A/N: I am indebted to several people for contributions to this chapter, because every piece of advice is one I've heard straight from the source either from a direct relative in one case or in some social gathering where somebody asked a couple of longevity, "What advice would you give people?" All of the couples I've known a minimum of 10 years myself, long enough to have seen them walk the walk and know they weren't just giving a nice-sounding but unapplied sound bite when they were put on the spot for one. The longest whose words are included had been together 73 years, and they were still happy. That wife is the one who said, "There is still nobody whose company I'd rather have even just driving down the road." I have added history bits a few times that match my story, but I never changed the advice itself.

Sorry it wasn't up earlier. The computer ate the chapter while my back was turned, and I had to start over. Hope you enjoy 55.

(H/C)

"This is my fourth marriage." Wilson looked down, unable to meet Thornton's eyes as he said it. "You made it 49 years. I wondered if you had any advice to share on how you did it."

"Basically, we just kept going," Thomas replied. His tone was easy, friendly, and Wilson looked back up. "I don't think there is one way to do it; people are too different. I've heard comments from other people, and while some of it I agreed with or learned from, some of it would have been a disaster for us."

"So what was the single most important thing for you two?" Wilson asked.

"Depends on which day it was. There were several major things, I think, and which one of them was in the lead varied." Wilson sighed. "Sorry," Thomas said, sounding sympathetic. "I'm not trying to be difficult. It's just a complicated subject. Let's see, some of the most important things. . ." He looked over at a picture of Emily.

"We were friends. I think that was crucial. We loved spending time together, talking, doing things. Even after 49 years, that never got old. After retirement, we'd take driving trips three or four times a year. We drove all over America, even up to Alaska once. Just the two of us." He paused there in reflection, some unpleasant memory crossing his face and then quickly set aside. Wilson was curious but held himself to the subject at hand. "There was still nobody whose company I'd rather have right up to the end. All those hours shut in a car with just the person in the next seat, and they never got long."

"Never?" Wilson couldn't help a trace of skepticism.

Thomas didn't take offense. "Sometimes the road got long. Some parts of America are definitely more interesting to drive through than others. But we were never tired of each other, not even briefly. We'd talk about the craziest things sometimes. I remember once we spent 50 miles or so seeing things in the clouds and describing them to each other. But we could talk about important things, too. We could talk about anything. Or we could be quiet together in other moods. That's a real test of a friendship. Drive 100 miles in silence and see if it's getting awkward or not." He sighed. "It never did. Not with her."

"Didn't you have fights sometimes?"

"Oh, yes." Thomas almost sounded like he missed them, Wilson noted. No more than he sounded like he missed the rest of her, but also no less. "Of course we had fights. I think if you could go that long with someone and never disagree on anything, it wouldn't be a real relationship. You might as well be married to a mirror. Emily could be a firecracker at times. She startled the hell out of a lot of people who thought they knew her. So quiet and such a good listener. She was the one people automatically wanted to turn to for advice or just come to for a little cheering up. And she'd compromise on little things to get along, so the first time they saw her run into something that wasn't a little thing to her, they couldn't believe it. When she did fight about something, it really mattered to her, and she could be a tiger."

Thomas took another look at the family pictures. "I wasn't the easiest person to live with, either. Intense was her word. And unlike her, I could get stubborn just for the hell of it once in a while."

"Stubborn just for the hell of it sounds familiar," Wilson noted. Thomas tightened up, a silent reminder. They would not be discussing House. Not that Wilson was about to go there; it had just been a comment. There was silence for a minute while they each took their last bites of lunch.

Thomas put down his carton and chopsticks on the coffee table – chopsticks in the carton, Wilson noted, instead of defiantly to the side resting on the table itself as House would have done – and picked up the thread of the conversation again. "About arguments, there was one thing that I think really helped us. This is one of those areas that would vary; my best friend back in St. Louis and his wife did it differently, and that worked for them. But with Emily and me, when we needed to have an argument, we had one. None of this silent treatment and avoidance and delay and saying nothing's really bothering me. Soon as we realized there was an issue, we laid it out on the table and went to work on it."

