Chapter 29

"Faith, Hope and Charity"

Cuddy was across from me, straight-faced and serious when I hung up the phone. She'd followed me to the kitchen with the test results she'd rescued from the living room, and stayed with me in support. She'd scribbled questions on scraps of paper from time to time, and handed them to me, and I added them to my own questions while talking to Dick.

Her warm fingers calmed my trembling hands every few minutes, offering reassurance where I had none. I don't think she realizes, even now, exactly how deep my gratitude goes for what she did for me that day. Faith!

When she left, I returned to Greg's room and performed all the night duties like an automaton, trying to let the tasks I knew by heart distract my mind from the distressing test results. When I finally finished, I sank wearily into the bedside chair and simply watched over his sleeping form.

And the thoughts came unbidden. And the worry. And the guilt. It would be only a flimsy excuse to blame any of this on the Ativan, so I didn't. I put it squarely where it belonged: with me.

Why did I take such a perverse delight in giving those thoughts free rein in my mind? I don't know. I looked at him, asleep and content, the unknowing victim of my denial and stupidity. I needed to leave, but he held me like a magnet, even when he was completely unaware. I'd done this to him, and now I was powerless to fix it. Only Greg could do that. I hoped he would allow me to help.

I still had no idea how much it would cost him, nor in what coin. He was the last person in the world I would ever want to harm, but now I'd found the single most effective way to hurt him. He'd trusted me to keep him safe, and I'd become his biggest danger.

As my eyes rested on his sleeping form, he frowned as though my errant mental ramblings had been transmitted to him directly and invaded his dreams, whatever they might be.

I'd had very few opportunities, during our long friendship, to observe Gregory House in sleep. But over the past few weeks I'd had endless opportunities for such observations, and the experiences never ceased to melt my heart. With all his defenses lowered and all his walls crumbling, he seemed so unprotected and defenseless. He was a mass of confusing contradictions. I could see such sadness in that expressive face, and an abundance of unguarded innocence that reminded me once again why I clung so tightly to our friendship. He defined me. He lent daring to my ingrained sense of caution. He thrust boldness into my reticence and confidence into my uncertainty. Greg House inserted exclamation points where I clung to ellipses, and dared to put into words everything I had ever wanted to say, but did not do so for the sake of propriety.

And now, in my zealous attempts to protect him, I had protected him to the point of obscuring the truth, and inadvertently contributed to his denial of the final diagnosis. We were both scared to death of it! We both knew the bitter truth, however, deep down inside where it counted. Our dreams-turned-nightmares had spelled it out relentlessly. I was so busy convincing us both that I could fix it, that I'd turned a deaf ear to everything he'd been trying to tell me. I had even ignored my own subconscious.

I was becoming uncomfortable in the chair, shifting and turning, trying to find a way to ease the cramps in my muscles, but there was no comfort. "Johnny Come Lately." The discomfort I felt was internal rather than external. There was no remedy I could foresee for all my good intentions gone wrong.

When Greg shifted in the bed, I froze in place, afraid I'd disturbed him. But he settled again, burrowing deeper into the pillows and blankets, and settled back into sleep.

With a last look at his peaceful face, I hefted out of the chair and made to leave. I needed to move my bones and thrust away the crawly feeling that scratched intolerably just beneath my skin. I hoped some form of physical activity would wear down the nagging sense of guilt that instilled itself within me once again.

I paced the living room awhile, but nothing seemed to help. I even made a sweep through the kitchen in hopes of finding something there to distract me. But the room was clean. Between Lisa's efforts and my own, there was no mess to clean up, no dishes to wash. The place looked almost too clean to compare with the inventive sloppiness of Gregory House. It made me smile and mist up at the same time.

Grudgingly, I returned to the couch and managed to sleep awhile, but by 6:00 a.m. I was again awake. After checking in on House and finding him still peacefully asleep, I gathered my laptop and the test results and went back to the kitchen. The room was too clean. I got out the pot, the kettle and the grinder and prepared to brew some very strong coffee. That would certainly disperse with my unease at "too clean". Then I sat down at the table in the corner and turned my back on the world.

