When Wilson gets sick, House has to figure out what's wrong, fix his medical problem, and then kill him. Only the first chapter is a medical mystery, and then after that, it will be a very different story. Warnings for House/Wilson slash, AU, OOC, mentions of child abuse, curse words, etc. Similar to many of my other fics.
"You can spend your
whole life working' for something
Just to have it taken
away.
People walk around pushing back their debts,
Wearing pay
checks like necklaces and bracelets,
Talking 'bout nothing, not
thinking 'bout death,
Every little heartbeat, every little
breath.
People walk a tight rope on a razors edge
Carrying
their hurt and hatred and weapons,
It could be a bomb or a
bullet or a pen
Or a thought or a word or a sentence," Brett
Dennen
"What suicidal moron paged me during General Hospital?" House shouted, upon entering his office, although by this point virtually every one in the hospital (everyone he spoke to anyway) knew he recorded it on the DVR at his apartment.
"House, I think you should sit down," Dr. Cuddy explained, placing her hand on his shoulder, gently. He had absolutely no idea what was happening and so Greg did what he always did in that kind of situation. He made a sex joke.
"What, you taking stripper classes again? I guess I'm in the mood for a lap dance, although I might need a couple extra Vicodin. Oh, come on, that was funny for just making up with it on the spot. Why are you looking at me like that?"
"You have a patient, a new diagnostics case," she tried to explain.
"That's funny; I don't remember accepting one, which is really the only way that I would ever end up with a patient."
"It's Wilson…"
"Well then I defiantly don't want it. Wilson's patients are all boring. I already resurrected that little cancer girl. What more does he want from me? I'm not gonna play pin the tumor on the idiot." He chuckled; although she had a feeling it was nervous laughter more than because he thought it was funny.
"No, Wilson is sick. He's the patient." House tried to listen as Cuddy listed his symptoms, but all he could think about was the last time the two of them had spoken to each other. The previous night the two men had spent their time sitting on the couch, watching his soap from earlier that day.
"I'd watch at work, but there are too many annoying sick people keep getting in the way of me being able to do that," he explained.
"Sick people in a hospital, eh?" James said sarcastically. "Well, they sure have a lot of nerve, expecting a doctor take care of them." They both laughed, sitting on the couch, two sets of feet propped up on the coffee table beside each other.
"Well it wouldn't be so bad if the cases weren't all so boring. My kid's nose won't stop running, he needs antibiotics. I'm tired all the time, I've got a rash on my wee-wee, my five year old is having seizures…although that one turned out to be mildly entertaining. Mother noticed her little girl was rocking, grunting, and getting all sweaty. Plus her stomach muscles got all dystonic…oh and it only happened when she was in her car seat."
"I thought you wanted to watch your show."
"I can do both at once. Any way, mother comes in, tells me she thinks that little-uh—Emily or something, has epilepsy. Only problem was, mom was an idiot. Kid was ya ya ing the sisterhood."
"Was she?" Wilson paused, unsure as if to continue. Sometimes little kids do those things. It's not the only indicator of abuse, and he really didn't want to get into that conversation anyway. Plus, House tends to have a sixth sense when it comes to those things, Wilson though, usually. "What did you tell her mom?"
"Shut up and watch the show," Greg told him, tossing popcorn in his face. "How the Hell am I supposed to spend whole day treating runny noses and pulled muscles? It's boring!"
"Cuddy's not gonna give you a real case until you hire a new team."
"That'll be the day. I'd rather do rectals and disimpactions for the rest of my life than spend a month interviewing baby-docs who know nothing about nothing." House turned back to the TV then, and the conversation was over, just like that. "Did his tox screen come back yet?" House asked, searching through his mind to try and remember if he had noticed anything. He did sneeze last night, but it—he didn't seem sick! "Well, did it?" The dr. squeezed his eyes shut, shouting.
"There didn't seem to be anything unusual, nothing that would explain why he hasn't regained consciousness yet. Everything was normal. His blood work looked okay too."
"That's fantastic! Hew must be all better, then. Give me the damn file. Don't summarize unless you want to kill him. In which case, I know a guy." Unfortunately, Cuddy was right. There was nothing in the tests that would explain what was happening to his friend. "I need more information," he announced after reading everything in James Wilson's medical history three times. "And call his parents. IF he gets worse, they're gonna wanna come be with him."
