The scene is set in Season 8; the episode entitled "The C-Word," in which House and Wilson attempt to give Wilson chemotherapy to treat a Stage II thymoma. We've ended the scene where House devilishly administers a highly potent painkiller to the pair of them and Wilson's drifted off into a drug-induced sleep. (The rest is my concoction, with a few key ingredients thrown in courtesy of the actual paid Housian gang.)

Maybe if I went to church…

House was lying awake, spread-eagled on his bed, staring at the ceiling.

Or if I stopped cursing…

It was that precarious hour between 2 and 3 am in which every insomniac feels the first twinge of being alone.

It's probably all the blaspheming I do…

And so it came to be that House was brainstorming all the theoretically divine reasons he had been thrust into wretchedom. His venomous thigh was pulsing, actually twitching.

There's no way it's the drugs. God invented drugs. I bet that's the drugs talking…

To get up and pace would be to wake Wilson- a threat barely mentionable, even in his head. To lie still would require further thought, and even he had a limit to useless self-deprecation, no matter how much it made him grin. It was very dark.

Wilson's muscle twitches had abated. Up next were the gastrointestinal symptoms. Then sweating and pain. Hallucinations if Wilson were lucky.

A better man would at least think that he would take the pain for his buddy. But he couldn't be that better man. Not now. What he could do was be there, although it went against every fiber of his being. Wilson was the helper. Wilson cared. House was the anti-carer. But without Wilson, House couldn't be anti- anything. Every atheist needed a theist to exist, and without Wilson, House… well, he just didn't.

God, it was dark. And so quiet. He waited. He closed his eyes.

You couldn't even smell Stacey in the room anymore. She'd left long ago. The bandage covered from his groin to his knee. It felt like the stitches went through his bone. Where had she gone?

There was cold on his forehead. He turned his head away, but he could imagine the worry creases between Wilson's eyebrows.

Fever, heat, soreness. Someone opened a window. A breeze. So nice.

After PT he always shook. The pain and exertion left his muscles tight and sensitive. Wilson had made his favorite- or what used to be his favorite. He made Wilson leave the dinner tray in the bedroom, propped up for him, but he never let him stay. No polite conversation or awkward looking away as House fumbled with the silverware. He embarrassed himself enough as it was- no need for an audience. But it was no use- he threw the fork against the wall, and in doing so painted a nice little mashed potato picture on the wallpaper. He felt like and three-year-old, and carefully turned over in bed. Sleep could begin quickly this evening.

"F**k off, Wilson!" He wanted to sleep. He did not want dinner. He did not want and audience. And he was angry. Which of course made the shaking worse. He also had not taken his medicine, but Wilson didn't need to know it was because he couldn't get the lid off.

"House, muscle tremors are no reason to be embarrassed."

"I said 'f**k off."

"And I'm not going to ask you or help you. I'm just going to do it. So there's no choice in the matter. I'm tired of seeing my wonderful cooking go to waste- your juvenile taste buds have a lot of growing up to do."

And Wilson had actually done it. He'd undone the blankets, propped House up against the headboard and guided spoon to mouth. He ignored both House's most powerful glare directed right at him and the way that House had flinched in response to the invisible spasms and knocked a glass of water onto his incredibly starched khaki Dockers.

A beeping sound. What was it? It wasn't cheerful. Morse code? Beep…beep…beep… no. Too steady. House started to wake up now. It was annoying is what it was. A cane was going to be stuffed in whatever orifice was handy if a neighbor was blaring music while Wilson was trying to sleep. Wilson. Wilson?