House, M.D. fanfiction: No Exit/Transitions
Mid season three, I wrote a fanfiction story that had House in rehab and in therapy with a psychaitrist to deal with both his emotional and physical issues. Thought I would repost it, given House being admitted to a pysch hospital at the end of Both Sides Now. We never saw House deal with his issues in season three after Merry Little Christmas, and nearly killing himself. But I do feel we’ll get to see some of that next season. Hope so…anyway, enjoy.
Title: No Exit
Category: TV Shows » House, M.D.
Author: Barbara Barnett
Language: English, Rating: Rated: T
Genre: Angst/Drama
Published: 12-27-06, Updated: 01-08-07
Chapters: 13, Words: 20,919
Chapter 1: Chapter 1
No Exit
Author: Barbara Barnett
Summary: House makes a decision in an hour of despair. House admits himself into rehab
Spoilers—through MLC (speculation for the future, but no spoilers)
Chapter 1
Christmas came and went and House sat on his sofa, still and sombre. The deal, the one he had fought so hard against taking. The deal, that in its final hours, had become a way out of the hell in which he found himself dwelling, had been revoked. Leaving House with no options.
He contemplated the past 72 hours: the pain, the humiliation of first Cuddy, then Cameron seeing him like that; stealing the Oxy and simply not caring anymore about anything. Just please let the pain stop. Let it not hurt anymore.
Summer had ended with something House had not felt in a very long time: hope. He flashed on the memory of burn he felt back then—was it only three months ago?–in his arms and legs, even his feet, as he pushed to finish that eighth mile. It had been so long since he had felt the lightness of flying through a park unaided by anything but the power of his two legs. One month, then two. He had silently thanked Moriarty (or whoever the hell he was) for shooting him and pushing him toward the radical Ketamine treatment. Had thanked him every day for the clarity he felt, his brain free of the opiates he sometimes struggled to fight through.
But then the vision changed. He was still running, but on a treadmill. The silence of the PPTH physio lab made the thump-thump of his running shoes echo through the dark. Wilson had challenged him. Wilson always thought he knew best, and usually House didn’t mind, until recently. Wilson didn’t want to believe that the ketamine was failing, when House knew that it was. The searing, ripping pain in House’s right quad was not a sore muscle. He knew that pain—was intimately familiar with it—like a playground bully come back to taunt him, tell him he’ll never be normal. Never again. Do not pass go; do not collect $200.00.
The ketamine had been his last chance. His only chance. And now, with no more to look forward to than years of pain and the fog of opiates…what was left for him? How long did he have, House had wondered then, before his liver was trashed beyond repair? Five years? Six? Less if he was less careful on his bike; less caring about the amount of his alcohol consumption.
House shivered, feeling like shit, unwilling or unable to arise from his roost to start up the fireplace. He realized that he was shivering despite not having removed his coat. His little jaunt with the Oxy had only slightly forestalled the Vicodin withdrawal symptoms. Cuddy had given him two vicodin when she had dropped him back at his apartment, telling him in her seductively sympathetic voice that she was sorry about the deal falling through, but that he had only himself to blame. “Then why give me the Vicodin?” He tried for defiant, with only minimal success.
“No one thinks that you don’t need pain relief. But House, the way you’ve been…stealing Wilson’s pad? A dead man’s oxy?” House looked away, unable to find an adequate come back line. “You don’t think you need help?”
“I’m…” No, he reckoned. He wasn’t “fine.” Not by a long shot.
“I’m thinking of doing it anyway, deal or not.” Cuddy arched an eyebrow at the non-sequitor. For a moment she was unsure of what House meant. He wouldn’t look at her, but his voice was grave. A fleeting moment’s panic ensued, making her regret agreeing to simply drop him off and not come in. Stay with him.
“House, I think I should…you shouldn’t be…” Realizing, House smiled weakly, knowing he’d evoked Cuddy’s panic response.
“Rehab. I think maybe I…”
“Are you sure? Will you even take it seriously?”
“I don’t know.” It was as honest as he could be. “Why, it’s what you and Wilson crave, isn’t it?”
“Yeah, since when have you sought our approval? On anything.”
“I’m not. Let’s just leave it at that. Thanks, Cuddy. For the lift.”
House tried picturing himself there, in the PPTH rehab facility. One of the lost souls: a vague, blank apparition of a human being with empty eyes floating aimlessly in the halls—and that would be after he detoxed. After a week of pure hell.
“Did you want to die?” Rebecca what’s-her-name’s words came suddenly back into his head.
“I’d hoped I was dying.” He had answered her. It was true then. It had been true a year ago, when he had thought he’d lost his grip on reality in the aftermath of the placebo; and again in the spring, when the pain again spiraled out of control and morphine seemed like his only answer. And in September, with the return of the pain after Ketamine had given him hope for the first time in many years. And how many other times, when the pain was so bad he would do anything to be put out his misery. When oblivion was the only answer until he could regain some modicum of control over it. He’d hoped he was dying last night and cursed his gag reflex for saving his life. Death wasn’t a suitable answer. Dignity was out. He spent the last of he meager resource when Wilson found him in his own vomit, barely aware of his surroundings.
So it was life. He’d tried everything else. Maybe rehab wouldn’t be the nightmare he feared. It certainly couldn’t be worse than the last 48 hours had been. Yeah, and who was he kidding.
“I’m checking myself into rehab.” House didn’t wait to catch the look of shock on the faces of the three fellows. He turned towards the elevators and disappeared from their view.
House had chosen the in-patient facility at PPTH because he didn’t trust himself. He knew he could detox on his own. Had done it before. Twice. Three times if you counted this past week. Which he didn’t. And the detoxing on Ketamine didn’t really count either, since the drug did all the hard work while he was in a coma. No, House knew that in the midst of detox, he could “want to die.” And the next time he probably wouldn’t botch the job.
And, at least if his staff needed him, he could come in on a consult. The down side of being at PPTH was, well, that he was at PPTH. He was far from anonymous, at least amongst the staff.
“Dr. House?” House peered up from his handheld game. At least it was someone he didn’t recognize. “If you wouldn’t mind coming with me…”
House glanced longingly at the doorway, thinking that now would be a good time to leave and return to the safety of his office. “Just joking,” he wanted to say. “Wanted to check out the nurses up here on four. Been there, done that, leaving now.” The words wouldn’t form. He rose in silence and followed the woman into her office.
“I’m Dr. Harrington. Catherine. There are a lot of forms to fill out. Dr. Cuddy did the pre-registration and sent up your medical files. But still…a lot of paperwork.” She sounded vaguely apologetic, but he knew this game. A shell of self-deprecation might get him to lower his guard. To “talk.” He had nothing to say. At least she wasn’t smiling that inane way that psyche people tended to. Point to her.
“I know you’re a doctor, and you understand a great deal about what’s going to happen the next few days at least. I won’t insult you by minimizing it. They will probably be some of the worst days of your life, but not as bad as yesterday…”
“Please no platitudes. I…”
“It’s not. I know what your yesterday was like.” She opened a file. House took it in, sighing. Cuddy was thorough. And quick.
“Does this mean I get a babysitter? Gonna take my privacy away too?”
“No babysitter. Dr. Cuddy also explained the circumstances. She doesn’t think you’re suicidal. I trust her assessment, provisionally, anyway. I’m going to be your therapist during your time here…and beyond, if it works out. As far as I’m concerned, you’re here voluntarily, and my job is to give you all the help and support you need…”
“Platitudes…”
“…Including trying to find a pain management plan that works for you. I’m not going to lie to you and say you’ll be off opiates…clean and sober, as the saying goes. It may be that you can’t be off narcotics. Dr. Cuddy notes that you’ve tried other pain relief from the common to the experimental. Radical, even. Nothing else has given you relief. This isn’t going to be easy. Physically or emotionally. As you know, the addiction is complicated by your valid and legitimate need for pain relief. We will find something that works. Now about those forms…”
Waivers, insurance forms and other paperwork took up the better part of the morning. With each form signed, House wanted less and less to be there. Locked up. Locked away. He knew what to expect: a week to detox. OD’ing on the oxy meant that he’d have to relive a lot of what he’d gone through three days earlier. But at least there’d be meds to relieve some of the withdrawal symptoms. The pain was another matter.
“We need to evaluate your pain, figure out what might work once you’re detoxed. There are some new drugs on the market that might be more effective without the massive quantities of hydrocodone in your blood stream. We also need to do a liver panel. You had a lot of tests after your shooting and during your recovery from the Ketamine procedure, but with the Oxy OD, we need to make sure your liver is stable. Are you in pain now?” House had said barely two words to the doctor, choosing instead to observe her warily, figure out what made her tick. What lay beneath the calm and calming professional mask.
“I’m always in pain,” he growled.
“Can you give me a pain-scale number, or do I need to guess?”
“Eight. It’s been…”
“I know how long it’s been. I know a lot more about you than you think I know. I know that a lot of the stuff we do here won’t work for you. You’re not a ‘get in touch with my feelings’ sort of guy. I get that. Meditation isn’t your style. Neither is visualization. But I hear you’re a terrific musician, so maybe we’ll go there. You have a better defensive line than the Chicago Bears, I haven’t met a defensive lineman yet I couldn’t get around, so…”
“You know you should really need work on your metaphors.”
“We’ll put you on Subutex. It should help with both the pain and the withdrawal symptoms. It’s not perfect, but you won’t be cowering in a corner shivering, sweating and puking your brains out for the next four days, at any rate. But I need to get the liver studies going first. Later you’ll meet an anesthesiologist who specializes in pain management. I promise that it’s no one you know. I borrowed him from another hospital. I want to ensure your privacy and grant you as much dignity in this as possible, Dr. House.” Catherine extended her hand and stood. The audience was over.
She’d given him no openings, no opportunities for backing out, for pissing her off. House stood with difficulty, stiff and sore. His leg felt on fire. He took the proffered hand, without looking her in the eye.
“Anlee will see you to your room so you can get settled. The lounge is down the hall. Pay phone on the wall right next to it. You’ll have a hospital phone in your room. You know how to use that, I take it.” She smiled. For a moment he wished he could return it, but there was nothing in him, no space, no cell within his body that felt able to. If misery was his steady state, as Wilson always assumed, this was surely a new level in Hell. He felt dead inside, and hoped he was dying.
End chapter 1
Chapter 2: Chapter 2
“We’ll start you on 40 micrograms of Subutex and then wean you off that over the course of the next 10 days to two weeks. We need to assess how much of you pain level is exacerbated by the opiates. And I know that you know on some level that opiates can do just that. But we can’t know till your body’s been cleared of the stuff.” House nodded slightly as he put the pills under his tongue. He tried to conceal the neediness with which he took them. “Just let them dissolve. The next couple of days, even with the Subutex are going to be…difficult, I won’t lie to you.”
“I’ve been through detox.”
“The circumstances are different. You’re in a hospital room. You have no distractions. You’re probably a little scared…”
“Like I said…I’ve been…”
“I don’t think you’re scared of detoxing. You know what you’ve done to your body physiologically, and you know the physical consequences of removing the drug from your system. It’s demystified for you. At least to an extent. I think you’re scared of what’s on the other side. This isn’t a quick fix like the ketamine. It’s going to take trial and error and patience. And you’re not a very patient…patient. Someone will be by every couple of hours to check your BP and respirations. If the nausea gets bad, hit the panic button. Same thing if you’re dizzy or feeling light headed. We want you to eat and drink even if you don’t feel like it…and you won’t. But do it anyway. Things shouldn’t be as bad as cold turkey, but with amount of Oxy you took on top of the vicodin still in your system and a pint of whiskey…like I said: no promises.”
House nodded, too sick and exhausted to respond. He was tired. Beyond tired. He’d slept about six hours in the last four days. He knew that real sleep could be a long way off; days off.
The hospital room slept two, but mercifully the other bed was empty. He was finally alone. He thought of it as a challenge. Cuddy, Wilson, Foreman: they couldn’t be more wrong. He really didn’t believe, he told himself, that he was an addict. Not in the way that Tritter defined the word. This was all bullshit. A show. But he couldn’t banish the image of himself in the mirror that morning when he came to Wilson begging. Begging for something, anything to make the nausea go away. He’d willed himself to look in the mirror at a man he barely recognized: his eyes hollowed out black holes peering into a withered soul. His face was dripping with water as he had tried to wash away the pain and fear with trembling hands. Trying to make himself convincingly human enough to sign out Zebalusky’s pills. “Do not take more than four per day,” read the bottle’s label. Thirty pills later over the course of 15 hours. With a Maker’s Mark Chaser. One pint. At least. Brilliant. Maybe if it had been two…
Four days of a waking nightmare, and he was still pacing his room like a wounded tiger. He was hot, burning up in one moment, and in the next, freezing: shaking chills wracking his body, which, in turn sent intense and searing pain through his damaged leg. The bed was too short for him as he fought with his sheets and fought with the pain and he fought with a God who he did not believe in.
So he paced, coming to light occasionally in the big easy chair, struggling to sit comfortably and struggling equally to move from it. And then there was the nausea: unrelenting. Nothing seemed to help alleviate it. And every time he retched into the basin, shock waves seared through his right thigh. Until his entire essence seemed to have boiled down to the area between his right knee and hip. Agony was too kind a word.
He dreaded morning when he knew Harrington would rachtet down the Subutex. He knew that conventional wisdom said that Subutex was the most humane and kindest way to detox. Fuck conventional wisdom. At least Harrington had been honest. No pity from her. And she had protected him from hospital staff and their concerned inquiries. “Sorry, Dr. Cameron. No visitors; and Dr. House has requested that he take no phone calls at this time. He’s doing fine.” He’d heard her two nights before, just outside his room.
House had refrained from using the call button. He understood the body’s mechanisms and could think them through: rationalize and intellectualize the entire experience. He made half-hearted attempts during his more lucid moments to distract himself. He tried to focus on Cuddy’s ass; on Wilson’s face. He tried counting backwards in Latin from 1,000; he called up random pages in every textbook he’d ever read. To no avail. But he knew that the nurses, Harrington, nor the devil himself could give him much of anything to make this all go away.
Catherine had stopped by several times daily to check on her patient those first four days. She experienced the many faces of Dr. Gregory House: sullen or depressed; anxious and manic, depending on where he was with the pain and the withdrawal. She didn’t want him to “talk.” Didn’t expect him to. Not now. He was hurting and vulnerable, angry, frustrated and broken. There would be time to talk later. She simply wanted him to know she was there.
In Catherine’s mind, Gregory House was a hero. They all were, to some degree. Her patients. The ones who emerged from their hearts of darkness bruised but intact. But Dr. Gregory House was another sort of hero. One she had admired and respected. He hadn’t known her, sitting up on the fourth floor, behind the locked doors of the psych wing. But she knew of him, what he did; what people thought of him and why—and, she had a pretty good idea—who he really was behind all that bullshit.
To his patients, most of them anyway, she saw House as a patron saint of lost medical causes. People who had been through the medical ringer, seen doctor after doctor; dismissed by doctor after doctor, found an ally in Dr. House. Catherine had been curious about him since she had seen him that night a nearly two years earlier at the tail end of the meningitis crisis, standing vigil at a patient’s window, unseen. Just watching. The chaos swirled around him, but he just stood there and watched through the semi-closed blinds. They could not see him and everyone else ignored him. One of his fellows had startled him from the moment, telling him that “she was going to be OK.” She observed the biggest jerk at PPTH choke back the emotion when he responded “I know.” Catherine hadn’t known anything about the patient. She didn’t need to. She learned that there was much more to House than met the eye.
In many ways, House was a lot like the patients he admitted onto his service. Dismissed by doctor after doctor. House’s response had been to shut them all out. Not to trust anyone with his own medical care. It was foolish, but she understood where he was coming from. He had not been served well by colleagues, doctors or friends. Not for a long time. And House was a genius of a doctor. He did the math and took the risk of trusting only himself. And her job was to change that. If House was to get out of this alive, physically and emotionally, Catherine knew she had to change the equation.
She sighed, looking in through the one-way glass. House sat at an open window, staring gloomily at the falling snow. He was quiet, at least. Seemed somewhat at peace for the moment. He was shivering; a blanket wrapped tightly around his shoulders seemed to do no good. “Come in out of the cold, House,” she wanted to yell at him. But he wouldn’t be ready to listen. Yet.
Chapter 3: Chapter 3
No Exit
Chapter 3
The snow had stopped falling and the sun streamed brightly into House’s room as a new day dawned. This was his fifth day. He knew the Vicodin was out of his system, but he continued to detox as the Subutex dosages had been decreased daily. House felt exhausted and sick. He felt like a junkie. He appreciated the fact that there were no mirrors in the room.
House’s eyes were closed against the brightness in the room. One arm lay across his face, further blotting out the light; the other massaged his right thigh. “Good morning, Dr. House.”
“The light…” Catherine was confused only momentarily. She moved to the window, tightly shuttering the blinds before pulling up a chair beside House’s bed.
“How’s the pain?” He dramatically swept away his arm, and opened his eyes long enough to glare daggers at her.
“You’re a doctor. Do the math. No meds…what do you think…?” House stopped himself. He hadn’t the energy for sarcasm. “I can’t even…” Never mind going there either.
“You’re going to meet Dr. Kwan this afternoon. He’s the anesthesiologist I spoke of the other day. We also need to talk.”
“I thought that’s what we were doing?”
“Talk as in therapy session.” She waited for the retort. “I want to show you around the facility.”
“Look, I’m not exactly…”
“I know you’re not feeling up to it. I know the pain is bad right now. I hope the withdrawal symptoms are at least improving. I’ll leave you at the Subutex level you’re on for now. No decrease.”
“I can’t…I can barely stand.” He looked away. She knew it was an admission he hadn’t wanted to make to her.
“I can do the math, as you said. I took away the Vicodin; put you on Subutex. It’s not enough to help much with the pain. I know that. That’s why I asked you about the pain when I came in. Can you give me a number?”
“Is ‘11’ a valid response?”
“Yes. OK, so maybe a stroll through the department was a bad idea. We can still talk.”
“Sure. Fine. Whatever.”
“Think you can make it to that chair over there? I hate talking to patients who are lying down. Too cliché for me.” She had pointed to the easy chair by the window. She wanted to get at least a primitive and objective assessment of his pain level. Catherine handed him his cane. “Sit for a minute before you get up. Don’t want you to pass out on me. Your BP was a bit low on the last check.”
House stood, steadying himself. His gait was halting, painful to watch. Catherine observed him carefully, resisting the urge to offer assistance. On the sixth step, just short of the easy chair, his leg gave out as the pain tore through his thigh. He crumpled to the floor, crying out in frustration and agony.
Catherine’s instinctively moved towards him to help. His glare kept her at bay. She waited quietly as he caught his breath and struggled into the chair, raising himself shakily on his left leg, his right never making contact with the floor. His knuckles white on the cane handle, House noted that Harrington was observing him; his grip on the cane. He hurled it across the room. “Be sure to note that in my file. Patient was angry, throwing useful objects violently about the room.” House’s voice was raw; his breathing ragged.
Catherine tried to think of something to say that would not evoke a defensive response. She put her pen and pad on the floor, making a show of not writing anything. “I’m sorry I put you through that. I needed…”
“Yeah? To what? I told you… You didn’t believe me. So now you know.” They sat for awhile in silence. Observing each other. He glared, willing her away. She refused to bite.
“Don’t you have other patients to harass, or do you just take on one patient at a time?”
“I don’t get that luxury, Dr. House. Besides our hour isn’t up yet.” Catherine noted that House seemed more comfortable; his breathing more relaxed. “The withdrawal symptoms seem a little better today. How’s the nausea?”
“It’s better than it was. I still feel like…can’t think of an appropriate metaphor…I think the word is ‘crap’.” Catherine shrugged.
“At least it’s not worse than ‘crap.’”
“It is. I’m just trying to be controlled in my speech.”
“Ah.” More silent observation from each side. Catherine glanced at her watch surreptitiously. “What happened Christmas Eve?” No time like the present.
“You’re the shrink. You tell me. I’m sure you’ve talked to Wilson. And to Cuddy.” Catherine nodded.
“I think you felt backed into a corner you didn’t want to be in, making a choice that you thought was a lose-lose proposition. You were desperate, in pain, detoxing from Vicodin. You took too many of those pilfered Oxy tabs and then you took more. And topped it off a hell of a lot of Maker’s Mark. You have no history that anyone knows of, of binging on either alcohol or the Vicodin, so it could lead one to believe…”
“It could that.” She noted both bitterness and resignation in his tone.
“So you tell me what happened, doc.” Silence. Catherine glanced again at her watch. The hour was nearly up, and she was pretty sure he wasn’t ready to go into it. But she wanted the question on the table for later.
“You’ll be going down to the pain clinic in a bit to get that assessment going. It’s not doing anyone a favor for you to be in that much pain. I don’t believe in torturing patients, despite what you might think right now. It’s been, what, three months since you’ve done any rehab on your leg? I think Kwan’s goal might be to get your pain adequately managed to a point that rehab is even possible. The Vicodin by itself wasn’t doing that. And I think you know it. So… You OK in the chair, or do you want to get back to your bed?”
“Think I’ll stay here.” Catherine nodded. Wordlessly, she retrieved his cane from where it had landed and leaned it against his chair at his right hand.
“Oh, by the way, you’ve had a lot of phone calls…and a visitor or two. The nurses have been under orders to protect you from inquiring minds and bodies. Dr. Cuddy has asked to see you when you feel up to it and I OK it. You up to seeing her? If not…”
House blew out a breath. “Fine. Welcome to the freak show. Come one, come all.”
“Only on your approval.”
“Thank you.” A quizzical look in response. “For my cane.”
“De nada.”
Chapter 4: Chapter 4
No Exit
Chapter 4
“Dr. House. I’m Jun Kwan. Honored to make your acquaintance in person. I’ve read one or two of your papers. Your clarity of thinking and honesty about our profession is refreshing.” It was a way to break the ice. Kwan assumed House would take it as so much bullshit, but he had read several of House’s papers on diagnostics and one on renal failure in pain patients. Right now, House didn’t look the vision of medical brilliance Kwan admired. He looked like a patient in dire straits.
The battery of tests took hours. Kwan was curious about the Ketamine treatment and its effects; he told House things he already knew. “I’m trying to figure out what went wrong with the Ketamine after three months.”
“Simple. It stopped working. Fifty percent of cases. Period.” EMGs, MRI, PETScan, blood tests.
Kwan scanned the list of meds and procedures tried over the course of six years. “But even the Vicodin doesn’t work completely for you. The pain is still too severe, even on the dosages you’re on, to make physio possible.” A question or a statement. House wasn’t sure. He was just exhausted.
Kwan had mentioned something about a guy at Albert Einstein and hedonic tone studies. House had recalled reading about it in the Journal of Pain Management. “I think your Hedonic tone might be signficantly lowered. It’s a guess right now. But if true, would complicate both your pain and pain management issues. But I think it may explain a lot. You probably know that you have CRPS, complicated by the muscle damage and the over-compensation by the remaining good muscle. The Ketamine short-circuited the CRPS for three months. Allowed you to exercise and do physio. If we can attack the both…”
“Been there. Done that.”
“In any event, I need to evaluate all these tests in light of your history and Dr. Harrington’s thoughts. We need to keep you on the Subutex for now, but titrate it down while we start you on a Tramadol/acetaminophen formulation short-term. Long term, I’m not sure your your liver will handle it. In any event ‘eleven’ isn’t acceptable. You’re in too much pain and I don’t have any long term answers today.”
House returned to his room. He felt sick and humiliated, having to be transported by wheelchair. The Ultram would kick in soon and then…
Cuddy was waiting for him when entered. She was standing, her hip perched on the window, arms folded. He looked away, embarrassed.
“Dr. Harrington said…” Cuddy tried to conceal her shock at his appearance. He’d looked bad Christmas morning, but nothing like this. His clothing hung loosely; she was certain he’d lost at least 10 pounds in the five days he’d been up on four. His beard had grown in more, making him look even more gaunt…and his eyes held more pain than she could stand.
“It’s fine. I just wasn’t expecting that you…” It was anything but fine, but it was inevitable: her visit.
“I can come back later if…” House glanced back at the orderly, who was waiting to assist House, shooing him from the room with a withering look. “Do you need…?” she stepped towards the wheelchair to offer. The pain seemed marginally better and House stood shakily, but on his own. His leg held as he dragged it slowly, finally sitting heavily in the easy chair.
“How are you doing?” It was a stupid thing to ask, she knew. The answer was obvious, even before she saw him; observed him.
“Peachy-keen. Lots of people at my beck and call, all hours of the day and night. All I have to do is flick a button and they come running. Just like Club Med.” He paused. “Thank you. For the other day, Cuddy. So. How’s life among the living? The team behaving? Foreman apply for my job yet? Wilson and Tritter elope?”
“House…”
“Yeah. Right. His motives were as pure as the snow outside this window. He’s been fucking with my mind since September. And it’s all been for my good.”
“His intentions…”
“Yeah, well you know about intentions and Hell, don’t’cha? Except I’m the one in Hell right now, while he’s out on the golf course.”
“It’s December.”
“Indoor golf course.”
“Harrington’s good.” Time to change the subject. She didn’t want to agitate him further. She’d leave that discussion to Catherine.
“Is she?”
“She knows what she’s doing. She works with a lot of doctors who…”
“Are impaired? That what you think I am? Well I am now. That what you think I was? Impaired?”
