He was running, breathing hard as he weaved through the maze-like 'battlefield.' Popping noises surrounded him; people unloaded their colorful clips in quick succession. He liked this, liked a chase. Felt like a hunter and the hunted at the same time, then rolled his eyes when his brain made the inevitable connection to 'The Most Dangerous Game.'
He paused for a moment behind a bale of hay, made sure his ammo was full and slid out into the fight once more.
Something moved in his periphery and before he could move, react, it hit him in the chest, hard; a dull thump, and then he was off his feet, his back braced on a wall he didn't know was there. There's no air, or he can't force it in. Either way his vision began to blur until something touched him—small hands on his damp back; they sat him up, held him straight. He coughed a few times and the air came back like it never left; he looked toward his attacker/rescuer, saw dark hair and eyes and a smirk that could rival his own.
She leaned in, whispered in his ear that he better get up so the lawyers can finish wiping the floor with the doctors. She left him there; he watched her walked away and tagged legs that crept up behind her.
"Christ, House, I'm on your team!"
He replied that he's a sovereign nation, then went off to chase his attacker.
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Stacy was in permanently an alarmingly short amount of time later; in his life, his house, his mind. Everywhere. It was good—she could hold her own, didn't back down. Just like him.
On a day that was so humid air collected on his skin like water, he felt it—just a twinge, at first. A muscle spasm. A cramp that he wrote off, put some ice on and then kept going—he was nine strokes under par, after all. It wasn't until he woke up the next morning with the flames licking his pounding muscle that he acquiesced to being driven to some clinic nearby.
They treated him like a junkie—more so after he stabbed the needle through his pants, pushed down the plunger and felt blissful relief, the soft blanket of numbness. He went home thinking it was over; it wasn't until he woke up in the emergency room that he thought something might actually be wrong. A woman came to reassure him, the Dean of Medicine; his eyes traced appreciatively up her figure. When he finally decided to look at her eyes, his expression became a mirror of hers.
He knew those eyes, knew that hair. He knew what this doctor looked like naked, what she looked like while waves of pleasure ran through her. He smiled lecherously, then introduced Cuddy to Stacy, who just shook her head.
It was three days before anyone figured out what was wrong—three days he didn't have. Three days before he finally diagnosed himself. They listened to him after that, and he died for it. His heart stopped and he saw people and images that didn't matter, things he couldn't understand so he didn't try. Either way, he heard someone say, "He's back," and there was a hand in his, and the familiar scent of that too-strong-for-day perfume Stacy used when she pretended everything was alright.
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He remembered the moments before sleep—he felt so heavy, so liquid, drooping eyes, unsaid syllables. Stacy grasped his hand, apologized and he felt joy, wanted to feel her in his arms, to assure her that he wouldn't leave her, that she had nothing to worry about. And then he let go of the words, let go of the pain of consciousness.
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They went home together, he with something missing, she with the addition of his hate.
Days, then weeks passed; first they shouted, next came angry sex. Stacy left when the sex stopped entirely, making up some excuse that her mother was sick. House new the truth; he was waiting for the day, and finally, it came. Stacy had encouraged him to go for a short walk—no, she couldn't come; too many cases right now.
When House returned, he found a note on the table telling him she'd be back in a few days to pick up her things.
He changed the locks.
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House wasn't sure he liked this hospital; it was made of glass, a fragile, open sort of place where he couldn't help but want to throw stones. The job offer came suspiciously at about the same time he began looking for a lawyer, but he took it anyway.
His office came with a balcony and a lounge; he found he was head of the department, as, prior to his hiring, there was no department. No department meant no patients, so most of his time was spent watching others near him. One guy, brown hair, was pretty interesting. He wore a wedding band but stood too close to the nurses, made too much eye contact. Smiled too much.
He'd stopped by House's within a week; introduced himself as Wilson. House hadn't stood up, had stared at the hand offered before grasping it lightly.
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It was midday; House was bored of daytime tv and solitaire. The balcony seemed like a nice idea, but as his hand curled around the cool metal of the door, he saw that he wouldn't be alone. Wilson stood outside, leaning into his forearms on the wall of the overlook. His gaze was empty, a sort of self-hypnosis. House didn't know what he could be looking at, but knew the moment was private and he should go back inside.
Moments later, Wilson snapped out of his trance at the arrival of his neighbor.
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When House found Wilson in his office, packing, he attempted to lighten the mood. Wilson looked up, flushed, and for a moment House thought the other man might hit him.
But, no. Wilson didn't use fists to damage; he preferred words and their psychological repercussions. House let him rant, let him yell until he was empty, until all that was left was to recognize that House had never really been on his side. Would never really be on his side.
