Title: Twenty Years of Stealing My Food: Part 16
Author: hwshipper
Disclaimer: All characters belong to Heel and Toe Films, Shore Z Productions and Bad Hat Harry Productions in association with Universal Media Studios.
Beta: triedunture patient as ever
Summary: Wilson meets a family member he hasn't seen for a while. House gets fired, again.
Excerpt: House added as he left, "He's not gonna be a relative of yours, though. Not unless you've got any homeless bums among your cousins."
Twenty Years of Stealing My Food: Part 16
Wilson had just moved into his new apartment in Princeton, and was feeling very happy. He was due to start his new job at Princeton Plainsboro on Monday, and House was working just down the road at Princeton General. And House and Stacy were only a few minutes away by car. He was whistling while unpacking when his cell rang.
Wilson looked at the display, and was surprised to see it was his brother, Jonathan. They rarely spoke these days. He flipped the phone open. "Hey, Jon?"
"James. How's things?"
"I'm fine, how are you, and the girls?" Wilson was referring to his nieces. He still thought of them as toddlers, although rationally he knew they were now ten years old and growing up fast.
"They're good, I saw them just the other weekend. Scary how much older they get each time I see them... anyway. Look, I was calling because Mom says you're back in Jersey, you've got a new job in Princeton?"
"That's right," Wilson said. "Just moved today."
"Then there's something I should tell you."
Wilson sat down on a nearby chair. "Go on."
"Last time I had any news of David... which was three years ago now... he was supposed to have been moving on to Princeton."
"Really?" Wilson didn't know what to make of this. Jonathan never tired of following up on rumors of his twin's thereabouts. Most proved to be completely unfounded; false trails, Wilson often thought, probably laid by David himself.
"Yeah. I went down of course, spent a couple of days poking around, didn't pick up anything. But thought I should mention it, seeing as you're living there now."
"Thanks. Um, I'll keep an eye out," Wilson said awkwardly.
They exchanged a few meaningless pleasantries and hung up. Wilson carried on unpacking, but his good mood had gone.
A few weeks later, Wilson had settled in nicely at Princeton Plainsboro, when he got a call from Stacy one evening, begging him to come to their apartment. She and House were flying to San Francisco the following morning for the wedding of a friend of hers, and staying for a week afterwards to make a vacation of it. But she had to finish a legal paper tonight, and House was being disruptive and hadn't even started packing yet...
Wilson went around to find Stacy hammering away at her laptop on the kitchen table with earphones on, doing her best to ignore House, who was hanging around conspicuously not doing much. Wilson managed to find House's suitcase, and after some effort, got House to start throwing some clothes in.
"Why is it no matter how many pairs of socks I have, I never have any socks?" House said petulantly, shutting a drawer with a hip and dropping a handful of socks into the case.
"Dunno." Wilson was settling himself comfortably on the bed to watch House pack. "So, looking forward to your vacation? I can't remember the last time you went away."
"Nor can I." House dumped an armful of T-shirts in the case. "Last time we tried to arrange something, Stacy had to work; time before, it was me." He turned back to the closet and surveyed the contents. "Nearly happened again. I got a case of suspected TB this afternoon, managed to slip the file onto the desk next to mine. I might as well have taken it though, as it turned out to be just a bad cough."
"Oh yeah?" Wilson picked up a magazine and flipped through the pages idly.
"I thought it would have been just my luck, and it would have been your fault by proxy, as the patient was one of the fifty thousand Wilsons living in the tri-state area. Where did Stacy put my blue shirt?"
Wilson perked his ears up, then remarked as casually as he could muster, "He--or she?--could be a distant relative of mine--I've got a few Wilson cousins here in Jersey. He look anything like me?"
Wilson's tactic was right out of Edgar Allan Poe; hiding the truth in plain sight, the best way he could think of for putting House off any scent.
"Never saw him. Just the file." House raised his voice. "Stacy! Where's my blue shirt?
"Go away!" an annoyed voice sounded from the kitchen.
