A/N: I'm baaaaack. Not that I was gone...I feel like I'm the only House writer still on here. Anyways, this will be a shorter fic with longer chapters. It's not my favorite thing I've written (I know; rousing endorsement) but I figured I should post it anyways because maybe you all will like it more than I do. Please let me know what you think and if I can do anything to improve! Also I am still in the market for a beta.

ALSO: if you guess the disease before they do, I'll give you an internet brownie!

"It's not sarcoidosis. Lymph nodes weren't swollen. White count wasn't up. What else?" House was twirling his cane by the whiteboard, thinking. His patient was a 10-year-old girl who came in with leg swelling and trouble breathing. They had scanned her lungs and had seen accumulation of fluid. The whiteboard read,

LEG SWELLING
DYSPNEA
PLEURAL EFFUSION

"Congestive heart failure?" Chase suggested.

"Maybe. If you have some kind of time machine that can age her forward 50 years. But then I'd be dead. Which would be OK with me because then I wouldn't have to listen to your bad ideas! Now go test her for...something, I don't care."

The team left reluctantly, and House stood and went to his desk, opening the drawer and popping three pills into his mouth. It was more than he normally took, but his leg hadn't been taking kindly to the rain. More than once this week, he had woken up in a cold sweat with his leg cramping and he had to drag himself to the bathroom, whimpering and hoping his neighbors didn't hear him.

He looked into the bottle and realized he was out. He stood slowly and limped more heavily than usual to the pharmacy. The girl at the counter was short, and looked like she could be about twelve. Good.

"Thirty-six Vicodin."

The woman smiled sweetly. "May I see your prescription?"

House pulled out an old prescription with 'Dr. James Wilson' written on top. The date was wrong, but he was banking on the twelve-year-old at the desk not noticing.

Unfortunately, he was wrong. The woman studied the prescription. She was clearly new to the job as House had never seen her before, and she was actually taking it seriously.

"This is expired," she said.

"No it's not. That's a seven."

"It's a one."

"It's a seven."

"House," a woman's voice cut in. House turned around.

"I'm sorry about him, Angela," Cuddy apologized to the pharmacist. Then she turned to House.

"What's the problem now?" she asked.

"This idiot doesn't know how to fill a prescription," House complained.

"She just doesn't know how to fill an expired prescription. It's her job. She's doing it well," Cuddy praised, and the pharmacist beamed with pride.

"Fine. Then write me a script."

"No."

House feigned surprise. "What? You? Not giving me medication? What a surprise. Call Wilson then."

"I told him not to write for you either. You're addicted, House. You've been taking more the past few months. I'm worried about your liver. And your patients."

"You told him not to write for me?" House said in disbelief.

"Yes. Until you're due for another bottle. Which isn't until...next week."

"Next week?!" House exclaimed.

"Yes, next week."

"Fine, I'll just get someone else to prescribe for me. Chase would do it."

Cuddy sighed. "You're just proving my point, House. How about this: if you can go a week without your meds, I'll admit you're not addicted."

"I don't care if you think I'm addicted or not."

"Fine. Then a week off clinic duty."

"A month," House argued.

"Three weeks. And I'll say you were right and I was wrong."

House sighed. He weighed his options. On the one hand, he was tired of doing hours in the clinic every day, having to deal with the runny noses and crotch rot that came through the hospital. On the other hand, his leg really hurt. He knew Cuddy thought he took the pills to get some sort of high, but that was only partially the case. Nothing else would touch the searing pain in his thigh; not Advil, not Tylenol, and certainly not Motrin. He was not addicted. He needed to prove that. He knew it would suck and that he'd have to hide the fact that he was in pain, but he wouldn't let Cuddy get the last word.

"Fine."

He stomped to Wilson's office, limping more than usual. If he could just get one more dose before he went cold turkey…

He opened the door without knocking.

"House, what a pleasant surprise!" Wilson said sarcastically.

"Yeah yeah. Why'd you let Cuddy manipulate you?"

"I...didn't? What are you talking about?" Wilson noticed House's death grip on his cane, but didn't want to say anything lest he get berated for it.

"Why don't you sit?" he suggested instead. House sat on the couch in Wilson's office usually reserved for crying patients.

"You let Cuddy manipulate you into not writing for me."

"No I didn't. I'm worried about you too, House. You're popping those pills like candy."

"I'm in pain!" he yelled.

"I know. You're not in so much pain that you need enough Vicodin for a horse though."

"How do you know?"

Wilson gave him a penetrating look. He knew House was in pain, but addiction had pierced the surface. "Look, Cuddy already told me about your deal. Do you want me to stay with you this week?"

"No."

Wilson shrugged. "Okay. Well you know where I'll be if you need me."

"The strip club?"

Wilson sighed. "I have a patient. Would you get out?"

House sighed and stood, shifting his weight onto his left side and adjusting his cane. He opened the door and left.

His team was back in the case room when he entered. He hoped they wouldn't notice his pronounced limp.

"Her legs are like sausages," Foreman informed him.

