And Again, We Continue On...
"About time you called," her voice is strong and determined as she answers and he can almost see her rolls her eyes in exasperation. "What is it this time?"
. . . .
"Ron Weasley is getting ready for his next great adventure," Harry reports dryly, knowing it will grab her attention.
"Explain," this time her voice is whip sharp and surprised.
"At Princeton Plainsbro Teaching Hospital, Ron had a high fever, back pain and a thready heartbeat. The head of diagnostics here, Doctor Gregory House admitted him after Ron had a panic attack and admitted to encroaching paralysis." Harry reports swiftly, knowing that the Lady on the other end of the line appreciates conciseness. "He's just suffered a seizure and has been taken of the medication of his previous diagnoses; meningitis and botulism."
"Concise," she is approving, the tapping of a pen on a table top reveals that she's thinking hard. "You want me to contact the family for you."
"Please," he agrees. "All of them."
"George is still in Russia, working for the Mafia there," she disapproving now. She hates crime syndicates, its even worse though when they're foreign and controlling other governments. "Ginevra and Neville Longbottom have gotten married and are living in Motueka, just outside Richmond."
Harry tries to pretend that the news of Ginny and Neville marriage does hurt, that he doesn't feel it like a kick to his stomach that makes him short of breath and rub his sternum. "Okay," he gasps. "Just pass the word along, I know you can. Even if they don't come, they deserve to know."
"Why should I?" She asks, her voice coldly curious more than judging. She knows she's just hurt him worse than any kick to the balls or disease that he can experience in the rest of his short life, but she's unsympathetic because she knows that the news may well drive him back into her arms. Where he belongs.
"I think Hermione's pregnant," he announces, throwing her off kilter. "Molly deserves to know."
"Molly threw you out," she reminds him, amused. "But I see your point. I'll do this for you and in return you'll come back and work for me. I need you, Harry."
Harry sighs heavily, "consider it done." He agrees tiredly, "I can't be active though… my leg…"
"We'll work something out," she dismisses. "Scarlett is getting too big for his boots."
"He won't last long then," Harry surmises.
"Unlikely to," she agrees.
"Thank you," he says before hanging up, knowing that those words are his dismissal and that there's nothing left to say. He also knows that when she needs to contact him she will be able to get the telephone number for the room with ease. Even if it is ICU.
The nurses manning the station are watching him curiously, clearly wondering who he had called. He was more than unlikely to answer their queries, more because it wasn't worth his life and impending job beneath her iron gripped rule. Learning about his grandfathers job from a bemused government attaché had been bewildering and concerning. Particularly when it became obvious that he was expected to fill in those big, big shoes. That he'd been doing so since he was eleven, if only for the magical world, had been surprising and the icing on the cake. Sometimes it didn't pay to get up in the morning.
Returning to the room, Harry leant against the door jamb and observed his two sleeping friends. This was why he would submit to her rule. This was why he called Molly. This was why he cheapened his own life by feeding Ron his magic. This is why he did everything he did. This, Hermione's head pillowed on Ron's belly, their chests rising and falling in synch as they sleep, dead to the world. Their eyelashes fan across their thin cheeks that are lined before their time. Bodies thin and undernourished, at least twenty kilos under weight. Hands that grip tight, even in the depths of sleep and lips that curve upwards as they anchor each other in the present, their nightmares fading from their minds.
Unlike Harry, Ron and Hermione are healing. Slowly, yes, but the hurts of the mind are less easily shed than those of the body. It's a peaceful sight that inspires pained tears because he knows that for all his promises, his determination and his desperation to live like this. Safe and free of the horrors of the night. He can't. Because unlike Ron and Hermione, it's all he's known. It's all he thinks about in the wee hours of the morning. It's all he can do to not inspire chaos around him, the peaceful setting crawling beneath his skin like thousands of fiery ants that nip and bite at his muscles, bones and organs. Making him want to leap up and pace. To run and never look back. To do something so terrifyingly foolish that it just might kill him.
He doesn't hate the violence of his younger years, he realises with sickening horror. He misses it.
