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Chapter 4
Sunday afternoon, House sat in his office, glad he had a patient. An excuse.
"Hello?" Wilson answered.
House had the phone on speaker phone, so he wouldn't have to put down the journal he had been searching through, "Hey."
Wilson hesitated, House never called him on a Sunday. He wondered if he was okay, but he knew better than to ask. "Shelby's making chicken and rice."
"Yeah, that's what I'm calling about. Nasty case."
"You're at the hospital?"
"Yep. Girl's been revived twice already. Kutner's finally got the hang of not electrocuting himself in the process."
"So you won't be here for dinner?" Wilson asked, skeptically.
House detected the note of doubt in Wilson's voice and called out, "HEY KUTNER, HOW MANY TIMES DID YOU SHOCK THE IDIOT PATIENT?"
Kutner poked his head into House's office, "You were there," he responded, wondering if whatever House had reason to check his blood for, might be affecting his brain. "Twice."
"See Daddy, I'm being a good boy," House said in a sing-song voice.
"Thanks, Kutner," Wilson said through the speaker phone.
Realizing House was proving to Wilson that he was in fact at work, Kutner relaxed a bit and returned to the conference room, relieved that Wilson was looking out for House.
"You thought I was lying to you, didn't you?" House asked.
"I, well," Wilson stammered, "You've lost weight, House. I thought you wanted to avoid eating."
House rolled his eyes, "Stop looking for problems."
"Stop lying to me."
"Gotta go, patient dying and all," House said, hanging up the phone before Wilson could say anything more.
_______
Late that evening, Foreman reached for his jacket as Kutner took his lab coat off. House was asleep in his office, stretched out on the couch that now sat on the far wall.
Kutner motioned towards House with his thumb as he asked, "Think he's okay?"
Foreman sighed, "He's fine. He's 63 years old and he's been here since seven this morning. Let him sleep."
"Did you know Cuddy requires him to have tox screens run?"
Foreman raised his eyebrows, "No, but I'm not surprised."
_______
"Uncle House?" Mia asked when House called around seven that evening.
"You're worse than your mother."
"Aren't you coming home soon?"
"I'll be there in another hour," House said as he turned his office computer off.
"Mom left us money for dinner."
"Order a pizza, or whatever you want."
"Okay, come home soon?"
"Pack your bags."
"Huh?"
"Puh…aack…yooour…baaaagsss," House said, exaggerating each word.
"Why?"
"We're going to the concert tomorrow." House heard a very loud shriek through the phone, forcing him to hold the phone away from his ear.
"Mom said we could go?"
"Yep."
"What am I going to wear? I should have started packing a week ago!"
"Mia, it's for one night."
"But it's Sasha!! Hurry home, I'll order pizza. Bye."
House hung the phone up and checking that his team had gone home for the evening, he grabbed his cane and headed for the lab. He checked for his blood work and punched the counter when he learned the lab hadn't finished with the tests he'd ordered. Strumming his fingers on the counter of the lab's front desk, scaring the receptionist with his angered gaze, House made a decision to take matters into his own hands. He marched himself down to the clinic, double-checking that Cuddy's office was indeed vacant, though knowing she had left hours earlier to get to Boston, and turned on the lamp on the clinic's main desk to search for the keys.
The clinic was closed, but he knew a spare set of keys were kept in a lock box that his hospital ID code could access in case of emergencies. It was a security measure implemented by Cuddy after a flu outbreak years earlier. The clinic had been closed, and with the ER overflowing, panic broke out when supplies began to run low. At the time, two employees and the janitorial staff had spare keys and it took a panicking Cuddy over an hour to find someone with a spare set. The lock box was installed the following week.
Punching in his birth date and fourth floor diagnostic's code, House accessed the keys that would unlock the clinic's exam rooms. Entering one, he dragged the portable ultrasound from the corner and ensuring that the door was closed, he stretched out on the exam table. He squirted the cool gel onto his abdomen and calibrated the machine, hoping he wouldn't find the mass he knew deep down was hiding one or both of his kidneys. Straining to see the screen, his hand shook as House began the exam. He pressed down onto his abdomen and almost immediately lifted the wand away from his skin, afraid of what he might find on screen. He was not yet ready to admit that he might actually have cancer.
_______
Wilson walked out towards his car, exhausted after the long day and noticed House's car parked in its usual space. He had checked House's office on his way out, to say goodnight, but the office was dark. He wondered if House was okay and pulled out his cell phone.
"You have impeccable timing," a gruff voice answered, sounding a touch startled.
"Where are you?"
"Cuddy's. Got stuck babysitting."
"You're lying."
House hesitated. "Where are you?"
"Standing next to your car in the hospital parking lot."
House remained silent.
"What are you up to House?"
"Nothing."
"Oh come on, this is me you're talking to."
"None of your business, Wilson."
Wilson pursed his lips, angry that he was getting the run around, "Fine," he said tersely. Wilson closed his cell phone, and headed back in to the hospital to search for his friend. He had clearly heard the tension and what he thought was possibly fear in House's voice. It was the fear he heard that scared him most; he hadn't heard that sound in House's voice for over a decade.
Passing through the main doors, Wilson knew the light at the clinic's front desk had most definitely not been on when he had walked by only minutes earlier. Growing more and more suspicious, Wilson walked towards the lamp and clearly saw that the lock box was open. With a growing sense of dread emanating from the pit of his stomach, Wilson placed an ear to the first exam room door. Hearing nothing, he moved on to the second and a bit of rustling sounded from the inside; he braced himself for the worst.
