"I tell you he is on drugs!" Chase insisted to his two fellow musketeers. "He must be."
"You know he pops Vicodin like candy," Cameron points out. "And with his mother's illness and his father's presence, he must need it even more than before."
"Have you seen him take them now?" Foreman asked.
"Yes, as soon as his father arrived I saw him, and since then it has been pretty much the same as usual." Cameron said.
"He is always taking Vicodin," Chase argued. "It does not explain his present behaviour."
"He is worried!" Cameron defended. "You are talking like he has suddenly grown two heads or something."
"He has!" Chase nearly shouted. "Or at least another head than the one he used to have. I tell you, he has changed. And unless Wilson hitting him caused head trauma, I cannot think of any other reason than drugs for his present behaviour!"
"I have to agree with Chase that House has definitely not been himself these last couple of days," Foreman agreed.
"Look," Cameron sighed, "drugs do cause personality changes, but House is not showing any such signs. Drugs make people irritable, paranoid, more aggressive, things like that. You know it. House has been more mellow of late, if anything."
"Personality change is a personality change," Chase insisted. "It is impossible for House to be worse, so if he changes it has to be to the other extreme. Or can you come up with any other explanation for him suddenly thanking Foreman and telling me that I do nice work?"
"He also told his father – in front of me – that we are the best team of doctors in this country," Foreman supported Chase.
"He has told us we do good work before this!" Cameron tried to defend House.
"Sure he has. But not like this," Foreman reminded her. "Before, there was always also a put down, somewhere in there. If nothing else, he told us that we ought to have thought of it sooner. And remember that time he told you that you had been right about that nun? When it turned out that it was a long term exposure to an allergenic, he said to you: good work, but in the next breath he said that you still nearly killed the patient! That you should have followed my example of sticking to my guns, only he did that in a way that also rubbed my nose on the fact that I was wrong about House having been wrong about that injection."
"Precisely! That is how House works," Chase exclaimed. "That is what we know to expect, not this thanking and supportive words and what not he has been giving us. There has to be a reason for the change!"
"It could be just stress over his mother," Cameron still insisted.
"Well, his mother's operation is over, we have the diagnosis and in a few days we can start trying for the best treatment for her, so I'm willing to wait and see how things go," Foreman conceded. "But if he doesn't show signs of returning to his normal self in the next couple of days, I'm searching his home for illegal drugs."
"And I'm coming with you," Chase agreed.
---------
House was sitting in Wilson's office unaware of the anxiety he had caused in his underlings, which was a pity, as it would have afforded him no end of amusement. He was waiting for Wilson to finish a phone call so that they could go and have lunch together.
"Fine, that would be fine, thank you," Wilson finished and hung up the phone.
"Ready then?" House asked getting up.
"Yep, nothing else I need to do first," Wilson agreed and they left his office.
"So what is the situation with Andie?" House asked, knowing that was pretty much the topmost thought in Wilson's mind these days.
"No change. The cancer doesn't seem to be very aggressive at the moment, so I think she may even have one last Christmas still." Wilson sounded mildly optimistic.
"Don't," House told him.
"Don't what?" Wilson asked.
"Don't set yourself up for it. You know perfectly well that even if Andie is still alive come Christmas, she will not be celebrating it," House stated. "You said a week after you examined her after she refused the chemo. Even if she beats that, she will be in so much pain later on, that you will need to put her in coma for the last few days to alleviate the pain. Don't set yourself, or her mother, up for the hurt that will follow if you start to hope for the impossible again."
"Dammit House!" Wilson despaired, "I ... Ah. You are right; I must not hope for anything like that, just see it day at a time and make sure Andie is comfortable and happy. If happy is a word that can be used here."
"She hates leaving her mother behind," House agreed. "But there is no help for it. I think she has reached acceptance for herself, but not for her mother."
"You may be right," Wilson sighed. "I will try and find a way to help there. If Andie's mother can have some kind of closure for this while Andie is still with us, it will help both Andie and her. I'll have a word with the grief counsellor."
"Whatever you think will help," House said. "But what about you? How are you going to deal with this? You know you are far more attached to Andie than you normally are to your patients, and it's not just because she is a child. You have plenty of children in your care."
