Author's note: Season 8 was so horrible for me to watch (I know I am not alone) and I haven't rewatched any of it. Despite this, a moment from 8.18 Body and Soul haunts me. It's when Dominika straddles him on the bed and he starts to go for her until the INS calls and she leaves angrily. There is something so… layered about that moment. Of course initially I was like "Dominika, nooooooo!" But there was also this, like, hope for a balm to all this pain he was in, this hope I have always had for House to allow love into his life. But then it was like, "Dominika, nooooooo!" LOL. So I've thought about that moment a lot, where he is needing and lonely and sad and longing, and I felt this intense need to write a fic from that launching point, reinterpreting the moment through my ever-Huddy lens. So I read transcripts of the last episodes (since I still can't watch them without dying small deaths) and this fic is another attempt to reboot the end of the series, keeping much of seasons 6, 7, and 8 the same, but playing with the very end a little and scrambling toward a happier ending.

For the FIRST TIME EVER I am publishing this fic incomplete. I have never done that and am pretty terrified of the experience, but I wanna get this out there and I am not entirely sure of the end yet. I will return to it in large chunks, and it won't be an epic 30-chapter thing or anything, but I thought I'd give this publishing style a try.

Chapter 1

House hit rock bottom when a beautiful woman was straddling his hips. He was lying there wallowing in the shittiness of his day bookended by the shittiness of his life when Dominika came in, with her promises that she could relieve that pain. Promising to make him feel good. Promising to love him. And in that moment, he was seriously considering taking her up on it. He was thinking that if a woman was touching him with affection and tenderness – not just the perfunctory mechanics he occasionally paid for – maybe he could close his eyes and pretend it was several years ago. He could pretend it hadn't all spiraled so out of control. He could pretend he could feel something-close-to-happy again.

He was wrestling with the quandary of whether or not to let himself imagine another woman was making love to him, when the goddamn INS called and even the mirage vaporized as well. So he lay there. Alone. Again.

And that's when he felt the impact of hitting the bottom… Not from waking up in a pile of his own puke. Not from a prison gate clanging shut behind him. Not from alienating, literally, everyone in his life. He realized he was at a new low when he'd been willing to cheapen Cuddy's presence in his heart by pretending another woman was her. His rock bottom was comprised of two unalterable facts he faced at the same precise moment, lying there in that bed listening to the rain. First, he still loved her, her alone, after all this time. Second, he couldn't get near her.

Oh, he'd tried. He'd called her many times since he was released from prison, easily finding her phone number through a series of well-placed calls that described "emergencies" and the "urgent need" to get in touch with her. Each time he'd called, she'd hung up the moment he'd spoken and she'd recognized his voice. He'd gone to her once, waiting outside her workplace until she left at lunch. He'd sidled up next to her and said something he'd thought was clever, yet self-deprecating, but she'd simply stopped walking and squared her shoulders to him when she saw his face. Then she courteously warned him, "You can walk away now. If you don't, and if I see you ever again, I will call the police and you will be arrested for violating a restraining order." He was allowed to look into her luminous gray eyes for five more seconds before she turned and continued walking in the direction she'd started in, leaving him standing on the sidewalk.

He was trying to think of another way to reach out, to get just a few words with her so he could have some hope of… what exactly? Of just something. He needed something that was her. But he knew any letters or emails would be promptly discarded, just as his attempts to reach out had been promptly shut down.

At his worst moments, he'd always wanted Cuddy. He wished he could just tell her how he was feeling at this minute, and ask her to save him, like so many times before. But even if he could connect with her in some way, somehow the explanation still seemed tricky: "Remember that prostitute I married in an adolescent stunt to hurt you? Well, I almost just had sex with her, pretending it was you."

But he lay there and knew there were only two options left – becoming a permanent bottom-dweller, or climbing up somehow. And he knew she had always been the one to pull him out of the hole. No matter how despicable he had been, she always stooped to reach a hand out to him. And he always took it eventually.

[H] [H] [H]

He tried something he hadn't in previous attempts. Uncensored honesty.

"I need your help," was his opening line when she answered. She hung up. He called again. "I need your help, Cuddy," he repeated. There was no click, but she didn't speak. He waited, figuring that her taking the time to gather any thoughts could only work in his favor, since the status quo had been against him.

"You really have unbelievable nerve," she said in a hushed voice. "Why would I help you with even the slightest thing?"

"You haven't even heard what I need yet. That's what's really ballsy."

