I finally figured out why I keep feeling like I need to write about the time between seasons four and five. I've never explored it from House's point of view, and so that's what this is, except for the bookends at the beginning and very end of the story (next chapter). Both House and Wilson are having difficulty dealing with their separation. Warnings for House/ Wilson slash, child abuse, alternate universe, out of character, and my other usual stuff.
"Well Baby I've
Changed
Won't you come back home
'Cause I've changed my wicked
ways
And I'll never throw your mail away
And I won't tell you
that your hair looks grey
And I'll let you listen to Sugar Ray
And
I'll say I love you every day
'Cause it's true
Baby I do,"
Fountains of Wyane.
The first call came on a Wednesday, just before 10:00 PM, about a week after I moved away. I figured it was Cameron, maybe Cuddy, or Dr. Fielding. I didn't look at the caller ID because there was only one person I was trying to avoid and I knew that there was no way he'd feel brave enough to call me after what I'd said and done to him. It made me feel like crap to hurt him so badly, but I couldn't be around the guy and not feel like my heart was being thrown into a wood chipper. I picked up on the second ring.
"Hello," I asked, standing up, and twisting the phone call. The person on the other end still wasn't talking. "Can you hear me?" Somewhere in the back of my mind, I already knew what was happening. No answer. "Hello? Is there anybody even there? I'm going to hang up now," I said, but—of course—I didn't. The other person made a sound somewhere between a cough and a sob. "Goodnight, House." Still nothing. "Don't call back, Please. I don't wanna have to change my phone number again." After three minutes of sitting there and listening to him breathe shallowly, I finally worked up the nerve to hang up. The phone rang again, ten minutes later. I picked up, listened for a second to make sure it wasn't important, hung up, and left the phone off the hook for the rest of the night. Not that it helped me sleep. I got four hours total. The next morning, I got out of bed, checked my messages, put the phone back in its cradle, and went out to get some groceries. I came back, ate—sort of—and then sat at the computer, and watched some of the web cam movies Amber and I had made. That day I got four more silent phone calls. Friday there were three, and nine over the weekend. I thought about ripping the phone out of the wall, and throwing it out the window or something, but couldn't. Because you still love him, part of me thought. Might as well move back and let the guy live with you. When he called, I 'spoke' to him every single time—all but once—usually the same sort of things. "I can't do this, please hang up. I'm going now. Don't call me any more. I don't wanna talk to you," and lastly, "Goodbye Greg."
On Monday I had group therapy, and stayed out of the apartment from 10:00 to 3:00. I was home for less than five minutes when the phone rang again. "You know I have caller ID, right? I can—and will, screen my calls…from now on. If your phone number shows up, or a number I don't recognize—I'm not answering again. Got it?" I heard him swallow, once again trying to keep from crying (I thought) but there still wasn't a response. "Or—if you limit it to one call a day, I might not get so mad. Alright," I asked, not expecting him to answer. He didn't. So, I sat there for another twenty minutes, and then hung up. I expected him to call right back, but he didn't.
GHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGHGH
I stopped keeping track of all the times I tried to call Wilson (and chickened out as soon as I heard his voice) about midway through Saturday but that last one on Monday was—different. I'd almost worked up the nerve to repeat what I had tried to whisper to Cuddy when I woke up after the seizure, when he said I could call him every day, as long as I limited it to one call.
Jimmy and I had been friends, best friends, for twenty years, lovers for the last fifteen of them, and he had been telling me 'I love you' almost from day one. I had never been able to say it back to him, hadn't even been able to say I love you to Stacy. But he understood that stuff. Sort of.
I was in my office during that phone call. I had been hiding out in there all day every day since he left. I leaned back in my chair, popped my headphones into my ears, and closed my eyes. I started to visualize the room the way it had been before we started working there, the two of us surveying the new territory, almost a decade ago.
"I dunno," the younger me had told the then younger Jimmy. "These offices sort of suck and Cuddy isn't that hot. Even if she showers in front of or with me, still not worth the change, or this hideous view."
"Well, it is cloudy out. On a nice day, you'll probably be able to see…clear across the parking lot," he'd joked, upon stepping out on the little balcony thing. "And how often are you gonna come out here anyway?" I stopped vaulting over the patrician (going back and front from 'his' side to 'mine') just long enough to let him see me shrug. Then, I went back. "On the plus side, being this close will make at work quickies really simple." I didn't say it at the time (or ever) but I only agreed to work there because he was doing the same. Now, he was gone and Cuddy hadn't so much as mentioned the clinic around me, let alone try and make me go down there.
