I DON'T MIND IF YOU FORGET ME

Cuddy was tucking Rachel in for her nap. She sometimes worried that all the baby did was sleep, but she was grateful for it just the same. It gave her time to get some work done. She hadn't been able to do much of anything these past few days.

She tried to banish House from her mind, but every time she did it just made her think of him more. She called Mayfair, as soon as Wilson told her that's where House was, but she wasn't allowed to speak to him. They said they could relay a message but she told them not to bother. She had nothing to say; nothing that could be conveyed in a message anyhow.

Instead she buried herself in her work and showered attention on her daughter. She tried to avoid Wilson. All he wanted to talk about was House. All she wanted to talk about was House too, but it was pointless. He was gone.

The team seemed to adjust better than she'd expected. Foreman was more than happy to take over the lead role and though he relied heavily on consults from Chase and Cameron and even Wilson, he was managing to make some progress on the case she had given him. It was an easier case than she would have given House, but then, the team wasn't as capable without him. And the hospital was quiet.

She didn't like the calm organization that was slowly becoming her life. House hadn't been brought up once during yesterday's Board Meeting. It was a first. It was also the shortest, most productive meeting she'd chaired. She should have been happy about that, but she felt empty. She liked debating the reasons to keep House on staff, she liked arguing over his wild antics. She liked the conflict. It made the day go faster.

This week, at least the part of it she had managed to get through so far, seemed to drag on forever. House had only been gone four days and it felt like a lifetime had passed. She felt like Rachel should be out of college, starting a career or getting married by now, but she was still an infant. She still wore diapers and drank from a bottle. Rachel cried in the other room.

"I'm coming." Cuddy took off her glasses and closed her laptop. She switched from administrator to mother in a heartbeat. Neither position seemed as satisfying as it used to. "What's wrong?" She said in a cooing voice as she swept Rachel up into her arms. "Shhhh." She bounced her daughter up and down gently, swaying around the room in a sort of maternal dance. "Shhhh, it's okay." It didn't feel okay.

Rachel could sense it and cried some more. Something had changed in the woman with the bright blue eyes. Something was different. Rachel didn't like the change. It made her feel sad. She wasn't yet able to associate the change with the absence of the annoying man with the cane. She just knew that she was glad he was gone and she was getting all Cuddy's attention now. Only, now that she had it, she wasn't sure she wanted it.

"I don't know what you want?" Cuddy, who had taken a while to even feel a connection with Rachel, felt it slipping away. She wished the infant could tell her what was wrong. She wished she didn't already know that it was her that was wrong.

She had read somewhere that babies could sense feelings. They could tell when the people around them were sad or stressed or happy. It was important to try to stay upbeat and positive around new babies, so that their first impressions of life were good ones. Cuddy was failing miserably.

She began to cry. As she held Rachel in her arms, in a tight hug that she needed more than the baby did, she cried. When he was around, she convinced herself she didn't want House, he was too much trouble, he wasn't good for her, he couldn't be in a relationship, but now that he was gone, all she could think about was when she would see him again, how he was doing, and if he meant it when he wrote that he loved her.

She still had the note. She couldn't bring herself to throw it out. It was crumpled and the words had been blurred by tears, but she still looked at it every night and saw the words "I love you" as if seeing them for the first time. And her heart caught in her throat every time she whispered back "I love you too."

Wilson wasn't having any better luck trying to move on. He called Mayfair every day, left messages of support and encouragement for House, but he never got a message back. He drove by the hospital on Tuesday, adding an extra hour and a half to his commute home, hoping to catch a glimpse of his friend. He arrived home late and disappointed and fell asleep in his clothes on the couch watching old reruns of MASH.

He was starting to cancel appointments and skip out on his patients. That's when Cuddy had to step in. She knocked on his office door even though it was wide open. "What?" Wilson looked up from an old article about House.

"I wanted to see how you were doing." Cuddy smiled warmly and took a few steps inside.

"Suddenly you care?" He had been hurt that she was avoiding him.

"Of course I care. You are…"

"House's best friend?" Wilson looked up at her. She could tell he hadn't slept.

"You're my friend James." She sat down across from him and reached out to take his hand. He pulled it away.

"You only care because House isn't around for you to take care of."

"You don't want to go there." Wilson was notorious for 'taking care' of House, often with disastrous results.

"No, I don't." Wilson was a defeated man.

"Have you heard from him at all?" She wasn't sure if she wanted a yes or no answer. She wanted to know that House was alright, but she would be hurt if he was ignoring her.

"No. You?" Wilson looked up at her hopefully.

"No." She thought about why she'd come to see him. "If you need to take some time off…"

"Are you?" He challenged.

"No. I…"

"Thank you Lisa, but I don't think sitting around my house all day is going to help."

"No." She got up to leave.

"Lisa?"

"Yes?" She looked down at him, not wanting to sit and prolong the visit any more.

"Do you want to go get something to eat after work?" Wilson looked nervous. His fingers were twisted together under his desk.

"I don't think that's a good idea Wilson." Cuddy was back to being his boss.

