7
Back in the room with the doors, House went to the table to see if another can of Coke might have appeared. He again heard the snick of a door closing quietly, and on the table found a white china plate with home-made cookies piled on it. He stuffed one in his mouth, grabbed a couple more and shoved them into his pocket.
Time to get this over with, he thought. The seventh and last solid door was right there. He went to stand in front of it, noticing as he did that it looked a little like a barn door. It was split across the middle so it could open in two halves. As he examined it, the top half of the door opened.
On the other side a woman smiled at him. She had skin the color of strong milk coffee and a beautiful, if somewhat mysterious smile. Her short dark hair contrasted with a bright floral shirt. She didn't say anything, just stood back and gestured with a sweep of her arm for him to enter.
It wasn't until he was on the other side that House realized the bottom half of the door was still closed. Interesting. How had he passed through it? Resigning himself to accept it as another thing he didn't understand, he followed the woman who walked a few paces ahead.
A moment later, as they rounded a corner, House recognized where they were. Outside the front doors of Princeton Plainsboro.
"Why are we here?" he asked.
The woman put a finger to her lips and her eyes twinkled a smile at him. Although she didn't speak, the message was clear. Silence.
She led him through the front doors of PPTH, past the reception desk and through to the clinic. Inside, she put a guiding hand on his elbow and propelled them towards the chairs for waiting patients. The room was empty – the whole hospital felt as if it was empty.
House sat down and she sat beside him, her hands folded neatly in her lap almost prayer-like. She remained silent.
House didn't say anything either, looking around. He'd been in the clinic so many times – so often against his will – but he'd never really paid attention to the room itself. He wondered what it would be like for a sick person coming for the first time. It wasn't exactly a friendly place. White walls, hard lines, a cold linoleum floor, the air smelling of disinfectant, a scent he barely registered any more.
Perhaps they were always so desperate to see a doctor not because of their illness, but to get out of this purgatory. Or perhaps it was just because the chairs were so damn uncomfortable.
House shifted, trying to find a position that didn't hurt his butt. He thought he saw a shadow moving in Cuddy's office, but couldn't be sure.
"What are we waiting for?" he asked eventually.
The woman again gave him a warm smile but didn't say anything.
House fidgeted, but was determined not to give in to this stubbornly silent woman. He searched in his pocket and pulled out the two cookies he'd stolen from the table, determinedly not offering her one. He ate both in a crumb-filled Cookie-Monster-style frenzy, just to see if it would provoke any reaction.
Nothing.
Maybe a twitch around her mouth, like she was trying not to laugh at him. That just made him more annoyed. He brushed the crumbs from his shirtfront with an irritated sigh.
"Okay, you win," he ground out. "I'm sick of this. I'm sick of waiting for something good to happen."
At that her face broke into a proper smile, showing white teeth. She sighed. "So are we," she said revealing a soft, New Orleans accent.
"Well then, if you're sick of it and I'm sick of it, let's do something!" House leapt to his feet and pointed his cane at the door back to the foyer.
She shook her head, staying seated. "That's not how it works."
House spun around, looking for something – anything – to end this interminable waiting. Again he thought he saw a shadow move in Cuddy's office.
"Let's go in there," he suggested, pointing in the direction he'd seen the shadow.
"Let's not," the woman countered archly.
House slumped back into the chair beside her. Yep, still uncomfortable. "What are we waiting for?" he tried again.
"We don't know."
"Huh?" He spun around to face her.
Her expression betrayed some of the same frustration he was feeling. "We have to learn patience. At least, that's what we think this door is teaching us."
"I thought the doors had lessons for me?"
"Sometimes the lessons are for you. Sometimes for us. Sometimes for everyone."
House felt his mind twist trying to wrap itself around that. "I'm getting sick of the cryptic crap in this dream."
"I know. But it's the only way we could try to get our messages through to you. Even now we're not sure if we've succeeded."
"Of course you have." House waved a hand dismissively. "There have been seven doors. The lesson from this door is patience, according to you. The lessons from the other doors were . . ." He trailed off.
His brain fought to remember. How could he possibly have forgotten?
The woman at the start, she was reading a book. What was it she had said? The memory slipped through his fingers like a handful of sawdust. And then there was the hippie chick and the Japanese lady. No, she'd been later. Who'd been after the reader? The typist? Or the woman by the lake? The last door had been Mayfield and the woman from Philly. But what had been her message again?
"I don't understand . . ." House rubbed his temples with his fingers, as if trying to physically reactivate his memory.
"I know. We don't understand either. We don't understand how you could have gotten to this point and forgotten all the lessons from the past. But it has happened."
Something clicked in House's mind, a piece of knowledge that landed without any connection to any other thoughts. He had no idea how he knew it, but he knew it with a certainty. "And that's why the eighth door isn't solid, isn't it?"
She nodded and gave him a sad smile. "That's right. Our lesson here is patience. We have to be patient and hope you remember your lessons. If you do, that will open the bottom-half of the seventh door and make the eighth door a reality."
House recalled the half-closed door and the miracle of walking through it.
"Can you tell me the lessons again? I . . . I could write them down!" He leapt up again and raced for the nurses' station. He found a patient file and began searching for pen. A pencil. Anything to write with. He pushed aside stacks of paper, opened every drawer. Nothing.
He looked up. "Don't suppose you have . . . ?"
She was still sitting there, patient. She shook her head. "No, sorry. I think writing it down is cheating."
"How can there be cheating?" House demanded. "This is my dream!"
