Many thanks to everybody who read and reviewed the last chapter. Even though we're heading into Angstville, please keep them coming! :)

There were a couple of things that people wanted clearing up, so I'll do my best to give a satisfactory explanation. Firstly, someone was curious about why I chose to have him dream about Wilson when their loose ends were tied up. I think there are two reasons. His best friend was always the one he took advice from, so it's not too much of a leap for his subconscious to conjure him up when his mind is trying to lead him in a certain direction. Guilt is also a major factor here too. For some inexplicable reason, in his own mind at least, now that he has everything he wants, a part of him would contemplate the justness of him having it all, whilst Wilson died a long and lingering death with just him at his side. This wouldn't be House if he wasn't well versed in self-sabotage.

Also, over the course of the story, a few people have wondered if I was going to put House and/or Cuddy in therapy. I did consider it for a while, but I wanted to do things a little differently from FWYS. I absolutely do believe that House especially needs to sit down and talk to a certain person, but it's not a therapist. More on that next chapter…

These two are not my property.

As Cuddy redressed his wound, House sat on the edge of the bed and stared gravely at the carpeted floor beneath his bare feet, unconsciously clawing his toes into the pile. His entire body hurt, but not in a fully present way. The pain was like an echo and mostly he just felt numb, as if his mind was enveloping him in an invisible force field that would protect him from what he was about to do., and readying him for the impending battle ahead. He'd put it off for long enough.

"How's the pain?"

"Fine," he mumbled back, his thoughts still elsewhere.

"It's healing well," Patting the sides of the dressing down and then removing the gloves she was wearing, she dropped them beside her. "The wound wasn't too deep and the scar should be pretty neat. I guess we were lucky the blade didn't do more damage."

"Great."

Hearing his lack of enthusiasm his girlfriend tried to change the subject, her hand initially seeking to touch the bruised expanse of his back, but stopping half way through the movement and resting it back on her own lap. Something was up. There'd been an air of gloom about him since he'd woken up at the hospital a few days before; not that she'd expected him to be especially ecstatic about having been attacked, but he'd been unusually quiet and contemplative to the extent that most conversations had seemed beyond him.

"Gabe and Rachel are really excited about coming home tomorrow. They're dying to see you."

"You should ask Julia if they can stay with her for a couple more days."

"Why?" Cuddy quizzed, confused by the suggestion. She'd accepted him not wanting to see them for the few days he'd been in hospital. He'd insisted it wasn't the place for them and she'd gone along with it, suspecting that he hadn't wanted them unnecessarily worried after the night they'd slept in his room.

"Because…" Inhaling deeply, he finally turned to look at her. "Because I think we should break up."

Feeling as if the wind had been knocked out of her lungs, Cuddy audibly gasped, momentarily incapable of responding. She must have misheard, or he was just messing around.

"House, if this is a joke, it's not funny."

Slowly he shook his head.

"I'm not joking. This just isn't working for me."

"What isn't working? We were fine before this." She paused for a second, her mind racing to find a possible explanation and then it hit her. "You're still mad at me for inviting your Mom over without asking you. You blame me for what happened to you… I apologised for that, and maybe part of this was my fault, but…"

"We weren't fine before," he interrupted. "At least I wasn't… This is nothing to do with you inviting my Mom over, or the mugging… This is me finally having the balls to tell you that I want out."

Needing to move away from him, Cuddy got to her feet and paced backwards and forwards across the room, her palm rubbing her own cheek as she tried to solve the conundrum. None of this made any sense.

"This is bullshit! I would have known if you were having doubts."

"I can be pretty convincing at making things seem like they're ok," House shot back, his eyes catching hers as she eventually stood still at the other side of the bedroom and glowered at him. "You know that."

"So how long have you been feeling like this? Weeks? Months?"

He shrugged.

"I don't know."

"Yes you do! How fucking long have you been thinking about bailing on me?"

