Chapter 22: Valentine's Day
The hospital was quiet when James arrived at a quarter to six in the morning. He smiled at all of the pink and red balloons in the gift shop, and once again he wondered if he should plan on stopping at a florist on the way home from work. For the hundredth time, he dismissed the idea, knowing flowers would only invite ridicule.
As he waited for the conference call with two colleagues in London and Tokyo to come through, he mentally reviewed the contents of his kitchen, making sure he had everything he needed for the dinner he planned to cook. He knew there was nothing to worry about, but just thinking about the fresh herbs and the block of imported Venezuelan chocolate made him happy. His enjoyment wasn't even affected by the fact that this morning, when he had leaned over to place a kiss on House's forehead and whisper "Happy Valentines Day", House's mumbled response had sounded suspiciously like "go to hell". He knew House had been up in the middle of the night as his patient had taken a turn for the worse, and he was content to leave the other man sleeping when he'd crept out of the apartment at 5:30 in the morning.
When the call was finished, he started reviewing the charts for the patients he would see that morning, confident that if everything went according to plan, he should be able to leave the hospital by 4:30 PM, plenty of time to get home and start cooking.
Everything was going well until the page from the ER during his second patient of the day. Sara Partinski had just been brought in. He made a detour down to the ER, and by the time he saw his third scheduled patient, he was already an hour behind schedule. Lunch was a sandwich eaten quickly at his desk while reading files, complete with a cup of lukewarm coffee. He phoned home to let House know that he'd probably be coming home late. Absently, he promised to call before he left the hospital.
He checked to make sure that Sara had been transferred to a room, and that his orders were being followed, and that the advanced directive was clearly notated in her chart. The afternoon was filled with more patients, and it was after six when he returned to Sara's room. "Where are the children?" he asked the woman sitting next to the hospital bed.
"They're at my mother's. They've said their good-byes; they don't need to be here for this," replied Barbara.
Wilson nodded. After all of this time, it really was the final good-bye. After years of beating the odds, this was one fight that Sara wouldn't win.
When he'd first met the couple, he'd been at PPTH for less than a week, and was still occasionally getting lost in the hallways. When Sara had found the lump in her right breast, she hadn't wanted to wait two weeks to see the head of oncology, so she'd checked out the credentials of the new guy and made an appointment for that afternoon. Barbara had been there for that appointment, even though she'd been 8 ½ months pregnant with their first child. Daniel had been born five days later.
Sara had fought cancer in the same way she handled everything else in her life – ferocious and aggressive, with a meticulous attention to detail. Lab results, symptoms and appointments were all managed with the day planner she was never without. When her body was cancer free, she had turned her organizational energy to fighting the disease in a different way, joining the board of the local chapter of the Komen foundation and helping PPTH raise money for cancer research. It was during that time that James had gotten to know Sara and Barbara.
She'd made it to the five year mark, but then they had found a lump in the other breast. This time, he had been giving the news to a friend. Again, surgery and harsh chemo had beat the disease into remission, but three months ago, scans had shown the cancer was in her bones and lungs, and was spreading fast.
He looked down at the woman in the bed. Out of habit, he checked the monitors, but he already knew she probably wouldn't last the night. "Do you mind if I stay?"
"No, please stay," Barbara replied, gesturing to the chair next to her. They sat, silently, watching as Sara struggled for breath. After an interminable time, the tenor of her breathing changed. With Barbara holding her hand, they stayed by her side until her breathing slowed, and then finally ceased altogether. Automatically, Wilson moved to turn off the monitors, and record the time of death. He was debating whether to leave Barbara alone when she pulled him into an embrace, and he was surprised to feel the wetness on his own cheeks. Typical Barbara, always there to offer comfort to someone else. When she released him, he watched as she wiped the tears from her face.
"Is there anything I can do to help?" he asked.
She shook her head. "No, Sara took care of everything. The only thing she couldn't plan was when." She seemed to be gathering her composure. "What time is it?"
"Nine-thirty."
"Is it that late? On Valentine's Day, no less. Surely there's someone who's waiting for you! I'm so sorry. I should have sent you home hours ago."
