Toxicity
The synthesized tunes of Depeche Mode filled the room, sparking from the record player that sat a few feet away from the two males. Wilson had been pleasantly surprised to find that House and he shared at least one interest in the field of music – Synthpop. There were the record sleeves of Depeche Mode, Ultravox and Tears for Fears scattered around the floor amidst empty bottles and stray packets of peanuts.
With his back pressed against the leather couch, one foot against the floor so he could use his knee as an armrest, House looked oddly placid. He was making no complaints as Wilson, who sat between House's legs, leant against his chest with eyes half-closed. Although his quietness could be attributed to the glass of scotch just beside his leg.
Their evening had comprised mostly of alcohol-based activities. House had broken out the Stella Artois while they were watching The L Word and eating Pizza. It had really only to take Wilson's mind off Blythe as he himself still felt knotted about Cameron and the mistake. But, gradually, as they progressed from the beer to a bottle of Jack Daniels, he found himself not caring as much. Alcohol was good at making you forget, replacing your worries with its intoxicating presence.
"Is there anymore, uh..." Wilson spoke suddenly, sitting up a little straighter against House's chest. "Um... peanuts?"
Reaching above him, House felt about the seats of the couch until he came across an almost-full foil packet. Emptying a good third of it into his mouth, he shoved the remains into Wilson's hand. With his head now fully resting back against the seats of the couch, House chewed thoughtfully as Just Can't Get Enough resonated around the room. Somewhere, towards the back of his mind, he could remember this track on the radio. God, it would have had to be the mid-80s then... had he actually survived that decade?
"Do you remember the 80s?" He asked Wilson, who seemed to be muttering along to the song. How old was Wilson again? Younger than him, but old enough to remember Band Aid, Aerosmith, fall of the Berlin Wall, surely.
"Rubix cube." Wilson replied, hooking an arm through the shape made between House's knee and the arm resting on it to grab the glass of Scotch. "Pac-man. Miami Vice. Could I ever forget?"
Smirking at the mention of the fads, House drew his head back from the couch to nod slightly, chin brushing Wilson's hair as he did so.
"Please don't tell me you had blond highlights." He replied, plucking the glass from James' hands to swallow the remains in one gulp.
"I had acid-wash jeans. Designer stubble. Back then, I was cool."
Snorting, Greg dipped his head to Wilson's shoulder, trying to stifle both his laughter and the mental image of James that had entered his head.
"Oh, sure. I bet you had a Swatch Watch and Leg Warmers too."
Wilson's smirk dropped by a couple of molars as he processed what had been said, and House could feel his body stiffen. He'd gone one fad too many, and suddenly the fun was over.
"Blythe did." Wilson muttered, eventually, the bottle of Scotch clinking against the glass in his unsteady hand as he poured himself another drink. By the time he drew the glass away from his mouth again, it was half-gone already. "She did."
House shifted uncomfortably, wanting to get back to SynthPop and Rubix Cubes. He didn't need a talk on relationships with Wilson, not tonight, but it looked like things were sharply heading in that direction. Sighing, he humored the inebriated Oncologist.
"When did you meet her?"
As he spoke each word, the tension in Wilson's shoulders slowly dripped away, and he settled comfortably back against House, using him as some sort of cushion. The cushion didn't seem to mind at all.
"Teenage sweetheart. You know how it is." Swallowing the rest of the peanuts, Wilson reached over to grab at an untidy pile of records. Shuffling them over the floor, he plucked a Bowie/Jagger record from the set, looking slightly scornful.
"I know." House replied, taking the record from Wilson's fingers and hiding it under a batch of others. Guilty purchase, regretted ever since.
Dragging the record player closer to them, Wilson changed discs, settling for Jeff Buckley's cover of Hallelujah.
"I just... I always thought she was the one." James continued, staring at the back of the record sleeve. The words swam in front of his gaze, just irritating the headache he'd managed to ignore for the last three hours. Throwing the sleeve halfway across the room, much to House's disapproval, he sighed.
"Turns out I'm wrong more often than you." He received a sharp dig to his side with House's elbow for that dig, and grinned again. "I met somebody else."
"Wife the second." House interjected, wishing Wilson had chosen something a little more upbeat that a song about broken hallelujahs. Iggy Pop would have been preferred over all this heart-touching stuff. A guys' night in consisted of alcohol and crude humor. Not... confessions and this malarkey.
"No. No, this... this wasn't a wife." Wilson rubbed his collarbone, which was exposed by his loose tie and partly-unbuttoned shirt.
"So... you just married two other women for the Hell of it?"
