Chapter 77 — Reality Check

A/N: Thank you to Lauren, Bee, ReaderOfWorlds, Robin, saashi samy, SaphiraRyuuka, Yuuki no Yuki, Musikrulesok, HeatherSS1, DawnneAndSkipper, GahMarques, and Lordban for their reviews on the last chapter!

"Anya. Hey. Wake up."

My eyelids fluttered open. We were on the couch in the townhouse. I was splayed over Zach in the most haphazard way possible. We'd fallen asleep watching...fuck, I couldn't even remember. A wrestling rerun, maybe? I remembered chest-pounding and bravado for the brief seconds of consciousness I had before passing out cold on Zach. I flung my hand around, and it landed over his face.

"Mmph," I grunted.

"Your phone keeps going off—you've got like twenty texts from House. Missed calls, too."

That brought my brain screaming back to alertness. I scrambled for my phone. What could have happened that House would deign it necessary to text-bomb me? I was calling him without thinking. It was on the third ring that I realized I probably should have checked those texts before calling, because suddenly, with perfect certainty, I knew what was going on.

"You TRAITOR," he spat the second he picked up the phone. "My own fake flesh and fake blood, and you betray me like this? I hope your silver sickles are worth it!"

"Oh my God, House. Can we please not do the melodrama with this? I need money. It's work. If you hadn't performed the incredible feat of alienating every human being you've ever come into contact with, I wouldn't have been in the position where I'd be taking the job at all."

"I will pay you NOT to work for her, how about that?" House countered. "There, problem solved."

"This job is gonna look like, incredible on a resume. And moving forward, I can even get recommendation letters from Cuddy that aren't forged by you. Imagine that!"

"Are you—" I could practically hear him throwing up his hands. "Are you being intentionally dense about this? Eight years, and you didn't pick up what a scheming harpy Cuddy is? You're a mole!"

"What exactly is Cuddy going to get out of me?" I asked, rising from the couch, fearing our conversation could turn a little too private for Zach's ears. I was already praying he hadn't heard the 'fake flesh and blood' or 'eight years' comments. I dipped into the kitchen and made an effort to lower my voice. "I don't know if you've picked this up, but I've spent the past year and some change lying about basically everything to everyone besides you and Wilson. I won't rat on you." A pause. "Actually, frankly, I'm a little offended that you think I would."

"Oh, it won't be at first. She'll butter you up. Wow you with the sensible heels and girl power. She's going to turn you. That's when she'll strike!"

I couldn't help but laugh. "You are being...just, so extra about this. Worrying about where my loyalties lie? Seriously? I haven't even filled out my hiring paperwork yet. Can we save this meltdown for later?"

"Patronize me all you want," House said darkly. "This means war."

Oh no. "And what exactly does that mean?" It took me a few moments to realize I was speaking to dead-air. He'd hung up on me. I let out a strangled scream of frustration and snapped my phone shut. This was exactly what I was hoping to avoid.

Zach appeared around the corner. "What's House's problem?"

"Remember that secretary thing I told you about? The dean of medicine wanting me to be her desk jockey?"

"Yeah."

"That," I said, shoving my phone back in my pocket with perhaps unneccessary force. "He's gonna make this a nightmare for all involved parties."

"How is he gonna do that?"

Remembering the legendary carpet incident, I just shuddered. "I know House frighteningly well. But, I can only guess. And none of my guesses are fun."

Zach watched me for a moment, a crease in his brow. His thinking face. "You two got a real weird thing going on, you know that?"

"House and I? No shit." Was he just now noticing?

"No, but like...really weird. I'll never get how you figured him out so quickly."

I swallowed with difficulty. "I mean, we've spent a lot of time around each other."

"You're not getting what I'm saying."

"What are you saying, then?"

The front door opened, interrupting our...possibly dangerous conversation? Zach could play at the dumb stoner all he wanted, but I knew the kid was damn smart and just about as perceptive as I was. Okay, I actually wasn't that perceptive with anyone outside House's crew, but that was beside the point. Zach was perfectly capable of figuring out that something was...not quite right with our little family unit. House and I could play at father and daughter all we wanted, but whatever dynamic we had going on, it wasn't that. I couldn't put a name to it, because we existed without precedent.

