CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE: Perfection Realized

I knocked on House's door.
"Come in," House called. I opened it and saw him sitting on the bed watching General Hospital. I watched him affectionately for a moment until he noticed. "What's wrong with you? Am I starting to look like Trinity or something?"

I laughed. "Come on, House. Let's go for a drive."

"A drive? Where?"

"It's a surprise," I said as I walked of his room, expecting him to follow. He didn't, so I had to come back and drag him out of his room.

House moaned, "Chase! General Hos-"

"I know, I know. General Hospital is on. But trust me, you'll like this a lot better," I told him.

"I doubt it," House muttered under his breath.

We drove for a little while, House, all the while, complaining about missing the episode where Tony finds out something important. What exactly, I didn't know, because frankly, I wasn't paying much attention. I was nervous for what was to come. I wanted everything to be perfect.

We approached a familiar street where I parked the car. We got out and went on a walk.

"I can't heal your leg, House," I said solemnly, as we ambled side by side.

House looked at me, confounded. "Excuse me if I'm mistaken, but have I ever asked you to? I wouldn't even let you touch my leg."

I smiled. "No," I started. "It's just that…well, look over there." I pointed further up the street.

"My eyes aren't as good as they used to be, Bobby," House said. "But they are as beautiful, aren't they?"

"Very funny, but don't you see what I see up ahead?" I interrogated.

House looked, as we got closer. "Cor love a duck! Is that a whorehouse! Chase, you've made my day!" he replied sarcastically. He laughed, but suddenly stopped when he saw clearly what it was. WHO it was.

The look on House's face was absolutely priceless. It was that moment of astonished and vulnerable joy as he laid eyes upon Cuddy, Foreman, Cameron, and the familiar teaching hospital they stood in front of.

I smiled as I led the still flabbergasted House to the old gang. "Chase…how? Why?"

"I wanted to give you your perfect day."

House shook his head in wonder. "But you got all of them here…here at Princeton-Plainsboro…this really means a great deal to me, you don't know."

I laughed. "You know you've gotten mushy in your old age, right?"

House glowered with a dangerous smirk on his face. "But I'm still tough as nails." He punched me in the arm.

"Ow!" It actually hurt. Laughing, we made our way across the street.

"SURPRISE!" everyone sang as we approached.

House riposted, "Not really. I saw you guys from a mile away." He winked at me.

Cuddy was the first to give House a hug, which House looked like he most enjoyed.

"Wow, Cuddy. Your funbags are as nice as ever, even though you're like seventy!" House exclaimed, pleased.

Cuddy replied, "Mentioning a woman's bosom AND her age in one sentence. How DO you do it, House?"

Foreman, next, came up. House and he both hesitated, but eventually they gave into a hug as well. "It's nice to see you again, House."

"You too, Eric," House said purposefully to get on Foreman's nerves. Foreman rolled his eyes. Cameron approached.

House sighed, "Oh, no, not another hug! Gosh, guys. You're getting soft."

Cameron smiled as she put her arms around House. House closed his eyes, seeming to savor the moment. "Thank you for coming," he whispered.

"I wouldn't miss this for the world," she said back.

"Well, what are we waiting for?" I exclaimed. "We have patients to save!"

Foreman responded sardonically, "Oh, yeah. Supermen and Superwomen to the rescue."

House asked, "What do you mean, 'patients to save'?"

"Well, maybe not literally, but I thought we could tour the hospital once more before we part ways."

Everyone nodded, saying, "Sounds good."

We walked into the memorable building. A lot seem to have changed. Of course, they had hired a new staff of pretty young nurses and the department of diagnostics was now headed by one 'Dr. Petra Gilmar'. But as we looked inside, as the doctors wrote furiously on the white-boards, even one doing a crossword, and saw the patients leaving the hospital, tears glistening from inexpressible, empyrean joy, saved and more alive than ever, we all felt that nothing had changed at all.

As I saw the doctors at work and the look on the faces of the patients as the left healed, I felt a stab at my heart that I hadn't felt for years. That longing, that passion for what I did. I saw the same emotion patent on House's face.

After we left the hospital, we all went out to dinner and caught up. It turned out that Foreman had become the dean of medicine at a hospital in Boston. He got married and had two children, Jamal and Elisa. Jamal wanted to be teacher, he said, and Elisa aspired to be a dancer. "Heh. I guess neither of them got the 'healing bug,'" he joked. "I can see why though. Whenever they got some sniffles or a flu, I'd be on them like…like…"

"Stink on cheese?" I offered my best metaphor.

He laughed. "Yeah. Like stink on cheese. I remember the first time my little girl had a cough and runny nose. She seemed panicked. She came up to me and said, 'What do you think is wrong with me, Daddy?' And I replied, 'Looks like Nasopharyngitis.' But that just scared her more. She was like, 'What's that!' Correcting myself, I said, 'It's just a cold, baby.' Heh. Man, no wonder they were scared off from pursuing medicine."

Cuddy told us that she had married as well, never had children, but was now retired and spent a lot of her time writing books. "I always wanted to be a writer. Finally, I have the chance. Things are really peaceful, now, and being retired allows me a lot of time to pursue my avocations. I mean, there are no more long hours, no more House looking down my shirt…"

"Wrong again, baby. You can never escape me," House told her as he looked at her 'funbags'.

As I already knew, Cameron was married, had children, and was still a doctor. When it got around to me, I merely said, "Well…I think I'm going through a mid-life crisis." I laughed. It felt good to laugh about my problems. "But the good news…I think it's almost over."

Everyone smiled, and we drank a toast to each other.

Later, when I led House back home, he looked at me and said, "Chase, if I wasn't enough proof for you, today truly proved that perfection could be realized."
I smiled. "So, it really was your perfect day? Because I really wanted it to be."

House nodded. "It was perfect, Chase. And you know why? It wasn't just because I got to see my old friends and the place where I spent most of my life. It's because I saw that you were happy. Truly happy, the first time I seen you like that in a long time. You were surrounded by love, friends, family…and I saw the glint in your eyes back at the hospital. You found your purpose again. And nothing could make my day more perfect that knowing that it was your perfect day too."

I was touched. "Thank you, House."

"Thank YOU, Chase. For making each of my last days perfect."