Reconciliations: A House MD Story Chapter 1, a house, m.d. fanfic

Reconciliations: A House M.D. Story.

Original characters introduced in this work of fiction are the property of the author; unless falling under the above disclaimer, names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales and persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Author's Note: This is my first attempt at writing for and I'm very excited to be joining the community. I welcome all comments both in praise and in criticism, but I ask that criticism be given in the spirit of contributing to the improvement of this work and of me as a writer of future fiction. This work picks up where the Season 6 episode "Teamwork" left off. Warning: This story involves major character death and is not suitable for teens under 14 years of age. This story is Rated T+ for language, violence and mild sexual content.

Chapter One

A Princeton-area parking lot was completely empty save for four carloads of teenagers gathering in the wee hours of the morning for a little innocent fun. The rain had subsided but the concrete still reflected wetly the light cast by a couple dozen lamp posts dispersed evenly throughout the lot. The teens began to emerge from the cars, laughing and kidding around in excitement. There were about ten of them in all, males and females, out way past their curfews, but that was nothing unusual. After curfew was when the fun really began. Kirk Gartner and his best friend Joey Preston were the last to arrive in Kirk's red Corvette. The car had been given to him as an early Christmas present by his parents and still had that distinct new car smell to it.

The high school junior pulled up beside his cousin Daniel's lovingly rebuilt 1989 Mustang convertible. He didn't really feel like racing but Joey had nagged him into joining the rest of their friends. Kirk had a headache that he had been suffering with for three solid days without relief. It was tolerable but hurt enough for him to be popping headache pills like Tic-Tacs in a futile attempt to get rid of it. He knew he was coming down with something and he suspected it was the flu, maybe even Swine flu, by the malaise he had been experiencing all day. His mother would be upset when she found out that he had been skipping the daily regimen of colloidal silver and vitamins his parents placed their faith in rather than "Big Pharma's poison vaccines".

Joey had bobbed up and down and all around the passenger seat, never breaking from talking to take a breath the entire drive from his place to the lot, which hadn't done anything to help the way Kirk felt.

Joey was already halfway out of the car before it came to a complete stop.

"Come on, Kirk," Joey insisted, "let's go help plan out the course before they finish the damned thing without us!"

"You go ahead, I'll be right with you," Kirk told him, remaining in the car. He pulled a bottle of ASA out of his pocket and emptied the last two tablets into the palm of his hand. He tossed the bottle over his shoulder into the small space behind his seat and then popped the pills into his mouth with a drink from his Coke to wash them down. It just had to work on the headache, or else nothing would and the pain would drive him crazy.

Kirk decided to let Joey add input into the planning of the course for the both of them and stayed in the warm car. His favorite song was playing on the stereo and he cranked the volume up high, trying to get himself into the mood for drifting. Joey was now running back to the Camaro with a piece of paper in his hand and jumped back into the car. Kirk lowered the volume again.

"Here's the plan!" Joey said, straightening out the piece of paper on the dashboard where they both could see it. On it a diagram had been drawn of the course the drivers were to follow around the parking lot and its various obstacles as they drifted. Each car would go individually around the route and would be timed as to how long it took it to complete the course. A panel of three non-driving judges would keep track of the times and rate each car on the skill and creativity shown in each drift based on a ten point scale to determine which car wins. The winner would buy the beer and pizza for the party being held at Joey's place Saturday night. Joey's place was selected because his parents were going out of town for the weekend.

Kirk tried to focus on the diagram but he couldn't quite get his eyes to focus well enough to see it from where Joey was holding it. He grabbed it from his friend and pulled it closer for a better look. While he could see it better, his eyes were still acting funny and things blurred in and out of focus.

"I don't know, man. I'm not feeling good. I got a headache and I'm not sure this is a good idea." Kirk told him with a shake of his head. "Maybe I should just sit this one out."