Don't know if I really exist without him around, I wondered. Then I thought, okay, even I think I'm taking too many Vicodin. Of curse, I quickly realized that I actively tried to make myself invisible. I started wearing sunglasses and headphones at all times. I didn't even need to turn the music on. All the paitents figured I was one of them and the staff knew to leave me alone. This didn't bother me too much though and, as usual, not everyone was ignoring me. If I ever actually got worried about it, I could convince myself that Cameron proved my existence. Two to four (usually three) times a week, she stopped by my office with a Ruben and an offer. "If you want to—talk, I'm here," she'd say. I was due for a visit that afternoon, and I seriously considered saying something—even I it was a lie—just to get a little bit of he garbage out of my head. Suddenly the reason for my calls became obvious. I actually missed Wilson, needed him and worse than that, Foreman's coming, I thought.
"Hate to bother you, Maestro, but we've got a case," he said. Maybe if I throw myself off the roof and break my neck Jimmy will come back, I thought, still unable to think about anything besides his having left me—the one thing I was always afraid of when it came to him. He still wouldn't love me, but he might feel guilty enough to stay by my side until I fall asleep one night and…I pulled the headphones out of my ears because Foreman looked like he had something important to say. I mouthed the word, 'huh.'
"Case," he repeated. I closed my eyes and counted to ten but he didn't go away. Two more pills and I was good enough to go into the other room and deal with the team, but I only half paid attention as they talked about our post-transplant patients.
"Could be cancer," somebody said, and part of me wondered if they were all conspiring to get me to talk to Wilson. Even if it wasn't intentional, I couldn't stop it. I tried to tell them that I couldn't be cancer but they stared at me, oddly.
"Find something else and treat them for that," I ordered. "I'm going home." They only tried to stop me as a formality. I got on the bike and started to drive back towards my apartment, only…couldn't make myself go inside. I sped past the parking lot three times before giving up. Almost went over to Jimmy and Amber'splace. Then, I remembered. That's when I realized I only had three places in the whole world to go (work, home, Wilson's) except for bars and strip clubs and they didn't count.
"Too bad you can't get drunk someplace fun anymore," the, cold, cruel part of my brain said. It wasn't out loud, and I knew it wasn't real but it was just as upsetting for me to think these things as it would have been had someone else said them "Wilson isn't around to pick us up, and we all know you can't stop at just one or two."
I just need to see his face. I know, I know…I'm pathetic, and I can't even handle two weeks of solitude. I always said I wanted to be alone, but it didn't take long to realize that all I really wanted was to be alone—with Jimmy. At least I knew where he was. I probably would have driven into a tree if I couldn't find the guy.
"Oh good, nothing like suicide to brighten up our day," I mocked. I drove the rest of the way to his apartment, and sat outside, watching the windows for movement. I could tell he was inside, but I couldn't get off my motorcycle. I could see him, sort of. He was moving back and forth probably from room too room but I couldn't tell where he was going exactly. I did know he wasn't eating. Whenever he's really messed up emotionally, he gets horrible stomachaches, nausea, sometimes worse. He needed somebody to take care of him, make sure he ate something, make sure he was safe, healthy, but he wouldn't let me inside. "Like you could actually get the guts to go with him."
Engine off, kickstand down, feet planted on the asphalt, I sat silently for over an hour, trying to think about anything except tat look in Jimmy's eyes when he said, "I don't love you anymore." Even if those weren't his exact words, that's what he meant. He knows my most sensitive areas. What he said had roughly the same effect that punching my leg, just on top of the scar—right over it—a good fifteen or twenty times would have had. My leg was hurting worse without him around.
"Go away," I was able to hear Wilson say, his voice right beside me, and I jumped—out of fear, or nervousness, or whatever—fell, and landed so hard that I damn near killed myself. "Need a hand getting up?" It's not until he said those words that I actually looked at the guy. Jimmy looked like crap. His hair was messy, like he hasn't washed or brushed it in—longer than it's been since I last did mine—and there were dark circles under his eyes. He was wearing pajama bottoms and a sweatshirt in the middle of the afternoon, and he looked like he might have lost weight, in a sickly way. He isn't eating, I realized, but whether it was from the stomachaches from feeling like crap or from the heartache that made him feel like crap, I couldn't tell.