“No. I…”
“Not able to do my job?” House laughed bitterly.
“I was out of my mind in pain. Detoxing. I hadn’t slept in days and puking my brains out every hour. I still figured out that girl’s problem. You couldn’t and neither could he. And I’m impaired.
“I never said…”
“Then why am I here?”
“You’re here voluntarily. I assume you came here because of what happened…”
“What happened was a direct result of what…”
“You tried to kill yourself.” There. She’d said it.
“I did not try to kill myself.” House rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Look. I do not want to talk about this now. I…” Even Harrington understood that. His emotional defenses were too worn down. He couldn’t do it. And Cuddy always knew how to get past even his best defenses.
Cuddy moved to House’s easy chair, sitting on the ottoman. House moved his feet to allow it. Even though her nearness was his biggest threat. “I’m sorry.” He looked upward, exasperated. Sorry wasn’t enough right now. He knew she meant it.
“I’m sorry for all of it. Not just this. It was wrong to lie to you about that patient. Hell, it was wrong of me to not allow you to try the cortisol in the first place. I was concerned…”
“That what? I was making intuitive leaps with no obvious medical evidence. How’s that different than…” What was the use, he thought. How often had they been over this ground. “It’s OK for me to connect the dots when I’m on narcotics; but when I’m not…not so much? That makes sense.”
“House, I didn’t come here to argue.”
“Why are you here?” He had been feeling better, the combination of the Ultram and sparring with Cuddy helping. But now he was fading fast. He was feeling suddenly sleepy and wanted nothing more than to make it back to his bed. He rose from the chair, intending to do so with a flourish to signal the end of Cuddy’s audience with him. Instead he nearly keeled over as a combination of the sleepiness and a slight dizziness swept over him. Cuddy caught his arm before he fell. He didn’t resist her assistance.
“Tuck me in?”
“How long’s it been since you’ve slept?”
”Don’t remember. Will that affect whether you tuck me in or not?” Cuddy smiled at the remark. “’Cause if so, I think it’s been a week. Maybe longer.” She regarded him a moment as he nodded off before tucking the blanket around him and quietly exiting the room.
“How is he?”
“Asleep.” Harrington looked surprised and pleased.
“He hasn’t slept in days. Not really. Kwan put him on Ultram for the pain.” Now it was Cuddy’s turn to look surprised. “Stop gap. The pain was bad. I might have titrated down the Subutex too quickly.”
“Has he talked about Christmas eve?” Harrington arched an eyebrow.
“Sorry. Instinct to ask. I know you can’t say. Is he going to be alright?”
“He may never be pain free. He may still have to be on opoids or opiates for the rest of his life. As for the rest of it…” She shrugged. “It’s early. He has a long road ahead and we haven’t taken the first step yet. I have two months with him. Just getting him to trust me could take that long. So, who knows?”
“I’m glad he’s working with you. Thank you, Catherine.” Cuddy moved through the hospital corridors like a ghost. She neither saw nor heard anyone in the busy hallways. She slammed, then locked her inner office doors and wept.
Chapter 5: Chapter 5
No Exit
Chapter 5
A/N—Again thanks to Silja, Magdala and all my friends in the fandom for their encouragement and support.
House woke with a start. He was disoriented as his eyes adjusted to the darkness and his mind battled the fog surrounding it. His hand went mindlessly to his right thigh, rubbing the muscle there. The dim light reflected in his eyes, causing them momentarily to be the brightest object in the room. “You’re awake.”
“What time is it?”
“Ten p.m. You’ve been out about five hours. Probably more continuous sleep than you’ve had for a long time.” Catherine had been sitting with him, glad that he was finally getting some sleep; hoping that it would improve things for him. “Can I turn on a light? Or do you want to go back to sleep?”
“Give me a minute.” House rubbed his eyes vigorously, trying to focus through the fog. “Have to…” He looked around for his cane, which had been hooked to the right hand siderail. Catherine watched House struggle as he made his way to the bathroom. He flicked on the light and paused in the doorway, leaning heavily on the doorjamb before entering and closing the door. Catherine felt some concern that House had closed the door, he looked pretty shaky. He hadn’t asked for assistance, and knew it wasn’t wanted. So she held her breath, listened (feeling slightly like a voyeur) and breathed again when she heard the water in sink turned off and the door once again opened.
“I have your Ultram.”
“That what’s making me groggy?”
“Shouldn’t be. You haven’t slept in days. Give it a bit. Did it help with the leg?”
“A little.” He seemed subdued. “I really need a shower.”
“Take the Ultram, give it half an hour to kick in. You seem a little too wobbly right now for anything but a sponge bath. That the leg, you think?”
“I don’t know. Probably.” He made it back to the bed, collapsing into it.
Idiot, Catherine thought, berating herself. “Dr. House, have you eaten anything since morning?” He was probably a little dehydrated and his blood sugar level was probably way too low. She noted the dinner tray untouched, and it occurred to her that he’d probably not eaten anything for hours. That, plus the new meds and the continuous roller coaster he’d been on…
“No…I don’t remember. I’m not really hungry…”
She gestured to the dinner tray perched on the bed table. “I need you to eat something. Probably tastes like shit right now, but I’ll get you a fresh dinner tray and some orange juice.” She pulled the top off the jello and handed it to him. “Eat.”
“You sound like my mother.”
He seemed a bit stronger as the moments passed and within an hour he didn’t look he was about to keel over. “Can I take that shower now?”
“Do you want some assistance? I can call…”
“No.”
“Fine. I’m going to sit by the bathroom door. If you’re not out in…”
“Don’t be such drama queen. I’ll be fine.”
House emerged from the bathroom in scrubs. He looked considerably better than when he’d gone in. Not great, but better. Catherine regarded him, noting the rugged handsomeness apparent even now. His eyes, so transparent that they had reflected light in the semi darkness earlier, now appeared darker.
Catherine had uncovered the dinner tray, placing the bed table near the easy chair. “I’m not really hungry.”
“You still need to eat. I don’t want you passing out on my watch. Sorry. Don’t have to eat it all. I’d go for the minestrone and mashed potatoes. The chicken’s not so good tonight. As long as the nausea seems to be better, I’d like to see you eat a little more than you have.”
She noticed the scar on his neck. “Ever catch the guy who shot you?” House shrugged.
“You don’t know, or you don’t care.”
“Both, probably.” He didn’t want to go there. “Thought you wanted to talk about Christmas eve.”
“Do you?”
“No. But on the other hand, I really don’t want to talk about anything at all.”
“I know. When did the pain start getting out of control? I mean before. Before you tried the Ketamine.” She wanted to keep the discussion focused on the physical for now. Symptoms, signs of his physical deterioration. Cuddy had noted giving him a placebo after he’d requested a spinal morphine injection. Her assessment had been that his pain was psychosomatic, caused by depression. That the placebo had worked, convinced her that she was right. That had been late last winter.
House sighed. “I started having breakthrough pain around February. It got progressively worse over the spring.”
“What did you do about it?” House paused, wondering if he wanted to go down this path. He figured it was all in his chart anyway. Cuddy, Dr. Detail, herself would surely have noted the whole placebo thing.
“When it first started getting worse, I went to Cuddy, asking for an intrathecal injection of morphine. I was working on a difficult medical case, and the pain was interfering with my ability to do my job. She gave me an injection. Saline. A placebo. It worked. For a while, anyway.”
“You know, of course that the placebo effect works against pain in at least 20 of cases. Even in cases of breakthrough pain. So what happened when you found out it was a placebo?”
“What do you want me to say? I began to doubt myself? I was convinced that it was all in my head? That the pain was a result of the fact I had ended an affair with the only woman I’ve ever loved and I felt bad about it? That’s what Wilson thought. And Cuddy.”
“And you?”
“The MRI was unchanged.”
“That doesn’t mean anything, and you know it. Breakthrough pain has nothing to do…”
“I know. I know…”
“How…” No, she thought. She wasn’t going to ask him how he felt about his doctors’ assessment. It was obvious he was still angry about it. Hurt by it. “Do you want to talk about Stacy at all?”
“No.”
“OK. So the placebo worked for a little while. How long?”
“A few hours.”
“The breakthrough pain continued. Or was it breakthrough pain? Did it jus keep getting worse? So that it was a constant? No longer just breaking through your meds, but…”
“It got worse.”
“Did you have some sort of injectable for it?”
“Not prescribed.” She arched an eyebrow.
“You self-prescribed?”
“This surprises you?” No, it hadn’t. Just that he admitted it.
“No. But why not go to another doctor? A pain specialist.”
“I knew what I needed. I…” He realized how that sounded. And he hadn’t meant to go there. “It was morphine. I only used it when I knew I was going to be home. I never…”
“Did it help?” She hadn’t wanted him put on the defensive.
“Yes.”
“When was this?”
“Last spring in the weeks before I was shot.” Back to the shooting. Great.
“Dr. House.” Catherine stood. “Care to take a stroll? We have a Baldwin Grand in the great room. I ‘d love you to see it.”
“No thank you.” House would have loved nothing more than to sit at a piano and lose himself for an hour or five. But not with her watching, observing how his hands still trembled, the notes coming clumsily and with effort.
She was satisfied that he was looking better; more engaged. She sighed, noting the bitterness that seemed to have crept back into his voice. Wondering where that was coming from. Maybe it was too much, too soon. His banter and reasonableness made her forget how fragile he really was. “Good night, Dr. House.”
He was surprised that she hadn’t pushed the issue. Tried cajoling him into seeing the piano. But then, she hadn’t pushed anything. She was testing. He knew this game.
Chapter 6: Chapter 6
No Exit
Chapter 6
New Years Eve had never been a time of great celebration and merry making for House. Even during those first years with Stacy. The good years. Those. Probably the four best New Year Eve’s of his life: Pizza, sex, champagne (Dom Perignon, and always a good vintage), the entire library of Marx Brothers movies, more sex, more champagne and then sleeping late into the next day. It was a routine and they had it down perfectly: an annual event.
Otherwise, New Years eve had never meant much of anything to House: another gig in a smoky bar—playing for other revelers—in those days; and later, after Stacy, not much of anything. But among New Years eves, this one probably rated in the bottom one or two. One, if you didn’t count those that occurred under his parents’ roof.
Cuddy had told him that Cameron and Chase were on duty and wanted to visit if he was up to it. Harrington thought he was ready; House did not. “You’ll have to face them sometime, Dr. House.” Catherine’s advice had not taken into account Chase’s bruised jaw or Cameron’s having seen him like…like that.
“Not tonight.” House was restless and bored. And in pain. He paced his room, considering the possibility of simply leaving. Going home. Who would stop him? He was there voluntarily—no deals. For all he knew it would be his last days of freedom for 10 years. Why should he spend them locked up? He thought of the hospital roof. It had been a place of both solace and pain over the years. Who was he kidding? He’d never make it up there. He’d either tire or his leg would give out by the sixth stair. More pacing.
He glanced at his watch: 11:35. Normally the halls were quiet by this time, but not tonight. New Year’s Eve. Revelers toasting sobriety on sparkling cider; laughter—the unconvincing smoky laughter of too many cigarettes and the desire to be anywhere but here.
House’s eye caught the handheld game on his bed. He’d beat every level of every game—twice in the last 12 hours. He flashed briefly on the kid’s face. The one who had given him the game—Adam, he thought his name was. “That was a 10,” Wilson had said. On the happiness scale. Had it been that? Was that what people sought within the messes of their lives? Moments? Seconds of unexpected joy, before returning to the normalcy of despair? They had thanked him. For what? What had he done? Nothing. Fixed a problem, nothing more. He had changed nothing for them; hadn’t made their lives better: not Adam’s—yeah, that was the kid’s name—not his parents’. House shook off the thought of them, picking up the handheld, mindlessly fiddling with it before tossing it back on the bed.
If that had been a “10,” then what was this he wondered? Which circle of Hell was this? The noise in the wafting from the hallway had died down and House again looked at his watch. It was after midnight. “Happy New Year Adam,” he reflected.
House opened the door to his room. Except for brief outings to other medical departments, House had not left it in the five days since he’d checked in. He had been impressed, that Harrington hadn’t pressured him to “join in” once the first, worst days of detox had passed. He knew that was coming, wanted or not. Ready or not. Leaving did not seem like such a crazy idea, after all. As bad as detox was, the thought of “group” anything made him cringe. He remembered “group” from the days and weeks just after the infarction. Well-meaning idiots with slogans for a vocabulary, who had no idea. NO idea of what it was like to… Trying to convince a bunch of new-bred cripples that life could be close to normal. And half were buying it. They could see themselves “visualize the pain” make it “go away.” “Feel the healing.” Well, he would never be healed. The pain would never “go away.”
The halls were empty, darkened. He needed to be out of his room; anywhere else would do; he felt caged; oppressed by the small space; it’s sterility, everything about it. He walked, quietly as he could, which was not very, wondering if he was even supposed to be out of here. Was there a “lights out” curfew. Hall monitors to check and make sure that all smoking materials were extinguished and all the little addicts were safely tucked in? He didn’t really know. Not that it mattered to him. He only knew that he couldn’t stay in his room a second longer.
The sight of the pay phone, hung as Harrington had told him, just outside the main lounge, made him think of his mother. They would be at a neighbors, probably playing bridge. She would be drinking rum and diet cokes. That was their New Years tradition. He thought briefly of calling, leaving a message. Saying… What would he say? What could he say? She would be worried. Probably called 15 times since that last call Christmas morning. After… He’d call in the morning. No sense leaving some ridiculously trite message, which would probably scare her half to death just as it had…”Just wanted to call and say ‘I’m fine.’” Right. She’d hear the tremble in his voice and know he was lying. Like always.
“Dr. House!” He had nearly run straight into Catherine, who had just emerged from her office, briefcase in hand. They had startled each other. Catherine caught her breath. “Do you need something?”
“No. I… I couldn’t sleep. I just…Can I…?” House felt like a kid caught smoking in the high school bathroom. It was stupid, he knew.
“You can be wherever makes you comfortable. Happy new year.”
“Right.” Recovering slightly, he regarded the psychiatrist with interest. “Partying late tonight?”
“I’m on-call,” she said more defensively than she intended. “A lot of paperwork. You know the drill. End of the year…”
“Yeah.”
“How are you feeling tonight? Your leg.” She noticed that he had been leaning against the wall, rubbing vigorously at his thigh.
“I’m just great. Just out for a New Year’s stroll. Love the accommodations here. Champagne’s a little flat, but…”
“You don’t get the good stuff until you’re here a month. Strolling anywhere in particular?”
“Ever been on the roof of this place?” Catherine tried to conceal alarm at the question, wondering where this was going. She put down her bag.
“Have you?” She treaded a bit carefully. A toe in the water.
“When I first started working here, I used to go up there for a smoke. Before I gave up cigarettes. Great view. Quiet. Best place on this campus to watch the sun rise. Make out. Sex even. Talk.” She was sure he was jerking her chain. Testing. Something.
“Are you asking me if you can go up there? No. I’m sorry. Look. I know you’re restless right now…” She didn’t need to be a shrink to see the anxiety pouring off him. It was a ridiculous request, if that was what he was asking… No. Maybe that’s not what he wants. She’d almost missed the opening, trying to read between the lines of his conversation.
“I’m not an idiot. I know you can’t let me go up there alone. Yeah. That would look great on your CV: Attempted experimental therapy technique New Years Eve 2007—allowed patient, who may or may not have suicidal tendencies, ascend the roof of the facility on his own. Trust-building technique was successful until the patient jumped. Look real good.” Harrington smiled. OK, so where was this going?
House scrubbed his hand across his face. “Look…I’m feeling like a little like…I feel like shit. I just need a little air. I couldn’t make it up those last six stairs to the roof on my own anyway. Not the way… The roof up on top of the Witherspoon wing has always been a bit of a…You could come with me. I’m not going to jump. I’m not going to kill myself.”
Catherine sighed. She actually thought it was a good idea. Maybe up there, a place he clearly cherishes as a sanctuary, maybe he would be willing to begin. It was a thought. On the other hand, he was very, very fragile right now. What if she was wrong and he really was suicidal, actively suicidal. Could she prevent a man nearly a foot taller than she was from throwing himself from the roof?
“Not tonight. I like the idea; and I’d love to see this place. Always looking for a good place to think.” He gave her a look. He’d taken the remark as patronizing. “Really.”
Catherine sucked in a breath. “I think you’re ready for group.” Oh, here it comes, he thought, glaring at her in anticipation. “I’d like you to go for a couple of sessions. You don’t have to talk. Don’t have to say anything. Not even your name. Just sit and observe if you want. Take mental notes on every patient. I don’t really care. Then, I promise you we’ll take a field trip up there.”
Catherine had known that getting him to even consider attending group therapy was going to be one of her great challenges with him. She’d known his history post-infarction and of the incident the year before with another pain patient. He would know all the angles and was a master manipulator. She’d only seen a little of that so far, but he had been sick and exhausted. She didn’t envy the facilitator.
“This a negotiation?”
“Call it what you like.” He began to walk away.
“One session.” She smiled, knowing he couldn’t see it.
“We’ll see. Dr House!” Her voice made him turn back towards her. She noted the difficulty with which he was moving, wondering why he hadn’t complained or asked for another Ultram. “I can’t let you up on the roof, but if you’re still restless, I’ll let you play my piano.”
House considered for a moment, not really wanting to give her anything more. He was still shaky, but he knew the music might distract him enough…”Would you have to stay?”
“No. I’ll just unlock it and leave. Go back to my office and do some work.”
“Thought you were leaving for the night.”
“Still on call; might as well be here.”
“Right. Fine. Show me this magnificent instrument.” His voice was noncommittal, but Harrington noted the anticipation hidden around the edges of his tone.
“It was donated by a very famous, anonymous patient. A concert pianist.” She was right. It was a gorgeous piano. Incongruous here among the wraiths of PPTH rehab. It didn’t belong there, any more than he did.
Chapter 7: Chapter 7
House loved playing his baby grand piano. It was very old, and its tone was rich and mellow. He had to confess, however, that Catherine’s piano was exquisite. The black, highly glossed ebony; real ivory keys. He was impressed. He looked over his shoulder at Catherine as he lowered himself painfully to the bench.
“OK, I’m going.” At this point, House really didn’t care if she stayed or not. He shrugged. “Don’t play too loud, you’ll wake the inmates.” She smiled inwardly, hoping he’d be able to lose himself a little. Gain some solace. Catherine went back to her nearby office, leaving the door open.
House examined his hands. They still didn’t appear very steady to him. But, who the hell was he playing for, anyway? He closed his eyes, trying to relax a little, not think about the pain now radiating through his thigh. A tentative note or two on the upper keys, quietly played, remembering Harrington’s request that he not disturb the other patients. The keys were responsive; the tone rich. A short blues riff followed, almost reflexively. Lighter than he thought possible, given the slight tremor in his fingers. The music slowly, almost seductively drew him in, enveloping him in a multitude of sensations. His fatigue, the restlessness, even, to a lesser degree, the pain, bled away as the Bill Evans melody surrounded him. After a long series of improvisations, he finished. It felt better than he cared to admit.
“Blue in Green?” House looked up to see Harrington leaning against the far end of the piano. House nodded, slightly startled, wondering how long he’d been finished and simply sitting there. And, how long she’d been standing there. “Bill Evans was a genius.”
“You recognized it?” It had been a sloppy rendering, at best, of the Evans masterpiece. It was meant to be played with the lightest of touch: a moody, melancholy piece. He was tired. Shockwaves coursing through his leg distracted him from the piece’s lyricism. Yet, he was impressed that she’d recognized it. Good taste. At least she hadn’t patronized him by telling him what a nice job he’d done with it.
“I’m sorry. Look, I know you wanted your privacy. But I it’s one of my favorites. I’d heard you were good, but I didn’t know you did jazz. And I wouldn’t mind hearing that piece again some time. When it’s not three a.m. and you’re less exhausted. So, what do you think of my piano?”
“Anyone else ever play it? It looks new.”
“I play it sometimes, not like that… but I can’t resist. And, we do get musicians strolling through drug rehab every now and then. I know that comes a shock, but…” House peered down at the keys, suppressing a smile. “Dr. House, I have a couple of questions about the ketamine treatment. Mind if I walk you back to your room…? if you’re finished playing for now. If you want to play more, feel free to…”
“No. I think that’s enough for one night.” Catherine watched as House cautiously rose from the bench, testing the leg before setting it down gingerly. If anything, he seemed more in pain now than when he had first sat down.
“How’s the pain? Can you give me a number?”
“Seven, maybe. Eight.”
“That typical for this time of night? I mean before…on the Vicodin.” House nodded.
“Maybe worse now.” His right leg buckled slightly as he took another step. “Definitely worse now.”
“Need another Ultram?” House nodded. “Look, Dr. House, we don’t really want you to be in pain. Despite what you think, we do not…I do not believe there is anything ‘good’ about pain. This isn’t about being stoic and sucking it up. It’s about dealing reasonably and effectively with what you’re going through. You have a pain problem. I know that. Everybody on the team knows that. We need to deal with that as well as any other issues.” She stopped. She was getting too wound up, angry with him and it was stupid. She wanted him to trust her; wanted to get on with it; wanted him better. Catherine sighed. “If you’re in pain, let someone know. Me, a nurse. Someone. Don’t be an idiot. Certainly don’t be a martyr. It doesn’t suit you.” She hoped her little tirade hadn’t pushed him further away. But she needed him to know that they weren’t necessarily on opposing sides.
She got him another pill and walked back with him to his room. She noted the effect of simply taking the pill. He seemed immediately more comfortable, and long before it would have kicked in.
House sighed deeply as he settled into the easy chair. “You said you had a question about the Ketamine.” Good, she thought, he hadn’t forgotten.
“I’ve been doing some reading about it—your own notes on the German studies and case notes from your file.” He steeled himself. “It’s pretty remarkable stuff. Has huge potential for patients with Complex Regional Pain Syndrome like you.”
“Yeah. Works really well.” He hoisted his cane dramatically to put a point on the statement. Catherine tried steering away from the iceberg floes in her path.
“I know the effect can wear off with little or no warning. Any sort of mild trauma to the area can trigger it, but if they can work out…”
“Be great.” Noncommittal agreement.
“I heard you’d gotten up to running eight miles a stretch…”
“Yeah. Good for me. You said you had a question. So far, I’ve only heard platitudes.”
“What made you want to try it? The risks were pretty significant.”
“Yeah, well, I’ve never been known as particularly risk-averse.” Her look said she wasn’t quite ready to let it go with that.
“You wield that cane like it’s some sort of crusader’s sword. Some of your colleagues, believe that you wear your pain like it’s some sort of badge of honor. Makes you different. Special.” Substitute “James Wilson, MD” for “some colleagues” and she’d be closer to the truth.
“Wilson. You had no right…”
“I never spoke to him about you. Not about this. I wouldn’t do that. But he’s your prescribing physician. I just picked up a vibe’s all.”
“Right.” Wilson hadn’t approved of trying the ketamine treatment. Thought it was just so much wishful thinking. He had told House that he was beginning to sound like patients of his who wanted to try any new experimental cancer trial that hit the popular press. It was a desperate measure, Wilson had argued. And since when had House become desperate for a cure? When had House started believing in false hope? Well, Wilson had been right in the end. It had been stupid.
“So why did you do it? The ketamine?” Back to the original question.
“What makes you think Wilson was right? About me and pain”
“Is he?”
“No. He’s not. Wilson thinks that…” House paused, feeling trapped, but also drawn almost against his will into the question. He didn’t want to talk about Wilson.
“I had been looking into it since last spring. Researching it. Almost all of the monographs and reports are in German, so I had to do a lot of translation. Cuddy knew about it; knew I had been considering it. When the pain began to get so much worse…so much more out of control…” He hesitated a moment. Stay with the facts. Stuff that’s charted. “I told you I’d started using morphine to control the breakthrough pain when I knew I didn’t need to be at work. I had no other options for when morphine was not an option. I couldn’t really take much more Vicodin than I already was, and even trying that was pretty useless because it didn’t really help. The ketamine treatment seemed to be a worthwhile risk. I had planned on doing it anyway, and when I was shot…It just seemed…” House was far away, suddenly. Harrington saw it in his eyes.
“You take the one good thing in your life and make it meaningless…” The words echoed somberly in House’s memory, not sure who had said them and to whom. His father to him? No, that wasn’t right. The shooter’s image hovered just beneath his consciousness. The hallucination still too fresh; too raw, even seven months later.
“I want meaning.” House’s voice was a ragged whisper. Harrington wasn’t even sure he was addressing her.
“Dr. House?” His eyes said he was back. “You OK?”
House nodded uncertainly, shaking off the memory. “Should I go?”
“I…um…” he looked away, having lost his train of thought. The Ketamine. Right. “But, as you can see, the treatment failed.”
“I’ve read that you can have booster treatments. Not as intense as the original, nor as risky. Dr. Cuddy and your anesthesiologist both suggested it after the treatment stopped working. It had been successful. I could be again.”
“I couldn’t…Do you have any idea…? A month of intense in-patient rehab and two out-patient. Can you possibly have any idea what it felt like that first time I felt the pain come back?”
“No. But that was a rhetorical question, wasn’t it?”
