The first thing House notices is the socks.

"Is this a joke?"

They're nine kinds of purple and green and yellow and it looks like a four-year-old sewed them together. Why wouldn't he notice them? People are supposed to wear fairly normal socks, right? So why was this patient wearing the same socks that a teenage 'Hot Topic' reject would be throwing on under a pair of Doc Martens?

Huh. The guy's wearing Doc Martens too. What a weirdo.

One would think House would have noticed other things first, more daunting things that demanded attention. The makeup, for one. If that was even makeup. Looked like an albino hooker applied lipstick on crack. House pauses at the door, holds up the chart of a one Ms. Chan, someone this guy very much is not.

"I think I have lupus."

Is that even a Mister? Perhaps a Missus.

"No, you don't."

House wonders what the proper way to address someone as an 'it' is.

When the guy pulls out a hair from his head and lets out some kind of ungodly wail how his scalp is falling off and he'll never get invited to prom, House realizes he doesn't really care. "Overabundance of he-she's over at the high school? I bet the freaky kid in the back of the chemistry class'll still be able to snag his fingers in," House offers helpfully, and crosses his fingers. "So long as you can put up with the smell." Shuts the door behind him and fixes Ms. Not-Chan with A Look. "Seriously. Is this a joke?"

Sticky white greasepaint when he leans forward, swipes a thumb at his lip and cups his ear like he didn't quite hear what was going on. "A joke?" His eyes widen in some kind of shock. "I'm in pain here. I need an opinion, doctor." And slumps back against the crinkly tissue paper like it's a travesty for him even to sit up. "I need a true opinion as to just what could be wrong with me. Numb fingers! Gritty teeth! Horrible-smelling flatulence! I may be dying."

Yeah. This is a joke.

"You want my say?" House reasons, and hops onto a stool because arguing with a weirdo is way more interesting than whatever crotch rot Mr. Exam Room Four has right now. It's too close to lunch for sex spores crawling all over the place. "Because, in my formal professional opinion, I believe you are plagued with a very bad case of acne, paired with a very mean disease called pain-in-the-ass-ius that only comes from a rare mosquito from India, assuming you've been out of the country recently. And then we have a possible case of crazy on top of all that, so that's not my gig, that's all the fourth floor."

The patient sits up and leans back on his hands, shoots House a look like he's quite unimpressed. "I think I need a second opinion."

"Fine, you're ugly, too."

Ms. Not-Chan hops off the table and experimentally picks up the cane House has slung against the counter, swings it like a bat and twirls it around in callused fingers. "You're going to deprive a cripple of his cane?" House asks in some kind of mock indignation. He would probably be a little more pissed off if it was anybody else. This guy, he's just curious.

"Would it help if I list my current medications and/or allergens?" the guy offers, still turning that cane like it's some kind of baton and he's running for a Miss America pageant. "Because I can."

"Why not? I haven't gotten a chance to nap yet today, this is a great time to start."

"Count sheep, always keeps me up at night," he returns, and squints an eye in thought. "That would be, ah, somewhere in the neighborhood of... 500 milligrams of Ziprasidone, 25 of Fluphenazine, apple juice, 40 of Mesoridazine - injections in rows of two, mind you, twice a day, half hour between each." He ticks off on his fingers and props the cane under his armpit in his thought process. "Ten milligrams of Paliperidone, ah, 1000 Lithium, a package of peanut M&M's, 150 Lamictal, 225 Efexor, 20 of Escitalopram. Oh! And my personal favorite, is the 1200 Chlorpromazine, because, well, suppository, and you know the nurse aids love doling out that peach."

Stops a second. "Also, shellfish. I'm allergic to shellfish."

He pauses again, opens his mouth to speak, decides against it, and reverts back to his twirling of the cane, a dreamy sort of expression back on his face.