"No. You're right." He tried to brush off his disappointment. Then he realized she might have thought he was asking her on a date. He blushed. "I just thought we could talk, you know, commiserate?"

"I don't want to commiserate." She wanted House back. Wilson seemed to understand and let her go.

House sat in his room doodling on a sketch pad. Dr. Fry had signed him up for art therapy classes. So far every one of House's pictures had been a big bottle of Vicodin. His teacher was not impressed. But today he wasn't drawing Vicodin. This wasn't a picture for class. It was a doodle and the doodle looked remarkably like a woman he knew.

The dark curly hair fell over bare shoulders, the penetrating blue eyes were marked by light shading with the pencil, the gently slope of her neck had been erased several times until he got it just right. He was working on her breasts now, taking his time. He closed his eyes as he tried to remember them. He held his hand out as if cupping one of them in it and he sighed.

"Knock, Knock," Fry said obnoxiously as he stuck his head in the door. "Are you busy?"

"Yes." House hid the painting quickly. It was not something he planned on sharing.

"You have a visitor." Fry stepped into the room and House's heart stopped beating as he waited for Cuddy to walk in. His heart started again as he laid eyes on someone he'd never seen before.

"Who the hell is that?" It certainly wasn't Cuddy, or even Wilson. Hell, it wasn't even one of his team.

"This is your physical therapist, Jeanine." Jeanine was not House's idea of a physical therapist. She was short and squat and squinted through pale eyebrows.

"I don't need a physical therapist." House wanted to get back to his drawing, or maybe play a little piano, or his guitar, or diagnose a case or anything but physical therapy with Jeanine.

Jeanine and Dr. Fry shared a look. It did not escape House's notice.

"I think it would be best…" Dr. Fry began.

"I don't really care what you think." House snapped. He was in a foul mood today. The pain was wearing on his nerves.

"You've made that abundantly clear, and yet, I still think it would be best if you spent some time with Jeanine to discuss pain management options."

"There is only one pain management option I am interested in," House said through gritted teeth.

"But that option is no longer available to you." Fry remained calm, annoying House even more than a fight would have.

"Then we have a problem because I am NOT doing physical therapy!"

Fry smiled patronizingly. "That is your problem Mr. House. Not mine." Fry was still respectful of House's privacy and did not tell anyone at the hospital that his patient was a doctor.

"YOU are my problem," House snapped.

"And for the moment, YOU are Jeanine's problem." Fry bowed his way out of the room and shut the door leaving House and his new acquaintance to get to know each other better.

"You can leave," House informed her.

"Or I could stay, and you can either ignore me or listen to what I have to say. I get paid either way." Jeanine sat down at the desk and stared him down.

House chose to ignore her. He could hear her talking but the words were just white noise. He felt frustrated because all he wanted to do was get back to his drawing, to finish putting Cuddy's body on paper for him to pull out and stare at as he drifted off to sleep each night. Instead he was stuck listening to Jeanine drone on about low impact jumping jacks and kick boxing moves he could do in his tiny little room as well as the fully equipped gym facility he would now have access to.

House really didn't care about kick boxing or treadmills. He had already found the activity that removed his pain completely, and it just so happened to be one of his favorite things to do. So why, when he finally got to do it, did he run away and hide himself in a locked down medical facility? What was he so afraid of?

Jeanine finally left after an hour of babbling incoherently, at least it was incoherent to House who wasn't listening, and finally he was alone. He pulled the drawing out from under his pillow and looked at it. It wasn't that good, art had never been his forte, but it was passable. It looked like Cuddy, within the constraints of his talent.

He set back to work, remembering her body and putting it to paper. With each memory came a surge of adrenaline and a minor relief from his pain. When the drawing was done, her full body laid out in pencil before him he looked at it, and he rewarded himself appropriately.

His mind flashed through their moments together as his hand quickly glided up and down under the sheets. All the times they had been together meshed together in his head, a flash of undressing here, a suck of a nipple there, all in bits and pieces as he continued to stroke with greater ferocity.

He wondered where she was and if she was thinking about him. She would still be furious with him for leaving, but she would get over it eventually. Maybe even get over him. He groaned as the effects of his work began to take hold. He told himself over and over as he continued to work himself into a frenzy that he wanted her to get over him. He wanted her to forget she ever knew him. That was why he came here. That was why he ran. He wanted to give her a chance to start over.

But House wasn't that altruistic. He didn't do things for other people. He did things for himself. And he knew she wouldn't forget him. He knew she was suffering. He wanted her to suffer the way he was. He wanted to know he was not alone. He felt the flood of relief issue forth onto his sheets. The cleaning crew hadn't said anything yet about the mysterious marks on his sheets. He doubted they would start now.

As he slipped off to sleep he thought of her. He couldn't have known that she was lying in bed thinking of him, but he hoped. He couldn't see her curled up with Rachel cradled in her arms. He didn't know how much his absence was affecting her because he hadn't heard from her since he committed himself and he hadn't reached out to contact her either. He thought it was better this way.