"Laundry basket," House realized with the air of divine revelation, and he headed towards the door. House added as he left, "He's not gonna be a relative of yours, though. Not unless you've got any homeless bums among your cousins."
And Wilson thanked his lucky stars that House had been distracted at the time, excited by the forthcoming trip and preoccupied with packing, and was halfway out of the room, as he knew his face would have given his secret away otherwise.
Wilson had not been a friend of House's for the last ten years without picking up a few tips. He didn't say another word about House's case, and fortunately House apparently wasn't interested enough to mention it again. Wilson stayed at House's apartment until Stacy had finished her work, made polite conversation with her and House for a short while, then excused himself gracefully to let them finish preparing for their vacation.
On his way out he lifted House's office key from the bunch sitting in the hallway. He then went straight to Princeton General.
Wilson had visited House at work a few times and knew his way around. House shared an office with a few other doctors and Wilson was grateful that none of them were there; by this time it was quite late in the evening. He looked at House's desk and shook his head at the mess of papers. The desks nearby were neater, but still with a lot of paperwork.
There was no need to hunt around, however; there was a filing tray on the side of the room, and right on top of them was the most recent case that day, a file marked David Wilson.
It was a thin file. Wilson flipped through it quickly. Very little information. As House had said, the diagnosis had been a bad cough, exacerbated by living on the street. Wilson was sad, but not surprised, to see the file also said habitual drug user. There was almost no medical history otherwise. No fixed address. But there was a temporary address--a homeless shelter downtown. Wilson memorized it. He went through the file again, carefully, but there was nothing else helpful at all.
He made sure to leave the room exactly as it had been, then left, his mind whirling. For the first time he was grateful that House hated seeing patients so much; whatever state David was in, he was still Jonathan's twin and House would have recognized him for sure if he'd seen him close-up.
He headed back to House's apartment, apologized for disturbing House and Stacy so late, and retrieved his wallet which had accidentally slipped down the side of the bed earlier. On his way out he replaced House's office key, and was satisfied that he hadn't aroused House's suspicion.
And then he went straight to the homeless shelter. There was no time to be lost; David was in the habit of moving from town to town, and if he'd recently had a brush with officialdom--and a hospital admission undoubtedly counted--he might leave Princeton very soon.
Wilson had never been to this area of town before. He parked some way away, and walked slowly through the surrounding streets towards the shelter. And then, without any trouble at all, he saw his brother, sitting on a bench on the street corner opposite.
Wilson hadn't seen David for many years, but knew exactly what he should look like right now--he should look like Jonathan, his twin. And he did, but much older than Jonathan, even though he and Jon had been born only ten minutes apart. He looked reasonably clean--presumably he had been cleaned up on his hospital admission. Certainly he looked markedly cleaner than the other homeless guy sitting with him. But he looked older than his years. His eyes were sunken, his hair was long and unkempt. He was dragging compulsively on a cigarette, and Wilson's oncologist mind couldn't help but recall the bad cough.
Not wanting to intrude, Wilson stood a little way off in the shadows, waiting. Within a few minutes the two men noticed him. He saw David lift a hand in surprise. Then David turned and said something to the other guy, and stood up. Wilson wasn't at all sure whether David would head towards him or away, but he came towards him.
"Hey, David," Wilson said awkwardly.
"Little bro," David said, for a second sounding almost exactly like a hoarse version of Jonathan. "Now what the hell are you doing here?"
"I've just moved to Princeton. I've got a job at Princeton Plainsboro hospital," Wilson said.
"So that's how you found me. Doctor grapevine," David said disgustedly. "You're a qualified doctor now, are you?"
"That's right."
"Mom and Dad must be very proud." David's voice was neutral, but Wilson squirmed uncomfortably.
"So, how are you, David?"
"Oh, just fine and dandy." David took out a cigarette and held it between twitchy fingers. "Got a bit of a cough. But you'll know that. What's Jon up to these days?"
"Uh, he's OK. He--he would love to hear from you."