He opened the door slowly, knowing in his heart he'd find House in the exam room. Wilson's own heart dropped upon finding House sprawled out on the exam table, attempting to give himself an ultrasound. House looked up, threw his head back to rest on the table and sighed loudly, frustrated at having been discovered.
"Well, the good news is I'm not pregnant," House said, not looking him in the eye.
Wilson closed the door behind him and walked over to the table, silently. Tucking his chin, and glaring at House with a mixture of anger and worry, he wordlessly took the wand from House and began to search the ultrasound screen for any abnormalities. House said nothing, instead closing his eyes to allow Wilson to perform the procedure, almost grateful that he no longer had to hide his secret from his friend.
He performed a thorough exam, searching both kidneys and the liver. The left kidney was fine, no abnormalities, as was the liver. The right kidney however, had an extremely large mass.
"How bad?"
Wilson exhaled and pinched the bridge of his nose. Before he could respond, House opened his eyes and looked at the screen. He sighed deeply as he again rested his head on the table with a mirthless laugh. "Well, if there is a god, I bet he's laughing right now."
"How long have you been in pain?"
"Too long."
"Blood in the urine?"
"Yep."
Wilson shook his head, "I should have seen it sooner."
"I have to go; Mia's waiting," House said as he sat up.
"Where's Cuddy?"
"Emergency conference."
"I can stay with Mia if you'd rather-"
"No, concert's tomorrow."
"House, we need to do a biopsy, run tests, start treatment. We need to get a CT, make sure it hasn't spread."
"Yeah, I'll get right on that," he said flippantly.
"You need to take care of this; you can't ignore this."
"Concert. Mia. Some young rocker wannabe with high cheekbones named Sasha."
Wilson relented, "Promise me. Promise me that on Thursday, we will run the tests before work starts. No one needs to know."
"Want me to pinky swear and everything?" House said sarcastically as he stood. Wilson helped him up by the elbow and House jerked his arm free, shooting him a warning glance.
Wilson printed the ultrasound picture and tucked it into his pocket, trying to find the words that would comfort his long time friend without offending his intelligence. He couldn't find any. "Cuddy's going to…"
House cut him off, "No, Cuddy's not going to do anything because she's not going to find out. Doctor-patient privilege," House said, staring at Wilson intensely. "She can't know."
"You can't hide this from her."
"Nope, not Cuddy, not Shelby, sure as hell not Mia, not my team. My business, no one else's. You wouldn't have known either if you hadn't stuck your damned nose in the door."
Unable to deny him his right to privacy, Wilson nodded curtly. "We'll get through this. We don't even know if it's cancerous or not. Maybe it's benign, some kind of..."
"Don't patronize me, Wilson." House closed his eyes and tried to keep everything he knew about medicine from running through his brain.
"There are treatments, protocols, cancer trials. We'll find something." Wilson looked on at his friend, unable to keep the tears from welling up in his dark brown eyes, and knowing he couldn't keep his voice from faltering, Wilson put the ultrasound cart away, busying himself with ensuring it was properly cleaned as House sat up. They walked out to the parking lot together, in silence.
_______
House walked in to the nauseating smell of pizza and to a certain teenager who was fluttering about the house in anxious anticipation. Her joy made House smile for the briefest of moments.
"Uncle House! So, what time do we go? Do you think I'll need more than three outfits? What about binoculars? Should we bring some? I've got the tickets packed, Mom left a bag for you that's stuffed with your clothes, and Uncle Wilson's going to watch Red for me while we're gone." Mia rattled off a dozen more things, bursting with excitement.
House sat in the living room recliner and put his feet up, "You should get to bed, it's late. We'll leave about ten o'clock tomorrow morning."
Mia stopped and looked at him, concern crossing her youthful features. House wondered if she looked more like her birthmother, or her birthfather. He didn't know. He made a mental note to dig up the file Cuddy kept with Mia's birth information, so that he could look at the few pictures of Mia's birthparents that Cuddy had managed to secure.
"Uncle House?"
"Don't ask. I'm just tired. Go on, get to bed."
"Okay. I put the leftover pizza in the fridge if you want some." Sensing something was up, but not wanting to push, Mia placed a quick peck on her uncle's cheek and much to her surprise, he kissed the top of her forehead before she pulled away.
She studied him, thinking that perhaps his patient had died that day. "Love you."
"Bed."
She smiled at him before turning towards the hallway.
House kicked his shoes off, went into Cuddy's bedroom and shut the door, pulled out a spare t-shirt from the bottom drawer and headed into the bathroom. He'd kept several older t-shirts, several pairs of boxers and two pairs of jeans at Cuddy's for nights when Cuddy had to stay at the hospital or when she was away at a conference.
He ran a hot shower and stood under the faucet for as long as his leg would allow. When he was finished, he dressed in the clean t-shirt and boxers, climbed into Cuddy's unmade bed and pulled the comforter up to his chin. Smelling Cuddy on the pillow next to him, House closed his eyes and wished she was there with him; he wished he could tell her. More than anything else, he wished he could let go of that self-crippling hatred of being touched, instead wishing that just for once, he could allow her to hold him, comfort him. But that was not his way, and he stubbornly turned his cheek away from the heavily scented pillow and fell into a restless sleep.
_______