"I wanted to throw myself off the roof of the hospital but I think this might keep me going a few extra days," I explained, holding up my bleeding scratched forearm, showing off what would be a nasty bruise. He sighed, hard, like my being there hurt him as much as being away hurt me. "I can fix it at home. Probably shouldn't of come here to begin with." He lifted my hands up into his, pulling me up. Jimmy kissed my arm, softly.
"Do you even have Band-aids, antiseptic cream, cotton balls, gauze, tape, anything?" I felt my head shake back and forth even though I meant to say yes. "Come on. I'll do this, only this. Oh, and be quiet. If you start doing that—thing, I'm not gonna be able to keep from throwing both of us of the roof."
"As long as you don't end up a cripple, or didn't get sent to jail 'cause I died and you didn't, probably wouldn't mind—hell, I'd like that." I should have known better than to say it, but after not talking to anybody for almost four months, I guess I sort of forgot how to fake good conversation skills. Wasn't very good at talking to people to begin with, but it had gotten way, way worse. All the stuff I was usually able to hide kept slipping out when I had no intention of letting it do so. "I miss you," I said, watching as he held my arm steady, gripping it like I was some kind of smelly clinic patient he couldn't care less about. "I really screwed up this time, didn't I?" He said nothing, did nothing; he actually stopped bandaging my arm.
"I told you not to talk." He even gave me the silent, judgmental look. I nodded, but suddenly felt the desire to rip my own heart out. "I know this is hard, Greg but I need—we can't keep on doing this okay?" I couldn't say anything. "I miss you too, but," he started to say, and then he stopped cold dead.
"I'll be good," I swore. Jimmy looked like someone, I was pretty sure it was me, had punched him in the stomach. It was just as bad for me as it was for him, only I didn't get to do any of the stuff he was doing. "I didn't mean…sorry, Jimmy. I am sorry. I just want you to—you know—do…something. I'm not doing so good right now. Just, I'm not—and you can't tell anybody I said this—but I'm nothing without you."
"You don't really believe that, do you Greg?" I looked at his feet. "Oh damnit!" I felt myself flinch and pull away even though I was trying real hard to be a big, brave boy. "Crap."
"I know," I admitted, sucking in my breath, and holding it for more than forty seconds before letting the air out again. "I don't blame you for hating me. Even I don't like who I am. It's just—better than the alternative." He sighed, rubbing his lips with the back of his hand. "Can't you just come back and hate me from close by? Please, Jimmy, I need you." But he didn't talk yet. He said nothing, just watched my eyes and stuff, like I was a disgusting bug.
"I don't hate you," he swore, very gently, in a whisper, as he reached over, stroking the side of my face. "You're okay," he said. "It hurts so much right now—for both of us, but we are going to be alright. I just need some time. That's what this is and nothing else."
"But you said—" I started to say. He cut me off.
"I was talking out of my ass because I'm in so much fucking pain that I can't even think straight. You know what that's like, don't you?" I nodded, squeezing my hand into a tight, little fist. "There you go, all patched up. Now get out before I hurt you again."
"I know I should go, but I'm confused because you just said…" I hadn't been that confused since I was five and we all know what happened back. Wilson held onto my hand, unballed my fist, and slid my palm in between both of his.
"I only said what I said in my office because I thought it would make you hate me so much that you'd never wanna see or talk to me again. I love you, and I want us to be together forever but, right now, I can't stand to be around you. I know it doesn't make sense, but it is how I feel. Bet you can understand that one too. Now please, get out of here before I say anything else to hurt or upset you." I didn't want to leave, and I couldn't handle being there. I was stuck. I was hurt, scared, confused, and I needed to jump him, or have him jump me, at least I was pretty sure that was what I wanted. I tend to get confused when it came to sex, maybe even more confused than I get about emotional stuff. I need something, something good, anything, I thought, begging the mean part of me to keep quiet.
