Title: Succumb (4?)
Author: Teenwitch
Summary: We have to succumb to the feelings we can never face.

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House sat at his piano, fingers softly scouring the keys without allowing the melody to escape. A glass of scotch rested at his elbow and he stared at it distantly. His mind was clouded with unwelcome thoughts, thoughts of a certain young immunologist, who had made an unprecedented return to his life.

Not so young now, he reminded himself dimly. He scowled, wondering why Cameron's reappearance had bothered him so much.

The fact that she had just decided to flit back into his life—with a daughter in toe—like the last three years had never happened was enough to piss him off. She had been an unneeded complication then, but her absence afterwards had served as a constant, mocking reminder of what might have been.

Everyday he faced off with that idiot Hudson he was reminded of how much he would have preferred Cameron. Judging by Foreman and Chase's cold reception towards the guy, he wasn't the only one. The balance of their team had been permanently shifted. He had hired them for differing, baseless reasons, but he was pleasantly surprised by the value each of them managed to offer to his team.

Foreman's street smarts also gave him the confidence to oppose him; a quality the other two had lacked. Chase's self-preservationist instincts meant that he could be manipulative when the situation required it; again, something the other two lacked in their integrity. Cameron balanced them out with her likeability and raw honesty. Her idealism had been her flaw, but it had also proven to be an asset. Losing her had cost him a vital part of their dynamic. Hudson was a shameless tattler with no backbone, and the only valuable thing about him was his skills as a doctor. House's selection criteria proved that that was, perhaps, not his foremost concern.

She also appeared to have flourished quite successfully without him. He had given her a recommendation for The New England Medical Centre, and her new supervisor had called him a few months later, to give him an update on her progress. She didn't know about that. No one did. Cameron was a taboo subject around him.

The fact that she had managed while raising a small toddler was admittedly impressive. He could allow himself to admire her the same time he resented her. He resented her for destroying his work environment, and he resented her for leaving at all.

A low rap sounded at his door, and he rolled his eyes, knowing full well who it was. He took a swig from his drink, leisurely wondering if he could just leave him hanging in the hallway. At last, he grabbed his cane, grudgingly rising from the piano bench to open the door.

Wilson lifted an eyebrow, shrugging out of his coat as House swiftly trudged back into the room, slumping once again behind the piano.

"I see you've taken up your customary sulk position for the night. All you need now is the Sarah McLachlan CD and you'd be completely pathetic."

House did not appreciate his friend's dryness. Obviously he had decided Cameron's presence lifted the unspoken ban on the subject.

"Julie kick you out again?"

Wilson gave him a tired look, and he knew he had hit a sore spot. For some unknown reason, the two of them had managed to weather out another three years, a record for one of Wilson's marriages. Though Wilson didn't mention it, he knew Julie had been pressuring him for a child for quite a while now. He thought of Cameron's convenient arrival with one of her own, and decided the irony amused him.

"It's nice to know we can skip past the preamble."

"We don't do preamble. It's too predictable."

Wilson shrugged, slinging his coat over House's sofa. "I thought… I would come and see how you were doing."

"Just peachy, Doc," House offered. "The OC starts in about twenty minutes, though. I know you're a big fan of teen soaps so you might want to hit the road in time to catch it."

Wilson rolled his eyes. "I'm assuming by the added sarcasm that your meeting with Cameron didn't go well."

House frowned at him. He smirked slowly. "You saw her."

Wilson shifted, attempting to come across as indignant when he realised he had been caught out in his statement. "Yes, I did see her. We… talked, and she left. What's wrong with that?"

"A little warning would have been swell."

Wilson rolled his eyes, resting on the arm of the sofa. "And ruin the surprise? The karmic irony? How could I resist? It's not everyday you see Allison Cameron with a daughter."

House scoffed. "Well I'm glad you're getting a kick out of this."

Wilson shook his head impatiently. "Come on, House. She's not married. You noticed that, right?" He smiled pointedly. "If she didn't tell you."

House turned his attention back to the keys. "Are you playing Matchmaker again? I told you not to watch that show. It warps your brain."

"So nothing happened between you two… before she left?"

House could see where Wilson's thoughts were headed. He jabbed his glass at him irritably. Of course that rumour was going to be popular. "Hey. Don't even think about it."

"What? You have to admit, it looks slightly off that she shows up with a two year old daughter three years after she left?"

"Save me the clichés, Jimmy. Your romantic streak is embarrassing."

Wilson folded his arms, dropping his half-serious grin. "House… It hasn't occurred to you that maybe you're being offered a second chance here?"

House gave him a withering look. "The guy with three marriages under his belt is giving me love advice? Nice."

Wilson frowned. "As opposed to the hundreds of other people clambering to give you advice? Admit that you've changed since she left. You haven't been the same for a long time."

House felt his fingers pinch tightly around his glass as he took another sip. He slid his fingers again over the piano keys to avoid meeting Wilson's gaze. It was a little too knowing. He knew Wilson and Cuddy talked about him behind his back. Considering they were about the only two people in the world who would freely admit to feeling concern for him, they naturally conspired together.

"I've changed because she left a gaping black hole in my team and nobody makes my coffee anymore", he said sarcastically. "Cuddy hired that twit Hudson. A monkey would have been twice as competent."

"Only because you couldn't hire a replacement. Nobody measured up, right? Face it, nobody is ever going to measure up to her."

"Will you stop it?" House snapped, turning roughly towards him. "Enough with the star-crossed lovers crap. Why are you bringing this up?"

"Because you wouldn't let me talk about it for three years and I'm talking about it now. You're getting harder to deal with everyday and the few people who do like you are finding it twice as hard. Now that she's here it's going to get even worse and I'm really not in the mood for it."

House gave him a dark look. "No one said you had to deal with it."

Wilson clenched his jaw. "Why are you always so difficult? She was the last chance you had to be happy and you blew it. I know it. You know it. I wish you could just face up to it."

"As fascinating as this all is, I have TV to watch. You're on my chair."

Wilson scowled, rising to his feet and slinging his jacket tetchily over his arm. "Fine. Be unhappy for the rest of your life."

"Bit of a dramatic statement, don't you think?"

Wilson slumped in defeat, putting a hand over his face. "I give up. I really do."

"Glad to hear it. I knew I'd break your spirit one day."

He sighed, a deep, weary sound that echoed in the sudden silence of the room. House truly did wonder why Wilson put so much effort into his arguments sometimes. He knew they got him nowhere. He was a lost cause, plain and simple. Wilson harboured some fanciful illusion that there was still some hope of getting through to him.

"Got anything left to drink?" the oncologist asked at last, pursing his lips as his standard sign of resignation. House gestured vaguely to the bottle of scotch on the piano, already flicking through channels on the TV.

Their arguments were usually resolved this way. There were no apologies, because they didn't do apologies. Wilson didn't want to go home, and House preferred mocking the characters out loud instead of inside his head.

The two men settled respectively on the armchair and the sofa, silently watching the characters play over the TV. Neither acknowledged that they weren't paying the slightest bit of attention, and that they were both thinking about exactly the same thing.

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