I just hoped he didn't start asking questions I couldn't answer. Because he wouldn't believe the answers I had. Ever.

"Anya?"

Wilson. Made sense. House was still occupied with getting a semi-functioning heart for his patient. And making over-the-top threats of war to me. I peeked out of the kitchen. "Heya."

Wilson looked harried. Moreso than usual. He stripped off his coat with a deep sigh. "Have you talked to House?"

Oh great. I was getting it on both ends, wasn't I? "Unfortunately. I want to be...very not here when he gets home."

Wilson turned to me, hands on his hips. "You've unleashed Hell, you do realize that?"

"Oh God. Not you too."

"You know this can only end badly."

I threw up my hands. "What do you want me to do, Wilson? I need a job. A good job. And one at the hospital. Cuddy's completely rearranged my clinical schedule for me. How else am I gonna get that?" I wanted to tell him that getting close to Cuddy was important to me as well, for both selfish and not-so-selfish reasons—hard to watch out for someone if you barely know them, one, and two, I wanted to be in her good books. I had a little bit of a brown noser side. It's been said. Mostly by House. Dozens of times. And, as usually, he was right.

"I'm not going to tell you what to do. I'm just telling you that when you're sitting in the smoldering ruins of the hospital a week from now, remember that I warned you," he told me with a grimace. "He's been on a roll all day. He already called Facility Engineering to have the locks on Cuddy's office changed. Have you ever heard his Cuddy imitation? It's terrifyingly good."

I carded my fingers through my hair, shaking my head. "I'll handle it."

Zach popped up beside me. "And...how exactly are you gonna handle it?"

I closed my eyes, throwing up a slew of desperate prayers and hoping God had His ears on. "I have no fucking idea."

As previously stated, I did fully intend to be nowhere near the townhouse when House got home. So, shortly before midnight, Zach and I were piling into Lola, intending to head to his apartment and crash there for the night. However, that plan went out the window when a roaring orange blur ripped past, then promptly whipped around and came to a screeching halt directly in front of the Corvette.

I groaned. "House, come on!"

"Get on the bike, Benedict Arnold!" he ordered. "You can start repaying me for your betrayal by helping me get a heart."

"House—"

"Just go with him," Zach said wearily. "You know he's not gonna let up."

I looked at Zach, wanting to argue, but I knew he was right. I pressed Lola's keys into his hands. "Take her home. Be gentle with her, okay?"

"I'm gentle with you, aren't I?" he asked with a sly little smile.

"Oh, he's got jokes." I bounced my eyebrows and gave him a quick peck. "If I don't turn up for my car, assume House finally killed me."

"Gotcha."

I hopped out of Lola and went to House, still idling impatiently. "What could you possibly need me for?"

"You make me look more sympathetic," he said shortly. "Get on."

I stared at the bike with open dread. "I'm never going to get used to this godforsaken thing."

"A traitor AND a crybaby!" He jerked his head behind him. "Get on."

I acquiesced with a grumble, accepting House's helmet when he offered it to me. I wrapped my arms around his middle and pinched my eyes shut. "Let's get this over with. I'm going to my happy place. Nudge me when it's over."

"If you say your happy place is church, I'm going a hundred the entire way."

"Well, when your fictional happy place becomes your very real everyday life, you gotta make adjustments," I replied. "Just drive."

"Where are we in the episode?" I asked, rubbing a hand over my face as we trudged through the front doors of the hospital. House had driven like a maniac, as per usual, and I was still trying to tame my heart rate back down to something approaching normal.

"Need me a big fat sloppy heart," House said. We passed by Cuddy's office. Maintenance men were working on her outer door. Great. Wonder if they were under House's orders, or undoing what House had ordered them to do. Probably the latter. Cuddy was pretty quick on the uptake. "Husband of wife with big fat sloppy heart is obsessed with giving her a dignified death. Unfortunately, that gives my patient a very undignified death in about four days. So, we need to convince him to let me go all Harvester of Sorrow on his nearly departed."

"And I'm here to...make you look like less of a dick?"

"Precisely. Where's your enthusiasm? A year ago you would've been bouncing off the walls if I dragged you along for something like this."

"Are you worried your charm's wearing off?" I asked dryly. "I'm just as happy to follow you around as I've ever been. Just not at 1am, when I have to go to work in the morning, knowing that there's probably C4 strapped to the bottom of my desk chair."