"No. I loved my wives."
"As you keep saying."
Wilson dropped into silence for a moment, taking on board House's sharp comments. He did say it an awful lot – why was he still trying to justify his love to House anyway? Because House was a skeptic. If he could convince such a skeptic, perhaps he could finally believe in it himself.
"This person isn't interested. Just friends."
House scoffed at that, raising an eyebrow as Wilson tilted his head up, resting it against his shoulder to view Greg from an upside-down view. "Just Friends" wasn't something that was in Wilson's dictionary; the man would flirt with a floormop if there was nothing else available.
"I'm serious! He'd make me an eunuch if I tried anything."
"He?" House quickly picked up on the gender used. He'd heard of Wilson's mystery crush before. Actually, he'd heard of near enough all of them. But with this one, James had seemed devoted to letting a gender slip. Always 'they' used.
Wincing a little, Wilson rolled his head back from House's shoulder and into his own chest.
"He." He confirmed, wishing he'd kept his tongue bitten. No doubt House would be making posters about his sexuality before the evening was over.
"Oh." It Was House's only reply, and an awkward silence followed. Wilson's gaze bore a hole into House's piano chair, while House himself stared up at the ceiling, eyes revealing just how deep in thought he had become within the last three seconds. He was only disturbed by Wilson's sudden movements to struggle to his feet.
"I should go." Wilson mumbled, to which House vaguely nodded.
Scrambling to his knees, James crawled in a circle, choosing that as the best position to try and stand as he would have something soft to fall upon. He didn't feel too great, and it would be just like his body to give up at that point. God only knew how he was going to get home, but he couldn't sit here and bite his nails and force conversation for much longer.
Sure enough, as he rose on his knees, the world gave an almighty tilt and he flailed for the couch, gripping the seats hard beneath his fingers, wishing the nausea would go away just long enough for him to get out of House's apartment.
Squeezing his eyes closed, Wilson breathed deeply for a moment before allowing them to flicker open. The world was no longer spinning, but his breath still hitched in his throat. About his hips he could feel the weight of House's hands, too light to be helping him up yet firm enough to say they weren't there via an accident. Lowering his head, he could see House's piercing blue eyes were trained on him, looking at him as if staring him out.
"Me?" Was the gruff question from House's lips, and Wilson swallowed as it was spoke. He didn't need this – Blythe was still in hospital. He had enough stress to keep him going for a year without admitting... he had hid it so well for so long already. He could carry on for a little longer.
Except House already knew. Wilson could see it, deep in his eyes he could see that House had fathomed everything in a matter of seconds.
"You." He whispered, his head dropping, notch by notch, until he was forehead-to-forehead with House. That was it – he'd just spat on the deepest friendship he had. This would be the last time House would even look at him, speak to him. Greg could always find excuses to worm out of anything – why should contact with his fagot friend be any differen--
Against his slightly parted lips, Wilson could feel a slight, gentle pressure, rough stubble scratching against his cheek as House trapped him in a brief, brush of a kiss. The weights on his hips had since moved as the hands slipped under the hems of his untucked shirt, forcing a shiver to crawl down his spine as they touched the bare skin of his back.
Pulling away from House's lips, Wilson's jaw moved in unspoken words as he tried to find a grasp on reality. This felt like nothing more than a vivid dream, a fantasy; in real life, House couldn't kiss him. House couldn't touch him. House couldn't make him feel like this.
"We were never 'just friends'." House muttered into his ear, brushing the lobe with his mouth as he spoke. A tingling sensation rocketed through Wilson's body as he felt that, and he had to struggle to stop himself merely slumping down into House's chest again.
Pulling Wilson closer to him, House found himself exploring the proud, firm rise of his coworker's shoulders beneath the shirt. He could feel the shoulder blades press out against the skin as the back arched in response to a secondary kiss, this one pressing deeper into the other's mouth.
Sinking low on his knees, James could do nothing more but submit to these actions, paralyzed by shock. And fear. The longer it went on, the more he realized how it scared him. The more he could taste the Scotch on House's breath, the more he realized how wrong this could be. But the more he was touched, explored, the more he realized just how much he wanted it.
Crawling closer to House, fingers flitting across his unshaven jaw, the fervid, rough kiss that had developed was punctuated by a low groan from Greg. Opening his eyes, Wilson was just in time to see the look of gratification slip away from House's features, a somewhat sly expression replacing it. Looking down the column formed by their two bodies, he guided both their gazes down to the knee pressing hard into his groin.
