. All of these symptoms could mean absolutely nothing, or at least something extremely minor. Why are we doing this?”

Sakes alive. It was usually nice, usually necessary, to have a team to bounce ideas around and off of, but there were far too many occasions where House wanted nothing more than to tear his hair out at the sheer uselessness they proved capable of. They didn’t need to know anything about this case — in fact, if he got any more specific, he was in imminent danger of a moral lecture from Cameron and a refusal to help from Foreman. He had already known it was risky to bring anyone else in on this case, considering its nature, but he was at a loss for ideas. His conversation (or, really, lack thereof) with Wilson last night had been decidedly un-illuminating, and he knew from experience that diagnoses were not exactly something that could be procrastinated. Additionally, the longer he took to figure it out, the likelier the chance that Wilson would catch onto him and become all miserable and secretive over his personal life. . 

“If it was ‘absolutely nothing’”, he said, imitating Foreman nasally, “would we be looking at it? Zebras, not horses, remember? Now, say something useful, or I’ll tell Cuddy you asked for your clinic hours to count as volunteer work.”

“It might help if we knew a little more about the patient?” Cameron suggested lightly. “How did you get this case? Is it someone important to the hospital, and that’s why you can’t reveal their identity?”

House hummed, chewing on the inside of his cheek. “Something like that.”

Foreman stood abruptly, making his way to stand in front of the whiteboard. He pulled a purple dry-erase marker from his inside jacket pocket and began to cross out certain words: romanticism, poor fashion sense, and stubbornness. He erased panty-peeling altogether, with the side of his fist and a scoff of disdain. Before he could do any more damage, House yanked the marker out of his hand and said, “I thought we just discussed not ignoring the symptoms you didn’t like?”

“That marker’s not hospital property! I bought it with my own money, since you wouldn’t let me use yours."

“And you can have it back if you give me three plausible diagnoses, one of which must be un-idiotic.”

“There’s nothing to diagnose! Whoever it is probably just has a bad cold, based on these symptoms. And you would never accept a case with a simple answer, so you obviously found something about it interesting, only you’re not telling us the interesting part, so you can hold it over our heads.” 

Cameron spoke up, having moved to stand around the whiteboard as well. “Actually, I don’t think so.”

Foreman looked at her, bewilderment and frustration fighting in equal measures to overtake his practiced neutral expression. “What? Why not?”

“Well,” she pointed to the crossed-out ‘symptoms’, “these aren’t exactly qualities you pick up on a person you met through medical records. My bet is that this is a friend, someone House knows, knows well, and that’s why he doesn’t want to give us too much information.”

From the table where he had been flicking his pen back and forth in his fingers, Chase said, “That might be true, but that doesn’t explain why the symptoms are so mild. It could be House’s own mother and this wouldn’t be enough for him to put her through the diagnostics process.”

Laughing, Foreman quipped, “You think House’s mother is a white male in her mid-30s?”

Cameron was still staring at the whiteboard, like she expected the answer to appear if she just looked long enough. “No, but it might be someone else House cares about.”

House just watched. Maybe he was losing his touch. He could attribute his failure to manipulate Wilson to their years of friendship or his mysterious ailment, but there was no reason the fellows should be able to see through him like this. They were getting far too close, and there was no way to stop them now. 

“Like who? Cuddy?”

“Are you kidding? If Cuddy had asked House to evaluate her, he’d be shouting it from the balcony by now. It’d be in the newspaper.”

“Wait, is it Wilson?” Cameron said, voice raised nearly an octave. Damn it. The jig was up. Or perhaps not — there was still one tried-and-true conversational roadblock when it came to discussing Wilson.

“Are you assuming I’m worried about Wilson because I don’t want him to fall ill on the night of our wedding? It truly would be a shame if he were too unwell to abuse our mattress as thoroughly as I’ve asked him to.” There. Just uncomfortable enough, just ridiculous enough. The House equivalent of a poisonous frog’s neon colors — a topical warning sign, keep out, don’t pry, you won’t get anywhere.

“It is Wilson!” Chase exclaimed, far too excitedly. Damn it, again. This was going nowhere and fast. 

Foreman sneakily wrenched his marker from House’s grasp, shooting him a deeply unimpressed look. “You want us to diagnose your best friend’s nonexistent problem? You two have a domestic or something and now you can’t talk to him, so you talk to us instead?”

“Never took you for such a rule-follower,” House spit back, on the defensive. “What happened to the good old days of our brilliant and conniving schemes? Maybe I want Wilson to think I think something’s wrong with him, and you’re all just pawns in the game.” 

Crossing her arms, Cameron said, “House, we can’t diagnose a coworker. I thought you more than anybody knew you can’t be unbiased about someone you have a personal relationship with?”

“Maybe the circumstances have changed! I still haven’t heard a single theory from any of you. Have I missed an email, or am I still the Head of Diagnostics?”

“You can’t use your administrative power to make us solve your personal problems! Why can’t you just talk to Wilson about this?” Even Chase was digging in his heels, it seemed. House was quickly losing this conversation. Christ, his head hurt. The rain outside seemed to have changed its mind since this morning, forgoing its polite patter for something more resembling the oppressive downpour of last night’s storm, and it struck the windowpanes forcefully, making his temples throb. His wrist was bent and ached from supporting his cane, and the reason for said cane was loudly complaining against the humidity and pressure, the way it always did when it rained, or got too cold, or got too warm, or really anything at all. He reached into his pocket, and found no Vicodin bottle. It must be on his desk. He hoped to hell it was, otherwise, he really was losing his touch.

Someone continued to speak — maybe Cameron? — but House ignored them, turning on his heel and stepping without a word into his own unilluminated office, where the blinds were determinedly drawn. 

