Evensong
A/N: This is the first fic I've written for House, and it just came out of nowhere, really. I was listening to classical music on the radio and they played Allegri's Miserere, which is an a capella piece for a quoir. It made me think about how House might react if he heard it being performed.
Disclaimer: I do not own Gregory House. Unfortunately.
House never goes to church. As he takes great delight in telling everyone who shows the slightest religious inclination, he doesn't believe in anything. According to the gospel of Gregory House, faith is for fools.
One thing that House does believe in, however, is the influence of music on the human mind. One warm evening, while he is limping doggedly through town in search of a bar, he passes a church. The doors are wide open and the choir is practising inside. The soaring notes spill into the balmy air outside, catching House's attention. In spite of his better judgement he finds himself drawn inside the church; as a musician he is intrigued by what he hears.
He sits in a pew a few rows from the back, fascinated by the performance. The high notes of the soprano pierce him through and through, sublimely. What is this piece? He catches a few words of the Latin. He remembers now, many years ago he heard this hymn sung at an Easter mass that a Catholic girlfriend had dragged him to. She's long gone, like a lot of the other people who used to be in his life, but he has never quite forgotten the singing he heard that day.
He doesn't believe in the sentiments of the song, of course, yet he closes his eyes and listens anyway. He appreciates the rise and fall of the notes, the singers' subtle harmonies, the complex pattern of the arrangement. He finds himself unexpectedly filled with a feeling he barely recognises. Could it be joy? He's really not sure.
All he knows is that for a rare moment he feels at peace with himself. For a rare moment, as he lets the choir's music drift over him, Gregory House almost wishes that he did believe in something.