Against his knee, Wilson could feel House harden considerably and a noise of desperation fell from his own lips. Setting the knee against the outside of House's leg, James found himself almost straddling the other, breathing becoming faster, more shallow as he ground his lower body against Greg's.
With his hands running down the front of House's shirt, tugging open every button, Wilson let his lips glide down to the base of the man's neck, tongue just playing over the sensitive arc of muscle there. It seemed to be appreciated, and House tensed for a moment before pulling his hands away from Wilson's back, setting them to task with unbuttoning the other's shirt.
It seemed to take forever, with each square inch of revealed skin just serving to excite him further, but House finally managed to pull away Wilson's shirt as his own was slipped to the crook of his elbows. Enjoying the sensation of the smooth chest against him, House trailed his fingers down over James' stomach, feeling the muscles there clench and unclench to his light touch. Reaching the buckle of the belt, nimble fingers pulled it through the loops quickly as he felt Wilson unfasten his pants.
Shrugging off his shirt, Greg shuffled backwards into the cool leather, heart crashing ever faster as Wilson brushed the kisses over his abdomen while pulling away his slacks. He felt light-headed, almost dizzy, but attributed that to the sudden movements after consuming so much alcohol. Thankfully, he seemed to be in enough of a right mind to remember when he and Wilson had been practicing spitballs months back. House had kicked the small tin of Vaseline under the couch, he was sure.
Reaching back, he searched blindly behind him until his fingers clasped over a small, cold metal object. Bringing it into the open, he caught Wilson's eye, caught the hunger there. Their clothes were practically non-existent – the last of House's garments were collected down by his ankles, which were soon removed with a quick jerk, and Wilson's boxers were riding low on his hips.
Peeling those boxers away, prising him free, he saw James shudder. Pressing the tin of Vaseline into his chest, the shudder was only greatened as his hot skin came into contact with the cool metal, and House found himself watching every movement. However slight, he was fixed on them. Lapping them all up.
Unscrewing the tin, Wilson took an era pressing his fingers into the lubricant, knowing perfectly well how he was tormenting the man beneath him. In plain view of House, Wilson folded his hand over, fingers trailing the substance clear over his palm before lowering his hand to Greg's erection.
As his hand closed loosely over the hardon, he could feel the throb against his fingers, causing his breath to be drawn sharp. Smearing the Vaseline over House's cock, Wilson forced himself to move slow, indulging in the look of torture over the man's face.
Shifting his weight onto his knees, James crawled further up House's body, pausing for the briefest of moments to examine what those eyes told him. His hands traveled up to the back of his hair, and, as he eased himself over House's erection, their grip became tighter. Discomfort, perhaps even pain was visible, but he pressed himself into the other's neck to try and mask the expression. It was easy to feel Greg gliding deeper within him, the throb ever evident, and didn't stop until the human anatomy made it impossible for any deeper penetration.
Holding tight onto House, he hadn't realized House was holding tight to him. The hands were against his back once more, holding him close. Wilson also hadn't realized he had spoken, made any sound at all, but the slightly raw feeling at the back of his throat told him otherwise.
Slowly, gradually, he let his hands slip down to the other's shoulders, beginning to use them to manipulate his movement. Leaning forwards, into House, he pressed into those shoulders, shifting upwards slightly, before settling back down. It evoked a thrill-laced moan from the receiver, and Wilson repeated the action, slightly harder, rougher. Feeling the member ride over his prostate, Wilson wasn't able to choke back a short cry of his own, muting it into the erect cords in House's neck.
Seconds, minutes, perhaps even hours slipped by without either noticing. Their sweat-slickened bodies ground, driving each closer and closer to the edge, the moans of ecstasy in no short supply. House's body ached, Wilson's hips bruised. Just breathing became an effort, kisses shortened to force air down to lungs.
The tension had been gripping House's abdomen for so very long, mounting bit by bit until it became unbearable. His back was arched, needy for just one more grind. One more. One more. One m--
The noise ripped from his mouth, a final moan as he came, body jerking up hard against Wilson. His teeth were grit, eyes closed tight, alternating between chokes and pants. Above him, he could feel Wilson's fingers dig so deep into his shoulders as the motions of House's climax drove him over the edge, head raised to the Heavens.
And then? Silence. A deafening silence that bore down on everything, a silence that refused to be shattered or splintered. No words, no noises. Just breathing – rapid and hungry breathing – was the only sound scathing Wilson's ears as he pulled himself from House, too drained to move much further.
Flat against the floor, Wilson closed his eyes against the world as sleep wormed through his system, enticing him to follow. He did – his last memory before the blackness of House's slightly shaking fingers brushing his hair.