“I was skateboarding.” She suppressed a smile imagining the lanky and very, very tall middle aged doctor on a skateboard. She would have paid money to have seen it for real. “Not like really skateboarding. Goofing around. I hadn’t boarded since I’d been a kid. There’s a freedom…its… Then it hit. Out of nowhere. It wasn’t a muscle cramp; it wasn’t a pulled muscle. It was lightning bolts tearing through my right thigh. One after the next.”
“How did you react?” How had he reacted? It had freaked him out. He’d left Wilson sitting there wondering where he’d gone off to while House hobbled back the nearest mens’ room to wait it out. He’d half expected it; dreaded it nearly every hour of every day for weeks. And now when he hadn’t been looking for it…
“The pain only lasted about half an hour.” He laughed ruefully. “Wilson was sure it was ‘just muscle soreness.’”
“So he dismissed it.”
“You might say that.”
“How did that make you feel.” House felt the trap spring on him. She was good, House had to give her that.
“How do you think?” he snapped. “You’re the shrink. How the hell do you think it made me feel? I was overjoyed. Wilson thinks it’s my aging body. Take some Motrin and call me in the morning.”
“Had you asked him to give you anything for pain beyond Motrin?”
“I asked him for Vicodin.”
“Why?”
“Why do you think. The pain was coming back. Had come back He laughed it off as nothing.” House’s calm had eroded into an angry bitterness.
“Did you tell anyone else, like Dr. Cuddy? Or your PT?”
“No.”
“Why not?” House glared at her, angry for this. For drawing him out. Manipulating him into it.
“How did you deal with the pain? Medically, I mean.”
“I was able to find some Vicodin.”
“Did it help?”
“Yes.” He was calmer again. Catherine glanced at her watch. It was five a.m.
“I’m off duty.”
“I’m glad for you.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Right.”
“I know how hard it is…”
“You have no idea how hard any of this is!” He managed to sound indignant and wounded.
“Get some rest.” Catherine felt drained, exhausted.
“Yeah. Right.” And she was gone.
Chapter 8: Chapter 8
No Exit
Chapter 8
New Year’s Day is for playing touch football (if the weather is nice) and watching college football on television. House had always preferred the former to the latter; until circumstance made only the latter possible. This year, his alma mater was in the Rose Bowl. Any other year, he would have cared; would have put money (a lot of money) on the outcome; would have been eating pizza and downing Sam Adams with Wilson. Not this year.
He could hear the shouts and catcalls coming from the TV lounge as voices far, far away. House stared at the ceiling, mindlessly counting the holes in the acoustic tile. He was up to 7,405 before a particularly loud yell distracted him and made him lose count. About to begin again, this for the third time, he heard a soft knock on the door.
He reckoned that it couldn’t yet be time for another group therapy session (oh, please, not that). It had only been a few hours. He was supposed to attend two each day, and, at this point, wasn’t sure he would survive the first day without breaking the facilitator’s neck. Or his own. He really didn’t care which.
House was more convinced than ever that he did not belong here: in rehab. They’d placed him in a group with other chronic pain patients who had developed an “unhealthy relationship with their meds.” He noted that three of the men in the group had probably not been properly diagnosed and still had underlying physical issues that had never been addressed. One was dying of cancer: and what the Hell made him want to spend time in this place when he had only months to live? Give the man his drugs and let him die in peace, for Chrissakes, he had thought as he droned on about wanting to be “clean” before going “home.” Marijuana. And lots of it, that what House would prescribe for that one. Wilson would too, he thought. Better not be one of Wilson’s patients.
But House had been good, as he had promised Harrington. He’d kept his mouth shut and simply observed. It had even been an amusing parlor game for about 15 minutes. Until the facilitator asked House if he wanted to introduce himself. Great. This hadn’t been part of the bargain. “Not at this time,” had been his curt reply.
“You don’t have to give your last name. Just a first.”
“No. Really. Thanks just the same,” he hadresponded politely, if edgily.
He just wasn’t ready to do this again. Even if it meant getting outside for a few minutes.
“House?” Cuddy. “You up to a visitor? Dr. Harrington said it was…”
“As long as you didn’t bring the kiddies,” House sighed, trying to not sound as sullen as he felt.
“I brought you a couple of presents.”
“Oh goody. Bring me a file in a cake?”
“This isn’t a jail.”
“Effect is the same.”
“You’re not locked up. Not yet.” She tried to sound light, forgetting for the moment truth to her quip. “Sorry.” He observed her intently for several minutes as she set the bag down on his bedside table. He sat up on the edge of the bed, grimacing at the pain.
“You even allowed to do that? Bring me stuff? They might think it’s cocaine; a little grass…”
“Being the Dean of Medicine has its privileges.” She handed him the bag. House withdrew his enormous red and white tennis ball.
“Thank you,” he choked out, not knowing why her bringing a ball had made him so suddenly emotional. He rose from his perch on the bed, walking with some difficulty, finally resting his head against the far wall, away from her sight.
She had also brought the small pink stress ball. “Figured you could use it now.”
“Who me? I’m the epitome of laid-backness. I’m… You lost the baby.” His tone was quiet, gentle. He had finally figured out what was different about her. She had only been five or six weeks along, but he had known; had guessed—and now…
“I’m not pregnant.”
“But you were.” Now it was her turn to hide from him.
“House…”
“I’m sorry.”
“I would have made a lousy mom.”
“I lied.”
“I thought you never lie,” she snarked. She gave him points for trying.
“I’m sorry about that, too.”
“That part of the rehab program: apologize to everyone for everything? You were honest.”
“I was in pain. I was…”
“I know you were hurting. I know you still are.” House sighed. He couldn’t look at her, not in her eyes. Not the way he was feeling right now. She had a way of cutting through his defenses, and right now his defenses were in serious need of reinforcement. If he let her into his eyes, he was sure he would fall apart.
“Do you want to see any of your team? Wilson? Harrington thinks it would be OK; a good idea, even.”
“No. I…I’m not really…I don’t want…”
“Wilson really wants to see you. You freaked him out Christmas Eve. You scared the Hell out of all of us. But Wilson…”
“Yeah. He left me laying half conscious on my living room floor.”
“He was scared.”
“He was pissed-off. And why? I wasn’t the one who betrayed him? Sent him to jail…”
“No, but you stole his patient’s pills and then tried to off yourself with them. Any symbolism there?”
“I really don’t think I can handle Wilson’s pyschobabble right now. I get plenty of that around here without his piled on.”
“Fine. If you’re not ready…”
“I’m not.” Cuddy sighed. She knew she was being impatient with him, but she bled for him inside; wanted him healed. Needed him back.
“How’s the leg?”
“Just dandy. Ready to join the PPTH Rehab bowling team. Ordered the shirt and everything.”
“Have they figured out a new treatment plan for you?”
“Not yet.” He blew out a breath, feeling that he’d just run through a minefield. “With the holidays…the tests… They put me on Ultram for now, but they’re still futzing with the dosage. I keep telling them, I’d be fine with Vicodin, but they just won’t listen….”
Cuddy smiled. “You look tired, I’ll let you get some rest.” She stood in front of him. He looked miserable and just sad. It took every ounce of will power to not offer him a hug. But he would take it wrong, seeing it as pity; hating her for it. She reached out and touched his hand, hoping that he would allow at least that. Feeling no resistance, she gripped his hand in hers, stroking it with her thumb. She saw that he had closed his eyes.
“I miscarried at six weeks. Two weeks ago.” It had been just before he had said those words to her. He had meant them then. He regretted them now. House nodded.
“You can try it again.”
“Now who’s spouting platitudes? No. I don’t think it’s really meant to be. Who am I kidding?”
“You’d probably be a great mom. Look how great you yell at me? You’d be the envy of all the other moms.” Cuddy smiled at his quip and let go of his hand.
“Yeah. Right,” she guffawed. And left it at that.
An attendant brushed past Cuddy as she was leaving. “Time for Group, Dr. House.” He sighed dramatically. Was this never going to end?
Chapter 9: Chapter 9
No Exit
Chapter 9
“How’s the pain this morning, Dr. House? Can you give me a pain-scale number?” House scanned her face and then away, not responding. He was clearly upset, angry. About something.
“You look rested,” he snorted derisively.
“Amazing what a day off will do.” Catherine tried to keep it light; take the comment at face value. But she knew that it wasn’t what he was really asking her.
“Great. Well, I did my two group therapy sessions. All better now. Ready to go home. I am healed. Wonder why I had never thought of doing this before.”
“’Did’ is a bit too strong a word. ‘Quietly sulked’ was the description used by the facilitator.”
“You told me I didn’t have to say anything. Just observe. I did that. I observed that it’s a total waste of time. Roof.”
“I didn’t forget. We can do that later. Even now, if you want. So, back to my original question.” Catherine wondered if he was so upset because she hadn’t been there yesterday. Had he wanted to talk? He had her phone number. He knew that he could call any time of the day. Even if she wasn’t at the hospital. Her momentary concern about lost opportunities vanished as she assured herself that House would not have been itching to “talk” after his group therapy session.
“It’s bad enough.”
“Care to give that a number?”
“Eight. Your miracle drug isn’t working, Dr. Harrington.”
“We need to…”
“I want to leave.”
“OK…You want to leave. I’m not surprised that…”
“No. You don’t understand. I’m done. I’ve heard enough platitudes about higher powers, and powerlessness to make me depressed for a lifetime.”
“Did you actually listen? Joe told me you weren’t actually paying much attention.”
“Want me to quote the entire hour’s dialogue?” He probably could, he thought, with only mild improvisation.
“I can’t force you to attend group therapy. You’re here voluntarily. You don’t seem especially open to the idea anyway, so…”
“That’s it?”
“Will it stop you from checking yourself out AMA? Anyway, if you do that, your pain won’t be treated either and…”
“I know how to treat my pain. I’m a doctor.”
“And a great one, as I understand it.” They seemed to be going round in circles. Catherine sighed in frustration. “Vicodin wasn’t working for you. You’ve already admitted that.”
“That was before…that was last spring. I was fine until my so-called friends decided to try some ‘tough love’.”
“They were concerned. I think their concerns might have been justified, given…” Despite the bitterness, House seemed less agitated than he had when Catherine first came in. Another tack. “We have a meeting with Kwan later. He wants to propose a treatment plan for your pain.
“Neurontin. The wonder drug of the 21st century. Tried it. Didn’t work very well.”
“Did he tell you that? Or do you just know. I thought your certifications were in nephrology and ID. When did you add Anesthesiology to your shingle?” For whatever reason, her retort seemed to disarm him. “You were pretty upset when I came in before. Why?” House shrugged. He mindlessly picked up the pink stress ball, massaging in his right hand for a minute before letting it drop to the floor. He wasn’t sure himself. Not really.
“I don’t belong in here.”
“You checked yourself in. This was your idea. And I think it was the right move. But we’ve been through this. Why did you decide to do this?”
“I love ping pong.” She wasn’t biting. “Impulse. My lawyer told me it was a good idea…”
“But he probably told you that weeks ago. Why now? Something must’ve happened…” Catherine didn’t want to push too hard, but she felt they were on the brink of something.
“Christmas Eve happened.” He’d said it so quietly that she’d almost missed it. “Christmas fucking Eve.” His voice was ragged. He turned his eyes to the ceiling before moving to the window. He stared out at the snow.
“What happened?” She ventured. “Just tell me chronologically. Everything that happened.” Her voice was nearly as quiet as his.
“It doesn’t matter.”
“To you?”
“To anyone.”
“That’s not being fair to Cuddy. Or Wilson. Or your team, for that matter. Something told you that it couldn’t go on like it had been.”
“Wilson found me half dead on my living room floor. I’d taken the whole damn bottle. All of it.”
“Why?”
“Thirty. Oxy with a whiskey chaser. Not just a chaser but half a bottle.” She almost had the sense that he was remembering it for the first time. He wasn’t really talking to her. More to himself. “I kept thinking that it wasn’t right. So many pills. It was too many. I knew that, but I couldn’t…”
“You had been detoxing from the Vicodin for how many days at that point?”
“Two.” He had almost forgotten she was standing there. He jumped slightly at the interruption.
“So the narcotics were almost out of your system, then you added 30 oxycodone right back in. Were you aware of what you were doing?”
He laughed ruefully. “You might say that. But only to a degree.”
“You were aware of the danger.” A statement.
“Yes.” His voice was unsteady.
“And yet…”
“The obvious question, which you won’t ask me, is ‘was there intent’? Did I mean to pull the trigger with a loaded gun pointed to my head? Or was I simply out of control? Or in so much pain that I took all those pills to simply not feel? Anything.”
“Dr. Cuddy told me that you had phoned your mother.”
“I’m a good son. It was Christmas Eve. Isn’t that what I was supposed to do? Call home? Reach out and touch someone?” His defensive line was reforming. This was all he was going to disclose for now. His back was still to her, still staring out the window. “I called…I called to hear her voice. I needed to hear her voice. I just did. I… I couldn’t bring myself to say ‘goodbye.’”
“Did you want to?”
“At that moment…..? Yes. I just wanted it to be over.” Another laugh, this time derisive. “God, I sound like a drama queen.”
“You sound like someone who was at the end of their emotional rope. Complete emotional meltdown.”
“You might say that.”
“Was that the first time?”
“That I was…? No. No, it wasn’t.” It was a difficult admission. House heaved a heavy sigh. Catherine realized that he wouldn’t want her looking at his face; his eyes, right at that moment. She knew the session was over, anyway.
“Dr. House. I’ll be right back. We’ll go see Kwan.” She threw a box of tissues on the chair near the window and left the room.
House turned back to the room as Catherine exited, pointedly ignoring the tissue box. He hadn’t wept; hadn’t shed one tear. At least there was that infinitesimal slice of his dignity intact.
Catherine returned a couple of moments later. “Do you think you can manage being out on the rooftop in the snow? They’re predicting 10 inches.”
“It’s never 10 inches when they predict 10 inches. Won’t be more than 2 at the most.” He seemed in better spirits than when she’d left. At least he was covering better.
“Ready to see Kwan?”
“Anything to get me off this useless pill. Ultram. The only thing ‘ultra’ about is how ‘ultra’-ineffective it is.”
“I want to start you on a protocol of gabapentin…” House shot Catherine a look. Told ya. “…well start tomorrow at 300 mg and build gradually over the next few days while you’re weaned off the Ultram beginning today.. By day four you’ll be on be on 3 dosages of 400 mg. House looked at him defeated. “I’ve tried neurontin. It doesn’t work.”
“If it’s not enough we can supplement with other meds after we get the dosage as close as we can to maximize the pain relief.. It’s a little trial an error, given your circumstances…” he said somewhat defensively.
“But while you’re figuring that out, I’m the one who’s…forget it. Look. I’ve tried all this stuff. I’m surprised you didn’t start with Ketaprofen.”
“It could work. It has some effectiveness as an anti-inflammatory in CRPS, but I think this is a better alternative for you. You may still need to be on some type of opoid therapy, but we need to see where the gabapentin will take us. Dr. Harrington can work with you on some alternatives for non-chemical pain relief while we’re adjusting your meds. I take it you know the side effects possible on the drug. But if you want me to go through them…”
“Dizziness. Looking forward to that one. The one thing I really need is more unsteadiness on my feet. Oh yeah, and tremors. I was beginning to miss those. Haven’t had those in 12 hours or so. And those are only two of the great side benefits to Neurontin therapy.”
House made a show of striding away from Catherine as soon as they left Kwan’s office. He had momentarily forgotten the pain, supplanted by righteous indignation. She would have to remember that.
“So you want to visit that rooftop?” she called as he reached the elevator.
“Yeah. Better do it now before the waves of dizziness overcome me. It would be dangerous up there. Might fall off. Topple to my death. Look bad to the board and all that.”
“Let’s go then. Before we start you on the gabapentin.”
Chapter 10: Chapter 10
No Exit
Chapter 10
“Why the rooftop?” It was a logical question, Catherine thought. It had been a struggle to get up there from the moment they left the unit. House hadn’t wanted to see, or be seen, by anyone he knew well. So they had taken the scenic route: down to the basement to a back cargo elevator and up to the eighth floor. House was pretty exhausted by the time they’d reached the short stairwell to the roof, and Catherine wondered how he would manage the 7 step climb.
House’s gait had gotten less and less steady as he leaned progressively more heavily on his cane. She briefly cursed herself for not suggesting they use a wheel chair. But she was fairly certain that House would have, not so politely, refused.
“I haven’t been outside for over a week. I want to feel the fresh air tickle my cheeks and frost my nose. And, you know, the snowflakes, I just love when they accumulate on my eyelashes. It just feels oh so good.” As if he would give her a direct and straight reply. They had otherwise made the trip thus far in silence. Standing at the base of the staircase, House hesitated.
“Do you need some help?”
“Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea. I don’t…” He stared up at the stairs, almost longingly, it seemed to Catherine. It was clear that he wouldn’t make it up there under his own steam and he knew it; he was unlikely to accept her help. She waited, hanging back at the bottom of the flight as he tested the first step. She knew this would be both difficult and painful—and humiliating, knowing House, so she allowed him a bit of privacy in his efforts.
He’d gotten three steps when he collapsed onto the stair, using the railing to break his fall. He sat on the fourth step, gripping his leg and breathing hard with exertion. “Damn it. I can’t even…” He slammed the cane into the stairs in frustration. He looked up remembering that Catherine was there. “Welcome to my world,” he spat out, glaring at her before looking away. “Do you like what you see?”
“I think you spend a lot of energy trying very hard to NOT let anyone ‘see.’”
“What would be the point?” His breathing was less labored, but he was clearly still in agony.
“Understanding.”
“Pity. That’s almost worse than…this.” He let go of the railing long enough to gesture to his leg, before gripping it again.
“People do want to help.”
“I don’t need any help. Look what ‘help’ has accomplished. Well meaning idiots creating more problems than they solve.”
“Is Wilson an idiot? Cuddy?”
“About this? Yes.”
“But they’re working with bad information, aren’t they? You don’t let them understand. You don’t let them ‘see’.”
“They see enough.”
“They see you’re in pain, but they can’t tell the difference between the leg and what you carry around inside. They can’t do a proper differential.”
“Spare me…I’m not asking them to diagnose me. I know the diagnosis. The diagnosis was made years ago. As far as I know, it hasn’t changed. I don’t need their help. Other people’s ‘help’ cost me half a leg and half a lifetime.” He stopped, realizing how agitated he must sound to her.
“The Ketamine was a way out. A way to get my life back.” He was suddenly calm. He sounded almost wistful, defeated.
“Stacy.”
“She was gone. I sent her back to her husband.”
“But she still loved you.”
“Maybe. But it wasn’t about Stacy. Not entirely.”
“So maybe…”
“No. I knew that it was over. Finally.” House paused, carefully considering before he continued. “When the pain…when the Ketamine stopped…” House’s voice wavered; his words were halting. He paused again, this time for nearly a minute. Catherine said nothing, sitting on the bottom step quietly. Waiting for him. She knew how terribly, terribly difficult this was for him. House began again.
“When the treatment began to fail…” House’s tone sounded different, as if he were talking about a patient and not himself: dispassionate. “…I went to Wilson. He dismissed the pain as the result of overexertion. Except it wasn’t. I’d been in physio for three months—two of those intense and demanding physical rehab. Running, lifting, more running. I was up to eight miles a day. For Wilson to dismiss it as ‘getting old’ was a bad diagnosis. He accused me…He suggested that I wouldn’t know what muscle overexertion would feel like because I’d medicated myself to the gills on Vicodin for years and I wouldn’t know a muscle cramp if…”
“Did he really say that?’
“Not in so many words, but…yes.” House sounded annoyed at the challenge.
“Was he wrong?”
“Clearly he was wrong. As far as muscle soreness, he had no idea what the first three weeks of physio were like. Believe me, I knew muscle soreness.”
“So what did you do?” House looked at her warily.
“I panicked.” He smiled slightly, sheepishly. She arched an eyebrow at the admission. “I had been without significant pain for two and half months post-op. Now, suddenly…” She knew the rest of that story. The scrip blanks, the beginning of it all becoming unraveled for House.
“Wilson is your best friend, right?”
“Not lately.” He looked better, breathing back to normal. She thought he had disclosed a lot. Maybe a break was in order.
“Do you want to try going the rest of the way to the roof? I think if you loop your arm around my shoulder so you don’t have to put weight on your right leg…it’s only four more steps. Think you can make it?” House nodded resignedly.
“I’m sorry about the pain. But until we get the meds right and the dosages adjusted…”
“Gee, wait, it’s coming to me…what would work…let me think…begins with a V…” She was actually delighted to hear the sarcasm slip back into his voice.
“You know that’s not an option. We may end up having to put you on a narcotic to supplement. Either a something time released or an infusion pump. That’s up to Kwan, with your input. Maybe morphine, maybe something else. But until we see if the Neurontin works, you’ll have to be…” They’d made two of the four steps while Catherine was talking. House put his hand on the wall of the stairwell, halting her.
“Yeah. Right,” he breathed. A short break for House to gather his strength.
“Two more steps. Well, we could try some non-pharmacological things: relaxation, biofeedback, massage. Any or all of those might help…”
“Been there, done that.” They were finally at the top of the flight. House leaned his back heavily against the wall, resisting the urge to slide down and sit on the floor. He wasn’t sure he’d be able to get up again.
“This better not be locked or we’re in a lot of trouble,.” She said. Catherine tried the door. It opened.
“Emergency exit to the roof. It can’t be locked. Against fire regs.”
“Ah. Ready?” Again he nodded.
The roof was wet, but snow wasn’t accumulating on it. The 32 degree temperatures and the heat of the building conspired against the snow, leaving only a wet slush. But the snow kept falling: giant flakes landed and melted on contact with the warmed cement.
House moved painfully to the short wall surrounding the roof. Leaning against it, he peered out over the city. His gaze was so intense, he almost appeared to be memorizing it, Catherine thought. Although the snowfall obscured much of the skyline.
“So why the roof?” She repeated the question asked much earlier, hoping for a slightly less glib answer. House shrugged noncommittally.
“Guess I wanted a last look.” He seemed subdued, resigned. She didn’t blame him. She found the space highly depressing and gloomy. Maybe that was why he liked it.
“Do you think you might be found guilty?”
“I wouldn’t place any bets on my freedom if I were you.”
“How do you feel about that?” It was a stupid question, and she knew House would see it that way, but she was curious. What was he thinking? Was he thinking about it at all?
“It doesn’t really matter.” He was trying to sound cool.
“How can it not matter?”
“OK. So it does matter. I don’t really want to go to jail. But it’s sorta out of my hands at this point.” He turned away from the wall. “I’d rather not spend my time worrying about things I can’t change.”
“What can you change?”
“Not a goddammed thing. Nothing.” She wondered where the sudden fury originated.
House hadn’t been out on the rooftop for nearly a year. It had been, at one time, a sanctuary for him. A place to think; a place to be alone; to be away from everyone and everything. During the last awful months before Stacy left him, when everyone had friendly advice for him; everybody wanted to “help” him. It was the only place to which he could escape them—and her.
She had certainly known where to find him that night when he had run out of clues regarding her husband’s illness. Stacy’s fury at House’s invasive questioning of Mark both aroused him and made him sad. “Medical screwing. It’s what I do.”
“I don’t know what’s wrong with him,” House had confessed to her. He had ready for her anger; but not for her shattered faith.
“It didn’t occur to me that you wouldn’t be able to figure out what’s wrong with him.” It had been against his better judgment to draw Stacy into his arms, but he could do nothing else. To hold her, then, to feel her leaned against his chest. Needing him. It was an ecstasy and a pain he had nearly forgotten. The longing he had felt at that moment was exquisite.
“So what do we do?” she had asked.
“We wait.”
:”For what?”
“For something to change. One of the great tragedies of life is that something always changes.” She had broken away from him and taken something of himself with her.
House returned from the memory. The snow had stopped and he stared out at the skyline “The last time I was out here, Wilson tried his psychobabble on me. Now I guess it’s your turn. Take your best shot.”
“What did Wilson say to you? I’ll try not to duplicate his effort.” She deserved that. She had begun sounding like a shrink and House called her on it.
“I had just told Stacy to go back to her husband. Wilson just lost it. Yelled at me about how self-destructive I was being to send Stacy away. That I just loved being miserable; I couldn’t bring myself to be happy. You know, the usual.”
“Why did you send her away?” House thought for a few moments.
“I couldn’t give her what I knew she needed. Her husband could.” His reply was curt and dispassionate. A diagnosis.
“And you knew this because…”
“We’d been there before. It dawned on me that we would be right back where it ended in a matter of a very short time. I couldn’t…” House stopped talking. He walked to the door, wordlessly and went in.
Catherine was drained. She had been half holding her breath the entire time out on the rooftop as House talked. She wondered if he’d ever talked to anyone about any of this before. He hadn’t said that much but even this tiny breakthrough seemed somehow huge. It seemed to keep coming back to Wilson. She needed to get House’s permission to interview him. She had a notion that Wilson had done more damage than good in trying to “help.” Good intentions or not.
Catherine went back into the stairwell. She suddenly realized how cold she was out there. House was sitting at the top of the stair, his head in his hands. “I don’t want to do this,” he said, hearing Catherine come back into the alcove.
“I know. But you need to talk about some of this. To me. To somebody. I’m not so concerned about the drugs. Yes, you used the Vicodin to cope with things other than your physical pain. You wouldn’t be the first, and it doesn’t necessarily make you an addict. Neither do some of the other things you did. Not even stealing the Oxy. Not necessarily.” She sat beside him, not wanting to loom over him.