He had to smile. Barbara was always worrying about others, and never enough about herself. "It's OK. There's one advantage to dating another doctor. He actually understands when I have to stay late." He thought for a moment, and then grinned. "Fact is, he usually works weirder hours than I do." It was strange to be talking about something so mundane under the circumstances, but he'd seen it time and again in his line of work. He realized that Barbara was grinning at him, and he mentally reviewed what he had just said.
"'He?' Have you been holding out on us, Dr. Wilson?"
He remembered all of the events that he had attended with his ex-wife, where he had seen Sara and Barbara. "Julie and I split up almost a year ago. Since then, I started dating my best friend, who just happens to be a man." He hated the fact that he was blushing. "It isn't exactly common knowledge around here."
She nodded, understanding. "You should get home. Especially seeing how it's your first Valentine's Day together."
"You'll be all right?" he couldn't help asking.
"Go!" She shoed him out of the room. He went back to his office to collect his briefcase, and remembering his promise, called home.
By the time he was standing on his doorstep, he was completely exhausted. When he was inside, he dropped his briefcase by the door and slung his jacket across the back of the couch, too tired to hang it up properly. He sank onto the couch next to House, and the first thing he noticed was the two bottles sitting on the coffee table. The second thing he noticed was the smell of pizza. He grabbed the plates to serve up the slices, and he found that all of the pepperoni on the pizza had been arranged to form a giant heart. He glanced over at House, who was snorting in derision. He sank back into the cushions, and took a long pull at the beer. He looked closely at the bottle that House was drinking from, and realized that it was actually root beer, even thought the bottle looked similar to the one in Wilson's hand.
He sat back and ate his pizza, grateful for moments like this. With House, he didn't need to pretend that his day had been great. He didn't need to make small talk, or pretend that he wasn't exhausted. As he ate his pizza and drank his beer, he felt the stress and sadness of the day bleed away. When he was finished, he sank back into the pillows, staring sightlessly at the television.
While House went to get ready for bed, Wilson rounded up the empty bottles from the coffee table and took the pizza off to the kitchen. He'd eaten over half of the medium pizza, while House had only eaten a single slice. He pulled open the drawer with the Saran Wrap, but found there was something impeding his progress. He looked closer, and then pulled out the magazine that was jammed in the drawer. He turned it over, and found a blue bow stuck to the front – he recognized it from the Hanukah paper he had bought in December. Scrawled across the front in House's writing was "Happy Valentine's Day!". He looked closer, and then laughed. Only House would decide that a copy of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition would make an appropriate present.
When he put the leftover pizza in the refrigerator, he saw all of the ingredients for the dinner he had planned on making. So much for that idea. And then he realized that the massage oil and belly cream (guaranteed to reduce the appearance of stretch marks) were still in the drawer in his desk. Damn. There was still the third part of his original plan, but he was starting to lose his nerve.
When Wilson had finished brushing his teeth, House was already waiting in bed. Wilson climbed in, and then handed over the exquisitely wrapped box. Uncharacteristically, House carefully peeled off the paper, as if ripping it would cause the small box to explode. He opened the box and silently stared at the two platinum rings for so long that Wilson was beginning to think that this had been a really, really bad idea. House's face was expressionless when he reached under his pillow and pulled out a small, unwrapped box, which he handed over to Wilson, who opened it to reveal another pair of rings, also platinum, but slightly wider and flatter, with a beveled edge.
The silly grin on his face faded when he heard House's next words. "I don't want to marry you." He tried to not feel hurt, as he stared down at the wedding rings in his hand.
House's words were halting, as he tried to explain. "It seems like marriage only ends in one of two ways. Two people living together, but utterly indifferent to each other. Or there's divorce, where you spend months arguing over who gets the silver bookends."
Wilson was distracted by the last statement. His wives had never wanted the bookends, and then he realized where those presents must have come from. Neither of his last two wives had been particularly bookish, and it was House's way of giving something only to him. He realized that House was still speaking.
"And weddings are the worst of all. Wedding cake and flowers. The symbolic first dance." He shuddered. "Standing up in front of a bunch of people saying some stupid vow, just because it's 'tradition'."