"And what are you going to do about it?" House asked, tapping his cane on the floor.

"We need to drain the fluid," Cameron suggested.

"I meant what are you going to do about diagnosing her?" House said, frustrated. He ran a hand over his already slightly sweating forehead.

"We could test the fluid?" Chase suggested.

"Fine, do that," House ordered. His team skittered out.

He woke up in the middle of the night as he had so many nights before. But this time was different. He was cold and hot at the same time, and nausea wormed his way into his stomach and up his esophagus. He tried to get to the bathroom, but his leg wouldn't let him, so he grabbed the nearest trash can and retched. Not much came up as he hadn't had dinner. He tried to go back to sleep; tried to shut out the cramping in his leg by rubbing it rhythmically.

That morning, House's team sat staring at the whiteboard. There was no House in sight.

"How long should we wait for him?" Foreman asked.

"He's only thirty minutes late," Chase said.

"He was late yesterday too," Cameron remembered.

"I'll go see if Dr. Wilson knows where he is," Chase offered.

"He'll be mad at you for ratting him out…" Foreman warned.

"Whatever. We need to get to work and we can't do that if he's not here." Chase argued, getting up and walking to Wilson's office. He knocked.

"Come in!" Wilson yelled through the door. Chase entered.

"Oh no. What did he do now?" Wilson asked.

"He's late," Chase told him.

"He's always late," Wilson pointed out.

"I know. But we have a patient and we can't really do anything without him signing off…"

Wilson sighed. "Okay. I can call him." He shooed the Australian out of the room and dialed House. No answer. He left a voicemail.

"House, you're late. Your team can't work. Hurry up." He hung up and continued his paperwork.

Fifteen more minutes and no sign of House, and Wilson was starting to get worried. He was late all the time, but usually not this late. He stood and started to search the hospital.

Eventually, he had to go to the bathroom. He had drunk too much water this morning with his morning run, and his bladder was screaming for relief.

Standing at the urinal, he heard an odd sound coming from one of the stalls. He looked at the crack at the bottom and saw the bottoms of House's blue tennis shoes sticking out.

"House?"

The sound returned. It was like a broken garbage disposal.

"House? You OK in there?"

House retched again. He had been vomiting since last night on and off. He eventually made his way to work after puking up his breakfast, but the second he got to work the nausea returned with a vengeance. He rubbed his sore, stiff leg and wished he had his pills. But he couldn't take them, because then Cuddy would be right. He couldn't let that happen; she'd talk about it for years.

"Fine! Bad Reuben!" House answered.

"Are you detoxing?" Wilson asked, concerned.

"What do you think?"

"Can I come in?"

"I can't get up so no."

"Okay, well now I'm coming in." Wilson opened the door to see House leaning over the toilet, his face drawn in pain, pale with bags under his eyes. Wilson squatted next to him.

"Anything I can do for you?" he asked.

"Don't tell Cuddy," House said, and retched again. Wilson noticed the bags under his eyes and ascertained that he hadn't got much sleep last night.

"I won't. Your team's waiting for you. Do you need help getting up?" House nodded reluctantly. Wilson held out his hand and hoisted House up. He could hear his friend wince and Wilson almost winced too. House was usually good at hiding his pain, but his defenses had weakened a little today. He was grimacing and leaning on the stall for support. Wilson picked up his cane and handed it to him.

"Are you sure you should be working?" Wilson asked. House nodded. Work was probably the best thing to distract him right now.

"Okay. Well come get me if it gets really bad, OK? Just because I'm concerned about your amount of use doesn't mean I don't care if you're hurting," Wilson said, studying House's pained expression. The diagnostician limped to his office slowly. Every time he put weight on his bad leg, it protested, and he was afraid he'd fall in front of the whole hospital. He finally collapsed in his wheely chair next to the whiteboard.

"Hey, House," Chase greeted him. House grunted, rubbing his leg.

"House...you OK?" Cameron asked, staring unabashedly at his hand rubbing his leg hard.

"I'm fine. Thanks for your concern," House snapped. "What's new with the case?"

"Well, we tested the fluid in her legs while you were gone and there weren't any abnormalities," Foreman filled him in.

House nodded. "That was a stupid thing to do. She doesn't have an infection. Her white count would be elevated."

"You told us to do it though…?" Cameron reminded him.

"Well you shouldn't always do everything I say. Go test her for lymphoma."

"Without a high white blood cell count?" Chase puzzled.

"Yes! Go!"

The ducklings filed out, Cameron looking back at House with concern.

He slumped as soon as his team was out of sight. He felt like throwing up again but he knew nothing would come up, so he just sat and rubbed his leg. God it ached. And it kept ramping up, too. Every time he rubbed it he could feel it pulsing with inflammation and cramping. He felt like yelling, but he couldn't or else Wilson might hear. He lie down on the couch in his office with one hand behind his head and the other holding his leg firmly. As an afterthought, he grabbed the trash can and dragged it by his head. He closed his eyes and wished the pain would stop.