Her department is as busy as ever. Nurses deliver samples and check vitals, returning to the desk with good news and bad at differing intervals. Just moments from the elevator when its door starts to close, she reaches out and rushes to catch it. It has a half-full load of people in white coats. None of them hold the door for her.
"Please, wait!" she pleads but the lift gate shuts before she can get close enough, leaving her with no choice. Either wait for the next one or take the stairs and she doesn't like waiting.
She also isn't against getting some exercise, so she goes for the climb. Arriving on the third floor, she exited to the main corridor with grace.
Shoes stomp through the sleek hallway, heedless of the swishing lab coats and flapping hospital gowns. A wheeled gurney narrowly misses the ginger-haired woman's close-toed pumps. She steps back, wide eyes darting up to the corridor ahead of her. Her white coat swings, showing off the plum color of her pencil skirt. Taking in the crowded view, her gaze snaps back down, trained to follow the line between the panels of linoleum that lined the entire hospital.
Dr. Darling Melina Sweety took the too-good-to-be-true job at Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital as soon as it landed on her desk and worked her ass way up the proverbial ladder. The opportunity to heal the wounded was one thing. The opportunity to teach and heal at the same time? She'd found it perfect, especially with the significant pay increase it came coupled with.
Her dedication and sharpness got her to the front of the pack with her peers intellectually. With patients, however, she could be a bit hit-or-miss. Autism made her already awkward demeanor worse, setting off patients at the least opportune times. Prosopagnosia had her misreading patient emotions and failing to spot things in the face that her coworkers could catch easily. She takes long-acting injectable antipsychotics for her delusions.
Delusional disorder magnifies everything else, making it hard to know what's real and what isn't when she's off her medication. She takes a long acting injectable so she can't forget her dose. She'd had these afflictions since she was young. She found work-arounds but nothing's perfect.
She was still able to involve herself in the teaching side of the hospital, often part of the demonstrations in the OR and present for most Urology seminars either as a listener or as a lecturer. What it really meant for her was she was mostly kept away from the patients, except for those that were specifically referred to or asked for her. Instead, she researched and taught and analyzed and experimented. She found many gainful opportunities around the hospital, but she never felt like it was enough.
Still, even she has to admit that the over six years since she transferred have been well-spent. Even when she has trouble connecting with her patients, her heart swells every time she helped heal one of them. It was part of the job. She never got the thank you letters or the gifted trinkets or the praise.
She just made people better.
Others seemed to think autistic people couldn't feel those emotions, simply because they had trouble interpreting or showing those things, but that just wasn't true.
She could feel, and she could understand empathy. Just because she was a bit of an oddball and didn't have the easiest time understanding social cues, she was considered different from everyone else. She never understood that reasoning, that's part of the reason she wasn't a psychologist.
She chose Urology because, though her classmates found it gross and labelled it taboo, she wasn't squeamish about such things. They didn't mind her once they knew she was no threat to their glorious specialties. It also helped that she no longer needed to focus on people's faces in her specialty.
As a Urologist, she spent most of her time dealing with the groin area. It was a perfect excuse not to meet anyone's eyes. It's not like she doesn't find other excuses all the time, but it's important to have one ready when she's questioned about it. It was an important skill for making it through medical school. She learned to show people what they expected. A shy smile here, a reciprocal laugh there and nobody seemed the wiser. They'd assume she was shy, quiet, weird, or any combination of those things before they guessed her real problem. That and it wouldn't be HIPAA compliant.
Her eyes continue trailing the false tiles, her coat fluttering behind her. She pulls a pad from her pocket, noting the time she started her movement from her office to the exam room.
11:13 am: Left my office, walked to Urology exam room 6 floor 3. Arrival 11:17 am.
Flipping the cover back over, she stuffs the pen into her breast pocket and the memo pad into another. She arrives at the room she was called to, supposedly some kind of emergency for a friend of Dr. Wilson.
James Wilson was one of the best Oncologists they had, and he always treated her like she was mostly normal. She liked that, when people didn't make a big deal about her differences.
She'd sent him several patients over the years and they all had raving reviews of him. Kind, friendly, caring, attentive. Of course she'd take his referral, given it was the first he sent her way. When her pager had gone off with Wilson's number, she hadn't hesitated at all in tossing her coat over her shoulders and fast walking over.
Hazel orbs focus steadily on the handle of exam room 6 as she turns it, opening the door. Her other hand snatches the file from the wall-mounted basket. Her eyes dart up at the patient, already resting his buttocks on the exam table. How long had he been waiting, she wondered, hoping it wasn't too long.