—

Cameron stopped, mouth still open, watching House disappear into the darkness of his office. She had expected him to argue, to make a joke, to change the subject, but to ignore her and leave? Clearly something had gone wrong in their conversation — she thought back to the exchange, tried to recall his exact reaction when they had realized who their mystery patient was. Nothing seemed particularly out of the ordinary, other than the fact that House was apparently serious about wanting a diagnosis out of the symptoms he had presented. It was extremely unlikely that she’d get a genuine explanation out of him, especially not now that he had retreated so abruptly, but the other party involved in this confusion was infinitely easier to talk to. 

She turned to Chase and Foreman, who were now playing tic-tac-toe on the abandoned whiteboard. “I’ll be back,” she said, but they didn’t appear to even hear her. With a sigh, she made her way out of Diagnostics and journeyed down the hall to the door with Wilson’s name on it. 

No response came when she knocked, but she and Wilson were becoming better friends as of late, and Cameron was nothing if not forward, so she turned the handle and stepped right inside. 

“Dr. Wilson? I wanted to ask you about Hou-” She stopped. There was nobody in the office, no patients, no families, and no Wilson. That wasn’t too out of the ordinary, was it? Maybe he was with a patient in their room, or down in the clinic. She stopped to affectionately brush some lint off of one of the many teddy bears displayed about the office, and closed the door behind her as she made her way to the elevator. 

When the doors of the elevator opened, she was almost bowled over by someone hurrying out of it. They stopped to face her with a “Sorry!” on their lips, and revealed they were none other than Lisa Cuddy herself. Cameron felt her cheeks warm slightly. She hoped it didn’t show. 

“Dr. Cameron! Have you seen House this morning?”

“Yeah, I have, but he doesn’t have us doing anything yet. In fact, he seemed kind of…”

“Weird?” Cuddy’s eyebrows arched, perfectly shaped as always. 

“Something like that. He wanted us to diagnose someone without telling us who it was, and when we figured out it was Wilson, he practically ran with his tail between his legs.” 

Cuddy seemed understanding, but not altogether surprised, as if she was in on whatever this was. “He’s trying to diagnose Wilson?”

“I think so? Do you know anything about what they’re up to? I mean, there’s no way he’s serious, right? The symptoms were complete nonsense anyway.”

“If I knew, I’d tell you, but I haven’t even seen Wilson today, and House is unmanageable as ever.” 

“Right. Well, if I find out anything, I’ll let you know.”

“Thanks, Allison.” Cuddy smiled warmly, inclining her head just-so, and Cameron’s stomach twisted at the sound of her first name. She had to go, now. In a move that aimed for ‘professionally efficient’ but probably landed somewhere around ‘hastily flustered’, she sped into the elevator and abused the close-door button. 

Once downstairs, she made a beeline for the reception desk. “Good morning! I was wondering if you guys had seen Dr. Wilson yet today? I would page him, but you know how he gets when he’s busy.” 

With a knowing smile and a nod, a nurse whose name-card read Sandra clicked around a few times on her computer, then looked up and said, “He definitely signed in this morning, and according to this, he hasn’t left yet, unless he’s been kidnapped unannounced by a certain diagnostician.” 

“Alright, good to know. Thanks, Sandra,” Cameron smiled brightly, emphasizing the nurse’s name, pretending that she knew it already. It never hurt to act as though one was friendlier with certain people than one actually was. 

One brisk and nosy walk through Oncology, one approachable and empathetic walk through Pediatrics, and one unauthorized gallivant to the OR later, Cameron was ready to give up. Wilson was nowhere to be found. It’s possible she was just coincidentally in the wrong places at the wrong time, but she was beginning to give up her belief in coincidences. If Wilson wanted to be found, he would be. 

—

Wilson wasn’t sure whether to be more grateful or more hurt that apparently nobody had come trying to find him. He wasn’t sure he wanted to be found. The locker room was empty at this time of day, because all the functioning, productive doctors were hard at work by now. There was nobody to witness the way Wilson had stripped, slowly, methodically, stepped into a shower stall, turned the handle to a deliberately painful degree of heat, and slid down the tile wall to bury his head in his hands. Water flowed in quickly-evaporating rivers down through his hair and over his face, getting in his eyes, his nose. He didn’t care. His fingers were beginning to prune, and he felt dizzy from the heat and steam, but he was so tired. Every muscle in his body felt weak and heavy, and he wasn’t sure how much of the flush in his face was from the heat and how much was from the oppressive shame that churned in his stomach and made tears threaten to fall. What was he doing in here? Wasting time, wasting water. Someone was probably looking for him, some patient, that poor girl and her family, and here he was, driving Cuddy’s bills higher. If he could just control himself, be responsible and disciplined, do the right thing, he wouldn’t be here. He’d be doing something useful, he’d be doing his job. That was his problem, really. Letting his own issues make him useless, never being where he was needed at the right time. Selfishness. 

He ought to turn the water off. He needed to turn the water off, if the sudden rush of freezing cold was any indication. He had been in here too long. The cold water burned more than the hot water had, sending shocking chills down his spine, and every part of him wanted to stand up, to turn it off, to dry off and dress and be a person again, but he was so tired. He didn’t move.

Chapter Text

Having sentenced the fellows to a long night of testing for their latest case (with threats of additional tedious responsibilities if he was bothered for anything less than full cardiac arrest until morning), House raced through the slowly drying streets on his bike. To his disappointment, Wilson had roundly refused his offers of a ride to the hospital this morning, opting instead to walk in the rain as some kind of sick penance for leaving the car parked there overnight. All things considered, House supposed he likely could have tried a little harder to circumvent this — a long walk in the cold, damp air was not exactly what he’d have prescribed at this point in the diagnostic process  — but in a toss-up between making Wilson sicker and making Wilson suspicious, he’d take the former any day. The way he saw it, the severity of the symptoms inversely correlated to the difficulty of the diagnosis, so he was really doing Wilson a favor. 

