Chapter 23

"Everybody Lies"

We were all full to the point of exploding. Sated and lethargic, grinning at each other with goofy expressions on our faces, and not an ounce of professional demeanor anywhere to be found!

It had been a great breakfast, and that was putting it mildly! Nobody missed the macadamia nuts.

It looked as though the only one of us with a coherent thought in her head right then, was Lisa Cuddy, who plunked her empty coffee cup onto the mess on the coffee table and turned to Greg and me with a conspiratorial smirk on her face.

"So how's this …?" She began … and the two of us looked at her with raised eyebrows while she waited for us to get our brains in gear to listen to what she was about to say.

When she decided she had our full attention, which wasn't much, she began again. "Since it's Sunday, I'll be receiving a 'call' from House …" and she pointed a finger at him in case he wasn't sure whether it was really him she was talking to … and he nodded solemnly. "I'll be getting a call from House letting me know that Wilson's come down with the 'flu', and he needs IV hydration, so he's staying here!"

She turned to me with the same serious expression on her face, as though suspecting that I too, was totally incompetent to understand what she was saying. I frowned and fixed her with an owlish expression of my own, and had the distinct feeling that now she was sure of it. "We'll give it to you first. That way, when you guys return to work, House'll just have gotten over it. That'll explain your weight loss, and any lack of energy and whatnot."

By then we were both listening to her, and understanding what it was she was talking about. But leave it to House to find the needle in the haystack. "There's a flaw in your plan," he announced archly, and there was a tug at one corner of his mouth. "A little 'flu' won't keep Cameron and her version of chicken soup away from here …"

"Oh yeah it will!" Cuddy argued, not letting him get anything like the upper hand. "After I point out that you both got your flu shots and appear to be suffering from the hybrid version … and I issue orders that no one is to come within a mile of here … they'll all get the message. I'm even planning to tell 'em that if you weren't both doctors, Wilson would have to be hospitalized.

"Then, as he makes his 'recovery', it'll be your turn!" She shifted a look in House's direction. "We can make yours even more dramatic!"

While she spoke, I took notice that House was suddenly clouding up. His eyes were darting furtively, and I could almost hear the little wheels inside his head as they ground out something he had thought of in contradiction.

"What with the hydrocodone suppressing your cough reflex, you're at high risk for influenza pneumonia … and that could buy us a few extra days if we need 'em." It was quite clear that Cuddy was pleased with her plan for keeping the hype under control at the hospital.

I nodded in her direction. "That's perfect! That hybrid version's been taking people out for a good two weeks … and some of 'em were winding up having to be hospitalized. We're going to be able to carry this off. Good going!"

The only one of the three of us who didn't seem quite as enthusiastic about the subversive plan was, of course, House. As a matter of fact, he had suddenly turned downright glum.

I noticed, and then Cuddy noticed. "Find another flaw?" She asked him.

He didn't answer right away. His interest had disappeared quickly. Something had taken its place and was gnawing at him. When he finally spoke, it was with his face averted. "Didn't hear anything in there about how we're gonna explain away this left leg … kinda hard to hide a wheelchair if you're sittin' in it!"

His vulnerability was really bothering him, and I looked at him with surprise. "We'll have a diagnosis on that in a day or two, and we'll treat it. It won't even be an issue by the time we go back. You know that."

"I don't know that," he hedged, "and neither do you. None of the preliminary results found anything. Not likely the final results will find anything different."

Cuddy and I realized immediately that he'd been giving this a lot of thought … and while he'd never admit it … it had him worried. Cuddy gentled down her voice and approached it from the compassionate-doctor angle. "If the final results don't show anything," she said, "that's good news, you know. A minor injury. Long gone by the time you return to work. Sometimes these things happen. Nothing ever shows up in the tests, but the symptoms are severe. Then it clears up as mysteriously as it came. We don't know why, and we don't have all the answers. It just … happens."

Greg looked up, and I could see he was beginning to get angry. "Forgive me if I don't get any reassurance from that 'relax and trust us' speech. Last time I bought into that garbage, I walked out of there with a third leg! Almost didn't walk out at all." He grabbed the cane from beside the couch and slammed it to the floor for emphasis. We both winced at the sound … and the memory. We both looked helplessly at each other.

I had to think a moment before I finally realized there was actually an up side of what had just happened.

Greg had been far too accepting of everything that had gone wrong in the past several days. This was the first time he'd shown any indication of fighting back. I remembered what Dick had told me about House actually lashing back, and that he actually saw me as a secure sounding board, and that I needed to be there for him when it happened.

