Chapter 38

Sally walked through the doors of Princeton Plainsboro hospital and right to the Clinic. She went up to the nurse at the desk and smiled brightly.

"Hello." She said.

"Sign in and your name will be called." The nurse said without looking up.

"Okay, but I need to see Dr. House."

The nurse glanced up then. "Why would you want to do that?"

"Because he treated my cousin and she said he was wonderful."

The nurse gave her a strange look. "Was your cousin dying?"

"Uh…"

"Because those are the only people who think House is wonderful."

"Well, yes, she was pretty sick. And he really helped her."

"Are you dying?"

"I hope not! I just really want to be treated by him."

The nurse shrugged. "It's your funeral. Just be prepared." She made a note on the sign-in sheet and told Sally to take a seat. She did and whipped out her phone.

About an hour later, the nurse called her into Exam Room 2. She went, followed a few minutes later by Ellen and Betty.

"Are you seeing him?" Ellen asked.

"I think so. I told the nurse I wanted him. So hopefully, he'll…"

She was interrupted by the exam room door opening. The three women stared as a tall man entered leaning on his cane. His blue eyes looked a little tired, but still gorgeous.

"Oh my!" Sally murmured.

The other two just stared.

"I'm Dr. House. What's the problem, Miss…" he glanced at the sheet. "…uh, Mrs. Mitchell?"

The three of them continued to stare at him, unable to speak. He looked back and forth at them, wondering what was going on.

"If the problem is laryngitis, you need some lozenges and rest. If it's something else, you'll need to let me know what."

Ellen swallowed hard, then said, "Uh, Doctor Je…uh, House, I mean…"

He frowned, then as realization struck, he said, "Oh, God, you're the stalkers."

"We're not stalkers!" Sally said indignantly. "We're fans."

"Right."

"Really, doctor, we are. And we're also friends of Mar—Roberta's."

"You don't even know her real name!" he said.

"That doesn't matter." Betty told him. "What matters is that she's unhappy and we want to help her."

"Oh, and I'm supposed to trust three nutsos who're obsessed with a fictional character."

"We're not nuts."

"We're not obsessed – exactly."

"You are stalking the creator of that character. That's obsessed. And you're in love with someone who doesn't exist. That's crazy."

The three of them just stared at him, small smiles appearing on their faces.

He eyed them warily as he started to back away. "Oh, no. You weirdos stay away from me. I'm not Jeff."

"But she based him on you. She told us."

"I am not old Doctor Jeff."

Betty stepped forward. "Look, Doctor House, I know you think we're crazy and that's okay. The important thing here is that we really want to help Roberta. She's so unhappy."

He looked at each of them and saw that they were sincere. They might be crazy, but if they could help him win Bob back, well, wasn't everyone a little bit crazy?

"What do you have in mind?" he asked.

"We thought if we could get you to talk to her, tell her how you feel, then maybe…"

He shook his head. "Won't work."

"Look, you must have some feeling for her. If you just told her…"

"Why does everyone assume it's my fault? Even people who don't know me?"

"We know that Dr. Jeff would…"

"For the last time, I am NOT your goddamned Dr. Jeff! I am Greg House. And I have been trying to talk to her for weeks. She won't listen, won't even let me say anything. She's got an idea in her head and she won't even let me try to shake it loose."

"Maybe we could help you. Maybe we could get you together so that she could listen to you."

He shook his head again. "She'd just leave."

Ellen smiled and said, "What if we kidnapped her?"

Betty was aghast. "Ellen, you are moving from petty offenses like following people to major crime! You can't just kidnap someone."

"We could go to jail!" Sally cried. "It would be wrong, wouldn't it, Dr. Je-House?"

House rolled his eyes at her slip, but didn't say anything as his mind was working. Then he shook his head. "No, it would be wrong to kidnap her."

"See?" Sally said.

"You'd have to kidnap me too." He said.