“You had a serious emotional breakdown on Christmas eve that sends klaxon horns howling through every professional nerve in my body. Whether you intended to hurt yourself and failed; or whether you simply no longer cared and just wanted the pain to go away, it amounted to the same thing. You nearly killed yourself. And without thinking twice about it. The call home to your family suggests to me intent.” House looked up at her, drained; his eyes emotionless.
“At this point, what does it matter? I’m going to jail. For 10 years. My medical license will be revoked. I won’t last a year in jail. I can’t.” His voice was flat and expressionless. Defeated.
“It matters.” She wondered how much of this was rawness left over from his disclosures; how much was the physical pain? How much for effect. With the Ultram dialed down and the Neurontin not yet being administered, he had to be in terrible amount of pain. Yet he hadn’t complained.
“Do I have your permission to speak to Wilson? About your friendship? I won’t if you don’t want me to, but I think it can help me gain some insight.”
“Sure. Fine. Great.” She knew he didn’t mean it, but that he felt somehow powerless to prevent it.
Getting down from the top of the stairs was going to be more difficult than going up—and that was no picnic. But they would take it one small step at a time.
Chapter 11: Chapter 11
No Exit
Chapter 11
No Exit
Chapter 11
A/N—I think I was misunderstood when I posted the last chapter. I will not end this either abruptly or unfinished. My thoughts are still to finish in just a couple more chapters—unless there’s more to say after Words and Deeds airs on Tuesday. If House is still in rehab at the end, I may continue. But in either case, I won’t leave it unfinished. I thank everyone who has been encouraging me to continue with this work, and I’m gratified that it’s touched so many people. It’s been fun, but draining, to write!
Of the five Brandenburg concerti written by Bach, the third was Catherine’s favorite. She had made a practice of leaving the piano unlocked at night before she went home, leaving House an open invitation to use it. The adjustment of his medication regimen had been physically and emotionally challenging for him and she thought having free access to the piano might bring him some comfort.
Of course there was the dizziness, leaving him even more unsteady on his feet than he had become. He was alternately sleepy and restless, always drowsy and never getting needed sleep as the pain woke him nearly hourly at night. House had resisted using biofeedback, but had accepted the manipulations of a masseur borrowed from physio. Kwan had upped the gabapentin as much as was safe, and his “normal” pain level still had not gone below a 5 or 6 on the scale. It was still too way too high. They all knew that House would never be pain free, nor had he been even on the high doses of Vicodin. But Kwan had hopes that with the right combination of the chemical and the non-chemical, they might be able to make the pain level very consistently tolerable, with few peaks and valleys.
House was playing the concerto with technical brilliance. Catherine was on-call and was in her office when she heard him take on the difficult piece. The complicated runs and extravagant trills seemed to emerge effortlessly through the piano’s mellow wood. It was when he hesitated for the third time, hitting sour notes on each attempt, that she became concerned.
House’s preliminary hearing was scheduled for the next morning. It was half past two and she was hoping he’d get some rest during the night. But if not that, at least some respite from the torture they were putting him through.
“Hi.” House nodded, his eyes closed. “You OK?” Right question, poorly phrased. “Is it the pain or the dizziness?”
“Dizziness.” Catherine automatically put a steadying hand under his elbow, thinking he would try to stand. House raised a hand, motioning her away. Catherine reckoned that this had to be a particularly bad spell. If they couldn’t get the dizziness under control, this was not going to work for him. He had to be functional. And severe, albeit intermittent, dizziness was a serious impediment to functionality.
A few moments passed and House cautiously stood, pushing back the piano bench, testing. It had been four days since going up on the rooftop, and House hadn’t spoken much since then. A lot of that had to do with his not feeling well under the new meds, she knew. But he seemed to have withdrawn back into himself.
House did not trust easily. He had very good reason not to, given the betrayals in his life. And Catherine suspected that they went further back than the infarction and what she had read about Stacy in his file. He had needed to trust Catherine, coming back off the rooftop, freezing, in anguish, and unable to descend the staircase on his own.
To House, dignity was everything. There was nothing particularly dignified in maneuvering down a stairway one torturous step at a time, draped over a woman half his size. “Thank you,” he had said to her, before looking away, embarrassed and humiliated. Catherine wondered, after all he had disclosed to her, the condition he had been in when he first came under her care and what he had gone through the first week, why now? Why this? And she came to the conclusion that it was about trust and power: giving in to the former and relinquishing the latter.
“You need to get that hearing postponed, Dr. House. There’s no way…You’ll keel over before…”
“Yeah. Great. That will look just wonderful. Defendant requested postponement of hearing because of difficulties in rehab. That’ll get me an acquittal right there. No. I’ll be fine.”
“The problem is with your meds, not you. You’re not ready.” The dizziness seemed to have passed and House seemed more steady.
“I’ll be fine.” He began to walk back towards his room.
“Your defense all worked out?” House nodded.
“I think it depends on the judge.” House was concentrating clearing his head as he spoke. “What her take is on my alleged action, in light of the fact that my needed medication was abruptly withdrawn. That my physicians were pressured by the investigating…by a cop with a vendetta…” He was struggling for words through the dizziness, but he seemed clear-headed.
“The DEA laws are pretty brutal.” House shrugged.
“What will be will be. I’m tired of fighting. I’m tired of having to justify every…” He stopped, closing his eyes briefly, reflecting. They had reached his room.
“I talked to Dr. Wilson.”
“He got his testimony all worked out? Ready to screw me on the stand?”
“He’s not testifying. He told me, anyway.”
“Doesn’t matter. They have his statement…and his deal. They’ll subpoena him and he’ll have to testify. His sentiment is a little ‘after the barn door’s open,’ if you ask me.”
“He wanted you to understand why he felt he had…”
“Spare me. Yeah. I know. He went to Tritter to ‘save me’ from myself. Save me from going to jail.”
“He said he thought Dr. Chase was about to go to the DA…”
“You mean he hadn’t already?” This was accomplishing nothing but to get House increasingly agitated. Catherine sighed.
“Dr. Wilson should never have been prescribing for you. He has a personal relationship with you and never…”
“He knew that I…” House stopped as Catherine sat in one of the bedside chairs. He eased himself onto the edge of the bed, manually lifting his right leg up. Catherine observed him. He had never asked for more meds or more frequent dosages. He followed the protocol without questioning it, patiently. And she knew House wasn’t a patient man.
Catherine had met with Wilson earlier in the day. She had wanted to figure out a little bit of their seemingly complex relationship: close friends, patient/doctor, confidants. She doubted it was sexual. House struck her as completely heterosexual. Wilson, she hadn’t had quite a handle on…and with three failed marriages. But it was clear that their relationship was completely platonic: a close, close friendship; family, even.
Wilson, she knew, was an oncologist. He dealt on a daily basis with intractable, chronic pain. It was part of the job description. And alleviating that pain was a large part of Wilson’s job. Maybe that was why he felt qualified to deal with House’s pain issues.
“So why are you Dr. House’s prescribing MD?”
“It’s convenient for him.”
“That’s it?”
“He needs the meds.” He had sounded a bit defensive.
“Of that, there’s no doubt. None.” Wilson sighed, rubbing the back of his neck.
“House doesn’t trust doctors. He hasn’t for a long time. Not since…”
“The infarction fiasco.”
“Right. He quit physio after the first year and a half. Shortly thereafter, his significant other moved out. He practically drove her away. House completely withdrew. Basically stayed in his apartment for six months. Never kept doctors appointments; shopped; went for haircuts. He became a hermit. He needed the meds. Without someone writing him scrips, he would have simply died. It would have simply been too much for him.”
“Your prediction nearly came true on Christmas Eve. It had become too much for him without the meds. You knew that, but you convinced Dr. Cuddy to deny him needed medication.”
“I had no choice, Dr. Harrington. The DA had put a deal on the table…I went to them because I was scared for House. I saw a disaster coming. He didn’t; he never does. House can figure out everyone and everything…except himself. He struck a subordinate; a young doctor who not only is an opportunist, but had betrayed House before. When it had happened the first time, I thought House would have fired him. But he defended him as simply wanting to protect his job. He understood Dr. Chase’s motivation and found it within himself to accept it. It’s more than I would have done, but…” Harrington detected a note of deep admiration in Wilson’s voice.
“Anyway, I believed that Chase would go to the police and tell them something damaging to House. I have no idea what—but House…House sometimes colors outside the lines. We all do that…break strict medical rules for the greater ethical ‘right.’ House does it all the time. So I had no idea what Chase may have told Tritter…”
“…the detective.”
“Yes. The investigating officer for the case. I thought it would be a lesser evil if I could mitigate the damage. I got the DA to offer a deal—rehab instead of jail time. I thought that House would go for it.”
“How could you think that? I’ve known him for two weeks and I know he would never agree to taking such a deal. Especially if he thought he was right and would be acquitted.” Wilson sighed. Catherine paused. “Dr. House said that you dismissed him when he came to you about the returning pain this past autumn. That he asked you for Vicodin, but you insisted that the Ketamine was still working and blamed his pain on creeping middle age.”
“I did. And I was wrong. Clearly, in retrospect, the pain was returning. But at the time…”
“That’s when he stole your prescription pad, you know. He felt no one was listening. His case was crashing in on him…”
“The Addison’s case. Yes, I know. I was…One day I knew that House’s arrogance would get him into trouble. I was only trying to help him see…”
“Do you know, Dr. Wilson, how much of House’s so-called arrogance is for show? My guess is, after getting to know him, that House has more humility…real humility than any three doctors I’ve ever know in a major institution? Sure, he has absolute confidence in his skill as a doctor, but he questions himself all the time…” A lot of that had been pure speculation, but between reading House’s own writings, and having come to know him…and her discussions with Lisa Cuddy, Harrington was pretty sure she’d hit the mark.
“He tell you that?” Wilson had been sure that Harrington was coming down with Stockholm syndrome.
“Look, Dr. Wilson, I’m not here to accuse you of anything. Certainly Dr. House is self-destructive enough on his own. He’s hurting a lot inside, and I think you know that. You want to help, and that’s good. I understand very easily how Dr. House could shut himself up; be unwilling to see doctors and rely on someone he trusts…you. And you are a good friend to want to be there for him. But you aren’t a psychologist or psychiatrist. I think one thing I will ask of you if you visit him during his time here, especially…but for all time…is to not try to psychoanalyze him. He resents it and it deeply hurts him. He may not articulate it; he may make jokes about it, become sarcastic…but it hurts. Believe me.
“We’re going to get him on a reasonable and tolerable pain management protocol. It’s likely to end up being Gabapentin; an intrathetcal metered morphine pump. It’s not going to deal with the pain completely. The best I’ve seen with this combination is a pain level between a 3 and a 4. His pain will never be less than that. On his best days. He’ll probably have occasional breakthrough pain; and for that we’ll probably send him home with an emergency kit. He told me that he had one last spring. I assume it was something that he self-prescribed. I intend be his prescribing physician, as a matter of convenience. If he asks you to prescribe for him, send him to me. That’s why I’m prescribing for him, and not his pain management specialist. I’m here; Kwan is in New York. I’m sorry to be so long winded. Dr. Wilson. Be his friend. He needs that from you more than he needs you to be his doctor or his psychoanalyst.”
“Can I see him?”
“He’s still unwilling to see you. Give him a little time.”
“You know…I couldn’t stay that night…Christmas eve. I had been worried about him after I he left the office. The look on his face…I’d called him three times and when he didn’t answer…I thought… I saw him…lying there… But then I saw the empty oxy bottle and the whiskey. I couldn’t deal with it anymore. I felt terrible leaving him there but I…”
“You called Dr. Cuddy. I think that was the best thing you could have done under the circumstances.”
“He won’t see it that way.”
“He will. Give him some time. Right now, he’s having a hard time adjusting to the meds and we’re not anywhere close to an acceptable pain level for him. He needs to concentrate on that. Give it time.”
Catherine watched as House tried with no success to find a comfortable position in his bed. He was clearly exhausted, defeated, resigned, hurting. She was worried about the preliminary hearing…probably more than he was.
“Is the dizziness better? Should I get you anything for it?”
“Won’t it screw up our readings? The…” House had slipped off to sleep.
Harrington removed his shoes, and pulling the blanket up over him, bid him a peaceful rest.
Chapter 12: Chapter 12
No Exit
Chapter 12
Wilson had caught Cuddy’s eye as she stood with Harrington and another doctor at House’s bedside.
“Excuse me Catherine, Dr. Kwan.” Cuddy reluctantly left the room and went approached Wilson.
“What the Hell happened? Why wasn’t House in court? His lawyer filed for an postponement?” His voice was tinged with a combination of anger, worry and panic. “What did he do?”
Cuddy was momentarily confused by the question. “What did…?” She sighed. “Wilson, if I’d known you were going to be there, I would have called and let you know. I’m sorry. We…” As Cuddy spoke, she occasionally looked over her shoulder back toward the room.
“Is he alright?”
“Yes. He’s having a bad reaction to the neurontin. They maxed out his dosage yesterday…”
“Harrington told me that.”
“You talked to Harrington?” She was slightly surprised, but that meant that House had agreed to it. That was good, she thought. “He’d been having mild dizziness since he’s been on it; last night it got much worse; this morning the unit nurse couldn’t rouse him.” Wilson listened silently, concern etching his face. “Harrington thought to call me. She knew about the hearing and knew I could get in touch with House’s lawyer. She had suggested a postponement to House last night. He refused.
“He’s awake, but barely. Kwan’s not ecstatic, but they have to cut back on the neurontin. Did the judge grant the postponement? I haven’t heard.”
“Yes. It’s been rescheduled for next week. Can I see him?”
“He’s extremely lethargic and not very alert. But…”
“I really want to see him, Cuddy. Look I know he doesn’t want to see me now, but if he’s that out of it, he won’t know I’m around anyway.”
“It’s really up to Dr. Harrington and Dr. Kwan.” Wilson, assuming what their answer would be, walked away from Cuddy, parking himself on a bench nearby.
By noon, House was considerably less sluggish and the dizziness had more or less abated. The doctors determined that they had no option but to cut back the Gabapentin, hopefully only a little. Back to where they had been with it two days ago: a dosage closer to what he’d been on two days earlier—and begin to add an opoid to the mix. Lowering House’s dosage was not going to be pleasant for him, as the pain level wasn’t great, even at the maximum dosage. And the sooner they could begin a narcotic the better.
Cuddy had been sitting with him most of the morning after the initial crisis was over. He opened his eyes languidly and looked at her, bewildered. “Hell of a way to get out of going to court.”
“What happened?” House was slightly confused at Cuddy’s worried expression.
“You went down a the rabbit hole for awhile. No one could rouse you. You missed your court appearance.” Her voice was gentle. House’s eyes widened in panic. “It’s fine,” she assured him, “It’s been postponed till next week.” From the overt gentleness in Cuddy’s voice, House wondered just how bad off he was. He tried filtering through the list of gabapentin’s adverse effects. His brain was simply to foggy for the exercise.
House tried sitting up. It was not such a great idea. Cuddy raised the head of the bed for him. “Better?” House nodded. He seemed to be looking better by the minute. He nodded, closing his eyes, as he tried clearing his head.
“Why am I so dopey?” He hadn’t remembered doing anything…just being tired. And dizzy. His mouth felt like it was filled with cotton balls.
“Too much Gabapentin. They slightly OD’d you.”
“OK. Now this time it wasn’t my fault.” She smiled at the comeback.
“Kwan said they’re going to hook you up to a morphine pump. They’re going to try to schedule the preliminary testing for as soon as you’re capable. Between that and the gabapentin…” House nodded sleepily.
“Morphine. Cool. Party’s at my house.” She knew House was making light of the situation, but an intrathecal infusion pump was a last resort solution. “Spinal morphine. Who’d’ve thought of that one?” He sounded slightly bitter. And it hurt. He’d asked her for just that—a spinal morphine injection–a year before; she gave him saline, instead. He was right to be upset with her.
“House…Wilson’s been sitting out there all morning, looking like an abandoned cocker spaniel. He’s been asking to see you all morning. Look, House, He only did…”
“Yeah. What he thought was right. It’s all anyone ever does. You, him, Tritter, my lawyer… Motives pure as the driven snow.” His glare slightly receded. “Fine. I’ll see him.”
Cuddy left the room to get Wilson as House steeled himself for the visit. He’d thought a lot about his relationship with Wilson, over the past two weeks, fueled both by boredom and his sessions with Catherine.
“So how ya doin?”
“Feel like I’m floating on a cloud. What could be better. Big fluffy one, too. Leg hurts like a bitch, but…”
“House. Look. I know you’re pissed off at me. But what I did…”
“If you’re looking for absolution, I don’t want to hear it. I’m certainly in no condition to grant it. You did what you thought you had to. The end.” House blew out a breath.
“I’m not here for anything but to be your friend.” House laughed disdainfully.
“Right. Now you want to be my friend. You put me through Hell these last months…” House’s indignation was colored by his own actions towards his friend. “…Look, I’m sorry about the scrips and involving you in the criminal case. I owe you that. But …”
“Everything I’ve done, I’ve done out of friendship. To protect you. Look, I didn’t come here to argue with you. I was worried when you didn’t appear in court this morning.”
“What? You didn’t get a chance to testify against me? Cover your ass?”
“I decided not to testify against you. I have the contempt charge sitting on my desk if you need proof.”
“Yeah? What made you decide that? Bet your buddy Tritter liked that a lot. Guess you’re not engaged anymore, huh?”
“The Stills diagnosis,” Wilson inserted before House’s next barb. House arched a questioning eyebrow. Had that really only been two weeks ago? Wilson took a breath. He knew what he needed to say. Had been rehearsing it for the two hours sitting on the bench worrying. He cleared his throat before going on.
“There was a time, House, when I was in awe of you. Your leaps of intuition, which half the time I couldn’t even follow seemed like medical magic to me. I’d known the science had to be there, but you had this ability to see the big picture and the infinitesimal picture both at the same time. Merge them together and form a diagnosis. It was eerie as it was incredible to observe you make those associative leaps from nowhwere. I watched you wield your magic and recognized true genius.
“But it wasn’t only that. You were battered and bruised, and I watched you withdraw more and more into yourself. Your words always protested that you didn’t give a shit about patients. You forged yourself into a classic misanthrope. People made you miserable and you couldn’t even stand to even speak to them, much less do more than coldly analyze their symptoms on your white board.
“Over the last year or so, as I saw you become more and more self-destructive, I had forgotten something I had known about you, having been persuaded by your own rhetoric. My anger at what I saw you doing to yourself made me forget…
“It’s not the riddles to you. It’s not the puzzle. It’s not that you don’t give a crap. Because you do. Maybe too much. And patients make you miserable because when you interact with them, you feel too much for them; empathize with them as only someone who knows pain as well as you do can…” Wilson could feel himself beginning to try and analyze House, and he hadn’t intended that. Harrington had warned him and she was right.
“That diagnosis? You were sick; out of your mind with pain and withdrawal effects; depressed and under intense pressure. Yet you figured it out. Both Cuddy and I had missed it. Both of us. It’s not lucky guesses; it’s not some sort of medical voo-doo. It’s genius. And I guess I had forgotten that. And in that moment of clarity, I decided that I couldn’t be the one to deprive the world of you. The guilt would be too much. I couldn’t testify against you. Send you to jail, when it was clear you weren’t going to take the deal. ”
House watched Wilson, stunned. How long had it taken him to put that speech together. A morning sitting in the hallway of a rehab center, probably. “But it wasn’t Stills.”
“Yeah, but you figured that out too. High as a kite on Oxy.” Wilson shook his head in disbelief at the accomplishment. “Patient’s mom told me what you said to her; how you got her to do the hormone therapy on the kid.”
“Someone has a big mouth for a little person.”
“Someone once told me that it’s not what you say, it’s what you do that matters. Every day, it seems, you risk your career…not to solve a puzzle; not to ‘be right,’ to arrogantly show off that you’re the smartest kid in the class… But to ‘do right’ to do what’s best for the patient—not because it’s expedient, or will sit well with your malpractice insurance company, or cover your ass, or the board’s or Cuddy’s…”
“Yeah, but what an ass!”
“You do it because it’s right.”
“Morphine.” House laughed, deflecting. “They’re fucking putting me on morphine. Beats your Vicodin,” House sniffed smugly. “I am sorry about the scrips. I had no right to pull you into this mess.” House turned serious, realizing that nothing had really changed. Not for him. He and Wilson would be alright. They always were. That was a given. But nothing else.
“I better let you get some rest.”
“Thanks.” Cuddy re-entered the room as Wilson left.
“NEXT!”
“You and Wilson kiss and make up?” House nodded, but his thoughts were elsewhere. “You seem to be doing better than you were this morning.” Another nod. “OK. I’m going to let you get some rest.”
“Thanks, Cuddy.”
Chapter 13: Chapter 13
No Exit
Chapter the last
House watched his own blood pour from his side, creating a small pool. He felt no pain, only confusion. The pain in his leg had vanished; he felt none coming from the wound in his abdomen. He looked up to see the shooter once again taking aim, this time at his head. And then…nothing…
“…Dr House?…” Someone was shaking him. “…Dr. House?” He was bathed in a cold sweat. House opened his eyes, elated, but bewildered to not see the shooter; to not be covered in blood.
House blinked several times clearing his head and focusing in on Catherine’s face. “I’m…I must’ve been dreaming. I…” House had been resting, going in and out of sleep all afternoon. The neurosurgeon had implanted the small infusion pump and catheter under mild sedation after Kwan had ascertained a tolerable level of pain relief from the combination of the gabapentin and morphine. Now they just waited, hoping that the pain levels would settle back permanently and Dr. House could get on with his life.
“That must’ve been some dream. You’re still shaking.” House looked down at his hands. They were trembling. He pulled the blanket up and over his arms, hiding them. “Care to share with the class.”
“Not really. Although I suppose you’re going to hound me until I say something. So, just so you’ll waste less of my time…I’ve had this dream before. Just not for awhile. The ketamine treatment I went through last summer has vivid dreaming as a side effect. Just after the treatment they were bad…frequent The intensity and the frequency of the dreams has decreased over time, but they haven’t completely abated.”
“So you think this was still residual ketamine effect? Seems pretty distant…”
“Sucks, huh? Pain’s back, but the dreams remain the same.”
Catherine took a deep breath. “What was the dream?”
“Just some déjà vu of the shooting.” Catherine raised an eyebrow. Ketamine or no, it would not be unusual for this visual to recur during sleep. Post traumatic stress. Especially since, as far as she could tell, he hadn’t dealt with that day at all.
“Are you feeling up to sitting in my office? No pain from the incision? I don’t want to do your session in here.”
“Is that what this is? Not just a friendly visit to the patient?” She smiled.
“If you want this to simply be a friendly chat, that’s fine. Call it what you want.”
“I was being sarcastic.”
“So was I. This is what it is, Dr. House. You may not think this is getting anywhere. I don’t agree with you. Why don’t you get yourself together and stop by my office in 15 minutes.” House nodded reluctantly.
The shooting. Could he even say for sure what happened? Guy comes in points a weapon and blam! Shot to the stomach…
House jumped, startled at a sound he heard in the distance, out in the hall. Was that a tray being dropped or the reverberations of his own memory? He couldn’t say that for sure either. After the second shot he remembered nothing, not even asking for the Ketamine treatment. Just echoes of things. Moments, dreams, the sounds of voices, nothing solid enough to retain for more than a microsecond or two. Until he woke that day post-op and the pain was gone from his leg. He had not realized until everyone had left his bedside that that morning that tears were streaming down his face. No one had mentioned it, although certainly they would have noticed. He had not cried. Not once since that other night, when the pain was so bad he had asked to be put in a chemically-induced coma. He had cried with Stacy that night, arguing about options and amputations. He had gone to sleep believing he had won that argument only to wake up a day later to find half his thigh muscles excised and his life in ruins.
In front of him lay a dismal future, more dismal than the one Stacy had left him with all those years ago. This time, it was his own stupidity, he reckoned, that placed him in this place. Ahead lay the purgatory of a drug trial; and beyond that the hell of prison. And not far beyond that, he knew, the end of his own life.
House sighed and knocked on Catherine’s door. She noted his reflectiveness wondering if this were a good or bad sign. House sat, looking down at his hands, which had, by now, stopped shaking. “Do you want to talk about your dream?”
House surprised even himself, replying, “Yes. I think I need to do that.”
End.
Title: Transitions
Category: TV Shows » House, M.D.
Author: Barbara Barnett
Language: English, Rating: Rated: T
Genre: Drama/Angst
Published: 01-17-07, Updated: 03-12-07
Chapters: 14, Words: 21,673
Chapter 1: Chapter 1
Fire and Rain
Chapter 1
“Anytime, Dr. House, you want to talk. Give me a call: Night or day. Can be completely off the clock.” He couldn’t help it. The James Taylor lyrics drifted through his head. The stint in rehab was over. Twenty-eight days. It would take six months for the ‘atta boy’ platitudes to stop ringing in his ears.
“You just call out my name, and you know wherever I and I’ll come runnin’…”
He had no doubt. Catherine Harrington had been a friend. And a wise doctor. At least in House’s estimation. She’d found out two weeks into his rehab. Of course he should have realized that she’d find out, and maybe somewhere in the back reaches of his mind he did. A trip off campus for his court appearance; a night in jail for contempt: go directly to drug testing do not pass security guard before depositing a specimen. Then wait for the inevitable summons.