Letting his head drop back down, once more he regarded the floor to avoid looking at her.

"A few weeks I guess, maybe a little longer. It crept up on me for a while."

Instantly Cuddy scoffed in disbelief.

"So for all that time, whilst you were working up the courage to tell me that you wanted to end this relationship, you were still screwing me because sex is sex, right?" Shocked, House's head shot up to look at her, quickly noting the unbridled vitriol in her expression as she leant against the wardrobe, her palms flat against it as if she was steadying herself. "Thanks for making me feel even more worthless than one of your hookers."

Hearing her compare herself unfavourably with the prostitutes he'd slept with in the past, House closed his eyes, briefly doubting he was capable of going through with this before reminding himself why he was: no matter how much he was hurting her now, it would be better in the long run.

"I was confused. I should have said something before."

"And why now?" she barked. "Did angels visit you in the OR, and tell you dumping your girlfriend is part of God's plan for you?"

"Because what happened on Friday night made me realise I can't live like this anymore… I feel like I'm suffocating here, pretending to be something that I'm not."

Gradually her eyes widened as she realised what he was saying. This wasn't just about her. This was him backing away from their whole family set-up.

"So you're not just ditching me? You're ditching the kids too."

Nervously House licked his lips.

"I'm not father material, Cuddy. I never was… I just went along with it because I felt I had to."

"You were the one who asked to see him!" she shouted back, her cheeks reddening with anger.

"I was curious about him."

"But now you're not?... Now you couldn't give a crap that he's just started trusting you? That he and Rachel love you like you've always been a part of this family?"

For a while House kept quiet as he considered how to answer. Inwardly his self-loathing had plumbed new depths, but he had to keep going. The more he made her hate him, the less chance he had of being able to take it back.

"Kids are resilient. They'll get over it… They'll barely remember me in a year or two."

Repulsed that he could be so casual about abandoning them, Cuddy folded her arms across herself and snarled at him.

"Why the hell did I let you back in my life?"

"Because when it comes to me you have a blind spot. You only ever see what you want to see."

Again there was a pregnant pause, the atmosphere thick enough to cut with a knife as they continued to stare at each other. Finally Cuddy shook her head vehemently.

"No, this still doesn't make any sense… I don't know why, but you're lying. We were happy. We are happy. Just tell me what's wrong and we can work through this."

Frustrated, House sighed.

"You want the truth?"

"Yes!"

"When you turned up in my life again I was bored. Finally after all those years of monotony you were offering me a case with a time limit that was actually a challenge." Purposefully he halted for a minute and squared his jaw brazenly, his pose deliberately screaming a closed-off arrogance. "And then there was a much bigger challenge. You… To be honest, I thought it would take a hell of a lot longer to get you back into bed, but you were so desperate you dropped your panties within no time at all… You even moved me in, and got me back into medicine. All I had to do was be nice to the brat you found in the crack house and the little freak we spawned last time we were together… It was easy. Too easy."

Finding it impossible to maintain her composure, tears began to form in the corners of Cuddy's eyes. She felt so betrayed, and yet still a part of her clung onto the hope that it wasn't true; that this was all some kind of horrible dream, and she was going to wake up any minute.

"You wouldn't do that. I know you."

"You didn't think I'd drive a car into your house either, but I did. What does that say about your judgement?"

Looking skywards, Cuddy jammed her tongue into her cheek and willed herself not to break down in front of him. There was no way she was going to add to her own humiliation by doing that.

"You're a two-faced, conceited asshole!" Gradually she was learning the man she thought she'd been in love with didn't exist, and the red hot fury was accompanied by an odd sense of mourning for the lie she'd loved. Everything they'd built up over the past months was crumbling before her very eyes.

