A/N – Rating remains M for continued use of very strong language. I'm trying to wrap this up before the premiere, but it keeps getting more and more complicated (smiling). It's still my goal, though, to wrap it up before the premiere. Enjoy!
"Of course!" House replied. "Who else would it be?" House said, relieved that Wilson even accepted the call at all. "No, wait, that didn't sound right. I'm sorry. Please don't hang up!" House said frantically.
Silence from Wilson's end. House was ready to faint.
Wilson sighed. "What do you want, House?" Wilson said, with obvious frustration.
Ok, so it's gonna be like that, House thought.
Now it was House's turn to breathe deeply. Uncharacteristically, he found himself having to think very carefully about what he was about to say. Wilson could hang up any old time and then where would he be?
"Prison calls are terminated after ten minutes so I have to say this quickly. I'm sorry and I need to talk to you badly."
Wilson sighed loudly again. After a few seconds of silence, he said softly, "Yeah, and I need to talk to you too. I can't do this over the phone. I've already called the jail about visitation. They let attorneys in anytime but they only let family visit once a week. I told them I'm your cousin. Visitation is Friday and I'll see you then. Bye, House."
Wilson hung up before House could reply. It was Wednesday. House had a day and a half to dwell on the significance of the fact that Wilson obviously had something important to say and couldn't say it over the phone. I guess it's lecture time and he doesn't want to hear anything I have to say. He has a captive audience and I'm gonna have to listen to it in its entirety. Either that or he's dumping me altogether and he doesn't know how to tell me. If he knew how to tell me he was dumping me he would've done it on the phone. Guess I'm screwed. Again.
House made one more phone call to Sam Bell, to let him know he pled not guilty to the charge and that his bail had been set at twenty five thousand dollars.
Silence descended when House told him the bail amount. "Oh my God. That's high. They must have taken into account the fact that you tried to flee first. Can you make bail?"
"Yes but not until I see my friend Friday. I have no idea how that visit is going to go. If it goes Ok, he can get my money for me but it'll be at least a few days before he gets it. But hell, it could all go south very quickly…." House's voice became quieter and quieter.
"Well, I'm glad you pled not guilty to the charge. That gives us room to plead down to something less serious. I don't expect you'll hear from the plaintiff personally. If by some wild chance you should hear from her, I need to be informed. I've already contacted her attorney and we'll discuss that tomorrow. I should be there about ten am tomorrow. Ok?"
"Guess it'll have to be. Yep, Ok." House hung up the phone.
The only thing House had left to look forward to on Wednesday was another visit from the nurse to change his leg dressing and give him his evening medications. Wowwee. Oh, that and two more meals in the chow hall. Maybe he could find some other loner losers who didn't want to be bothered, and all of them could sit at a table and peacefully ignore each other while shoveling down their food.
Thursday rolled around, and it was more of the same. Wake at 5:30 am, shower for no more than fifteen minutes, then line up for the chow hall for breakfast. Then morning medications, and the only interesting part of the day was his visit with his attorney, Sam.
At ten am on the nose, the guard came to get House and announce that he had a visitor. Well, of course he did. House had been prepared for Sam for hours.
House made a dramatic point of sitting down at the table and planting his hands on top of it with emphasis, along with an irritated eye roll at the guard. He couldn't be written up for rolling his eyes, could he? The guard completely ignored House's attitude. Nope, eye rolling must not be a reason for a write up. Good. I'll have to do that more often.
Sam made his usual perfunctory announcement to the guard about these proceedings being confidential.
"After I got back to the office yesterday evening I drafted a letter to Ms. Cuddy's attorney of record. I'd like you to read it before we do anything else. If you agree, we'll send it by registered mail today." Sam pulled the letter out of his briefcase. It was a request for Lisa Cuddy to provide Mr. Bell with a written estimate of the amount of damage done to her house.
"They are not suing you for damages and that's good. We want to keep it that way. I want a written copy of the insurance estimate so that they can't come back later on and claim there was more damage than there actually was. It's minor but it's a good place to start. I've also already requested a copy of the police report. I know what happened, but we need a written copy of the police report in your file. I don't anticipate we'll have any problem getting the reports that Dr. Cuddy and Dr. Wilson filed with the police. Should have that tomorrow."
"Wait – Wilson filed a complaint too?" House knew about the police report Cuddy filed. Obviously she did or he wouldn't be here. He was stunned that Wilson filed one too.
