5

The fifth door looked like a hippie's Combi van from the sixties. Painted with psychedelic swirls and splotches, it almost hurt his eyes to look at it. Someone had been on some very good drugs when they'd painted it.

It opened easily and inside a woman with a doll-like face and short, strawberry-blonde hair danced to music only she could hear. A daisy chain circled her head and a flowing silky dress swished around her ankles.

She grinned broadly when she saw him. "You're here!" She rushed over and enveloped him in a warm, soft hug that he didn't return. "I'm so glad you're here." She stepped back, seemingly unfazed by his lack of response. "It was taking ages and I was getting so bored."

House couldn't help wondering what kind of lesson he was in store for here. "I got here as fast as I could," he said mildly.

"Of course you did." She gave him another of those sunny grins.

Silence fell and the woman seemed content just standing there, smiling at him. House began to grow uncomfortable. He shifted his feet and looked over her shoulder. "Um, shouldn't we be getting on with something? Isn't there stuff you have to tell me?"

She shook her head as if awakening herself from her thoughts. "Yes! Yes, of course. Sorry. It's just so nice to have you here. I couldn't help soaking you in for a bit."

"Uh, okay. Whatever." House felt strangely pleased by her observation.

"So this is kind of fun," she said, dancing again. She'd gathered a bunch of pink peonies from somewhere and held the sheath in her arms as she danced. "We can tell dirty jokes and play swear-word Scrabble."

"Finally!" House said with true relief. "Everyone I've met has been really sweet, but I haven't really been having any fun. The walk by the lake was nice, but the conversation wasn't really fun."

"Oh yes, we're going to have lots of fun," she said emphatically, handing him a flower. "You were supposed to get this at the last door, but she forgot."

House took it and held it gingerly, not sure what to expect. But, it seemed, it was just a flower. "Are you sure we're going to have fun?"

She stopped dancing and looked at him, her expression more serious now. "Well, it will be fun to start off with. And then . . . it might not be."

House snorted. Figured.

His eyes lit on an image in the background and froze. "What's that doing here?" He pointed at the poster that hung, waving slightly in the breeze.

She did a little pirouette to see what he was pointing at before spinning back to face him. "Oh, that? It's a reminder of someone important. That is a significant event you need to think about at this door." Her light tone belied the gravity of her words.

It was a poster for a Star Trek movie.

Ku—

He couldn't bring himself to think the name. A year of therapy and when it came to remembering his employee he was still a mess.

"This is the story you made for yourself."

House spun around as another woman emerged from the shadows. Her words were tinged with an accent and as the light dawned on her features he recognized it – Japanese. The words themselves sent a shiver down his spine.

"Pity it's not true," the blonde woman said sweetly.

"No, no, no!" House stumbled back. "I'm not back here! This is not a hallucination!"

"It's okay," the new woman put out her hands as if calming a wild animal. Both of them stepped towards him, determinedly calm expressions on their faces.

The two women wore matching blue silk dresses, but there the similarities ended. They both had sweet rounded faces, but the blonde and dark hair were at opposite ends of the spectrum. The dark-haired woman didn't have flowers in her hair, nor was she holding any, instead her outstretched hand held a glass of whisky, which she offered to him.

"Here, take this. It'll settle your nerves."

"O-o-o-h yes." He took it with a shaky hand and knocked it back in one gulp. Dream though it was, the whisky made a satisfying burn as it went down.

"Sit with us." The flower-child sat cross-legged on the floor, while the Japanese lady elegantly folded her legs beneath her. She rubbed her shoulder as she sat and the doctor in House thought to ask about it, but then the flower-child produced a huge pillow from nowhere and perched it on the floor with another of those warm, welcoming smiles. House gratefully sank down – his knees felt a little weak. He laid his flower stem on the floor beside him.

"This is a good thing," the dark-haired woman said. "I know it was hard to see at the time. That is why we had to learn to trust."

"Trust," the blonde woman echoed, nodding. "That's what you have to take with you from this door."

Well, at least this time they were up front about the lesson – he didn't need to work it out from some random cryptic clues. Trust. That seemed straightforward enough.

He nodded. "Okay. Trust." Curiosity bubbled inside him until he couldn't contain it. "Why?"

The dark-haired woman smiled at him and House began to feel calmer. She reminded him of someone – someone from his childhood maybe? She began to speak before he could work it out.

"This was a difficult time—"

House interrupted before she could continue. "Difficult time! I lost everything! My work, my friends, my home – my mind!"

She waited patiently for him to rant and then picked up again as if he hadn't spoken. "This was a difficult time. Things happened that shouldn't have happened. They weren't real, but it still wasn't right."

"You mean Amber?"

The blonde woman chimed in. "No. She was good. Interesting. It's the other part that shouldn't have happened."

"Ah," he said. "You mean C—"

The dark-haired woman cut him off. "We don't need to say it," she snapped. She then seemed to gather her patience again. "What's important here is that we all learned to trust. There was a payoff for the trust we all placed in you."

"'We all'?" House questioned the phrase.

"Us and you."

House burned to know who "us" was, but there were higher priority questions. "Trust what?"

"Trust . . ." The dark-haired woman waved an arm, searching for the right word. ". . . the grand design."

"The grand design?" House couldn't help sneering.

The blonde woman gave him a thoughtful look. "We know you don't believe. You don't have to. What you have to understand, though, is the trust that has been placed in you. Trust that when you go through bad times, there will be a pay off. That our trust and faith will be repaid."

"Faith?" House echoed witheringly.

She cringed a little at his tone, and House wondered if she was wishing she hadn't used that word.

The dark-haired woman wasn't about to back down, though. "Yes, faith," she said, her tone firm. "We put faith in you. Don't let us down."

"Faith . . . in me?" House rubbed his face with the heels of his hands. This was all getting too much for what should have been a simple night's sleep. What happened to good old ordinary dreams of Angelina Jolie in a bikini with a banana and a can of whipped cream?

When he looked back, both women were smiling at him beatifically. The contrast between their porcelain and olive skin tones, their strawberry-blonde and dark hair, was dramatic, and yet they seemed to have a connection somehow, a sisterhood. Somehow, House felt, it was a connection they shared with all the women he'd met behind the doors so far.

"Who are you?" he asked eventually.

The women beamed, as if he'd asked the sixty-four-million-dollar question.

"Thank you so much for asking," the blonde woman gushed.

"But you don't need to know the answer," the dark-haired woman said immediately, gently chastening her more enthusiastic friend. "And now it's time to move to the next door."

House was quite comfortable on his pillow on the floor, but another clue was waiting. He'd learned so far that once these women said it was time to move, they rarely gave him any further information – there was no use pestering them for more.

"Okay." He rose from the floor with a struggle, but both women were suddenly there on each side, helping him to stand. It was assistance he'd usually snap at, but for some reason their calm presences he could accept.

The blonde woman handed him his flower again. "Go. There's a new adventure behind the sixth door. Something that's never been done before."

That sounded . . . interesting. House would have liked to have stayed longer and talked with the two women, but the mystery had to be solved. He turned to the door and they were gone.