"I'd rather be that than the pussy-whipped eunuch you seem to want a relationship with… The truth is you don't know me at all. You never did… I've been wrapping you around my little finger on and off for the past three decades, but now the novelty's worn off… You're just not a challenge anymore." Narrowing his eyes at her, and forcing an unnerving smirk to curve his mouth crookedly, he put the final nail in the coffin. "You're weak and you're boring, Cuddy. I don't do either."

And with that a strange calmness came over her, all her doubts melting away exactly as he'd planned. Now she was the one who was certain about what she had to do.

"I want you gone in the morning," she retorted coolly. "If it wasn't for the fact you've just come out of hospital, I'd be throwing you out right now… You make any attempt to come near me and my children, and I'll find a way to have you thrown back in prison again. Do you understand me?"

House nodded.

"Believe me, I've got no intention of coming back."

If it was possible to see the exact moment when someone's heart broke, he mused that was probably it. All the hatred rapidly drained from her features and was replaced by a deep-seated sadness and emptiness that he too was experiencing, but couldn't show. More than anything he wanted to hold her. To tell her that he didn't mean any of it. That he loved her and the kids, but he couldn't and it was killing him.

From a few feet away he watched her turn her back on him and approach the door, pausing and looking over her shoulder when her hand rested on the handle.

"If this is the monster you really are, you deserve every single ounce of pain you have in your life."

Not giving him the chance to respond, she opened the door and slammed it behind her, leaving him alone.

A state he was going to have to get used to all over again.

After awkwardly lumbering down the hall, House dropped his bag onto the floor near the door and turned to see Cuddy sat listlessly in the living room, her faraway gaze locked onto the blank television screen, as the early morning sunshine bled through the window and seemed to light her up ethereally, almost as if some kind of cosmic joke was being played on him, reminding him how stupid he was for letting her go like this. Tentatively he ambled towards her, straight away noting her red, swollen eyes that betrayed the tears she'd shed during the night and her complete lack of rest. Then he saw the empty strip of tablets on the coffee table, his own tired eyes bulging in panic.

"What have you taken?"

Irritably she rolled her own.

"Your ego must be really over-inflated if you think I'd be suicidal over you dumping me… I had a headache. There was some aspirin in the kitchen."

Not in the mood for another confrontation, he simply nodded and pulled his key from his pocket, placing it on the arm of the sofa next to her.

"I've taken most of my clothes, and my laptop." Glancing around him, he spotted the piano in the corner of the room and paused. He'd only been living there a few months, but already he'd had so many good memories of sitting down with Rachel and Gabe and teaching them to play. It hurt like hell to think he'd never do that again, but he was going to have to treat this situation like he was pulling off a band-aid: get it over with as quickly as possible. "Everything else you can keep or sell."

"I'd rather burn them," Cuddy snapped back.

"That's your choice," he shrugged, turning to leave when he caught her planting something square and black next to the house key he'd left.

"You want me to throw this on the bonfire too?"

Getting a better look at what it was, House's mouth gaped open a little: the small, leather box he'd last seen the night he was attacked.

"Where did you find that?"

"I couldn't sleep so I thought I'd start bagging your things up in the laundry. It was with the things we brought back from the hospital… So either you're a bigger asshole than I thought, and you've already found my replacement, or you're just a huge fucking liar?"

Witness to the utter disgust and confusion in her expression, he grabbed the box and sat down in the chair adjacent to her, lifting the lid and staring down at the ring inside, it's beauty seeming to taunt his previous idiocy. Days before he'd fought to hang onto it. Not just the ring itself, the future it represented as well. Now it seemed like a pipe dream. What kind of fool did he have to be to believe he could have what other people seemed to take for granted? That wasn't how it worked for him, nor would it ever be. He felt ridiculous for ever believing otherwise. That being said, he couldn't spout more lies. All night long her reaction when he'd rejected her had been there every time he closed his eyes, and he couldn't bring himself to be that cruel again. It was too much to bear.

"If I was less of a coward I'd tell you there was somebody else… That's she's younger than you, prettier and less hassle, but the truth is I've barely looked at another woman since we got back together. I've never been interested."

