Chapter Six:

Friday morning found Susan carting a bag of oranges and another sack that contained her lunch and other miscellaneous items into the hospital. Wilson had just walked in the elevator and held the door open while she caught up and went inside. "Hungry?" he asked as he indicated the oranges.

"I'm using them as part of my discussion on moles today for class," she said.

Wilson raised his eyebrows in question and said, "Well, that should be interesting."

They walked down the hall together until Wilson turned in his corridor. Susan went on toward the conference room and went inside. Taub was there, but the others hadn't arrived yet. She walked over to the small refrigerator in the corner and put her lunch inside and closed the door.

"Craving oranges?" he asked.

"No, they're for moles," she said.

"Moles," he repeated.

"Yep," and then she was gone leaving Taub to wonder how oranges were supposed to treat moles.

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House walked in his office tossing his back pack in his chair before heading into the conference room to make his coffee. "She said they were for moles," Taub was saying.

"Moles," Chase repeated.

"Yes, moles," Taub said.

"What was for moles?" asked House

"Oranges," Taub answered. "Susan had a bag of oranges with her and when I asked her about them she said they were for moles."

House smirked but didn't say anything and headed out the door, "Where are you going?" Foreman asked.

"To class," he said as he left.

House stopped by Wilson's office, "You coming?" he asked.

"Yeah, don't want to miss this," Wilson said.

House and Wilson walked to Susan's classroom and sat in the back of the class. Susan saw them come in and smiled as they sat down. Susan passed out a worksheet to the class, House and Wilson each took one when the stack of worksheets came by their seats and looked them over while Susan worked her way back to the front of the class.

Susan started the class by asking if there were any questions from the worksheet reviewing the first two chapters. There were and she helped work a couple of problems from the worksheet. Having finished that, she started on today's lecture. "Is there anybody who knows what a mole is?" she asked. House and Wilson both raised their hands, "OK, anybody other than the two dork-wads in the back of the room know what a mole is?" she said laughing as the class turned around and looked at the two older men sitting in the back. When no one answered, Susan said "6.02x1023, otherwise known as Avogadro's Number. What is 6.02x1023 ?" she asked. A student raised her hand. Susan pointed at her.

"Avagadro's number," the student said.

"Which is?" Susan prompted. The student didn't say anything, "a mole," Susan answered for her. "A mole of "whatever" is 6.02x1023 "whatevers"," she continued signaling quote signs with her fingers with the "whatevers".

Susan continued to explain moles when the inevitable statement was made, "How can a mole be so many different things?" the student asked.

Susan explained that a mole was just the name of a quantity which happened to be 6.02x1023. The class stared at her blankly, so Susan went over to her bag of oranges, "Count with me," she said. Together the class counted out 12 oranges. "How many is 12?" she asked. Someone yelled out, "a dozen."

"Count with me," she said. Susan went to her bag of miscellaneous things and pulled out a box of paper clips. Together the class counted out 12 clips. "How many is 12?" she asked. Some else called out, "a dozen."

"Count with me," she said and repeated the process with 12 pencils and once again the answer was 'a dozen.' She walked over to the pile of oranges and asked the class, "How many is a dozen?"

"Twelve," came the answer.

"How many oranges are in a dozen?" she asked.

"Twelve,"

Susan paused for a moment and then asked, "How many oranges are in a mole of oranges?"

Light bulbs clicked on all over the class, "6.02x1023" came multiple voices. She repeated the process for the clips and the pencils. "Awesome," she said picking up two oranges and walking halfway up the stairs toward the back row. She pitched each doctor an orange and said, "You have your answer, get out of here," with a smile. House and Wilson got up and left the room out the back door.

"She really is a good teacher," said Wilson. "I've never seen anybody explain moles like that before. It took me a couple weeks to figure out what my professor was trying to get across when I was a freshman,"

"Seriously?" House asked.

"Not everybody is as brilliant as the great Dr. House," Wilson said sarcastically.

Susan finished class, gathered her things and went to the conference room. She put the oranges on the table to share with the others and went back down to the lab to start her daily maintenance routine.

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House stared at the printout in his hand; it was Susan's lab report. Everything was normal, even the thyroid tests were normal. He had thought that a thyroid issue might be the reason for her mood swings and when that wasn't it, he tested her hormone levels. They were also normal and according to those levels, she hadn't entered menopause yet, so that wasn't it either. He needed to do a CT scan of her head, but how was he going to do that without her knowledge. He was going to have to drug her, there wasn't any other way. House sat trying to think of how to drug her without her realizing she'd been drugged.

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"No House, I'm not going to do it," Wilson said.

"You have to," House said.

"No, I don't. She told you she was fine and all the tests you've ran indicate that she's fine," Wilson argued.

"I need a head CT scan. Whatever the problem is, it's in her brain and blood tests aren't going to show it," he implored.

