Chapter Five:

His cell phone rang waking him up. He looked at the clock, 7:00am and then he looked at the caller ID, it was Laura. "House," he said deciding to answer.

"Hey Uncle Greg," she said.

"Why are you calling me at this ungodly hour in the morning?" he asked.

"Yeah, sorry about that, I need to leave for class in a half hour and I wanted to ask you if mom was OK," she said.

"Why do you ask?" he asked.

"I called her last night just to chat and she just wasn't herself," Laura said. "She seemed depressed and I don't remember her ever acting like that before. I was wondering if something bad happened at work or if you've noticed anything different."

"I hadn't paid any attention," he lied. "But I'll keep my eyes open."

"You'll let me know if you find anything important, won't you?" she asked.

"Sure," he said and then he hung up the phone.

OK, so he wasn't imagining things, if her kid picked up on it even just over the phone, then it was real. House's internet investigation hadn't turned up much. He'd searched her on the web and found a couple of papers she'd either written or had been part of the research team, but he already knew about those. He tried to break into her university records at both her undergraduate and graduate institutions, but was unsuccessful. She was an only child, well except for him, but no full siblings. Both her parents were dead, and he knew the circumstances of her dad's death, but was unable to find out anything about the cause of her mother's passing. He was up against a brick wall. He needed some lab tests, but how was he going to get that from her without her knowing. It's not like he could just come up to her say hi, and pull her blood without her noticing. He needed to talk to Wilson.

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"You want me to do what?" Wilson asked.

"You heard me, I want you to pull some blood from Susan and give it to me so I can run some tests," House said.

"How am I supposed to do that?" Wilson asked.

"You'll think of something," House said as he exited Wilson's office.

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"Hey Susan," Wilson said as he entered the lab. "What's up?"

"Calibration day on the chemistry analyzer," Susan replied. "Why are you carrying around a phlebotomy kit?"

"I have to pull your blood today, the hospital is checking to make sure everybody's HepB vaccination titer to see if anybody needs a booster."

"Oh, OK," Susan said as she sat down and rolled up her sleeve. "You'll be happy, I have great veins."

"That's good to know," Wilson said as he started the process to pull her blood.

Wilson pulled the first tube of blood and then grabbed a second tube. "Why are you pulling another tube? You only need the serum tube for a titer," Susan asked.

Damn, thought Wilson, he should have known better than to use that excuse. "Uh, well that's what the memo said, so that's what I'm doing," he said as he tried to recover. He finished the blood draw and put a band-aid on Susan's arm.

"Don't lie to me Wilson, what's going on?" Susan asked.

Wilson looked down and brought his hand up to his eyebrows and pinched the top of his nose, his typical sign of being bothered by something. "Nothing, it's just what I said," he said as he quickly stepped out the door and ending the conversation.

"Why did Wilson just pull my blood?" Susan asked when she walked in the door to House's office.

"What did he tell you?" House asked as he turned his chair to face her.

"He said that the hospital was checking everybody's HepB vaccination titers, but he pulled two different tubes of blood and you only need the serum tube to run a titer," Susan said. "What are you looking for?"

"And you assumed I put him up to it because…?" House asked.

"Because Wilson can't lie for crap," Susan replied, "and the only reason he would bother to pull blood from me and then lie about it was if you told him to."

House sighed and leaned back in his chair. "You're not acting like yourself, I wanted to see if there was a medical reason why,"

"You could have just asked," Susan replied.

"Ok, so you admit there is something wrong then," House said.

"I never said there wasn't," said Susan. She paused and then said, "I'm just a little down right now; I'll be fine."

Susan left House's office and headed down the hall. She's not fine, House thought to himself. Something's wrong.

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"You're an idiot," House said to Wilson as he walked in the door, "You tell her it's for a HepB titer and then you pull two tubes? She's a lab tech Wilson; she knows which tube you need for a titer."

"I'm sorry," Wilson replied. "You caught me off guard. I couldn't think of anything else that wouldn't seem out of the ordinary." Wilson handed over the tubes of blood to House. "Where are you going to have the labs run? It's not like you'll get much help from the main lab. The lab manager hates you."

"I'll run them myself after Susan leaves for the day," House said pocketing the tubes and walking out the door.

Wilson poked his head out his door when House was about halfway down the corridor, "Are we meeting for lunch today?"

"No, I have a date," House replied behind him as he continued walking.

"Tell Cuddy hello for me," Wilson said as he started to turn back inside.

"Not with Cuddy," House replied as he turned the corner.

Wilson burrowed his forehead as he poked his head back out his door to ask, but House had already turned the corner and was gone.

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Susan had her head buried under the lid of her analyzer cleaning the reagent probes when she heard someone clear their throat behind her. She pulled her head out from under the lid and recognized the tissue culture lab tech from the main lab standing in the middle of her lab, "May I help you?" she asked.

"I'm here to collect back my Dewar flask from the other day," she said.

"Oh, sure," Susan said as she walked over to the drain rack above the sink. "I cleaned it up for you, and I'm sorry I didn't get it back sooner. I got rather distracted with our patient and other duties," she said.