"Frankly, I don't know why I like her so much. It could be her bravery, everything she has been through, or just something in her got to my heart strings. But you are right, she is different."
"You really need to work on your objectivity, you know," House pointed out. "It does you no good if you start seeing your patients as your family."
"I know," Wilson said with some resignation. "The problem is that I suspect they really are the only family I have!"
"I have met your family, remember," House dryly remarked. "They do exist and are perfectly ok, so don't try and pull that Oliver Twist act on me."
"I'm not!" Wilson exclaimed. "What I meant is that I spend much more time with my patients than I do with family and friends – with the possible exception of you."
"And who is to blame for that?" House asked. "I find it perfectly possible to treat patients without ever – or hardly ever – even meeting them, let alone constantly hovering over their fevered brows."
"We can't all be you," Wilson scoffed. "But I suppose I could try and get a life, or something resembling it. It will be my New Year's resolution!"
"Good," House supported, though there was some scepticism both in his voice and face. "That still leaves Andie, and how you are going to get through that."
"Yeah," Wilson sighed deeply. "I need to find a way to deal with that, if I'm going to be of any use to her and her mother. I wish it was summer! We could take her out of that stuffy room sometimes now that she still has some strength left to enjoy the sun and the breeze."
"You haven't thought of the balconies?"
"Yes I have," Wilson answered House, "but only mine is sheltered enough for this time of the year, and there is no way we get her bed to fit in there, never mind the monitors and all."
"Does she need monitors? I would have thought she is DNR by now?"
"Yes she is," Wilson admitted. "But we will still give her oxygen if she needs it, and it's also there to monitor her pain."
"I would think she is much better able to monitor her pain than some unfeeling monitor," House groused.
"I suppose, but we still cannot fit her bed on my balcony – or even a gurney," Wilson pointed out. "So there really is nothing for it. At least she has a window in her room."
"Both sides!" House pointed out. "I would really like to know who the fool of an architect was; who thought it would be fun for patients to be sick in a fishbowl."
"Or the administrator who agreed with that thought!" Wilson agreed. "Speaking of patients how is your mother?"
"I looked in on her briefly after she woke up from the anaesthetics," House said. "She looked ok. I'm hoping that once I've had lunch I can go see her and send Dad to have his lunch while I sit with her."
"You really don't get along with your father!" Wilson stated.
"Wow! You must be psychic or something," House answered with heavy sarcasm.
"Hah!" Wilson huffed. "By the way, what did you do to Chase?"
"What do you mean," House was puzzled.
"I saw him soon after the surgery and he looked, I don't know, spooked?" Wilson said. "Foreman said you had spoken with them."
"Can't imagine what it could have been," House wondered, but then a gleam of unholy glee entered his face, "unless it was me saying to him that he did good in there."
"Sure that wouldn't have spooked him!" Wilson exclaimed.
"Might," House mused. "I don't usually thank them, so such unheard of behaviour on my part might have thrown him. I wonder..."
"What?" Wilson asked. "You are making me nervous here."
"I wonder if I was to thank them, just unreservedly thank them for their work every now and then, how badly would it mess with their minds?" House planned.
"House!" Wilson exclaimed exasperated. "Couldn't you just be nice to them? Why do you need to think of ways to mess with their minds? Everybody else is quite happy to acknowledge good work, thank their fellowman once in a while. Why can't you just be nice to your ducklings, just once in a while?"
"But that is just what I'm thinking!" House said. "If I am nice to them, just once in a while, they won't know what to think. It would really throw them. It would be a great way to mess with their minds. I really must try it sometime!"
"Has anyone told you lately that you really are a jerk?" Wilson sighed with resignation.
"No, not lately," House thought. "I'm pretty sure somebody called me a callous bastard not that long ago, but I don't think it counts as the same thing. Does it?"
"You are not going to let me forget that I hit you, are you?" Wilson asked.
"No, not in a hurry," House acknowledged. "At least not when we are about to have something to eat and I want you to pay for it."
"Ok, just so that you know, I think you are a selfish jerk, a bum and," Wilson had to take a deep breath before saying it, "and for some insane reason I wouldn't want you to change!"