"I'm going to be far more creative than that."

"...Great. That's great."

We rode the elevator to the second floor ICU, and House bee-lined for...I'd forgotten the woman's name. And the husband's name. Whatever. Greg Grunberg played him.

Those are House thoughts. This is real. These are real people. A real woman who's lost her life and a real husband who's grieving.

I hadn't had much interaction with House's patients lately. I feared I was starting to forget that they were just as real as anyone else, and I couldn't let myself do that. I was here for them, too. Hell, maybe if I'd bothered to remember their names, I could have stopped the car crash that killed the wife in the first place. I could have saved a life.

I stopped in my tracks, suddenly feeling sick to my stomach. House halted when he realized I wasn't following him. "What's your problem?"

House certainly wouldn't be a shoulder to cry on about my sudden realization that I'd inadvertently let my brain slip back into thinking that this was all a TV show, and one-off characters were just that: one-off characters. Once again getting so caught up in my own life that I'd unintentionally thrown blinders on. And when normal people did that, it was human nature. When I did it, people died.

Maybe it weighed so heavy on me because it'd been almost a year to the day since I'd been leaning over what I thought was Joey Arnello's corpse and begging for forgiveness. I didn't know. All I knew was that I felt slimy inside, and I didn't like that. The more I got caught up in my own personal bullshit, the more I'd forget. The more I'd fuck up. The more people would suffer. Now, granted, if I'd somehow managed to save uh...Greg Grunberg's wife...House's patient would die.

Or I could have given House the diagnosis for his original patient right off the bat, and saved them both.

But I didn't.

I went behind the nurse's station, further puzzling House. "Do you guys have a notebook I could borrow?" I asked the charge. "I'll bring it back tomorrow." That was a lie. But I'd at least buy another one and drop it off at some point.

The charge looked confused, but a glance at House erased any possibility that she was going to say no to me. "Uh. Sure." She rifled through a nearby drawer, extricating a small black spiral notebook. "I think we've only used the first few pages for notes." She quickly flipped it open. She tore out the used pages. "Patient information. I'm not always by a computer when Admissions calls," she explained. The torn-out pages went in the shredder, the notebook went in my hand. I thanked the nurse and returned to House.

"What the hell is going on with you?" House demanded immediately.

"Don't worry about it."

Then I turned to leave.

"Hey! What happened to—"

I whipped around. "Pull whatever scheme you normally would if I wasn't around. Worked the first time. You'll get your heart. She's got an STD, by the way. Can't remember which one."

House just stood there with his mouth open. "What!?"

"There's something I need to do. And I...I need to get started." I went to go, but stopped one more time. "House, what are their names? The wife and the husband?"

House looked at me like I was an idiot. Shocking. "I don't know. Last name's Neuberger."

I snatched the chart House had out of his hands. "Laura Neuberger. Donald Neuberger," I read. I repeated their names under my breath two more times.

Real humans. Not actors.

I handed the chart back to House. "Good luck. Wear a cup."

I disappeared, notebook tucked under my arm. The charge hit the button for the ICU doors to open for me. Just as they closed again, I heard another "What!?" from House.

Clueless

Safe

All In

Sleeping Dogs Lie

House vs. God

Euphoria: Part 1

Euphoria: Part 2

Who's Your Daddy?

No Reason

"No, that's not right, I know there's twenty-four episodes...there's one between WYD and No Reason..." I racked my brain. "Forever. It's Forever." I tapped my pen furiously on the surface of House's desk. "Come on, come on...Forever. What was Forever about?" The episode was completely dwarfed by the ones that surrounded it, clearly, given the amount of hard-hitters at the end of season two.

I'd started by writing down all of the episodes thus far—what happened originally (that I could remember) and then what happened in this timeline, what changes were made, etc. So that led me here, trying to scrape every bit of information out of my brain that I could about the rest of season two.

And I couldn't even remember an entire episode. Surely my memory would get jogged when it started actively happening, but what if I needed to act before that?

I put Forever to the back of my mind and tried to chart out Clueless, as it was next up. Okay. That was the 'wife poisons her husband with gold flakes' episode. Definitely remembered that. Wilson moved in with House—that obviously had already happened. Not a lot to avoid. The husband got saved, wife went to jail. All's well that ends well.