"There's always writing your own vows," Wilson suggested.
"Yeah right. Like I want to say something that personal in front of others. What we have is just between us. It doesn't involve anyone else." He sighed and stared at the rings for a moment before he reached over and plucked a ring out of the box James was holding. "Will you be with me, love me, and not marry me for the rest of our lives?" he asked.
James nodded, and allowed Greg to slide the ring onto his left hand, where it fit perfectly. He grabbed the ring intended for Greg out of the box Greg was holding, and repeated the question. When House agreed, he placed the ring on his hand. They were now wearing mismatched wedding rings. James looked into the box held in his hand, containing the companion to the ring he was currently wearing, and saw that the ring was inscribed on the inside. He picked it up and squinted at the tiny writing: Property of James Wilson. He grinned, knowing that the ring he wore now identified him as the 'Property of Gregory House'. He picked up Greg's left hand, and slid the second ring onto his ring finger, so that he was now wearing two rings on the same finger. Neither band was very wide, and even though it was unusual for a man to have two rings like that, it looked good on Greg's long fingers. "I know that it may never be legal for us to be married, but I want you to know that this feels more real than any of my marriages. I just wish that I had figured out what I really wanted years ago."
Greg nodded, and then picked up the last ring. Following Wilson's lead, he looked at the inside of the ring, and saw the inscription: JW & GH written in gothic script. He placed the ring on James's finger, and then confided, "I've loved you since the day I met you." Then he grinned, "and I wish you'd have figured it out years ago as well." Unfortunately, he spoiled the effect by yawning, and Wilson insisted that it was time for them both to go to bed.
The next morning, Wilson was in his office working on the schedule for the month of April. It was frustrating, because he had no idea what days he might be taking off, so he was forced to make the schedule assuming that he would be there the entire time. As he worked at filling in the grid, he kept looking at the two platinum rings on his left ring finger. His fingers weren't as long as House's, but the double rings didn't look too ridiculous on his hand.
He was shuffling through a stack of papers when there was a tap at the door, and then Cameron entered, holding a steaming cup of coffee. He frowned in confusion. He occasionally stopped by the diagnostics conference room to pilfer a cup of coffee, especially when it was Cameron on coffee duty, but she had never brought a cup by before. Then he saw the look on her face, and realized that this cup of coffee would be served with a side portion of sympathy.
He sighed. Despite her age, sometimes Dr. Cameron seemed so damn young, which in turn made him feel very old and jaded. She set the mug down on his desk, trying not to look like she was lingering in his office. All at once, he figured out where the magazine and beer had come from. Finally he decided to speak. "I bet you think that beer and pizza is a crappy way to spend Valentines Day."
She slid into one of the chairs in front of his desk. "Isn't it?"
He didn't know why he felt like he needed to explain it to her, but for some reason he wanted her to understand his relationship with House. "For most of my life I have done what was expected of me. That included Valentine's Days with overpriced flowers, an expensive meal, and diamonds that felt more like blood money than a gift. And where did it get me? Three divorces and three ex-wives." He sighed. "Pretty pathetic. The saddest thing is that for the last few years, the one place I felt happiest was sitting on House's couch drinking beer and eating pizza or Chinese takeout directly from the containers."
He looked up, and saw that she was looking intently at him. "Sitting on that couch, I'm not expected to be the 'boy-wonder oncologist, or the kind, compassionate person everyone expects me to be. Hell, I don't even have to be particularly nice. I don't have to live up to anyone's expectations, because House has never expected me to be that other person. Does that make any sense?"
She nodded slowly. "So everything is really OK?"
"More than OK. One of the best Valentine's Days ever."
"What about the magazine?" she couldn't help but ask.
He laughed. "I don't know what exactly that meant. I guess it's House's round-about way of saying that it's OK to look but not touch." He reached over to take a drink of the coffee, and saw her staring at the rings on his left hand.
"Looks like there was something other than beer and pizza."
He smiled, but refused to offer any details. It wasn't until almost a week later when she again pulled House-sitting duty that she verified that her boss was wearing an identical set of rings. He didn't offer any explanation either.