Effectively hiding my face from any form of intrusion, I opened the laptop and checked emails. I had asked Dick last night to record our conversation and send me the file. And there it was … waiting for me like a glaring testament to my shortsightedness and denial.

I had to figure out a way to tell Greg what was really wrong … and help him get through it … if he would allow me that privilege. Hope.

When the water boiled, I ground the coffee quickly and dumped the grounds into the French press. I noticed I had a good case of the shakes. I stood at the counter while the coffee steeped, holding both hands out in front of me, watching them tremble in spite of anything I could do to get them to stop. I sighed. This was getting me nowhere.

I pushed the plunger and the fresh-coffee aroma floated upward to my nostrils. Heavenly! I picked up the carafe and began to pour the steaming liquid into my cup.

I don't know what made me lose my grip. A lingering weakness in my wrist? A result of my unsteady hands? I didn't know, but suddenly the pot was tumbling out of my hands, knocking over my cup, splashing across the counter and cascading onto the kitchen floor like a miniature Niagara Falls. I was lucky I didn't burn myself or break the carafe.

I can remember thinking to myself that this was the last straw, and muttering a string of epithets that would have gotten me thrown out of polite company on my proverbial ear.

But when I finally shut up, I found that the verbal explosion had actually relieved some of the tension and tamed me down a bit. Suddenly calm, I watched the liquid begin to pool, and then mosey across to drip off the edge of the counter and add to the flood already seeping across the floor.

Unhurried now, I reached for a roll of paper towels and began mopping up Lake Erie. The mindless sopping of runaway liquid that quickly overwhelmed even large wads of paper towels helped free my head and unclench my gut. I found that I was farming it out, allowing the lack of mental turmoil and hurtful thoughts to close in over the dread I was feeling at the prospect of listening to the word file …

I took the huge handful of paper towels to the sink and wrung them out, then turned back and finished mopping up the counter. Staring at the floor in resignation, I knew it would take more than absorbent paper to dry up that whole other body of water.

I put fresh water on to boil and ground up another batch of coffee beans. I'd come out here for coffee, and by damned, I intended to have some before getting down to business. I rinsed out the French press and placed it back on the counter. I let the hot water run on full and poked around for a mop. I found one hanging outside Greg's back door, but there was no bucket. I went back and placed the mop into the sink to rinse the stiff strands. Slowly, I mopped up the spilled coffee, wringing out the mop by hand beneath the hot water every time it filled up and began to drip.

The water was boiling by the time I finally finished … and the upside of the whole thing was that there was a very clean floor. I took the mop back where it belonged and returned to the kitchen to wash my hands until they were pink. Then I shut off the water and poured the water from the kettle into the press. I waited only a minute before pouring my coffee into the cup … very carefully this time … and noticed my hands were no longer shaking.

I carried my coffee over to the table where the laptop with the email, the voice file and my legal pad and a pen lay waiting for me.

I flicked the voice file on and listened to the conversation from the night before. The opening statement, the one about the loss of the breakthrough pain and how it might affect House, hit me between the eyes with the necessity of his acknowledgment of it and

his subsequent acceptance. I'd asked Dick what the consequences might be.

For the second time, his answer rocked me, not with surprise, but with collaboration. "The most serious thing would be a conversion disorder … or a psychosomatic illness."

I paused the file and picked up the test results. I read them; reread them, then read them again. The words, of course, did not change, even as I willed them to do so.

"Possible Diagnoses and Recommendations:

A full battery of tests, including imaging studies …. Blah blah blah …

And ending with: "the recommendation is that malingering or psychosomatic illness be given consideration …"

House didn't malinger … unless he was locked into some foolish contest with Cuddy … and everyone knew that at those times he was playing his "cripple card" for all it was worth and enjoying every second of her sputtering and eye rolling.

For Gregory House to actually pretend to be in pain when his mindset was locked into pretending to not being in pain … didn't even make sense! I should have talked to him. I should have! Damn!

Dick asked me if I was blaming myself. Well, yeah … of course I'm blaming myself. Who else was there?

But no charity!

Oooo0oooO

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