Title: While My Guitar Gently Weeps
Summary: Charlotte turns to an unexpected source for comfort, and it even shocks him.
Disclaimer: Inspired by long trips on the highway and my ipod. No thought is original. They all come from somewhere.
Same disclaimer from "Happy Alone" about the pain killers applies. I apologize.
I look at the world and I notice it's turning
While my guitar gently weeps
With every mistake we must surely be learning
Still my guitar gently weeps
I don't know how you were diverted
You were perverted too
I don't know how you were inverted
No one alerted you.
I look at you all see the love there that's sleeping
While my guitar gently weeps
Look at you all...
Still my guitar gently weeps.
I don't know if I believe in love anymore. Not for me, at least. But Charlotte… she deserves a lot more than what House could ever give her. Chase could give it to her… but here she is, sitting on my couch. She's been a permanent fixture in my apartment since the breakup and it's getting annoying. I don't know why she picked me.
"Wilson?" She asks, rather lazily from her usual spot on my couch. She's wearing an oversized Michigan sweatshirt and jeans. Her legs are tucked under and she clinging to a throw pillow like it's a lifesaver. She looks so lost. "You didn't tell my dad I've been hiding here, have you?"
"No." I confirm. I'm still a little confused as to why I can't tell House. She probably doesn't want to hear the incessant taunt of "I told you so." Maybe I can't really blame her.
"Thank you." She whispers softly and I barely hear her from my position in the kitchen.
"Charlotte." I put down the dish towel and I make my way to the couch where she's sitting, staring off into space. I cautiously sit down on the other side of the couch and she shoots me a warning glare. She knows exactly what I'm about to say. I find that disturbing simply because the more I get to know her and understand her unique personality, she'll surprise me with a look so unquestionably House. It isn't how she raised her eyebrows or even pursed her lips – it's that flash of recognition that issues a challenge as it passes quickly through her eyes.
So I shake my head, pretending I forgot what I was going to say.
"It's just that Lisa would be consoling me. Dad would be mocking me. Anna is in New York. Mom would be Mom." She answers my unspoken question. "I can't go home because well, he has stuff there and I'm afraid if I'm home, he'll come by and get it and I don't want to run into him." She shrugs and turns her attention to me. "You're the only person I know who won't want to buy me ice cream or pry too much or even psychoanalyze me." She gives a half smile, the left side of her mouth curls up slightly. "The last thing I need is sappy chick flicks and big "Charlotte, this is your life" moments."
"Ah," I nod "You're clear of those things here, I promise."
"I'm a therapist." She reminds me poignantly
"Right." I'm really confused.
"No, I'm saying," She huffs in frustration. "If you had cancer, you wouldn't treat yourself, would you?" I shake my head, wondering where she's going. "Well, I'm not going to treat myself. I'm not my boyfriend-" She bites her lip quickly and corrects, "Ex-boyfriend's therapist. I'm not my friends' therapist. I know I have my dysfunction. I know what my maladaptive behaviors are. Because I'm a therapist, I recognize these things, but I'm not going to try and fix it." She smiles. "I find my dysfunction oddly comforting."
"Alright." I nod again and can't help but smile. She's a cognitive-behavioral therapist through and through and, most importantly, she's a little House.
"You know what I think it was?" Charlotte asks after a minute and I give her an encouraging look to continue. I've watched House use that trick on her before. "He asked my dad for permission to marry me."
"He refused?" I'm shocked. Not that House would refuse, but that Chase would bother asking. Didn't Chase know House better than that?
"No, he said ok." She sighs. Oh. I get it. "I didn't." My heart is breaking a little for the young couple. That's really sad. I really have no idea how to respond to that… "I just don't think I'm ready for that."
"For what?" I wonder out loud. What would really be so different about the way things are now? Chase and Charlotte live together. Chase has his friends, Charlotte has hers. House still is a strong force in her life. Oh, House.
"You know," I muse out loud. "You and your father are like magnets." She looks at me like she's going to kill me, but I continue. "If we were to place you down on a table, one of two things is going to happen: you're going to connect or you're going to jump away from each other. But the positive and negative sides aren't labeled, so you never really know what you're going to get."
"You're saying we're both bipolar." She sneers. Maybe I said the wrong thing.
"No," I say cautiously "But someone is going to have to flip one of you around in order for you two to connect."
"Robert did a lot of flipping." She nods her head in understanding.
"I can imagine it gets tiring." I shrug. But then again, I've never had to flip both sides… "I get it a lot with House. He does wear on you after a while."
As we're sitting in silence, I can't help but thinking about how hard it has to be for Chase to be in between two very strong personalities. I thought they were managing well, but I guess I was wrong. But what could really be so difficult? Both House and Chase realize that Charlotte is a woman of her own mind.