"What makes you think he's going to get worse?" Dr. Robert Chase asked, stepping into his old office. He was followed by Drs. Cameron and Forman. "Cuddy called us," he explained before House could say, what the Hell are you doing here?
"Because if he was going to get better, he'd be talking to us or at the very least conscious by now, and she wouldn't have called you guys." Cameron watched as her former boss stood up, limping towards the door. "I'm going to check out his place, for toxins and whatever," he explained.
"Should he even be on this case?" Foreman asked, once the door closed. "The two of them are practically living together. Everyone knows about their—relationship. He can't treat Wilson any more than he could treat his own parents."
"If he doesn't do this and Wilson dies, he'll never forgive himself. Then the two of them will be able to share a coffin. Besides, no one has any idea what's killing this guy. If somebody will find an answer, it's gonna be House," Cuddy answered, still standing behind the brilliant doctor's desk.
"Probably a bit premature to be ordering caskets just yet," he announced, popping back into his office, and successfully scaring the daylights out of everyone. "Just thought of something. We should get his childhood records. Wilson's got some pretty serious scars, and if nothing in the file explains what's happening, I'll be able to freak him out when he wakes up," Then, just as abruptly as he arrived he was gone again.
"I'm coming with you," Cameron said, following him, then reaching out to touch his hand. "Are you sure you should be doing this?" House couldn't help but wondering why she was behaving this way. Yes his former employee was nice to everyone, and tried to take care of as many people as possible, but she also quit. He knew better than to ask if she was coming back, but wondered all the same. "I—he's your friend, no doctor can be expected to treat a patient they are that close to."
"Who the Hell is gonna fix Jimmy if I don't?" he shouted. "You know what's wrong with him? You know what to search for, what could cause his symptoms? Or do you need me to tell you what's relevant and what doesn't mean Jack shit?" Cameron sighed, and started to riffle through one of Wilson's dresser drawers.
"There's a bottle of pills in here—Valium. It's not even prescribed to him. The name is James, Stewart. What the heck—where—who? I, what if he took a whole bunch of these? That could cause…" House took the pills away from here, and looked at them.
"Don't be stupid, First off, they tested him for Benzos, it's part of a standard tox screen. Second, he just refilled this last week. 30 pills, only six missing. Even if Jimmy swallowed all of them at once, it wouldn't do more than make him sleep all day. This is something else. I don't—but why would he be taking them? Did something—nevermind. I can ask him about it later." There was nothing in his voice to suggest that Dr. House believed his friend wouldn't wake u. The idea was simply too difficult for him to face. "Did you talk to his folks yet?"
"I spoke to his mother, but his dad's driving to some sort of business trip, and he hasn't called me back yet I gave a message to his mom though. She had no idea—she said no one had ever been sick like this before." House wanted to scream, how the Hell would she know;' she hasn't even seen him yet. She has no idea what this is; I don't know what this is. He touched his beard, then looked at the floor. "We have to consider the possibility that Wilson was hiding things from you, like a health problem. He went to a different hospital; saw a doctor that wasn't you—I assume you two usually take care of each other."
"I'm not answering stupid questions like that, but yeah, if he needs a script, which he never does, he usually comes to me, except last year when he got anti-depressants, and this. He once had an ear infection though, and asked for my help…"
"He went to a doctor that wasn't you, for something you would have given him if he'd asked. He made up a name all to get drugs. Was he behaving unusually the last few weeks? How the Hell should I know?
"I'm not really sure. He seemed…quiet, but I talk a lot. Quiet is sort of normal for him. He—um. He—you didn't talk to his dad?"
"I told you, his mom is calling back with his cell phone number, or making him call me. Apparently he just got it, and doesn't know the number."
"I've gotta call the jackass that was giving Jimmy these pills…fi you went into a doctor's office calling yourself Maralyin Monroe, no one would take you seriouslky. This guy just doesn't care." Cameron nodded, patting his shoulder once more, searching the remainder of the apartment while listening to her old boss yell at Wilson's other doctor on the phone.