She shrugged. "I don't know. Sorry. But you have to remember the lessons yourself."
"And you can't help."
"No. All I can do is try to be patient while you remember."
"You do realize the irony of talking about patience here."
She gave him a quizzical look.
"Patience. Patients. Geddit?"
She seemed disappointed. "Yeah, I get it. I'm just surprised you felt a need to point it out."
House pouted and slouched down into the seat beside her. "This isn't fun anymore."
There was a moment of silence, but then it seemed that the waiting finally got to the woman beside him. "Can you remember the lessons? Try. Please, try."
"Does it matter what order they're in?" House asked.
She shook her head. "Not at all. Just the lessons in whatever order."
"Maybe I could create a mnemonic," House said, more to himself.
"The order doesn't matter," she urged again. "Just please try to remember."
"The woman with the book, she talked about something annoying . . ." House recalled.
The woman beside him placed her palm on her chest.
"Heart!" The word popped into his brain. The reason for it was still fuzzy around the edges – why it was "heart", and what the damned book she'd been reading was he still couldn't recall, but at least he'd made a start.
The woman beside him beamed. "Yes! You've got it!"
House narrowed his eyes shrewdly. "With your help."
She shook her head and frowned. "No, I didn't help you at all."
House was about to contradict her, yell, "oh, come on, I saw that," in her face when she gave him the subtlest wink. House got it instantly. She wasn't supposed to help him, but she was going to give him clues. Excellent.
"Okay, so something about the heart was the first one. But I don't remember why or what it means," House was still frustrated.
"That's okay. At least you've made a start," she said encouragingly. "Keep going."
He noticed her fingers twitching in her lap. Her fingertips tapped against her thighs, almost as if she were—
"The typist – words. She was writing stories."
He was rewarded with another of those beaming smiles. "Keep going," she repeated.
What else could he remember? There was flowers, dogs, a lake . . .
The woman sitting beside him was sniffing. Her shoulders jerked. She looked like she was crying.
One of the women had cried for him. Cried about his pain.
"Pain," House said. Although he was excited about remembering, he couldn't bring himself to sound enthusiastic saying that word. "Suffering and pain."
"You're on the right track," the woman said, smiling again, her crying just an illusion.
"It was either the woman with the dogs or the two women with the flowers next," House said, reasonably sure of his guess.
She nodded.
"The woman by the lake had dogs with her – the dogs were about loyalty. And the women with the flowers – and the whisky," he added as the memory returned, "they wanted me to remember . . ." What had it been again? They'd helped him to stand up, they'd talked about . . . "Trust," House said the memory clicked into place.
The woman beside him jumped up as if she couldn't contain herself any longer. She paced, rubbing her hands together. "Oh, this is so much better than we imagined! We were so worried you'd forgotten everything!"
"How many more are there?" House asked, because he'd already lost count. He didn't want to ruin the woman's excitement, but the lessons he'd just recalled were already starting to fade again in his mind. And even though he might remember a word, the meaning of it was lost to him. The frustration was overwhelming.
"There's only two more, including this one, which is patience, remember?" she replied. "And patients. Both meanings of the word. Because both are important."
"Okay, so the one before this was the Mayfield lesson," House muttered to himself, trying to recall. "It was about being positive, about being happy, no . . . not quite right . . . it was about being . . . proud of what has been achieved."
"That's right! You've recalled all of them!"
House stood and faced her. "But there's no point! I don't remember the reasons for any of them. I don't know why I'm here or what it is I'm supposed to do with all these lessons. I'm sure you're all wonderful people, but I just don't get why you've put me through all this."
"I know, I know," she said soothingly. "I know it's confusing right now, but it will all come together, I promise."
He saw a shadow move in Cuddy's office. Suddenly he was overwhelmed by exhaustion. Even though he was dreaming and therefore by definition asleep, all he wanted to do was lie down and close his eyes and fall . . .
"I've had enough of all this. I'm going into Cuddy's office to lie down on her sofa and have a nap," House declared.
"No!" The woman put up her hands and looked alarmed. "You can't do that! Please, after everything we've done, you can't end up there. That's not how this should finish!"
She seemed so upset she was close to tears.
"But I'm so tired," House said, beginning to feel defeated. He took a step towards Cuddy's office. "I'll just go in there for a little while. Then I'll come back out and get on with the puzzle solving, okay?"
"No, no, no." The woman shook her head. "We don't know if you'll ever come out. That's why you had to learn these lessons again. That's why we need you to see this through to the end. Please."
House sighed. "I'm just not sure if I can help you all."
"You can. We know you can. Remember one of the lessons was trust? Faith? We still have it. All you have to do is go back out that door and solve the puzzle with the lessons we've given you. We know you can do it."
House paused. "I really think I'd just like to go to Cuddy. That seems easiest right now." But he sounded less certain.
"I know it seems that way, but you've never been one for taking the most obvious answer, just because it was easy. There's a puzzle waiting for you. You've got all the pieces except for one. Don't you want to solve it?"
"Well of course I do, but—"
"Yes-s-s-s." She let out a long breath in relief. "Come on, come with me. You're so close. Not much further to go at all." She grabbed his hand and tugged, pulling him out of the clinic, back outside PPTH and around the corner to where their original door stood. She stepped back and pushed him towards it.
"But—" House tried again.
"Thank you. Thank you for trying. Now please solve the puzzle for us. We're all waiting." With that, she gave House another gentle push and before he knew it, he was on the other side of that confounding half-door.