Safe. The one girl from Buffy, immuno-compromised with the overprotective mom and tick-bearing boyfriend. I jotted her name down— Melinda. At least I remembered her. Episode had a happy ending, all things considered. There was more House and Wilson living together drama. Once again, didn't need to worry about that.

All In. Great episode. Poker fundraiser gala thing. Erdheim-Chester. I didn't remember the patient's name, the little boy, but I knew House's obsession with Ester was the influencing factor in him snaking the case from Cuddy. And he was right, of course. The kid did have Erdheim-Chester. I needed to get him diagnosed fast, save him as much suffering as possible. I could do that.

Sleeping Dogs Lie. Lesbian couple, trouble in paradise, no sleeping, organ donation as entrapment. Foreman steals Cameron's article about Andie. Foreman and Cameron seemed to be on much better terms in our timeline, so that probably wouldn't happen. Wasn't sure how to tackle that one. I'd play it by ear. But if I could halt things before the patient needed a transplant, that would be ideal.

House vs God. I practically wrote a transcript of the episode down. I remembered it vividly, and probably always would. One of my favorites of the entire series.

Euphoria 1 & 2. I took my time writing out everything I could remember, but was massively dismayed to find that I couldn't remember the cop's exact diagnosis, but I knew that the team figured it out the second time they went back to the apartment. And if I made sure Foreman went in full Hazmat the first time around, he would never be exposed, and it would only be the shitty cop's life on the line. Obviously I'd go out of my way to make sure he didn't die this time around, but, I was infinitely more concerned about Foreman. The more of Euphoria I could negate, the better. Especially given that Foreman walked away with at least a tiny bit of brain damage.

And then I was back to Forever.

"What the fuck happens in Forever?" I thunked my head on the desk. It was the post Euphoria episode. It dealt with Foreman's recovery, how his view on life changed. Just, yeah. Very Foreman-centric. Couldn't remember a single thing about the patient though. Damn it.

I left that page blank and moved on to Who's Your Daddy and No Reason, documenting WYD in vague detail because I didn't recall that much, and then recounting No Reason with a great degree of accuracy. Until I realized halfway through that I was wasting my time, because I'd been writing down House's coma fantasy. Maybe I should have gone with a pencil instead of a pen.

I laid my head down on the desk. A quick check of the clock confirmed it was pushing 3am. And I still had six more seasons to jot down. But it was good I was doing this now. I needed to, before too much of the show faded from my mind for me to be of any use to anyone.

I jerked out of my half-asleep state when House pushed into his office, looking exhausted but dimly satisfied. "My patient goes in for surgery in four hours. Free heart, little bit of gonorrhea," he said without preamble. He limped, much more pronounced than usual, to his Eames chair. He seemed to be taking great care when he sat down.

I smirked. "I told you to wear a cup."

That earned me a withering glare as House extricated his vicodin from the pocket of his sports coat. "Cute."

"Can you really blame the guy? You earned that nut-shot."

"Maybe if my supposed guardian angel had clung to my coattails as requested—"

"Your guardian angel has been busy trying to actually do some guarding," I cut across him. "We're on the last third of season two. Things heat up. I need to be ready sooner rather than later."

"Somebody die in the season finale? Or do they save that for the later seasons, little more emotional impact?" House asked.

"Nobody dies," I said shortly. Yet. "And maybe if I avert all the things I need to, I'll tell you what would've happened. But for now, don't worry about it." A thought hit me, and I leaned back in House's office chair. "House...have you treated anyone with the last name Moriarty lately? Clinic patient? Or even had a file come across your desk? Request for consult, anything?"

House made a face that suggested he wouldn't have remembered even if he did. "I don't even keep track of the names of the patients I do treat."

I rubbed my eyes, letting out a long exhale. "Yeah. Didn't think so."

"Wait. Moriarty." House suddenly seemed infinitely more interested in what I was talking about. "You said I'm supposed to be some love letter to Sherlock Holmes."

"House and Wilson, Holmes and Watson. You live at 221B Baker Street. Your first televised patient's name was Adler. Yeah, you're a love letter to Sherlock Holmes. I'm sure Arthur Conan Doyle is rolling over in his grave."

"And Moriarty is Holmes's nemesis."

