9

A/N: Thanks for all the feedback last chapter. It felt really good. I am going to keep the chapters shorter like this because it is the only way I can manage it with school. I was inspired by the opening scene of Hunting for the final scene of this chapter. Don't get worked up though. I don't see Wilson and House as gay. Not that I would mind, I just don't see it. I hope everyone had a great turkey day. Mine was wonderful. It is really my favorite holiday of the year. See you next week, and thanks a million for all your support.

Sheila

Heart Cancer

Chapter 11

Wilson didn't want to cry. He blinked his eyes hard when they began to focus, and he couldn't stop the moisture from leaking out of his eyes. It had started when his blurry vision focused on the long, thin mug of his friend House, and a profound sense of relief flooded through his body. Unsuccessful in his efforts to staunch the flow, he turned his head to the opposite wall, staying as nonchalant as possible.

House busied himself with a blood pressure cuff, fumbling uncharacteristically with it.

Wilson let out a breath, his face turned away. "Ah, when do you get here?"

"About three hours ago," House mumbled, studiously keeping his eyes averted down.

"That means I've been out for quite a while then." Wilson dug at the corners of his eyes with his free hand.

"Yeah, well I had a local doc sedate you until I could get here. No reason you should have to struggle with the pain." House finished checking blood pressure and carefully rolled the sleeve into a ball and put it in a bag.

Wilson cleared his throat and braved a look at his friend. "How did you convince him not to load me in an ambulance?"

House stared at him, and Wilson was struck by the intensity of blue in his eyes. It suddenly seemed like they were the exact shade of the tropical bay they were situated on in the full bloom of an afternoon. "I..just told him to do what I said, and he was too stupid to question me."

Wilson stared up at the ceiling for a moment, contemplating the real possible reasons House didn't put him in a hospital. He was sure it was a question House would not easily answer for him. Instead he sighed and said, "Flying is hard on your leg. I bet you're pretty stiff."

"It gives me an excuse for a Vicodin orgy. I'll be a happy man in about an hour."

"Yeah, I bet you will." Wilson chewed his upper lip for a moment. "House, I want to apologize…for being an idiot. I was using no common sense."

House nodded. "Okay, but you left me messages saying you felt good, really good. You said you were happy. Were you lying about that?"

"No," he said softly.

House looked out the window. "Well, then you really don't have to apologize for, do you? You took a risk and it paid off. Any anger I'm feeling is pure jealousy; nothing more."

"I got scared and I ran; nothing to admire there."

House squinted. "I'm getting the feeling that you're not going to be satisfied until I tell you what a blockhead you are. So, in the interest of all things therapeutic, why don't I just say you're a royal idiot on a scale that I have not before encountered among people who should know better. Does that help?"

"Well, that's starting to feel more familiar." Wilson's drawn face curled up in a smile.

House tried to hide the grin tugging at his mouth.

"House, what's the plan?"

"We're going to get you on the next plane back to New Jersey."

"Okay, sounds good. You're aware that they have hospitals here in Hawaii, right?"

House snorted, "So, you want to stay, huh?"

"No," Wilson said carefully. "I just want to have an honest conversation with you about why I didn't wake up in a hospital bed."

"I told you—"

"House, you're afraid that if I get admitted to a hospital here, I'll never leave, ever. You want to spirit me back to New Jersey as fast as you can before it's too late, before it's clear that I can't leave."

He worked his jaw for a moment before answering. "They don't have facilities…here like we do at Plainsboro. Well, I guess I don't know that, but I want access to what I know."

Wilson caught his eyes. "You really think there is something more to do? Do you somehow imagine that my tumor is not growing? I can actually feel it, I can feel the pressure of it, Greg. It's growing."

House stared at him silently. Finally he spoke, "I'm not giving up. I won't."

"Do you have a reasonable belief in this procedure you've been working up?" Wilson studied his face warily for a response.

"If the tumor isn't too big, I think we have a real chance of success. I really believe that, James."

Wilson nodded. "Okay then, we're going to have to figure out a way to get me back to New Jersey. I place myself in your hands."

"You trust me?"

"I always did, House. The person I didn't trust was me."

House considered that response for a moment, then he looked at his watch. "I gotta keep an eye out for the three stooges. They took a later flight. They should be here shortly."

Wilson's eyes widened. "You brought your team? What did Cuddy say? She must be beside herself."

"Until you get better, every wish is her command. Anything! I'm trying to convince her that your procedure requires a hot tub be built onto my back deck. I'm thinking you can help me with the language."