Thomas had wondered through the years a few times if part of that had been influenced by his work in the Marines, where deception and putting on an act were integral parts. He simply couldn't stand to be less than honest at home. Or maybe he was just like that anyway. Whatever the reason, he was fortunate that Emily had had the same preference.

"We actually had a rule. Well, exceptions for total exhaustion or being sick; no rule ought to be 100% inflexible. But neither one of us took advantage of the excuses. Normally, we couldn't go to sleep with something bothering us that was . . . unacknowledged." He chose the word carefully. "Not that everything could be solved in one night's talk, of course, but it had to be admitted to. Right there out in the open so that both of us knew what the other person was thinking and we could share it. Even a disagreement. We had to share the fact that we were having one, couldn't each be having our own part separately and sealing it off."

Wilson really squirmed there, remembering those long days of trying to hide it from Sandra after he had cheated. Even after accepting that he had to confess, he still had wished secretly that some way around it had been available where his failure could have remained hidden forever.

Not that it would have remained hidden for long, he reminded himself. The HSV2 would have reared its head sooner or later. He could never forget that, the physical reminder of his lapse. It was only an occasional inconvenience for the two of them, but it could have killed Daniel, and the chance of fetal infection would remain for all subsequent pregnancies. The odds would be statistically even less now since Sandra would already have the infection before she got pregnant, and the chance was very low. But it wasn't zero. They would have to face that every single time in having children. Far too high a price for a random encounter that he barely remembered.

He dodged before he even stopped to think about the words. "Wow, with that habit of getting it out there in the open built up for decades, it must be incredibly frustrating for you dealing with House. He could give a bank vault lessons."

"We aren't going to talk about Greg." Thomas' voice was a lot sharper there.

"I wasn't . . . I guess I was." Wilson almost sounded surprised himself. "I just. . . sorry." He was abruptly glad that this conversation wasn't being recorded for Jensen's ears later. Jensen would probably draw it out of him, but at least he wouldn't have to hear it.

Thomas leaned forward to pick up his drink off the coffee table and take the final few swallows. Yes, damn it, it was frustrating at times, but the colossal difference here was the background. Greg was perfectly justified in being slow and suspicious opening up to him. Even so, Thomas did push the limits now and then, very cautiously, as with sending the Christmas gifts to the girls. He wouldn't let progress stop, but slow was the speed they were going to be progressing at. How he missed talking to Emily. She alone in his world had known about Greg, who had been otherwise sealed off as a topic in that tight compartment labeled John's son, but she hadn't known how massively things had changed now and how wrong Thomas had been then.

Wilson was still sitting there looking uncomfortable, and Thomas wrenched the conversation back on track. "We were very well matched there. Both of us didn't want to waste any time and needed to get right down to things. Some people do need to think about things alone a while first. Tim, now, was a little like that. He was very outgoing, but he also needed some time to chew on it when something was bothering him." Thomas smiled. "We used to drive him nuts when he was a kid because we'd set a time limit. Chewing on things yourself just turns to sulking if you do it too long. Either that, or you get stuck just running mental circles and have trouble seeing a way to resolve it. So we'd say, 'All right, Tim, you can have three days until you have to start talking to us.' Understand, that's when he was growing up. We gave him a lot more leeway when he was an adult, of course. But he needed that time alone, even if just a little bit, first before he was ready to really dig into something together."

Jet arched against Thomas' ankle, and he reached down to scratch the kitten's ears. "You can hear that purr from here," Wilson commented. "His meow sounds like a toy running low on batteries, but he definitely has a purr."

"The meow will grow." Thomas stroked the kitten again before straightening up. Jet looked across at Wilson once more, feline curiosity starting to kick in. "We seem to be focusing on the arguments. Those were the minority. That probably is where we had to work hardest on listening to each other, though. Most of the time, we loved listening to each other, but when you're in a disagreement, it gets harder no matter how close you are. You have to work to continue doing it."

"I've definitely noticed that," Wilson agreed.

"Listening is one key, I think. Really hearing what the other person is saying even when you just want to say your piece. We heard a piece of advice once that was useful a few times in a major dispute." Thomas shook his head. "This one can drive you nuts, but when we were getting stuck, it did help."