"Hmm. A kidney, I suppose. Or money? A loan to help you finance your life of debauchery? Maybe a Vicodin prescription…" Her musings had an acidic quality to them. She was venting. That was good, he figured. She wasn't recovered. She wasn't over him. Hate beat apathy, any day.

"I was wrong," he admitted.

There was a silence, a pause in her thought process. "About what?" she asked carefully.

House swallowed hard. "People can change," he answered. "You… changed me. And now… I don't know how to go back, but I don't know how to be this different man."

There was a full minute of silence. He heard the quiet whisper of the connection or else he'd have thought she'd hung up. She finally responded. "So now I'm under some sort of obligation to help you with that? I don't think you've changed as much as you think, House."

"You aren't obligated, no." He thought for a moment. "I'm just asking you to help me. Which is evidence of change, I might add."

More silence. Then, "I can't fucking believe this."

He waited a beat. "Which part?"

He heard her sigh heavily. "I prepared for everything. Every mode of communication, every cockamamie request. I have an answer planned should you actually need a kidney, whether the inquiry came by email, phone call, or text."

"But I've stumped you?" he asked hopefully, assuming all the prepared responses didn't work in his favor. Stumping was good.

"You're always so… specific. This is vague. I don't know what to say to you right now because I don't even know what you're asking me for."

"Just this."

"What?"

"Not hanging up on me."

He gave her time to think more. Then she asked, "Why?"

He had to think now... Why? "Because this, right now, is the happiest I've been in years."

She hung up.

[H] [H] [H]

He wasn't sure how to play this. He decided not to call back immediately. Pestering her, making her feel pushed or pressured or trapped would just send her running for the hills eventually. He needed to be patient and try to just slowly give her pieces of his thoughts, of his message, hoping she could take it in with small doses and not realize she was actually "hearing him out."

He also realized he had something now… some chance of talking to her again. He almost procrastinated any future attempts for fear of losing that. He might be only one step above rock bottom, but somehow he was more scared of the fall this time.

But he didn't need to obsess about all of this for too long because she called him.

"Uh…" he answered. He knew her number, but didn't know if she would like that or not, didn't know if he should act like it was her or an unknown number. So he ended up answering in that bizarre way.

"You know what, House? Fuck you. In every fucking way I could possibly articulate that fucking sentiment, fuck you."

"Uh…" he repeated.

"You want truth? That's what you're always after, right? Well let's go over the truth, shall we. Here's some truth for you: You don't get to just do the things you do, then decide you don't want the consequences that came with those choices, and manipulate the people involved to create your little alternate version of reality so that you can be more satisfied with the results of your heinous and thoughtless actions."

He stayed silent, sensing this was some kind of purge that needed to happen. And also, at least a little, knowing he should hear what she was saying because it was all probably true.

"And here's some truth for me: As much as you can draw me into your messy web of a world, it is my responsibility to avoid getting caught in your trap over and over again simply because I keep foolishly holding out hope that eventually you might realize that if you…" she paused, her voice cracking a little," That if you suck the fucking life out of me you won't get to have me anymore."

He stayed silent now because he honestly thought he might cry if he tried to speak.

"And finally some truth for both of us: The truth is, we do so little for each other that is good and so much that is bad." He heard her sigh. "And that has been our truth. Every time. In every fucked-up version of our relationship, whether professional, fraternal, or romantic. I was wrong, House, when I told you we make each other better. We only make each other want to be better, which is very different… And much sadder."

He stayed silent now because there was nothing clever or logical or helpful to refute this argument.

And she hung up.

[H] [H] [H]

This time he called back immediately. She didn't speak but it stopped ringing so he just started talking.

"Everything you said is right. Can I see you?"

"What the hell is the matter with you?"

"Not seeing you."

"Did you listen to anything I just said?"

"Yes."

"And you agree with it."

"Yes."

"But you want to see me."

"Yes."

"Because you have nothing else."

"No."

"Then why?"

"Because I want nothing else."

He'd been prepared for her to hang up immediately. But she didn't. They just listened to the silence between them – the constant quiet static that was the sound of all the damage they could not repair – for several minutes.

"Good night, House."

"Good night, Cuddy."

She hung up.

House went to bed and lay there thinking. He was feeling something… some feeling that was strangely familiar, nostalgic. It was both comforting and terrifying. He stared at the ceiling and rubbed his thigh and finally placed the feeling. Hope.