If Wilson had ever been under the impression that Cuddy valued him for the compassionate care that he gave his patients or for the efficiency with which he ran his department, then their discussion that morning had dispelled that illusion. After listening to Cuddy, it was perfectly clear to Wilson that his chief virtue in her eyes had always been his ability to rein in House's excesses and keep him (relatively) happy and productive. House was uniquely gifted. Wilson was expendable.

"The last thing this hospital needs is a feud between departmental heads," Cuddy had said, leaning over Wilson's desk. "You two have to be able to work together. What if House needs an oncology consult?"

"There's no feud," Wilson protested. "I can work with House. I won't let what happened between us compromise patient care or get in the way of my professional duty."

"At the moment, you're avoiding House," Cuddy said. "Your current behaviour does not inspire me with confidence. If I find that your personal dispute with House is affecting the smooth operation of the hospital, I'll be forced to make some unpleasant personnel decisions."

Wilson recognized the unspoken threat. Get along with House or get out. He nodded.

Her message delivered, Cuddy adopted a more relaxed, friendlier manner. She sat down opposite him.

"I know he hurt you," she said, "and I sympathize. But you chose to enter into a relationship with one of your colleagues. There's a downside to workplace romances."

"You want me to forgive him because it will make your job easier."

"You don't have to forgive him," Cuddy corrected, "but you do have to talk to him. You can't just leave him dangling."

She stood up and headed for the door. Her hand was on the doorknob, when she turned and spoke.

"I think you're being deliberately cruel," she said impulsively. "I wouldn't have expected it of you."

"I'm cruel," Wilson repeated incredulously.

"Yes, you've been in the position that House is in now. You've been unfaithful; you've cheated on someone you promised to love. At least your wives listened to you; at least they gave you a chance to apologize. How could you deny House that? Whatever he's done, he deserves the opportunity to tell you that he's sorry."

------------------------------------------

Stacy had always been very straightforward about getting what she wanted, but the circumstances forced her to be indirect and move slowly, and she was finding it very frustrating. She was a modern American woman forced into a Victorian courtship. No maiden aunt could have made a more diligent chaperone than the doctors, nurses and orderlies who bustled in and out of House's room. Not that anything could have happened anyway. Greg was immobilized, as vulnerable and helpless as a turtle upturned on its shell. Hand-holding, words and the occasional stolen kiss were all she had to work with.

Stacy came to visit House every day though not always at the same time. Sometimes she dropped in on him in the morning with a fresh banana nut muffin and a good hot cup of coffee. Other times she didn't visit him until the evening, so that he would have the whole day to think of her and anticipate her arrival. She wanted her visit to be the highlight of his day.

This time, Stacy turned up in the middle of the afternoon. At the sound of the door opening, House turned his head towards his visitor. Stacy saw a tiny flicker of disappointment cross House's face. It lasted no longer than the blink of an eye before it was replaced by a welcoming smile, but it was unmistakeable to someone who knew Greg House as well as she did. Stacy was not the person he wanted to see. House was still hoping for Wilson.

Stacy was too smart to denigrate her rival in front of Greg. The last thing she wanted was to force Greg to come to Wilson's defence. She merely suggested that Wilson's continued absence was proof that he had turned away from House and was unable to forgive him. For his own sake, Greg had to accept that Wilson had made his choice.

"I know it hurts, Greg. He's been part of our lives for so long," she said. "He's been a good friend to both of us."

"He was more than a good friend to me," House said.

"Maybe trying to be more than good friends was a mistake. Look at James's record with romantic relationships. He tries so hard at the beginning. He's always convinced that he's at last found the one true love of his life. Then when things get difficult, he gives up."

She clasped Greg's hand in both of hers in a gesture of sympathy. Thinking that she had said enough and that further discussion of Wilson would be counter-productive, she quickly changed the subject.

"I saw your doctor in the hall. He told me that you're recovering very well and he'd like to release you as soon as you make arrangements for home care. Why didn't you tell me? I could have taken care of things for you."

"I've been working on the arrangements myself. I told Kutner that I picked him to stay with me. Unfortunately, he's got more backbone than counted on, and he said no. My mistake was in appealing only to his brown-nosing instincts. I'm going to try again. Next time I ask, I'll use a two-pronged approach. I'm going to give him my sad puppy dog eyes, too."

Greg demonstrated his sad puppy dog eyes, and Stacy laughed.

"What about me? I can stay with you at least until your casts are removed."

"I don't think that's a good idea. You've spent enough time in your life as an unpaid nurse – first with me and then with Mark. I couldn't ask you to do it again."

"You don't have to ask. I'm offering."

"Stacy, I know you're just making the offer because you think that we're going to get back together. That's not going to happen. I hope that Wilson will decide to come back to me, but even if he doesn't, I haven't changed my mind about us."

"You aren't making any sense, Greg. Wouldn't you rather be with me than be alone? We love each other."

"I love you, but we made each other miserable when we were together."

"That's not true. We were happy. If it weren't for your infarction we'd still be together."

Greg shook his head.

"We would have broken up eventually. You must remember the arguments we had."

"Sometimes we disagreed. All couples disagree at times. At least we could always talk about our differences."

"Neither one of us could compromise. Remember when we he had that argument about the merits of putting health warnings on cigarette packages. Neither of us smoke, neither of us really cared, but we fought bitterly about it for weeks."

"I enjoy a good debate. I'm a lawyer. Argument pays my rent."

"I'd wake up at three in the morning with some brilliant idea that would prove conclusively that I was right. I'd have to wake you up then and there to tell you."

Stacy laughed, "We were a good match for each other. It was a game. We enjoyed it."

