Two Man Job
"We're going to have to keep a very close eye on him from now on." Lisa Cuddy sighed sadly as she watched Doctor James Wilson close the passenger side door of his car on the slightly older Diagnostician. House had spent several weeks in the hospital after the infarction, and after many long hours of painful rehabilitation and physiotherapy he'd finally been discharged. He still wasn't going home yet however, as if to add to the burden of the crippling physical pain which the middle aged doctor would now have to learn to put up with for the rest of his life, and would therefore have to learn to cope with if he was to keep what was left of his severely mangled leg, his wife Stacy had finally left him only a few days before his scheduled release from the hospital. Unable to cope with the dramatic change in her husband over the previous few weeks since the full scale of his pain had finally started to take its toll, and Greg's seeming inability to be able to completely forgive her for consenting to a surgery he had himself refused their seemingly previously stable relationship had finally crumbled under the strain, never to be reconciled. As a result House was going home with Wilson for the time being, at least until he was back on his feet again, both physically and metaphorically.
Wilson sighed sadly. "It's going to be hard for him. He's going to be in constant pain for the rest of his life, and I don't think it's completely sunk in yet that Stacy's left him, he still seems to be under the impression that she's coming back."
Lisa Cuddy sighed. "Is there no chance of a reconciliation do you think?" She asked, but Doctor James Wilson folded his arms against his chest to shield himself from the cold rain which had suddenly started to drip half-heartedly from the darkened and swollen skies above them, and shook his head.
"She said that too much had changed." He explained to her sadly. "That there was too much bad water between them under the bridge. She said that Greg had changed in such a short space of time, and that she didn't know whether she could ever bring herself to love the man he was becoming." He looked down through the passenger side window at his best friend as he said this, and Cuddy followed his gaze to see House curled up, hospital blanket pulled up tightly around him, left side pushed deep into his seat, and eyes closed. He was still on sedatives and a variety of some pretty strong pain medications to help try and dull the pain he was in, and she couldn't help but feel the heat swell inside of her.
"Well of course he's changed." She exclaimed angrily with this. "He's coming to terms with the fact that he's now going to be crippled for the rest of his life, not to mention the fact that he's going to have to endure more pain on a daily basis than any of us can possibly imagine. It's going to be hard for all of us to have to stand by and watch him go through that. It doesn't give her the excuse to abandon him when he needs her the most… I just don't know why he just wouldn't consent to them to amputate the leg." She sighed.
James Wilson forced a meek smile as she said this, he knew his best friend better than any of them, but even he was going to have to take the time to get to know this new man that Gregory House was now slowly becoming over the next few weeks and months. Cuddy could only hope that unlike Greg and Stacy's marriage the pairs close friendship could survive House's recovery, and the inevitable change in them all which would ensue.
"You know House." He smiled. "He's stubborn. I do believe he would have died before he'd have consented to that. At least this way we still have him with us, and he has still retained at least some function in his leg. He can still walk. He still has his independence."
"He's always going to be somewhat dependent upon us all, and the pain medication for the rest of his life now though." She sighed.
"And you know Greg." Wilson forced a smile. "Looking after him is going to be at least a two man job; do you think you're up to it?"
Lisa Cuddy looked back at the young man with the liquid brown eyes staring back at her, casting one last look at her Diagnostician and friend through the rain streaked window of James Wilson's car, and nodded. "I'll wait a few more weeks before weaning him off the morphine," she explained, "let him build up a stronger tolerance to the pain before starting him on a more permanent pain management plan."
House shifted uncomfortably in his seat with this however, and slowly opened his eyes to stare back out at the two of them tiredly.
"I'd better go." Wilson smiled meekly, before wrapping Cuddy in a loose embrace and placing a gentle and friendly kiss on the side of her cheek as she nodded, silent tears glistening in her dark eyes, but they went unobserved. "We shouldn't really leave him to sit in that same position for too long, his leg will cramp up."
Cuddy nodded in agreement with this as Wilson let go of her gently, and as the young Oncologist made his way around the back to the driver's side of his car she turned to wave goodbye to House, but the middle aged man's eyes had eventually closed again as the sleep he'd been fighting finally threatened to take hold.
"Look after him Wilson." She spoke gently as she followed her friend, and the young doctor wound down his window as he took his place in the driver's seat of his car and clipped his belt into place before looking back up at her rain soaked face.
"Of course I will." He smiled reassuringly. "I promise. I'll call you." And with that Doctor Lisa Cuddy watched her two close friends Doctor Gregory House and Doctor James Wilson drive off into the distance, before finally allowing her own tears to flow.