"What was it?" Wilson had focused again after his lapse into the subject of Greg and was getting curious himself. Thomas, watching Jet start a slow, tentative approach across the floor, was struck by the similarities in this conversation between the oncologist and the kitten. Both were curious and interested in what was across the room but were also proceeding with caution, afraid that it might be too uncomfortable for them.

"In a serious argument, each of you have to be able to present the other person's point of view to their satisfaction. If you can't state that well enough, you haven't been listening correctly."

Wilson stared at him. "Wow."

Thomas nodded. "Wow. Like I said, it was maddening. But it helped. Along with listening, there's compromise. That can be a tough one, too. But if the relationship is a priority, you have to be willing to give a little to meet its needs. Both of you do." He looked back over at the family pictures. "One of the biggest disagreements we ever had was the one time I really got hurt in the Marines. She wanted me to quit."

"She was scared it would happen again," Wilson pointed out.

"Yes. I don't think I'd truly appreciated until that argument how hard it had been on her all along. Of course, I didn't like leaving the family when I had to, and I missed them. But with the work, I had the mental challenge, the puzzle, the adrenaline. Yes, there were high stakes, but I truly enjoyed it. All she had was missing me and the worry. She couldn't get frequent updates, and that just left her to fill it in. Usually with something worse. She was even shut off from the other military wives. They formed a community of themselves; so many men were over in Vietnam. But that wasn't what I was doing, and she couldn't share what I really was doing, since it was classified. So she didn't even have that support group as much as the others did."

"So how did you work it out?" Wilson asked. "Did you quit?" Jet was about halfway across the living room floor now. Watching the kitten trying to be stealthy while strapped into that splint was amusing, but Wilson was careful not to react and spook him.

"We compromised," Thomas said. "It took a while to work it out, but we got there. One thing we did have was time; I was on convalescent leave for several months. That gave us a chance to really have some long talks and, like I said, listen to each other. She realized that what she'd wanted as her first reaction wasn't possible. You can't just give two-week notice to the Marines; it doesn't work like that. And I realized how much the strain had been on her through the years. I was so close by then to hitting my twenty and earning military retirement. I promised her that I would retire then, and I had been thinking of going on with it before that point. I'd thought things would settle down after the war and it would be a more stable job in terms of location and risk, but after that fight, I agreed to quit anyway, regardless of political or career outlook. I promised to get a job that wouldn't make us have to be separated regularly like that, and I promised her that we'd settle down and she'd never have to move again." He sighed, and his eyes again went to the pictures on the wall, to the mountain painting. "I kept that one."

That one? Wilson thought. He forced himself not to ask. He was also wondering how exactly Thomas had gotten hurt, but that really wasn't relevant, either. He was trying to keep a grip on himself, especially after his outburst about House. Of course Thomas would want things to progress faster with his son, but having it pointed out only rubbed salt in the wound. "I really do appreciate this," he said again.

"I hope it's useful to you. Sandra is a beautiful woman." Wilson could tell that he didn't just mean physically. Actually, physically, she was not a classic beauty. "So with the arguments, I think the most important things were listening to each other and being willing to give some. Nothing we ever disagreed about was more important than we were. But there were so many good times. Many more good times."

Jet had reached Wilson and was sniffing over his shoes. "You don't have a pet," Thomas commented, watching the kitten's reaction.

Wilson was reminded again that this was House's father. "No. We've discussed getting a dog. Not sure if we want to let Daniel get older first, but we're starting to talk about other kids, too. It might be a while before we had all of them several years old."

"It's good for kids to grow up with animals," Thomas said. "Teaches them compassion and responsibility."

Jet moved around to survey Wilson's other shoe. Just then, a car drove by, and as the kitten came to attention to make sure it wasn't stopping to open doors, his splint, not quite pausing in mid stride as quickly as the rest of him, threw off his motion, and he fell over. Wilson bent over automatically to pick him up and put him back on his feet, and Jet gave a startled squawk and struggled. Wilson let go quickly, and the kitten limped away, retreating to Thomas' ankles before turning to make sure he wasn't being pursued. "I was only trying to help," Wilson protested, surprised at the reaction.