"I need to speak to you aobut one of your paitents…James Stewart, the actor…yeah, he did die, but you're still giving him meds for some reason…I know you can't give out that information…No…would you listen to me? His real name is James Wilson. He's a doctor, and he's in a coma right now…I've got the damn prescription bottle right now, in front of me! I will not calm down, your paitent is dying and I don't know why. You can help me; why is he talking valium? I'm double board certified, you idiot, I already know that. Why are you giving my spesfific paitent tranqulizers? But why was he having panic attacks? I can't send a signed conset form, he's going to be dead in less than 24 hours!" At this point the phone conversation ended, but not because House wanted it to. Alison hung it up for him.
"You were getting nowhere, and like you said, it's not those pills. There's nothing here that will help us help him. It's time to back to the hospital. Maybe there's something in Wilson's records that will tell us—"
"Go away." House only whispered the words, but anyone could hear and understand his meaning. "I need to think, and I've got to be alone for that." Once she was gone, he sat down on the floor under his bedroom window. "I don't know how this thing works, mainly because I don't believe in it, but Wilson does, and if this was me who got sick, he'd be asking whoever for help. There's a problem and I can't see it, because Jimmy's the one who's sick, and we're closer than I've been to anybody, ever. Everyone's right about this. I am too close to this, but I'm the only person—the only doctor who can help him. I just need to figure out what's wrong with him. I can't see it. I need to know more." House slowly stood up, and staggered towards the door, heading for the hospital. Once in his office, he tossed his ball at the window, watched it bounce, picked it up, put it down, paced back and forth, and then, as if struck by a brilliant idea, headed for the door.
"Where are you going?" Cameron asked, reaching out to touch his hand again.
"I'm gonna speak to my paitent."
"He's in a coma," Foreman called out, as the door was slammed in their faces. House couldn't help but notice how pathetic James looked, lying in that hospital bed, all laid out, paper gown and scratchy blanket barely covering up his body.
"Wow, you look like crap. Come on, Jimmy, what the Hell? You can't die, who's gonna give my pills?" House had hopped that seeing his friend in person would some how give him a clue as to what was wrong. He thought he might see something. No, you thought he'd be in here, awake, and ready to tell you it was all a mix up, the logical part of his rain argued. "Shut up," he ordered. "Or at least think of something useful. I hate you!" he shouted, when ten minutes went by without a sound save for the ever present beep of the stat monitor and the hum of the fluorescent lights. "What's wrong with him? Why won't you tell me?"
Cuddy and Cameron stood in the hallway, each one eyeing the other as if psychically arguing over which one was more fit to go in and try to comfort House. Sure, he and Lisa had a long history and he knew certain things about her that no one else ever would, but this was Alison's thing. She was sweet, and kind, and cared about everything and everyone until her eyeballs popped out. Cuddy, on the other hand, came off as more of an authority figure, and while she could be nice and gentle, she mostly came off as strict, cold, and distant.
"Maybe we should both go in," the younger doctor explained, already stepping towards the door. "But try and pretended like we're here for Wilson or something. Otherwise, he won't let us near him."
"He won't let either of you anywhere near him unless you both lose the tops. Bras are optional, but I was always very supportive of those girls—women—in college who used to burn the darn things."
"You were in there yelling at an unconscious paitent," Cuddy said, as if it needed to be brought up.
"Technically I was yelling at my self. Had I known you two, his doctors, were standing out here not doing anything, I probably would have been a bit quieter."
"We called his old pediatrician's office, but the files aren't on computer, so someone's gotta go dig through the basement files to find it," Cameron explained, gently. "I finally spoke to his father. He says he has a meeting in the morning."
"What'd you do, sugarcoat his condition, tell him son isn't dying of a mysterious illness and nobody has any idea why?" House asked, suspiciously. She just sighed. "Wow, even my dad called when I was sick. They didn't come, but then again I didn't call them until after my surgery. Forget it…Are you sure he understood you?"
"You're gonna call him yourself no matter what I say, but yes. I told him that you were on the case, and that you were the best, but it could be—that he still might not survive. I told them he could die, and repeated it when his dad told me he still needed to go on that trip."
House's face looked sympathetic for less than thirty seconds. Then all of the sudden, he made that annoying, I'm such a genius expression, and ran back into Wilson's room, and started digging through the bag of his personal belongings.
"What are you doing?" Cuddy cried, then she lowed her voice. "IF you're looking for money, or Vicodin, I'll give it to you. Wilson needs rest and peace and quiet right now." Greg wouldn't have appeared more hurt I she had punched him in the crotch.
