Author's Note: A long chapter...Also, alll comments and opinions are what I imagine the characters voicing them would say, NOT necessarily what I believe myself =)

Remy's quick scan of the ambulance bay revealed Stephen nowhere in sight, but his partner was crouched by a cupboard, no doubt looking for supplies to restock. "Hey, Marcus, has Stephen left yet?"

"Oh, hey, Remy. No, he should be back soon - went to take a shower," he smirked. "Our last run was a woman with a broken ankle. The 911 call wasn't really necessary, and on the way here she was so upset she threw up all over him."

She laughed. "Poor woman. You two might need to work on your bedside manner."

"Usually, when the patient's bleeding out or going into cardiac arrest, that's not our first concern," Stephen commented as he came through the door behind her.

"Hey, all cleaned up?" she teased.

"Spick and span." He shook his head like a wet dog and sent the water droplets still clinging to his short hair flying her way. She smacked his arm jokingly, but he easily caught her wrist, then turned serious. "How's it going with everything?" He tugged her over to sit on the back of an unused ambulance, and she knew he wanted to hear about House.

"His preliminary PT assessment was today, but he wouldn't give me any details. He's doing...better, but he's going to get so bored of sitting in the hospital here. He always has to have something to do, a puzzle to solve...he'll have all the nurses completely figured out by the time he leaves. For their sakes, I hope none of them have anything to hide." Stephen laughed. "We played chess tonight - my idea, of course, but he went along with it. No wonder, he's probably bored already. He was pretty civil for a while."

"For a while?"

She silently cursed. Should have known he'd pick up on that. "House has his limits."

He could tell she didn't care to elaborate. "Are you ready to head home? Come on, I'll drop you off."

Grateful that he hadn't pushed the question of what had ended House's good behavior, she agreed.

***********

"Hello?" Remy tried not to sound groggy as she answered her phone.

"Hello, is this Doctor Hadley?"

"Yes..." She scowled at the clock, still trying to get her bearings. Nine forty? How did I sleep through my alarm?

"This is Chris Myers, Gregory House's doctor. We were hoping to talk to you before your shift starts at ten thirty."

"Yeah, of course...I'll be at the hospital in half an hour, can it wait till then?" Sliding out of bed quickly, she walked toward the bathroom and grabbed her clothes along the way.

"Certainly. Could you meet me.." His voice faded, and there was a rustling as the phone changed hands.

"Thirteen." House's voice was more gruff than usual - he was in pain.

"What's going on, House? I know you're a doctor, but he is too. It is possible that he knows -"

"Just get here." Click.

With a sudden sense of urgency, Remy showered quickly and was out the door in twenty minutes. She usually walked to the hospital when the weather was nice, since she lived only a few minutes away and it was often faster than taking the bus. Five hurried blocks later, she whisked through Faulkner's front doors and headed straight to the elevator. After waiting almost three minutes, tapping her toe impatiently, she gave up and headed for the four flights of stairs up to House's room.

Finding the door not latched, she pushed it the rest of the way open and stepped in. "House? Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," he said, but the pain lines around his eyes said otherwise. "I've been trying to tell this idiot that for the last hour."

Dr. Myers looked at her apologetically. "Gregory has informed me he doesn't want any more morphine."

"What?" Remy was shocked. House didn't usually disagree with hospital authorities because he wanted to avoid painkillers.

He was impassive and stubborn. "I don't need it."

Seeing the way he wouldn't quite meet her eyes, she asked the doctor, "Could we have a few minutes?"

"Of course," he said, then his voice dropped so low House couldn't hear."But Doctor Hadley...He is justified in taking the morphine. The pain from these burns must be still at unbearable levels."

"Thank you, Doctor." She waited until he stepped out.

"House."

He continued picking at his blanket. "I told you, I can handle pain. I don't need the morphine."

"You can't recover right if you're hurting this bad - you know that. Really, why won't you take it?" He didn't answer. What could he be so ashamed of that he couldn't even look at her? "What are you afraid of?"

His voice was barely audible. "I can't take any more of it."

And suddenly she remembered. According to Eric, he'd abused morphine before. If he was a recovering addict (from that drug, anyway), it would be easy for him to lapse back into dependency. "Because you don't want to get hooked again?" Staring miserably at his hands, he nodded, and the sight sent an unexpected wave of sympathy through her. "Hey, it's okay. I'll talk to Dr. Myers, and we'll get you on something else."

He shook his head stubbornly. "Just Vicodin."