The result, as an added bonus, was that he got to take himself home whenever he wanted, instead of forcing Wilson to stick around long after all his work was done to wait for House and his ridiculous schedule. House could have some extra time to pretend to focus on his current case (a particularly well-developed, oddly-presenting, and thus-undetected case of simple pneumonia — but just because he knew the answer after a minute with the patient’s file didn’t mean his fellows had figured it out yet, and he was happy for a mystery with which to distract them from the morning’s fiasco), and Wilson could have some extra time to do…whatever he had been doing avoiding him all day. House hadn’t seen him since the morning, before they both left, and as he rounded the corner onto his street, he privately hoped to share some company before sleeping tonight. 

Though the car was parked neatly outside on the street, the lights were all off inside, and silence threaded itself into House’s mind as he stepped inside and kicked off his shoes. Wilson was clearly home, but making deliberate attempts to appear disappeared. It was a telltale sign, a relic that House remembered from previous shared-living arrangements: it wasn’t unheard of for Wilson to have bad days, to need time to himself after a beloved patient’s recurrence or death. Still, it certainly threw a wrench in the diagnostic process. It was a delicate situation — bother Wilson for more clues, and risk riling him up when he was in a vulnerable state (he shook his head, mentally hitting himself to clear the images that arose from that particular wording), or leave him alone, emotionally (good) and physically (bad)? 

A sharp jab of pain made his decision for him — he needed to lay down, now, Wilson be damned. House booked it gingerly (an oxymoronic feat, but he was good at those) to his bedroom, sat on the bed, threw off his jeans and coat, and turned to lay on his side, viciously massaging the damaged muscle of his thigh. Christ alive, barometric pressure really does a number on him, doesn’t it? He felt, eyes closed, for the nightstand bottle of Vicodin, and decided he deserved a little treat, in the form of four pills. After swallowing them dry, relishing with a sort of sick relief the odd burn and discomfort in his throat, he pulled the sheets over himself, and reached to turn off the lamp. Wilson could wait until the morning. Surely he’d get no worse in that time.

—

He got worse in that time. 

House woke with a start to a not unfamiliar sound from the room adjacent — he had spent enough delightful drunken evenings with Wilson to know what his miserably dramatic vomiting sounded like. That meant whatever Wilson had, it must be spreading, must be infecting him further. House felt a little sick himself at the thought — this was moving faster and faster, and he still had very few leads or ideas of what could be happening. 

He let out a forceful breath and forced himself to stare in the general direction of the pebbled ceiling through the darkness, forced himself to try and think it through. Lungs, sleep, ducts, stomach. Stomach, sleep, ducts, lungs. Lips, eyes, hands. Sakes, focus. Images of Wilson’s glassy, glittering, solid-yet-soft profile from the night before mixed with horrifying scenes from House’s worst cases, all the things he knew could and would go wrong if he was too late to the diagnosis. There lay Wilson, gums bleeding, emaciated, bruised, seizing, hysterical, catatonic. The ache in House’s chest seemed to swell with the clarity of the images; this is why he made a point of not meeting patients. He’d lose his touch if he lost the ability to be objective, and though only privately, he could admit that objectivity had almost never been a witness to his relationship with Wilson. It was impossible to stay removed from someone who had given so much of himself to House. 

He wondered if any of Wilson’s wives felt this way — entirely incapable of not letting their feelings for the man color their decisions concerning him. If so, why would anyone let themself divorce him? Kick him out? He might make far too much of a habit of drugging Wilson’s coffee, and forgo all other routes of cheering-up in favor of pranks instead, but House couldn’t imagine a series of events that would cause him to reach the conclusion that leaving Wilson behind and alone would ever be the right decision to make. In fact, he couldn’t imagine anyone making that decision, not unless…

…Unless they had another reason, one having nothing to do with Wilson altogether. 

House had a lead.

Chapter Text

Wilson sighed as he watched House chase after him in the rearview mirror, hurrying out the door far earlier in the morning than he usually would be awake. He knew that House knew he’d slow and stop for him, and as much as Wilson bitched about it, he’d never actually drive away and leave House to walk on his own, at least not if he knew it was the only option. Besides, the past few days had been tough to say the least, and though House was snooping around, he at least hadn’t done anything to specifically make Wilson feel worse in that time. He owed it to the guy to give him a ride, especially with how tired he looked. In fact, House seemed wired in the way he only got when he hadn’t slept at all, which meant Wilson was in for either the diagnostic discovery of a lifetime, or the grumpiest, most irritable car passenger he could imagine.

Whichever the case, he wasn’t sure he had the energy for it, which is why he breathed a sigh of relief when all House said upon opening the door was an amiable (if slightly breathless) “Thanks”, and they sped off into the dawn together.

Wilson didn't have much time to wonder at House's odd behavior, because, as was just his luck, no more than three minutes of silence passed before House wound up to speak. Wilson instinctively braced himself, gripping the steering wheel a little tighter.

"I know what's wrong with you," House said.

Before Wilson could begin to ask what the hell he was talking about, he continued, "Well, I don't know what's wrong, exactly, but I know how's wrong. Or who's wrong, at least. I know something's wrong, and I've got a place to start."

"Does this have to do with your case?" Wilson could feel House's eyes on him, but kept his determinedly on the road.

"In a manner of speaking, yes. It has to do with your case as well."

That threw him for a loop. "What, the Nanticoke girl? Is there something we're not doing for her that we should be?"

"What? No, I don't care about her. And neither do you, I think. Or if you do, you shouldn't, because there are more pressing matters at hand."

"Oh, come on, what could possibly be considered more pressing to me than that? And if you say your current patient, I'm going to throw something at you. I have my own department to run, you know."

"I know." House cleared his throat, turning to look out the window briefly, as if steeling himself. "It has to do with your split with Julie."

Wilson nearly choked on his own spit. "With Julie? What about her?"

"You've been acting differently ever since you...came under my observation, to put it lightly."