"I need to talk to Wilson's dad."
"He's already on the road. His mom made a—I don't know the number, I still don't have his—he called me so I don't know how to get a hold of him."
"Jimmy does, he's got it programmed into his cell." Once he found what he was looking for, the doctor limped back to his office, stepped out onto the balcony, locked the door, and jammed a chair under its handle for good measure. Going through his friend's list of numbers it became clear that when they were apart the only non-work related calls Wilson made were to take out and delivery places, and his divorce attorney. Jesus, Jimmy, how screwed up are you? The number he had been looking for passed by twice be fore Dr. House realized that the word Dad was nowhere to be found. Mr. Wilson was listed under his first name, Aaron.
"If you don't explain who you are, and why you are using my son's phone, I'm going to hang up and call the police," he answered, emotionlessly.
"It's House—err Dr. House. I'm Jimmy's—friend, and I am treating your son, as his doctor. Well, I was until about ten minutes ago, actually." There was no response except for a mildly annoyed grunt. "He's dead, because he killed himself."
"What?" still no concern, worry, or even a hint of anything at all. "Do you know how he did it?"
"The autopsy will tell us."
"Then how can you be sure I was suicide. Maybe he accidentally—whatever."
"You don't accidentally leave a suicide note, or send obituaries out to newspapers all over the country."
"I'm on the highway right now. Unless you need my wife and my signature on the consent forms, Sarah will take care of everything herself."
"He mentioned you in both things." This time House did hear something resembling human emotion in the other man's voice. He listened as tires screeched and the radio was switched off. The gentle purr of the engine remained on, but that was all. Aaron Wilson seemed to be collecting himself.
"I remember you, Greg. James told us a few things himself, over the years since he's known you. He isn't even sick, is he?"
"He will be dead by the time his mother gets here, unless I'm wrong, and this is something other than a suicide attempt."
"So James is still alive?"
"Just barely."
"What do you want from me?" once again, he was angry, but not because he had been told his child was dead when he wasn't. "I don't have time for these games of yours, House."
"What did you do to Jimmy when he was a little boy? Why does he have panic attacks now?"
"I'm hanging up now."
"If the answers were nothing, and I don't know, you would have answered by now. He screams if someone wakes him up by touching his body, anywhere, and cries at night when he thinks no one can hear. Somebody molested him, beat him, ignored him, I dunno what, Listen, I can't tell anybody, dr. paitent confidentiality, but if you did it, I need to know it to save his life."
"If you're so sure of what's wrong, then just fix it." Mr. Wilson hung up and Dr. House had to redial the number four items on the cell, and then a fifth on his office phone before getting an answer.
"I can't just treat him. If I'm wrong, and we give him—whatever, anyway, it will kill him. So, don't say anything except what I need to hear." No response. "You can save him, damnit! All you have to do is say one stupid, fucking little word. I can give him his life back. Just tell me, yes, or no."
"I—"
"If the next word out of your mouth is something that doesn't help me save him, I swear I will spend the rest of my life tracking down every person you have ever met, or had any contact with, and telling them that your son died 'cuz you were too busy to answer one question from his doctor. How do you think that will effect your business? And when they act what that question was…"
"Yes," Aaron said coldly, then hung up again. Dr. House ripped the phone out from the wall, and slammed it down against his desk over and over, breaking it into millions of little pieces. HE would have continued to hit his hands, now scratched up, bleeding, red and raw, until they broke, had Chase not walked in and stopped him. Shortly after he finished getting his hands wrapped up, he started to get mad at the other doctors again.
"I need to see Wilson's medical files."
"They will be faxing them over as quickly as possible, but…"
"No those, you stupid wombat! His paitent files . I need to know who he's seen recently and what he gave them." Chase stared at him oddly for a moment "I won't hit anything except you until after I get them,"
Soon the whole team was back in the office, going through Wilson's recent files, finding absolutely nothing.
"House, it's not here; if you think he overdosed on something, then we should run a more expansive tox panel," Foeman said. "This is illegal and could take forever! He sees at least 25 clinic paitents a day and has almost as many consults and paitents on the ward."
