CHAPTER 22
THE DEVIL YOU KNOW
I sat straight up.
"It would be easier to ask who didn't want to shoot him. Dr. House isn't exactly well liked. He's difficult to work with and his bedside manner is non-existent. But he is brilliant and the best at what he does. He saves a lot of people who would die if it were not for his skills."
"Well, there you have it Dave. Doctor Gregory House was shot today by a former patient. We'll stay on the scene and keep you posted."
By this time I was at the edge of the bed switching channels to see if anyone else had more information, but CNN had the most. I started packing. I called the front desk and told them that I needed a cab to the train station. It was going to be faster going by train than by air or road.
When I arrived at Princeton, I caught a cab from the train station to the hospital. There were lights and cameras all around. I went through to emergency and then when one of the locked doors was opened by an orderly coming through, I acted like I was part of the staff and zipped by with my luggage. I didn't look back because that would have given me away. I kept going until I came to a bank of elevators and then I took them to the second floor. I started wandering around. I saw an office with "Gregory House, M.D. Diagnostics," on it, but it was very late and the office was dark. The lights were on in the adjoining office and there was a young African-American man sitting and reading something. I kept going. The intensive care ward wasn't on this level. I found a directory and it said that intensive care was on the fourth floor. I took off running up the stairs with my luggage.
On the fourth floor I managed to get up to the glass outside of intensive care. I could see him hooked up to machines, a unit of blood attached to a drip and another I.V. which I assumed was either morphine or antibiotics. I didn't think seeing him would cause such a violent reaction in me. I broke out in a cold sweat and I started to get dizzy. If I had eaten, I would have thrown up. He was still handsome, with his brown hair now mostly gray on the sides and his face covered in a beard. He looked helpless. I wanted to touch him, protect him, comfort him. I was 9 years old all over again. I started to go in, but I was stopped by a nurse.
"You can't go in there unless you are on the list. What's your name?"
"Maggie Molloy, I am family, we grew up together. Please let me in to see him, I promise I won't do anything funny."
"You aren't the first of the press to try and get in...sorry, but you aren't on the list."
I started to cry. "Just tell me he's going to be alright and I'll go."
"Sorry but you aren't family, I can't do that."
"Please? Please?" But the nurse kept her lip tight.
"What's going on?" I heard a man's voice behind me.
I turned around and there was a very pretty young female doctor with another thirty-something male doctor. Their coats said Drs. Cameron and Wilson respectively. I still had tears going down my cheeks.
"I just want to know if Greg is going to be ok. Please, I'll leave, but just tell me."
Dr. Wilson nodded, "We're about to release a press statement that he is going to be just fine. He took two bullets, but we were able to stop the bleeding and sew him up. He's ok." He smiled, "He's okay."
"Thank you, thank you very much," I said as my shoulders relaxed and I started to breath again, "Good night. I can't tell you how good it is to hear that." I felt relieved. Dr. Wilson was going to ask me something, but the nurse came back to tell him something. I grabbed my luggage and walked off.
I heard Dr. Cameron ask the nurse, "Who was that?"
The nurse said, "Maggie something, she wasn't on the list."
Cameron turned to Wilson, "Do you know a Maggie?"
"She looks familiar and I'm trying to remember where that name came up. Well, it's been too long now and I can't remember."
I called John and Blythe and gave them the update but they already knew, someone had already called them from the hospital.
"You're there at the hospital?" Blythe asked.
"I'm leaving right now."
"Did you get to see him?" her voice was strained and worried.
I was still upset, "Only from behind the glass, they wouldn't let me in because I'm not family."
"Oh, sweetie, if I had known you were going to go there I would have told them to put you on the list."
"It's ok, I just wanted to make sure he was ok. I'm going to fly home now. Please don't let him know I was here. I assume you are flying out here."
"Our plane leaves in two hours."
"Well, I'll let you go. Love you. Bye."
Blythe turned to John, "That girl still loves Greg, why I don't know. Come on, we better get going."
CHAPTER 23
ET TU MATT LAUER?
I called John and Blythe almost every week for the next few months and found out that Greg recovered, even had the use of his bad leg for awhile, but then the pain came back. I didn't understand how that could happen and they couldn't explain it either.
That following summer the buzz about my book was great. Articles were starting to appear in places like "Harpers", "The New York Times" and "Book" raving about it. I still didn't think it would make a big splash and, if it did, no one was going to care if George was real or not. I always wrote in my pen name, M.M. Molloy and I thought that it might give me some protection. Especially since my middle name was not May but Sara and I didn't let anyone but my publisher and agent know where I lived. All the offers for appearances and book signings came through my agent.