"Technically, no. Maybe I should rephrase. He was at the scene when Dr. Cuddy called the police. The detective merely questioned him because he was there. The fact that he was injured would have drawn more police attention. Dr. Cuddy was the only one to press charges, but because they talked to Dr. Wilson and he was injured, there will probably be a separate report filed by the officer who spoke with Dr. Wilson. That doesn't mean Wilson pressed charges too. I can tell you most definitely that he did not. Basically what it amounts to is they probably have a separate report for each person they interviewed. They may have interviewed the other people in Dr. Cuddy's home. If they did I'll get copies of those reports too."
House was still hung up on the fact that Wilson talked to the police at all. The last time House was in trouble with the law it was during the Tritter mess. Not only did Wilson lie to get him out of trouble, so did Cuddy. Wilson was bound not to be so willing to manipulate the facts this time.
"Dr. House?" Sam was saying. "Are you with me?"
"Yeah. I have no idea how things are going to go with Wilson."
"We're going to plead down. I just need to review all of the police reports first before we decide what we're going to plead down to. I may also need character witnesses and I need you to think about who would be a good character witness. This will probably get very personal. They'll probably try some type of character assassination, to prove you're a vindictive SOB trying to get back at your ex-girlfriend, and they'll make it as nasty as they can. If you thought your breakup with her was bad, you haven't seen anything like the kind of character assassination that a trial attorney can do to the opposing side. You need to be ready for that. So when we meet tomorrow, there are two things on the agenda. I'll have the police reports and you'll have a list of potential character witnesses for me. Do you have any questions for me before we part today?"
"Yeah. Wilson is coming to visit tomorrow. I have no idea how it's going to go. He may be one of my character witnesses but it all depends on how it goes tomorrow. I don't really want you here for that."
"Good. It's just a friendly family visit, not a visit between a potential plaintiff and a defendant. Keep that in mind at all times. Don't let it turn into anything contentious. You keep saying that 'it all depends on how it goes.' Remember, you have the power to determine how it goes. Don't give that power up to anyone else. He probably will be very upset. That's normal. He's probably going to want to take it out on you. That's also normal. Remember that you have the power to make it work, to keep him on your side, or not. Don't give up that power. I'll see you tomorrow later in the afternoon after I've had a chance to get all the police reports. Bye for now."
After House was escorted out of the room and Sam Bell left, unknown to House, a caseworker in another part of the jail had just been handed House's jail paperwork. At Mercer County Jail, all inmates were assigned to a caseworker. There were woefully few caseworkers there, far too few to adequately meet the needs of the hundreds of inmates there. Most of the time all they had time to do for first-timers was read the inmate's arrest record and help the inmate bail out or post bond. If the inmate's case required any more work than that, and most did, it would have to wait until inmates with fewer needs had been taken care of. It was a simple statement of fact that there were not enough caseworkers to handle all of the cases. Now that House had had his bail hearing, the caseworker had a copy of the bail paperwork from the court. The caseworker's initial conclusion was that House appeared not to have many needs other than posting bail, so the caseworker was planning on meeting with House later on Thursday to help him with that process.
Back in his cell, again with the door closed but not locked, House buried himself in the tattered Steve Martini novel. He really didn't care all that much about the novel. He was trying to distract himself from the real issue with Wilson. Reading made the time go by faster and every minute spent reading was one more minute he didn't have to dwell on what Wilson was going to say.
The Thursday afternoon and evening routine varied not one iota from Wednesday's routine. Apparently the same damn things happened at exactly the same damn time every damn day in jail. The noise level didn't change either. It was deafening at night when everyone was locked down for bedtime, only slightly less deafening when inmates gathered in the rec yard outside during their one hour of rec time every day, and the only time it was even anything close to quiet was in the chow hall when the only reason everyone was fairly quiet was because they only had thirty minutes to throw down their food.
House had a visit from the nurse Thursday evening at the same damn time she came Wednesday evening. No doubt the nursing staff come Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and every other day at the same time in the morning and the same time in the evening. One day soon they would cut his nursing visits down to one in the evening with his Methadone. The nursing visit always went the same way. A guard came with the nurse. The guard went in first, then the nurse followed. The nurse did his dressing change, gave him his medications, watched him swallow them and then left. Five whole minutes.
Then it was time for another count, lockdown, lights out and bedtime. In other words, it was time for the volume to pick up about another hundred percent. House was learning to ignore the yelling. It became a nightly routine, like turning the TV on to go to sleep. The yelling became like white noise, something he was learning to ignore.