House had observed her as he entered Catherine’s office. He anticipated the disappointment he would surely discover in her eyes.. Would serve her right, he rationalized to himself, for having too-high expectations. “My friends have no expectations of me. Makes it easier that way.” He had been more honest than the group facilitator knew that first time.
“You should have come to me.” She said it quietly, with no judgment in her tone. Just sadness, almost guilt. Like she had somehow failed him.
When it came right down to it, it was the morphine pump that triggered it. Two days and he knew it would not work. Yeah, he reasoned, it might take the pain’s razor edge off to the same level as the Vicodin, but no better.
In truth, House could stand not one more outward reminder. The scar, the cane, the limp. They were more than enough. His life was more than enough out of his control. The thought of a lifetime tethered to mechanical device, no matter how small was more than his psyche could really handle.
“You would have insisted I try longer, and I couldn’t do that.”
“You don’t know that.” He grimaced at her. Yes. He did. “But the acetaminophen…”
“I’ll be careful…more careful. Just for you. I’ll check my eyes every morning and if they’re yellow…I’ll get myself listed for a new liver.” She knew he was lying, of course. And he knew that she knew it. But she also couldn’t say for sure that he was wrong.
“It’s only a small pump.”
“Yeah, well it’ll screw with my sex life.” She nodded. He smiled. “Well, it’ll be one more thing that’ll screw with my sex life. Don’t want to scare off any more hookers than…” And then she understood. It wasn’t the pump. It was what it said about him; what it did to him.
And now he sat in his discharge meeting, just he and Catherine. And then…freedom: from platitudes; from the McNeil Rehab Facility; from Tritter; from Catherine Harrington, whose understanding of him both unnerved him and intrigued him. Although he was pretty sure that the intrigued part was some sort of variation on the Stockholm syndrome.
“…I’ll be writing your scrips.”
“Why? You’re a shrink. This is, if you hadn’t noticed, a pain problem.”
“Your pain doc is attached to Columbia, not Princeton. It would be inconvenient to have him write for you from New York.”
“I have…”
“Had. It’s not a good idea to have your best friend be your prescribing physician.”
“It’s worked so far!” A protest, slightly more than half-hearted. He knew he was going to lose this skirmish, at least. Catherine arched an eyebrow in disbelief.
“I can’t believe you said that! Even you.”
“Fine.” White flag raised. She was all business this morning.
“If you begin to feel that you need to increase your dosage, call me before you do it on your own. Or call Kwan, if you’d prefer.” She realized that it sounded like she was advising an alcoholic to call his mentor before taking that fateful first drink. It’s not what she meant to say. Not really. “We’ll need to do another liver panel. See if your liver can tolerate the increase…or whether we need to supplement the Vicodin with something not containing acetaminophen.”
“Nice cover.” She reddened.
“Also, we need to deal with breakthrough pain. Kwan sent over a rescue kit.” She opened the nylon pouch. Syringes, three vials of morphine sulfate, alcohol swabs and tourniquet. House arched an eyebrow, smiling sardonically.
“What every junkie needs…” To say he was surprised would have been an understatement.
“Dr. House…”
“It was a joke.” Uttered dry as a bone left out in the sun for 10 years.
A silence, awkward, permeated the small office. Catherine’s deep brown eyes softened. “Here it comes…” The thought darted through House’s mind in bleak anticipation.
“I’d like to keep on meeting with you. I think…”
“Rehab’s over. I thought that’s what this meeting was about.” She saw that all the shutters were back up and iron bars installed around them.
“I think…” She sighed. “I believe that…Talking, like we have over the last month…”
“Please don’t patronize me.”
“Fine.” Her voice sounded slightly indignant, exasperated. “Fine. I think that you’e benefited from our sessions. You’ve been able to talk about things, by your own admission, that you have never talked about. With anyone. But as you know. Four weeks of therapy isn’t enough…” House held up a hand.
“I don’t know if I can…I need to be able to…I need my mind clear of…” House groped for the right words to explain honestly what he was feeling. He couldn’t focus on himself and be the brilliant diagnostician? He needed to separate his feelings from his job? And pushing his emotions to the far reaches of his psyche was his best ally, not his worst enemy—at least as far as his work was concerned? The sense of it was indistinct, and he was therefore having difficulty articulating his thoughts.
“Think about it. I’ll schedule an appointment for you for this time next week.” She wrote out a card. “I have another office on 7, where I see private patients. If you show up, great. If not, I’ll take that as my answer. If you want to reschedule the appointment, call my secretary. The number is on the card. Continuing counseling with me is not a requirement to my writing scrips for you. It’s separate. I do think it will help. I feel that you will continue to have a tendency to abuse the Vicodin—use it to help with your non-physical issues. That’s not going to go away without therapy. With me or someone else. And someday, you might have a repeat of what happened Christmas Eve…” House been listening to her with some disdain. He was tired of the pitch. He simply wanted to leave and go back to his life (such as it was). At the reminder of Christmas eve, he sighed. Catherine observed him, stopping.
“It won’t happen again because I won’t be put in that position again and…”
“That’s such bullshit, Dr. House. How do you know that? Or what if something else comes at you that you can’t handle and all the defensive barriers and moats and iron bars you can erect won’t stop the pain…or won’t stop the hurting. And you’re right back there, maybe not with Oxy; maybe with morphine and a syringe…” She glanced down at the rescue kit, now closed and sitting on House’s lap. He voice had become impassioned and angry…and sad. Catherine handed House the card, which he tucked into his shirt pocket.
“Are we done?” Catherine sighed again, extending her hand, which House took.
“Thank you Dr. Harrington.” House stood. Catherine watched as House left silently. She closed her eyes and uttered a silent prayer: “Please…heal his body; heal his soul; keep him safe…”
Chapter 2: Chapter 2
Transitions
Chapter 2
House unlocked his office door and walked in. The blinds were drawn and the office was dark despite the mid-morning hour. The conference room was likewise darkened, meaning that his team were elsewhere engaged. Probably the clinic. They’d love that, he was sure: all those sick people to fix and send home.
He meandered the space, glancing at the mail on his desk. It had been opened and neatly stacked into several piles: consult requests; speaking engagement requests; medical journals; articles for peer review and bills. Cameron’s work, of course. House mindlessly picked up the first journal in the stack and sat heavily in his Eames chair.
Eyes closed, House massaged his right thigh. He had to confess that the Vicodin dosage Kwan had put him wasn’t quite as effective as he’d hoped, but it was better than being tethered to a morphine pump. It was, all in all, a fair compromise, he thought, as he drifted off.
It had been a brutal six months: a roller coaster ride with no safety belt, and then a free fall. The landing had not been soft, but he had survived. Again. More, or less.
In a way, the weeks of rehab after the Tritter mess had gone away were a haven. He had long since tuned out the group therapy banality and learned to smile insipidly. He would respond in clichés leave the leader and participants with phony insights that reeked of sincerity but were far from honest. A parlor game. He was sure that had he asked, Catherine would have freed him from having to attend, given his situation, but why bother when it was so much fun.
The team had finally left him alone. No more trips up to McNeil for consults. He was pretty sure they were all on clinic duty anyway.
House knew he would have to deal with Cameron. Her dewy romanticism and willingness to accept a patient’s words unchallenged cost that young firefighter a lifetime’s worth of memories and maybe his career. But House knew that he had also failed. He had failed to question their work; their suppositions, their data. Had he not been puking his brains out every half hour and off his own game, he might have saved…
Wilson and Cuddy, too, had left him in peace to deal with…things. No more nagging from Wilson; glares from Cuddy. But he knew it had only been a temporary reprieve. He wondered how much of that reprieve was Harrington’s doing. House hated to admit it, even to himself, but she was OK. She had handled the Vicodin thing pretty well; except for firing Voldemort. Served him right though, dealing drugs to people in rehab! What a sleaze…
She did seem to understand that his problems had more to do with pain than with pills, and for that, he was grateful. She had disarmed and unnerved him over the weeks, slicing through his armor with a laser-driven precision scalpel. On the other hand, House considered, he certainly wasn’t at his defensive best: hurting, sick and besieged. Maybe he was an easier mark he might have otherwise been.
She had told him it was good to talk about “it” whatever “it” was. So far, he hadn’t seen any evidence to support her theory. Nothing had changed, and some things are better left unexplored. Forever.
Voices emanating from the outer office snapped House from his thoughts. He sighed at the inevitable “welcome home’s” and pats on the back from the various quarters. He swiveled the Eames chair towards the wall, hoping that, with the light off, they would leave him unnoticed.
The urge to be outside seized him unexpectedly. House had been penned in for weeks and the indoor atmosphere felt suddenly oppressive. He waited impatiently, restlessly, and out of their sight. After a seeming eternity, he heard their pagers sound and, as if on cue, they exited, creating the opportunity to follow suit.
House grabbed his pea coat from the coat tree in the outer office and made his way out of hospital through a rear exit. It was cold, but not bone-chillingly so. Bracing, but not abrasive. The sun was out and there was no wind to speak of. The oppressiveness of the past several weeks seemed to lift from his shoulders, and had his leg been willing to forego its constant distress signals to his brain, House might have felt elated. But elated was not a state of possibility for House. Not in months. Not since August had come and gone. And with it any second chances. Or third.
House rarely came to this part of campus in winter. Maintenance was shoddy at best and snow or ice usually covered the paths at this time of the year, which would make it too treacherous to maneuver by himself. He preferred to keep this place his own—and private, so walking here with Wilson…or anyone, for that matter, was out of the question. He’d never even been there with Stacy. He had run there all summer and into the early fall. But had avoided this particular park once he…once he had stopped running.
It had been a mild winter. Must be that global warming thing that doesn’t exist, mused House darkly. The paths were clear through the park and his favorite bench was clear of snow ice and other persons. He realized quite unexpectedly that he had actually missed coming to this secluded little haven. Even if he couldn’t run there.
He sat, wishing momentarily that he had thought to put on gloves or his hat, neither of which, of course, had been in his office. His leg, too, had begun to mildly protest the cold. He lifted it, propping it on the bench.
It was from here that House would watch the living world: people falling in and out of love; fighting, laughing, playing Frisbee. It hurt, in its own way, as inevitably, Stacy’s image entered his consciousness and he could almost see her own wildly thrown disc coming towards him. Sitting there, alone on his bench, was the only time outside his own flat, that he felt he could let his guard take a much deserved coffee break and allow his thoughts to break free and wander unchecked. For better or worse.
There wasn’t much to observe in the middle of winter. Few students ventured out to this park: too far from the center of campus. But it was still a good place to be alone. And the cold, though uncomfortable, helped to make him feel alive.
A case is what he really needed. Get right back into it. No time for answering inane questions about how he was feeling: Did the rehab help? Are you going to continue with your therapist? Attend Narcotics Anonymous? (And it was the inevitable question, probably to be asked by Wilson, the answer to which would be simple, straightforward and honest: “No fucking way in hell.”) But he hadn’t come all the way out here to reminisce with himself about rehab. He had come to get away from that. To…
He saw her approach, emerging from the sun’s glare, aglow. A halo surrounded her. An irony not lost on House. Who would she be, this vision, this time? Angel or devil? His rescuer or his destroyer? Her swift pace and tense body language made her seem not benevolent. No angel today. House sighed as Cuddy reached the bench. She stood, hands on hips waiting for him to move his leg and give her room to sit.
She had been his rescuer. He still was not sure why she had done it. Had perjured herself, had risked her career and her freedom for him. They hadn’t spoken since that afternoon when she stood poised at his jail cell, furious. She owned him.
“You’re a fool, you know.” He stared ahead, unable to look at her.
“So I’ve been told. By Wilson, in fact, several times in the past…” she glanced at the date on her wristwatch. “…three weeks.” She refused to look his way as well and he couldn’t tell easily if she had come all the way out here just to yell at him. Or worse, to give him a pep talk of some sort.
“Look. I’m a big boy. I can play outside by myself.”
“Yeah. I can see that. Frostbite becomes you. I meant what I said. I own you.” There was no mirth in her voice, no irony to soften the severity of her decree.
“Thank you, Cuddy.” He caught sight of a hawk floating against the sapphire of the sky. It functioned well as a way to avoid her glare. “But I still don’t know ‘why’.”
“I couldn’t sign the death sentences of all those patients whose lives you wouldn’t have saved from your jail cell.”
“That isn’t even close to the truth.”
“Or yours.” She had said it so quietly, he nearly missed it. For an instant they were caught in each other’s eyes, and then it was over, each distracted (gratefully) by something less intimidating at which to gaze. “Clinic duty,” she continued, finding her voice. “You will not only do your regular rotation, but be on call to fill in…unless you are directly involved in patient care…three days a week. Your other choice is to teach a class in diagnostics to third-years as well as a seminar for post-docs. Three mornings a week. The on-call time will go away in that case. Not your regular clinic time, however. And one more thing. We are co-hosting an international conference on genetically altered viruses in June. I want you on the faculty for that.” Cuddy stood to go.
“Walk back with me. You’re going to freeze without gloves or a hat.” Her voice had softened, almost imperceptibly. He nodded. House had been sitting too long in the cold. His leg had stiffened; he was overdue for another pill. He perceived Cuddy watching him as he popped a Vicodin into his mouth.
“Give me a minute.” She observed him, the way he moved. He was hurting, that was clear. She turned away from him, offering him a moment of privacy. She didn’t realize just how much she was giving him, and how grateful he was at the gesture. Finally able to stand, he still wasn’t sure on his feet. Cuddy offered him her right arm and they headed back together.
Chapter 3: Chapter 3
Transitions
Chapter 3
“So how did you know where to find me?” He was slightly annoyed that she had, in fact, found him. But he was also genuinely curious.
“I didn’t get to be dean of medicine by not knowing stuff. And contrary to what you might think, I’m not an idiot…”
“I never said…”
“No, but you think it. Besides, I hired you…”
“Case in point. Mind if we stop for a minute?” House eyed a park bench. Concern flashed in Cuddy’s eyes. It wasn’t like House to admit, for a second even, that he needed to stop. She shook her head and headed towards the bench.
She observed his face, especially his eyes. And she wondered how much of the pain he was concealing. Or rather trying to. They had walked about half a mile. It was probably too far for him, given the cold, even newly dosed on the Vicodin, but they didn’t have far to go. “You just took a Vicodin.” There was no accusation in her voice, only concern. He shrugged as he looked into the distance, hating both the situation and, in that moment, Cuddy as well.
“Why did you do the ketamine treatment? I was barely alive when I told Cameron; hardly in my right mind. But you did it anyway.” Cuddy was momentarily stunned at the question. They had never discussed it afterwards, and then within a few weeks, it had seemed inappropriate to even mention it to him.
“I…I’d known you were researching it; we’d discussed it and I… When I walked into the ER and saw you lying there, I…” Cuddy’s eyes filled with tears at the memory and she looked away.. She had never gone back to that moment, even when alone. He had been lying lifelessly on the gurney, covered in blood. Everyone was covered in his blood: Cameron, Foreman, Chase. The red of it contrasted to the paleness of his skin. “When Cameron told me what you had said…She said you were delirious and had been mumbling through your unconsciousness…You had lost so much blood. I wanted…” Cuddy struggled with and regained her composure. He deserved to know.
“I saw an opportunity to give you back what I helped to steal from you. I wouldn’t have done it, had you and I not talked about it—had you not asked Cameron to tell me. Delirious or not, there was a reason you asked. If I had known how temporary…”
“That wasn’t your fault…” House watched the red-tailed Hawk as zeroed in on a target from high in the sky. “You had no idea… On the other hand…” His voice turned bitter as he trailed off, not wanting to tread upon more recent schemes. Not today.
“When I was shot…” House sucked in a breath as he noted the lack of feeling in his fingers. “I think we better go in. You’ll freeze your ass off. Not to mention the boobs. Wouldn’t want that, would we?”
“I could go for a chai tea.” She motioned to the Starbucks at the edge of the park, and just across the street from the hospital. In truth, she didn’t want him to drop what he had begun to say. He needed to talk about it. So did she. But not in the hospital. He nodded, anticipating the warmth that would seep into his fingers.
A triple espresso for House and a venti Chai latte for Cuddy. The Starbucks was deserted mid-morning and they settled into easy chairs. House eased his right leg onto the ottoman, sighing at the relief. Cuddy awkwardly sought the words that would bring House back to the topic he’d begun back on the bench.
“You were saying.” House looked momentarily bewildered, when he realized what she meant. The moment had passed, in his mind. He closed his eyes letting the warmth from the cardboard coffee cup return the feeling to his fingers. He shivered. “House? You were talking about when you were shot.” Another prompt. Unheeded. Cuddy sigh. A different tack.
“When you came out of surgery…after the shooting… All I could think of was ‘what would House do?’ I knew the ketamine was dangerous; I knew it was likely temporary, and that doing it I could…if it was temporary…that it could be worse than doing nothing at all. But it was what you wanted, even knowing the risks. Everyone thought I was crazy, and I was. Had I known…” House opened one eye, looking at her. “Wilson told me I was being selfish to do it. He accused me of trying to assuage my own guilt for what happened with your leg in the first place. He was right.” House grimaced.
“It was what I had asked for, Cuddy. With my informed consent. It wasn’t your fault that it didn’t last. I had to try it, Cuddy. It was my choice. My right…”
“But you were delirious. You had lost a lot of blood. You weren’t in a state to…”
“Yes. If we hadn’t talked about it before. Absolutely right. But we had…” House’s voice had become agitated. He stopped, consciously lowering it, trying to keep his frustration out of it.
“But you had been concerned about the procedure. What it could do to you cognitively. To your brain…the long-term effects. You weren’t sure…”
“I’d hallucinated. The loss of blood, the trauma…as I was lying on the floor. I had another choice. One that was only mine to make.” This was getting into treacherous territory for House. He didn’t want to sound morbid – or melodramatic. “Part of me…There was a …It would have been so easy for me to simply drown in the comfort of it. The pain was gone. Just gone. There was a euphoria I felt in simply being without pain. For the first time in years. Somewhere in my brain I knew that it was in reality the fact that I was seriously injured…But I wasn’t sure…Maybe I didn’t want…”
Cuddy’s eyes again moistened at his admission. She knew him well enough to understand what he was trying to say. He had chosen to fight for his own life. He had chosen life. But he had also chosen to try to have a life without pain. Even at the risk of losing some of his genius. It explained a lot. It had been a rare moment of optimism for him and it was betrayed, not only by the failure of the treatment, but by the actions of people he trusted to understand. She felt suddenly ashamed. Did Wilson know any of this, she wondered?
“House.” She reached over and touched his hand. It was still cold. “I never told you how sorry I was about the Ketamine; about what Wilson and I…”
“Don’t.” He interrupted. He wasn’t good at this. It was over. Past history: so there was no point anymore. He shook off the feeling. “I mean, unless of course, there’s a corresponding reduction in clinic hours; teaching…any of it will do.” He knew the answer, of course. And her 11th hour rescue of him in court was more than he could ever acknowledge, much less repay (despite her motives). But it never hurt to try.
“Yeah. Right. She glanced at her watch. You’re late anyway. Shoulda been in the clinic half an hour ago.”
“I was just discharged. I’m not even due back at work until tomorrow,” he protested lightly.
“Yeah, well…with all those hours you’re going to owe me, no time like the present to get on it.” He gave her a sour look, but it had no real anger in it.
“Great. At least it will keep me away…” Unwilling make another admission, he stopped. He just wasn’t ready to face his staff. Maybe the clinic was just what he needed. Mindlessness and strangers. The clinic never looked so attractive.
Chapter 4: Chapter 4
Transitions
Chapter 4
It was nearly five, and out of the corner of her eye, Cuddy spied House just leaving exam 2. He’d been in the clinic nearly five hours. She thought it might be a record for him. She watched him sigh as he reluctantly took another patient file from the stack, glancing at it. She approached, snatching it from him, nearly causing him to lose his balance. She had only meant to get his attention.
House was exhausted. He had been confined to a relatively small space for a month. His morning walk had been stupid; he hadn’t considered that he might actually have to work on his first day of freedom. His leg had been agony all afternoon, and now, whoever had caused him to nearly fall on his ass… His anger deflated only slightly when he saw that it was Cuddy.
“Enough, House. Go home. Go to your office. Somewhere. You’re done.” She was well aware that he was hiding out in the clinic. Here, he could be the anonymous, albeit bad-tempered, doctor. No colleagues; no questions; no prying, no perceived pity. It was classically predictable House behavior.
“I’m going for a personal record. I’ve given out…let’s see….45 free samples of Motrin. I’m goin’ for 50.”
“Now.” Her eyes softened, just slightly. “You look exhausted. I don’t want you to have an excuse to avoid the clinic by getting sick. Now go.”
In truth, House didn’t really want to go back to his apartment. He hadn’t been back there since Christmas morning. Not really. The memory of the Christmas eve was still too fresh in his mind. House knew he couldn’t avoid everything and everyone forever, but returning to 221B, trashed and echoing with the bitter reminders of recent events, was to much for him…for today, anyway.
He thought of Wilson. Maybe a drink at the new blues club near the hospital…? No. He really didn’t want to spend the evening with Wilson. Wasn’t ready for that either. He could ask Cuddy to dinner, but she wouldn’t take the invitation seriously enough to say yes.
House sighed and headed back upstairs to his office. It was, after all, five o’clock, and surely the team would be gone for the day. Hopefully, anyway. Now if he could just avoid Wilson…
No such luck. It was almost as if he was lying in wait. Figures.
“So Cuddy tells me you’ve sequestered yourself in the clinic all day.” House halted in his tracks, about to enter the office. He tapped his cane in mild frustration.
“She tells me she’s going to chain me to the clinic, and then when I actually spend time there, she badgers me that I’m there too many hours. Must be a female thing. So what explains you?”
“You’re avoiding…”
“Oh here we go again…” House moved into his office, sitting heavily in his desk chair. When he looked up, despite his fervent wish to the contrary, Wilson was sitting opposite him. “And here, I thought this was a private office.”
“Yeah, like you honor those sorts of boundaries.”
“Give me a break, Wilson. It’s my first day back. I need to ‘readjust to my life.’ Or haven’t you read the latest issue of Platitudes Weekly?”
House glanced at his watched and pulled the Vicodin bottle from his jacket, shaking out two tablets. He observed Wilson watching him, assessing him. On cue, Wilson arched an eyebrow. “What, did Voldemort give you a month’s supply? How did…?”
“Relax. It’s legal. As for Voldemort, he’s history. Don’t you know it’s illegal to give rehab residents their drug of choice?”
“They found out?” House nodded, noting the way Wilson’s voice went up two octaves in disbelief. “Then how….?” House tossed the bottle to Wilson, who studied the label. When he looked up House was smiling smugly. “But why Vicodin? I thought they were thinking…”
House’s expression became serious. “I can’t be tethered to a pump, Wilson. Vicodin’s the only…”
“What about your liver?”
“It been taken into consideration. This isn’t your call.”
“So nothing’s changed.” A statement, reiterated. “You go back to the way it was before.” House nodded again. Let Wilson believe it, even if it wasn’t true. Not completely. Not even physically. His dosage had been cut back. And gratefully so. House was no fool, and even he had realized that he was taking far too much acetaminophen, at least. And then there was Harrington. But there, again, Wilson didn’t need to know. Anything.
“Nothing’s changed. All of your nagging; your incessant lecturing—a waste of time: mine and yours. Rehab is just a bad, but blurry memory.” The response smug and curt. “Now if you don’t mind…” House gestured grandly to the stack of mail on his desk, bearing his best indignant expression.
“You don’t even read your mail.” Wilson rose disgustedly. “It’s your funeral, House.” House watched him leave, his glare nearly boring a hole in the back of Wilson’s head. They would be alright. Boundaries. They needed boundaries. And this was a start.
House set his iPod carefully in the dock and set it on shuffle. “The Stoned Guest.” Perfect for his mood. Bach on Crack. House selected a journal, a Chinese journal of tropical diseases and dug in. The last aria of the PDQ Bach work crescendoed just as House finished the article on the latest variant of hemorrhagic fever to hit the Southeast Asian rain forest. Both legs had been perched on his desk: his left was stiff; his right was practically begging for a mercy amputation.
“Need a ride?” House looked up, grimacing as he lifted his right leg from the desk. “I realized that you don’t have your bike or your car.” She explained the offer. “Buses stopped running regularly an hour ago, so…” House examined his watch. Time sure does fly, he thought sardonically.
“I’ll manage.” The Eames chair looked like as good a spot as any to spend the night.
“C’mon. You can’t live here, House.” She walked into the office, seating herself on the edge of his desk, well within his personal space.
“What do I have to do to get a little privacy in here? Last time I looked the sign on the office said ‘Dr. Gregory House.’ When was it renamed ‘Grand Central Station?’”
“House…” He looked up. Her eyes were filled with a compassion he could only read as pity.
“Am I that pathetic?” He’d asked the question before, when she’d acquiesced to electroshock therapy. He was in rehab then. Was he still so wretched? Maybe he was. He couldn’t even handle going back to his own apartment. House looked away. He couldn’t stand having her look at him like that: her eyes moist and caring; her voice warm.
“Do you need…?”