Bewildered by the admission, Cuddy frowned.

"Why would that make you less of a coward?"

"Because this would be so much easier if you hated me. You'd never forgive me if I cheated on you… This time there'd be no going back."

"Why would you want that?" she quizzed, everything he was currently saying seeming like a cryptic puzzle.

"What I want, and what needs to happen are two different things."

Sombrely she watched him continue to ponder the contents of the box, the sadness in his expression matching her own. This is all seemed so needless.

"Was the ring for me?"

"It doesn't matter now."

"Of course, it matters!... Were you going to propose?"

Running his fingers through his hair, he sighed in exasperation. This was the last thing he wanted to get into now, but with the physical evidence there of course she was going to press for an answer. It was in her nature too.

"Cuddy…"

"Don't bullshit me!" she cut in, sensing he was going to fob her off. "I spent the last night thinking I was going crazy. The least you can do is give me an explanation"

"I was going to ask you to marry me, yeah… But it would have been a mistake."

"Because you don't love me?"

"I love you," he shot back immediately, the words tripping from his mouth without him even having to think about them. "Some of the things I said last night, about you, about the kids, they were vile. I'm sorry… I just didn't see another way of drawing a line under this."

"I still don't understand why you want to."

"Because I was stupid enough to think that I've changed, and I haven't… I'm still the same idiot, who gets himself into trouble and then has to rely on other people to pick up the pieces." Stopping to look her squarely in the eye, he shook his head. "I won't do that to you or the kids. Not anymore"

"All of this has stemmed from you being attacked?"

"I was attacked because I walked out, got drunk in a bar at the wrong side of town and was stupid enough to start waving this ring around in front of a couple of knuckleheads. That's not really the behaviour of suitable husband material, let alone someone who's supposed to be responsible for two kids, is it?"

"Maybe you overreacted about me inviting you Mom over, but you didn't deserve what happened to you."

"That's not the point," he insisted. "The fact that there's something about me that means someone always gets hurt is. If it's not me, it's the people around me: Amber, Kutner, Chase, Wilson or you… If the only way to protect my family is to keep away from them then I've got to do that. I won't drag you down with me." Remembering his previous actions, he bit his lip. So many times he'd made the wrong, selfish decision, and as a consequence he'd blown the lives up of the people he cared about. "This time I'm going to do the right thing and walk away. Before it's too late."

Frustrated, Cuddy threw her hands in the air. Was he really going throw all of this away, because he believed he was afflicted by some sort of curse?

"You're being absurd!"

"I'm not… We've never sat back and considered the reality of this relationship, because we got too swept away with what we felt for each other… I wasn't lying last night when I said you have a blind spot when it comes to me, because you do. In the cold, harsh light of day, look at me. I'm not exactly a catch and I've been violent towards you…"

"I forgave you for that!" she exclaimed.

"And you shouldn't have… If it hadn't been for Gabe you probably wouldn't have." In his mind he could see the Wilson of his dream telling him that she was trapped by that very fact, and the more he'd mulled it over, the more it seemed undeniable. It wasn't that he wished away his son's existence, he could never do that, but the truth was Cuddy would have had a better chance of moving on if she hadn't been left to carry and bring up his child. It was just as much of an incarceration as he'd experienced when he was locked in a cell with his dubious fellow prisoners.

"That's not true!"

"You know that for certain?" Opening her mouth to answer, nothing seemed to come out. Taking advantage of her indecision, House continued. "It's not even just that… I'm a crippled, former junkie, who's abused his body for so long that most of my major organs are probably on the verge of giving up. Even if by some miracle I don't manage to get shot, stabbed or beaten up again, how long do you really think I've got left before something happens?"

"Anything could happen to either of us at any time," she countered vehemently. "What happened to Wilson is proof of that. Jonathan too."

