Under a heavy blanket of drugs, House has strange dreams. He's floating through his life.
Four years old, his father's heavy hand is clasping his neck, slamming him in and out of the ice water. He gasps for air but is greeted only by cold. Up down, up down, into the frigid water. And then, it's over. Slammed onto the floor of the bathroom tiles, John House pins Greg to the ground until…. "Thank you, sir." And he is released. No one loves clumsy, stupid Greg.
Seventeen years old, the star of the lacrosse team, Greg is about to win the match. The whole school is cheering for him; he is riding on the wave of adrenaline. In the last few seconds, he jars his rib, where his father hit him the other day. Greg slips and loses the game. No one loves Greg, the idiot who messes everything up in the last few seconds.
In med school, Greg has the time of his life with the most amazing woman he's ever met. Lisa Cuddy. Intelligent with a smokin' bod. He really wanted to call her back. But being kicked out of the school the next day solidified it in his mind that no one would want to date Greg, the moron who cheated on a test and wasn't worthy of anyone's time and affection.
The infarction. He finally manages to get his life in some kind of order, and the universe breaks it apart with a blood clot. He thought he might make it out okay if they just gave it time… but he was weak. Greg was weak and he suffered the consequences. Greg was weak and he managed to lose Stacey. No one could love crippled, weak Greg.
Except Wilson. Wilson who had cried with him when Stacey left. Wilson who had changed his bandages, wiped him of his vomit, and stayed with him when the pain was so bad he had no screams left, only tears. He had been the one there when he first got up from the wheelchair, urging him on when everyone else pushed him to accept his fate. He had been there as he dragged himself along with the walker, and hobbled with the forearm crutches. He had been there when he fell down. James had caught him when he fell down. Finally, the cane, and James knew how to keep his mouth shut. Greg was grateful but didn't want to talk about it.
They hadn't had a real conversation about it since. And that was okay.
Drifting in his subconscious, all he could think about was James. Through the women and the booze and the bandages and the tears, it had been Wilson. It had always been Wilson.
And then, the curtain of morphine begins to lift away, and expose the harsh pain. But with the pain comes a new awakening of love for James, and a realization. He can't go on like this. He wants to… amputate.