House actually has the decency to blink. And the guy was still standing? "Well, golly, all the big words there, I think I lost you. Can you say that again? Three times fast?" Cocks his head back and pops a Vicodin, dry. "One of those sounded like Skittles. I think you just made all those up to try and confuse stupid people. I'm a doctor, I know these things."

"Right, right, forgot those ones! The Skittles that is."

"If you make a taste the rainbow joke, I will punch you in the nose."

"Whatever, I like big words. Pram and zine and done are all such pretty suffixes." And House pockets the prescription vial as the patient kicks off his pants, starts unbuttoning his vest and humming a song that House is pretty sure is Donna Summers. "Can you tie this for me?" he asks once he shrugs on a johnny, and House shrugs.

"Sorry. Cripple."

"That's too bad," Ms. Not-Chan replies cheerily, and smudges red across the strings as he ties it on, like he had too much ketchup with his fries or something.

Oh, yeah, didn't he mention? Because Ms. Not-Chan has blood spattered all over, caked across knuckles and clotted under nails like finger paint on a kindergartner, spittled all up his forearms like he didn't even notice it was there. Like House hadn't even mentioned it was there, because he hadn't yet, he wanted the explanation to come in time. Didn't ask about things like scars and makeup and murder, partly because he wasn't too fond of dying. Mostly because crazy people interested him; dangerous people who thought in squiggly lines instead of up and down and side to side.

"I'm thinking CAT scan. I need a CAT scan," the lady (who's not a lady and has very much shown that somewhere in the transfer over to hospital clothes but House still likes to think of him as a lady) offers, half to himself, half out loud. "And one of those thingies where you poke someone in the back." He ties a bow, all by himself, and holds up his hands and wiggles his fingers because he's quite proud. "Do you think it's Maple Syrup Urine Disease? I always liked that one."

"Actually, I was figuring rickets. Had enough Vitamin D lately?"

"I eat all my vitamins and floss after every meal, mummy dearest," Ms. Not-Chan replies with a shit-eating grin that splays across cracked and chapped lips and unsettles even Gregory House. "Am I gonna get the back poke-y test?"

"Do you have medical insurance?"

He pauses, starts rummaging in the cupboard behind the examination bed. House doesn't like the smell starting to waft through the room - a lot like rigor mortis and copper. The guy hands off an insurance card, though, the same Ms. Chan that's supposed to be in here right now, before he starts rummaging away in different cupboards.

"Asia suit you well at all? Ms. Chan?"

"Racist!" the man shouts over his shoulder, before methodically donning a surgical mask and pulling out a couple of purple latex gloves. "I speak American just like you folks." There's a snappy sort of noise as he yanks on the latex, hops back onto the bed and wiggles his fingers in a flirty sort of wave. "Ni huì shuo Zhongwén ma?[1]"

"Gong gòng qì che[2]," House accuses back, and wrinkles his nose. "At least I think that's how you say 'hello', it's been a while. Gimme my cane back."

It's when Ms. Not-Chan hands over the thing when the door slams open again. It's a nurse, and she's paired with three impressive cop-looking types who are well-armed. House puts his cane back in its rightful hands, as the patient holds up splayed fingers and sits up a little straighter. "Wasn't me!"

"Joker, don't even," says the forefront cop-type, a woman, and she has a tazer. "You're going back. Now."

"Man, see what I get when I try to go out bowling with the guys?" Ms. Not-Chan - Joker? Joker. - tosses back to House, all nonchalant, and when Cop Chick jams the tazer into him with a stare that is decidedly unhappy, House decides this is the most exciting his job has been since he got shot. He's going to need to answer questions. Probably quite a bit of questions.

Joker blows him a kiss as the guards start wrestling him through the door, and House has the decency to wave, at least, even when the crazy's kicking and screaming his way out of the building.

"Have a lovely day, Ms. Chan!"

Translatey thingies!
[1] = 'Do you speak Chinese'
[2] = slut (lit. "public bus"), used for a women who sleeps around, as in "everyone has had a ride"