The anger. The pain. The need to run, god, we've got to run. Escape, leave this place now! To see the flash of burning spell fire, to know that his life is in his hands as he ducks, whirls and dances on the battlefield. He's never felt so alive as he had that day. Watching in satisfaction and pleasure as his enemies body drops to the floor, wide eyed and staring. Open mouthed at the heavens. The pleasure of raising his wand, not in oppression but in defence. To stare another human in the eyes and tell them, not today, never again, no longer. To know that he is needed and necessary. Harry is a soldier, he is a leader. He has no place in peace time and he has no way of living a life behind a white picket fence with a wife and two point five kids without going utterly, completely and undeniably insane.
It's always been like this, he realises. Fleeing Dudley. Hiding from Uncle Vernon. Avoiding Aunt Petunia. Being Dumbledore's personal flying butt-monkey. He knows no other life. And now, standing in a sterile hospital, he watches his two friends that have stuck by him for an unfairly long time. He's dragged them from country to country, state to state, place to place, violence and rage dogging his heels, their heels and he's done what? Driven Ron to near death? Hermione to secrecy and desperately wishing to flee this blatantly abusive relationship? What has he given them but pain and fear while they've given him love, peace and companionship. And he dares get angry with Hermione for wanting to leave?
She should leave, he thinks bitterly. She should take Ron, their unborn child and run. Leave him behind. Settle down and live out their lives. Leave him to his madness, his pain, his rage. Leave him alone once more where he can't hurt anyone. Leave him to be another persons weapon. To live as he knows, to be nothing but the killer he was raised to be. There is nothing for them here. Not now, perhaps there never was. Perhaps there never will be.
"Stop it," Hermione's voice cuts through his self flagellation and he looks up to see her and Ron staring at him knowingly. "I know that look. Whatever you're thinking, stop it now. This instant."
"I called Elizabeth," he states, avoiding her gentle probing.
"What?" Hermione asks, horrified. "Why?!"
Harry licks his lips, wondering if he should tell them. "I needed to let your family know about you. She was the quickest and easiest way."
"Harry," Hermione whispers with dread. "What. Did. You. Do?!"
"Nothing I shouldn't have done earlier," he replies dismissively.
"Don't. Lie!" Hermione snaps, while Ron tries to sit up, his tube tangling up in his blankets, blue eyes wide and Hermione immediately helps him. "What did you tell her?"
"To tell Molly, to tell the Weasley's that Ron could be dying in a hospital outside Philadelphia City and could she let them know," Harry informs them jerkily, his fingers playing with the long scar on his side.
Hermione closes her eyes tiredly, "in return for what?"
"Me."
Hermione's brown eyes are wide with fear and horror, taking in her dark haired friends defeated profile, knowing that there would be nothing she could do or say to change his mind now. She has lived by his side for thirteen years and knows him very, very well. The War had only exacerbated that closeness, him being so far removed from her was akin to the loss of a limb that she'd never realised was quite so important to her. While Ron just felt despair overwhelm him. The past six years had been spent trying to keep Harry away from Elizabeth. Away from the woman who say him as nothing more than a well bred weapon like his grandfather. A woman who failed to realise that Harry was so far removed from his grandfather that it was not funny.
Harry was brittle and fragile. A wrong touch, a wrong look could shatter him into a thousand pieces. She had not given up the past six years without reason. Without one last ditch attempt to keep her best friend away from an ambitious and controlling woman who would not hesitate to send him into battle once again, uncaring of the results for him or the people he was up against.
"Harry," Hermione rasps., shocked "No, you can't."
"It's done," Harry states with finality. "Drop it Hermione."
"No," she refuses, angry. She stands, one hand still gripping Ron's, the redhead staring at his best friend in despair. "You can't do this. Not now. Not ever. Harry, last time nearly killed you! You cannot be serious!"
Harry slices a hand through the air, cutting her off. "Stop, okay?" He breathes heavily, trying to regain his equilibrium. "Just stop. I'm sorry, I know, it's not fair, I'm going to die that little bit sooner but I'm sorry, but I don't care." He shrugs, ignoring her tortured expression. "I'm sorry."