Joey's face fell in disappointment. "Come on, Dude! You don't drive and everybody will think you're a pus--." But Kirk cut him off angrily.

"I'm not, shut up you douche bag! I don't care what those guys think."

Joey shook his head and pointed to a pretty blonde girl leaning against the hood of a Sunfire a few feet away. "You're the douche bag! You want that honey to think you're too chicken to race her brother?"

Kirk shook his head. "I don't care what she thinks. I already have a girlfriend."

A frustrated sigh left Joey's mouth. "Damn it! If not for yourself, think about my rep! I don't want to be known as the dork who hangs out with a coward."

Kirk glared at his friend for a moment, holding his breath to keep himself from spewing a flurry of curses at him which he would later have to apologize for. Finally he exhaled loudly in resignation.

"Okay! Let's get this—"

"Yes!" Joey exclaimed in victory.

"—damned thing done so I can go home and get to bed!" Kirk growled. "So help me, Joey, I get a scratch on this car because I'm driving with this headache and I'll kick your ass so bad that it'll be coming out your nose!"

"Ooh," Joey mocked with a smirk on his face. "I'm petrified! Besides, everybody knows you kick ass at this! JK, JK!"

It was decided that of the three cars competing, Kirk would go last. He wasn't thrilled to hear that seeing as it meant having to sit and wait with Joey jumping up and down like an idiot in the seat next to him. His cousin was chosen to go first. If anyone could beat Kirk, it was Toby. He tried to watch closely as Daniel completed his run cleanly, meaning he didn't drift into any of the lamp posts or meridians dividing up the parking lot. He kept blinking to clear his vision because no longer was it blurry but his vision doubled every so often now as well.

"I'm not seeing right," Kirk told Joey with apprehension. Joey just rolled his eyes in exasperation and turned his attention to the next driver who started off. Kirk wasn't interested in watching. Instead he grabbed the Big Gulp in his cup holder and began to chug back the rest of his Coke. For some reason he was incredibly thirsty. His mouth felt like it was stuffed with saw dust. He closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the head rest of his seat, trying to prep himself for his turn on the course. It was a struggle not to doze off in spite of his unrelenting headache. He was so tired and the Coke he had just drunk wasn't sitting well in his stomach. He couldn't wait to get this over with.

Kirk opened his eyes and lifted his head suddenly when he heard the sickening sound of metal scraping against metal. The driver of the Sunfire had hit a puddle of water wrong and tried to overcorrect but he ended up scraping the driver's side against a lamp post and then overcorrected again, spinning a one-eighty and slamming his back end into a concrete barrier before coming to a stop. The driver pounded his steering wheel with both wrists in fury and then drove his wounded vehicle to the finish line, his bumper scraping on the concrete along the way.

"Holy shit!" Joey shouted, laughing almost hysterically. "What an idiot! Did you see that, Kirk?"

"Not quite," Kirk muttered, but he was drowned out by Joey's laughing.

"We're up!" Joey exclaimed.

"I know," Kirk said grimly. Blinking almost steadily now, he started his car and pulled up to the starting line to await the starting flag—a green t-shirt donated by one of the guys and held by the blonde honey. His stomach was churning now, and he was afraid that he was going to be sick all over his brand new interior.

"Joey," Kirk said suddenly, "I don't think I should—"

He was cut off by the drop of the flag and Joey's screaming interpretation of it.

"Go!!"

It was too late to back out now. Gripping the steering wheel in both hands, Kirk punched the accelerator to the floor, his wheels spinning with a high-pitch squeal before finding traction and propelling the Corvette forward with a jolt. He forced himself to be in the present, to forget the headache and nausea-- and now the crazy ringing in his ears--and to focus only on the car and the course in front of him. The first half of the course was relatively easy and his drifting was perfect as he rounded corners and avoided lamp posts. He was starting to feel more confident in spite of how ill he felt and it showed in the greater degree of risk he was beginning to take. He knew the second half was a lot more difficult.