"They aren't going to give you enough, not even as much as you usually take." His gaze met hers for the first time that morning, pleading silently. She sighed, knowing what he wanted. "I can't, House. Only your official doctor can prescribe for you."

"I know you can find a way around that. Thirteen...please."

His actual begging caught her off-guard, enough that she voiced her real fear. "Your liver won't be able to handle more than your normal dose, you know that."

"I don't need more than my normal dose. I can deal with it." She started to argue, tell him he couldn't withstand that kind of pain, but his earnest expression stopped her. Wow. He's serious. Since when did House listen to arguments like "Your liver can't take it?"

"All right. But if the pain gets too bad, tell me. I'll get you something stronger instead of just more Vicodin." He nodded, but she could tell he had no intention of following through. She made up her mind to monitor how fast his pills disappeared, then found the paper and pen sitting on his bedside table. Scribbling first the number 13, then a longer string of digits below it, she said, "I'm leaving my cell number here, so you can get ahold of me without going through the hospital staff. If you need me...call." He nodded once without comment, and she held his gaze for a moment before turning to the door.

**********

Two hours passed before she had the chance to slip away to the pharmacy, and another two before she could make it up to room 608 again. Her quiet knock provoked no response, and she silently eased the door open to find House sleeping. Stepping barely inside, she took in a startled breath when she saw his brow creased and sweaty with pain. Suddenly she felt horrible for not being able to bring his medication earlier. Knowing he'd likely just gotten to sleep, she settled in the chair next to his bed and was struck by the thought that she was the only one who had occupied this spot since he'd arrived. Sad...No one should be alone in the hospital.

Considering his lack of visitors brought her thoughts back to the disagreement between him and his best friend. Of course House was a complete ass to Wilson, but it seemed to Remy that Wilson had come to accept that fact a long time ago. Surely he knew how much House needed him? After everything the two had been through, she just couldn't see Wilson allowing House to finally push him away.

Remy was pulled from her musings by the rustling of bedsheets. "Good morning, sleeping beauty," she said, then winced as she heard his breath shudder with pain.

"No way it's morning," he groaned. "I couldn't have been asleep for more than fifteen minutes."

"Probably not," she agreed. "I brought you something."

His eyes took on slightly more life at the sight of the orange bottle. "Thank God. Gimme." He reached out toward her, but grimaced and dropped his bandaged arm back to the bed.

She quickly popped off the top and handed him two small white pills, then reached to pour water from the pitcher by his bed into his glass. By the time she turned back to him, the pills were nowhere in sight. Sighing, she put the water down. "Sorry it took so long, busy day in the ER."

"People are idiots," he said, and she assumed he was referring to the fact that most injuries in the emergency room were, in fact, caused by the patient's below-average intelligence. "What was the stupidest thing you saw today?"

The question held just enough casual curiosity to make her pause. Apparently he was bored and in the mood for a conversation, and she did have a good story. "Nineteen year old girl came in convinced there was something wrong with her - cancer, probably. Symptoms: vomiting, especially in the morning; weight gain; and missed periods." House raised his eyebrows, seeing the obvious diagnosis. "She assured me she couldn't be pregnant."

"Everyone -"

"Lies. I know. But she didn't claim she hadn't been having sex - she told me she was fine because they used saran wrap."

This earned a snort from House - almost a genuine laugh, she thought. "And this is why abstinence-based Sex Ed is a bad idea. Teenagers these days."

"Not all of them are that bad," she pointed out, half to keep him talking, half because she felt she should defend what was practically her own generation.

"In the Princeton-Plainsboro Clinic, I treated this sixteen year old pothead. He told me he had pain in one arm and both legs. He proceeded to show me that it hurt when he did this -" House poked his right arm with his left pointer finger, "and this -" prodding gently at his right leg, "and this." He touched his left leg. "Care to guess what the problem was?"

"Surely not his..."

"Finger. The idiot had a broken finger."

Remy burst into laughter. "There had to be some outside influence." She gestured like she was smoking something. "No one is honestly that dumb."

"Like I said, he was a pothead."

"Judging by the fact that I don't remembering hearing about a lawsuit for verbal abuse, his parents probably didn't even know about his clinic visit." House's rare smile disappeared, and she didn't understand. "They did sue?"

He shook his head. "I didn't make fun of him. I was feeling nice that day." Feeling nice? She knew the explanation was incomplete, but decided not to push. She was surprised when he offered more information anyway. "It was while I was on the methadone."