David lit the cigarette and inhaled deeply. "Yeah, that's gonna happen."
"David, let me help you," Wilson said urgently. "You--"
"Fuck off, James," David said sharply.
Wilson looked at David helplessly. "Can--could we stay in touch?"
"No," David said definitely. " I was thinking about leaving Princeton anyway. Tell Jon to stop wasting his time looking for me."
"He won't," said Wilson.
David shrugged, and started to turn away. Suddenly he paused and looked back at Wilson. There was a speculative look in his eye. "Hey, as you're a doctor now--could you give me a scrip?"
Wilson tensed. "What?"
"A prescription."
"I know. What for?"
David raised his hands. "Whatever."
Wilson stared at him. "For your cough?"
"Naw, I've got stuff for that. For--other stuff. Some kind of opiates maybe."
Suddenly Wilson was transported back to high school. David, home from college, trying to wheedle money out of him, his kid brother. And Wilson was furious. "No way. I'm not giving you anything to get high on. Or to sell on. I am not going to enable your addiction."
"Fine," David shot back. "Tell Jon when you see him that I would have stayed in Princeton and even kept in touch if you didn't have your head so far up your own ass."
"David, that's not fair!" Wilson heard his own voice raise in frustration. Suddenly another man appeared, standing right behind David: the other homeless guy. He looked a little older than David, and had dark hair and darker eyes.
"Everything all right, Davey boy?" the other guy said, and Wilson stared, because along with general hostility he could see something else in the man's eyes. A proprietorial glint.
"Yeah, Tom, it's cool. But we'll be leaving Princeton a bit sooner than we planned." David dropped the cigarette and ground it out underfoot. He turned, and touched the other man briefly on the shoulder with a gloved hand. "Let's go."
And he walked away. Tom stared back at Wilson for a few seconds before following, and Wilson gulped: he recognized that look, unfriendly possessiveness. He had seen it in House's eyes before, in relation to himself.
Wilson started to go after them, then stopped after a few paces. Because what could he say? What could he do?
Later, he thought of things he could have said, could have done, and regretted it. But by that time it was too late; David had left town, and Tom too, and although Wilson repeatedly wandered back to the spot he'd seen him, and talked to people at the homeless shelter, it was all to no avail. David had gone underground again.
Wilson called Jonathan to tell him he'd seen David but scared him away. Wilson was careful not to allude to Tom, and couldn't bring himself to mention the prescription thing; he rather thought Jon would say he should have done it, started prescribing, to keep David around. And in fact, Wilson wasn't at all sure if he'd done the right thing or not. Perhaps he should have agreed; maybe it would have been worth it, to get his brother back.
But he'd made the choice, and had to live with it. At least David knew where he was, could find him if he decided he wanted to. Wilson hoped for this for quite a while; but time passed, and nothing happened. Wilson pushed his brother to the back of his mind, and tried not to think about what he should have done differently.
A few months after Wilson had started working at Princeton Plainsboro, Cuddy invited Wilson, House and Stacy to her home for a dinner party.
It was a very pleasant occasion; Cuddy was an excellent hostess and her large, beautiful home was the perfect surrounding. House was in his element at a table with possibly the only three people in the world who actually liked him. He dominated the conversation, concentrating his considerable intellect on making witty remarks and shrewd observations about life, the universe and everything .
At one point, Wilson and Cuddy were discussing a tricky patient of Wilson's from the clinic; House listened, and made a couple of pertinent suggestions. Wilson nodded and made a mental note; Cuddy was clearly impressed, and said, "Perhaps you should come and work for me at Plainsboro, House."
"Make me an offer I can't refuse," House said smoothly, and leered at her cleavage.
"Perhaps I'll just wait until Princeton General finally fires you," Cuddy countered. "And then I'll get you cheap."
Wilson thought this was a little too close to the bone to be funny. He and Stacy exchanged glances.