Friday morning rolled around with more of the same thing. Wake up call, another count, another morning visit from the nurse with meds, then chow. Showers were three times a week. House had his allotted shower on Thursday so no shower today.
Today was different. Family visitation day. Wilson was coming, hopefully. Or maybe he shouldn't hope for that. It could completely blow up in his face. It could be the last time he saw Wilson. Maybe it was like the lawyer said. Maybe he really did have the power to make it or break it. Maybe. Maybe if he just repeated that enough he would really believe it. I have the power to make it work. I have the power to make it work. I have the power to make it work. I have the power to make it work…
In the chow hall for breakfast, he tried very hard not to show how surprised he was to find they were serving silver dollar pancakes. He noticed when inmates had things they liked, those things tended to get taken from them. He didn't want anyone taking his pancakes. It wasn't so much that he was hungry for pancakes; he imagined they probably tasted like stale gum. The sight of the pancakes brought feelings to the surface that he'd tried to deny for so long, and also stoked the fire of profound fear in his heart that the subject of those feelings might be lost to him forever.
They reminded him of Wilson.
Instead of eating them, he secreted them away in his pocket. If Wilson was really through with House, at least he'd have the pancakes for a little while. Maybe that was stupid; but House was beginning to think that he'd done a lot of stupid things in his life. Maybe he deserved to lose Wilson. In House's mind, he'd screwed up every relationship he'd ever had. He was already convinced of this before Cuddy screamed that to him at the top of her lungs during the crane disaster. He felt that if his relationship with Wilson was in tatters, it was his fault too. That alone terrified him, but what terrified him even more was the knowledge that he had no idea how to fix it or even if it was fixable.
So he clung to the pancakes in his pocket as if they were a lifeline, hope for something left to salvage with Wilson.
Bob sat next to House before House could move. "Don't let 'em see you hiding food in your pockets. They'll write you up for taking food back to your cell," he hissed into House's ear. "The guards, I mean. Get your hand out of your pocket. They'll write you up."
"It's none of your business. I want to eat my pancakes later," House hissed in return.
"Don't care. Just don't let the guards see you," Bob whispered to House and then got up and left.
House scanned the room quickly. Nobody else appeared to have seen him pocket his pancakes, so he calmly ate everything else on the tray and went back to his cell.
With the Librium and Methadone on board, most of his withdrawal symptoms were held at bay. Alone in his cell, he laid on his back on his bunk and studied the marks on the underside of the bunk above him; marks probably left by other inmates. Most of them appeared to be gang graffiti. This was one language House didn't know. Judging by the ink on most of the other inmates, House knew that he would learn gang graffiti soon enough. A few of the drawings on the underside of the bunk were unmistakable and might come in handy later on when he needed relief of sexual tension.
Wilson popped back into his thoughts. He was never out of House's thoughts. House wondered if Wilson had ever seen gang graffiti. He wondered what Wilson would think of the new House, emerging from jail in a few months or years with a profound knowledge of prison life and gang graffiti.
Get back to the present. House pulled out another piece of paper and his trusty pencil. They only gave out one pencil at a time. Better guard it with my life.
He began to scribble his thoughts about what he was going to say to Wilson – that is, if Wilson even gave him a chance to talk. Most likely, it would just be one long lecture from Wilson. House figured that if Wilson wasn't going to give him a chance to talk, he'd just walk out and that'd be that. One more relationship down the tubes.
Have Wilson get loan paperwork from my 401k to cover the bail
Wilson bring it in, I'll sign and he can fax to 401k plan to get the money
All of this depended on whether or not he still had any kind of relationship left with Wilson. He'd find out soon enough.
The prison doctor came by to check up on House's leg, accompanied, as always, by a guard. Just as the brief examination was about to get underway, another guard came by to let House know he had a visitor.
Well, well. It was now or never. House combed his thinning hair and wished he could look in a mirror. Everyone thought he didn't ever care what he looked like. Far from it. He loved that rumpled macho look. He studied the balding top of his head a little bit. Sign of testosterone. That's a good thing, he reminded himself. He didn't think Wilson ever cared what House looked like, but House did. He wanted to look good and as normal as possible in this god-forsaken abnormal place.
House limped out slowly with a guard at his side. Inwardly he thanked the God he didn't believe in that Wilson didn't have to see him handcuffed.