Joey was laughing and squealing—and talking—like a 12 year old girl beside him, and Kirk found it much more distracting than he usually did. He barely noticed that he was beginning to breathe harder but he was aware of the sweat rolling off of his forehead and into his eyes. That, the stinging of sweat in his eyes, and his vision doubling and re-doubling, was making it more to difficult for him to keep his attention solely on the car.

"Shut up, Joe!" Kirk told his friend through gritted teeth. The next curve he took too fast and lost control of the drift, nearly sliding sideways into a retaining wall before correcting the car a second before impact.

"Jeez, Kirk," Joey shouted, glaring at his friend with fear, "Watch what the hell are you doing!"

"I am!" Kirk screamed back. "You wanna take over? No? Then shut up!"

Joey backed off and was quiet for the first time all evening.

Kirk felt his stomach heaving and having to force himself from allowing its contents to come up was another distraction he didn't need. As he narrowly missed lamp posts and barricades it never occurred to him to just hit the brake and stop. There were too many other thoughts demanding recognition.

The finish line was just a hundred feet or so ahead now. All he had to do was clear the barriers on either side of him before drifting over the line. He felt his body beginning to shake and suddenly, just as his brain was commanding his leg and foot to press down hard on the break the muscles in his leg gave out. Kirk lost control as the front driver's side wheel hit a meridian, caught on it and then, like a sling-shot, sent the Corvette careening sideways to a dead stop as it slammed the passenger side into one of the final barriers. Joey screamed in terror, "Oh my god--!"

Kirk and Joey were jolted hard; Kirk's seatbelt felt like it was cutting into him like a band saw. Then everything was perfectly quiet and still for a few seconds. Kirk looked over to Joey. The passenger-side airbag had deployed, the only one to do so. Besides being covered in a grayish white power and wheezing from it, Joey appeared unhurt. He was in shock, but not injured.

A miracle, Kirk thought. He looked around himself dumbly, unable to take in what had just happened. Everything seemed so unreal. It was a dream, Kirk decided. It was all just a dream from which he had to wake up. He opened his door and struggled to be free from his seat belt. He barely managed to extricate himself from his car. His legs felt like spaghetti. He took a few unsteady steps towards the group of teens running towards the car. Why were they running? Was something wrong? Was someone hurt?

He wobbled unsteadily on his feet and looked back at his car. Shit, he thought, Dad is going to kill me!

Before his next thought occurred, his head exploded. At least, that's what it felt like. The pain he experienced was like nothing he had ever felt before. He grabbed at his head, screaming and his knees buckled, sending him falling to the concrete. He couldn't tell if his head had hit the ground hard because the pain he was already experiencing was so excruciating that he never would have felt the impact. His stomach heaved violently and he vomited onto the concrete around his face. He saw red in it.

"Is that blood?" he slurred softly and then closed his eyes and let darkness envelop him.

Dr. Gregory House could have kicked himself for forgetting to turn off his cell phone like he did with his beeper before going to bed. For the first time in weeks the pain from his ruined thigh hadn't kept him awake for half of the night and he was having a good night's sleep. A sleep that was free of nightmares. The new ringtone he had downloaded, AC/DC's Highway to Hell, had ended that rare bliss. He opened two blurry eyes and looked at the alarm clock next to his bed: 5:30 a.m. Whoever was calling had better have his or her will up to date, House decided.

He fumbled a couple of times with the phone that sat next to the alarm clock before getting a hold on it and answering.

"What?!" House nearly shouted into the mouthpiece.

"House," an all too familiar voice responded immediately, unphased by the rude answer. "We have a case. You need to get down to the hospital a.s.a.p."

Foreman, House groaned to himself, his favorite person in the whole world. He made a note to himself to put laxative in the African-American doctor's coffee when he wasn't looking.