After dinner, Cuddy went to the kitchen to make coffee, and Stacy kept her company. House and Wilson went outside for a breath of fresh air, and wandered around Cuddy's large and beautiful backyard. It was pitch dark by this time in the evening. Although the garden path was dimly lit, once they got to the end of the path and stepped off onto grass it was so dark they could barely see each other.
Wilson sat down under a tree, and heard leaves rustle on the ground as House sat down next to him. He felt House's knee brush his own. He pressed back with his own knee, lightly, then reached out and felt for House's shoulder. Finding it, he leaned his head against it.
They sat there companionably in the dark. It was very quiet, with only the faintest noise and light coming from Cuddy's house in the distance, and they might as well have been the only people in the world.
"It might be fun for me to work at Plainsboro, don't you think?" House remarked.
"What, so you can grope me in my office?" Wilson said, a little sleepily.
"Actually I hadn't thought of that. Best to avoid the temptation." House put a hand on Wilson's knee and squeezed. "You should get yourself a girlfriend. We could double date."
"That sounds appalling," Wilson said, with feeling.
House put a hand up and covered Wilson's face with his palm, as if trying to sense his expression. Wilson breathed gently into House's hand.
"I'd kiss you," House said unexpectedly, "but you stink of that ghastly aftershave, and I think Stacy would notice."
Wilson leaned into House's hand, resting his forehand against House's fingers, and smiled into the darkness. He was happy, and part of that was because he could tell House was happy too. And House was so rarely happy, really.
As it turned out, House lasted another year at Princeton General before getting fired, for the fourth time in his career. He'd been there a long time, for him, but his boss had been patiently waiting for a major screw up for a while. One day House made a diagnostic leap too far, and a patient died.
With Stacy's help, House breezed through an independent investigative committee and escaped any formal sanction as a physician, but unfortunately he had been on a final written warning. It was the last straw for the hospital administration, and he lost his job.
At least for once there was no need for anguish or job applications. Cuddy surveyed his range of ground-breaking journal articles and influential conference papers, and hired him to work in Princeton Plainsboro's Infectious Diseases department. She knew full well that House would have found it extremely difficult to get a job elsewhere with his employment record;she also knew that House had all the reasons in the world to stay in Princeton, in his apartment, with Stacy, and with Wilson nearby. Wilson gathered from Stacy that Cuddy took some pleasure in halving House's salary: House gritted his teeth and bore it.
The first couple of years at Princeton Plainsboro were shaky ones for House. Although Wilson tried to be friendly and supportive, the Infectious Diseases department was at the opposite end of the building from the Oncology department and they didn't see each other very often. They would always have lunch together if both were free; but more often than not, one of them wasn't free.
On one particularly trying day, a few months after he'd started working at Plainsboro, House came stomping into Wilson's office and threw himself down on the couch.
"I'm gonna quit. I'm surrounded by idiots."
Wilson pantomimed looking around his office. "Bad day?"
"Fuckers all hate me. None of them want to work with me, so they're letting me work my own cases, giving me all the hard ones. The patients none of them is intelligent enough to diagnose..." House stared at the ceiling.
"Isn't that what you want?"
"Yes, actually. I don't care if they hate me. But they all think I'm boning Cuddy--Christ, if only!--and that's why I got the job."
Wilson would have liked to have denied that anyone could possibly think that, but he had in fact overheard a nurse express that very opinion in the hospital cafeteria a few days before.
"And I wouldn't care about that either, except it's not fucking fair on Stacy," House went on. "She shouldn't have to put up with this poisonous crap."
"Ah." Wilson was genuinely sorry. Wilson had come to like Stacy very much, indeed to regard her as essential for House's well-being.
"My boss has made it quite clear to Cuddy he's only putting up with me in his precious department because he has to, and he's not responsible for anything I do." House put his feet up on the couch.
Wilson considered "That's okay, right?"
"If Cuddy wasn't likely to be out on her ass herself any moment, then it would be."
Wilson nodded. Cuddy was still relatively new as Dean; some of the board members obviously thought her too young and inexperienced.
