House sat in his office, tossing his thinking ball. Up and down, always coming back to him, comfortingly under his control.

They had a new case this morning, but he had already worked it out. Well, he knew it was one of two things. The team was off running tests that would confirm the diagnosis - for House, anyway - and by tonight, they hopefully would have put it all together for themselves and caught up with him.

Which, here at 10:40, left House free for a private opportunity to call MacDonald. He knew Cuddy was going to ask about it when she saw him at lunch, and while he had not technically promised to in so many words, she would be disappointed if he didn't. He hated letting her down.

The whole problem here was that she simply didn't understand. His leg. The pain. What it felt like when yet another treatment that worked for others was forced to be scratched off your list. No questions and no diaries, read legitimately or otherwise, could really tell her what it was like.

He ran his hand along his thigh. The prednisone was kicking in nicely, though the skin was still annoyed and would take a few days to settle down, and he felt its response to the friction, pain increasing a little. Stinging, superficial pain at this point. Nothing like the sharp-toothed monster beneath. At least prednisone worked for him, always had and even without the negative acute side-effects that it had for some people. But he knew better than to stay on it long term.

With a sigh, he checked his watch, then paused halfway through reading the time and took the old heirloom off, turning it over to read the inscription on the back of the face. This is your time, my son.

Might as well get with it, even though this call was nothing but a waste of some of that time. He replaced the watch and then slowly dialed. Of course, the secretary wanted him to talk to the nurse when he said there was a problem. He insisted on talking to MacDonald, and the secretary countered that not only did problems need to go through the nurse, but also that the doctor was with a patient. MacDonald would call back if he felt it necessary after hearing the nurse's message. House grudgingly agreed to be transferred, but he kept the delivery short if not sweet to the nurse and ended up by telling her not to bother calling back as proxy, because he would hang up on her. He needed to talk to the doctor, and the letters LPN, no matter how you arranged them, did not spell MD.

After ending the call, he resumed tossing the ball. He jumped when his cell phone rang even though he was expecting the call.

It was MacDonald, at least, not the nurse. "So you had an allergic reaction?"

"Yes. So much for using the TENS. I'm just keeping you informed like that damned contract says I have to, so be sure to write it down in my chart, and then you at least can have a nice day."

"Do you need another prescription for prednisone, or did you get one locally? You'll have to have that to make it bearable while it heals."

That wasn't the opening he'd expected. He'd thought MacDonald would kick straight into a spiel on how there were other options besides the TENS, more things to try, and other annoying cheerleading to try to disguise a failure as just another step on the road. "I got one from Wilson last night. It's helping. I'm taking Benadryl, too - and it does not make me sleepy, so skip the lecture on being careful driving."

"I believe you. It doesn't make me sleepy, either. Very common side effect but still not a universal one. What about the overall pain levels on the leg? Is the prednisone adding enough of a contribution there along with the methadone to compensate for a few days off the TENS, or do you need something more?"

A few days off . . . "You're not listening. I can't wear the TENS unit. Constantly annoying this severe of an allergy will risk kicking it up past local to systemic."

"I definitely agree that you can't use it like this, but there are more options. This isn't a common problem with the TENS, but it's enough of a known one that there are measures for dealing with it. But back to the original question. Is the pain manageable without it for the moment?"

House stared at and through the far wall of his office. Was it really just a speed bump in the road? "I can live with this," he said. It was still an improvement over his levels on the Vicodin. It was the methadone that was his biggest contributor to the new treatment so far.

Now if he developed a problem to the use of that one . . . that fear, already present, gave a stab of worry, reminding him.

"I know you can live with it," MacDonald said. "But you shouldn't have to, not at the levels you lived with for years. How bad is the pain right now?"

"It's about a 4 1/2 at the moment. Maybe 5 if I'm up walking around for a while. The methadone works, at least."

"I was thinking anyway about raising the dose on the methadone. You shouldn't be over a 4, Dr. House. I would have suggested that Friday anyway, assuming that you still hadn't noticed any negative effects from the methadone. Have you?"

"No."

"All right. Let's take the methadone up to 10 mg tid. Of course, if there are any negative effects you notice, drop it back immediately and call me."

Still digesting the thought that he shouldn't ever have to be over a 4, House said, "I know that," but his tone had lost its sharpness.

"That will give a few days of feedback for you to report to me on Friday. Now, about the TENS, this does unfortunately happen now and then. Of course, you can't use the unit for a few days until the skin is thoroughly settled down again. No doubt the first course of prednisone had indeed been countering the reaction, but we can deal with this. The first step is to change brands on the gel. We can also get a different kind of patches. I have never heard of anyone who was allergic to all of the options for them. I think it's most likely the gel you're reacting to, but we'll change both just in case. There are also skin preparation wipes specifically designed for this reason. They create a protective barrier between your skin and the gel and patch. Every time you apply the patches, wipe the area of skin off first with those in that immediate area where you will place a patch and then allow it to dry."

A protective skin barrier. Why on earth hadn't he thought of something like that? There were several products of different formats out there for that, though he'd never heard of the wipes. "All right."

"Also, you need to take everything off and wash the skin thoroughly once a day with soap and water. Keeping it clean in general will help. I'd also use slightly different locations for the electrodes, pick out a set of two for each, for instance, and alternate which you use day to day. You don't want to have it just constantly in contact in the same place for several days with no break for the skin."

No break. Due to the bad case Monday and Tuesday, it had been around 36 hours last night since he had reset the patches.

"You won't be using it yet Friday when you see me, so I can give you new prescriptions then for the medical supply store. I just wanted you to know that there are ways to deal with this. It's a setback, that's all. I'll give you a prescription for the new strength on the methadone once your current supply runs out, but for the moment, of course, just take two pills instead of one."

"You said you'd been thinking already about raising that before the allergic reaction?" House asked. He knew the methadone worked. He didn't want to get used to a higher level of that and then have it suddenly pulled out from under him.

"Yes. Assuming that you don't have problems with it, this would be a continuing change. I'm not planning to drop the methadone back down when you restart the TENS. But please do be careful with it. Are you keeping up better with the pain diary?"

"Yes," House said. That wasn't even a lie. He was trying to.

"Good. Did you have any other questions before Friday?"

"No. Thanks." The last word slipped out almost unaware.

"You're welcome. One last question before I hang up, Dr. House." He tensed, waiting. "How is Abby doing?"

"She's fine. Pretty much back to normal." What was it with MacDonald and kids? They made him less stiff, more human. Although he had been amazingly sympathetic and encouraging in this call, even before now.

"Wonderful. I'll see you Friday, Dr. House."

Then MacDonald hung up. House sat there at his desk for a few minutes still holding the phone, the ball at rest in its holder.

The TENS was not a total failure after all. Cuddy had been right.