He sat at his piano, fingers gliding over the keys easily, playing a melody that had developed in his mind only seconds before. He'd tried his guitar, but the piano worked even better than iPod or the new gameboy Wilson gave him as a present.
He couldn't sleep and knew all the articles he had at home by heart. The ones about posttraumatic stress disorder as well as the playboy and what else he had found. The articles in the playboy surprisingly were really good. He had laughed at himself when he thought that.
Then he couldn't concentrate anymore on the words before his eyes and had turned to music.
Hitting a sour note he stood up from the bench and grabbed his cane.
Walking up and down in his living room normally helped. Not against the thoughts in his head but against this throbbing in his leg.
And he couldn't decide what was worse.
It should have been him in there.
He gritted his teeth and walked faster.
It should have been him.
His cane grazed against the back of his couch, pulling out one of the high heels he had shoved under it the day she was shot. He stopped and grabbed the black leather shoe.
Suddenly angry he cast it on the wall, hitting one of the paintings hanging there that fell down with the shoe.
"It should have been goddamn me in there!"
Suddenly really tired of everything he walked into his study to grab a metal box on top of his bookshelves.
Today it hurt THAT much.
The limping was better the next day, nevertheless he felt like chewed on and spit out. A headache had decided to torment him this day, and he let it out on his ducklings.
The two that were around.
Cameron somehow had decided that after her confession three days ago she should avoid him.
Around noon he decided that he just didn't have the strength to fight Foreman this day.
"You know what? Do what you want. Kill your patient. I don't care."
With that he limped out of the conference room with the new carpet into his office, grabbed the iPod from his desk and marched off.
"Do you have to be so hard on him?" Chase asked, glaring at his colleague. (For everyone who hasn't noticed until now: I just CAN'T stand Foreman!!!)
"Me? Hard on him? He's the one who gives us one case after the other!"
"That's our goddamn job. You torment him even though he's got a headache."
"Please. As if that would stop HIM to treat us like that", Foreman snorted and Chase got up from his seat.
"You know what? You have no right to complain! You're even more ignorant, selfish and arrogant than he is."
With the little difference that you could like House despite these 'qualities'. He had tried to protect Cameron when she refused to step into the room next to his office…
Grabbing his files the Aussie started to leave the conference room as well.
"And by the way: He's right. You will kill your patient with this diagnose."
"He's not always right!" Foreman growled, but Chase had already left, hurrying after his boss.
"House! Wait!"
The surgeon wondered how the slightly disabled older man could be that fast with his cane.
"You were right with your guy. Stop bugging me!" House growled over his shoulder.
"You'll really watch Foreman kill his patient?"
"Nah, already told the nurses to give him antibodies an hour ago. I'm not that stupid."
As if he didn't know that it would fall back on him when they misdiagnosed someone. When Chase finally reached him he stopped.
"What do you want?"
"What if Foreman wants to treat him nevertheless? Still could kill him!"
"I took him off the case. It's no longer his patient."
At that Chase sighed. He knew this would finally end in another argument, abusing the ears of everybody too near.
"He'll be running to Cuddy…"
And her high voice hurt even more when she was screaming.
House's hand disappeared into his pocket, pulling out the Vicodin-tube.
"I don't care."
"Wouldn't aspirin be the better choice?" the surgeon asked softly and got a surprised look.
House looked at the tube and then put it back into his pocket.
"Yeah… maybe would."
Then he turned around, walking away from his duckling.
"Will you wake up finally or do I really have to beg?"
He sounded really angry when he marched into her new room, real walls, no glass to be seen – despite the window. Why coma patients would need a TV he still didn't know but grabbed the remote, sitting down next to her bed.
"Yeah, I know that sounded desperate and pathetic. You know what? I don't care! Foreman's been going on my nerves since you decided to not wake up after surgery."
Leaning back on the chair he put up his feet on her bed, switching the TV on.
"Would have been better if you did wake up, though. Now you have to see a psychiatrist, or a psychologist. And yes, I also know that there's no difference, and that all shrinks are their own best patients… jeez, I'm really talking to myself in here."
He watched the news for a while, swallowing two aspirin dry, then remembering that he should drink at least some water with it. He stepped outside, getting a cup of tea at the nurses station and returned to the room, sitting down again.
She still hadn't moved.
"Wow. You're tough. I thought you didn't like the news…"
He shook his head about himself, again talking to someone who most probably couldn't hear him or wouldn't remember that he'd talked to her.
Her parents didn't do anything like that. They visited her for half an hour a day, preferably in the evening. Not talking to each other, not talking to the sleeping form in the bed. He'd also seen some of her siblings, all of them as dark as her parents, black hair, black eyes… it was somewhat funny to see four 10 year old children stand next to the bed, the spitting images of their parents, silent, earnest… concentrated…
None of them camped in the hospital, knowing they couldn't really change anything by going on the nerves of the nurses.
What was really funny was the fact that suddenly he felt the urge to do that.
He'd not been in her room since he took the case.
Instead he had read everything he could find about posttraumatic stress disorder.
Still didn't help against the fact she was still sleeping.
Sipping his tea he switched to another channel.
"Oh, Baywatch. Wanna bet how many mouth-to-mouth we'll be seeing today?"
Somehow it wasn't funny watching Pamela's 'funbags' jump around as if they had a life of their own. For this series he'd need Wilson to watch.
He changed the channel again.
"Knight Rider? Did David Hasselhoff die or what?"
Well, at least there was the cool car.
He continued zapping, finally finding an old episode of General Hospital.
"Ha! Haven't seen that! I think Cuddy was yelling at me that day because… uh, doesn't matter. I wonder how the little nurse got pregnant…"
After 10 minutes he got bored.
"Jesus, will you finally go in there or does he have to send you an invitation?!" he growled at the nurse, drinking the rest of his tea.
Five minutes later the nurse was with her doctor and House switched the channel again.
"CSI. If that doesn't wake you from coma, then I don't know. Come on, let's mock their playing laboratory with no clue of genetics! Or forensics… or common sense."
A side glance to the bed told him that she still didn't move. Not that he expected her to.
"You're no fun."
He continued zapping, stopping at Spongebob. About that he just could shake his head.
"I still don't know what you like on them."
The next channel showed the Simpsons.
He didn't have the nerves for that right now and switched the TV off.
"Hey, I haven't seen that episode yet!"
Obediently he put it on again.
"Sorry… I'm just… oh my…!"
He turned his face to the bed, being caught in her black gaze immediately.
"You're awake!"
"With you making that much noise in here? Who the hell could sleep?!" Hannah grinned, turning her attention back to the TV.
"You okay? I didn't hurt you when I tackled you before?"
He frowned.
"Ah… Hannah…"
"Hmmm? Wow, you must have a real good surgeon here. Almost don't feel the wound. Or I am on real good drugs…"
"Hannah."
She turned her head to him slowly, the smile faded.
"You've been in coma for 10 days."