He got up from his desk and walked around to perch next to House on the couch. He would have liked to reach out and touch House, but House had been rigorously enforcing the Stacy Convention almost all the time since Wilson had moved to Princeton, and Wilson didn't want to risk a rebuff. Rationally Wilson knew House was only being sensible. Hospital scuttlebutt knew that he and House were close friends, although few people other than Cuddy realized just how long they'd known each other; most people assumed they'd met here at the hospital.
"Cuddy needs time to establish herself," Wilson said eventually. "If you can stick around for a while, she'll ride it out. Try not to commit any sackable offenses for a year or so, perhaps. Or ever, even."
"That is exactly what Stacy says." House closed his eyes. "And she also says to keep on hanging out with you because you're becoming indispensable to the hospital with your readiness to do clinic duty, complete paperwork, serve on committees, assist with fundraising, and generally kowtow and kiss ass as necessary."
Wilson grinned a little, and said, "Cuddy needs some allies." He realized as he spoke that it might be useful to House at some point if Wilson could also become influential in the hospital management. He stored that thought for future consideration.
House reached up and flicked Wilson affectionately on the arm. "I'll try not to kill anyone for a while... can't promise anything though. Especially not with my idiot colleagues."
"Attaboy," Wilson said, and flicked House back.
As it turned out over the next couple of years, Cuddy had not gotten where she was without a sound grasp of hospital politics. Several regime changes later, some the most senior board members found themselves unexpectedly isolated and took early retirement, or found better jobs elsewhere. Cuddy filled their places with her supporters. Where legal issues threatened, Cuddy brought on Stacy as her muscle and faced them down.
House, for his part, managed to co-exist with his departmental colleagues by more or less ignoring them and by actually doing his job well. Some high-profile patients were saved, the hospital basked in occasional good publicity, and Cuddy generally vindicated in her steady support. As time went on, the rumors about House and Cuddy faded, House and Stacy grew closer than ever, and ironically House got a little more relaxed about occasionally lifting the Stacy Convention with Wilson.
There was only one occasion during this period when the Stacy Convention really got well and truly busted, and the occasion was Wilson's seminal conference paper.
Wilson had now been at Princeton Plainsboro for three years. Taking his cue from Stacy's influence on House, Wilson had worked extremely hard and become increasingly career-minded. Unencumbered by wives or long-term girlfriends, he had little personal life to distract him, and such social life as he had became focused on networking with colleagues, and playing golf or going fishing with potential donors. And hanging out with House, of course; but House had Stacy, and spent most of his own free time with her.
The national oncology conference was being held in New York and Wilson was giving a paper on the first day. Although not earth-shattering, it did break new ground, and the conference was the most important event in the US oncology calendar . He had spent some months researching and writing it, and during the weeks leading up to the conference he started obsessively going over every word, staying late into the night after the working day was over to get it absolutely perfect.
House, whose idea of writing a conference paper was to scribble down a few notes and ad lib, was contemptuous of the time Wilson spent on it ("Wilson, I'm getting the impression you must've cured cancer!") but Wilson ignored him and continued to obsess.
The night before the conference, Wilson went up to New York to stay in a hotel near the venue, to ensure he could arrive promptly the next morning. He was sitting at the bar and reading his paper through (even though by this time he practically knew it by heart) when suddenly there was a thump next to him, and he looked up to find House sitting on the bar stool next to him.
"House, what on earth are you doing here?" Wilson said, apprehensively.
"I've come to stop you stressing yourself out the night before your big paper," House announced. He motioned to the barman. "I'll have what he's having," pointing to Wilson's glass of whiskey. "And on his tab."
Wilson waited until House had his drink in front of him, then asked suspiciously, "And how were you proposing to...stop me stressing myself out?"
House leaned in so nobody else could hear, and hissed quietly, "What you need is a good hard fuck."
Thirty seconds ago sex had been the last thing on Wilson's mind, and now--instant erection. He swallowed hard. "Right. And you came all the way to New York to tell me that?"
