Human condition-al

"He didn't keep his promise to you," Nyx sounded almost indignant.

"I told him he wouldn't," House reminded her. "And I was right."

"Is that enough of a consolation prize?" Nyx asked.

"Well I did get to say to him that I told him so," House shrugged. "Even if I didn't use those exact words."

"What I don't understand is why you didn't see his altruism for the symptom is was!" Nyx wanted to know.

"Wilson didn't see it as such either, as soon as he had his own horse in the race," House pointed out. "And that was after he had already given me 'the lecture' about it."

"So you're saying that because you had personal investment in the patient – even if it wasn't emotional but monetary – you didn't want to see his symptoms for what they were?" Nyx demanded.

"Basically, yes," House admitted. "I wanted his money, so I decided he was suffering from rich-kid-quilt and too many episodes of Secret Millionaire."

"But even if that had been all, wasn't he taking it a bit too far?" Nyx queried. "Park homed in on it as a symptom right away."

"So she did. Too bad I had other fish to fry otherwise I would have been delighted to find someone equally suspicious of 'niceness'. But as things were I dismissed it as a symptom of stupidity," House admitted. "I just assumed that he was an easy mark. I've known those before, you know. Of course, I didn't know he had left his family because of it."

"Family comes first?" Nyx suggested.

"Well, it should, but that wasn't exactly what I meant," House stated. "What I meant was that if he had so fine-tuned a sense of guilt it would have work for his family as well. So for the guilt to basically bypass the family there had to be something else going on than just stupidity."

"You think charity is stupid?" Nyx frowned. "Yet most of the money the hospital uses is charity money. Do you think that is stupid, too?"

"Most of the donors are," House shrugged. "They use money to get something that really can't be bought. They think they will feel better about being rich; they buy their way out of guilt because their money didn't save someone important to them and now they fund research into the illness they didn't care about until it took a loved one. They fulfil a perceived social obligation; they want to keep up with the Joneses and show they, too, can give away lots of money; it's fashionable to have a pet charity and it looks good. Myriad of reasons."

"And what in your opinion would not be a stupid reason?" Nyx wanted to know.

"Charity is not my area of expertise," House reminded her.

"Just like ethics," Nyx accepted. "And yet you gave 13 her freedom. You told her that she can't do your kind of medicine anymore and there are plenty of ordinary doctors to go around so she can go and be happy. You set her free."

"I didn't have her properly captured," House said. "She would have just torn herself apart."

"Not a decision one would expect from you," Nyx mused.

"I think one prisoner per hospital is enough," House dismissed the suggestion.

"You see yourself as a prisoner still?" Nyx asked.

"I am one until this monitor comes off," House stated. "You may pretty it up by saying it is parole, but until you can decide where you go and when, it's still imprisonment. Mind you, I do like this better than the Big House, but though I'm no longer in prison, I still am a prisoner."

"Is that why you try to control your environment?" Nyx queried. "In prison everything was as it was, but here you might be able to manipulate things to your liking. Though the restrictions are a hindrance this is still your home turf and you have ways to affect it."

"This isn't really my home turf anymore," House shook his head. "It is as you said before: it might be easier to adjust to something totally new than to old that has changed."

"You have your office back, your stuff is there, and I have no doubt you'll get rid of orthopaedics soon enough, too." Nyx surmised. "Wilson is here, you have a team – and, again, probably the team of your choice soon – and you are working cases just like you used to do. You even have clinic duty to hate."

"But only my home to go to when I leave the hospital and only the hospital to go to when I leave home," House pointed out. "That's not my normal environment in all and I can't even go to the patient's home to find out if the cause for the illness is there."

"You always send your team to do that anyway," Nyx pointed out. "Or is this just a case of you wanting to do it because you can't?"

"When I send my team to do it, I trust the team," House said. "I don't trust Park and Adams quite enough to trust their results. But partly it is also the restrictions. It's one thing to choose not to do something and something else entirely when you can't even choose."

"So where is it you so want to go but can't?" Nyx wondered. "Because I don't think you were talking about the patients' homes there."

"It's silly," House evaded.

"Of course it is," Nyx agreed broadly. "Doesn't make it insignificant, though."

"Cuddy's house," House stated simply.

"Why?" Nyx exclaimed.

"Don't criminals usually return to the scene of the crime?" House shrugged.

"Maybe," Nyx accepted. "But I don't think that's your reason."

"Maybe I just want to see if there is any signs there left," House muttered. "Anything showing what happened."

"You know what happened," Nyx said. "Your car is surely sign enough, why would you need to see any more of them? And surely you don't need to go there to make it seem real to you since nothing is more real than prison. So what is it?"

"It's not the accident that I need to make real," House sighed in defeat. "It's Cuddy."

"You need to see for yourself that she really is gone," Nyx understood. "That there really is somebody else living in her house and she is not on a sabbatical or anything like that but really, really not coming back."

"Yes," House stated simply.

"Banquo's ghost?" Nyx asked.

"No, there's no feast here," House denied. "No. Foreman hasn't found his voice yet. He isn't filling the hospital the way Cuddy did. She was always there even when she wasn't. She still is, but only as an echo. The hospital is like a zombie house now. Empty hollow, lacking soul – and waiting. The others have had a year to get used to it. They know what not to wait. I still need to get my heart around it. I didn't think I could still wait; I thought the prison had cured me of that, too, but seems that I was wrong. It seems that I need some kind of closure. Not with her, that was done for sure. But about her; to realise that I'm here and she isn't. It's just the wrong way around. I wish I could go and see her house and learn her absence. Foreman may in time make this his hospital; he has administrative skills, but I'm not sure he can fill it. Maybe that's not necessary – I've seen plenty of hospital that have no soul but still do good work – but I rather liked the way things were. And I am sorry that I broke it. I never thought anything could make Cuddy leave her hospital, but apparently that was just one of the many things I got wrong."

"You could ask Wilson to get you pictures," Nyx suggested with a rueful smile.

"And listen to him lecturing me about letting Cuddy go or letting the past go or whatever it would be he felt like lecturing me about," House laughed. "No. Thank. You. I'm done with judgemental for a while. I'll survive as I am. I always do."

"Yeah," Nyx sighed. "But sometimes it would be nice to have something a bit more."