Wilson didn't know how it had happened.
He didn't even know when.
It was just, one day things were normal, and House made one of his completely regular sarcastic remarks playing off the intermittent rumor that they were together: "C'mon, sweetums, we've got a date with some Chinese food," on the way home for the day, and Wilson realized that, when House called him that, it made him... happy. It didn't even matter that House was just being his usual self, poking others' buttons, practically shouting the sentence across the clinic for the nurses' benefit. Wilson was warmed by the word 'date' even associated with him spending time with House.
And that was wrong.
He studied their interactions over the next few days, to see if maybe it was just a fluke, but no. Their hands brushed as House handed him a beer, and Wilson's heart skipped a beat. House actually smiled and Wilson had trouble wiping his own smile off his face for over an hour. House's limp was particularly bad, and Wilson had to fight off the urge to order House to sit down and stay there. House downed two more Vicodin and Wilson wanted to do something remarkably drastic, like check his best friend into a rehab clinic just so he'd learn to function in a way that didn't half kill him.
It was official. James Wilson had a crush on House.
In a way, it almost made sense. Not only was House Wilson's only close friend, but he was a lot of what Wilson wanted in a woman: someone who needed him, someone who made him feel funny, someone who enjoyed spending time with him, depended on him... If it wasn't for the fact that House was a guy, Wilson wouldn't even have been surprised.
For a while, things went on like normal. The fact that this had developed so slowly, grown into their friendship like the cancer Wilson spent his life treating without being noticed, meant that he could act like nothing had changed. Because nothing had, to tell the truth. Now he just knew what was going on. And it wasn't like he wanted to do anything about it, really. Sure, once in a while he wanted to run his hands across House's stubble, or press their knees together across the lunch table, or hold House's hand and keep it, but mostly he was content. He was the most important person in House's life, and House was the most important person in his. They had more than enough alone time to satisfy Wilson's slightly jealous needs.
And it wasn't like he wanted anything sexual. Whatever was going on between his emotions and House, it was not at all physical. Everything he needed in that regard was still purely focused on women: soft curves, big eyes, sweet smiles, people who actually took time to look nice...
Yes, he could be content living around this new development.
He wasn't going to tell House, of course. Not that House would really have a problem if he did - the man would probably just pause to fit the new information in his brain, then move on. Wilson bet the only difference would be that there would be even more jokes about them being a couple. The teasing was part of the reason he wasn't going to say anything. But besides that, he was fairly happy with the way things were, and he though House was... satisfied (not happy, House wasn't ever really happy anymore), too. He didn't need to go shaking up the one steady point in both their lives.
Plus, on the minuscule hope that Wilson couldn't quite squash that House felt the same way, it would ruin things. Neither of them were good at long term relationships. House was too much like sandpaper, and while Wilson could take that in a friend, he already knew it would be a horrible quality in a lover (look what happened to Stacy). And Wilson... well, he'd yet to go more than a year being faithful to one person. And that would kill house. Even if he didn't cheat, they'd both spend all their time waiting for it to happen. It would drive them apart.
Which is why it would never have a chance to happen.
Although, if he was completely honest, he was a bit miffed that House hadn't noticed. Really, what kind of best friend couldn't tell when things shifted from friendship to something extra?
Everything would have been fine if Wilson hadn't started having fantasies. It was a normal lunch break, House leaned over to steal his chips, Wilson slapped his hand over the bag in time to save them (for once), he popped one into his mouth-
and was suddenly whisked away into a very embarrassing and private movie in which House leaned further over the table to take the chip in question by force, using his tongue to do so in very creative ways.
House drew him out of it with one of the least sexy comments Wilson had ever heard, and he hid his flushed face with a jumbo coffee until he thought he could look his best friend in the eye again. Of course, when he did, his mind rushed straight back to the image it had just played out in such glorious detail, and he had to excuse himself from lunch early before he really made a fool of himself.
But it didn't stop there. Wilson found himself lying in bed at night, imagining House there next to him; House's lips against his; House on top of him; House (goddamnit) underneath him; House exposed; House his-
It was a problem, and it was ridiculous. The man wasn't even attractive, for goodness sakes! He looked a good decade older than he was, he was skinny and gimpy and his hair and beard were a mess, and he had these gorgeous blue eyes, and the limp was really kind of endearing, and-
And he stopped himself there, before his mind brought him somewhere he'd regret.
Wilson knew, courtesy of a particularly adventurous and headstrong college girlfriend, that he had no problem, and kind of even enjoyed, both kinds of anal sex. However, he didn't like penises - never had, would have said never would if it wasn't for the fact that he found his eyes drifting down to House's groin and wondering just what was down there.
The worst part, at the moment, was that there was nobody he could talk to about it. Even if he hadn't been feeling like this about House, his friend wasn't exactly the kind of person to talk about feelings and bond. And... there wasn't anybody else.
Which was really sad, now that he thought about it. Sure, he had plenty of friends, but none of them were close. It was hard to have close friends and still be friends with House.
He refused to get the least bit excited at the possibility that House had driven away his other friends so it would be just the two of them. That was nothing to be happy about. Nothing at all. In fact, it was a hallmark of an abusive relationship, which explained more than it didn't.
Wilson wondered if what he was going through was some weird sort of Stockholm Syndrome. He'd become so used to it just being him and House, to all his other relationships being weak and superficial, or falling apart, to being there to pick up House's pieces every time the other man fell apart, that somewhere in his subconscious he'd decided that was all that there was, all that was important, and in order to make the best of it, he'd just flicked a switch in his brain so the situation made him happy.
It was possible.
Unlikely, but possible.
He thought there was a time he'd been normal, once, in the days before House. Once upon a time he hadn't worried about his psychology rewriting itself to turn him into something other than a very straight skirt-chaser. He'd had friends.
But to be honest, none of them were... worth it. There was a reason that he'd fallen out of touch with his old friends, and it wasn't House.
He was hopeless, that's all it was.
And he'd just have to live with it.