"Well I could have sent a hooker, but that wouldn't have been as much fun," House said carelessly. "Actually, I could be a hooker, propositioning you at the bar like this. If you're willing to pay for it, I'll take your money."
"Does Stacy know you're here?" Wilson asked, tempted to follow House's line of conversation, but not wanting to let House off the hook quite yet.
"She knows I've come to find you; she thinks I'm taking you on a bar crawl."
Wilson frowned and dropped his voice. "And the Stacy Convention?..."
House had obviously been expecting this and answered readily. "This is a special occasion. Can't have you standing up on the podium tomorrow with everyone thinking you're a sad bastard who obviously isn't getting any."
Wilson spluttered over his drink. "Oh thanks. And since when did you care?" He thought for a few seconds and then looked carefully at House. "You've had a fight with Stacy, haven't you?"
"We never fight," House protested indignantly, but he was lying and he knew Wilson knew he was lying--House and Stacy were both too blunt to never argue. But it didn't happen often, and their fights were usually quickly forgotten.
Wilson would have liked to know what it had been about, but decided not to ask right now. House was offering himself up on a plate, and Wilson knew this wasn't likely to happen again for a long time.
He asked, "So what am I, the revenge fuck?"
House hesitated. "Would you care if you were?"
"Not really." Wilson thought for a moment. "Actually, not at all."
"Then hold that thought." House drained his drink and reached for Wilson's. He leaned in close again, and pushed a knee between Wilson's legs, angling his body so as block any view from the room. "That and the fact its been a long time since I sucked cock."
Wilson breathed deeply; goddamn House for knowing exactly how to turn him on.
House finished Wilson's drink and looked enquiringly at him.
Wilson fished in his pocket for his wallet, took out his key card and slid it across the bar to House. "You go on up. I'll be a few minutes."
House grinned wickedly, pocketed the key card, and glanced down at Wilson's crotch. "You really are a tightly coiled spring just waiting to unroll, aren't you?"
And House got up and left, heading towards the elevator.
Wilson noticed that the barman had seen him slide the key card across to House, and was now looking at him with a knowing expression. Usually this would have concerned Wilson, but right now he really didn't care.
He sat for a couple of minutes until he felt able to stand up without too much embarrassment, then headed up to his room to join House. Wilson half expected House to jump him from behind the door, but House was playing hooker again, and was lying sprawled on the bed with his pants off and his shirt undone.
It was an irresistible sight. Wilson could glimpse just a bit of House's chest hair and the hint of a nipple through the unbuttoned shirt. House's right leg has raised and his thigh, muscular and powerful, was proudly bared. Wilson felt his erection return rapidly, and more forcefully than before.
"So," House said conversationally. "When did you last get laid?"
"Shut up." Wilson was pulling off his tie, kicking off his shoes.
House watched through slits of blue as Wilson dropped his pants and boxers, and joined House on the bed.
"Weren't you saying you wanted to, um..."
"Suck cock," House said in a throaty voice, and Wilson crawled across the bed, straddled House's head, grasped the headboard, and slid his hard-on into House's mouth.
Wilson kept it shallow to start with, partly to let House breathe, partly because he didn't actually need to feel himself all the way down House's throat. House's lips sucking lightly at the head was enough, more than enough, Christ, how long had it been?... Wilson honestly couldn't remember; House had always been more eager to receive than give when it came to blow jobs.
He grabbed the headboard and shut his eyes, rocking back and forth, giving himself entirely over to experiencing the nerve endings jumping where House's tongue was lapping away. This was just so good, Wilson would have liked to stay like that forever, but his pulsing cock told him he wasn't going to last long.
"Gonna come," he gasped, and House's bobbing head twitched to indicate assent. Wilson groaned and pushed, and then pulled backwards swiftly as he climaxed, letting his come leak over House's face. House, trapped between Wilson's knees, shifted his head backwards and took it mostly on the chin.
Wilson sat back on his heels, breathing heavily. He felt simultaneously exhausted and exhilarated. House had been right, he had needed this.
"My turn," House muttered, rubbing a hand over his chin and wincing. "Sheesh, Wilson, you must've been building this up for a while."
