The Gauntlet

Chapter 21

"You're singing," Wilson exclaimed coming up to him in line at the cafeteria.

"No I'm not," House said grabbing another package of chocolate pudding to go with his bacon cheeseburger. He was completely unaware that he was humming along with the Muzak playing out of the speakers overhead.

"Yes, you are," Wilson insisted. "You're singing Christmas carols?" He dropped his voice low and leaned in close. "You had sex last night!"

"What? No," House laughed in disbelief. How the fuck could he possibly know that?

"No. You definitely had sex," Wilson pressed. "You only sing when you're drunk or you've had sex. And you're certainly not drunk, because you're standing upright, albeit it a little bit gingerly, which means - you had sex!"

House ignored him and moved down the line, stiffly. He grimaced as his glutes complained all the way up into his back. "You're so off base," he lied.

Wilson grabbed a yogurt and a banana and followed him, automatically taking out his wallet to pay the cashier. "Uh, uh. I think you hit all the bases and scored a couple of homeruns." They walked out to the seat to find a table. "You're walking like you're eighty-five."

"I have a bum leg," House protested.

They found a table with a booth. Wilson slipped in easily while House tried to casually glide himself in but his hammies were having none of it. He had to put his hands down on the bench and inch his butt in tenderly, much to Wilson's amusement. Damn it, he should have taken one of the tables with chairs. There was no way, Wilson was going to let this go.

"She's got to be amazing," Wilson speculated in awe.

House grinned, despite his best efforts to keep it under wraps, and shook his head chuckling. Rule number one was not to share out side of the two of them, but damn, he could not keep this information to himself. "We broke stuff," House said in bemused astonishment.

Wilson's mouth dropped open in astounded wonder. He squirmed around like he'd just won the jackpot. "I knew it! I knew it!" He actually did a fist pump. "Yes!"

House opened his pudding and licked the chocolate off of the foil wrapper. "That's what she said."

Wilson chuckled and leaned in conspiratorially. "You broke stuff?"

House nodded. "A five hundred dollar antique lamp and all three pictures going down the hall."

"Holly shit!"

"I know!" He dropped his voice to a whisper. "I literally cannot walk today."

"That good?" Wilson stared at him in amazement.

"Remember your yoga instructor from last summer," House reminded him and Wilson nodded in dazed reminiscence, "the one that fucked up your back so bad you had to see a chiropractor?"

"Yeah…" he mused.

"That good. Maybe better," House bragged.

Wilson dropped his jaw even further open in bewildered envy. "So I assume you're going to keep seeing her…"

"Hells yeah!" House said confidently. "This 'friends with benefits thing' is the best idea ever. All the benefits of a relationship but without the relationship. It's perfect."

"You guys were fine this morning?"

"Totally copasetic," he said.

Wilson nodded, impressed.

"She was late coming in this morning, but I think we covered it pretty…"

Suddenly Wilson's eyes widened and he covered his mouth with his and to muffle his speech. "In coming…"

House looked over his shoulder; Thirteen was nearing him with a cup of hot tea in her hand and a salad wrapped to go. Her eyes narrowed at him when she saw the culpable look on Wilson's face and House kicked him under the table.

"Ow, hey…" Wilson whined reaching down to rub his shin.

"Stop looking so guilty," he ground out through his teeth.

Clicking her tongue, she set her chin angrily and stormed off in a huff. House dropped his eyes to his tray. "Fuck."

"What?"

"First rule was to keep it between us. She knows now that you know," he muttered.

"What is it like Fight Club, first rule of Fight Club is never talk about Fight Club?"

"Yeah, something like that," House said sarcastically.

"What, I'm not going to say anything," Wilson defended himself.

"I know that," he said. "They problem is she doesn't."

If he could move faster, he would have gone after her but there was no way he could get out the booth and catch up to her. Plus, it was probably better to let her cool off than to actually talk to her right now. So he left well enough alone and finished his lunch. He'd deal with her pissiness later.

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After lunch in the Diagnostic's office, House had decided that maybe Kutner's Secret Santa thing could have some benefits of its own. He could sow some dissention and have fun watching them scramble to impress him.

In a decidedly cheerful mood, he wrote out names on little pieces of paper and folded them in fours.

He saw them coming down the hallway from between the slats of the blinds covering the glass wall. Thirteen entered the room first and tossed the file at him with a little too much English on it, sending his papers fluttering off the table. "Nothing in the Ecstasy except Ecstasy."

"Well that never hurt anybody," he muttered sarcastically as he bent from the side to pick up his slips of paper. Ah God, even bending to the side fucking hurt. And she was pissed. He could tell because her eyes were burning a whole through his shirt right down to his skeleton. Okay…

Foreman took a seat across the table from her and crossed his legs settling in. "Ecstasy can't make people blind days later."

House looked at one of the slips of paper in his hands, and frowned. "Do you spell "Homie" with a Y?"

Kutner glanced up from his seat next to him, intrigued, but House folded the paper up without letting him see what he'd written.