"But why, Harry?" She whispers. "Why?"
Harry purses his lips and rakes a hand through his hair while the other sits on his hip. He stares at his shoes for a beat like this before sliding his arms around himself, pained. "Because," he whispers. "Because I'm not like you and Ron. I thought I could be, but I'm not. I'm sorry."
"But why?!" Hermione demands, her voice hoarse with withheld tears. "Dammit, Harry, why? What is wrong about peace? We've earned it! You know we have."
"Because I hate it!" Harry snaps, enraged and irrational. Bearing his heart unaware of the trio of doctors behind him, their eyes wide with shock. "Becuase I fucking hate this. Waiting, driving around, pretending that what we went through doesn't matter!"
"It does matter!" Hermione snaps back, her eyes lit like fire. "What, do you miss it or something? The pain, the death, the uncertainty of day to day?!"
"Yes," his rasping whisper is loud in the silence, punctuated by the beeping of Ron's heart monitor. "Yes, okay. I miss it. I miss being useful. I miss being able to do something about the pain, the hate and the fear in the world."
"Harry, we killed people," Hermione says, horrified.
"And save millions of others!" He snaps, "it's a fair trade in my opinion."
"So that's it then, is it?" Hermione snarls, angry and pained by Harry's admission, ignoring Ron's wide eyed stare from his position in the bed, the white tube in his mouth effectively silencing him. "That's it. No peace for you, you've given up. It's all over," she rakes a hand through her wild curls and glares at Harry, frustrated and irritated. "You're done."
Harry straightens, looking like the soldier he always was, had been and always would be. Straight backed and proud. "Yeah, that's it."
"Better to be a murderer than to be safe in your bed at home with a wife and that family you've always professed to wanting," Hermione snips prissily.
"It's boring," Harry admits, shrugging uncomfortably. "Peacetime is boring. I don't know what to do with myself. Hermione," he stares at her earnestly. "I've never lived peacefully. Never, not in my twenty four years on this Earth. Not once have I been able to take that suburban grace for granted like you could. I was always running, hiding and fleeing for my life. From the age of two I knew nothing but pain, fear and uncertainty, of have you forgotten the scars across my back?!"
"You could try!" Hermione pleads, unable to truly understand.
"I have!" Harry retorts, "I can't do it and at least I'm not George and operating for the fucking mafia!"
"George is sick!" Hermione shrills, angry and fearful. "You're selling your soul if you work for Elizabeth!"
"She's the fucking Queen, not a mob boss!" Harry snarls, enraged.
"She runs England in an undemocratic manner," Hermione sighs, tiredly running a hand down her face. "This is useless, you've made up your mind, nothing I can do will change it, will it?"
"Why do you ask questions you know the answer to," Harry says rhetorically.
"Wait, you know the Queen?" An Australian voice interrupts and Harry spins around to see Foreman, Cameron and Chase staring at him sadly (Cameron), suspiciously (Foreman) and in awe (Chase).
"Know and occasionally have tea with," Harry deadpans.
Chase grins, widely and brightly, "I'm not a monarchist but that, there, is awesome."
"So glad you approve," Harry drawls.
"Yeah, a Queen that secretly runs half the world," Hermione mutters bitterly. "Meet her new dogsbody. Anyone insults her, he's the go to guy for assassination."
"It's not like that," Harry groans. "We've had this conversation before. She's the worlds best mediator giving her some sway among even countries she doesn't know too well."
"Dictatorial," Hermione coughs, her eyes wide and innocent.
"Whatever," Harry shrugs, rolling his shoulders. "What's done is done."
"I can't believe that you know the Queen!" Chase is in awe still, looking like a five year old with a rand new puppy. All wriggles and bright smiles. "What is she like?"
"A Queen," Harry says, watching the doctors fan out, Cameron carefully taking Hermione's arms and pulling her away from the bed while Foreman and Chase are checking Ron's stats and making notations on a clipboard. "What are you doing?"