"Jimmy's smart. He didn't just take a while bunch of sleeping pills, It's gotta be something we'd never thing of, chemo drugs, or—I dunno. Do you know how long it would take to test his blood for all of those? Just keep looking for an order that doesn't fit. A paitent he only saw once but wrote a lot of scripts for…" House stood up again, ignoring the aches and protests coming from his overused leg. "I need to see Dr. Wilson's prescriptions," he shouted at the pharmacist three minutes later. "I already told you that four times. Now, which part did you not understand? It's quite simple; how stupid are you?"
"Just as I've already told you, Dr. House, I can't hand over bottles of pills to just anyone, or a list of his paitents. Those things are supposed to be confidential."
"Dr. Wilson is going to die because he wrote a script for someone who didn't come in. He then took those pills, or shot up that liquid, and is now dying! IF I don't find out what he took, he'll be dead and it will be your fault!"
"Just give him the log," Cuddy ordered, stepping out from her office, just in time to prevent one of them from jumping over the barrier and pummeling the other, mainly because she was worried that it wouldn't be House. "He only needs to see which prescriptions Wilson wrote orders for this morning, and he doesn't need the actual medications. Right?"
"Fine, bur hurry up or he's gonna die and it'll be both of your faults!"
"You should probably stop saying that to people," The pharmacist suggested.
"Are you sure about this?" Cuddy sounded as though she wee speaking with a cold, hr nose stuffed up. Her eyes were red-rimmed and wet. "What happened to your hands?" she asked, touching them gently.
"I broke my phone," he explained like it were an everyday occurrence. "I take it his dad called? Did he also tell you he abused Jimmy when he was growing up? Didn't think so. He never said anything to me about his dad. I met them. They all seemed like perfectly ordinary people. I've met them., and I didn't see it. He's my best friend. How could I know what was wrong?" Cuddy was about to say, there was no way you could have. He didn't want you to know, when the pharmacist interrupted them.
"Dr. Wilson only wrote one prescription this morning, for a James Stewart."
"That's at least two idiots who didn't see anything wrong with that. Haven't you seen the giant poster in his office for Vertigo? Staring JAMES STEWART the fucking actor? Idiots!" He screamed. "Every last one of you!"
"Is there anything we can do for him?" Cuddy asked, looking at the log herself. Dr. House didn't hear the rest of the conversation, or any of what Cuddy. Cameron, or Chase said to him in the following hours, as he sat beside his freiend's hospital bed, waiting for him to wake up. He watched as Wilson's mother sat at his bedside, patting her son's hand, touching his hair, kissing his forehead, and praying for his health.
"What?" she asked when she realied he was staring. "It couldn't hurt." She would have stayed at his side all night, but hospital rules dictated that visitors must leave by 9:00 pm. House, who had been practically reduced to a toddler, sat there barely speaking, and not connecting to anyone, until 3:00 am when James Evan Wilson opened his eyes, and watched as the world around him came into focus. He groaned softly when he saw his best friend sitting in a chair at the ednd of his hospital bed.
"Your'e not Hannah Bernstein," he said, voice sounding both tired, and pained. His friend raised a questioning eyebrow. "I had the biggest crush on her in 10th grade. Almost asked her out ounce, but…never had the guts. She died right after graduation, maybe like two years later or something. Went on a cruise for her honeymoon, and fell off the boat in the middle of the night."
"And you thought God would reward you for killing yourself by handing her over?" House wasn't shouting, but he might as well have been, his tone was so cruel. "Speaking of which, who tries to off themselves in a hospital?"
"I guess I wanted you to figure it out more than I wanted to die…" he admitted, looking way, as if there were something very interesting on the wall across from him. "How did you—I…I suppose you searched my hotel room?"
"No we just checked my place. Did find a butt load of Valium prescribed to a dead actor. Can't believe I never noticed that before—or that I didn't see what a jackass your father is."
"So everybody knows then?" Wilson asked, trying to reach out and grab House's hand. He wasn't sure who was more uncomfortable in this particular situation, but it must have been extremely close. "What happened to your hands?"
"I smashed my phone to bits. Cameron called your parents, but only one was willing to come. So I called him on your cell, but he wouldn't answer my questions I yelled at him. He hung up, and I had to call from my office."
"You yelled at my dad?" Wilson looked like he didn't know whether to cry or smile. "Bet he didn't like it, huh?'" House shrugged. "He's not coming here, is he?" Jimmy asked, carefully nervously
"No way, Jose, now either tell me what you did, what you did—today. This has been—this sort of thing…I, we, you never did anything like this before. What made this morning worse than all the others?"