Wilson sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. He wasn't prepared for this conversation, not on the ride before work in the first few hours of the day. Still, who was he to assume House cared what he was prepared for? Better to just bite the bullet and deflect as much as he could, and hightail it away as soon as they arrived at the hospital. "Well, I'm glad you finally started paying attention."

"I've been paying attention the whole time." House sounded suddenly sincere, and Wilson dared a glance to find his eyes soft, tired, yet genuine. House looked almost hurt. Wait, was he being serious? Was House trying to have a heart-to-heart right now?

Wilson inhaled, aiming for less 'miserable sigh' and more 'calming deep breath' now. These conversations were always tricky; even for those as close to House as Wilson was, emotions were oft-uncharted territory. It would do to tread lightly, not make assumptions or generalizations that would threaten House's idea of security in this friendship. Internally kicking himself for caring so much, Wilson said, "What have you noticed?"

It was the right thing to ask. House immediately began rattling off a list of symptoms, clear indicators of Wilson's worsening depression. Was he really so obvious, or was House just paying attention like he had said? Either way, it was almost nice that someone had noticed, that someone wanted to help. He wasn't sure that House could do anything for him -- it was largely Wilson's own fault things were this way, after all -- but the thought that he wasn't alone made something warm unfold in his chest.

"So, obviously, you're not okay," House concluded, "And I think I know the reason."

"You think the reason is Julie? That I'm acting this way because she kicked me out?"

"I mean, why would she split with you in the first place? She didn't hate you, wasn't unhappy, wasn't cheating...It would make no sense for a rational person to leave behind a lucrative relationship for no reason. So, there has to be a reason."

The warmth in Wilson's chest was replaced unfairly quickly with a sour sinking guilt. "There was a reason, House, you know that. There always is."

"That's what I'm saying! She wouldn't just make you leave, unless she had something to hide, that she didn't want to expose you to! Except she did, and now it's spread!"

Ah. A wrench thrown. "House, what are you saying?"

"I'm saying that Julie gave you whatever you're sick with. I knew something about your split was funny, and she's got to be the missing piece."

"Sick with?" Wilson raised an eyebrow as he hit the blinker and turned into the hospital parking garage.

"Yes, Wilson, sick with, that's typically how a differential diagnosis concludes. With a diagnosis. Or did that list of symptoms not alarm you? You think I ought to add 'slow'?"

"House, I'm not sick, I'm depressed."

"I could add that to the list, for sure."

"You're not listening to me!" Wilson put the car in park, unbuckled his seatbelt, and turned to face House, who was looking at him with that infuriating 'I-know-more-than-you-and-am-just-waiting-for-you-to-get-the-hint' face. "I'm not sick, House, it's normal for a man to get a little neurotic after his third wife kicks him out! And you're wrong, she was unhappy, she was cheating. Her reason to make me leave was perfectly rational! Your need to justify it somehow else is not!"

House looked taken aback, eyebrows raised. Good.

"I can't believe, House, that you can't look past your own pathological need to solve the problem long enough to realize that this one doesn't get solved! And what's more, I can't believe I was stupid enough to think you cared because I'm your friend, not because I'm some puzzle that's intellectually stimulating enough to catch your attention."

-

This was not going the way House had hoped.

Wilson was yelling at him, pointing and gesticulating in the way that was endearing in times of peace, and paralyzing in times of war. House could have sworn he'd entered this conversation correctly, first expressing concern, then stating his case, then listing off the evidence. He wasn't sure what he had expected from Wilson -- maybe to thank him for figuring it out? To ask what the next steps were? Whatever he was hoping for, it certainly wasn't this. He knew patients were stupid, but had expected better from Wilson.

"Do you think I don't know what regular depression looks like? That I wouldn't know if something unusual were going on?" As he said it, the implications only made him more frustrated. "Should I retire, is that what you're saying? Hand in my medical license to Cuddy?"

"Oh, don't be dense, House, if you knew what regular depression looked like, you'd have diagnosed yourself with it long ago." Wow. Low blow.

"Look, if you want to let this go untreated and waste away as some unidentified disease eats away at your insides because you didn't listen to me, be my guest. Egg on my face for wanting to help you, I guess." The words tasted bitter as they left House's mouth, but he couldn't stand down now.

"Help me? Help me? House, helping me doesn't involve sneaking around behind my back to find symptomatic evidence that I'm dying, or whatever you think it is. Helping me means being my friend, and actually listening to me, instead of just deciding you know what's best all the time."

Before House could answer, Wilson had slammed the car door and was almost already to the front of the hospital, no doubt already plastering on his patented pleasant, unthreatening smile. House fiddled with his cane in hand and scowled. His leg flared in pain, almost as if in sympathy, and he dug his thumb into the scar spitefully. The pain turned bright, making House nauseous with clarity. He hadn't done anything wrong. It wasn't his fault Wilson didn't want to listen to him.

Chapter Text

Wilson was sure he was losing it. Losing time, seeing the world in flashes. He was in Cuddy’s office, feeling his chest rumble and lips move, and hearing no sound. He was in his office, signing papers that he didn’t read. He was in the cafeteria, eating alone, not eating at all. He was in his hotel room – when did he get a hotel room? Was this his? 

He woke more tired than he was when he had gone to sleep. He couldn’t face a mirror. He couldn't eat. 

Patients began to look at him, questioning, concerned, asking what’s wrong, was he sick, was he okay. He’s not sure what he says back, not sure what expression his face is making.

He’s not sure what tie he’s wearing. What day it is. He’s not sure he cares.

–

House was at home, in pain. Annoyed at Wilson for being depressed. Annoyed at himself for being awful about it. Annoyed at the world for not going Wilson’s way, for not laying his paved path that Wilson might help smooth House’s. Despite everything trying to prove otherwise, Wilson’s life is meant to be perfect. The earth bends around Wilson. He’s the only improbability in an otherwise logically predictable world. And if Wilson is falling apart, he’s no longer untouchable. The world is returning to its logical state. Unless Wilson’s role as the improbability was necessary for the continued functioning of the rest of the world’s logic. He doesn’t know. For the first time in years, he doesn’t know.