"You've forgotten that I'm back in charge," House accused sarcastically, rubbing one of his eyes with his free hand. "I decide whether we have a case or not and I say we have no cases before nine—no, make that ten—a.m. Don't wake me again."

His thumb was about to press the End button when another familiar voice, female this time, sounded in his ear.

"You've forgotten that I'm in charge of you, House!" Dr. Lisa Cuddy, Dean of Medicine at Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital where he worked, told him firmly in her most authoritarian voice.

House sighed in frustration. She was one of the last people he wanted to talk to these days and especially not so early in the morning.

"I see you've decided to go ahead with the sex reassignment program, Foreman," he replied drolly. "I think you need to up the estrogen."

"This is not a joke," Cuddy responded mirthlessly. "I expect you here in thirty minutes!"

"Let me guess, Cuddles," House sneered, "The patient just happens to be Chairman of the Hospital board."

"No," was the cold reply. "His son." He heard the connection end abruptly as she hung up on him.

"Of course," he muttered to himself in disgust. The son of god. Well, he for one wasn't about to bow to the influence of the almighty dollar—especially when it didn't mean that any more of it would find its way into his bank account. The kid could wait just like everyone else. The fact that his disobedience would get underneath Cuddy's craw had absolutely nothing to do with his decision, either.

House slammed the cell phone back down on the night table and laid his head down on the pillow. He pulled the covers up around his shoulders again and tucked them under his chin. Wilson insisted on keeping his place irritatingly cold overnight. House had moved his bed closer to the heat register but it didn't help. Returning to the fetal position, he tried to go back to sleep. Just as he dozed off again, his cell phone rang again.

Growling angrily, he sat up in bed and picked up the phone.

"Get lost!" House hissed into the phone and hung up right away. He threw it at the far wall but miscalculated. It went flying towards the door just as it opened and his best friend's head poked into the room. The cell slammed him directly in the middle of the forehead. It couldn't have been a better hit if he had meant to do it.

Dr. James Wilson yelped from both surprise and pain as the cell clattered to the floor.

"--What the hell?!" Wilson shouted, shaking his dark-haired head to dispel the stunning dizziness the phone's impact had caused.

Despite experiencing a twinge of guilt House had to hold back the urge to laugh. He didn't succeed completely as the smirk on his face attested.

"Knock next time," he griped.

Wilson stepped into the room holding a cordless phone receiver. He frowned and shook his head. "I came to tell you that Cuddy's on the phone. She says—"

"I don't care what she says," House cut him off with a sneer. "Tell her to go take her PMS out on Lucas and leave me alone."

"I'm not going to tell her that!" Wilson retorted, tossing the phone to his friend. He rubbed his forehead gingerly. "That's going to leave a bruise." He turned and walked out of the room, shutting the door.

House glared at the phone in his hand for a moment and then tossed it aside on the bed without answering it. He was wide awake now, so there was no point in protesting any longer, but that didn't mean he didn't want to. He'd save his ranting until he could do it face to face with his tormenters. His leg hurt now. He rubbed it gently and then swung both legs over the side of the bed and slowly rose to his feet. Still in his boxers, House grabbed the cane he kept easily within reach and then made his way to the bathroom.

Locking the door behind him, House went to the vanity mirror and looked himself in the face. His closely cropped hair and trimmed moustache and beard were becoming greyer by the day. Should he get some Just for Men? Forget it, he decided. Chicks dug the mature look. It tricked them into believing he actually was mature and responsible—why mess with that? Besides, he was fifty, not twenty-five. Denying that wouldn't change it.

He could hear his mother in the back of his head. You're not getting any younger, Greg. It's time to settle down and start a family before it's too late. She wanted the best for him, he knew. That and she wanted to have a grandchild before she died of old age.