Wilson rolled his eyes.

House grinned. "They should be in some shape. I bet you didn't know that Chase is afraid of flying. Idiot decides to work half the way around the world from his home, and the trip just about kills him. He took the ticket and bumped it to first class. Says it's safer there. I imagine that Cameron and Foreman were trying to annihilate him with their eyes from their cramped seats back in couch."

Wilson grinned.

Seeing his friend smiling as if the world was right was too much. A rush of pain filled his gut, and he started. Leaning against the bed, he pulled himself to an upright position. "I gotta make a few arrangements, and you need to get some more sleep."

Wilson caught his wrist. "Thanks for coming. Thanks for not giving up. Thanks for being my friend."

House pulled away gently unable to sustain the contact. "The tumor's got you sounding like a Hallmark card. We need to get in there and get those cynicism synapses reconnected or you're going to be downright intolerable."

House couldn't pull off the sarcasm well, and so he beat a hasty retreat. Wilson let his head sink into his pillow, and contemplated the odd feeling growing inside that comes from suddenly realizing one's impact on the lives around him.

………………………………………………………………………………………..

Conni was waiting when House emerged. She stood up, hands clasped tightly.

"He was awake for a little while, and he sounds good."

She let out an audible sigh of relief.

"When my people get here, We're going to make some arrangements to get him on a plane back to New Jersey as soon as we can."

"We're coming too." She looked around as if preparing to pack.

House took a deep breath. "I think that's a good idea. There's a flight in ten hours that we're going to try to make. It's almost full. I think you and your family is going to have to follow us on the next flight."

She nodded, and he was glad that she didn't know enough to probe more deeply. She leaned against the back of a sofa, and he heard the slight catch in her breathing.

"What does Wilson have you taking?"

She looked startled. "Pardon me?"

"What drugs? Treatment?"

"Oh, ah… a nebulizer and some meds, I don't know the names, but I feel okay right now."

He dug around for his stethoscope and then limped over to her. "Turn around and pull your shirt up."

"Ah..well, I don't think—"

"Can it. My pick-up lines are never this subtle. I want to hear your lungs."

She nodded, and turned, pulling her tank up her back. House placed the scope on her back, telling her to breathe in deeply and exhale. He did this four times, and by the fourth she was struggling for air. He stepped away, gesturing at her to pull her shirt down.

"You're losing integrity in your lungs. They are starting to fill. You feel fine now, but six hours from now some dust blows your way and you're going to start wheezing like great grandma did down on the hacienda."

She folded her arms tightly around her middle, and struggled to keep her composure.

Just then, the front door burst open, a set of three tired, cross doctors stumbled into the villa. Foreman threw House a heavy glare before heading off in search of a bathroom. Chase looked as pale as a ghost, and Cameron was carrying bags for all three of them. She leaned against a wall, and let them slide off her shoulders.

House gestured with his head. "Don't get comfortable, Cameron. I need you on the phone arranging to get us on the midnight flight out of here. Chase, pull yourself together. This woman needs a pulmonologist. You can curl up into fetal position later on."

Chase narrowed his eyes at House, and didn't dignify him with a response. He reached over and shook Conni's hand. "I have some sketchy details about your condition. Can I assume there is a nebulizer nearby? And your medications?"

She nodded. He extended an arm. "Then lead the way."

He passed House without so much as an acknowledgement. Cameron walked up to him, her hair sticking up at the back of her head, the creases of a dry cabin, no sleep, and dehydration growing around her eyes. "How is he?"

"You tell me. He looks like he spent the day in front of a firing squad. We're going to have to pretend we don't know him on the flight back because I can tell he's going to embarrass us."

She sighed. "I mean Wilson. How's Wilson?"

House avoided her eyes. "We got to get him on a plane."

"We're not going to check him in somewhere first?"

"Arrange an MRI and a CAT scan at a local clinic. We should have some films to look at on the flight."

"House, this is irresponsible."

His eyes flashed at hers. "Do you want a chance to treat him? 'Cause that means we get him back to Plainsboro ASAP."

"We don't know if he's stable."

"This is how it's going to work. We're going to dress him up good, put him on a plane, and hold our breath for the next 14 hours. We're calling a bluff, Cameron, and if I'm right, we'll have him prepped for surgery in less than 48 hours."

"He's going to do it?"

"Yes, so you need to pull this together with the airlines now. Don't give away too much or they are going to want an insurance exam before he boards."