"At first it was fun, like a chess game between evenly matched opponents. Later, when we couldn't stop, it wasn't fun anymore. Then it was trench warfare in World War I, no way out and no end in sight. I'd invite Wilson over just to have a break in the hostilities. We'd have to be civil to each other while he was there."

"James used to think we were the wittiest, most sophisticated couple on earth," said Stacy.

"We both wanted to live up to his expectations. I think we were always at our best in front of an audience."

"Remember the dinner party we had to celebrate my partnership?"

"Of course, I do. Bonnie sat and sulked, while we captivated her husband with our wit and brilliance. You really dazzled him that night. Wilson thought you were Nora Charles, Dorothy Parker, and the whole Algonquin Round Table all rolled up together."

"I almost felt sorry for Bonnie," Stacy agreed. "You and I were good together. Admit it."

"We had fun."

Stacy leaned over the hospital bed and kissed House.

"We were in love. We still are," she touched House's cheek tenderly. "Please reconsider. I'll stay with you until you can be on your own. Then we can both decide whether we belong together."

"I'd be taking advantage of you," House said. "Besides, you don't like my apartment, and I couldn't live in that Kleenex box in the sky that you're currently calling home. My wheelchair would leave tread marks on the carpet and I'd smudge those perfect white walls."

"Don't be stubborn," she said. "You need someone to look after you."

House just shook his head, and Stacy recognized his determination. She knew she was not going to be able to change his mind. She stood up abruptly.

"Just remember I offered," she said. "When you're all alone, just think about what we could have had."

"Goodbye," House said, but Stacy was already gone.

--------------------------------------------

Wilson stood outside House's room and took a deep breath. He had already worked out exactly what he was going to say.

"Hello, House," he said, opening the door.

"Wilson!" said House.

"I want you to know that I don't bear any grudges. I sincerely hope that you and Stacy will be happy together, and I'm sure that you and I can continue to work together as colleagues. I have always had the utmost respect for your professional abilities."

"You memorized that," House said.

"That doesn't mean I'm not telling the truth."

"It doesn't even sound like you. You stole that speech from some manual on human resources," House said. "And you weren't even looking at me when you delivered it. You were staring at a point on the wall a foot and a half over my head."

"Fine," Wilson said. He glanced towards House for a fraction of a second. "Just tell Cuddy that we'll be able to work together. Tell her we talked and we worked things out."

"You expect me to lie to Cuddy for you again."

"I don't know what I was thinking, asking you to go against your stringent moral code like that. Maybe I thought that you might at least help me keep my job, considering that you've destroyed everything else that mattered to me."

"I'm sorry," House said.

"Well, I guess that makes it all better," Wilson said sarcastically. "At least I tried to sound sincere. You can't be bothered even to do that."

"I know that I hurt you. I don't have any excuses. I'm hoping you'll forgive me anyway."

"I'm tired of forgiving you. I forgive you and then you hurt me again. It's an endless loop."

"I was on my way home to tell you about Stacy when I had the accident."

"You were coming back from Stacy's apartment."

"Stacy told you that? Did she also tell you that I only went to her apartment to tell her that we'd made a big mistake? I told her that I wanted to stay with you."

Wilson sat down in the chair next to House's bed. He avoided looking at House. He turned his gaze instead to the television screen above House's bed, where muted football players huddled.

"I thought we could be happy. I thought I was making you happy."

"You were."

"If you were happy with me, you wouldn't have cheated on me with Stacy. You wouldn't have taken outrageous risks, like riding a motorcycle in the dead of winter. If you actually had someone in your life that you cared about, you wouldn't want to risk your life for some ridiculous thrill. You wouldn't stick a knife in a light socket to see God or dare a crazed gunman to shoot you."

"Have you ever thought that I do stupid things just because I'm an idiot and that it has nothing to do with how I feel about you?"

"If you actually gave a damn about me, if you actually felt something for me, you wouldn't have tried to kill yourself. I know your Vicodin overdose wasn't an accident, House. You're a physician and an addict - you know exactly how much it's safe to take. You didn't even care that I would be the one to find you."

"That was years ago, Wilson."

"I'm so angry with you right now," Wilson said. "I can't even look at you. I'm afraid I'll lose my temper and hurt you. You're helpless. You wouldn't be able to do anything to stop me."

"I'm not scared," House said. "Then again, we've already established that I'm an idiot with no sense of self-preservation."

Wilson almost smiled. Finally, he looked at House.

"See," House said. "No homicidal rage."

House reached up and touched Wilson's hand.

"I love you," he said. "Please forgive me."

---------------------------------------------

House said, "You didn't have to do all this. You could have just ordered in pizza. We both like pizza and I can eat it one-handed."

"I wanted to do it," Wilson said. "Besides I'm tired of one-handed food. I could go the rest of my life without eating another hot dog."

He was busy cutting House's turkey.

"Each piece doesn't have to be perfectly square and the same size. Hurry up or it will get cold."

"Almost done," Wilson said. "Here, take the gravy boat out to the table."

"I can't believe you actually own a gravy boat."

"Heirloom from my grandmother," Wilson said.

He picked up House's plate and his own and followed him out to the table.

"She made the long journey from the shtetls of eastern Europe, clutching her gravy boat..."

"I think she ordered it from the Sears catalogue."

He poured both of them a glass of wine.

"May the light of love guide us home when we are lost and weary," Wilson said, raising his glass. "Now, it's your turn."

"I have to make a toast?"

Wilson nodded.

"Over the teeth and past the gums,
Look out stomach, here it comes."

Wilson gave House a stern glance.

"A real one, please."

House thought for a moment, and then remembered something he had once heard his grandfather say. It seemed appropriate to the occasion.

"May we have those in our arms that we love in our hearts."

Wilson smiled and raised his glass to his lips.