"But the likelihood is that I'm not going to live long enough to see either of the kids go to college. Chances are I probably won't be here when Gabe goes to high school… Can you honestly deal with losing someone else? Why put yourself through that again?"

Finding herself once more unable to respond immediately, Cuddy pulled her feet out from under her and leant forward to rest her head in her hands. He was making a valid point. House had always teetered on the brink of here and the abyss, but it seemed like he was failing to acknowledge the obvious.

"If you leave I'd be losing you anyway. So would the kids."

"But you wouldn't have to deal with the messy stuff."

"That's what you do in relationships!" she retorted heatedly, her temper starting to fray again. "You open yourself up to the messy stuff, because what happens in between makes it worthwhile. What we have now makes it worthwhile!"

For a long time he just looked at her, his reticence to respond making her hope she was finally getting through to him, until he shook his head.

"You're not thinking logically. I need to go."

Wincing a little as he got to his feet, House tried to manoeuvre himself out of the room, but was forced to stop when she caught hold of his hand and pulled him back.

"What happens if I'm the one something happens to? I've had a scare once. It could be more than that next time." Looking up at him, she saw him scrunch his eyes shut as if he was trying to blink away the thought. Last time that very notion had driven him back to Vicodin, but it needed saying. "What happens to the kids then?"

"They've got your Mom and Julia," he said quietly, still refusing to look at her.

"My Mom's old, House. She could never deal with looking after both of them full-time. Julia already has three children of her own too… There's only so far she can stretch herself around."

"And you honestly think I could do a better job than either of them?"

Meeting his eye as he finally glanced down at her, she nodded.

"Maybe years ago I would have found the whole thing crazy, but seeing you now, seeing how you are with them, there's nobody else I'd trust with them as much as I do you… You're the only one who loves them as much as I do."

"I'd fuck up," he whispered, gulping back the lump in the back of her throat. "I always fuck up."

"I don't think you would. You wouldn't let yourself." Gently she ran her thumb over the back of his grazed knuckles, and gripped his hand a little tighter. "In the cold, harsh light of day you're still the most incredible man I've ever known, and my babies need a Dad… They need you."

"Don't…"

Ignoring him, she stood up and rounded the end of the sofa, turning him to face her and reaching out to lightly brush his bruised cheek with the backs of her fingers.

"If you'd have asked me, I'd have said yes."

"That's not fair," he stammered, fighting to keep his resolve. "Why are you making this so hard for me?"

"It's the truth… I've got no intention of letting you go without a fight. I won't make the same mistake twice."

Clasping her wrist, he pulled her hand away and let his fingertips brush against hers. Short of pleading with her, he had no idea what else to do. She had to see that this was for the best. That he wasn't doing this out of spite, cowardice or malice, but out love for the three people left in his life who he genuinely cared about more than himself.

"Please let me do this."

Adamantly she shook her head, a fresh tear rolling down her cheek.

"If you need some time to get your head together I can deal with that. You've had an awful shock, and it's affected how you're processing things right now, but you will change your mind."

"I won't," he replied.

"Then it won't hurt to call me in a week and tell me that you haven't… If you still want out I'll accept your decision."

"You shouldn't build your hopes up." Without thinking he reached out and wiped the dampness from her cheek. Even in her present state, to him, she was still the most beautiful woman he'd ever met. It seemed preposterous that she'd chosen to be with him in the first place, let alone that she was practically begging him to stay. "It'd be so easy for you to find someone else. Someone better."

Unexpectedly, Cuddy snorted.

"In case you forgot, I already tried that. Didn't really work out." There was no way she'd put her children through such another huge upheaval either, even if she did have the appetite for another relationship. They'd already been through enough in their short lives already. "One week. You owe me that."

Taking a deep breath, he let his gaze fall down to the space between them. He had no intention of changing his mind, but how could he refuse her that? Perhaps if she had time to think about it, she'd come to realise that a permanent and decisive break from one another was best all round.

"One week."