His throat burns from alcohol. His eyes hurt. His chest hurts. He wonders what kind of pain Wilson is in.

Chapter Text

“I’m telling you guys, they’re in a fight.” 

Chase spread his hands in an exasperated arc as he received nothing but blank, uninterested looks from his colleagues. At least Cameron had been pretending to listen to him this morning, but Foreman had paid neither of them any mind as he clocked in and began organizing his work for the day. Now, it was lunchtime, and neither hide nor hair of House had been seen, so the fellows had gone down to the cafeteria together for dishes-and-dishing. Only, it seemed Chase was the only one far more interested in the latter than the former. 

He sighed and was about to return to his lunch when Foreman looked up and said, “Hold on, who’s in a fight? Sorry, I haven’t been listening. Is everything okay?” 

Chase smiled. Finally, he could spill. “I’m perfectly fine. It’s House and Wilson that are in trouble.” 

Foreman raised an eyebrow. 

“Don’t tell me you haven’t noticed something’s off with them! House came in early yesterday, which is weird enough, but what’s more is he didn’t talk to Wilson all day .” 

Foreman still didn’t look convinced. “And what evidence do you have to suggest he’s not avoiding Wilson because of something he did? He does that all the time when he’s fucked up or hiding something.” 

“That’s the thing! Wilson didn’t come around knocking either! They’re avoiding each other. Which means either Wilson’s avoiding House for a different reason than House is avoiding Wilson, or they’ve had a fight, and only one of those makes sense.” 

Foreman hummed as he chewed, considering. Before he could swallow, Cameron piped in, saying, “Do you remember a few days ago when House was trying to get us to attribute Wilson’s symptoms to a diagnosis? What if Wilson finally found out?” 

Foreman stifled a laugh. “I’m sure it isn’t the first time Wilson’s been under House’s investigation. Whatever this is, it’s probably more serious than that.” 

The two turned back to Chase, who wasn’t looking at them. Instead, he had gone white in the face, and was looking at the booth behind them. They turned, and Foreman nearly fell out of his seat when he saw House’s face, gaunt and uncomfortably close, looking back at him. 

“Did you three want to keep airing out other people’s business here, or shall we take this back to my office?” 

–

The blinds were already drawn when House entered his office, three fellows in tow like baby ducklings. 

He sat in his desk chair with a sigh, relying heavily on his cane to get down there. He was so, so tired. He didn’t want to talk about this with anybody, much less with the people he could hardly trust to come up with an interesting idea once every few years. He was stuck, torn between the fact that he didn’t want to be wrong, and that he didn’t want to have hurt Wilson. Really, those are the only two important things, he thought bitterly, and now he’s gone and put them at odds with each other. 

He had his head resting on his hands resting on his cane, surely looking miserable and pathetic, when Chase spoke up. “Were we going to talk about it, or are we just supposed to stand here and look at eachother?” He then stifled a yelp - Cameron had probably stepped on his foot. 

House sighed again, feeling like an elderly dog, and looked up. “I’ve screwed up.” 

That sparked the exact reaction he had imagined: Cameron, Chase, and Foreman were wearing immediate expressions of curiosity, surprise, and amusement, in that order. 

Cameron was the first to ask, quickly remembering to morph her expression into something that was probably meant to be concern. “What happened? Did you and Wilson have an argument?” 

“Something like that. Do you remember the differential I asked you three to do?”

Foreman smiled knowingly, saying, “I’m guessing it was for Wilson, judging by the way you were so dodgy about it and never brought it up again.” 

Ah. Subtlety was not his strong suit when it came to Wilson, House knew, but it still didn’t thrill him to hear it called out. “Yeah,” he said, quietly. “He found out.” 

“Oh! Is he sick? Is that why he’s avoiding you, he doesn’t want you to treat him?” 

“Keep up, Chase.” House cleared his throat, daring to meet his fellows’ eyes. “It was the wrong diagnosis. He didn’t have what I thought he had. He’s not even sick.” He said, deliberately leaving out the part where he couldn’t even think around the emotional part of his head long enough to come to an actual diagnosis. 

Disbelieving, Cameron said, “He’s not? That list of symptoms was no common cold. Sure, it was more mental stress than bodily illness, but it sure didn’t seem like he was all A-OK.” 

“He isn’t. He’s depressed. Severely.” 

A silence filled the room, though it was obvious what was going unsaid - He’s depressed, and you made it worse. House didn’t need to hear it. He knew it, and he wanted nothing more than for it to not be true. 

“So, what are you going to do?” Foreman asked, obviously trying to barrel his way past the conversational roadblock before anyone thought too hard or too long. “You two are friends, I’m sure you’ve fought before. If you can get out of your own head about it and just apologize, he’ll come around.” 

“Have you ever heard House apologize?” Chase asked, sounding like he hadn't meant for that particular thought to leave his head via his mouth. “I mean, sorry, maybe it’s different with Wilson–” (What isn’t?, House thought) “–but it doesn’t really seem like that’s how he solves anything , from what I’ve seen.” 

“Foreman’s right,” House muttered, low, begrudgingly. All three fellows turned to look at him – those were not words oft-uttered in this room.

“I am? I mean, I am. Yeah.” 

Rolling his eyes, House continued: “He’s got nobody but me right now. Least I could do is actually be there for him.” 

– 

One of the things Wilson appreciated most about Cuddy is that she knew what battles to fight and what battles to leave alone. Rather, at least, he thought she did. The messages on his answering machine tell a different story. 

“Wilson, you’ve got to pick up. I know you were in this morning, but your patient’s in trouble. I need you at the hospital as soon as possible.” 

Wilson hit DELETE . 