“My cane,” he spat out, frustrated. He didn’t want or need her help. Not to stand; not to walk. Cuddy retrieved it and watched as House struggled to stand. He knew he had waited too long to take another pill. And sitting for hours in one position hadn’t helped. He popped the cap of the prescription bottle and swallowed two Vicodin. Cuddy continued to observe him, saying nothing. “It’s been six hours.” In truth, it had only been four. But without it, he’d never make it out the door, much less to Cuddy’s car—with or without her help.
“Do you need to wait a bit? Let it kick in?” House nodded, sitting again, resigned.
“I hate this Cuddy. You and Wilson, you think I love the pills; love the excuse to take narcotics. This isn’t a fucking game. It’s not recreation. It’s my life. Don’t you think if there was any possibility of another way, I’d…”
“There was and you tried it.” She approached cautiously, keeping her voice soft, non-threatening. “I know you’re trying. I know you’ve tried.”
“This is real, Cuddy. My real life.” He hadn’t wanted to come off morose. “You driving me home or not?” He stood shakily, but he didn’t feel as unsteady as he had moments before. Cuddy followed him to the door.
Chapter 5: Chapter 5
The truth was that Cuddy had no understanding of how best to treat House. She knew he was hurting; she knew he wasn’t dealing well with the latest of those internal injuries. But because there were no visible scars; because there were no outward signs beside the terrifying pathos in his eyes, she had no way to approach him without his shutting her out.
So she pushed him; she yelled at him. Treated him no differently than she had before rehab. Two days of clinic duty. Two days of runny noses and crotch rot. He’d never suspect a thing. The last thing Cuddy thought he needed was to feel he was being pitied or accommodated. Especially after she had thrown him out of the clinic the night before—and he’d allowed her to see him vulnerable and exposed. She would never pity him. But she did cry for him and hurt for him. But it was nowhere close to pity.
“Do you know he goes out to the jogging park by the lake? He does it every day, no matter how cold; rain, snow. It doesn’t matter to him. He just does it.”
“Why?” Cuddy was baffled at Wilson’s disclosure. Why do that to himself, she wondered.
“I saw him out there not an hour ago.”
“Yeah. He’s supposed to be working on a patient. Cameron told me the patient was discharged. What’s he doing out there, hiding from me?”
“Basically, yeah. At least this time. Last place you’d look for him.”
“He’s right about that. He doesn’t jog. He can’t jog.”
“But he could a few months ago. He told me that he goes to the park to watch. ‘To imagine,’ he said.” A lump caught in Cuddy’s throat at Wilson’s words.
“That doesn’t sound like House. He’s not exactly sentimental. Or nostalgic.” But she did know. And it was exactly something House might do. Just not something he’d share with anyone. She knew how keenly disappointed he was that the ketamine didn’t work for more than a few weeks. She also knew he would never discuss it.
“What’s the point of discussing it?” House had told her when she opened the topic months earlier. There’s nothing more to do about it. It’s done. Over. Time to move on. She had heard the enormous sadness and grief in his voice, despite the stoic words. She had let it be.
She could picture him, though. Wistfully observing: a little kid watching a baseball game from behind a fence, knowing he couldn’t participate. Would never participate. Not in that game.
She walked out to the jogging park. It was late January and most of the snow had melted. The grass was unusually green; on the other hand there had been little “usual” about the weather the past few years. Her irises and hyacinths had popped out of the ground a week ago, two days before a big snowfall. Yet another series of near 50-degree weather days had melted most of the snow, leaving only patches where the shade prevented full melting. Global warming, eerie as it was, and scary as it was, had, at least, some pleasant side effects.
She saw him from afar as she approached. Cuddy had to smile. He was lying atop a picnic bench sprawled, more accurately and staring up at the sky. She wondered what could be holding his interest. Mabye nothing. Maybe he was asleep. As she neared, she saw that his eyes were open and cast into a large pine tree. She followed his gaze up to a large bird, perched incongruously in the treetop. It was a blue heron. She knew she was observing something as rare as he was: the private House—unguarded, unwary, in repose—maybe even at peace (although she knew also that she might be stretching the point a bit there).
She almost hated to disturb him, but… House tensed as he heard someone coming towards him. Looking slightly back, he found himself looking directly into Cuddy’s eyes. Her face hovered above his. For a moment he thought she might lean down and kiss him. But, then again, this was Cuddy. And not the Cuddy of his late-night fantasies; this was the real Cuddy, bundled up and looking more than a little bit annoyed.
He sat up on the table, eye-to-eye with her and popped a Vicodin. She hadn’t known yet that, in fact, Vicodin was his prescribed pain medicine. The urge to yank her chain was irresistible.
“So, rehab. It was all a scam?” He shrugged. Now she was pissed off at him. Good. Right where she was supposed to be. There was so much comfort in the familiar. Gone was the angel of mercy expression with which she had regarded him so earnestly the night before.
“You owe me, House.” When it was all said and done, that much was true. He did owe her. She really couldn’t put him back in jail; really couldn’t turn him in without endangering her own freedom. (Well, he had told her that she was a fool to have done it.) So, stalemate. She didn’t own him, but he did owe her. Big time. Clinic duty. Two days. Fuck.
But then there was Eve. And with her the dredging up of memories best left for dead. He needed to find his humanity. He needed to find his humility bone, too, right? But who were they to say when, where, how or even whether humanity was even relevant?
“You did good, House.” Yeah. Really. Got her to get in touch with her emotions; to begin to process what had happened to her. Why was that an a priori good thing? Got her to terminate the pregnancy.
“Yeah. We tell ourselves that we’ve helped her. Make ourselves feel good. Maybe all we’ve done was to make girl cry.” He simply didn’t know. He only knew that he felt raw: exposed and naked (and not in a good way).
House’s abrupt departure from the lounge and the foosball game left Wilson and Cuddy bewildered at his sudden anger.
“What did we say to him?”
“You told him he did a good thing. Maybe that’s not what he wanted to hear.” Cuddy cocked her head. “Maybe he’s not sure it was a good thing. That only time will tell.”
“Since when did you become the House Whisperer?” Wilson shrugged. It was a guess, that’s all.
“Did he say how he got her to talk? Traces of sodium pentathol in her blood, maybe?” Wilson sighed. “She wanted to know if anything bad ever happened to him, House told me. He didn’t know how to respond. I told him to tell her the truth, tell her about being shot. That was a pretty bad thing, Maybe he talked about it with her. Maybe that’s why he’s so upset. Who knows, with him?”
Cuddy found House back in his office, headphones on, eyes closed. Again, she wondered if he might be asleep. But it had only been 15 minutes since he’d left she and Wilson.
“What do you want, Cuddy?” He hadn’t moved a muscle or opened an eye. He simply knew.
She sat on the edge of the ottoman, gently nudging his feet out of the way as she did. “I just wanted to tell you that you don’t have to do clinic hours tomorrow. You put in overtime today.”
“Tired of paying out all that extra money? Did I win the game?” He had meant the words to sound bitter; they simply sounded tired.
“It was amazing how you got her to talk, House. She wouldn’t say a word to Stone. With you… Don’t you get anything out of that? She trusted you. And you helped her. That gave you nothing at all?” She was baffled. Only House would turn something that huge around and make into nothing. Less than nothing.
Chapter 6: Chapter 6
Transitions
Chapter 6
Bird was located on a side street, half a mile off campus. As a jazz club, it was patterned after New York City’s Birland—Charlie Parker’s own nightclub. The club was only about 10 years old, but it might have just as easily stepped out of a 1950’s movie set. It was House’s favorite jazz haunt. House parked the bike in the single handicapped space and waited as Cuddy dismounted. He’d never admit it, but he had enjoyed the slight pressure of her body against his back; her arms around his waist.
Cuddy handed House’s helmet to him, trying to fix her hair a little. “Do you have a death wish, House? For both of us? Jeez.” House shrugged with feigned innocence. “No wonder the cops have it in for you.”
“Thought you weren’t new at this.”
“I’m not. On the other hand, I’ve never tried breaking the sound barrier on a motorcycle.” They walked in, taking a table near the bandstand. The band was on a break. About 10 of the 20 or so tables were occupied. Drinks were served. He: a Guiness; she a glass of Shiraz.
“Can I get you folks anything to eat?” An earnest college student reeled off the evenings specials.
“I’ll take a Caesar salad, with salmon. Dressing on the side.” House scowled at her selection, but wasn’t surprised.
“I’ll have a burger. Rare.” A quick glance towards Cuddy, who was sipping the Shiraz. “Hold the grilled onions. Fries and a house salad.”
The college kid exited. “Service here is lousy. Food is good and the Music is even better. But be prepared to stay awhile though; your salad may take an hour. Burger’s quicker. Guess they have to personally go out and catch the salmon. At least that’s what they told me last time…” House was fidgeting with all of toys in front of him. The silverware, the paper napkin, which was slowly being dismembered; the Guiness bottle…
It had been a long time since House and Cuddy spent any sort of casual time together. Years since they had sat together sharing a drink. Many, many years. He wondered what the hell he was doing here with her. Gratefully, for House, the band’s break was over and they launched into a lengthy rendition of Jerome Kerns standard.
Cuddy watched House with interest. His eyes were closed and seemed to listen with his entire body. His hands drummed to the piano solos, the guitar improvs and the drums as they brushed the skins. “Dr. House?”
House’s eyes flew open, momentarily annoyed that someone had broken his concentration. It was the club’s owner, Sam. “The guys want to know if you want to sit in on the next number.” Slightly embarrassed, House nodded.
“Fine,” he replied, looking away from Cuddy’s intent stare.
“You play with them?”
“No. Not really. I used to play with the sax player in another band; sometimes I sit in for a number or two. Do you mind?” He really should have asked her, he thought. On the other hand, this wasn’t a date, so…
“Why should I mind? I’m just surprised. I’ve never seen you perform. I didn’t know you still…”
“I don’t.” Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea. What had made him bring Cuddy here? He knew that answer to that. The music provided a rock-solid excuse to not talk. Drink, eat, listen. Not that he had really thought about it as he had driven here. House sighed as the band came back together to finish The Way You Look Tonight.
The pianist made a grand show of deference as he gave up his bench to House, taking his cane and hanging it on a nearby music stand before picking up Stratocaster guitar and sitting on a stool at the back of the bandstand. The leader said something to House, to which he nodded then smiled broadly. The rest of the band laughed as Cuddy watched in fascination at the interplay between House and the band members. There was an easy camaraderie between the regular players and House. More than would be suggested by an occasional number or two, as House had claimed.
It was a long piece. Cuddy didn’t recognize it, but then again, she was no jazz expert. She knew good, however, and theses guys were much better than good. Each player took a break, playing long and winding improvisations until meeting the rest of the band back at the chorus only to pass the baton to the next player.
The expression on House’s face as he took his turn was like nothing she had ever seen in years of observing him, decoding his expressions and body language. It was pure concentration; it was as if nothing else existed for him but the music and the moment. The intricacy of his playing was not lost on the band members as he used the full range of the keyboard. The smiled, laying back, giving him room. His eyes were closed during his solo, but Cuddy could easily perceive the pleasure. Her eyes were on him alone and the combination of his artistry and her nearly voyeuristic scrutiny of him left her feeling unexpectedly aroused. She hadn’t noticed that the server had brought their food and was surprised to see her salad sitting in front of her as the band came back together for a final chorus.
She smiled slightly as she saw the sax player ask House to sit in on another number, and House politely and bashfully demur. Cuddy had known that House had been a professional musician at one time or another; it had been part his undergraduate legend at Michigan. But this was a part of House with which she was completely unfamiliar. And she was saddened that he chose to keep this part of himself private. She didn’t want to make too big a thing of it when he returned to the table. Didn’t want to scare him off and watch him retreat behind his fortress walls. So she willed herself not to gush.
“Your piano playing has unanticipated magical powers. It makes food arrive on the table.” Cuddy smiled. “It was also amazing. I had no idea…”
“I’m out of practice.”
“Modesty does not become you. Who wrote that?”
“It’s a Bill Evans piece.” House took a large bite of the burger, his eyes cast towards the bandstand. The group had begun their next number. “Ssh.”
They ate in silence, the music providing an ideal landscape for House’s reticence. She couldn’t tell if he was brooding about the Eve, or simply mellow. She hoped it was latter, but feared that he was yet ruminating about the wisdom of drawing out the rape victim.
Couples had made their way onto the small dance floor as the band played an Ellington tune. She watched House watch them, glancing every now and then back at her. She noted a wistfulness at play in his eyes and wondered where that came from so suddenly.
“What are you thinking?” she asked as non-threateningly as she knew how.
“I’m not. I’m watching.” Cuddy cocked her head, confused.
“You’re watching.” A statement.
“Yeah. See? That couple over there. Married for ages….but that one, over there,” he said pointing to his left. They’re lovers. Not married at all.” Both couples appeared to be in their early 60s, more or less. Other than that, Cuddy could tell nothing more about them. House shrugged. “I can’t dance; can’t be out there…with you, for example. So I do what I can. I watch. I imagine…” His voice trailed off as he finished the Guinness with a long swig from the glass.
“House…” Cuddy’s voice became hushed. She bit her lower lip, swallowing the lump that had formed in her throat. “C’mon let’s get out of here.” She misunderstood his mood as yearning rather than simple, rational acceptance.
“Why?” Now it was his turn to be confused. Truthfully, he didn’t want to leave her company quite yet. It was a pleasant distraction from his thoughts; his doubts. “Want me to take you back to your car?”
“No.” She touched his hand, and he knew.
Chapter 7: Chapter 7
Cuddy knew that House had been sleeping in his office since Christmas, minus the four weeks in rehab. “How about your place?” she asked a bit disingenuously, if gently.
“Why?” The suggestion elevated his natural wariness to suspicion.
“You have a fireplace. I don’t.” Plausible enough. And true. “You have wood?”
“I have wood.” House had realized that eventually he’d have to return to his apartment. Maybe it would be easier with someone, even if that someone was Cuddy. She’d leave him no opportunity to think too much about it, or at least forestall things for a while. On the other hand, how would he explain to her that he hadn’t been back there since shortly after Christmas. It would be easy enough for her to tell, he considered. It had been a wreck when he left: still not entirely put back together after Tritter’s dismembering of it, not to mention his own damage inflicted. At least he’d had the presence of mind to clean up the vomit and the dishes. As disheveled as was his personal appearance, he had no interest in sharing his flat with roaches or mice. A rat, in a cage, was another story.
House had given Steve McQueen to a neighbor to feed before going to see Tritter on Christmas morning, sure that he was going to be taken immediately to rehab. He didn’t want the rat’s starvation on his conscience. Very little about his thinking was clear that morning, but he was no rat murderer.
“The apartment’s a mess, Cuddy. Why don’t we…”
“What happened to your cleaning service?”
“Yeah. Another casualty of Tritter’s. They took one look at the chaos wrought by Tritter and his friends and told me I needed a bulldozer and not a ‘housekeeping’ service.”
“But that was in November!” House looked away exasperated at this line of inquiry.
“Yeah, well…I forgot. Just wave my magic cane and voila! Apartment put back together. How stupid of me to have not remembered that…” Cuddy’s stare bored into him, but he wouldn’t return her gaze.
“House. I know it’s difficult for you. Why not hire…”
“Oh, what was I thinking? I did have a few other things on my mind…I…”
“Doesn’t matter. It’s getting too chilly out here. A wood-fire is just what I need right now. So, your apartment. If you’re extra-special nice, I might help you clean up a bit.”
“Fine.” Defeated, he handed her the his helmet and they traveled the short distance to Baker Street. The thing of it was that it wasn’t the mess that kept him away so much as memory of Christmas eve. Hell Christmas eve, the memory of that whole week; that whole month. But Christmas eve especially.
House asked himself if things were any better now than they were then? Did he really feel much differently about…everything…than he had when he had called his mother? Catherine had told him that he shouldn’t expect much from a month. To give her time; to give himself time. For what, he wondered? He wasn’t going to down another bottle of Oxy with a whiskey chaser. Time to heal? He hadn’t healed in 40 years; or seven years; or six months—take your pick.
It wasn’t rational to not want to return to the apartment. House knew that. “I haven’t been back here since Christmas, you know.” He dismounted the bike and took the helmet from Cuddy as he unlatched his cane.
“I know.” House arched an eyebrow.
“Been spying on me?”
“Just concerned.”
“Is that what this is about? I have a shrink you know.”
“This,” she said emphatically, “has nothing to do with that! And …how’s that going by the way. Thought rehab’s over, hence my question about using the present tense regarding Catherine. You know, scam and all…” She probably should have let the comment drop, but he had left the opening. She had tried to keep the teasing in her voice.
House unlocked the door and stepped into the foyer. A pile of mail on the small table near the mailboxes threatened to topple over. He glanced at it, and realizing the effort to pick it all up and open his door was too great for the moment, House ignored it.
The apartment was not as trashed as she had feared, but it wasn’t good. Saying nothing, House piled some logs on the hearth and lit them. Cuddy began to wonder what the hell she was doing there. It had all seemed a good idea, back at the jazz club, wine seeping through her veins, watching House, the musician become someone entirely different. Now, she wasn’t at all sure. About anything.
House was pacing, picking things up; an expensive lamp that had fallen. A guitar, laying askew against the sofa, House replaced in its rack on the wall. He folded several throws, setting them carefully over the back of an armchair. Finally, he sat on the sofa, propping his right leg on the coffee table. The nearly empty bottle of Maker’s Mark sat upon it, an unwelcome reminder of Christmas. He knew Cuddy was observing him and it made him uncomfortable. This was not a good idea. An uncomfortable silence enveloped them.
“I suppose I should offer you a drink. I suppose I’m not being a very good host. I don’t usually…”
“Don’t get up. Where do you keep your beer? In the fridge?”
“I can get you a beer, Cuddy. I’m not that…” But she was already up.
“I’ll get one for you too.” Cuddy threw on the light in the kitchen, only to be stunned. The place had been ransacked. Every cabinet, every drawer had been emptied; their contents dumped unceremoniously on the floor. The shattered remains of antique etched crystal goblets (his grandmother’s maybe?) shattered amongst metal flatware, broken dishes and copper pot covers. No wonder he hadn’t wanted to return to this. No wonder he couldn’t deal with putting it all back together.
“House…Tritter’s people did this?”
“Amazing what a little search warrant will let ya do, huh?”
“They did major damage. Is there anything you can…?” House shook his head, taking the bottle from Cuddy. He took a long swig.
“On the other hand, kitchen’s nothing compared to the bedroom. They did a really good job there. Real thorough.” House was surprised at how bitter he still felt after over a month. On the other hand, the priceless collection of artifacts he had collected as a kid; his beloved chemistry set—destroyed; a crumbled heap of so much ground up glass and rock lying beside his bed. House sighed, rising from the sofa. He walked to the fireplace mantle, staring down into the fire.
The light from the blaze made his eyes nearly colorless. Cuddy approached him cautiously, lightly touching him on the back. Again, she noted the slight flinch. And again she noted that he didn’t move away from her touch. She figured that it wasn’t the destruction of physical things that had upset House; it was the violation. It was the violence of it. But she didn’t think that even that was the whole story. He turned, slightly surprised to find her quite that close.
He both craved her touch and was repelled by his own neediness. He broke the contact and stalked to the sofa, sitting in the corner of it, warning her off and daring her at the same time. She took the dare; knowing him too well to be put off by his glower. She knew the moment, as it were, had passed, recalling how serene he had looked back at the club, playing, immersed in his playing. She tried to move the game back onto his turf, back into his comfort zone.
“Play me something?” She grabbed his hand playfully, pulling at him, while being mindful of his bad leg. “I’m a pushover for a good song, you know. I’ll do anything, maybe even help you clean up this disaster area before it’s condemned.” She tried for a combination of seductiveness and pragmatism.
“Gee, Cuddy. So, I play ‘Mary had a Little Lamb’ and you’ll follow me to my bedroom?”
“To clean.”
“It’s a start.” He arched an eyebrow, making his way to the baby grand.
Cuddy sat beside him on the bench. Close, but giving him room and access to the entire keyboard. A smile quirked his lips as he pecked at the opening measure of “Mary…” Cuddy slapped his arm.
“Ow.”
“Play, then.”
“Fine. I’ll play.” He thought for a moment before the lyrical sounds of Gershwin’s American in Paris wafted from the soundboard. Cuddy closed her eyes. She could nearly see the Eiffel Tower lit in the dark.
Chapter 8: Chapter 8
Transitions
Chapter 8
A/N—This story will progress as if Needle in a Haystack hadn’t happened (or hadn’t happened yet). I view NiaH sort of like those X-Files stand alones that didn’t fit into the overarching arc of the seasons.
Had she not known him for so long, Cuddy would have been completely swept away by his playing. His face was serene with his eyes closed, the sorrow and resentment always present in them were not visible. The lines that marked him with tension and pain were imperceptible when he disappeared, like this, into the music.
Cuddy observed his face from her close vantage at his side. He was more gaunt these days. The toll, she thought, from the last month. His hair had a bit more gray at the temples, and his beard, if you wanted to call it that, had sprouted twin patches of white.
House stopped playing, catching Cuddy unawares. She looked away embarrassed to have been caught so closely observing him.
“That was amazing.” She hoped she hadn’t sounded too much like a swooning teenager, but she was always slightly amazed when House allowed himself the luxury of being himself, rather than quote-House-unquote.
Cuddy understood how much he needed the image that he was quick to acknowledge and refused to defend. In the beginning, just after she had hired him, House had always said that people don’t like to be treated by sick doctors and he hated being viewed like that, so he curtailed patient contact as much as he could. When that wasn’t enough for him, House withdrew more and more into his office and into himself.
He’d had a reputation, when she hired him, of being one of the best diagnosticians on the planet. It was as if he had a sixth sense about diseases. Other hospitals, anxious to capitalize on desire to leave private practice after the infarction, made him offers impossible to refuse. What they didn’t understand, however, was that Gregory House had changed elementally. Along with several pounds of leg muscle, House lost his taste for the game of medicine. He would refuse all requests to speak at conferences; to fundraise; to chair committees; to play golf with major donors. He would sit in his cushy office and read journal articles. When asked to review articles for publication, he would agree, only to rip the researchers’ work to shreds (not without reason). His reputation evolved to one not so glowing. After the fourth job in a year, the offers from major medical institutions dried up. His relationship with Stacy deteriorated into alternately silent glaring or cruel and vicious arguing.
When he came to PPTH, his reputation for genius was superseded by a reputation for being difficult, sullen and withdrawn; uncaring about his personal appearance and refusing to meet with patients under his nominal care.
Cuddy had known all of that, but as the new dean of medicine, she had secured his services to head a newly endowed department of diagnostic medicine. He would be a consultant on cases that no one else could figure out. A medical court of last resort, as it were. He had funding to hire three fellows, which would fulfill his teaching requirement and secure his tenure on the faculty. He would, she had told him, only have to take the cases he wanted. No commitment to fundraise, give speeches or any of the other public ventures that clearly would make him uncomfortable. The position wouldn’t make him rich, but it would keep him medicine, doing what he did best.
It had been nine years ago, give or take, and Cuddy had seen House slowly come out of his shell. When he did interact with patients, which, she suspected he did more often than his reputation would allow him to admit, the were always better for it. He was a significant source of frustration to her, but almost as if on cue, he would do something for a patient, or for her personally, that would disarm her, wow her or simply leave her speechless with awe. Like with Eve. Or like now, watching him play Gershwin, sitting close by his side. No sarcasm, not a hint of cynicism, just the lushly romantic and virtuoso piano playing of a haunted and sensitive soul. No one at the hospital was likely to believe it (except maybe Wilson)—that this side of Gregory House even cohabited with Gregory House the cold, unemotional jerk. She doubted that even House really understood this side of himself, that it even existed.
“House. Your playing…where…when…did you learn to play like that?”
“Yeah, well, I had the requisite piano lessons when I was a kid…”
“Yeah, right.” Cuddy stood, wanting to sit by the fire. House took the last swig from the beer bottle, setting it on the piano. He stood with some difficulty; his cane was halfway across the room.
“Can you hand me my cane, Cuddy. I think…” Cuddy nodded, realizing that his leg must’ve stiffened sitting at the piano.
“Is the new dosing regimen of Vicodin working out for you at all?” House was a bit taken aback at the question, considering their earlier conversation in the park. Cuddy noted his confusion and smiled.
“I checked…”
“Those records are private. Patient confidentia…”
“Hah! As if you give a crap about patient confidentiality. Besides. You’re my employee. I have a right to know…”
“No. You don’t.” But his argument was only half-hearted. “It’s really not enough, what they have me on.”
“How many hours?”
“Four. Not quite. Not due for another two.” House walked painfully over to the sofa, sitting in it heavily. His peaceful demeanor had all but vanished.
“Take your next dose.” Now House was astonished. It was almost surreal, a weird sort of role reversal.
“I told Harrington I’d give the new regimen a week to work.”
“Yeah, but it’s been a day, and clearly…” Cuddy had taken a seat next to him on the sofa. She watched the flames dance amongst the logs as the fire crackled, sending small sparks up into the hearth. She loved the smell of the burning wood.
“She’s not going to be so quick to up my dose. She’s going to want to supplement it with other fun drugs. I’m not sure…” Cuddy couldn’t quite believe that this was House she was talking to. “I can’t run out of…” House looked into the fire, not finishing his sentence.
