Title: You Say Love Wrecks Everything
Author: Taisa Prongsie
Pairing: House/Wilson, Wilson/Amber
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 836
Warnings: Angst, spoilers for S5.
Disclaimer: House and Wilson are mine, you can keep Amber. Title/lyrics by Josh Groban ("My Heart Was Home Again")
Author's Note: Based on a relationship I had that just ended. Rawr.

You say love wrecks everything and none of us survive. So, I got over you last night and I am still alive.

Wilson was packing up every last token of appreciation; every last diploma he had earned that brought him to Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital. Over the years, he had picked up and moved out, but never for very long. Unlike those few times, he knew this was for good.

He looked back on the black leather couch in his office; the one House would come and relax on when he was bored. In essence, he was the reason this was happening. He was always the reason, and it hurt Wilson deeply to admit it. This was the unhealthiest relationship he has ever been in. Granted, three divorces, an affair with a patient and a dead ex-girlfriend later, it's hard to believe that could be true.

When he had met Gregory House the very first time, he didn't like him at all; he was a pompous, caustic bastard that, quite honestly, intimidated him. Greg had complimented him on figuring out a case that had puzzled the entire Diagnostics Department, which had left the blue-eyed doctor somewhat surprised. A few days later, that very same doctor sought out the young oncologist and struck up a conversation with him in attempts to see what had made him tick.

That's what it was for the first few years of their relationship. Depending on whom he told, the surprise factor would vary if Wilson explained how they went a year without talking to each other. Some would be surprised that Wilson could avoid him that long, or that House would ever let a victim go. Then again, mostly everyone could understand why Wilson would want to stay away from House. No one in the hospital quite understood why Wilson was as close with House as he was.

Once the two men started talking to each other once again – Wilson had grown up a bit, grew a thicker exterior as a professional doctor instead of being a bright eyed intern – and the following years were rather smooth. Infarctions, gun shots, and testy detectives aside, friendship with House was surprisingly natural.

Perhaps the question remaining for Wilson was, why would you give it up? Twenty years of waiting for whatever recognition he could get, twenty years of House taking advantage of him, twenty years of lies – it wasn't worth the pain in the very end.

You could say he loved House, in more ways than one. There were a few times, way back when, where the two fell into each others' beds, seeking nothing but instant gratification. Or, at least, that's what Wilson figures House's motivation was. For him, things were different; he fell in love. He never wanted to, never expected it. There were times he would lie alone in his bed, wishing he could just forget that side of their relationship. Conversely, there were also times where he would scold his mind for ever thinking such a thing.

It wasn't until he lost Amber, the one thing that felt so very right to him, that he realized what was necessary. Wilson had to grow a backbone, he needed to leave. God, he needed to find his resolve, his strength again. House didn't care for him the way that he cared for the blue-eyed diagnostician, and it was futile to wait around until he realized how irreplaceable Wilson truly was to him.

Wilson had tried a number of times before to stop talking to Greg, to stop associating with him, if only to save whatever was left of his own sanity. It never lasted more than two days at most, and it hurt more than he expected to go without House. Perhaps the diagnostician was his vice, his Vicodin; it was an addiction he wished he could live with, and one that drove him up the wall – usually at the same time. Whatever the older man was, he was his best friend and at one point, he could honestly say, he was his lover.

Those days have long since passed. They tried to repair what was left of their friendship after the Hell that Tritter put the relationship through. They tried to work things out when Amber came along. Both times, one of them was betrayed; first was House, now it was Wilson. House needed Wilson there, but Wilson could not forget nearly as easily, short of a frontal lobotomy.

It stung to say goodbye. There were a few tears in the back of his eyes, but he kept it together. It would take time to ease the uncomfortably empty void inside of him, but he was strangely comfortable with the separation. House had apologized a thousand times, and wished that Wilson wouldn't go. Wilson knew, however, that leaving everything behind was the right thing to do.

As he picked up the last box off of the mahogany desk, he switched the lights off in the office and made his final walk through the hospital. He stopped for a moment, running his fingers along the glass that read Gregory House, M.D., Diagnostic Medicine.

"Goodbye."