"You said right now," I started to say, and for the first time since he'd invited me in, I looked at him, and really saw the guy. Sure, I'd noticed the physical signs of his exhaustion and whatnot before, but this time I saw something else. Jimmy looked as bad on the outside as I felt on the inside, which meant he could very well have been hurting even more than me. "It suggests that your feelings might change, eventually—and they will, right?" He still said nothing. "Please, I need to know I this is a forever thing. I can't handle eternity or—whatever if this is…but if you say that you might, someday ten or twelve years from now, maybe be able to, I dunno, have coffee—even I it's only every once in a while, that gives me something to look forward to. Something to—then I just might be able to dig my fingernails into the dirt and hold on until you change your mind."
I wanted to stop myself there, but I still couldn't control it. "Otherwise and I know I'm talking too much again so, sorry but I need to know. Because, as of right now, I don't know if I can make it. I need to know if there's a reason for me to hold on, or if I should just let go." I didn't mean to say that last part. Jimmy looked like I kicked him, again. I the looking t him like that, probably as much as he hates seeing me drunk or stoned, or both. "Sorry, didn't mean to say—"
"That you're suicidal," he gulped. I didn't know how to respond. I had said almost the exact same thing before, but he didn't seem all that worried then. Maybe because it had been a joke then and he knew it had been a joke, so it didn't freak him out as much.
"Maybe he still doesn't feel bad," that part of me joked. I almost barfed. If I'd denied how I felt, we'd would of gotten into an argument and everything would be a Hell of a lot worse.
"I'm not cutting myself in the candle-lit den, with melodramatic pop songs blaring on the stereo. I just—before I met you I was nothing…well I had nothing—you know what I mean—and now," I stammered. "We've been, together for forever. But I—I…now—sorry, Jimmy. I'll stop. Just don't look at me like that ever again. I won't even ask for help on the case!"
"You came all the way out here because of a case?" I nodded. He smiled, sort of. "You do realize that there are other oncologists in this world, right? Ones whose lives aren't in shambles." I shrugged helplessly. "Okay, quick consult—referral. That's it. Tell me what kind of cancer you think the patient has and I'll tell you who to go to." I didn't say anything again but I think he could tell what the problem was, not because I was giving anything away, he just knows me. "You don't know what kind it is, huh?"
"We're not even sure it is cancer," I admitted, although I hadn't planned on it. He had—has—a way of making me do all kinds sorts of things he thought I oughta do but I didn't feel like. I handed the file over. He looked at it for several minutes, put it down, and sighed. "I should probably just…go."
"Look—um, about the thing you asked me before, give it a couple more weeks, and then ask again. Keep calling, and for gods sakes say something. You can talk to me. It'll help you. Okay, Baby?" I sniffed. "But don't come over without calling—same goes if I ever don't pick up." I was afraid of his last statement. He'd always answered. Jimmy's having picked up all those other times, made me wonder—worry—if perhaps he was also in danger of hurting himself.
Still, I nodded, even though I wanted to scream at and kick the crap out of him. I was the one that had a bus dropped on my head. He had no reason to be mad at me. Besides, it wasn't entirely my fault. Amber didn't hafta come to get me. She could have found Jimmy, and he would have come to pick me up and everything would have been fine. Even if she hadn't gotten him, even if shed insisted on coming to the bar herself, she hadn't needed to follow me onto the bus. If she had left me alone, everything would have been okay, but…this was not my fault—not completely—and he had no right to act like it was, to make me feel lie I was responsible or bad. I did enough of that myself. It wasn't that I hadn't heard what he was saying, but I didn't completely believe it. I'm pretty sure the only reason he hadn't thrown me out and slammed the door in my face (or on my hand) was because he knew I didn't completely believe him and he probably knew I blamed myself for Amber dying.
"I'm sorry, Wilson. I know this whole thing is my fault and I'm sorry. I didn't mean to—I didn't want this. Please don't hate me." Before he could say anything else, I popped up, grabbed my file, and left. Didn't go back to the hospital—couldn't—just drove to my apartment. When I got there, I looked at my machine. Two new messages. Both from Wilson. The first was him calling to check and see if I got home, and make sure I was "okay."
The second message insisted I not read too much into the first one. He said, I had looked really messed up and he was worried I might run over some helpless pedestrian with my bike. "And don't forget to change the dressings on your arm!" Beep! After that, I thought the message was over, but it wasn't. Jimmy had stayed on the phone—I told myself it was because he was hopping I'd pick up—for a minute and a half but he didn't say anything. Now I knew how he felt when I called and didn't talk. It scared me bad enough that I decided to not do it to him ever again. I replayed the last half of that message twice before deleting it—"you really are a masochist," my brain teased. I kept the first message. The machine told me I now had two saved messages, but I had no idea what the first one was. So, I hit play.