House no longer had his stash. His safety net of extra Vicodin, should the need arise. If he ran out, that was it. Wilson was no longer writing for him. No one was. “House, you need to talk to Harrington tomorrow. If you need… You shouldn’t have to…”
“What? Be in constant pain? Wonder where my next fix is going to come from if I run out Vicodin? What?” House stood, frustrated. He hated this. All of it. Especially the idea of begging Harrington for a higher dosage. He had risen from the sofa too quickly and faltered, nearly toppling into the coffee table head first. He caught himself on the arm of an adjacent easy chair as he staggered and landed softly, sitting on the floor. He leaned his head back against the seat of the sofa, defeated. Cuddy joined him on the Persian rug.
“Give me your right leg.”
“We trading? I’d be happy to. Mine’s longer than yours, but I think you’d be getting the wrong end of the deal, so…”
“Your. Leg. Here.” She motioned toward her lap as she reached over, pulling his leg carefully and gently toward her. House moved the rest of his body awkwardly closer to Cuddy. She turned and faced towards him, placing his leg across over her crossed legs. “I used to be pretty good at this, you know.” She began to very caringly massage his leg. She started at the calf, avoiding the center of his pain for the moment. House gasped slightly at her touch, closing his eyes and allowing the sensations to envelop him, relax him.
“Tell me when you’re ready for me to work your quad.”
“Not yet.” That much she knew. The pain above his right knee had rendered every other muscle in his right leg a tangle of knots. She wanted to relax those peripheral areas before touching his thigh.
“I’m sorry about your apartment, House. All those things…” He shrugged. “The sense of violation you must have felt…” She wondered if that was the source of his empathy with Eve—that shared sense of violation. Violation he had suffered too often over the years, from Stacy’s betrayal (or saving his life, depending on your point of view, she considered); the shooting—now this. It wasn’t rape, but… “Look, I know you aren’t sure about whether you did the right thing about Eve.” Cuddy could feel House’s muscles stiffen again beneath her hands. “But you did all you could do. She’s talking about it.”
“What makes you think that’s necessarily a good thing?” It was more a statement than a question.
“You shouldn’t let things fester inside. It’s corrosive. At least if she’s talking…”
“You don’t know anything about it, Cuddy.” House moved, disrupting Cuddy’s massage. She pulled his leg back over her lap.
“Stay still, or I can’t do this.” He was getting agitated and Cuddy wasn’t sure why. “…And you do?” She responded to his question.
House responded by pinching the bridge of his nose and rubbing his forehead before replacing his hands on the floor. Cuddy moved up to his knee. “You ready?” House nodded slightly, waiting for her touch. “You did good, House. With Eve. She trusted you. You must’ve said something; done something to win her trust.”
“She was raped. She’s a bad judge of character. Why else would she trust me?”
“Or a good one.”
“I told her a story. Ow.” Cuddy had come to a particularly sensitive area of the thigh. She could feel the scar tissue beneath his jeans and she momentarily flashed on the night a year before when he had come to her office, desperate and in agony, begging her for relief; for a spinal shot of morphine. She felt ashamed suddenly that she hadn’t trusted him; hadn’t believed him. “I told her…I told her that I had been abused when I was a kid. She asked me if anything terrible had ever happened to me…”
Cuddy stopped in her tracks, shocked. Why tell her that? Why not tell her something real, she wondered. The shooting; even the infarction. Why make up something, she wondered?
House sighed loudly, his breath sounded ragged as he breathed out. Cuddy realized that she had stopped her massage. “Sorry.” She continued, kneading the damaged muscles between his knee and hip. “House.” Her voice was a whisper. “What you told her…?”
“It’s true.” House’s voice was nearly a whisper; the words catching in his throat.
“Oh my God, House…” He wasn’t sure exactly what had made him confess it to Cuddy. The words just seemed to slip out, disarmed as he was. He instantly regretted it, cursing himself; cursing her for care and concern. Her pity. Fuck. Just. Fuck.
“It was a long time ago. It was a strategy. Hardly ever think about it anymore. You can’t tell? I’m such the picture of great mental health.” He failed to keep the bitterness from his voice. He jerked away from Cuddy’s touch, raising himself back up to the sofa, and then, with the aid of his cane, walked up to the fireplace mantle. He stared down into the flames, poking them with an antique long handled tool. He felt Cuddy’s breath on his back.
He turned, facing her. They were very close. “It’s not what defines me. Not who I am,” he responded to the unasked question. His voice was even again.
“But it’s part of you.” Cuddy’s voice was too soft, too compassionate. It made him uncomfortable. He wanted to insert a sarcastic remark, but couldn’t seem to access that part of his vocabulary. “How old were you?”
“Six, seven, eight…it goes on. Until I grew too tall and too big…and too not caring.” Cuddy ventured into the inevitable.
“Was it sexual?” Not that it mattered. Abuse was abuse.
“No.” It explained a lot about House’s attitude towards abusive parents, and their victims over the years. Even at his most apathetic, if he suspected abuse, he took the case. It fit.
“Do you…”
“No. I don’t. Want to talk about it.” He again turned away from her. She was still standing very close as he stared into the flames. The smoke burned his eyes and made them water. Cuddy’s hands were on his back, willing him to turn around. He didn’t want her pity, but instinct drew him back towards her. She looked deeply into his eyes. “It’s the smoke Cuddy. I’m not…” She nodded. Entwining her hand in his, she led him back to the sofa.
Chapter 9: Chapter 9
Transitions
Chapter 9
Cuddy had let herself out of House’s apartment around midnight. She had turned down both his offer of a ride home the use of his bed, with or without him. “Your choice,” he had quipped with one eyebrow arched. She had been relieved to see the, albeit slight, return of his sense of humor. Ultimately, Cuddy opted for a taxi ride back to PPTH and her Lexus.
She’d hated to leave him, but he had become uncommunicative and she was beginning to fall asleep. And as much as his offer of a bed was both gallant and tempting, she wasn’t sure these were the best conditions to stay with him. Conditions under which innocent comfort could lead to a whole other place (given her hormones and his mood). She wasn’t sure that she was ready for it; and she knew that House would view any such encounter as pity and nothing more. Even if it wasn’t true. She wanted him, and she was pretty sure he wanted her, but under circumstances so ambiguous, it wouldn’t be a very good idea.
Cuddy had stayed for a while after House’s disclosure, but with every question or comment ventured, he looked away, completely withdrawing from her. She knew that he had thought it a terrible blunder to tell her; that he regretted it instantly. House continued to sit on the sofa, staring into the fire. Eventually Cuddy reluctantly got up from her place at his side and began to examine the damage wrought by Tritter. She needed something to do with her anxiety. And talking to House, who had apparently turned to stone as he stared motionless into the fire. She didn’t feel she could leave him like this, yet she needed to do something. And cleaning was more productive than pacing. Or screaming.
She thought the kitchen would be easiest; the most straightforward. Clearly, House had made a half-hearted attempt at cleaning the mess, although with his limited mobility, she guessed he hadn’t gotten very far. A few pots had been replaced on their hooks; the sink had been cleared of debris; a small space on the butcher block. Cuddy sighed, surveying the disaster area. Maybe House would let her send her own cleaning crew to set things back in order. She knew if she did nothing, it might stay that way forever.
Quite suddenly, he was standing in the doorway to the kitchen, surprising her when she stood with an armload of surprisingly intact ceramic mugs. “You don’t have to do this.”
“I know. I want to.” She didn’t sound convincing. That much she knew. No one “wants” to do this sort of detail. “House you can’t manage…” Anger darted across his gaze, but Cuddy was at a loss. It was what it was. “Look, I don’t really want to do this. How about I send my cleaning crew. There are five of them. They come all at once. In an hour everything will…” She was talking too fast, trying to him on the idea. On accepting help.
“Please, Cuddy. Just let me drive you back to your car.” It was almost a plea. His voice was hushed and raspy. “If you don’t want to drive, you can stay here tonight. My bed is your bed” The attempt was half-hearted at best, and she knew he’d rather be alone.
She knew it was time to leave. He was on the edge. She wanted to hold him; to reach out to him. But she wasn’t sure how to do it without setting off his defensive alarm bells and drive him away.
“Will you be alright?” A nod. She wasn’t so sure, but there was nothing else she could do. She hoped he would at least call Catherine—end of rehab aside—tomorrow.
Now home, Cuddy couldn’t sleep. She wandered the spacious and airy rooms, her mind overflowing with worry. Of course the information was only new to her. House had lived with it for a lifetime. It was too new for her, however, and she couldn’t help but see the young Gregory suffering at the hands of God-knows-who. An uncle, an aunt? A teacher? God forbid, a parent? No. She’d met his parents. They were nice enough. Friendly enough.
Cuddy stopped mid-kitchen in her tracks. His parents. He had tried so hard to get out of seeing them. He had acted so strangely, even for him, when they were to visit him. To her, to everybody. He’d offered to do clinic duty, for heaven’s sake!
“I don’t hate her. I hate him!” The tone of his voice had been remarkable. She hadn’t been able to put her finger on it then. Regret? Sadness? Fear? But no anger, no vitriol, and more importantly, no sarcasm. At the time she thought it was simply House being House. But he refused to lie to them.
“I can’t lie to her. She’s a human lie detector,” he had remarked. House of all people, the great manipulator. Lying when it served his purpose, his agenda, was never a barrier for him. And no one could figure out why he couldn’t do what they all did when they didn’t want to see family: lie. But he wouldn’t. Or couldn’t. And she laughed at him for his childishness. What had they done to him?
Cuddy wiped her eyes. She wanted to talk to him. To someone. Should it have been obvious? Would it have mattered? Would she have forced him to deal with Eve? Oh God. Eve. Had he not had to deal with her, he wouldn’t have had to open that wound. A deep wound. The deepest. But hadn’t she just told him only hours ago that talking was the best thing?. “At least she’s talking. She can begin to deal with it. You did good, House.” The words were acid in her throat now as guilt eroded her insides. She felt sick.
Another attempt at sleep left Cuddy tossing the bedcovers into a tangled mess. Images, words, casually tossed off, sarcastically snarked, bitterly spat, battered her mind, invaded her consciousness and kept sleep a far-off destination. “He wants to be miserable. He thinks it makes him special. He simply can’t be happy.” Wilson thought he had his friend pegged. She wondered how much he knew. She guessed that it was not much, if anything at all.
“Part of him doesn’t think he deserves to be happy. I’m not sure how to reach that part of him; how to make it better; how to change that.” Stacy’s parting words to Cuddy as she said her tearful good-bye the first time all those years ago rang in her ears. In retrospect, it was classic. And House’s trust issues? Yeah. Classic.
Of course it didn’t explain him completely. Not by a long shot. On the other hand, maybe she was being overly dramatic here. He had simply said that it was true. That he had been abused. There was a pretty broad range to what that really meant. And his dad…if it was his dad, and not a teacher, a family friend or some other adult…was a marine officer. Could have been good old fashioned discipline. And House could be a bit of a drama queen. A bit? Yeah, more than a bit.
Cuddy looked at the clock, surprised to see that it was six a.m. and time to get up. She felt like hell warmed over.
A shower and a stop at Starbucks and Cuddy felt almost human again. The lush strains of An American in Paris competed with her disquiet. She hoped she was wrong and that yesterday’s events had not opened a festering wound—one that was better off left scabbed and scarred over. She needed to talk to Wilson. She needed to know.
Chapter 10: Chapter 10
House had paced his living room for two hours before phoning Catherine Harrington’s service. It had been two a.m. and he knew he wouldn’t get Harrington at her office at that hour. And he had regretted making the call by the fourth ring. He had almost hung up. But the service had picked up.
“It’s not urgent. She can phone me in the morning. I need a consult regarding a patient.” His voice had been even, professional, as he spoke to the answering service. But the truth was, he was edgy as hell. Why on earth had he told Cuddy anything? But she was gone. Home by now, asleep in her bed surrounded by downy comforters and silk sheets. Much better than the paltry offer he had made her. He tried to focus on her. Cuddy: her jet black hair splayed across her pillow. Bad idea, that. Not a place he wanted to go right at that moment.
More pacing, He was certainly going to get no sleep that night. He turned on the television and settled on an infomercial about insomnia. Talk about speaking to your demographic, he mused sardonically. House closed his eyes only to see her—tears streaming down her cheeks as she told him about the rape. The violence of it incongruous with the pastoral setting of the park. He hadn’t known what to do, how to act; what was expected of him. So he simply let her cry. He’d offered no solace, no comfort. He knew there was none to be had. “What if all we’ve done is make a girl cry?” he’d wondered aloud to Wilson and Cuddy.
His leg was worse tonight. He mentally noted the number of Vicodin he’d consumed in the past 24 hours. Maxed out. His last blood tests had been slightly alarming. No more Vicodin till morning.
As for his own disclosure, memories only barely remembered in the Byzantine maze of his brain returned in shattered images that came and went as flashbulb pops in his head. He knew that if he slept the images emerge more fully formed to haunt his dreams. Sleep was not something he craved, despite his fatigue.
More pacing. Every step was agony, but he knew that even if he stopped, the pain wouldn’t retreat, but would just as likely intensify. He began to casually eye the room for his rescue kit. The next day was Saturday and he wasn’t expected in. A morphine injection seemed a rather attractive prospect on many levels.
His pager went off, vibrating against his hip. “Got your message. Didn’t want to wake you if you were asleep. Call if you want to talk. I’m on call anyway. Harrington.”
“I need a professional opinion.” House threw as much “doctor” behind the request as was able.
“I’m free at 10:15 tomorrow morning. Meet me in my office on six.”
“Fine.” Silence.
“Look, Dr. House, I’m awake anyway. Do you want to meet now? I mean… We can meet at the Sunrise Café.”
“I’ll meet you there in half an hour. That OK?”
“Sure.” Click. House downed two Vicodin, certain that he’d never make it even to his bike without the drug in his system. The café was only five minutes away, but he needed time for the pills to work their magic and ratchet the pain down from intolerable to merely agonizing before venturing out of the apartment.
By the time he’d reached the café, House was less tense and regretted making the call in the first place. It two thirty in the morning, his leg hurt like hell, and he was beyond exhausted. A consult. How long would it take Harrington to see through that? On the other hand he did want to know her opinion. He still didn’t know if he had done the right thing with Eve. He also didn’t know why it still gnawed at him so many hours later. Maybe it was the fatigue; the pain.
Catherine had arrived first and sat in a back booth in the deserted café. She took him in before House saw her, observing the agitation still apparent; his gait, which wasn’t good. She wasn’t surprised at that. She hadn’t been happy with his choice not to allow the morphine pump, nor the gabapentin. Vicodin had been a poor choice, therapeutically. They both knew it. But House had argued that stronger meds would have too great an effect on his ability to think; to analyze. Vicodin would dull the pain, yet leave his faculties intact. It was a tradeoff he was willing to make.
“How was your first day back at work, Dr. House?” Catherine had to admit her surprise that House had contacted her so soon. She half-expected to never hear from him again, writing him off as skeptical of therapy, at best, if not downright hostile to the very idea.
“Like I said,” he replied, sitting heavily on the padded bench. Catherine cringed a bit, thinking that he might have been more comfortable sitting at a table in a chair. “I need a professional opinion.”
“OK.” She waited, trying to keep the sleepiness from her eyes, but intrigued. “What’s up?” He stared back at her in reply before looking down at the table, intensely studying graffiti scratched into the laminate surface. It was only his first day back. Catherine was a growing a bit alarmed.
“I had a patient,” he began awkwardly. “Does it help to talk….I mean…She was a rape victim…” Catherine had heard through the grapevine about a rape victim who had OD’d in the clinic. Right in front of Claire Stone.
“Slow down, Dr. House.”
“Sorry.” House sighed, frustrated with himself, with Harrington, with Cuddy for getting him into this situation in the first place. He began again. “Do you really believe that bullshit that ‘talking about it’ is a good thing? Always? I mean if you didn’t, generally, anyway, you’re in the wrong specialty. I get that. But is it always the best course?”
The earnestness in his voice and the lateness of the hour suggested that this patient really got to him. An idea that ran counter to everything she knew about him and his reputation. But not so out of line with what she believed was beneath his defensive shields. “If I believe that it’s good, it’s not bullshit. Not to me, anyway. I know it’s not what you believe. But yes, in general, I think it’s healthy for a patient to talk. Suppressing feelings about psychological or physical trauma isn’t usually a healthy thing, but you know I feel that way. I suppose there are situations where something is so painful, maybe not dealing with it better in the short run, anyway. My question to you, and you know I never answer anything without asking a question myself, is why are you asking me?. And why in the middle of the night?”
“Well, that’s two questions, Dr. Harrington. I…this patient. I got her ‘to talk.’ Did all the right things. Followed all the rules. I just don’t know if it was the right thing to do.”
“Why were you with a rape victim?”
“Clinic patient.” So, why hadn’t he handed her off to psych. “Tried to take myself off the case. I’m not exactly right doc for a rape victim.” He tried to avoid sounding bitter.
“Why do you say that?” House scowled.
“Yeah. Not exactly the touchy-feely type. Ask anyone. I flunked ‘bedside manner 101’ in med school.”
“So why didn’t you get Cuddy to release you? I can’t imagine that she would put a patient through…”
“Cuddy put in a psych referral. Stone.” House figured that by now Harrington would have heard about the Stone’s fiasco. House fidgeted, watching her make the connections. He observed the realizations spread to her eyes.
Catherine sighed. She could think of no worse a patient for House on his first day back. He was still emotionally raw from his experience in rehab, admit it or not. No wonder he had been ravaged by dealing with her. No wonder he was second guessing himself, hours later. She was suddenly less concerned about House’s patient than she was about House.
“Can I get you anything?” The server had been patiently standing beside their table in the nearly deserted café.
“Cinnamon dolce latte, no whip. Skim; decaf.”
House smiled. “I’ll go for elegant. Coffee; high octane. Black. Sure you want decaf? I thought you…You’re not on call are you? You lie to all your patients?”
“I thought you wanted a consult, not a session. So, technically…” Actually, she was pretty sure that the consult was a smokescreen, anyway. But he didn’t have to know that either.
“So you just lie to your colleagues.” Catherine was too sleepy for semantic games.
“You got her to talk. Pretty good for an unsympathetic jerk like you, huh? What’d you do, threaten her?” It was a half-hearted attempt at best, but it was as good as she was capable of in the middle of the night. She thought she had a pretty good idea as to what happened. Under all the bullshit, House was as empathic as they came. He’d fight it, deny it, try to push it under a rug, but in the end, there it was. His woundedness would have been a beacon to the girl, if she was looking through the right prism.
“Yeah. Pretty much.”
“You OK?” She knew he wasn’t, but she had to ask anyway. He looked as if he wanted to say something, like there was some other thing bothering him. “You know, you may have saved her life.”
“I doubt that.” His voice was somber.
“I heard she was suicidal. You turned that around.”
“She wasn’t suicidal. It was a tactic.”
“Still, you don’t know…”
“That is the point, isn’t it.”
“There is no right or wrong answer, sometimes. I know you don’t believe that, but sometimes we just have to do the best we can and let it go.”
“But that’s not…”
“I know, but it’s all we have. Sometimes. Your leg bothering you tonight?”
“It’s fine.”
“Right.”
“I’m looking into some other things. I know you’re not too happy with me being on the vicodin.”
“Evidently your not, either. What other things?’
“Some experimental stuff. There has to be something.” He sounded frustrated, defeated.
“I can ask Kwan to keep his eyes open if you want… You really want to find an alternate therapy for your leg?”
“Not a therapy. A cure. I’m tired of living like this. I can’t live like this.” She arched an eyebrow. House picked up on her concern immediately.
“Not what I mean. Don’t worry. I’m not going to go home and slit my wrists. I just mean that I want as normal a life as I can have. Whatever that means for however long that means.”
“How’d you get her to talk to you.”
“We just talked. That’s all. Religion, politics, philosophy. You know, the usual.”
Catherine smiled. “Nothing about you is usual. You got her to open up by chatting?”
“Believe me, it wasn’t intentional. Not at first.”
“I can only imagine.”
“No. I mean…I told her some things…a strategy. I figured I share; she would share.”
“And you told her a story. One that wasn’t true. And she saw right through it.”
“It wasn’t a total lie.”
“But enough of one to break her trust. OK, so clearly that wasn’t what worked.”
“We walked. I took her out to the lake in the middle of campus.”
“The jogging park? That was a good strategy. Taking her away from the hospital. Nice. That get her to open up?”
“Eventually.” He stopped. There was something else he wanted to say, she knew it. But she knew he wasn’t ready. He was already feeling too exposed, she thought, just having brought her out in the middle of the night. He didn’t want to turn it into a session; make her think he was in some sort of crisis. He knew too much of the process to let himself be carried away by it. At least not tonight.
“You did the right thing. I’d heard that Stone got called on the carpet by the Psych department chair. Totally embarrassed the department when she had to be bailed out by some attending in the clinic. Tall guy with a cane, I heard. Rescued the whole situation. It probably wasn’t a good case for you to handle on your first day back—not for your well being , anyway. Patient benefited from it though. I’m glad you called me. Always happy to consult with such an esteemed colleague. Or just talk with you.”
“Thanks, Dr. Harrington.”
“Catherine.”
“Yeah.”
House was still a bit edgy when he got home, but not quite so bad as before. The vicodin and conversation had relaxed him a little as it dulled the pain in his thigh. The sour images of his childhood had faded back from vivid to sepia. At least for the moment, they might be kept at bay. He flopped himself on the sofa as the earliest moments of dawn leaked through his window. He opened the latest issue of Topics in Pain Management, hit the remote on his stero system and settled into the new day.
Chapter 11: Chapter 11
Transitions
Chapter 11
“Time changes everything.”
“That’s what people say. But it isn’t true. Doing things changes things. Not doing things leaves everything exactly the same.” House stared out his office window into the night.
He had spoken from experience. Time changed nothing. Certainly not for him. At least nothing positive. The passage of time doesn’t heal; doesn’t make the hurt any less profound; love less intense. Not that he’d had all that much experience with love…
House had to smile as the image of the disheveled Cuddy—the bra-less, disheveled Cuddy popped into his head. He hadn’t quite meant to annoy her that night. Actually, he wasn’t entirely certain as to what drove him, like an overly-protective older brother, to her door the other night. Yeah, he had told himself that he needed her medical opinion, and the on-call endocrinologist was an idiot. And, she had already OK’d the nerve biopsy. Thyroid storm. It was extremely unlikely at best.
She sure had fallen right into bed with him. First date. Impressive, he considered. Eastern Lube. House had to admit that he had, on the surface at least, all the makings of a serious prospect for Cuddy. He was tall (though not as tall as House); nice looking (well except for the decided lack of hair); probably rich (yeah, richer than him. A lot richer than him); nice. Cuddy would eat him alive. Unless she put on that really annoying demure act. Fuck. So why did that bother House so much: enough to distract him from his reading.
“Do you like me, House?” She had gotten right in there. Right into his personal space, her voice, at the same time, a challenge and a seduction; a growl and a purr. And he had been rendered speechless, if only for the moment. He had become almost undone by her gaze, with its mix of sensuality and callousness.
“…Do you want me for yourself, House?” That was the question, wasn’t it? When she was close, her voice soft and warm, saying things to him that no one else had leave to say; comforting him, when he would allow no one close enough to even try…
He couldn’t go there; refused to go there. He had no right to go there. What could he offer? He was soul-withered and weary. He could barely walk at times; making love—having sex could have none of the spontaneity of a playful wrestle in the sheets. His right leg would always be the elephant in the room, affecting his mobility, his agility, his pleasure—and hers. She was so better off with Mr. Eastern Lube.
But then there was that night not long ago when he had told her his deepest and worst secret. What had made him tell her? Why had he needed her to know that about him? House shook off the emotion, willing himself to return his concentration to the task at hand.
No, time changed nothing. Well, except for the cost of Medline searches. Now, that had changed for the better. House smiled as glanced at the scatter of monographs and journal articles. Post-it flags decorated the edges of most. A yellow legal pad, now filled lay on top of one stack.
Back in medical school a Medline search required a trip to the library and $95 per hour of search time. He remembered his shock when he’d asked the librarian at Hopkins to do a search on a fast and dirty synthesis of lysergic acid. She hadn’t been shocked. Not at Hopkins and certainly not in the early ‘80s. No, the shock had been all his when presented with the $500 bill and a bibliography. “Can I get copies?” he asked in his most seductive voice.
“Sure. Library has most of these journals. Check them out. Show the clerk your student ID and she’ll get them for you. Copier’s right around the corner.”
“But I don’t have time…”
“Well, I can order copies. Five bucks apiece.”
“Great.” He was in the wrong field, he griped.
But now. Now, he could sit at his computer, handy Medline subscription, courtesy of PPTH, do a click or two and voila! Not that he was searching for cheap and quick ways to synthesize LSD anymore. No, this was much more important.
“Pain management,” he had typed in quotes. “And experimental and clinical.” The Boolean logic linked the terms together to maximize the relevance of the hits. He watched as the list of publications scrolled down his screen. He scanned the screen, looking for names he recognized, respected, knew personally (and hadn’t pissed off recently.)
“Knicks game on at nine. Want to do pizza and beer?” Wilson had startled him. House felt a bit like a kid being caught red-handed. “What are you doing?”
“New porn site. Med school babes.”
“Yeah. Right.”
“Right up your alley. Who knows, one of them could be Mrs. Wilson number 4.”
“Nah. Now if they were nursing school babes…”
“True.”