"We have booked Mr. Weasley into a Lumbar Puncture this afternoon, we're just making sure he can make it." Cameron replies, watching her colleagues interestedly.
Hermione frowns, "a Lumbar Puncture? Isn't that where you shove a hollow needle between two vertebra and drain fluid from the spinal column?"
"Yep," Chase agreed, checking Ron's eyes, throat and nose, smiling slightly. "Your lymph nodes have gone down nicely."
"Lymph nodes?" Harry asks, confused.
Hermione rolls her eyes at the raven haired male. "Ron was diagnosed with pneumonia shortly after you left the first time. The pink bag is filled with antibiotics to combat it."
"I see," Harry murmurs, feeling peeved that Hermione and Ron had failed to tell him about the pneumonia. Not to mention irritated that he hadn't seen the bag himself and thought to question it being there. He feels like a failure.
Cameron lets Hermione go, the brunette woman tossing herself back into her chair and snatching up her boyfriends hand. Foreman and Chase have left and are discussing the revelation that Harry works for the Queen of England while the auburn haired doctor is watching Harry curiously. Harry meets her stare blankly, wondering what is going on behind those blue-grey eyes. She smiles and swishes past him, hands in the pockets of her lab coat and Harry goes back to leaning against the wall, the events of the past twenty-four hours catching up with him. The afternoon can't come quick enough, Harry just wants Ron to get better.
Hermione takes charge not half an hour after the doctors have left them alone again, settling Harry into the two chairs she'd set up earlier and standing guard over him as he slept. The bruises circling his eyes are a dark purple and stand out like bruises against his translucent skin. She wonders what drove him to calling Elizabeth now, after all this time. Wonders if Harry is going to escape this time, whole and sane. She doesn't believe him when he says he misses the violence. She can't understand how any sane person could miss warfare, knowing what she does about love, loss and torture. It doesn't make sense to her. It should make sense to him and she wonders if one day all they'll see of him is a pine wood box covered in the Union Jack, a wreath of red, red roses on the lid.
Ron is silent, his blue eyes, deep and unfathomable like the sea, watch her from his position on the bed. She wonders if he worries about Harry like she does. Wonders if Ron misses the violence that has characterised and dogged their lives for the last decade and a bit. She hopes not because if he does, she knows she won't be able to deal with it. Fluttering hands brush her lower belly, the warmth that sits there like a fire comforting her in her discomfort and fear. Ron watches her, still oblivious, clearly not remembering that night three months ago in Ohio, drunk out of their minds and slipping, fumbling, clutching and gripping. Harry in the bed next to them as they sloppily kiss and cry, losing themselves in that age old rhythm that had resulted in the tiny heartbeat in her womb.
Hermione doesn't regret, not really. She knew what would happen. Knew that they had forgotten to use a condom or any kind of birth control. Had known the moment Ron had slipped from her body, his breath thick, sticky and stinking of bourbon on her neck. Had felt the fire that had erupted there, the fusion of new life from her egg and his seed. The next generation that she will prevent from being roped into wars not their own. The next generation that she holds so much hope for. She turns from Ron's deep blue gaze and stares at Harry's pitiful form, curled up across two chairs, a light blue hospital blanket thrown across him, a white pillow beneath his head. Her daughters godfather, should he accept.
Morning slides into afternoon as the shadows in their room lengthen and darken. Outside the skies turn grey and heavy with the promise of rain and Hermione can't help but feel this to be an omen, a portent of what is to come. Harry is awake now, his head on his bony knees, blanket draped across his shoulders and body, bare feet sticking out beneath the hems of his ragged jeans and the pale blue blanket. Ron is asleep, red hair blazing against the white of his linens, the steady beat of his monitor comforting in the silence.
They come silently and solemnly, Harry and Hermione ushered from the room and stood guard over by Foreman and Cameron while Chase wakes Ron up and rolls him onto his side. Hermione plasters herself to the window, watching with desperate and sad eyes, watching her boyfriend clench his teeth and stare back, just as desperate and sad, as the handsome blonde doctor slides the thick steel needle into his spine and drains a test tube full of spinal fluid.