“Okay, I lied about your patient, she’s the same as ever, but I thought it would get your attention. I’m worried about you, Wilson. House is acting weird, which is essentially a catalyst for you acting weird, and I have nurses from Oncology telling me you’ve barely been talking and have been in and out of the department like a ghost. Look, there’s not a lot of space on this recording. Please come in and-” 

Wilson hit DELETE. The next message was from the day after.

“Okay, Wilson, I’ve asked as your boss and your friend, but since neither of those seem to get through to you, I’m asking as a doctor for you to come see me. I haven’t seen you in two days, now, and House tells me you two haven’t talked. You wouldn’t isolate yourself like this unless something serious was going on. This is going to kill you if you let it. Answer your phone.” 

Wilson hesitated. Dialing back was not an option, he knew, but the words gave him pause. Would this kill him? Would he let it? 

He found the thought startling, but not altogether unappealing, and the realization sank to the pit of his stomach like shame. He wasn’t really trying to ignore Cuddy, it was just that he heard the phone ringing all the time these days, and sometimes there was an actual call, and sometimes there wasn’t, and he could never be sure whether was just imagining it or not. He had decided it was safer to ignore any and all calls anyways. He didn't want to talk to anybody, didn’t want anybody to worry about him. He could go missing too. Maybe it’s a Wilson family thing: first Danny, now James. They’ll be a curious statistic in an article someday. 

The side effect of this decision was that he didn’t know whether House had tried to reach out. He wasn’t sure he wanted him to.

–

House isn’t sure what time it is, or whether he was dreaming or not. He feels unmoored, like a ship cut loose on a windless night, unsure where he would go or whether he would go anywhere in the first place. He feels warm, but too unsettled to find it a comfort. There is no pain. 

He walks forward, down a road, watching the sunlight dance as the leaves above brush eachother in the wind. There’s a bench. 

Wilson is there. He’s smiling at him. 

This is definitely a dream. 

The bench is a couch, now, and Wilson is asleep on it, hands curled under his chin. He looks happy. He breathes, evenly, peacefully, and looks for all the world like the most perfect thing. House reaches out to touch him, to brush his hair from his forehead–and can’t. His hand goes straight through. 

He walks away. 

–

When he woke up, it was far too early in the morning to get up, and far too late in the day to go back to sleep and risk being even later than usual. House stared at the ceiling in his bedroom, one hand absentmindedly massaging his leg. 

He thought of Wilson. That's all he thinks of, these days. Questions run through his head: what is Wilson to him? Is he the only person who knows him? Does Wilson feel known by him? 

House dug a thumb into his scar to distract from the painful twisting in his chest at that thought. He knew Wilson wasn’t sick. He knew he just wanted to believe he was. He doesn’t want to think about him in a pain that can't be cured by medicine.

Chapter Text

House had very few qualms on principle regarding breaking laws. He had his own fair share of B&E, forgery, theft, and malpractice under his belt, but in his defense, they usually fell under the category of “the wrong thing done for the right reason”. As far as he was concerned, a little snooping, lying, and sneaking around in order to find out which hotel Wilson was staying at and getting ahold of a keycard for his room was nowhere near the worst he’d ever done.

As he approached the door, though, he faltered – it wasn’t a question of whether Wilson wanted to see him, he knew. He was pretty sure he didn’t. He wouldn’t want to see himself either. 

Then again, he rarely did, and Wilson needed somebody. 

Since he had nobody else, it would have to be House. 

It was the logical option.

Obviously. 

All he needed to do was open the door. Be sincere. Understanding. Easy. He’d done it a thousand times.

Only, he hadn’t. He’d acted sincere before, to get his way, but he didn’t want Wilson to see through him. Wilson could always see through him. He used to be able to see right through Wilson, too. Whatever had changed, it had happened without House noticing. Wilson knew him now better than he knew Wilson. Pretending wouldn’t work. 

House stood outside the door, deliberating, shifting his weight between his leg and his cane, flicking the keycard between his fingers. He didn’t know why he was nervous. He’d been in much worse fights than the one he was surely about to participate in – been hit worse than whatever punch Wilson could possibly pack, been yelled at, insulted worse than anything he could come up with. There’d be a fight, but it probably wouldn’t be that bad. 

He took a deep breath, and opened the door. 

The lights were off, but the outline of Wilson sitting on the bed staring out of the window was clear against the gray afternoon light. His posture betrayed his exhaustion and pain – House felt that twinge of guilt again. It wasn’t his fault, entirely, but he had contributed to this. He couldn’t imagine what Wilson was feeling, couldn’t admit that he was afraid. He couldn’t afford to be afraid. Wilson needed him. 

“Wilson?” 

No response. House was reminded of catching Wilson in the middle of the night – crying, he must have been. He kicked himself for not seeing it sooner. Maybe if he had been a better friend, things wouldn't have had to get to this point.

“It’s House. I’m here to apologize.” The words tasted bitter and came out stilted, but he got through it, watching for the tensing of Wilson’s shoulders, the set of his jaw. Nothing moved. He wondered if Wilson was drunk. Or worse. 

Slowly, gingerly, House laid his cane down on the bed and limped, holding his leg, around the corner to see him. Wilson gave no indication he’d heard or seen him, still staring out the window, eyes dead. House sat on the bed, near-but-not-next-to him, not wanting to assume a closeness that Wilson didn’t want. At this, Wilson seemed to stir, and his eyes numbly followed the motion. 

“House?” His voice sounded creaky, strained, like he’d been sobbing, but he seemed calm. Almost too calm, but House pushed forward. 