"Sorry, Mom," he said to the mirror grimly. It just wasn't that simple. He was a bastard and he knew it. What woman wanted to settle with a miserable fifty year old recovering opiate-addict with a gimp leg that ran at the hint of emotional intimacy? Cuddy didn't, hence Lucas. His mother's chances of holding a grandchild before dying were slim to none. He didn't even like kids. They were too little and needy—and they scared the hell out of him.

He debated shaving off the beard. He grew it because it had seemed like a good idea at the time and his personal appearance hadn't been foremost on his mind in Mayfield but now he wasn't sure if it didn't make him look too mature. He shrugged, moving away from the mirror. He took a leak and then dropped his boxers and started the water flowing in the tub for a shower. Just before he pulled the valve to divert the water from the tap to the shower head he heard the phone ring again. He yanked the valve and stepped quickly into the very warm spray before Wilson came looking for him again.

After a leisurely shower he wrapped a towel around his waist and returned to the make-shift bedroom Wilson had set up for him after House had moved in following his release from the psychiatric hospital. He took his time dressing, selecting a pair of charcoal twills and a t-shirt that read, "I'm not deaf—I'm ignoring you." It was a nice touch. Cuddy would appreciate it, he knew. Pulling on a pair of sport socks and sneakers his outfit was complete. Now he was ready for breakfast—an omelet, bacon, pancakes with butter and syrup, everything suitable for a fifty year old to be consuming. That is, if he was looking for a heart attack. Oh, well, what the hell? You only live once, right? His life might be a lot shorter than expected by the time Cuddy got hold of him.

He sauntered to the kitchen to find Wilson already there. The coffee was already finished brewing, waiting for him. Who needed a wife when there was Wilson?

"Morning, dear," House quipped as he opened a cabinet door and reached for a mug. "Mmmm, breakfast smells delish!"

"I have your travel mug ready for you," Wilson told him, ignoring the sarcastic greeting. "Grab a whole-grain muffin on your way out."

"What's the rush?" House asked with feigned innocence. "You always complain that we never talk anymore."

Wilson exhaled loudly in exasperation and shook his head. He sat down at the kitchen table with his coffee. "This isn't a joke, House! That kid could be in dire straits."

"He's not," House assured him confidently. He grabbed the filled travel mug off of the counter and joined his friend at the table, hanging his cane on the back of his chair. "If he were, Cuddy would have known better than to admit that he was some hospital big-wig's kid." He grabbed a muffin from the plate sitting in front of him and eyeballed it unenthusiastically. "Don't you eat real food anymore?"

"It is real food," Wilson retorted, undeterred. "Passive-aggressively driving Cuddy crazy isn't going to convince her that you're ready for a stable relationship with her."

"Who says I want a relationship with her?" House took a tentative bite out of the muffin, chewing slowly. He made a face, gulped it down quickly and dropped the rest of the muffin back onto the plate with the rest. "That tastes like dog kibble—and don't ask me how I know that."

"Don't put it back with the others," Wilson protested, "you just had your mouth and hands all over it."

House rolled his eyes. Wilson could be such a chick sometimes. He stood up and began to rub his hands across the tops of the rest of the muffins on the plate.

"There," he said, "now the others won't feel left out." He grabbed his mug and cane and headed for the exit.

"Great, perfect," Wilson muttered in disgust, first nodding and then shaking his head. He was not surprised in the least. He followed House to the door. "You're just going to quit and hand Cuddy over without a fight?"

House was growing very irritated with their entire conversation. Every time he tried to retreat into the comfortable familiarity of denial, Wilson felt compelled to try to prevent him. He grabbed his leather jacket from the coat stand near the door and shrugged it on. Juggling his travel mug and cane, he grabbed his motorcycle helmet as well.

"You can't quit something that fizzled out before it even began," House retorted. He opened the door. "Stop worrying about my non-existent relationships and start focusing on getting a life of your own. Amber has been gone for over a year and a half now and you're still living like a monk. We both know that she wouldn't have wanted that."

When Wilson didn't respond, House made his quick escape, shutting the door behind him.