CHAPTER TWENTY - Deja Vous

Cuddy came in to the hospital at 4 a.m. the following morning to check on Wilson. Since she went home earlier the night before she hasn't had a chance to talk to Wilson yet, not that she really wants to but feels she needs to. She knows Wilson has the right to make the decision about whether he wants to see House or not, not his parents. She wouldn't do that to him, or to House for that matter.

She quietly walks in the room, places a clipboard with some papers on a nearby chair and approaches his bed. She's surprised to find him with his eyes open and staring out the window but he hasn't focused on her yet. She checks the monitors and is satisfied he is out of critical condition. She doesn't say a word to him; she waits for him to acknowledge her. It was a good five minutes before he does so.

"What are you doing here so early? he mumbles, although he still stares out the window.

"Can't sleep."

"You can't lie, either," he tells her as he looks at her for the first time.

"I know Dr. Singh has confirmed there are no lingering ill effects from the concussion. Since you are no longer in critical condition, I need to know something." Cuddy takes a deep breath before she continues. "I'm sure you know how your parents feel about House and they've requested he not see you."

Wilson nods his head. "I know," he says sadly.

"Legally, they are no longer responsible for any medical decisions regarding your condition." Wilson nods his head. "What I need is for you to acknowledge that fact in order for me to deny your parents medical proxy."

"I know. I'm a doctor, too. What is you really want to know? Whether I want to see House?"

"In a nutshell, yes," she tells him softly.

Wilson is thoughtful a moment before he says, "I know my parents are mad at him, and in a way I think I should be, too. Cuddy, we've got to do something about him now. He's doing morphine. Did you know that?"

She looks at him surprised. "No, I didn't. How bad?"

"Bad enough to send me on a 'hide the drugs from the parents' mission. And that in itself is enough for me to be angry. But I can't. He needs help, and he almost killed me. Who else is he going to kill?" he says with a bit of a viperous tone.

"First, you and House need to get out of here and get back to normal, whatever 'normal' is. We'll address it then." Wilson looks at Cuddy with sadness, loss and confusion in his eyes before he closes them tightly. "James, we've tried it before. We can try it again. But for now, you need sleep."

He nods his head slightly. "But I want to know, do you want to be put in the same room as House?" she finally asks.

Wilson's eyes flutter open at her question. "Do you really think that's a good idea?"

"It'll only be for a day; he's being released tomorrow afternoon."

"That's a day and a half," he says half-heartedly then closes his eyes again.

"Close enough. But before you go to sleep I need you to sign these papers," she says as she walks to the chair she previously laid the clipboard on.

"What is it? The 'I'm sane enough to make my own decisions' or...," Wilson takes in a deep breath of air as a sudden pain surges through his body. "Or an 'I'm insane enough to be House's roommate again?'"

"Well, uh, both," she says as she hands him the board and a pen.

He looks over the wording and agrees to its contents then signs it; the board is shaking in his hands and Cuddy is concerned the pain is starting to get to a breaking point for him. When he's done signing it he hands the board to her and closes his eyes, seeming to her to have resigned all his strength and will to the pain, reaches his fingers of his right hand out and presses the button to administer a shot of morphine.

"Are you taking that for the pain you're in now or the pain you'll be in when you're with House?" Cuddy asks, trying to make a joke.

It works and Wilson gives her a weak smile. "Both." And within a few seconds he drifts off to sleep.

Cuddy stands beside his bed and stares at him a few minutes. She's relieved he has improved, and so quickly at that. She leaves his room, looks at her watch and sees it's only 4:30 a.m. 'Darn, the cafeteria doesn't open until 6:00. I need coffee,' she thinks to herself. 'Maybe I can check on House.'

She continues to the elevator to go down one more floor where his room is. She says hello to the nurse on duty at her station and then reads over House's chart of the past several hours. 'Well, for a bullet wound in the neck and losing a spleen, he, too, is improving rather well,' she thinks to herself as she heads off to his room.

She is relieved to find him sleeping because she just isn't in the mood to talk to him, yet; she needs her coffee first. She stands over him and watches him sleep, too, just like Wilson. There was always something fascinating about watching a man sleep. She figures it's the only time one gets to check out every nuance of a man's face: his frown lines, the curvature of his face, the appearance of new freckles.

He stirs in his sleep and Cuddy holds her breath but soon realizes he isn't going to wake up. "Coffee," she says out loud, "I need coffee." She smiles knowing House is resting comfortably and turns to leave to head back to her office.

House lies in bed pretending to be asleep until he knows for sure that Cuddy has indeed left. 'Damn leg! I thought that spasm of pain was going to clue her in that I was awake. Damn, I'm good!' he thinks, snickers to himself and presses the button to release the much needed (mentally or physically?) pain relief of the morphine.

House soon drifts off to sleep to the squawks of waking birds from the branches of the trees outside his room window.

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Later that morning House is awakened by a sudden, irritating noise in the room; it sounds like the high pitched squeak of rusty wheels. He curses to himself but doesn't open his eyes.

'I wanted a private room,' he thinks to himself. He hears the curtain being drawn between the two beds and tries to go back to sleep, but he hears the orderlies talking to the patient and it's keeping him awake. He sighs and repositions himself on the bed.

"Ok, the nurse will be in in just a few minutes," House hears one of the orderlies say as they wheel the empty gurney past the end of his bed and out of the room.

'I've got to talk to Cuddy to get him out of here,' he tells himself as he drifts back to sleep.

HOUSE MD HOUSE MD HOUSE MD