“I came to apologize,” House repeated, steeling himself, “and to ask for forgiveness. I should have just asked you. I should have listened, and helped you in the way you wanted.” He paused, quietly searching Wilson’s face for any sign of reaction. Nothing changed, no flicker of an eyebrow or twitch of the mouth to indicate Wilson cared what he had to say. House shifted closer, hoping to jostle some life into his friend. It was eerie, he could admit, to see someone normally so expressive and emotive looking mute and blank. He wanted to get in Wilson’s face, to check his eyes, his response time, to see if he was under the influence of anything, but he stopped himself – Wilson had been the subject of too much of his medical observation lately. That was exactly what he was meant to be apologizing for, if only the damned man would listen! 

Against his self-control, House felt the guilt and discomfort mixing in his stomach. The bed he was sitting on was like a cardboard box – this is where Wilson had been staying, been sleeping. House knew his couch was hell on the back, but this bed wasn’t any better; it was probably hell on the back AND the hips. His leg hurt, and his head hurt, and that damned ache in his chest had returned at the sight of Wilson, miserable and alone. He was tired of this. Why was Wilson ignoring him? House felt the bitter taste of fear rising in his throat – what would it take to shake him out of this? “Aren’t you listening to me? There’s no way you’re that far gone.” Yeah. One could always count on Wilson’s temper to provoke a reaction out of him, or, at least, House always could. He raised his voice carefully, conscious of the thin hotel walls, and put a hand on Wilson’s shoulder. “Whatever’s going on, if you don’t snap out of this, I can’t help you, and if I can’t help you, you’re going to have to figure your way out of this on your own, and we all know how good you are at that. What, you want me to leave you here, to stew in your own self-pity? To feel–”

“It doesn’t matter anymore, House.” God, finally. A conversational foothold. Time to start climbing.

“What doesn’t matter, Wilson? Your career? Me? Our friendship?” Wilson wouldn’t meet his eye, and it was pissing him off. 

“Myself.”

–

Wilson felt the same clench of fear again, like he was going to get in trouble, as he spoke. “You should leave.” He knew House was only saying it to get a reaction out of him, but he heard the truth in it – House didn’t want to be here, wasting his time trying to deal with his stupid self-loathing. It would be better if he just left Wilson alone, like he said, left him to stew in his emotions. 

“What are you saying?” House looked angry, confused, concerned; emotions flashed across his face faster than Wilson could comprehend them.

“I’m better off not affecting anyone else’s life, anyways,” Wilson took a breath, feeling unprepared for the unfortunate facts he was facing, and continued, “Just look what I did to you, House! You thought you could rely on me to be there for you, to help you through everything and what do I do? I argue with you, I avoid you at work, I leave you. I wanted to be someone you could rely on, but I can’t. I’ll ignore you, and I’ll stay up and use everything in your fridge to cook pasta that I don’t eat, and I’ll…” The image of Julie, red-faced and pointing, outraged and betrayed and so, so disappointed crept into his mind. The last argument they had… she had told him the truth. About who he was, and what he did to people. “I’ll use you until you’re not interesting anymore, and then I’ll resent you, and insult you when you don’t mean to, and I’ll be cold and bored and callous and absent and–” He stopped at the motion of House standing up next to him. He relied on his cane so heavily to stand – the stress of being around Wilson must be hurting him. When House noticed he had stopped speaking, he turned to look, and Wilson knew he must look pathetic, starting to cry again, red-faced and shaking, and he couldn’t stand to meet House’s eyes. 

House didn’t say anything. He reached down, and took Wilson’s hand, and he went with him, limply, heavily. He didn’t know where they were going, but House’s hand was warm and grip was firm, and Wilson didn’t want to think about it. He didn’t really care, anyways. He wasn’t sure he still knew how to care about what happened to him. 

They walked together to the elevator, out of the lobby doors, and to Wilson’s car. The door of the passenger seat was open in front of him, and his head felt full of cotton. House had already sat in the driver’s seat. Wilson’s body operated as if on autopilot, and he felt himself sit and shut the door and buckle the seat belt. The familiarity of the action brought him back to himself, somewhat, and his face grew warm. It’s embarrassing to act like this , he told himself, get it together. He looked down at his lap, his hands. They were shaking, so he balled them into fists. It wasn’t until the car had stopped that he looked up again and saw where they were – House had taken them to his place. He looked over at him and opened his mouth to protest: “House, I don’t want to intrude any more than I already have, I’ve got my own place, besides, all of my clothes and things are in my hotel room.”

House looked him level in the eyes, said, “You can use mine,” and got out of the car. 

The stuffy silence of the car filled Wilson’s head and he felt like he couldn’t move if he wanted to. His limbs felt heavy, like he had been sitting so long that his blood had pooled. He couldn’t remember the last time he and House had shared in that direction – everything that he had belonged to House whenever House needed something, that was easy enough to agree to, but House was particular about things that belonged to him; he didn’t trust others to take care of his things. He wondered if House considered Wilson something that belonged to him. 

Wilson rubbed his sweaty hands off on his pants, opened the door, and began the walk inside.

Chapter Text

When Wilson got inside, House was nowhere to be seen, but he heard the water running in the bathroom. Was House going to take a shower? Light from the bathroom spilled into the hall, so the door was open, and though House was rather shameless, it wouldn’t make sense for him to have brought Wilson here to just leave him alone. 

Deciding he’d rather run the risk of bothering House than being left in the dark, he gingerly walked down to stand in the bathroom door frame. House was there, gathering towels and soap, squinting through the steam of the hot water. When he noticed Wilson in the doorway, he didn’t say anything, just gestured to the shower with his are-you-stupid eyebrows. All of this felt off. He didn’t understand why House was doing this – driving him here, running a shower, taking care of him. He didn’t deserve this. He opened his mouth to say so, and was met with a glare, so he told himself to calm down and carefully began to strip. 

He folded his clothes as he went, and laid them on the bathroom counter. He tried not to look at House, tried not to feel his eyes on him as he did what he thought he was supposed to. He didn’t want to ruin the careful silence of the past hour or so by speaking his worries or concerns or suspicions, and he hadn’t had a shower in a few days, anyway. It hadn’t seemed worth it, somehow. As with so many things in his friendship with House, he decided not to look a gift horse in the mouth, and take whatever kind of gesture this was meant to be as it came. Never mind the knot of anxiety in his stomach or his still-shaking hands. 