Then they leave once more, just as silent and solemn, perhaps suspecting that the trio are not as able as they to rustle up optimism and are instead silently perched on the edge of a chasm. The black depths below their feet yawning wide and deep, daring them to leap on down, to let everything go and just fall free. Hermione curls up beside Ron, Harry on the other side, and they wait, hands joined in the middle and they draw comfort and love from each other. It's not sexual. Not between them. It's familial, love, caring and compassion. They are too close for true comfort most days, but on days like today when the black dog roams free between them, the closeness is a joy, not a burden.
Ron is asleep when they return in the morning, this time House is with them, his face grave and looking like it's been carved from marble. Chase and Cameron flank him while Foreman lingers behind, they all look compassionate and sympathetic and Harry feels his stomach sink to the bottom of his toes. Hermione too, turns pale and wane, and she closes her eyes in dread and fear, knowing that whatever's coming isn't going to be fun or easy to hear. Harry turns to Ron, gently shaking him awake and sliding from the bed to stand at his friends bedside, one hand resting on the redheads shoulder, the other wrapped about his body and stroking the scar that runs from shoulder to hip down his side. Drawing comfort where there is none to be had.
"You have Guillain-Barre syndrome," House announces without preamble. His blue eyes intensely focused on the dynamic between the three people before him, wondering just what it was, because the tortures a pretty tale but not the whole story, that can bring three different people together so tightly and smoothly. It's like him and Wilson, but it's not, because their relationship is basically co-dependant and freaky, while his and Wilson's is healthy. He thinks. Maybe. He doesn't know.
"What is… g-ee-ya-ainn ba-ar syndrome? Harry stumbles over the foreign words uncomfortably, they sound heavy and clunky on his tongue and not for the first time does he wish that he could speak and second language.
"It's a rare but very serious autoimmune disease where the immune system attacks healthy nerve cells in the periphery nervous system," Cameron explains because this is her area. Her love. It's interesting and horrible and she can't quite deal with those serious blue, green and brown eyes that are focused on her, frightened and tear filled.
"Basically the immune system, which is supposed to protect you from infections and diseases, get supercharged and confused and thinks that your nervous system in an intrude and attacks it." Chase supplies, stepping in swiftly as Cameron chokes and falters. He can understand that though, she's always been sensitive to other peoples issues, even if he finds it to be stupid and worthless most of the time. "Had your nervous system not been damaged by the terrorists during the nineties it would have been easier to pick up and treat, but because it was," Chase shrugs, his hands in the pockets of his lab coat, sympathetic if not empathetic.
"But it is treatable, right?" Hermione asks, terrified, a hand pressed to her lower abdomen and House frowns at her before his eyes widen in shock.
"In eighty-five percent of cases it's very treatable," Foreman assures her. "But in Ron's case, it may have been left too long. There may be some long term damage to his nervous system which can result in a lack of manoeuvrability."
"So what do we do?" Hermione questions, her free hand tangling with Ron's and squeezing tightly in a death grip.
Cameron shakes her head slightly, clearing her thoughts and rallies herself, smiling slightly, tightly, painfully. "We've signed him up for physiotherapy where he should regain the majority of his mobility back, although he may need leg bracers and pain medication for the rest of his life."
"We've also decided to utilise plasmapheresis, which is a treatment designed to remove the antibodies attacking the nerve system by filtering the blood through a special machine before returning the blood back to the body," Foreman continues quietly.
"And if that doesn't work?" Hermione asks, still worried but soothed by the confidence displayed by the doctors in front of her.
"There is a new treatment available if the plasmapheresis and physiotherapy don't work as well as they should." Foreman states confidently, "it's called Intravenous Immunoglobulin, where immunoglobulin is injected into the patient which combats the antibodies. It's new but looks promising and apparently has fewer complications attached to the treatment."
"Okay," Hermione nods, still squeezing Ron's hand and occasionally glancing at Harry who stood silently on the other side of the bed, his eyes serious and grave. "Okay," she says again, centring herself. "What are the complications then?"