"You don't mean it," Wilson had said, deflating after the half-hearted, barely-mumbled apology House had thrown toward him. "People—when they give, they want to. They acknowledge the other person, they sacrifice." Wilson was babbling, but getting closer to the truth. "You don't want to give, don't actually mean anything you say. You just want to keep people around you so they can take the fall."
House didn't have words, had nothing to fall back on. So he just nodded, and listened to Wilson's order to leave. As he turned his back, he realized he had no connections, no real ties or loyalties. He could walk away from anyone and not blink twice. He didn't know what to do with that, so he just ordered a cat-scan for an underweight baby and went about his day.
A few hours later he was sipping champagne from a plastic cup, nonchalantly asserting that somehow, he knew 'der Diktator' would be banished from the hospital before he caused too much damage. Order was restored, as well as a tentative, apologetic truce between himself and Wilson.
He was tipsy from the champagne and Vicodin; he stood with Wilson to go, but tripped over an abandoned cup. His wrist was caught and he remained standing, supported by the arms of someone who had hated him hours ago.
"Surprised you didn't let me fall," He'd mumbled, forcing a chuckle to lighten the truth of the statement.
"Me too." Wilson said, still holding House's arm. For a moment they stood like that, straddling time, seeing how far the moment would go.
Nowhere.
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He felt her, smelled her before he saw her. She was the same but different; thinner, maybe, with a different hair cut, but he knew all of her. She got close, got into his space and he wanted to push her down, scream at her; then maybe pick her up and bring her home.
He told her he didn't want her husband—the one he didn't know about, the one, Mark, whose name couldn't be said without scorn, without his stomach tightening—to get better. He went home that night, tried to walk without limping and fell on the couch, twisted an ankle that was useless anyway, just as Wilson walked in.
He regretted giving the key; should have known Wilson would drop by to 'hang out.' To spy, or see how he's feeling, maybe.
House yelled, hurled insults at Wilson, who just tried to help him up. But House couldn't take it, couldn't be someone to be pitied, to be spoken about in hushed tones. He was not 'poor House.' Anything but that.
So he pushed away the hands that grasps his side and shoulder, savagely tore away. But Wilson wouldn't leave, wouldn't take his tantrum. He told House to grow the fuck up, to move on, because Stacy certainly had.
House wasn't sure exactly what happened after that, but somehow he hurled himself at Wilson, wanted to prove him wrong, wanted to show that he was in control. Wilson's body took the weight of their fall; House heard him groan, but he just pulled himself up. He meant to hit Wilson. Meant to do what he'd done to his dad so many years before, meant to force submission into him. But what happened was far more complicated, far more excruciating. Lips met; House kissed hard, kissed forcefully and for whatever reason, Wilson responded. They stayed like that until they were both out of breath; in the bedroom neither really knew what to do, so they just mimicked what they did to themselves.
When Wilson asked what it had been about, House told him to get out.
He did.
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After Stacy left with her newly crippled husband, House couldn't help but laugh at the irony. He told her she must have really fucked up a past life; his eyes were glazed, cruel. She just bit her lip and told him he was crippled before she had anything to do with it.
A few days after she left, he was given a reprieve in the form of two bullets. They allowed him a narcotics-induced coma that took away his pain. For awhile.
After a few days he could walk properly; he invited Wilson over and jumped him as soon as the door opened. It was fast, frenetic and not like anything he'd done before. He laughed as he came, a noise that echoed out from him in waves. They hit Wilson and reverberated in his chest. His heart pounded with the echoes, mimicking their wild rhythm.
And then, on a day eerily similar to all those years before, he felt the twinge. And whatever he had felt for that short period of time, that almost-joy, that reckless abandon, was gone. He was pardoned, briefly, then sentenced to death for a different crime.
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He had made Wilson get a hotel, hadn't touched the man in weeks. His hands were in constant fists; he had to keep from screaming, from losing his temper over nothing. But they all treated him differently, all looked at him like he was going to fall apart.
So he did.
He pissed off a cop, got the hospital monitored, and then, as a grand finale, overdosed on stolen Oxycodone. He'd laid on his back after calling his mother and wishing her a merry Christmas, and finished the bottle of white pills that took him out of his body. He was tired, and then he wasn't anymore, so he assumed he was asleep.
Then someone was shaking him; he rolled over, saw vomit he didn't remember throwing up, and tried to focus on the blurred, flesh-colored mass in front of him. But then it was gone, evidenced by retreating footfalls.
House closed his eyes.
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"I'm sorry," was all House could say.
Wilson looked surprised, but seemed to absorb the weight of the words. "You mean it now."
"Yeah."
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Cameron smiled as she handed him her letter of resignation. He asked if she was following the latest trend. She just turned, said goodbye and left him in his office.
He gathered up his belongings, made his way out the door and stopped when he saw someone standing in the shadows of the hall. Wilson stepped forward, his briefcase and coat in hand.
"Ready to go?"
"Yeah."
They went home.