The phone rang.
House swallowed the pill he'd just tossed into his mouth and answered it.
"Hello?"
"Hey. House's leg hurts."
House's eyes went wide. "Son of a bitch." He said. "You're watching me through a window or something."
"No. It's one a.m. I'm at home. But I guess you're at work still."
"You're not psychic or anything." House said, brain whirring to assemble a theory. "I bet I have some kind of pain schedule that I haven't realized and you don't know consciously, but the self preservation part of you has it figured out and…"
"Yeah, sure. How much longer will you be at work?"
"Dunno. Patient is still a little blue." House smothered a cocky grin. He'd been waiting all afternoon to spring this joke on someone.
"What?"
"At four o'clock patient developed blue coloring."
"Hey. Who you talking to?" The little girl in the hospital bed asked. Her skin was a stunning shade of dark blue, but her pout was all kindergarten.
"My boyfriend. Want to talk to him?" House asked. The little smurfette nodded and he swapped his cell phone for the video game she'd been playing. Though she was barely out of toddlerhood, she apparently knew a thing or two about cell phones, as she easily activated the speakerphone function and held the phone in her lap to avoid mussing with the slender plastic tube that delivered oxygen to her nostrils.
"Hello?" She said.
"Hello there." Wilson said. "And who are you?"
"Abigail."
"Hi there, Abigail. Do people call you Abby?"
"Sometimes. My mom does."
"Well, Abby. How are you?"
"I'm bwue." Cell phone prowess aside, the child apparently had a bit of difficulty differentiating between l's and w's.
"Excuse me?"
"I'm bwue. This afternoon I turned bwue. Like a bwueberry."
"Well, blueberry or not. Don't you think 1 o'clock in the morning is to late for little girls to be wide awake?"
"I have hype-r-act-iv-it-y." She said, speaking the long word in a staccato. "But Dr. Cane made me stop taking my meds so's now he has to watch me so's Mommy and Daddy can sleep, cause the nurses are understaffed already."
"His name is Dr. House, you probably shouldn't call him Dr. Cane."
The child's face struck a look of fear. "Will it hurt his feelings?"
"It might."
She looked terrified over to House. "I didn't mean to hurt your feelings Dr. Mouse. I'm sorry. You're not sad, are you?"
House was trying desperately not make any noise, thus alerting Wilson to the speakerphone. He clenched his jaw to keep from laughing, and shook his head.
The girl looked relieved. "He's not sad anymore. I didn't mean to forget to be tolerant."
"To be what now?"
"Tolerant. You know, to be nice to everyone equally and not make funna them cause of their name or race or phys-ic-al hand-i-caps. What's your name?"
"Jimmy."
"Do you and Dr. Mouse have any kids?"
"Um…no."
"There's a boy in my class named Caleb and he has two mommy's but I never met anyone who had two daddies. If you have a kid can I meet her?"
"Yeah. Sure. Why not?"
House barely managed to muffle a snort. He hoped it sounded like static.
"Are you mad that Dr. Mouse had to watch me?"
"What? No."
"Promise?" The girl asked seriously.
"I promise."
"So you'll kiss him and hug him when he gets home?"
House did snort and it didn't sound a thing like static.
"Yes. Fine." Wilson said, growing wise. "Will you…"
"You have to promise."
"I promise." Wilson said. "Will you please give Dr. House back his phone?"
The girl disengaged the speakerphone, which was good as House wasn't sure he knew how to do that himself, and handed back the phone, her pudgy navy hand stuck out for the video game. House relinquished it and pressed the phone to his ear.
"You'd rather do that then be home with me?" Wilson asked.
House sighed. "We all have to be tolerant, Jimmy."
"Yeah, are you sure her parents are going to be so tolerant about your boyfriend?"
House laughed. "If she can say physical handicap at five I'm sure she's being trained to ignore sexual orientation as well. Besides, what are they gonna do? Take her away? She's blue for Christ's sake."
"Bad language." The girl recited, eyes stuck on the handheld screen.
"Quiet and I'll let you watch the Simpsons later."
The girl cheered, but silenced it quickly with her hand. As she did, her character took a particularly bad hit, apparent from the music change, and she dove back into the game with renewed vigor.
"If you're not coming home, I'm going to bed."
"But Jimmy, you said you'd hug and kiss me when I got home. You're not going to break a promise to a little girl, are you?"
"If you let me go to bed now, I'll hug and kiss and do whatever you want tomorrow morning."
House leered. "Whatever I want?"
"Yeah."
"So, even…waffles?"
Wilson burst into laugher. "God, we're old." He said, finally.
"Why?"
"Oh, come on. You'd rather carboload for breakfast then…"
"Because I know what I'm going to do to you tonight, whether you're awake or not."
Wilson breathed in sharply. "House…"
"What? Afraid I'm gonna…"
"You're talking about something bad!" The girl squeaked.
House scowled at her. "No. We're talking about sex."
"House!" Wilson said.
The girl scrunched up her face in thought. "Okay…" She said hesitantly. "But be nice."
"Don't worry I will."
"House. Stop scarring children for life, please." Wilson said patronizingly.
"Right. Sorry." House said. "What were you saying?"
"Your leg hurts."
"Thanks for the news flash. Anything else you wanted to tell me?"
"Your cock is hard."
House smiled and looked to the floor. He could tell Wilson had that wide, cunning grin spread across his handsome flushed face.
"I'll see you at home." He said, after a moment.
"I'm going to bed. If you wake me up there will be death."
"Death I can deal with…lack of breakfast however."
"Goodnight."
"Goodnight."
Dial tone.
In reference to the lovely Lanie Kay-Aleese's review, I refer you to a disorder called methemoglobinemia.