2008

When House came back to work three weeks after being discharged, Wilson's office was still dark. Wilson was still away. Nothing seemed different – he seemed like he always was after nearly dying. The same House.

Cuddy wondered how sad it was that he had nearly died twice before – enough times for them to be able to compare his behaviour now and from before, after the shooting and after electrocuting himself.

They expected House to be subdued, or quieter… Or go in the total opposite direction and make all their lives miserable. Any change would have been an appropriate manifestation of the multitude of feelings that he must have been having.

What they didn't expect was for him to be the same. Other than the fact that he now relied on a forearm crutch, due to slight balance and coordination problems, and had more frequent migraines, he was still the same House. Eating in the rooms of coma patients, banging his cane on tables, avoiding clinic duty, and insulting them like there was no tomorrow. Or so the new team thought.

The old team, and Cuddy, however, could see that things were not quite right. House was just incredibly good at making everything seem fine. There was something off about him, but they couldn't tell what it was. Any attempts to talk to him about it were all rebuffed with a roll of the eyes and his signature deflections. He didn't even yell at them.

House didn't go onto the balcony much anymore. Chase and Cameron took to asking House to eat lunch with them. Most of the time, he said he didn't want to "interrupt your lovey-dovey sessions". But he said yes, sometimes, when it got too hard to bear. Cuddy lunched with him too, occasionally even paying for his lunch.

Every action has a consequence. On the physical body. More so on the emotional and psychological aspects. Right?

But House seemed to be coping perfectly fine.

Wilson found himself in Philadelphia, staying with his parents. It was a natural reaction.

He grew up in a warm and loving family where his parents showered care and love on him. The only blemish in their family was the disappearance of Danny. Wilson never forgave himself for that, but his parents did. They always forgave. That was the extent of their love.

So it was natural for him to head back home, to where they were, to seek comfort, like a child who had been frightened or hurt.

As he took time off for himself, to grieve for his loss and to simply recuperate, he found himself not missing House.

He'd been around House for so long. He'd never been away from House for more than a week at a time; it became so after the infarction, when it became clear that he was House's lifeline. He'd forgotten what it felt like to be away from House.

Not that he wanted to think about House at the moment. He didn't want to think about House at all. But House kept coming back into his thoughts. He didn't actually speak to House before leaving. After the funeral was over, he'd packed up, and returned to his parents' home. House was still in the hospital.

He still cried at night, sometimes, when he thought of how it felt to have Amber in his embrace in bed. Or when he came across her favourite flowers. All her belongings were still in her apartment, untouched. But he had brought along her favourite t-shirt – he swore it still had her scent on it. And he took it out at night, sometimes, when it got too hard.

He expected House to call him, or look for him. He didn't know why. Maybe he wanted an apology? But then again, he was pretty sure he didn't want to speak to House.

He could leave Princeton, and never look back. He could leave all the painful memories behind. The very fact that House occupied his thoughts even when he didn't want him to, was a very sign that House had overtaken his life. And he was a toxic influence. Like poison.

As Wilson spent the days grieving, yet trying to forget, he found himself calculating the value of their friendship. The good and the bad. But more often than not, the bad memories would rise to the surface.

And then he realised that all he'd been doing was giving. And House just kept taking and taking and taking. And what kind of friendship was that?

As his bereavement leave neared its end, and Wilson faced the prospect of returning to Princeton (and his life with House), he decided that it was time to stop giving. And that he could, perhaps, go on with life without House. But still, he held off on making a decision.

When time came for him to really return to PPTH, he could feel the weight of it all settling upon him, and he couldn't breathe. He just couldn't return to whatever he had with House. How could he resume a friendship with someone who had killed his girlfriend, who constantly took but never gave?

So he made up his mind for real that it was time to get the hell out of Princeton and away from House.

When Wilson finally managed to step into PPTH, he saw House from afar. He saw the forearm crutch. But all he felt was grief, for what had happened, and a desire to leave. Whatever concern he would have felt for House, was just overwhelmed by his own sense of loss.

He was in his office, settling all his administrative matters in preparation for his departure, when Cuddy entered.

"Wilson… What is this?" She placed his resignation letter on his desk as she sat down.

"Massachusetts General offered me a position as Assistant Head of Oncology."

"Wilson…"

"It's a great offer. I'll have more time for my patients."

"Don't do this. I know it's not – "

"Don't talk to me about him."

"You haven't even asked about him."

"I… don't want to know," he shrugged. He really didn't. It seemed unfair to him, somehow. That House should survive, but not Amber. Who was it that decided such stuff anyway?

"He's having balance and coordination problems. And still has absence seizures. He misses – "

"No, don't say it."

"He's your best friend."

"Stop, Cuddy. Stop. Just… I don't want to talk about him."

"He nearly died too, Wilson," Cuddy said sharply. The memory of giving House mouth-to-mouth was still etched in her mind. It had been terrifying. "He gave all he had. He went into cardiac arrest, and did the deep brain stimulation despite his skull fracture!"

"He… he wouldn't have had to do that if she wasn't on the bus." But even that sounded feeble to him.

"The two of you need to talk about this. You can't just run away from the problem."

"I am not running away, Cuddy," Wilson put down his things, and for the first time in the whole conversation, really looked at her in the eye. "I've just had enough. I'm not going to keep giving anymore. I could have been the one on the bus, you know that? I've had enough. It's time for me to leave. This friendship… I don't even know if it's a friendship if I'm the one who keeps giving. And enabling."

There was a long silence in the room. There wasn't even a peep of noise from House's office, from which there would be the usual thunk of the tennis ball or cane, or voices engaged in a heated differential. It was just... silent.

"I'm not accepting this letter of resignation," she said, desperate. "You…"

He managed a half-smile at her. It was more like a grimace. "I'm leaving anyway."

There was the obligatory farewell party. It wasn't really a party since the whole hospital knew that Wilson was still grieving, and of course, what the real reason behind his leaving was.

Wilson was sure that he had done his very best in PPTH as a doctor. A fellow department head came up to him and clapped him on the back, "You've left behind some pretty big shoes to fill." He was leaving behind a great legacy – the Oncology Department of PPTH was one of the best in the world, and the remission rate of his patients was one of the highest in the country. He had done his best.

Cuddy came, as did House's team members. They went up to him, and exchanged the obligatory niceties. But Wilson didn't miss the sullen and rather hostile undertones in some of their words. But Cuddy must have talked to them, for there were no attempts to get him to reconcile with House, or to change his mind.

House himself, was not present. Not that Wilson expected him to be.

When Wilson went up to his office to remove all his stuff, he found House sitting on his couch. His head was on his cane, and he was huddled over as he thumped his cane on the floor. Like a little boy, thought Wilson. But that didn't matter.

And so, the final thing he left behind in Princeton, were the words that came out of his mouth just before he walked out on House. He felt like he'd never said words that were more true.

"I don't blame you for Amber's death. As much as I've tried to find a way to, I couldn't. But we're not okay. I didn't want to tell you the truth. I'm tired of protecting you and enabling you. We're not friends anymore, House. I don't think we ever were."

He packed up, and left the very next day.