“Seriously, man, what are you up to? You looked like I caught you with your hand in the cookie jar.”
“Got me. Never could keep my hands off of Cameron’s Toll House cookies.” House looked back at the screen. “Nothing. Just a little research. Nothing.” House shrugged, flipping the computer off, trying to remember if he had bothered to save the search. Probably not.
Wilson sat opposite House, who had picked up, and was now destroying, a large paperclip. Wilson was now eyeing House’s collection research papers on House’s cluttered desk. He grabbed one, reading the title.
“You thinking about getting a fourth sub-specialty in Oncology? Diagnostics no longer doing it for you? ‘Phase II Clinical Trial Protocol for Experimental Pain Management Protocol in Terminal Cancer Patients.’ Sexy title.”
“Movie’s probably better.” Wilson leafed through the monograph.
“Cornell University Hospital? Sounds like a plan. Except for one problem. You don’t actually have cancer.”
“Hey, Wilson, did you know that Cuddy is going on blind dates? Guy was a real…”
“He seemed pretty nice.”
“She found him on…”
“Yeah, I know. doesn’t even do ballroom dancing. Does she?”
“I don’t think she was actually planning on going ballroom dancing with him. Why are you so suddenly interested in Cuddy’s social life? Did you know that’s he a mechanic?”
“No. Actually, he’s not. He owns Eastern Lube. And when did you meet him?”
“Really? I’m impressed. In passing. Yesterday.”
“She went out with him again?” House looked stricken.
“Again. Why do you care if and who Cuddy dates?”
“I don’t.”
“Right. Did you ever ask that patient about the nerve fiber?” Wilson knew when to change the subject. At least most of the time. It was something that House appreciated about him.
“No.” House looked away from Wilson. “Why? Would you have done it, seriously?” House’s voice was quiet. The playfulness present when discussing Cuddy was gone.
“Yeah. Probably. Asked at least.” House couldn’t do it. Not anymore. It was Wilson’s fault, anyway. But he was right. House had no right to risk a patient’s life for his own benefit. Had he really fallen so far to have even considered it? He couldn’t venture to answer that, not even to himself.
House knew he had to do something. To change something. He had to find a clinical trial, or at least a protocol that he could undertake on his own. Or design one himself. Something. Anything. House rose from with some difficulty from his chair and began packing up for the night. “So pizza and the Knicks? I’ll even buy.”
“You always buy. I’ll take a pass. Got a hot date with a hooker.” House continued packing his backpack, stuffing four large monographs and several journals into it.
“You OK, House?” House nodded in reply, distracted.
“Yeah. Fine.” Wilson eyed him with curiosity. House grabbed his iPod from its dock and headed towards the door. House was not up for a Wilson lecture tonight. Wilson had been opposed to the Ketamine from the start. And when it went south, House could read Wilson’s “I told you so’s” from a mile off. He certainly did not need them now.
There were times when House appreciated Wilson’s self-appointed role as ethical guardian. He had been right about the patient. House had been right all along that they needed to biopsy a nerve. Clearly there had been nerve damage. But a spinal nerve was unnecessary, and House had known that. And what if he had paralyzed her for life, only to find out that it was a tapeworm? It was a good call. Annoying, but a good call. Back safely behind his ethical barrier, House could see that, and couldn’t pursue it further. He had no right.
There had to be a way, just not that one. “See you tomorrow, Wilson. Hooker awaits.” House really didn’t want Wilson shooting holes in his efforts. He knew the risks with experimental procedures, especially the more radical options: the options with the highest possible reward; the highest risk. Wilson was right. Life on immunosuppressant drugs; shortened life-span; constant monitoring. Always the potential for it not working or worse (or not worse depending upon how you looked upon it)—death. And in House’s estimation, a completely acceptable risk/benefit ratio. A life of relative normality–no matter how short—priceless. But Wilson would see it differently, so the less he knew, the better—for now, anyway.
It had taken House months to get to this place, where he would feel again like seeking an answer to his own puzzle. He had fought through enough of the devastation, the anger and depression to even begin to give a damn whether he lived or died. Some days were better than others. On the worst days he considered the temptation of a loaded syringe to finally end the cycle of pain; on the best, the darkness lifted and he could see a future only hinted at last summer when he could run; hell, when he could walk.
The hospital’s main floor was only dimly lit at 11:00 p.m. The clinic was closed for the night and visiting hours were long over. He observed the light on in the recesses of Cuddy’s office as House strode with his broken gait past her door. He paused, noting the heaviness of his backpack, deciding whether he should stop; apologize for disrupting her evening with Mr. Eastern Lube; or, conversely, give her the chance to thank him for the rescue. He smiled inwardly as he quietly opened her door.
Chapter 12: Chapter 12
Transitions
Chapter 12
“You’re here late.” Cuddy turned to see House entering her office.
“Yeah, well. What else is there to do?” Cuddy cou;dn’t keep the disappointment from her voice.
“Not seeing Mr. Wonderful tonight?” Cuddy glared, her eyes hard and laser like.
“Gee, House, I guess I have you to thank for that one, don’t I?” She sneered the words at him, sarcasm dripping with molten lead.
“Look, if he was going to be put off by a simple…”
“There was nothing ‘simple’ about it. You crashed my date. Not once, but twice. What the hell is the matter with you. I…” She turned away from him, striding to her window. House could not help but notice the tremble in her voice as it trailed off into air.
House blew out a breath. “Cuddy…”
“Go away.” Her voice was both resolute with anger and stained with tears. Regret merged with jealousy somewhere in House’s psyche. Instead of leaving, he sat in front of her desk, waiting for her to turn around. “I told you to leave, not move in. Go away!”
“I’m sorry.” House’s voice was a mere whisper. He rarely apologized. To anyone. But it had to be said.
Cuddy laughed ruefully. “Do you know what he said to me?” She was standing, arms folded and leaning against the window. “He said when I talk to you, interact with you, I’m a different person. A better person, if I read him right. That I’m focused and engaged.”
“He could tell all that from one direct meeting and overheard fragments of a second conversation? That’s impressive. I say go for it, Cuddy. Sounds like he’s your man.”
“He thinks I thrive on conflict.”
“That’s what he thinks? It’s probably true, but it’s not all the story.” House sat back, relaxed in the chair, a satisfied look on his face. “Not by a long shot. Do you like me, Cuddy? Turnabout and all that…”
“No. I don’t.” Simple, direct. And sometimes true, they both thought. House nodded, the self-satisifaction now gone from his eyes.
“Never?” She was lying. They both knew it. They had come too close, too many times; been there for each other on too many occasions, like an old amicably divorced couple always toying privately with the notion of reconciliation.
“Yeah, well, you never did answer my question the other night. What is it with you, House? Are you really that evil bastard who doesn’t want anyone to be happy? Too lonely out there on your ledge? Afraid that if I’m happy; if Wilson’s happy; if even Foreman were happy, for Chrissakes, there’d be no one around to rescue you when fell off it—or jumped off it?” She was still too angry, and even as she said them, she regretted her words. They were cruel and unnecessary. She, like House, knew where to poke that sharp stick. The had known each other too long and too well.
House had no response. There was a lot of truth to Cuddy’s accusation. Cuddy watched as he wearily rose from his chair, not knowing how, or even whether, to try to make it right. She noticed the deep, dark smudges beneath his eyes; the exhaustion in his body language for the first time since he had walked in on her. She extended her hand out to stop him, but his back was already turned as he headed out the door and into the darkened corridor.
Cuddy knew better. Yes, he was occasionally cruel to her. And yes, he quite knew how to make her bleed. She remembered the last time he had spoken words later regretted. And they still stung, despite the apology later proffered and accepted. But he had been strung out then, desperately needing the pain meds she had refused him, and he had lashed out at her in the only way he knew how. House had thought that he was criticizing her for being too eager to compromise—patient care and his own care. In the aftermath, she realized that what he was saying had less to do with her aptitude for motherhood than with her inability to take a stand. But it hadn’t stopped the hurt.
Cuddy contemplated pursuing him, but was too certain of a loud argument in the middle of the hospital’s main foyer to act on the impulse. And despite the late hour, hospital staff would be around and highly curious. He could live with the hurt for a little while. It might do him some good, in fact, she reflected.
House slipped around the corner out a side exit. Certain that Cuddy would be right behind him, he knew that he couldn’t face her. Everybody lies, but not always. And this time Cuddy told it like it was, hitting him with the force of a gunshot fired point-blank. And he should know.
House’s bike, hauled out of storage as February became March, was parked in the first space in the doctors’ lot. He raced from the lot, looking vaguely over his shoulder and down the darkened Princeton
Streets he passed, the ghost of Michael Tritter at every corner; in every blind alleyway. He stopped the bike somewhere on the outskirts of town, suddenly lost. Not in a geographical sense, but lost, nonetheless: his apartment still bore the scars of the December madness; as did his relationship with Wilson. He keenly felt the loss of Cuddy as if his last rudder had been severed; his last remaining sail torn asunder. He had nowhere to go, adrift in the cold night. Alone. Lost.
“What the hell is wrong with me?” He was anxious, wired. She picked up on the third ring. A brief moment of admiration that Harrington had answered her own phone at this late hour.
“Dr. House?” Catherine was alarmed. He was clearly upset; his voice panicky and ragged. “Where are you?”
House glanced around. Good question. He had pulled off into a parking lot. “I…” Suddenly embarrassed at having phoned her, he couldn’t find the words to cover. “I think I misdialed. Damn cell phones. I’m sorry…” He flipped the phone shut, just sitting on his bike for the time being, trying to recapture his bearings. Why had he gotten so unhinged about this. Words. Her words. She’d said worse to him before. And he had certainly said worse to her. This was stupid. Crazy. Calmer, House made his way back to Baker Street and his home.
House’s phone vibrated against his hip as he dismounted the bike. It was Harrington. He wasn’t sure what he would say to her. He’d cancelled his follow up appointment, calling her office and simply asking for a refill of the Vicodin while making his apologies. She had given him that out, and he gratefully accepted it. He’d reschedule soon. He’d promised the secretary. She was too good at getting him to talk about things better left unsaid, and right now, if he was certain of one thing, it was that he did not want to discuss those things. With anyone. Especially not with her. He ignored the phone. House was fairly sure that she would ring back, but maybe she’d wait until the morning, when he was less tired and he could relate a more rational explanation for his call.
“You have three messages. ‘Hey, House. I thought you were staying in tonight. You know, hooker and all. Knicks lost. I’m drowning my sorrows. Call me. ‘” Despite his mood, House had to smile. Wilson, predictable as ever. They had hurt each other and their friendship over the past several months. The camaraderie was still there, but there still existed an edge to it. “’House, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean what I said. I feel terrible. I just…I’m not sure what’s going on in that mind of yours. Why would you disrupt my date? Not once but twice; same night. Never mind. I’m coming over.’ ‘House, it’s Catherine. Are you OK? Stupid question. Please call me. I think you need someone to talk to. I get this strong impression that you want to talk to me but aren’t sure how now that you’re not being held captive in a rehab facility. If you want to just talk we can just talk. But call me. Doesn’t matter how late. OK?’”
House sighed. Turning around, he realized he wasn’t alone. “How the hell did you get in? You taking lessons from Foreman? Don’t you know breaking and entering is illegal in New Jersey?”
“I was worried. Wilson let me make a copy last month. When we were concerned that…” Cuddy was perched on the arm of the leather sofa. She had started a fire in the hearth and was now gazing into the flames. “We need to talk, House. Now.”
Chapter 13: Chapter 13
Transitions
Chapter 13
“You can leave, Cuddy. Any time now. See? I’m fine. You had no need to break the law…again.” House gestured grandly towards himself as he demonstrated how “fine” he was. His eyes told a slightly different story to her. She hadn’t budged from the arm of the sofa, and he did have to admit that the fire warmed him as he stood beside it. “Thanks. For the fire, anyway.”
“House…” Cuddy’s voice was gentle again. Her anger seemed dissipated; replaced with something kinder. “We need to talk.”
“Everyone wants to talk to me tonight. You, my shrink…” He knew Cuddy had heard Catherine’s message played back on the machine. As if on cue, House’s phone rang. “House,” he replied automatically: a physician’s reflex. Although his back was turned, he could feel Cuddy’s eyes on him, paying close attention as he spoke, looking for clues. He hated this.
“I’m fine. I misdialed. Meant to hit a… Oh, that? … It was a figure of speech. I mis… OK. Fine. Whatever…” House sighed, clearly trying to end the conversation with a very persistent caller. “Look, I have company and I’m being rude to HER…. All evening. Right here. Crackling fire and all. … Tomorrow. Nine a.m.” Great. He took a moment before turning to face Cuddy. “My mom. You know how mothers are.” He tried laughing off the call. It wasn’t working well. Cuddy knew too much.
“How did she allow it? Your mother, I mean.”
“What?” House was momentarily confused by the question. The phone call? Him entertaining a woman in his apartment? Then it dawned on him. Crap. Their conversation of a couple weeks past. He pinched the bridge of his nose, the full weight of his exhaustion and…events…suddenly hitting. He was out of snarky comebacks and unable to withdraw from Cuddy’s concerned gaze.
“Military discipline and all that. Her dad was army brass. Believe me, it wasn’t that unusual. It’s just the way it was. Still is. Probably.”
“I don’t buy that for an instant. And I can’t believe that you’re excusing it.” House paced the room angrily.
“What the hell do you want me to say? My parents were monsters? They weren’t. That I love my parents despite it all? Nice bumper sticker. But I don’t. My dad can rot in Hell. My hate for him knows no bounds. My mother? She’s a military wife and a military daughter. It’s all she knows. Who am I to pop her bubble? I simply avoid them. Until some busybody like Wilson…or Cameron…or you decides I need to see them.” He hadn’t meant the outburst; regretted it. It would only mean that Cuddy would pursue the conversation. Something he did not want. At all. He was too tired; in too much pain. Like a marionette with the strings suddenly snipped, House fell down into the sofa and closed his eyes, defeated.
“House, if I’d known, I never would have…”
“That’s kind of not the point.” A deep sigh. “Can we just not talk about this right now. Maybe later. Like in 2054 or something.” Cuddy had moved from her place on the sofa arm, settling into the comfortable leather cushions next to House.
“Fine.” They sat in silence, House, eyes closed, feet propped on the coffee table; Cuddy nearby. House, finally calmer began to drift off.
“House…” Cuddy’s voice, barely above a whisper, startled House to full wakefulness. He was slightly surprised to find her still there. If he didn’t open his eyes, he mused, perhaps she would simply leave him in peace. “Why did you…why would you want to…” She was having difficulty finding a non-combative verb. She tried again. “Why did you…why were you….so curious…I mean, the other night…my blind date?” She had hoped that she conveyed the sentiment without accusation; without indictment of his possible motives.
House yawned, concluding, finally, that she would not be so easily gotten rid of. “Can’t just accept the evil bastard argument and let it go at that?” He opened his eyes, finally returning her gaze. She could swear that she saw the glint of a smile somewhere within the depths of his expression.
“No,” she replied with all seriousness. “I can’t. Because you’re not like that. Not really. So, no. I don’t buy that it was just some cruel attempt to destroy my happiness.”
“Fine. You know me so well, then, you tell me.” House was tired of being psychoanalyzed by everybody: from Catherine Harrington right down to Foreman and Cameron. Even Chase.
Cuddy moved even closer to him. She tucked one leg beneath her and turned to face him. He shifted uncomfortably, unsure suddenly of her presence inside his personal space. Cuddy seemed not to notice his discomfiture at her nearness to him. He felt trapped, but intrigued. His instinct to run failed him; he waited.
“It’s like I asked you the other night. Do you like me, House? I think the answer is yes. But for you, it’s not so simple: liking someone; even loving someone. I’ve seen you in love, House. I’ve seen you in love when it’s returned. And I’ve seen you in love when it’s nearly destroyed you. I’ve seen you yearn and have that yearning answered; and I’ve seen it rejected. To ‘like’ someone, in that way…” She thought of Stacy, the one true love of his life, and how that love nearly destroyed him—and how it nearly redeemed him. She knew that he carried strong emotions just under his callused veneer. And that he was terrified of those emotions overwhelming him. She couldn’t blame him, really.
She had tried to keep her voice steady: non-threatening and light. She rose from the sofa, giving him space. Giving him time to make of her words what he wished. She walked over to the fireplace, staring into the flames. Why, she wondered to herself, did this have to be so complicated? So convoluted?
“What about you?”
“What about me? And you haven’t…” She stopped there, not wanting to back him further into the corner than she knew she had; scare him off completely. But this was a conversation long, long overdue.
“Do you ‘like’ me?” You were the one, Stacy had told him, so many years later. And what good had it done for him to know that? None. Not in the long run. Wasted time and energy; he’d given up too much of his soul in the aftermath of that disclosure.
“You’re frustrating as Hell, House. You’re impossible to read; impossible to know when you’re serious. Sometimes, your just plain ‘impossible.’ I would trust you with my life, and with my death. You are more trouble than you are worth most of the time, but when you’re not, you’re like some dark, broken-winged angel, who’s simply ‘there’ to make it alright for your patients; and for me. Like you?” She sighed, her emotions confused and overpowering. She turned and he was there, towering over her, despite the fact that he was hunched over his cane.
House hung his cane on the mantle, holding on briefly to steady himself. He needed both arms free. “Look. I’m sorry I broke into your blind date. He seems nice enough. I just couldn’t seem to stop myself. Maybe it’s my insatiable, but endearing, curiosity…”
“Yeah. Right.” She looked away, both amused and irritated. House moved his hand to her face, turning her back towards him, and into his eyes. Facing him again, House drew her into a warm embrace. He was trembling, she noticed. Or was that her own body shivering at his touch?
He was kissing her: her forehead, the top of her head, the area in front of her ear. Soft, feathery, barely-there, but passionate. Almost desperate. His fingers trembled on her face and in her hair, holding her there, sure that she would run away if he let go. He arrived at her mouth, lost in the moment. As was she.
A moment. Only that. Senses recovered. His first. He backed away as he mumbled something slightly apologetic, his embarrassment acute. “I think you should probably go. Please.” Leaving was something she really had no desire to do, but knew it was probably for the best.
“House…”
“I have no right to…” House retrieved his cane. He searched his bookcases: a distraction, a thing to occupy him. His eyes settled on a volume of Byron. “You deserve better than me.” He had said it. “Mr. Eastern Lube. You should call him. Tell him that you’ll lock me in my office the next time you have a date. He’ll believe you, too.”
Cuddy was sure that House believed it. But that’s not what he was afraid of, she thought. He was afraid that she would leave him, or worse, betray his trust. That why he had stopped himself. He’d had a bad history with women. She suspected that when he gave it, he gave his heart fully and completely; which was why it was a rare gift. But that gift had been trampled on first by his mother and then by Stacy. Not once, but twice. He was reluctant to put himself out there again. Even for her.
Cuddy approached him, gently placing a hand on his back, summoning him to turn around; to face her. “Yeah, well…” she said as she took both of his hands in hers. “Lube guy is history anyway.” She wanted to say more. To tell him that it was OK, what he did. That she wouldn’t be opposed to more of the same. But there was time for that. Cuddy tugged at House’s hands, leading him back to the sofa. He stopped her as he put an album on the turntable. They both drifted off curled on the big leather sofa to the extravagantly romantic strains of Mood Indigo.
Chapter 14: Chapter 14
Transitions
Chapter 14
A/N: Thank you all for reading and joining me on this ride. Chapter 14 ends this story (I almost ended it last chapter, but a good friend told me never to end with chapter 13, so I didn’t.) I don’t like writing two fanfics at once (I have other writing going on as well—not fanfic), and the material presented in Half-Wit beckons me in another direction (although not unrelated to Transitions).
Thanks to my friends at “HL: Too Handsome for Paperwork” for their inspiration and lively discussion as well as to Silja on TWOP for her medical expertise.
House was dreaming. It was a rare, but recurrent dream. It involved Cuddy, Saturday morning and the smell of fresh ground coffee; conversation and sex. The picture of domestic bliss he would never have again. For a long time, he had dreamed this dream about Stacy, a vague memory, just out of reach. Somewhere along the way, the image of the woman in the dream more and more resembled Lisa Cuddy. It wasn’t unwelcome (and there’s not much one can do about dreams, anyway), but somewhat disconcerting to him.
House opened his eyes, realizing that he had fallen asleep on the sofa. With Cuddy. He could, indeed, smell the aromatic beans, freshly ground, brewing in the kitchen. Sex. No, he was pretty sure that there had been no sex.
“You’re up. Coffee’s made. It’ s nearly 10.” House looked surprised, quirking an eybrow. He’d probably not slept that many consecutive hours in months.
“I could get used to this. Marry me. ” Cuddy guffawed at the absurdity of House’s statement.
“Yeah. I’m sure you could.” House seemed to be in a light mood, given his state of mind the night before.
“Cuddy, look, about last night…” He’d started a sentence he wasn’t sure how to complete. What about last night? Cuddy was right: House did “like” her. Enough so that the idea of her being with anyone else made him slightly queasy. Most of the time he didn’t worry about it too much, but this time Mr. Eastern Lube had enough of what House didn’t to make him… House didn’t want to admit, even to himself, that he had been jealous. But he could puzzle out no better description for what he was feeling.
“I liked last night, House, how it ended, anyway.” She was smiling. That particular smile, which had always viewed as beatific, always had the effect of disarming him completely. He returned the smile, or began to, until he tried moving. House could not prevent the gasp emerging from his lips as he tried to move his right leg. It felt as though in a vise grip. Normally he would grab his pills from the nightstand, take a couple and wait out the pain. His pills were in his jacket pocket near the front door; his perception—his fantasy of “normal” faded like the pop of a soap bubble.
“What’s wrong?”
“My pills. Would you mind…?” Cuddy looked immediately concerned as she grabbed his jacket from the desk chair. She watched House desperately retrieve the bottle, shaking out two Vicodin with shaking hands, barely aware of her presence until he had swallowed them. Cuddy observed him as he waited, trying to steady his breathing; calm his leg as he furiously massaged it.
“House.” It was almost as if she weren’t there; didn’t hear her. “House,” she repeated. “Do you want me to get you anything? I can massage…” House looked up, finally aware of her again. He shook his head, wordlessly pleading with his eyes to let him deal with the crisis. Eventually his breathing returned to normal and he let go the death-grip on his right thigh. He glanced up at Cuddy momentarily before looking away, embarrassed that she had seen him like that.
“Sorry we slept all crumpled up like that. I should have realized it would have been hard on your leg.” House shook his head.
“I could have been sleeping on a feather bed surrounded by clouds of down and it wouldn’t have made any difference.”
“This is…”
“Only difference was that my meds weren’t right at my hand this morning…and that you were here…” House stared at spot somewhere on the far wall of the living room.
“I had no idea House. Why didn’t you…? It would explain why you’re always…”
“It’s not your business. Or Wilson’s. Or my team’s. It’s my life. It is what it is. Telling you, or Wilson… For what? For sympathy that doesn’t matter? For pity that life as a fucking cripple is not as sexy as one might think…you know with all my inherent woundedness and all…? Believe me, I can barely keep the babes at bay.”
“People care, House.”
“Yeah, I forgot.” The joy of half an hour past had evaporated. The lightness of House’s mood had been trampled beneath the weight of his reality. The smoky light in his eyes from the evening before as he held her, wanting her. His pain momentarily, at the time removed to a vaguely recognizable position, was now replaced simple sadness as he struggled to rise from the sofa, keeping the pressure off his right leg.
House knew that Cuddy was watching him, observing him as he walked with a staggered gait to the bathroom. He closed the door behind him, grateful for the barrier between them.
He emerged several minutes later, seemingly better. His composure was newly intact along with a distance that left Cuddy feeling isolated from him. He located his cane and made his way into the kitchen, pouring a cup of coffee before returning to the living room. Cuddy wanted to say something about what had happened the night before, but couldn’t find a way back in behind his barriers.
“House, last night…” He froze, about to take a sip from his oversized mug as Cuddy sat near him. He willed himself to look anywhere except into her eyes until absolutely ready; until his own eyes were glacial.
“Last night was a mistake. I can’t… I don’t want you in my life. Not in that way. You’re just not my type. You asked me if I ‘like’ you. I don’t.” Of all the things she was expecting him to say, that wasn’t even 100th on the list. She was stunned at his bluntness; at the iciness of his words. He rose from the sofa, stalking to the fireplace.
Recovering somewhat, Cuddy retrieved her coat and keys. “Fine. Then stay out of my life. Stop stalking me; stop trying to learn every infinitesimal detail of my personal life. Stop gawking at my ass. Stay out of my dates and my private life.” Her voice quavered, trying to keep the tears out of her voice, ending what she hoped sounded like a tirade.
House did not turn around until he heard the door slam loudly behind him. He looked briefly at the coffee mug, taking one last sip of its seductive aromatic flavor, before hurling it against the far wall.
A/N—sorry to have ended this on a bit of a down-note, but I needed to clear the slate. What occurred in Half-Wit couldn’t be reconciled with where this story was heading, and I so adored Half-Wit, that I needed to end whatever House and Cuddy might have been thinking in Transitions. If . NeverJthat makes any sense at all fear, however, Half-Wit opened up all sorts of interesting possibilities for a different exploration of House and Cuddy’s relationship and House’s relationship with his other colleagues as well. Two more weeks till a new episode, so….who knows?