But then the book came out and it went straight to number one. People on television and call-in radio programs began to debate whether George was a real bastard for having sex in front of Rachel so that Rachel would find them screwing. Others thought he was a martyr, he had done it because he loved Rachel so much that he wanted to set her free to go have a life. Everyone agreed he was a jerk over the abortion, especially since he knew she was having a hard time agreeing to one. The debate raged everywhere with women calling in and claiming they were in love with George and would have never left him, no matter what he did; others hated George and wanted him dead. I watched this maelstrom and worried, what if they find out Greg is George?
My Publisher wanted me to do an interview on national television. I had just about everyone clamoring for the first sit down interview and so they picked The Today Show with Matt Lauer for me to start with. I flew to New York, got up at 5 am, cleaned up an and went to the studio. When it was my turn, Matt and I sat down at the taping and we shook hands. He praised my book, talked about the fuss it was making and that the last time he saw a book create such a buzz was "The DaVinci Code." Then he turned to question me. The first thing out of his mouth was, "Who is George?"
I almost swallowed my own tongue. "What makes you think he is real?"
Matt smiled and looked as if he could tell I was nervous, "Well, he seems so real in the book. We know that the book follows your life quite closely. We know you were a military brat, you had a mother who was murdered, your father and brother died in an accident and we understand that you had neighbors who took you in after your family died. All of this happens in the book, so who is George really?"
"That's all true, but George is an amalgamation of a lot of men I've known." This wasn't really a lie. For the most part I had described Greg when I was writing about George except I had embellished the sex scenes with moves I learned from my other lovers. It made Greg look like an ideal lover, both romantic and inventive. Now this was true to a point, but I had learned a lot about lovemaking over the years and I'm sure Greg did too. We both probably picked up tricks that we didn't have in our repertoire fifteen years ago.
Matt Lauer wasn't buying it and I had the distinct feeling that he was going to announce Greg's name on national television. I was sick to my stomach.
I was just leaving the studio when the call came in, it was the Houses and they would want to know about the abortion — I would tell them it was just fiction, Greg would never do that.
"Maggie, who do you think you're kidding?" Is all that John said.
Blythe said, "That was a pretty big grenade, wasn't it?"
Months later, I discovered that the all hell broke lose that day at Princeton-Plainsboro. The interview was shown on the Today Show in the 9:00 a.m. hour. Cameron, Chase and Foreman were watching the show when Wilson walked in looking for bagels.
"He's not here yet." Cameron told Wilson.
"What's this?" Wilson asked pointing to the television.
"You know the book, "My Back to the Piano?" Cameron said. "They're going to have the author on next."
"Everyone's reading that book, have you read it yet?" Wilson asked her.
"I just bought it." She pulled it out of her satchel and showed it to him. He held the book in his hand. It had a picture of a young man playing piano and a young woman sitting on the floor with her back leaning on the piano. The man had reddish brown hair and the girl was blonde. Wilson looked for a photo of M.M. Molloy but there was none on the book cover.
"Is the author male or female?"
"I think female, it's a love story from a female's point of view. But we'll find out in a minute. One of the nurses read it and told me the main male character sounds like House, only nicer, sexier."
Matt Lauer introduced me just as House walked into his office and saw everyone gathered around the television. When my face came on the television Cameron and Wilson looked at each other. Cameron jumped up and pointed at the television and started yelling, "That's her, that's her."
"Who? What are you talking about?" House asked in a loud voice from his office.
"That's the woman that came to see you right after you were shot. They wouldn't let her, in so she asked Wilson and I if you were ok..."
House was behind the television and had to come around to look. All he saw was the camera on Matt Lauer who was asking a question, "Well, we have anecdotal evidence that says George was really your next door neighbor, Gregory House." The camera cut to me and House pulled his head back and his mouth opened in shock.
"Oh my God, George is you???" Cameron glanced up at House. Chase, Foreman and Wilson were also staring at House.
House was stunned when he saw me on television. "Who is George?" House asked rather meekly.
Cameron held up the book and said, "It's a character in this book." House grabbed the book out of her hand.
Meanwhile, in the interview I'm smiling and trying to hide the fact that I'm scared to death. "No, it's not Gregory House, although Greg was very kind to me as a child. This is a fictional character, nothing else."
The phone started to ring. Cameron picked it up. "Diagnostics...Ewww...no. Don't call back." She looked at the phone with disgust. She turned to House, "That was a woman who wanted to know if you had ever stored your semen? What is that about?"
House was giving them all a look that said, "Don't ask me."
Cuddy came running into the office. "You're George?" Her hands went to her hips, "You pig. You made her have an abortion?"
House went white and then blushed red. Both Cuddy and Cameron were staring at him with female revenge in their eyes.
"I'm going into my office and I would prefer it if anyone with ovaries stayed out of it."
Wilson followed him in to his office. House looked up at Wilson, "Did she really stop by to see me?"