"I want to be respectful," House said in mock reverence. Foreman looked at him with a peculiar expression on his face and he responded by flashing him a disarming smirk.

Kutner sat in his chair and grinned like an idiot. "You're actually going to let us do Secret Santa?"

"Not just you guys," he said excitedly and turned around to grab a Christmas socking putting the slips of paper inside. Shaking it up to mix them, he said happily. "I like presents too." Thirteen eyed him from the corner of the table speculatively. If she raised her eyebrow any higher, it would have become part of her hair. Ignoring her, he grinned and offered the stocking up to Taub who was sitting next to him. "Pick a name."

Taub looked at him suspiciously. "Why are you doing this?"

House rolled his eyes. "See, this is why no one likes your people."

Taub scoffed almost looking offended. Everyone else just snorted in half-hearted contempt; Thirteen the loudest.

"The notion of picking one time of the year to be decent to other people is obscene, because it's actually validating the notion of being miserable wretches the rest of the year," House explained.

Foreman laughed dryly. "So you think this is the part of the year that's screwed up?"

House shrugged. "On the other hand, you are now a team," he said looking at Thirteen. "Gotta work together and the simple fact is, giving people crap makes people like people." She rolled her eyes at him and he smirked. "So spend twenty-five bucks." He turned to Taub. "Learn to love…"

Taub stared blankly at him seemingly unimpressed but deciding it was best to indulge him anyway. He shoved his hand in to pick a name out of the stocking.

Thirteen shot him a disgusted glare and looked at Foreman. "Blindness could be a complication from the hemodialysis," she said, avoiding all parts of the Christmas conversation.

House offered the stocking to Kutner next who smiled graciously and stuck his hand in.

"No, the dialysate composition was within range," the young puppy disagreed looking at the name on his slip of paper. He nodded smiling to himself, pleased with his choice. "Sweet."

House eyed him curiously. "Interesting."

Thirteen shot House a look of annoyance. "The dialysate composition just indicates…"

"Indicates nothing…" he cut her off. "I was referring to his reaction to the name he got."

Kutner chuckled joyfully. "I was pleased. I thought it'd be fun to buy for…"

"Means… there's someone here who wouldn't be fun to buy for…" he said cutting Kutner off too and stared at him purposefully. "I wonder who?"

House turned his attention to Thirteen next who looked like she was about to pummel him with a very blunt object. Ooo, she's fierce when she's pissed … and he was pushing all of the right buttons today. He reached across the table to offer up the stocking to her and winced as his back twinged in achy discomfort. She raised her eyebrows pointedly at him and he narrowed his eyes. "Pick a name, then go check out the patient's house," he ordered.

Begrudgingly, she obeyed and stuck her hand into the stocking. He squeezed her hand while it was in there and she fired a laser glare at him yanking her hand out. She looked at her choice and push out her chin, thoroughly displeased with her selection. Crumpling it, she shoved it into the pocket of her lab coat presumably to forget about it.

House smiled slowly. "Interesting…"

Thirteen looked at him and they locked eyes for a moment, the electricity crackled between them. She almost smiled, but caught herself remembering that she was mad at him. Instead she narrowed her eyes even more at him and looked away making him chuckle to himself. She'll come around; she's not immune to him like she thought she was.

"We're wasting time going to the home," Foreman announced taking a name from the stocking. He tucked it into his jacket's inner pocket without even looking. "Kearns-Sayer syndrome fits the symptoms."

House shook his head. "No family history of Kearns. Go to their house…"

Thirteen shook her head. "They would have told us if there were any other drugs," she interrupted him. "You met her, she couldn't have been more candid."

He breathed impatiently. He hated when she cut him off like that. "You're absolutely right. Go to their house…"

"MS or a vascular problem fits better," this time it was Taub who cut him off. "They could affect hands and eyes."

House let out a breath. "Fine. Do an MRI, check for MS. And a fluorescein angiogram of her eyes to see if we missed a bleed somewhere," he ordered begrudgingly. The group rose from their seats ready to leave. "Oh! And whoever goes to their house… get me their computers."

They all look at him obviously frustrated that he wouldn't drop the subject. Didn't they know how stubborn he was yet?

"You talk to your kid about sex so she'll think you're being open about everything. Keeps her from asking questions about the things you don't want to talk about," he justified his insistence on them going to the house, reaching in to grab the last name from the stocking for himself.

Thirteen put her hand on her hip forcing her curve to jut out seductively at an angle that made his mouth go dry. HE knew what was under those sexy jeans and that blouse, and it was getting a little warm in there. "That's right," she said drolly. "Her honesty proves just how dishonest she is." Uh oh, there was that subtext again… Wow, she was really mad at him.

Forcing himself to ignore her, he looked at his slip of paper. "Yes! Exactly who I wanted," he exclaimed merrily. "This is going to be fun."

She rolled her eyes one more time at him and stormed out of the office bitching to Kutner about having to go all the way to the patient's house on a wild goose chase for lies they'd never find. Kutner followed after her like the little puppy he was. House shook his head and laughed out loud. This whole day was chalking up to be quite interesting.