A/N: Feedback's magic! It makes me love you, like I love Ivy3, Dr. Rebecca Chase and Rose12345 because they REVIEW!
Disclaimer: Not mine. Don't sue.
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Wilson was the perfect man. He was the nice guy, the good doctor and son, the fantastic cook who could charm you in an instant and could make you feel like a better person with just a few words, who got thanked for telling you you're going to die. He could make you grateful for everything and sorry for nothing. He was that guy who made more money than you, who drove a better car and owned a bigger house, and yet somehow next to him you felt rich, because his mere presence made whatever was wrecking your day seem insignificant.
And yet, as a human being, he sucked.
He was lonely.
Because out of all his great attributes, Wilson had no idea how to love, only to need. He could charm you, make you believe, make himself believe. It's how he ended up in three failed marriages. He could fall in love and have you falling too. And falling, falling felt good, until you hit the ground. And with James Wilson, you were guaranteed to hit the ground hard. Reality tasted like shit after the sugarcoating wore off.
Reality is shit.
Wilson smiled sadly to himself as he watched his latkes fry in a bit too much oil. Damn. They were going to be greasy. It didn't matter the season; he made his world famous potato pancakes year-round, never too dry or heavy or oily. They were always perfect. Except this batch. This batch was greasy.
He really was a great cook. It was part of his lure; funny, sweet, a doctor and incredible in the kitchen. He was the guy all those fifties housewives spent years screaming for their daughters to marry. And he did marry. Just not for long.
Wilson was magic. His magic just had the bad habit of dying.
Never see the downside. Never see. Never see...
He'd always been an idealist, lost somewhere far too far from actuality not to see the cracks of his relationships until it was too late. As long as he believed in his fellow man, as long as he never lost faith, there would always be some faith to be had.
Had he lost faith?
He ran his finger through his slightly frazzled hair.
He had lost faith.
He had never been a man who followed religion. Yes, he believed in God. He believed when there was nothing left to believe in, but as for praying, as for attending synagogue and acting as a brother to his fellow Jew, he was a failure. Hell, he couldn't even act as one to his own brother. How could he be expected to hold a nation on his shoulders? How?
He was a good man, but he was a broken man.
Wilson sighed, rolled his shoulders back and blinked a few times. If only he the world would stay in focus. He was going to burn his dinner.
Oh well, they're greasy anyway, he though hopelessly. Why bother trying to save what's already lost?
It's what he had said years earlier, in that final blowout with his brother. His mind seemed repetitive in its sleeplessness.
"Why are you condemning me? You don't condemn your goddamn cancer kids. Why don't you save me? Why don't you save me you goddamn hypocrite?"
Wilson winced at the memory. It wasn't his proudest moment, standing in the middle of a packed sidewalk, just standing there as the crowds filed past, his brother standing before him, clothes ragged, words slurred. He had once been older. He had once idolized that man. What turned him into a stranger he no longer recognized? What tore everything in his life apart?
When he was a kid, he had an uncle, a real sweet guy who never did anybody any wrong who died a slow, painful death; terminal brain cancer, a tumor that had metastasized everywhere. He had promised his parents he'd become an oncologist, a promise that had earned him a laugh and a pat on the back, a promise he never bothered to break. No, he just broke everything else. He needed the broken to survive, to fill his borderline addiction with fixing everyone and everything around him. Maybe that's why he hung out with House so much.
Wilson sighed for what felt like the millionth time, dropping his sizzling latkes onto an almost-clean plate.
House pushed and tweaked, nudging you closer to the edge with every passing day. Wilson wondered vaguely how hard he'd have to push before he fell past the point of no return. Why he let him was beyond most people's comprihension.
The truth was he was used to being shoved around. Not arguing was an added bonus on his marriages. Instead of screaming he just drifted away until one of them rediscovered actual human contact with someone they weren't married to. He wasn't afraid of the screaming. That's what his first two wives did when he told them about his affairs. He was, however, terrified of losing those around him. He didn't yell when he Julie told him about screwing her lawyer. By then he figured she was already lost, and the idea of another man seeing his wife that way, touching his wife, made him sick to his stomach. He knew he was a hypocrite. He knew he had no right ot be angry, no right to hate. He didn't hate Julie, or even Julie's goddamn lawyer; just himself for letting it happen, for being distant, for not screaming.
James Wilson didn't loose it. He didn't love. He needed, he hated. He was falling, falling anyway he could.
Nobody ever tried to catch him. Nobody ever tried.
Why bother trying to save what's already lost?
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Hey, if I get enough reviews, I'll include a bonus chapter where everybody gets together and gets drunk. Doesn't that sound nice? Worth the three minutes it takes to review?
Cuddy's up next, then House unless I get any requests for characters to come before him., (I'd like to wrap it up with House, sinse he sees everything and I can tie everything together with him the best.) That is, unless people review and I do my pass-the-whiskey chapter, which I promise, will be fabulous.
REVIEW!