Remy was silent, remembering that week. It was her and Eric who figured out he was on something stronger than Vicodin, at the same time Wilson did. They based their suspicions mainly on the incident when he stopped breathing, and the fact that Taub and Kutner realized they were still together before House did. Their initial thought was heroin, but the next day House was back to normal, and the whole team was surprised. It wasn't until Eric confronted Cuddy about it two days later that they found out he had actually been on methadone, which erased his pain. The reason he stopped taking it (other than the obvious side effect of likely death) remained a mystery, but Remy knew it was tied to losing a patient that day. "Well," she said, coming back to the present and referring to the broken-finger kid, "He probably appreciated your treating him like an intelligent being."

His smirk didn't quite reach his eyes this time. "Might have been a once in a lifetime experience."

She studied him for a moment, relieved to see the stress lines around his eyes relaxing. The Vicodin was kicking in. "House -" She was cut off by the ringing of her cell phone. Looking at the number, she saw it was the one she had programmed in for Robert Chase and was grateful it hadn't been sitting anywhere House could see. "I have to take this," she said apologetically. "I'll come back later tonight; my shift ends at six."

"Your boyfriend?" House asked, motioning to the phone. Boyfriend? She was too busy noticing he hadn't argued that he didn't care when her shift ended to decipher what he meant by 'boyfriend'. Ignoring his comment like usual, she stepped into the hall and walked a few steps away before answering her phone.

"Hello?"

"Hi, Remy. This is Robert Chase. Listen, there's a developing situation here you should know about." She bit her lip - this didn't sound good. "Wilson's starting to worry about House. He isn't buying the 'vacation' story, and he's convinced House is somewhere getting into some kind of drug trouble. He was in my office today asking me if I'd heard from him, to which I of course said no. He told me - don't ask how he knows this - that House hasn't been home in the last four days, but he didn't pack anything like he was going somewhere. I guess Wilson has a key to his apartment."

"Or he's learned something from House about breaking into others' residences," Remy pointed out. "Well, Wilson has no way of knowing he's here..."

"True, but if he gets concerned enough he might do something stupid, like go looking for him. Today, when I talked to him, he was debating whether to call Cuddy and ask if she's seen him. I told him there's no way House would go running there; it would just revive memories of something that will never be the same. Wilson knew I was right, and he doesn't want to worry her, but he's desperate. He still seems pissed at House, but he's so worried I swear he was almost crying today. I don't know what's going on between them, but it's obvious Wilson still cares what happens to him."

"House still doesn't know I called you in the first place, and he hasn't brought up Wilson at all. I've asked if he wants to contact him a couple times, and he just shuts down. I could try encouraging him to call again..."

"I think that's all you can do," Chase assured her. "If he won't...Wilson's hands are still pretty much tied here. He would never think to check Boston hospitals; he has no idea where to even start looking. I feel bad, though - he really is concerned."

"Maybe this can be the first step toward fixing whatever's wrong with those two," Remy said, hopeful.

"Yeah, I tried hinting at asking Wilson about it today. I commented that House had seemed a little upset the last month, and you should have seen the guilt in his eyes. But he didn't tell me what happened, just cursed to himself and walked out."

"And if Wilson won't talk about it, there's no way House will tell me," she sighed.

"You're probably right," Chase agreed, "but you never know. He might tell you things he wouldn't tell other people."

"We played chess last night." She knew he would understand the significance. "And today he started a completely extraneous conversation."

"See," he laughed. "He does like you."

"We'll see about that. I don't want to ask him again about Wilson and the reason he's here yet, but maybe eventually..."

"Whenever you think he can take it. The most important thing here is House's recovery; Wilson's concerns can wait. If it comes to that, I'll tell him I know where House is, he's fine, and I'm not saying a word."

"That won't go over well," she pointed out.

He chuckled. "I can take it. Wilson's never liked me."

"He's jealous of the hair," she joked, then wondered if he would be offended. "Sorry, that just popped out. Too much time around you-know-who."

"Obviously," he complained, but he was laughing too. "Listen...Would you mind giving me a call in a couple days to let me know how it's going there?" He sounded almost embarrassed. "I probably care more than I should how he's doing...He's an ass, but he grows on you after a while."

"Believe me, I know," she assured him. "I'll call you in a couple days, or if anything big happens before then. Thanks for keeping me up-to-date on the situation there, and let me know if you're having trouble holding Wilson off."

"Thanks, Remy. I'll talk to you later."

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