"Well, Guillain-Barre affects your nervous system," Foreman says while Cameron visibly restrains herself from gathering Hermione into a tight hug and Chase pretends to not be bored by this flow of information that he already knows. He doesn't even guess at what House is doing, his blue eyes never faltering from his observation of the trio in front of them, curious and bemused by their stoic stance to the disastrous news being given to them. "So Ron may experience further paralysis until the treatments kick in, and even when they do there may be some lingering weakness in his limbs; trouble breathing as the brain may have difficulty sending the signals to the lungs that control their movement; problems with going to the toilet, again for the same reasons; and heart and blood pressure problems.
"That's the bad news," Foreman states, maintaining his calm in the face of the brunettes horror and dismay. "The good news is that you can expect good results from the treatments available. Like I said, eighty-five percent of people recover almost perfectly, and while this isn't curable now, it may well be in the future."
"What are the chances of relapse?" Harry asks, his voice funny and croaking as he stares at the dark eyes doctor who had taken over the delivery of the bad news. Understandable really, since Cameron was close to tears herself, House was more interested in him, and Chase was disinterested in everything around him. Harry actually wonders what drove Chase into medicine if he hates it so badly and suspects parental pressure more than anything else. The blonde is oddly meek for someone who presents a façade of disinterest most of the time.
"About ten percent of cases relapse, but continued treatment will take care of that," Foreman says, shrugging slightly.
"Okay," Hermione accepts, twisting around to press a hard kiss to Ron's forehead. "You're going to be okay, Ron," she's smiling wetly, tremors shaking her frame. "You're going to be okay."
Harry reaches across the bed and pulling both of his friends into a tight hug briefly before following the doctors from the room. House is far up the corridor, Wilson waiting for him by the lifts while Chase has been sidelined by a harried looking nurse, his hand drifting up to his stethoscope and his face becoming a mask of concentration as he follows her down the hall and into another room. Cameron and Foreman watch the intensivist go with curious interest before taking the stairs down to the clinic three at a time.
"House!" Harry barks, loping down the hall and scooting into the elevator just before the doors slide shut. "Our agreement," he reminds the bemused doctor, ignoring Wilson who watches him curiously. "You treat Ron, you fix him, which you have," Harry states. "And then I'm all yours to satisfy your curiosity."
"You remember," House muses, interested, his eyes sharp. "I thought you'd back out of our agreement."
"I'm not you," Harry snarks, having more than a slight suspicion regarding the other man and his abilities to accept his own pain and the treatment of his bad leg.
House sneers slightly, "you don't know me."
"Maybe not," Harry agrees darkly. "But I have my suspicions."
House grunts noncommittally, ignoring Wilson's delighted grin, knowing that the other man thought he'd met his match in the dark haired, green eyed man beside him. House almost thinks that Wilson's a little strange to be getting off on their interaction until he reminds himself that Harry is interesting and that he himself is getting off on trying to figure out just what is hindering the other mans movement. It could be a psychosomatic limp, but that's unlikely and it's not until he gets to open the leg up and remove most of the scar tissue that he'll know for certain. Which makes this fun.
"It is honestly scary, just how similar you two are," Wilson comments as he follows both limping men from the lift and through the lobby, watching House angle towards the clinic and Cuddy's office.
"It's like we were split up at birth," Harry snarks. "Or, it would be but for the obvious age difference making him closer to that of my fathers."
"Where is your father?" House wonders, shoving the glass doors of the clinic open and ignoring Nurse Brenda's calls for him to do your clinic hours already, House, we're swamped in here!
Harry stiffens slightly as he follows the older man through the wood and glass doors into a fancy looking office where a woman sat behind a desk, her curly hair pulled into a bun, and writing out various forms while looking completely exasperated at House's presence. "Dead," Harry answers, surprising the woman behind the desk with his apparent blunt manner.
"House, Wilson?" She questions in confusion, "why are you here and who is this?"
"We're here for the view," House snarks, leering mockingly at the woman's practically exposed chest, her low-cut blouse doing little to hide her attributes. The woman stood and smoothed her blouse, drawing attention to her thin, fit figure and Harry smirks at the sight, enjoying the sight.
