Disclaimer: I do not own House, or the characters in it. However, some of the characters in this series are my own creations.

Summary: What ever happens to the patients after House and his team diagnose them?


Breath in...Breath out...Emmy thought to herself. She was running. Again. She knew it was stupid to run two miles when she had recently cut her meals in half, but she was bored. Running took her mind off things. Besides, she had someone that she needed to see.

*****

"You have the most beautiful eyes," Marcos Vanuel had the most amazing smile Emmy had seen in a while.

"Thank you," she replied, and averted her eyes. Marcos was a client. And he was very, very overweight. Two hundred and thirteen pounds overweight to be exact. They had met three months after Emmy had been released from the hospital. Emmy originally hadn't had any feelings for Marcos, but he was very persistent. So far, he had followed her instructions to a tee, and had lost fifty one pounds in four months. Marcos had also managed to keep Emmy's spirits high by just listening to her. No one ever listened to her unless she was helping them loose weight, or giving them advice, or dying. But Emmy hadn't been in any real danger of dying for a while.

"Did you run all the way here?" Marcos's voice interrupted her thoughts.

"Uhm, yeah. Yeah, I did." Emmy looked up at his doughy face, "I kind of wanted...well, I wanted...Are you busy?"

Marcos sighed, "Emmy, what's wrong?"

She glanced around nervously. But it was an act. They always pretended that when she had a problem, it was small and she didn't need to talk about it. "I just figured I'd get some exercise, and check up on you."

Marcos smiled again, and Emmy quickly turned to stare around at his apartment. It was nice, and had a cozy feel to it. A small kitchen branched off of the living room, so you could still see the TV when you made food, or ate food, or did the dishes, or whatever else you needed to do in the kitchen. The living room had two small, comfy sofas surrounding a glass coffee table, and a plasma screen TV. The TV was flanked by tall bookcases, filled to the top with books ranging from thick novels, to picture books that Marcos read his daughter, Anna. Anna was staying with her mom at the moment, who had split with Marcos two years ago. Down the hall were two bedrooms, and two bathrooms. It was nice. Much different from Emmy's large, empty house.

"You don't look so good." Marcos reprimanded, still staring at Emmy; almost as if he was scrutinizing her.

"I'm fine." Emmy shook her head. The recent cut in her meals wasn't good for her hereditary coproporphyria, but her butt had been looking bigger. So out went the second pancake, in came the double dosage of pills. Marcos knew. Or at least he thought he knew everything. Emmy had told him about the bypass, the hereditary coproporphyria, and her choice not to get 100% healthy. He understood. Somehow, mystifyingly, he understood. And she understood him. He was fat, obese, disgusting, everything that Emmy had refused to go back to, but he got her. The last few months, she had opened up to him about all of that, but it still wasn't everything.

"I've been thinking," Emmy began, "About when I was hospitalized for...my condition."

"At Princeton?" Marcos inquired.

"Yeah...at Princeton..." if she was going to say it, she might as well get it over with fast, "There was this doctor-"

"-House?" Marcos interrupted, and than quickly added a "sorry."

Emmy frowned. Marcos didn't usually interrupt.

"No. His name was Taub. He used to be a plastic surgeon, and he...thought I made the wrong decision. He and Doctor House thought I was choosing beauty over health."

Marcos raised his eyebrows, "And?" he asked, softly.

"And..." here went nothing, "What do you think? Do you think I made the wrong choice?"

Sighing heavily, Marcos leaned back into his chair, "This Taub guy, he was a plastic surgeon?" Emmy nodded in response, "Then he corrected flaws in people's looks for a living. Where does a guy like that get off telling you what's good for your health and what's good for your beauty?"

Emmy smiled and looked down at the carpet.

"He doesn't." Marcos's voice resonated throughout the small apartment, "Who is he to say that not getting fat again isn't healthy? Has he ever been obese?"

Emmy inhaled sharply at the last word. She hated the word obese. The way it just dripped out of your mouth, almost like it was too big to get out. "No, I don't think so."

Marcos just gazed at her in silence. Emmy sat there, thinking. Marcos hadn't directly answered her question. He had just given her fuel to her thoughts. Was staying skinny another way to stay healthy? The doctors had told her that the pills she was taking for her hereditary coproporphyria should give her about the same lifespan as she would have if she was pigging out. But could she sooner die of a medical complication because of her weight if she did eat the high glucose diet? She had thought over these questions a hundred times in the last seven months, but had never come up with an answer.

"Thanks." she said to Marcos, who just waved to her on her way out.

*****

Dear Doctor Taub,

I'm writing to inform you that I have been doing fine.

My hereditary coproporphyria has been perfectly

controlled with the pills you gave me a while ago. I

don't know that you'll even remember me, or if you

are even still a doctor, or if you even still use this

e-mail address, but it's the one that you gave me

seven months ago when you were diagnosing me.

You gave me the e-mail address and told me to e-mail

or call you if the drugs had any side-effects or didn't seem

to be doing their job. They are. I'm still a skinny,

rich, fitness adviser, and I'm still alive. I'm happy

with the decision I made.

-Emmy Harding.

P.S.- I had cake for breakfast yesterday (it was

chocolate).

It had taken Emmy seven months to admit how she really felt, seven minutes to write it, and seven seconds to delete it without sending it.

*****

The next morning, Emmy woke up, got dressed, and walked into her kitchen. On her answering machine, there were two messages from Marcos asking if she was all right. Emmy knew that she should call him back, but instead she went out for a run. Without eating breakfast.


Because most of House's patients DON'T have a happy ending.

Feedback is always welcome, and I'm open to requests if you had a favorite patient from past seasons on House, and want to hear what happened to them.