"Its fine," the lab tech started and then paused before starting again, "I'm kind of new here; why did my lab manager get so upset when you came in the lab?"

"He doesn't like my boss and he feels the need to take it out on me," Susan explained. "I don't really understand it. He got what he wanted when the board decided to give Dr. House his own lab tech, but there was so much animosity between them by that time, that he doesn't feel the need to let it go. Sometimes I wonder if he thinks if he's rude enough to me that I'll quit and leave Dr. House in a bind just to get back at him, but it's not going to work. I'm not going anywhere. I'm also not going to stop going to the main lab whenever I need to. I don't have all the equipment I need in here for everything and what I do have is a little out of date. You're lab manager is a jerk, but he doesn't scare me. I work for Dr. House after all. He should know better."

The lab tech chuckled, "I better get back before I'm missed. Nice talking to you." She walked out the door just as Dr. House was walking in; he watched her leave the lab.

"Who was that?" he asked.

"Tissue culture tech in the main lab," Susan said.

"What'd she want?"

"Her Dewar flask I borrowed when I had to flash freeze the biopsy from the baby," Susan answered.

"Get your jacket and come on," he said.

Susan grabbed her coat and followed him out of the lab. "Where are we going?" she asked.

"To lunch," he said.

Susan stopped in her tracks, "I told you I didn't need your pity," she said and turned to go back to the lab.

"Susan!" Susan stopped and turned around to face him. "I'm not asking you to join me for lunch. I'm telling you that we're going to lunch. Now come on, let's go," he ordered.

Susan followed him out of the hospital and to his car. She got in the passenger side and shut the door. The trip to the restaurant was quiet and the tension in the air was thick. When they arrived, she got out and followed him inside. The hostess led them to a small table toward the back and left the menus with them. The room was fairly dark and it was hard for Susan to read the menu. She took off her glasses and held the menu closer to her face so she could read the print. "You know, they make these things called bifocals," House teased.

"I'm aware of that," she said curtly as she perused through the menu items. Making her selection, she put the menu down and picked up her glasses and put them back on. "I don't need them unless I'm in a darkened room trying to read small print or I'm trying to thread a needle. I can see close up fine without my glasses, so I just take them off when I need to."

"Why did you bring me here?" she asked a few moments later.

"I can't take my little sister out to eat once in a while?" he replied.

"Not you, that's out of your character. You want something; I want to know what it is that you want?" Susan retorted.

House started to reply when the waiter came to take their drink order. Susan ordered iced tea and House ordered bourbon. When the waiter left, Susan looked at House, "Well?" she asked.

"I don't want anything, I just wanted to do something nice," he said.

Susan decided to drop it for the moment. "What are you doing for Cuddy tomorrow?" she asked.

"What's tomorrow?" he asked.

"You're kidding, right?"

"No," he replied.

"Tomorrow is Valentines Day," Susan explained.

House sat back in his chair. "Oh," he said. "I don't guess I'm doing anything."

"Not doing anything?" Susan asked, "Are you insane?"

"It's just a stupid holiday for the sole purpose of making men spend money for their women," House said.

"Don't," said Susan.

"What do you mean, 'don't'," he asked.

"Don't do that to her. It doesn't have to be much, just let her know you're thinking of her," Susan said.

"She knows I think of her all the time, I shouldn't have to send her cards, flowers or anything else. She knows how I feel; besides she's not into all that snuggly stuff," he said.

"Greg, trust me, do something for her. She'll appreciate it. Even if she doesn't act like its any big deal, it is," Susan said with confidence as the waiter came back to deliver their drinks and take their orders.

"You talk like you have experience," House said when the waiter left.

"And you're still trying to put my puzzle together when I told you that I would be fine," Susan said. She sighed and leaned back in her chair. "Greg, Jeff was not a romantic. He never remembered my birthday, our anniversary, Mother's Day or Valentines Day. He didn't even bother giving me anything for Christmas and insisted that I didn't do anything for him either. Over the years I got used to it and said that it didn't bother me – and for the most part it didn't, except Valentines Day. I know it's stupid, but Valentines Day would come and everybody else got balloons, candy or flowers delivered to them at work. All the other women would ooh and awe and then talk about where they were going for dinner that night. I remember one time, one of the lady's at work was serenaded by a men's quartet. I wouldn't want something like that at all, but a card would have been nice or even a single flower, something, anything would have been nice. Instead I got nothing and when I got home the first thing that was said to me was, "What's for dinner?" Don't do that to Cuddy. Don't hurt her like that. She may not act hurt, but believe me – she will be."

House nodded his acceptance, "What do you suggest?" he said.

"It doesn't matter, Greg. It doesn't have to be traditional flowers or candy," Susan said, "Something in your own Housian way that says you love her."

"Housian?" he asked.

"You know what I mean, you're way," Susan said.

Their meals came and the two concentrated on their meals. When they were finished, House paid for the meal and they went back to the hospital.

"I'll meet you back down here in time for clinic duty. Oh, and thanks for lunch," Susan said as she headed to the lab. House nodded and went to Cuddy's office.

"Learn anything?" Cuddy asked.

"Maybe," House said.