"You were right," Harry says lightly, crossing his arms across his chest, on hand stroking his scar that ran down his side. "It's a lovely view."
"Oh god," she groans, closing her eyes in exasperation. "There are two of them!"
"I'm the better looking one though," House snips, shooting Harry an amused look. "And eyes off, she's mine."
"Oh please," Harry snorted, rolling his eyes. "You couldn't hit her even if you tried."
"Why not?" House is mockingly offended but clearly curious.
Harry smirks, lengthening his side enough that his leg didn't give him too much trouble and holds out a hand for the woman to shake, when she took it, he swiftly flipped it over and brushed a kiss across her knuckles, knowing it would piss House off no end. "Because," he breathes, feathering his breath across her hand watching her try and refrain from blushing but failing to do so as pink spread across her high cheek bones. "She clearly has fantastic taste."
"Oh god," Wilson mutters from his position by the door. "This is awful."
Harry laughs freely, unable to help himself as he straightens from his fluid bow over the woman hand and shoots the oncologist a dirty grin. "Jealous are you, Wilson?" He asks smugly, "I'm all for sharing if you're interested."
Wilson chokes and pales rapidly, his eyes huge with shock. "Uh!"
Harry laughs again and winks at the beautiful woman who had still yet to drop his hand, "Harry Potter," he introduces himself, amused.
"Lisa Cuddy," she replies, apparently highly amused and entertained by his behaviour. "And why are you here, Mr. Potter?"
"Harry, please," he insists charmingly, playing it up for her. "And I have no idea why, Doctor House was most insistent though."
House rolls his eyes as Cuddy turns her interested and suspicious gaze onto him. "Mr. Potter has bad scarring on his left leg resulting in poor circulation and muscular pain."
"You want to admit him into surgery," Cuddy surmises, recognising House's desire to fix a patient at the expense of the patients of freedom.
"Yep," House agrees. "He promised me I could do whatever I want with him."
"Did not," Harry mutters mulishly. "I said you could 'fix' me, not do what you like with me."
"Your reasoning behind this freeing a maniac upon your body?" Cuddy asks him concerned and surprised, her blue eyes staring at the raven haired man.
"I don't have a death wish," Harry replies, amused but her concern.
"No," Wilson agrees from his position by the door, looking entertained by the rapid fire conversation. "You just have no sense."
"Wilson, I'm hurt," Harry smirks darkly. "Are we breaking up already?"
House barks a short laugh, amused. "That's my line, Potter."
"I had my suspicions," Harry agrees cheekily.
Wilson flounders, horrified. "We're not…" He stammers, "we're not gay!"
House smirks wickedly, twisting around to stare his best friend in the eye, leaning on his cane. "It hurts me when you lie like that, Jimmy."
"House!" Wilson protests, dumbfounded.
Cuddy, watching this interaction between the three men, is unable to do much else but tip her head back and laugh. Harry grins smugly satisfied while House flicks his eyes between the three other people in the room, weighing up his chances at being able to continue the joke. Wilson just stumps from Cuddy's office, grumbling about idiots, stupid friends, and unhelpful bosses.
"Bye Willy!" Harry shouts after the oncologist, getting the rude finger in reply. He turns to House and smirks, "I think he likes me."
Cuddy rolls her eyes, calm once more. "Yes, that must be it."
"It's not sexual harassment if you enjoy it," House quips sending Harry into low chuckles, grinning broadly himself.
"So, surgery," Cuddy cuts in, sliding back into her chair with a sigh of pleasure, leaning back and observing the two men across from her.
"On the left leg," House agrees, settling into a semblance of seriousness. "Like I said, the scarring is so bad that I suspect that it's restricting the blood flow and causing intense pain for the patient."
"I have neuropathy," Harry shoots House a bemused glance. "There is no pain."
"Shut up," House retorts, ignoring Cuddy's eye roll and Harry's amusement. "Once inside I recommend the surgeon taking out any damaged muscle."
