Therapy: 6th Sense (I See Dead People)
Rating: K+ (rated E for everyone!)
Summary: NEW CHAPTER!House's counseling sessions at Mayfield
Words: 'bout 1,600
Disclaimer: Mine Mine Mine. Or not. Okay, I just asked House to come out and play with me…
Beta: Semi-beta'd by Belladionne – thanks! All remaining mistakes are mine and mine alone.
Warnings/Spoilers: Includes events through Season 5 Finale. I have no idea of what will happen in Season 6 as I try to stay unspoiled.
Feedback: Reviews are like Vicodin – addictive and pleasing.
Ah shucks, you make me blush…
Author's notes: Oh frak FraK FRAK! I've been trying to keep my brain free from any spoilers and they showed a preview for the two-hour opener after tonight's episode. Grumble, grumble… Well, now my thoughts are tainted and I'm not sure how AU this is going to be. Drat.

Music: Don't Let Me Get Me – Pink
The Authority Song – John Mellencamp

House! I hadn't expected you today. Glad you decided to come by.

I, um, I needed to talk.

That's what I'm here for. What would you like to talk about today?

I, um, I don't know. I just...I don't know.
I never really talk with anyone. I keep to myself. I always have. But I think I need to do more than that if I…If I want to get better.

As a kid, I learned to keep my own counsel. My father didn't want to hear about my problems and Mom was too busy trying to keep him happy to spend enough time with me. Dad thought I was weak. That I was a problem. He never gave me time to figure out an answer. If he asked me a question, I had to have the answer he wanted when he wanted it. He didn't see things the way I did and wouldn't let me come up with my own decisions and answers. So I stopped answering him and I stopped asking him anything.

But, everyone seems to think talking helps so I guess I have no choice.

I think-

Stop.
Don't talk.
This is hard enough.
Don't talk.

I was doing fine. Yes, I was in pain. Yes, I knew I was taking too much Vicodin. Yes, I gave up the chance of no pain when I passed on the Methadone. But I WAS TRYING. Why can't people acknowledge that? I don't want to be miserable and in pain, but I AM and no one seems to understand that. Everyone wants to think I can get over the pain – that's it's really not as bad as I think.

Wilson wanted me to be more social. Cuddy tried to get me to step up, to make a choice, to be a human being. I was trying because I knew it would make them happy and for some stupid reason that was important to me.

I was afraid Cuddy was going to give up her quixotic quest for a child so I made her angry. I treated her badly to get her to understand what she really wanted. And she didn't give up. She got her child. Doesn't matter that it means she'll never want ME now... I know I'm an addict and would be a terrible father figure. But I didn't want her to miss out on what she really wanted.

House-

I said DON'T TALK!
If you want me to do this, don't TALK.

…

I tried to be a better friend to Wilson. We went to visit his brother. I had a chance to meet Daniel and messed it all up. I had tried not answering my phone, not replying to the texts Taub sent. I WANTED to be there for Wilson. To give him the support he's always freely given me. But I couldn't. When he was talking about how it was his fault Daniel ran off, it just made something click in my brain. What was I supposed to do? Let my patient die? I knew Wilson would be okay. He doesn't really need me…

I tell Kutner he's doing a good job. I encourage him. And the bastard kills himself. What the hell did I do that would drive him to that? Why did I not know that was going to happen?

And then dead people start haunting me. Literally.

I know that they are hallucinations because I know they are dead.

House –

I will leave right now.
I will walk out of here and walk out the front door and not come back if you don't shut up right now.

…

The night I was with Cuddy… Or thought I had been with Cuddy. That was REAL. I KNOW it happened.

I felt her. I tasted her. I felt her against me. The smell of her was all over my bed and my body. The sound of her moaning with pleasure and delight filled my ears and made me hard.
The power she held over me. It made me feel so good. Made me feel whole. Needed. WANTED.
Hell, I remember having an orgasm that rocked the world.

How could that have just been in my mind? I mean, I'm good, but hell, that was more than I could have ever imagined.

How do I know what's real and what's not?

That this is really happening? Maybe everything is an illusion. Maybe I went into a coma after the infarction and all of this has been in my head.
Maybe the Methadone fried my brain and I'm in here because I'm a walking vegetable.

How do I even know that you're real? Maybe you're a figment of my imagination and I'll wake up and find out my entire life has been nothing.

…

That one wasn't rhetorical. I really need an answer to that one.

Wow!
That's a lot on your mind Greg. And we will deal with all of it, but in smaller pieces.

I'm really glad you were ready to share that with me.

Is all this anger why you've been so combative lately? Are you trying to determine what is real and what isn't? There are better ways to do that. And I think you know what is real and what isn't. You want to allow yourself to sink down as far as you can, then you won't be responsible for anything you do.

When I spoke with Dr. Cuddy when you admitted yourself, she talked about how reckless you had become in the past year. That you used to derive pleasure from "The Game" but how this past year, ever since Amber died actually, she thought that you were off a bit. She chalked it up to the loss of your father and your proof that he wasn't your biological father. Then she was caught up in her own life with her foster daughter and acknowledges that she let you drift. She's feeling guilty that she didn't, if you pardon the phrase, ride you harder. She knew that always got you going.

Then when she did try to get you to open up after Kutner's death, you just shut her down. You closed up so tight she couldn't find a way to break through.
She thought you had been seeking solace from Wilson and was so taken aback by your insulting her that she just had to step back and let things happen.

Now she regrets doing that.

But I think this is more than just your reaction to circumstances. You've always pushed. Always wanted to see what made things tick, even if you had to destroy the object, or person, in the process. But things have been pushing back a lot harder now haven't they?

Yeah.


It's in your nature to be aggressive, to look for the one thing that will really irritate someone, especially if they are an authority figure. You've been brutally unkind when you are upset, even when you don't realize you are upset over something. I gather that as a boy, you used to get into a lot of fights, skipped school whenever you wanted.

You have no personal boundaries when it comes to other people. No topic is off-limits. No one is allowed to keep something from you – you have to know everything.

And yet, you allow no one to get close to you. You don't let anyone in on your personal thoughts.

Yeah.


Greg, if you are serious about going home for your birthday, I'd like to invite Dr. Cuddy out for our next session. I think it would be best if you had a chance to see her and talk with her about what happened before you get back to Princeton. It's going to be stressful enough, you need to deal with your hallucination about the two of you and how it will affect your relationship. She is still your boss and she deserves your respect.

You'd still let me go home? Even after everything I said? The way I've acted lately?

I'm not sure I can see her yet.
I feel like an idiot for believing it could have been real.
That she would drop everything for me.

I think it's important Greg. If you want to go home next weekend, I am going to ask Dr. Cuddy to come in so we can lay some ground rules and agree on certain things that must happen and I want you to be able to talk to her here, in a safe place, in a way that makes it easier for you to discuss some of the things that have been going on with you.

Yeah. No. Yes. Maybe. I want to go home. I want things to be normal again. If I have to do this to go home, then you do what you have to do and I'll do what I have to do.

Normal is boring Greg. I'll set it up for a few days from now. If you want to talk before then, my door is always open.