While I was busy trying to decide on the right thing to say to him in return, I began to notice that he was rubbing absently at that left thigh. Then the gesture became more focused, and Greg was looking down in dismay at his leg.

He was about to panic. "Would somebody bring that chair over here?" His voice was hard and commanding. "I'd like to go to my room … alone!"

The opportunity was there. Right then. I had to take a chance … a big one. It was time to find out of all this trust stuff was going to pay off.

Cuddy was already on her feet and heading for the wheelchair, but I held up my hand, palm out, staying her. "That's all right. I'll get it for him in a minute. Would you … please … would you mind going out to get a Sunday paper? Please?"

Cuddy was fast. She stopped in her tracks and made an about face. Picked her purse off the table in the corner and started for the door. She was out the front door and gone before House was even finished glaring at me.

"What the hell was that about?" He snarled. "I want the wheelchair! Now!"

I could see he was grabbing at the leg in earnest now; gripping the muscle as it began to snake beneath the skin, in a futile attempt to break the growing spasms.

I rose from the corner of the couch matter-of-factly and moved some of the pillows. "If you think you'd be more comfortable in bed, I'll help you get there. But I don't want you to be alone right now … so I'm staying …"

I wouldn't leave you now for all the tea in China, I didn't say.

"Personally, I think you'd be better off right here. Why don't you shift around and lie down, and we'll talk. Maybe it won't be so bad this time … but if it is, it's not a problem. I'll get a syringe ready, if that's okay."

I was extremely careful not to allow a change to come into my voice, even as my emotions began to tug the first vestiges of the old waterworks, and I could already feel the moisture at the corners of my eyes. He was beginning to hurt really badly, and I didn't dare let him down again. I poised calmly, watching him, waiting for his decision, one way or the other.

When House, in his anger, tried to stand, and his legs, one at a time, collapsed beneath him, I did not move to help him as he caught himself clumsily on both arms, then flipped around and sat down in a heap on the couch again. I did not offer any indication of either concern or impatience, even though my heart was in my throat and my body was wracked with its own pain in sympathy.

I waited.

I didn't wait long. He was panting. I could see the surgical dent on his crippled leg through the old scrub pants, and the writhing of the skin on the other one. I wanted to reach for him, but I knew I couldn't.

"Don't patronize me!" He yelled, and I could feel the heat of his frustration in the space that separated us across the couch. He was glowering at his legs as though they were betraying him; first the right, then the left. He had no resources remaining. He had transferred all his fury to me, but I sat there impassively, glaring back. Still waiting.

Then … finally. Finally!

Just as I decided, with despair in my heart, that there were still some walls that hadn't crumbled yet, and maybe Greg's anger and distrust went even deeper than I, his best friend, suspected, I heard him take a deep, shaky breath, and he lowered his head until his chin nearly touched his chest. When he finally lifted it, he looked deeply into my eyes.

"I could use some help here …"

I slid calmly across to his side, not even a hair's breadth away, and looked at him with the empathy of understanding. Quietly, I got up and placed a palm on his chest, forcing him back against the pillows once again. Wordlessly, I lifted his treacherous legs and positioned them both on the warm space I had vacated, with as much gentleness as I could muster. The spasm in the left leg was increasing, and he allowed me full access.

"I'm not patronizing you. I'm asking my patient's permission to help him, medically. If he refuses, I'll respect that … because I respect him. And then I'll ask my friend's permission to help him … and support him in any other way I can. Because I want to be here for him! As his physician, and as his friend. I'll be here either way. Both ways. I'll be here!"

When I finished speaking, I was still locking gazes with this friend of mine.

House took another deep breath and held it. The spasm was building steadily, and speech was an effort. That was obvious.

When he finally found the strength to speak again, his words were sure and certain.

"Your patient trusts you to do what's best. Your friend is …" His eyes closed as the pain built, and the end of the sentence was an anguished whisper.

"… glad you're here …"

Before I stood to the side to prepare the medication, my hand found his shoulder and rested there. "Me too …"

That was all I could manage verbally, but it was all right. My touch and my eyes, even moist as they were, conveyed all the rest.

A half hour later, I took him to his bedroom in the wheelchair and got him settled. I doubted if he would even remember the transition, other than maybe to wonder, when he awoke again, how he got back to bed.

I watched him from the entrance to the bedroom, and then pulled the door nearly closed and retreated back down the hallway.

That's when I came back out to the living room and ignored the mess on the coffee table. I walked straight to the baby grand and sat down on the bench.

Touched the keys in reverence. Just sat there.

Damn!

There were tears running down my cheeks again.

But they contained no hint of sadness …

And Lisa would be returning soon with the Sunday paper.

Oooo0oooO

137