House was escorted to the public visitation room. The room was crowded and he didn't see Wilson immediately. He scanned the faces in the room. The guard who escorted him from his cell led him to the back of the room until House recognized Wilson's khaki-clad butt sticking up in the air. House could see that each inmate had his own table. The inmate's visitors sat around the table with the inmate. At House's designated visiting table, Wilson apparently had dropped something on the floor and had bent over to pick it up; thus giving House the view he was initially presented with.
Wilson stood up when House and the guard approached. House expected an angry scowl or that furrowed brow Wilson had when he was about to begin lecturing House, but when Wilson stood up he bumped his head on the bottom of the metal table and both men broke out in an unexpected chuckle.
The guard left House's side and resumed his post elsewhere. There was one guard and there were plenty of security cameras in the public visitation area. Everyone could not help but read the signs regarding visitation rules because they were posted everywhere, in English and in Spanish.
"Visitation rules. Visitor and inmate are not allowed to exchange any items. Inmate must keep his hands on the table and visible at all times. Bodily contact between inmate and visitor is limited to a handshake or a hug. Visits last fifteen minutes and can be ended at any time at the guard's discretion."
Both men sat down at the table, neither knowing what to say. In their silence, both men looked at each other intensely, obviously trying to figure out what the other was going to say. Wilson was not in lecture mode. He appeared completely exhausted. House could read the worry lines, the exhaustion in Wilson's features. The way Wilson's shoulders slumped, the way his hair was not combed as neatly as it normally would be, the way his clothes were just the slightest bit unkempt and the way Wilson kept looking at House and then diverting his gaze to the table. Wilson would look at House for a few minutes and then dart his gaze back to the table as if he really, really didn't know what to say.
This could be good or it could be very bad, House thought. House was so sure that Wilson was going to launch into a harangue that he had no idea how to react in this instance. House was not prepared to be the first one to talk.
"I'm sorry I hurt you," House began, pointing to Wilson's splinted wrist.
"It's nothing."
"Yeah, it is. I hurt somebody I love. I'm telling you I'm sorry."
Wilson looked at the table again, sighed, and raised his gaze up to meet House's again. "I accept your apology. You don't love me, so don't say that you do."
"Wilson," House said, and then buried his head in his hands. Crying would not do, and neither would leaving. No, he would stick this one out. He just didn't know what to say, so he kept his head in his hands.
"If you loved me, you wouldn't have forged prescriptions in my name. You would have gone to a pain doctor and gotten properly prescribed treatment. If you loved me, you wouldn't have electrocuted yourself. If you loved me, you wouldn't have shot yourself up with insulin. I know you were mentally ill then but House, mentally ill people are still capable of not hurting people they love. If you loved me, you wouldn't have tried to play a trick on me in Mayfield and get me to do something that would have gotten you in more trouble there. If you loved me, you wouldn't have done something to warrant incarceration where I can't be with you. You say that you love me, but you don't show it."
With his eyes closed and his head in his hands, House's emotions internally were at war with themselves. In House's mind, crying would show weakness. Although the tears were bubbling to the surface, House would never show them. That was how he was raised and he couldn't overcome fifty one years of training in the skill of how not to cry in public. He also had the option of just leaving right now without saying anything, but dammit, this is a conversation, not a lecture, House thought. I won't be lectured to. Not this time. A conversation requires more than one person to talk. I gotta figure out what to say.
"Are you going to say anything?" Wilson asked.
House sighed and raised his head from his hands. His eyes were red but not wet. "Why have you stuck with me all these years?" he asked.
Their fifteen minutes were almost up.
"Don't leave me."
"House, I'm not leaving you. But we have to figure out where we stand. I don't know where we stand. It won't be easy. Maybe you'll get the help you need in here. I don't know; maybe I need help too. I just wanted to come today to see how you were."
The announcement came over the PA system that the fifteen minutes was up. All inmates and visitors had to leave. Guards began to escort inmates back to their cells. Visitors were instructed that they were to remain where they were until all inmates had left. House and Wilson stood up to say goodbye to each other. Despite what Wilson said, House went back to his old adage that everybody lies, and was certain that Wilson would leave and never come back.
"I need some paperwork from my 401k retirement plan so I can get a loan for my bail. If you're coming back, would you mind getting that for me?" The guard was escorting House out, so House had to raise his voice for Wilson to hear him.
House actually did not ask me to loan him the money directly. Hmmm, Wilson thought.
As House was being escorted away, Wilson said quietly to himself, "Sure, House. No problem."
