Disclaimer: I do not own House. If I did, would I be writing this?
Author's Note: My first foray into the House fandom. Constructive critcism is always welcome. Flames will be laughed at.
What Dreams
Chapter One
"It's House. He's been shot."
The words echo through his brain, over and over, as he sprints through the hospital halls, desperate to get to the ER.
They pound at him, like a relentless drum, as he rushes down the stairs, two at a time, heedless of his own safety.
They are all he hears as he skids to a stop in the middle of the ER, greeted by Chase, with House's blood on his hands.
Then, Chase slowly shakes his head.
His best friend is dead, shot by someone he tried to help.
And he hears nothing at all.
XXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX
With a yell, James Wilson jerked awake, his panicked cry echoing in the empty apartment. Then, he calmed down as he realized that the images running through his head were nothing more than the product of his overactive, hung over imagination. Nothing but a dream. A quickly-fading dream, at that.
He sat up on the couch, wondering why he was sleeping there, of all places, before he realized that he wasn't in his apartment, but in House's. The papers he saw sticking out of his jacket pocket served as an awkward reminder as to just how he'd ended up on House's couch.
What should have been just another routine meeting between himself, Julie, and their respective divorce lawyers had turned out to be anything but. Julie, who'd originally been amicable about the whole proceedings, had turned everything on its head by demanding everything she could get out of him. The house, the car, alimony. The dog.
This, coming on top of having to tell a mother her six-month-old baby had an inoperable brain tumor, had left him too shocked to put up much of a fight.
After it was all over, he'd driven himself to the nearest dive. All he wanted was to get good and drunk, to forget everything that had happened during that miserable day. He'd nearly succeeded, too.
If it hadn't been for that bartender…
Nosy guy, poking in where he didn't belong. Wilson still couldn't figure out why he'd done it, but the bartender had somehow gotten his cell phone away from him. And had dialed the first number on his speed dial. House's number.
Wilson hadn't heard the ensuing conversation; he'd been too plastered, by then. He imagined, though, that it had gone something along the lines of "Come get your drunk friend before I call the cops."
Whatever had been said, House had shown up. Both of him, Wilson remembered, with a pained groan. And he'd grabbed Wilson's keys away from him, dragged him, stumbling, out of the bar, and dumped him in the front seat of his own car, threatening pain of death if Wilson puked in the Corvette.
He'd driven Wilson straight to his apartment, ignoring, for the most part, the drunken insults coming from his best friend. Once and a while, he'd give back some biting comment that had Wilson's brain swimming as it tried to wrap around whatever he'd just said, but, mostly, he was uncharacteristically silent.
He let Wilson rail at him the entire drive over, had dragged him into the apartment and dumped him, unceremoniously, on the couch. And had sat on the nearby chair, watching him, until he fell asleep.
Wilson may not have remembered everything he'd said last night, but he remembered that.
Of course, he also remembered puking on House at least once, with startling clarity.
'He's never going to let me hear the end of that one,' he thought, ruefully.
Speaking of House…
He looked around, as though expecting to see the other man limping into the room, before his gaze fell on the piece of paper sitting on the end table under a bottle of aspirin.
Wilson,
Had to go in early. Complication with a patient. Take the aspirin and drag your butt into work before Cuddy gets wind of your drunken stupor.
Wilson smirked slightly at that, struck by the irony of House going in early while he was home, hung over, before reading on.
Took the bike. Keys to the 'Vette are on the kitchen counter. Crash her and I will kill you.
House
Deciding he may as well do what the doctor ordered, Wilson took a quick shower and dressed in yesterday's clothes, thankful he kept clean clothes in his office and could change there, before anyone saw him. Then, he snagged a cold piece of pizza out of the fridge, for breakfast, grabbed his bag and the keys, and went out the door.
He took his time driving to work, savoring the feel of being behind the wheel of the Corvette. For once, even the sound of his pager couldn't entice him to hurry. It was probably Cuddy, he reasoned, and he'd be there in person soon enough for her to yell at.
It was with great reluctance that he pulled into his usual parking space and headed toward the hospital. He managed to make it though the front doors without attracting any attention, and had almost made it to his office unnoticed when he saw Cuddy standing outside his door.
'She's lying in wait?' he thought, looking instinctively at his watch. 'I can't possibly be that late.'
"Dr. Cuddy," he said, cautiously, and she turned toward him, an indecipherable expression on her face.
"It's House," she said, softly, in an uncanny echo of his nightmare.
His heart clenched, painfully, in anticipation of her next words.
"He's been shot."
A/N: This could go on, depending on the reaction I get to it. If you'd like more to it, please tell me.