"Kind of an exaggeration. All the modern adaptations make a way bigger deal out of the Holmes/Moriarty stuff. But, yeah. Kinda." Uh oh. House was catching on. Not the worst thing, I guess. I needed to avoid him getting shot somehow. Straight up warning him wasn't a terrible idea. I'd prefer if I didn't have to, but, I didn't have a lot of ideas. Maybe just warn hospital security? Warn the police that a threat had been made, even though it hadn't?

I needed to figure it out soon. Yes, House got a few months pain-free post-ketamine after getting shot, but I couldn't take the risk that this time, a bullet might be lethal. I wasn't going to risk House's life so he could have an able-bodied summer.

"Do I get a nemesis?" House asked, and he sounded excited. Because of course he did.

I shut the notebook and tucked it into my bra, one of the few places I knew House couldn't pickpocket it from me. "No, that's next season." God, I didn't even want to start thinking about the Tritter arc yet. "Also, if you want a nemesis, Vogler's office is one floor down."

"I want a better nemesis."

I rose with a groan. "Can we just go home? I can barely keep my eyes open."

"We can go home when you tell me what happened earlier. The stopping and staring off into the distance and then suddenly leaving gimmick is mine. Got the copyright and everything. And you just tucked that notebook in your bra, which means you don't want me to see it—"

"Steal it," I corrected.

"Whatever. Point is, spill."

"I...I guess I just had a realization. It's hard to explain. I got caught up in my life—our lives. And I needed to remind myself that I'm not just here for you and the others. I'm here for your patients, too. They're real, flesh and blood people, not actors fake-seizing for the camera. I can't let myself forget that again."

House got to his feet, eyes rolling all the way. "Are you seriously blaming yourself for our car-crashed heart downstairs? What were you supposed to do, hunt her down, tell her not to drive ever again?"

"I don't know, House!" I snapped, exhausted. "But I can't just keep letting your cases fly by and barely acknowledging them. I can help people. God sent me here to—"

"Do you have any idea how sick I am of hearing the God line?" he interrupted, reflecting some of my temper back at me. "God didn't send you here. A freak, quantum accident sent you here. If there is a God, He doesn't give a shit about me, and if He hypothetically did give a shit about me, or anyone for that matter, he would not send a teenage girl to come save the day. He could save these people Himself. He could've saved that woman. What omniscient, all-powerful deity is going to reach down and pick you out of the ether, send you here, and make you responsible for, what? Every person you come in contact with?" With a mirthless laugh, he added, "I mean, come on. Do you honestly believe that?"

I wasn't even sure how to begin to tackle that tirade. "You've been holding that back for awhile, huh?"

"I keep waiting for you to wake up and realize on your own that the only mission you're on here is the one you made up. Life has no meaning, so we ascribe our own to it. Optimistic nihilism, sure, fine. But that's all this is. You're doing this to yourself. There is no divine retribution waiting for you if you pull back and worry about your own life. It's what everyone else on the planet is doing, and has been doing since we stopped picking berries and started sharpening rocks."

"Do you know how many papers anthropologists have published that show overwhelming evidence that mankind has been taking care of the sick and the old since basically the dawn of time?" I shot back. "And, more than that—do you expect me to believe that you believe this is all just a cosmic coincidence? That me, me," I emphasized again, voice almost breaking, "the possible biggest obsessive in any universe, when it comes to this one very specific thing, happened to get yanked out of my own world, dropped into yours...by accident?"

"The probability isn't zero."

"The probability isn't zero," I repeated. "And the probability of God sending me here with a purpose in mind is zero?"

"The probability of God is zero," House retorted. "At least the probability of a benevolent God."

We stood there, unstoppable force versus immovable object. Or at least I'd like to consider myself as such.

"You will never convince me that this wasn't intentional. That I'm not meant to be here. That God doesn't have a plan for me, for you, for all of us. And you will never talk me out of doing everything I can to help everyone I can."

House just watched me, expression inscrutable. "Then you'll always be miserable."

Maybe he was right. But in that moment, I couldn't bring myself to think that mattered one bit. I took a few steps forward, daring to enter his personal space, something I rarely risked. I tilted my head to look up at him, and he stared right back.

"Then I guess we'll be miserable together," I said quietly.