"Hey, Greg. Obviously you're not home yet. I just wanted to call and make sure we're still on for tonight but you're probably still stuck in traffic and can't answer me. I'll call you back in ten minutes. And don't forget to go to the bank. I'm not loaning you money so we can play poker. It's like I'm playing against myself. Even if I totally kick your ass, it doesn't feel like I've won anything. It's just plain stupid. Bye. Oh, wow! I'm sorry; I almost forgot. I love you."
I'm not usually the sentimental type, but for some reason hearing these three words hit me harder than they ever had before and worse (or maybe better) they hit me harder than the cold, hateful ones ever could. I suddenly needed to hear them again and again and again. I vaguely remembered the day this call had been from but still had no idea why I'd saved the message back then. It wasn't as if 'I love you' was a phrase he guarded with his life. He said it all the time. Still, I was glad I had done what I did.
I poured myself a shot of bourbon, downed it with one sip, and went to refill my glass, but was starting to wonder how much it actually helped, if there was really a point. I drink a lot, often too much, and yet I almost never thought there was a problem, not even when Wilson lectured me about it. And yet, there I was, seriously considering the possibility of pouring all my alcohol down the drain.
"For what," my brain asked. "You think he'll come back if you stop drinking? He wouldn't come back if you quit the Vicodin and the booze, and the swearing, and got rid of the motorcycle."
No, I whispered. I answered out loud even though I was alone. It's not true.
"He's never coming back," it teased.
But he said—
"He lied," it taunted, clearly enjoying this. "No wonder nobody likes us!" That was the last coherent thought I had all day. I finished the nearly empty bottle, too a couple extra Vicodin, and then lay down on the sofa, and spent the rest of the—who knows how long—curled up, trying not to cry. In the end, my stupid Machismo didn't matter much. The tears came out of me when I was asleep. The next morning, I replayed the 'I love you,' message eight times before going to work. I solved the case. The next few weeks I went to work every day. At night, I'd come home, have a few drinks, and took too many pills, passing out in the same place, sometimes alone, sometimes with Steve McQueen sitting on my shoulder, or my chest.
Work went back to the way it was before my visit to Jimmy's. Luckily I didn't have to deal with too many people on any given day—save for Cameron's moronic attempts to rescue me with free sandwiches and French fries, and then I'd get to go home, be by myself.
A week went by. I came home one night, replayed the 'I love you' message another dozen times and preformed for my nightly ritual. Sometime later, the phone rang. I looked at the clock. 3:27. Who the Hell calls at this time of night, I thought, and worried that Jimmy was dead. "Hello," I said, peeling my tongue off the roof of my mouth.
"Greg," my mother's voice sobbed. No, no, no, I screamed silently I can't handle this right now! "It's your father." Part of me expected her to say he'd been arrested for touching someone's little kid, but then I remembered the stuff about his heart finally starting to give out, and I knew what she was going to say—for the most part—before she said it. "He's dead." Thank god, I thought and then, what god?
"Okay," I managed to say, like the small, sad little boy I am, and some how it didn't sound ecstatic. She asked me to deliver a eulogy. No way. I can't even go. Sure as Hell not gonna say nice stuff about the guy who used to treat me like a poorly trained, worthless dog who he could beat the crap out of, that nobody would ever care about.
"Although, he was right about that last part," the voice in my mind taunted again. "Even Wilson doesn't like you."
"I—I…" I may have said something else. It's so hard to say. I was half passed out, scared, and the most evil person I'd ever had to deal with, who had abused me in every way imaginable, had just died. I don't really—I remembered listening to the phone call, or rather not listening to the call, and drinking another bottle of Jack Daniels and then I lay down and…well, that's about it. I didn't black out, just fell asleep. Before I did, I remember thinking if I ever needed something from Jimmy, it's now. Not to get me to the funeral— 'cause if I get up in front of those people, I don't think I can control what I say. I actually only say about 25% of the of the stuff that pops into my head, but so much of it ends up being inappropriate, so nobody realizes that I do have a filter. No, I need Jimmy because I need to tell somebody what happened, and if I don't say it to him—who knows where this shit will spill out!