"Uh." Wilson let himself fall on the bed next to House, suddenly devoid of any energy.
House propped himself up on an elbow. "Foot of the bed."
Wilson wriggled downwards, still scarcely able to think or move, dimly aware of House reaching under the pillow; the crackle of latex, the click of a plastic lid. He reached the foot of the bed and lay sprawled on his back; and then House was there, standing, easing his legs apart.
Wilson closed his eyes and gave himself over to House; House's hands on his thighs, reaching down for his ass. Coldness and wetness made Wilson shudder briefly, and he felt momentarily exposed, before a palm grabbed his hip and House's erection pushed up between his legs.
"Fucking hell!" The angle wasn't quite right: Wilson arched his back and tried to guide House in. House thrust again, better that time, ohGodohGodohGod House's cock right up inside him now; House's hands on his hips, his chest; House's body inches from his own, reverberating heat and sweat and excitement.
"A good--" grunt--"hard--" grunt--"fuck, that's what you need," House was gabbling close to his ear. Wilson gasped for breath, lost on a wave that was three parts ecstasy to one part anguish; House was slamming into him now, heedless of Wilson's shaking body; slamming between repeated utterances of "Good--" grunt--"hard--"
House came like a train; Wilson tried to stay still but couldn't help but writhe in soundless bliss.
Afterwards Wilson roused himself sufficiently to reach over to the nightstand and set the alarm for the following morning: he wasn't going to risk being late for his paper.
House stirred as he did so, and murmured, apropos of nothing, "I had a patient complaint yesterday. A mom said I'd tricked her into agreeing treatment for her daughter... "
"Yeah." Wilson vaguely remembered the case from the previous week. House had more or less railroaded a cautious parent into some risky surgery.
"...Stacy defended me. The mom withdrew the complaint, but afterwards Stacy told me I shouldn't have done it. That what I did was unethical and wrong. I said, so I should have let the kid die? and somehow this led to the most enormous fight... turned out I'd also missed our paintball anniversary, because I was at the hospital working three nights in succession last week. She was pretty mad, and so was I."
"So you're a crap boyfriend," Wilson said, and the irony of House lying there with him naked and post-coital was not lost on either of them: House winced. "It's just a fight, you love her and she loves you," Wilson went on hastily. "You'll go back tomorrow and make up, and everything'll be fine."
"Hmph," said House, but he seemed comforted. They fell asleep shortly afterwards, bodies entwined affectionately.
The next day Wilson gave his paper. House claimed to be going home, but chose to gatecrash the conference instead: Wilson spotted House sitting at the very back of his session.
Wilson was extremely pleased by the reception his paper got. He dealt with a variety of questions afterwards with authority: House kept his mouth shut and shot Wilson occasional grins.
A triumphant Wilson was hanging out with House during the coffee break a bit later on, when a man came up behind Wilson and clapped him on the shoulder. It was the head of oncology at Vancouver. He congratulated Wilson on his paper, and said before walking away, "I'm going to have a job vacancy in a few months time, if you're interested then keep an eye out for it. I think you're just the kind of person I could work with."
Wilson laughed and thanked him, and as soon as he was out of hearing distance House rounded on Wilson and said, "You're not interested."
"No. Well, probably not. No reason to leave Princeton Plainsboro right now." Wilson was giddy with his conference success. "But hey, who knows? Maybe it would be a good thing, different experience, make new contacts, get exposed to new ideas..."
House looked at him through piercing blue eyes. "There's other ways of getting that kind of thing."
Wilson realized suddenly that he'd upset House; he'd forgotten how much House disliked change. "Hey, it's only a thought. I'm not actually planning on going anywhere."
"Yeah." House drummed his fingers on the table, and his eyes grew distant as he thought.
END OF PART 16
TBC. Next part: the infarction.
A/N: House and Wilson's early years at Princeton Plainsboro are also observed by Nora in Memoirs of an Oncology Department Secretary, chapter 1.