"He can get up on his own," Thomas said. "He has to, in fact. He is here alone sometimes." He reached down - slowly, Wilson noted - and scratched Jet's ears. "It's okay, Jet. He wasn't going to hurt you." Jet leaned against him, those large yellow eyes fastened on Wilson. He didn't run, but he clearly was ready for any movement.

"Any advice on just dealing with life?" Wilson asked. "Just when things were going to hell? Not as an argument but something both of you had to deal with." He was thinking of that chance of HSV2. Statistically, it was only a couple of percent. Their odds were very good that it would never come up, but it might. Even facing it fully together this time, which he was determined that they would, he dreaded having to deal with it if it did strike.

Thomas nodded. "Life is a bitch sometimes. I've definitely learned that. We did have several things come up together where all we could do was survive it, not change it. We wanted more children, and Emily had complications with Tim, so that was impossible. We wanted grandchildren, and that door got closed, too."

His mind raced back across the years. The lack of grandchildren had been a very tough pill to swallow. Tim and his wife had had problems there, but they had been starting the process of adoption. Applications had been filled out, a home inspection done, and their number was high on the list. The call was expected any day. When Thomas had taken early retirement after twenty years in St. Louis, still well short of 65, and Emily had quit her job, too, the plan was for them to spend their golden years enjoying family full time and spending many hours with their new grandchildren, as well as just with each other. They had reminded each other at night in bed that they would have to give the new parents privacy, couldn't push too hard, but the excitement had been stronger than waiting for any Christmas back when they had been kids.

And then the car crash, mere weeks after Thomas retired, Tim and his wife taken in one blow. Not only no grandchildren after all, but now no son or daughter-in-law.

"You do have grandchildren now," Wilson reminded him. Thomas seemed lost in some memory at the moment and not a pleasant one.

He gratefully seized the reminder. "Yes. I plan to enjoy every minute of it, however much is left." He sighed. "I just wish she could have known them. And Greg."

Wilson abruptly felt that this conversation had about hit its limit, or rather that Thomas had. He checked his watch and was startled how late it truly was. They'd been talking for a while. "I need to get on the road. I have another appointment."

"One last thing," Thomas said. Wilson waited for another piece of advice from Thornton's marriage, but instead, the spotlight was turned the other way. "You said this was your fourth marriage. Not to pry, but that's too many to be coincidence. There is some habitual mistake there. If you really want this time to be different, I hope you're getting help with that."

Wilson flinched, but he couldn't really complain about that getting personal, not after what he had just put Thomas through. "I am," he admitted.

Thomas didn't push on. Instead, he bent over to pick up Jet and then stood. "Could you do me a favor?"

"Of course. You've been doing me a huge one."

"Come over here slowly, and let's see if you can pet him. He's making progress just in the three days I've had him, but I don't want him to decide that all visitors are frightening."

Wilson approached with his best bedside manner. Jet watched him and shrank back a little against Thomas, but the arms around him were secure, comforting as well as restraining. "It's all right, Jet," Wilson said. "I didn't mean to startle you earlier. I just thought you needed help." He reached out slowly. Jet hissed, and Wilson paused.

"Go on," Thomas said.

Wilson's hand finished the journey, scratching the kitten's ears as he'd seen Thomas doing. Jet relaxed after a minute and started to purr. It wasn't as loud this time, but it was there. "See, Jet? I'm one of the good guys. Totally harmless."

The kitten settled down, still in Thomas' arms, and Wilson met the other man's eyes. "Thank you again for this," he said. "You've given me a lot to think about."

"I hope it helps." They shook hands, and Wilson gave Jet a final stroke and then left.

Once he was gone, Thomas put the kitten down. He thought of clearing away the food cartons, but first he walked over to the wall and took a slow tour of the pictures. At any age, she had been beautiful. "I miss you, love," he said softly.

Jet bumped against his ankle and trilled, and Thomas realized he'd been standing still for a minute lost in thought and memory. Coming back to the present, he pulled the pouch of cat treats out of his pocket. "How about a snack?" he asked.

Jet sat up straight, ears alert, eyes riveted. "Mow!"