Author: Regency
Title: The Void
Spoilers: House's Head, Wilson's Heart
Warning(s): implied character death
Summary: When Wilson asked House to risk his life for Amber, he jeopardized all he had left. His gamble didn't pay off and all he has left are the consequences.
Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters or plots presented in this piece. No copyright infringement is intended.
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"You were an infuriating bastard," he told the headstone on a sunny day. The sky was beautiful now, but it had been unremarkable when they laid him to rest, or whatever a man like House might get up to after death.
"You probably drove insane as many as you saved—drove as many to suicide. You were certifiable, House. I'm probably certifiable, too, after all this time." Wilson rubbed his face to give himself a moment of reprieve, a moment not to be confronted with the sight of this…rock that represented his friend now.
It had been so easy to be mad, then. It had been effortless to walk away from the lucid blue eyes and uncharacteristic plea there. He had been asking Wilson not to leave then, not to abandon him when he could hardly speak, much less flee the humiliation that life presented him daily. His voice had been his last weapon once his body had begun to fail him. Once he could no longer assault those around him with verbal jibes, he became a victim of his disability and he knew it. And Wilson knew it.
James Wilson had known Gregory House better than anyone who ever lived, perhaps even better than his parents. He had known that he would rather waste away than admit weakness. He had known that House would see Death coming from a mile. What he hadn't known was how welcomed it would be once it arrived.
"I don't think I've ever been as angry as I was when Amber died. She was everything to me, House. She was endless possibility. She was the next Mrs. James Wilson. Maybe even the next ex. It didn't matter whether it failed. I wanted—I deserved the chance to find out!" The wind didn't blow and the grass didn't sway in response. There were no smirking eyes peering back at him. He could not drown in the depths of their perceived superiority. All that remained was what he recalled.
"I deserved the chance find out what we could be; us, House. You and me. Where would we have gone from here?" He rubbed his face again in a perpetual defense against grief. He shouldn't have been so disturbed anymore. Months had left the gravestone aged and graying. Time had passed; there was all the talk about wounds and how time healed them. He was a failed experiment in that.
"I would have forgiven you." He shook his head and scoffed. "Like you would have accepted otherwise. You would have pestered me until I took you back into my confidence and, then, asked me for a beer. For all your talk of not wanting to 'break this,' you would never have allowed this to die. We would have survived. All you had to do was make it without me for a little while." He was pleading now in hindsight, bargaining with someone who was in no position to deal. It was his routine when he visited.
He thought that little pieces of him had begun to chip off since House had been gone, pieces that would have survived without Amber, maybe even thrived without her. What was left was sympathy and that he gave freely to his patients. To those who lay dying, he gave his restraint. It was so hard not to ask them to just take him a message. If all life and death was relative and there was no judgment to speak of—why not? House would be on the other side with a leg that worked or, at least, all the Vicodin he could stomach for eternity.
There'd be Amber, too. She'd be radiant, he hoped, and at peace. No flu, no diet pills, no misery—if forever in the vicinity of House could be considered a lack of misery. She'd be there, but Wilson was out of things to say to her. Their goodbyes had been sweet and complete, though premature. If he could have her back today, he'd carry her to the Justice of the Peace and marry her without a second thought. If he couldn't, because he couldn't, he'd learned to function without her.
Losing House was a different animal. His old friend. His old pain in the ass. His other half. That, he wasn't functioning as well without. That was why he was here, why he was always here in the moments not filled with other duties to other people. He always hoped that if he asked a different way this time, there might be a chance he could still have it all. He could still have his heart and his heart. He was going on, but he hadn't moved forward in the least. The places that had become empty still were. There was nothing left fill them with.