As he closed the shower curtain, he saw House walking out, silently, closing the door behind him. The bizarreness of the situation had spooked Wilson out of his numbness, and he wondered if that had been House’s plan all along. Either that, or House was really trying to do something selfless for Wilson, to prove some kind of point, to apologize, maybe. Surely there was a conversation coming as soon as this gift-shower was over. The thought made him want to stay there forever. He wet his hair, letting the warmth of the water run down his back and soothe some of his aching joints. He reached for the shampoo House had left for him, and realized he’d never seen it before – it was much nicer than what he knew House usually used, far closer to Wilson’s meticulous five-step hair care routine than House’s five-in-one. Where had this been? Did House buy it for him? The thought of House standing in the hair care aisle, weighing benefits and prices, trying to find something he’d like, made Wilson smile despite himself. Let it never be said that House couldn’t surprise him anymore. 

Once he was clean, Wilson took a few deep breaths and turned the water off. He felt new, lighter, nothing like he had felt after his desperate attempts to calm himself in the hospital locker room showers. The towel House had left for him was clearly new, too, fluffy and clean, and something in Wilson’s chest warmed at the thought. House wasn’t in the habit of replacing his things – he held onto them until they were too worn to be used, no matter what. These nicer things were not House’s; they were Wilson’s, and there was something in that, something tangible, a sign that he was not alone, this friendship was a physical thing. 

Feeling brave, he stepped out into the hall, where, on a chair in front of the bathroom door, lay a stack of folded clothes. These were decidedly not new – these were House’s, for sure, as evidenced by the faded band logo on the soft-worn t-shirt and the soft lining of the sweatpants. They smelled like him, too, and though Wilson would not admit it under oath, that was a comfort. 

He dressed quickly, leaving his towel to hang in the bathroom, and ran a hand through his wet hair to tidy it somewhat. That, too, held some weight – House didn’t care if his hair was messy, if his clothes prioritized comfort over style. House wanted him to be comfortable. 

Wilson, now clean, dressed, and internally settled, walked into the living room, where House was sitting on the couch. He felt an odd symmetry to their earlier beer date, where he had been too busy drinking himself to sleep to actually spend time with his friend, and shame and embarrassment flashed through him. What a wreck he’s been, selfish and idle, leaving all his responsibilities and relationships behind, wallowing in his misery. As the nausea and dread returned, he felt the urge to turn and run out the door, but he had already made his way halfway to the couch, and a voice that sounded like Julie’s whispered in his head: for once in your life, don’t be a coward. Jaw clenched, he closed the distance and sat next to House, who was watching him curiously, clearly waiting to say what he had prepared. 

Silence came, then, and Wilson realized House was probably waiting for him to meet his eyes. He didn’t think he could handle that kind of vulnerability, so he kept his head down, but waved a hand to indicate “go ahead”. He felt more than heard House take a deep breath, then–

“While I’m flattered you see me as one of your wives, it’s really sort of assumptive to pretend I see you as my husband, isn’t it?”

Wilson didn’t know what he had been expecting, but it certainly wasn’t that, and in his surprise, he couldn’t stop himself from blurting, “ What?” “You know me. I’m famous for pushing people away. You’re telling me you haven’t wondered once in the past decade why you’re my only constant?”

Something in the wording tugged at Wilson’s stomach, made his hands hurt. 

“I don’t keep you around because we said some words in a church or because you spend a ridiculous amount of money on a ring. I don’t even get to be included in your life insurance. And I certainly don’t keep you because you cater to my every whim and stand beneath me running to catch my needs as they fall.”

That didn’t make any sense. That’s what Wilson was good for, that’s what he did on principle. Wasn’t it? Wasn’t that what he brought to every relationship, even this one? “I don’t understand.”

“You’re kind of a bitch, Wilson, you know that? You’re selfish, and judgemental, and your manipulative streak is really more of a manipulative cummerbund.”

That’s the first normal thing House has said. Wilson felt himself begin to close off again – he knew, that was the thing, he knew he was a horrible person, and his friendly approachability was just a persona, and he wasn’t good enough to keep up–

“And I’m the only one who knows it.”

What?

“Come on, you can’t even tell your wife when you wish she’d load the dishwasher differently. If you really started to treat me like one of your wives, we’d never talk about anything.” Affecting stupid (and frankly insulting) voices, he pantomimed, “How was your day, honey? Good, darling. No kids died today. Maybe we’ll have better luck tomorrow. That’s nice, honey. Goodnight!”

Wilson scoffed, but he could admit privately to himself that there was no small amount of truth in what House was saying. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d said what he really felt to Julie, or had a conversation longer than what niceties allowed with her. Maybe House had a point.

“No, I like you, Wilson, because deep down, you’re not perfect, or even really all that nice, and I’m the only one who gets to see it. To everyone else, you’ve got insincere sincerity down to a science. No wife of yours has heard you say a negative word about anything, but I have. I know you hate Oncology department staff parties. I know you hate wearing dress shirts that are too large. I know you hate, absolutely hate , your mother’s cooking. I don’t want that to change.”

Wilson just stared. House’s tone had turned pleading. 

“I can’t let you make yourself think I expect from you what everyone else does, I can’t let you turn me into someone who wants you nice, Wilson. I don’t want you nice, or clean and pretty and selfless. I want you bitchy. I want you to cook everything in my fridge and eat it without letting me try. I want you to use my card to pay for your gas. I want you to wear my clothes and leave me to do the laundry. You can need me, Wilson. I want you to need me. You can’t live your life needing nobody.”

Wilson’s mouth was dry. He didn’t know when he had grabbed House’s hand, but he found he couldn’t let go.