She licked her lips. "If we're wrong, and this goes bad at 10,000 feet, it's going…"

House looked away. "If we don't do this, then Wilson sits at Honolulu General or wherever the hell, and waits two weeks while they make him sicker with treatments, at which point, it will be determined that he cannot leave as his cancer is too advanced and he's too weak, and I'll be fighting with the board for privileges at the hospital that they will not grant once they look at my malpractice insurance, and so we'll all be sitting at some rundown motel overlooking Waikiki waiting until the day he dies because I'm not leaving here without him. Do you follow?"

She nodded. "I got it."

He watched her as she walked away, and secured a phone in one of the bedrooms. He let out a deep breath, and sagged against the wall. Foreman emerged from the bathroom, and House merely pointed to Wilson's room. "Do a neurological. I want him on a plane in ten hours." Foreman blinked, but out of all of them, he understood immediately what House was doing. Without a word, he disappeared into the bedroom.

…………………………………………………………………………………………

The drive to the airport was grim. Cameron had elbowed her way into a local hospital, and House bullied them for the tests they needed. Foreman oversaw the neurological exam, and was still waiting in radiology to get copies of the films. Wilson leaned heavily on House, and neither one of them talked about the growing mass that was taking over the MRI films they got a chance to see. Chase was up front, staring out the window of the cab, and House felt a tiny stab of guilt as he considered the young man's fear of climbing back into the plane.

Cameron rushed them through security, still carrying most of the luggage while House and Wilson used each other as leverage as they slowly negotiated the long hallways of the airport. Chase eventually snatched a security cart, and pushed the two of them into it.

At the gate, they huddled around Wilson while waiting for Foreman. Chase paced nervously, and, in his annoyance, it was all House could do not to poke at him about his fears. Cameron secured three first class and two coach seats. Automatically, she pressed two of the first class tickets into House's hands and the final first class ticket into Chase's. Chase looked at her, and murmured an inaudible thank you.

Foreman showed up in at a trot, two long envelopes of films tucked under his arm. House took him by the arm, and pulled him over to where Chase and Cameron were standing. "All right, Foreman. It's your turn. Can Cunningham still operate?"

Foreman shrugged. "It'll be his call. We'll know when we get there."

House tightened his grip on his arm. "No, you're going to study these films for the next 14 hours, and be able to draw him a picture on how this can be done. It's the only way. He gets a glance at these before that, and he won't even consider it."

Foreman let out a heavy sigh. "I'll do what I can, but I'm not spinning a fairy tale. If I see it, he'll know about it, and that's it. Reading films on a crowded plane is going to prove something of a challenge."

Chase rolled his eyes and walked away. House nodded and let go of Foreman. "We don't have another way to do it."

Chase turned around abruptly and thrust his first class ticket into Foreman's hand. "You'll concentrate better, and you'll have more room to spread out the film."

Foreman blinked in surprise, and stared at the ticket in his hand. He started to protest, but Chase shook his head sharply, grabbed Cameron, and steered her toward the plane. "Allison, you are going to have to hold my hand and tell me lies about what you think of me for the next 3,000 miles. I don't care if it kills you. I need a distraction."

House stared after them, a soft look finding its way onto his craggy features. Foreman shook his head, and headed off after them. House limped over and helped Wilson to his feet.

Wilson raised his brows. "You were telling secrets about me. You know I hate that."

House chuckled as he linked arms with him. "The kids are playing nice with one another. I almost choked to death on the shock of it all. I'll tell you about it on the plane."

They limped toward the flight attendant, shoulder to shoulder. "People are going to get the wrong idea about us."

House grinned. "Yeah, well I'm telling them that you're my very hungover boyfriend. And when you fall asleep on my shoulder, I'm going to tell them that you drank too much because you were jealous of the Hawaiian guy who was hitting on me at the luau last night. Then, just to stay close to reality, I'm going to tell the sympathetic flight attendant your long history of cheating. By the end of the flight, she's not going to feel anything other than disgust for you, and she won't notice anything unusual about your condition."

Wilson shook his head. "When I said, I was putting myself in your hands, I had no idea what you were really thinking."

House threw back his head and chuckled. Wilson swayed a little as House's grip loosened, but House caught him and pulled him in tight against him. "Face it, Wilson. For the next few hours, you're going to be my boo. But don't get too used to it. The minute I get back, I'm going to troll the bars for someone drunk and willing so I can reclaim my manhood."

"Yeah, me too," Wilson murmured as they stumbled their way onto the jetway.

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TBC