"Yes, she was crying too. Very upset that they wouldn't let her in or give her any information. Who is she?"
House was looking out the window and trying to think. "She was Maggie May, the only woman who ever loved me for who I was."
"What about you? Did you love her?" Wilson asked.
"I've never stopped thinking about her, or wondering where she is. Is that love?"
"Sounds pretty close to me. Well she certainly is beautiful and obviously talented."
House watched Cuddy and Cameron talking. Cuddy was showing Cameron passages in the book and Cameron was glaring at House. House frowned, "Damn, I need to get a copy of that book."
The phone was ringing off the hook and within ten minutes the phone system was fried with people trying to call Gregory House for an interview, to threaten bodily harm or offer to bear his children or just be his sex slave. It was a strange day. He managed to sneak out because no one expected a doctor to be riding a motorcycle. He made his way down to the bookstore and bought the book. He took it home and started to read it.
Greg was both pleased and dismayed at the characterization of George. He liked the exaggerated sexual prowess which he knew he didn't have back then. He thought my description of him was pretty accurate, but that also meant that the whole world knew he had been very cruel to me at the end.
He wished he could write his own interlude in the book. The truth was that he didn't know how to handle my depression over the abortion. He had regretted the abortion from day one. He knew I would have made a great mother and if he was ever going to have children, he wanted them to be with me. The baby would almost be eighteen. He sat at the piano with a whiskey and wondered what his life would have been like if he hadn't forced me into the abortion. He might have been happy. He had been happy with me. Greg played the piano until midnight and then went to bed. The next day Greg went into the hospital and found Foreman, Chase and Cameron, each with a copy of the book. They were each at different stages of reading it.
He yelled, "For God's sake, isn't anyone looking in on the patient?"
They all looked up at him and said in unison, "She's stable."
Greg shook his head and started for the clinic. As he passed the nurses and staff in the hall he kept hearing remarks aimed at him, "I'd have his babies," "asshole," "He's George?", "Oh yeah, I'd nail him."... Greg wasn't sure who was going to kill him and who was going to jump his bones.
When he got to the clinic Cuddy cut him off at the pass. He gave her a look of curiosity. "What?"
"You see the clinic?" She asked.
He looked in and the clinic had twice as many patients as usual. However, over half of the patients were women between the age of 20-55 in all forms of dress and undress.
"The women... they all want you to see them."
"Well, I better get started then." House smiled at the thought of all these women asking for him to examine them.
Cuddy narrowed her eyes and grit her teeth in emphasis, "No pelvics or chest exams without a nurse in the room, do you understand?"
"Yes, she-who-must-be-obeyed."
House stepped through the doors and the women started to rush forward. He held up his cane and said, "Stop...I know how to use this...sit down and I will try to see each of you." A few kept coming and he pointed at chairs. "Sit!"
He grabbed a chart and called the first woman who shrieked with excitement when her name was called. There were sounds of disappointment from the other women. Wilson and Cuddy were both observing all of this from the side and laughing.
House soon found out that trying to keep a woman from disrobing because of an ingrown toe nail was harder than he thought. "I really don't need to listen to your chest. Ohhhh, woaa... I don't really need to see your chest either."
The next patient came in and gave him a Snickers bar and told him that she was having chest pains. "I don't hear anything out of the usual but I'll send you to cardiology for an EKG."
"Well, George, I think it's a broken heart, broken because you don't love me anymore."
Greg looked at the chart, the name on it was Rachel Surrey. Greg wrote a referral. "You need to take this to the second floor in the east wing and ask for Dr. Pfeiffer, he'll help you." Dr. Pfeiffer was a psychiatrist.
"But all I really need is you George. Come back to me..."
He had to call security.
Everyone wanted to show him their breasts or ask him if he wanted children now because they would be willing to assist him. He did get one real patient who didn't know who George was. But she had a cold and so she was out of the clinic within a few minutes. After two hours of being flashed every size, shape and color of breasts and receiving numerous offers of sexual favors, Greg was tired. He never knew breasts could be so exhausting. He wondered if Wilson ever thought this with all of his breast cancer cases.
When his shift was up he went out to the waiting room and announced, "I am not George, I do not want children. However, if you still want to screw me leave a name, phone number and a nude photo of yourself and I will get back to you." and then he left.
Surprisingly, two of the women actually left him the requisite information which was sent up to his office in an envelope and opened by an unsuspecting Cameron. "Ewww..."
(Dear Readers, This story will be over in a day or two. I hope you like it and leave me your thoughts. Thanks to those who faithfullyleave a word. It means a lot to fanfic writers. I am working on a novel this summer (non-House) so I will probably post another, older story here if you would like for me to keep putting my stories here. I am on another site, but it is very difficult to navigate the web site. Take care and thanks for reading.)