"You think there's damage?" Cuddy says slowly, mulling over the implications. "What, there was an infarction in the thigh muscle that has gone undetected until now? Even with neuropathy Harry would feel the pain, it had you on the floor screaming for morphine."
House glares at her, furious. "It's not an infarction."
"What the hell is an infarction?" Harry demands, not liking where this is going.
Cuddy looks at him, her gaze sharp and painful, "it's a blood clot that restricts blood flow to the leg. It can appear anywhere, House's infarction was in his leg, which is why he's the grumpy, misogynistic arse that stands next to you today."
Harry rolls his eyes, "of course it is." He sighs and returns his gaze to the diagnostician, still stroking his scar running the length of his side. "When can you book me in?"
"Do you have health insurance?" Cuddy asks, cutting across House's answer.
Harry doesn't even blink in her direction before answering, his eyes steady on House's blue gaze. "No, but I can pay my and Ron's bills."
"How?" Cuddy asks, annoyed.
Harry finally looks at her, pulling out his wallet from the back pocket of his jeans and tugging out an unlimited credit card that was linked to his vault back in England. He had close to five billion galleons in the vault and that would be very, very hard to blow through, particularly considering the shares and investments he had in his name thanks to Griphook. The goblin may loathe him, but had been more than happy to consolidate his wealth and make it available to him in the muggle world. For a small fee, of course.
Cuddy stares at the card with barely hidden desire and greed before closing her eyes, pinching the bridge of her nose and waving the pair off. "Fine, fine," she allows, exhaling exasperatedly. "Go do your thing."
"He's not a thing," House snarks, bemused by the gold card that Harry was waving around like it meant nothing. The man didn't look rich yet he had, likely, the same kind of cash as Chase did. Then again, Chase didn't look rich, just colour blind. "And you, come with me, we're getting you admitted and then you're mine, I tell you, mine to do with as I wish!" House let out a mad scientist laugh, pulling the other man behind him enthusiastically.
"Don't kill the man, House," Cuddy cautions as she watches them leave, bemused by their apparent friendliness and companionship. House was never this open unless Wilson or she were around, that Potter has slid beneath is skin with such ease is something of a concern for the Director. She wonders if she should mention to him that she'd scheduled him to lecture next week? Further consideration makes her decide that she won't, not yet anyway. It will give him less time to come up with a suitable excuse. Decided, she returns her attention to the task of managing the overflowing paperwork in front of her and curses ever becoming the Head of Medicine at a teaching hospital.
House drags Harry into the Witherspoon wing and has the nurses set the other man up on an IV of saline and nutrient drips, plying him with food while the raven haired man struggles into a hospital gown of pale green. He smirks at the sight of bright green eyes beneath messy black hair against a backdrop of white linen sheets. It makes the man look like a teenager, tiny and helpless to his every whim. It's a heady feeling. A ten minute phone call during the health and background check had Harry Potter booked into surgery later that day, just before the theatres close for the day and House feels smugly accomplished with everything as he watches the younger man refuse the food that the nurses try and give him until House mentions his surgery that afternoon.
"Enjoy yourself," he says as he limps from the room leaving Harry to the nurses dubious intentions.
Harry glares at the departing doctors back and feels mutinously petulant as the nurses cluck over his obvious scarring, poor health and thin body. He wants to scream but doesn't. He's not hurting, just frustrated. And angry. And worried for Ron, who he hasn't seen since early that afternoon. And peeved at House for leaving him here. And annoyed at Hermione, who hasn't seemed to realise that he was missing yet. And just generally pissed in general.
The anaesthetist swings by an hour before the surgery, prepping him for the anaesthetic that he'll be put under before going under the knife. He's handed a black marker to write on the leg their not supposed to be touching and he leaves a deliberately insulting message that he knows will get back to the gimpy diagnostician within moments. Sooner if the man's watching the surgery. Then the nurses come, wheeling his bed through corridors and hallways towards the operating theatre that will be used to house him while he gets cut up and fiddled with. He goes under with a small smirk on his face at the cooing nurses reaction to the heavily knotted scarring on his left leg, her brown eyes shocked by the sight.
