Disclaimer: I don't own the characters, only the ideas…
Chapter one – On the road
"Remind me again why you are in my car," Wilson turned of the radio for what seemed like the tenth or twelfth time. They were on the road and Wilson was driving. He had been driving for several hours already, and they were both getting restless. For the past five minutes, House had been turning the radio on some kind of hip hop station and maximising the volume, just to annoy Wilson. No matter how many times the oncologist turned off the radio, House just turned it on again. I was like travelling with a toddler.
"What?" House yelled as he pushed play again.
"House!" Wilson turned off the radio once more, and in doing so got distracted for a moment and almost drove the car off the road.
"Fine, I'm here cause my best buddy needed me and I just love to see his smile," House finally answered the question, an unmistakable note of sarcasm on his voice.
"Of course," Wilson said, ironically. He had actually been thinking that House's purpose was to make him miserable, and the diagnostician was being quite successful at that, "you must have missed the part where I did't actually ask you to come."
"Do you know what do we need?" House interrupted him, paying no attention to Wilson's words, "We need a travelling song!"
"In fact, I remember anticipating the fact that you'd want to join me against my wishes and cleverly lying about the day I would leave."
"I'm thinking 'Row, row, row your boat,'" House continued to ignore Wilson. "What do you think? Of course, it would be a lot better if we were actually on a boat… Think we can abandon your car and find a boat somewhere?"
"You know, incessant pestering might not be the wisest way to treat the guy who prescribes your Vicodin," Wilson pointed out, ignoring House's ramblings about a travelling song. He was definitely not in the mood.
"Would you withhold pain medicine from a pain patient?" House asked theatrically, and when Wilson mumbled something about him being an addict, House added: "Luckily for me I am also the guy who stores for the rainy days. I can annoy you as much as I want because I happen to have enough Vicodin to last for this trip even if I swallow a bottle a day."
Wilson sighed.
"That's about right, isn't it?" Wilson said bitterly.
"Tomayto, tomahto."House threw a tin can out of the window. "You aren't going to lecture me on my drug abuse again, are you?"
"Did you just through a tin can out the window?"
"Nope," House lied transparently.
"I could be fined for that!"
"Oh I'm sure the boy wonder oncologist of Princeton Plainboro can spare a few hundred dollars."
"House, I'm going to-" But whatever empty threat Wilson intended to use, they would never learn. He was interrupted by the car making an unusual noise. "Uh oh."
"What?" House asked.
"I think we're out of gas..." Wilson's eyes were locked on the fuel gauge. The car was gasping for gas now and Wilson pulled over.
They looked at each other for a moment.
"Well if you think I can walk the rest of the way-" House started.
"What are you talking about? Just get the fuel so we can fill the gas tank.
"What fuel?"
Wilson looked at House for a moment. When he spoke next the oncologist was spelling every sillabe.
"The fuel I told you to get when went to the bathroom at that first gas station."
"Oh," House seemed surprised, "you see, when you said 'fuel' I thought you meant whisky," he lifted a rack of bottles on the back seat.
"House!" Wilson became livid, "did you spend my money on alcohol?"
"How would I know that when you said fuel, you meant 'gas'?"
"House, just-" It was so much like House to do something like that, so irresponsible,-
"What kind of moron leaves for a road trip without enough gas, anyway?"
"I assumed you would have bought the gas when I told you to!"
"What's that they say? 'When you assume, you make an ass out of -"
"House, shut up!"
Wilson looked away from the diagnostician. He had no idea what they were going to do. Not that they had much choice. The oncologist ran his fingers through his hair. Then he picked up the map in the glove compartment.
"The next gas station isn't that far away. I suppose we could lock up the car and walk there and back to get some- OUCH!" House hit him hard on the leg with his wooden cane. Wilson almost tore the map apart. "What was that for?"
"It was to remind you that you brought the cripple along!" House swallowed a couple of Vicodin pills. "No way am I walking three miles with this." He shook the cane.
Wilson sighed
"This is a very bad day."
"Are you sure you don't want a travelling song now?"
"House!"
"Oh, don't worry, Wilson! I'm sure mommy and daddy will understand if we explain what happen. Although, daddy will be disappointed when he finds out that his boy-wonder didn't check the gas tank."
Wilson tried to remain calm. He wasn't sure his parents would understand his delay. He hadn't even tell them why he was coming. Since his brother Daniel had reappeared, Wilson had postponed the task of telling his family what about it. He just didn't want to do it on the phone. The plan was to stay at his parents' house for the weekend and casually bring the topic up during lunch. I might not seem like a very good plan but it was all he had.
Wilson had no idea why House had offered to accompany him. It was probably just a chance to annoy him, too good a chance to pass up. He had to admit that House's playful attitude was distracting him from his own nervousness about meeting his family, but it was hard to welcome the diagnostician when that same attitude was responsible for them being stranded on the road now.
He must have been lost in his own thoughts for longer than he realised, because House pulled him back to reality by getting out of the car and slamming the door.
"House, what are you doing?"
"Well, we can't sit here all day," he said, popping a couple more pills and looking at Wilson, "get out of the car, let's go to the gas station."
"House? Get back here!" Wilson got out of the car. He was more than aware that House's leg couldn't take the long walk to the station, no matter how many pills he had in his jacket.
"Don't be such a mother-hen, Wilson," House yelled while the oncologist locked the car, "come on, we can't sit here all day."
"House, what do you think you are doing? You can't walk to the station."
"Sure I can! See? Walking," he said as he took a few more steps, trying not to reach for the painful spot on his right leg, "unless you think we can call Cuddy and ask her to brink more gas from Princeton?"
"Or, we wait here until someone passes by and gives us a ride," Wilson suggested.
House shrugged.
"That might work," House said, and as he walked back to seat on the hood of the car, next to Wilson.
"Now I guess we wait." Wilson said, looking at the road, but there as no sign of any in coming cars.
"Luckily I have just what we need for this situation," House said, pulling a flask from the internal pocket of his jacket. "Martini," he said, drinking a sip from the flask and extending his hand to pass it to Wilson.
"I'm driving," Wilson mumbled.
"Really?" House asked, sarcastically, "because it doesn't look like that car is moving."
"House..."
"Look, unless you think we can fill the tank with this thing,-" House started, "Is your car one of those that also runs on alcohol?"
"No," Wilson mumbled, quietly.
House tried to pass him the flask again, making his best impression of puppy dog eyes.
Wilson sighed. Then he reached for the internal pocket of his own jacket, pulled out a flask of his own, took out the lid and clinked his flask with House's as if it was a toast before taking a sip of its contents.
House's smile widened the way it only did when Wilson surprised.
"You know, Wilson, this could actually shape up to be a great road trip."
AN: I wrote this a long time ago, and I am not sure I had posted it at the time... Now I am re-writting it though. Hopefully I managed to keep House and Wilson in characters. I think this will be a short multi chapter, about 5 chapters long. I have a few more ideas for House MD stories, I should be posting them soon... Please Review.