"I can't help but feel like I did Robert a favor." She shakes her head and I feel the tugging at my heart again. "I'm not marriage material. I mean, I'm used to people loving me. I've had a lot of great boyfriends." She smiles to herself, which makes me wonder if I should want to ask for some stories, but she continues. "He just doesn't realize that I did him a favor. I think Dad realizes it, though."
"Chase is a good guy." I hope I haven't said the wrong thing. Am I supposed to defend the guy? What are girls supposed to do in times of crisis?
"He is." She nods. Ok, she's not mad, so I didn't mess up.
"But to your dad, he's still Chase. He's not your boyfriend, he's… Chase." I shrug. I don't really know how to describe that relationship. "He's never going to be supportive of your relationships not because he's your dad, but because he's House."
"I don't want to see Dad right now because I think he's resigned my fate to match his own. I'm not ready to be there, yet." She sighs. "Losing Chase means he wins me back, you know?" I do know. "I'm not ready for that right now."
"I have a question." I feel like I'm about to burst through my skin. "I've been meaning to ask this since I met you…" I look at her questioningly and she nods. "You're a successful psychologist who runs a rehab." She blushes a little "How do you live with House and his addiction?"
She pulls back a little and I can almost see her turning around words in her head.
"I see it every day." She says after a moment and I wait for her to continue. To be honest, I wasn't expecting an answer other than "he's my father" or some crap about how he's House, like the rest of us spit out all the time. "The psychological dependence on opiates… it lasts a lifetime. Physical withdrawal won't kill you, but the psychological withdrawal… severe depression, anxiety, insomnia, mood swings, amnesia, low self-esteem, paranoia…" She rattles while ticking off the symptoms on her fingers. "The deficits are phenomenal for chronic abusers."
"He's going through that now-"
"Exactly. But he's happy about it. You can only travel down a road for so long before you lose the ability to go back. There's no question in his mind how he's going to die." She sighs and repeats, "I see it every day. I see what it does to people. Trust me, I've weighed the costs and benefits of each option." She smiles a little, "It's not worth my effort to take that certainty from him."
"You're giving up on him." I test
"No, I'm accepting him."
"You believe in acceptance?"
"Yeah."
"Then why can't you accept your own happiness?" I ask her and she opens her mouth to respond, then abruptly closes it. "What makes you happy, Charlotte?"
"I have to go." She stands up and messes with the hem of her sweatshirt, not pulling it down, but simply fidgeting. "There's a lot of stuff I left unfinished at work."
"It's late." I point out, glancing at my watch. It was a lot later that I had thought it was.
"See, the unfortunate thing about detox and rehab, late is when addicts chose to find shelter." She shrugs and makes her way around the couch. "If you look at our intake statistics, 28% of intakes are after office hours. Specifically, 7% after ten." She rattles nervously.
"Alright." I stand up and follow her to the door.
"Thanks." She throws her jacket on in a graceful movement. "For everything."
"My door is always open." I bow grandly and she giggles.
"Seriously," She waits till I straighten up again and she steps in and stands on tip toe and kisses me quickly on the check. "Thanks, Wilson."
With a flip of her long, golden hair, she turns and opens the door and I watch her walk down the hallway. Normally, she walks with a little bounce in her step, but tonight her steps are heavy. She has her hands jammed in the front pocket of her sweatshirt and her head is looking down at the floor. This isn't right. I can't help but think, over and over, that something has gone terribly wrong.
I wonder, as she reaches the elevator, what if things had been different. Who would we be? What if I had known her when House and I first met at that conference? She was still making summer trips to visit House back then. Would the girl with the defeatist stride be like a favorite niece? Instead of saying, "Thanks, Wilson." Would she be saying, "Thanks, Uncle James"? Who am I kidding. She'd be saying "Thanks, Uncle Wilson" but that's beside the point. Would I have sent her birthday cards and Christmas presents? Would we have gone out for ice cream when she came to visit to talk about how her life was going? Would I been proud to know her when she stood up and graduated from college? How different could we be…
But I know she isn't that girl. I know I can never play uncle. I know I couldn't help her tonight other than being an ear and a shoulder to lean on. I know she didn't ask for this. She wasn't prepared. No one is ever prepared for anything that seems to be happening lately.
She deserves more. More than House can give her. More than I can ever give her. Me, just the poor would-be uncle who she barely knows. Me, who always loves too much and never lets go. I could have loved her if House had given me the chance. I could have been her uncle. Now, it's too late. She's grown up. Life hit her too fast and I wasn't able to be there. I wish I could have.
I hope she listened. I hope she heard what I tried to say. I hope she realizes that it's not only House's happiness that matters, but it's hers too. She's been so busy taking care of everyone else, that she forgotten about herself. She doesn't see it now, but she will. She will see that she deserves so much more…
..fin..