"How am I supposed to get her to a place where she doesn't realize she's being drugged?" Wilson asked. "The only way she won't know if she's being drugged if it she happens to be drugged just as she's going to sleep…..Oh no! I'm not doing that, besides she's already turned me down flat for a date."

"I'm not asking you to sleep with her, in fact if you touch her I'll punch you in the face," House said.

"Figure it out on your own House, I'm staying out of it," Wilson said.

"Fine, I'll take care of getting her to sleep – but you'll help me get her here and back" House said as he left Wilson's office.

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"Hey Susan," Susan looked toward the door and saw Martha walking in the lab. "What are you doing?"

"Nothing much at the moment, I'm getting ready to pack up and go home," she explained.

"Well, the guys and I are going out tonight and were wondering if you would like to come along. It's valentines and since none of us are dating, we thought we would celebrate 'Singles Awareness Day' together," Martha said.

Susan smiled, "'Single's Awareness Day', I like it. That's cute. Where are you going?"

"Shelly's bar down the street," Martha said.

"Oh, well you know I don't drink," Susan said.

"I know, they have non-alcoholic drinks there and their hamburgers are really good," Martha said.

"Ok, sure – why not. What time?" Susan asked.

"Meet us there at 7:00," she answered.

Susan went home and changed and then headed to Shelly's bar. She went inside and easily found the team sitting in a large booth in the back of the bar. "Hey," she said as she sat down. The team answered in turn and continued their discussion as the waiter came over. "What'll you have?" she asked.

"Iced tea would be fine, thank you," Susan said.

"Designated driver?" the waiter asked.

"Well, I'm driving anyway," Susan answered.

The waiter nodded and went to fill the drink order. Susan sat quiet as she listened to the doctors discuss their last case and the write up they were working on. "Susan, we're adding you as a contributing author on the paper," Foreman said.

"Why?" Susan asked.

"We wouldn't have diagnosed it without your help," Taub said.

"But I didn't run the test that clinched it for you, that was the lab in Bethesda," Susan countered.

"Doesn't matter, you're still part of the team and we're all co-authoring the paper," Chase said.

"Well, thank you. I appreciate it," Susan said.

"What's wrong, you seem rather down in the dumps lately," Martha asked.

"Nothing, I'm fine," Susan replied.

The evening went on, the fellows ordered dinner and the waiter re-filled Susan's tea, Chase asked, "Susan, have you ever had Long Island Tea?"

"No, how's it different that regular tea?" Susan asked.

"It just has favoring added, I bet you'd like it," he said. "I'll get one for myself and you can try some. If you like it, you can order your own."

Susan agreed she would try some of Chase's tea.

Martha's eyes went wide, "Susan, are you aware…."

"Martha," asked Foreman. "Would you go tell the waiter we need more chips please?" Martha furrowed her brow at Foreman, but got up to find the waiter. While Martha was wandering through the dance floor trying to get past all the people to the bar to find the waiter, the waiter arrived at their table with Chase's Long Island Tea and then left.

Chase handed her the tea and Susan took a sip. Her eyes went wide, "Wow. That has a very interesting flavor, what kind of tea leaves are used to make it?" Susan asked as she took another sip.

Martha was wandering her way back to the table when Chase spotted her. "I'm not really sure," Chase said as he looked down at his watch. "Oh," he said, "I've got to run, just keep the tea. I'll see you guys later." Chase left the table and discreetly grabbed Martha by the arm and led her out of the bar.

Foreman, Taub and Susan sat at the table a little longer. Susan managed to drink about half of the glass when things started getting fuzzy. She stood up, "You know, I'm not feeling …too….well, I….I think I should….go…" Taub stood up quickly and caught Susan before she fell to the floor.

"Wow, that didn't take long," he said.

"Alcohol virgin," Foreman said as he left money on the table to cover the bill and together they dragged Susan out of the bar. Outside, House and Wilson were waiting in Wilson's Volvo. They got out and helped put Susan in the back seat.

"She's really going to be pissed when she figures out what happened," Wilson said as he took off toward the hospital.

"Just get us there, I'll deal with her when she wakes up," House said.

Once at the hospital, Wilson went inside to find a wheelchair and the two men wheeled her into radiology. They ran the CT scan and found nothing of any interest. "We're missing something," House said.

"We're not missing anything. House you've done blood work and now you've done a CT, there is nothing wrong with her. She's perfectly healthy," he said.

House and Wilson wheeled Susan back out to Wilson's car and went to Susan's apartment. They took her inside and to her room. They laid her on her bed and House removed her shoes. "Think we should put her in her night clothes?" Wilson asked.

House glared at Wilson, "You just want to see her naked. No, we are not going to dress her for bed. She's not going to know how she got there as it is, if she wakes up in different clothes, it'll be worse."

"Are you going to stay here tonight?" Wilson asked.

"Yeah, she's never been drunk before. She might need some help," House replied.

"What about her car?" Wilson asked.

"We'll get it tomorrow," House said.