"A paitent died."
"How often does that happen?" he asked, scratching his beard, then starting to stand up and walk away. Wilson grabbed him again. "What mad this paitent different from the others?"
"We have the same first name, and…he didn't die from being sick. He had ALL, but…when he was coming in for treatments, I started to notice bruises, marks, and he freaked out whenever people came close to him. I knew what was happening. HE told me, not in words, I didn't—there was no proof, and no complaint for social services. Then, yesterday, he came in D.O.A. Kid put his father's revolver in his mouth, blew his brains out. He was ten. I just—it was too much," he said, sighing, and then curled up on his side, hugging his knees.
"It's not your fault, Jimmy. People like us, we can see it, when we look at a kid. Her mom yells at her, a lot, is dad is a jerk, but mostly harmless, that lady won't let her son eat, 'cuz she thinks he's fat. This guy is fucking his kid...but we can't explain it. If you haven't been there, you can't always see it. They definitely don't believe us, especially when we haven't got proof."
"I should have told somebody."
"Are we talking about now, or then? Look—I don't know how to talk about stuff like this. That's why I'm so screwed up. I brought you these, dunno if you're allowed to have them, probably on something already, but…"
"You found my pills? Did you find anything else?" House shook his head. "I left you a note, hid it under the mattress, on your side. Guess you didn't look as hard as you thought."
"Cameron did most of the search. I was on the phone with doctor idiot."
"What was she doing in our apartment?"
"I need to hire a new team, but I couldn't do it while you were…Cuddy called her, and Chase, and Foreman in. Not that they did anything," Greg explained, scooting closer to his sick friend on the mattress. Wilson rolled over, and grabbed onto him. "You're gonna be okay, I don't know how, but we'll figure out something."
"How?"
"I just--I'm sorry. We'll see somebody, okay? " Wilson nodded. "Ready for bed?" he asked, laying down, wrapping his arms protectively around the smaller, younger man.
"House?" one voice called out in the darkness.
"Yeah?" a second responded, with a surprising amount of love and compassion. "It's okay Jimmy. This place is pretty safe. And your dad isn't coming, promise."
"Can you turn the light back on? I'm not scared, I just like to be able to see—to see what's going on around me." House flipped the switch beside their hospital bed on, kissing the other man on the forehead.
"You're not gonna do that again, are you?" he asked, trying to sound as if the days events hadn't had any effect on him. "Because I really don't want to have to carry antidotes in my pockets all the time. Between the Vicodin bottles, my wallet, and the magnums, haven't really got much more room."
"Now there's a disgusting image," Jimmy said, and chuckled, "No, I don't think I ever could do that again, even if I did feel like it. Do you think we're gonna be okay? Can you ever trust me again after I lied to you and kept all this stuff from you for so long?"
"Don't be stupid, and stop acting like a chick, or I'll turn the lights off again. Yes, I forgive you. Look, we're gonna be okay—somehow. We'll see somebody, or whatever people do in this situation."
"But you don't believe in psychotherapy."
"You need to talk to somebody, and if having me there makes it go better, I'd sit through an eight-hour-long play every night for you. You're my best friend, and maybe I'm more messed up than I let on."
"Everybody knows that, House."
"But not about you. Even I didn't see it. You keep telling me I need help, and if that's true, then you do too."
"You're gonna do this for me?"
"Go to sleep. It's late."
"Are you?'
"Jimmy, come on."
"Please," he begged, sounding much like a six-year-old child. Wilson's brown eyes were sore, and red-rimmed, plus the front of House's shirt was wet with his tears. "I need to hear you say it, please."
"Yes, Jimmy, Wilson, James—I…what do you want me to call you? Sorry, that was—stupid. I promise. Nothing's gonna change between us, we're just not gonna be in so much pain anymore. We 're not gonna be as scared."
"Okay, then," he whispered, before falling asleep. "I'll do it for you," Dr. House smiled and thought to himself, that's supposed to be my line.
"I'm not gonna go through this whole stupid thing for nothing. I—it better help him, fix him, make him okay. One of has to be, and it's not me. I can't do that. I love him. I never thought this would happen, but I love him." Slowly Gregory House allowed his eyelids to grow heavy, and drift downward. Maybe, he thought, maybe we just might make it.