This is another one in the "Sounds of Silence" series

099. Early

Ruminations

Wilson woke slowly, smiling with his eyes still closed at the warm weight against his back and the arm that was wrapped around his waist. He could feel House's soft breaths on the back of his neck and he was sorely tempted just to drift back to sleep. He opened his eyes and glanced at the clock in the early morning light. Seeing that it was not all that long until he would normally get up, he carefully slid out of House's embrace, turning just in time to see the other man's sleepy murmur even though he couldn't hear it.

Wilson walked over to the window and leaned against the frame, looking out into the street for a moment then turning to watch House. His lover had taken the opportunity to sprawl over into the warmth he'd created and Wilson smiled almost involuntarily.

The last couple of months had been in turns painful, difficult, exhausting, depressing and miserable. But they'd also been challenging, full of achievement and at time utterly hilarious. He tended to blame the accident for the first set of adjectives and give House the credit for the second set. Not that House had been overly different from his usual snarky, sarcastic attitude; it's just that he'd somehow made it easier to adjust to being deaf in the middle of all of that.

Wilson's favourite thing, which many people wouldn't expect of him, was the bastardised one-handed version of sign language that House had worked out. It was kind of a work in progress since they always had to come up with new signs as their vocabulary expanded. House had been driving their teacher to distraction, wanting to know the signs for various words. The teacher kept insisting that they would get to those words in time and that the basics should be learnt first but House would just keep whining…and how he could manage to whine in sign language was beyond Wilson's understanding…until he got his own way. But what made their private sign language so much fun was that no one else could understand it. Even those who knew ASL were baffled by what they were saying.

It was kind of like being twelve again…not that he'd ever been that devious at that age. They had their own secret language that they could use under everyone's noses to make each other laugh and, in his case, blush. It was certainly driving Cuddy up the wall. Just the other day they'd driven her to distraction and it had had that naughty feeling of getting one up on the principal about it.

He was drawn out of his thoughts by the sight of House shifting on the bed as he woke, one hand stretching out and searching for something. The lack of what he was searching for woke him more fully and he shifted onto his side before catching sight of Wilson standing near the window.

"Exhibitionist," he said clearly as he gave a small half-smile.

Wilson caught that word and laughed. "You're complaining?"

House's smile became more genuine. No, he signed one-handed. Come back to bed.

Wilson shook his head. "We have to get up soon anyway."

House raised an eyebrow. Come back to bed.

Wilson rolled his eyes. "Why?"

House's smile became decidedly wicked. I'll make it worth your while.

Recent experience caused Wilson's dick to twitch at that smile and the subsequent widening of the smile told him that House had seen it. Wilson surrendered at that point since he was certain arguing was not only pointless but also would fall into the category of cutting of his nose to spite his face.

"Well, if you insist," he said casually as he sauntered back towards the bed.

House shifted onto his back and watched with interest, desire and amusement in his eyes.

You never used to be this easy to convince, he signed before he grabbed Wilson's wrist and pulled him down onto the bed.

Wilson went with it, catching himself on one hand so that he didn't fall onto House's thigh, then he freed one hand and signed back with a grin that matched his lover's.

You never gave me a reason as good as this.

AN: If you want to see the tiny little scene (that was written by the lovely pinglederry) in which House and Wilson drive Cuddy to distraction go here: http://swordkat.