"Good morning, Gregory," she greets, reading his name from the file. The first thing other doctors do is greet their patients, so that's what she does. "You feeling okay?"
Gregory House. 6'2, 170lbs, 45. Male.
She skims over the block of text explaining his past vaccinations and checkups, searching for anything that stands out. The biggest revelation she finds in his history is his heavy Vicodin usage. There are many side effects to the pain medication, not the worst of which included lowering the overall amount of urine or causing it to come out cloudy or bloody. She reads further down the chart to the reason he showed up today.
"Oh, I'm in perfect health, that's why I'm here, seeing a doctor. Just wanted to hang out with someone smart for once, that's all."
It isn't the answer she was expecting, and it was spit with that odd variance that told her he was being facetious.
That was another thing people assumed about autistic people, that everyone on the spectrum can't understand sarcasm. Just like everyone else, different people on the spectrum have different flaws, and they don't all share the same ones. Darling has the most problems with faces, always had even before the prosopagnasia.
"It says here you haven't been urinating recently." She looked at his body, finding a pattern on the shirt he wore to stare at. It's covered by a crumpled blue button-up. His blazer hangs on the back of the door, a cane with a polished wooden handle leaning against the exam bench. "How long has that been going on?"
His shoulders seem to slope down, making her think he could use some posture correction. However, since he seems to walk with a cane, that may be the cause also. She should, however, focus on why he came in today and on her specialty: Urology. The shoulders do another thing for her, though. She has to find other ways to remember people since she can't use faces. The voice was a good trick, but meeting as many people as she did that all dressed in white coats meant getting creative. The man's slouchy, dark jeans and graphic tee would change, so instead she used his arms, slightly hairy, lengthy cords of muscle but not too much. Gorgeous elbows with perfectly taught skin covering them. Flat stomach, but not scrawny. Masculine hands just wrinkled enough to show experience.
His face is scruffy with harsh angles. His blue eyes strike her as quite handsome. Short, unruly brown hair, like bedhead but sexy. His nose is straight and defined. She commits to memory that she finds him attractive, knowing she'd soon forget everything she observed about his face. As soon as she looks back down, the image of him is gone. All she knows is his body from his toes wrapped up in New Balances up to his neck, scraggly dark brown stubble growing just under his chin. That chin dips down when he looks down to check his watch.
"Twenty-four hours. I'd like to get back to the regularly scheduled programming, so I came to the urine expert."
"That was a good idea on your part." She quickly notes on his chart the amount of time since his last urination, keeping her gaze on his shaking foot while she speaks. "I'm guessing you can't provide a sample for me, then."
"Pipe's not running right now, Sweety. Sorry if you were feeling thirsty."
"I'd really prefer you call me Dr. Melina. Been sweating a lot?" It always felt too intimate for people she barely knew to be calling her sweetie, regardless of the spelling. Darling, too, so she went by her middle name.
"I know what you're thinking: It's gotta be the Vicodin, right?" Greg slips off the table onto his left foot, totally ignoring her question. The right one comes down delicately, limping over to the cane, leaning on it as he paces over to the sink. He seems to favor his left leg. "Patient takes too much pain medication, maybe he sweats out all the moisture and none is left for pee. I promise you, that's not the case. My sweat volume has been maddeningly normal."
"Alright. Well, there's a few things we can test-"
"My bladder is full, no need to test for that..." He bends over, squinting at her name tag. She wasn't entirely sure if it was performative. "Sweety."
Steeling herself and making sure she doesn't pinch the bridge of her nose, she puts on a phony grin. "Please, call me Dr. Melina."
"Nope!" He says with a smug smile. "Anyway, I'm here for an examination, not an interview. Let's get down to brass tacks, or should I say brass balls?"
She almost rolls her eyes, but remains professional, eyeing his silvery sneakers, ribbed white socks disappearing under his blue jeans. "Right. Please remove your pants, Greg."
The older man pauses, sending her a look she doesn't pay attention to. "Happily," he says, lowering his pants just enough to expose his hips and groin. He stands there in gray boxer briefs, eyes following the redhead sat on the rolling stool, jeans sitting right under his ass. She gestures for him to get back up on the table, which he does, a grunt leaving his thin lips when he picks up his right leg and moves it to the side as much as he can. She rolls over, stopping between his wide open legs, white vinyl exam gloves snapping as she puts them on.
"Tell me if anything hurts while I'm doing this."
"And if it feels good, should I not say anything?"
"Not unless it's medically relevant."
"Your wish is my command."
She makes contact with his flesh through his underwear. The fabric does nothing to hide the warmth of his testicles. Gently squeezing them, rolling them slightly to check every side, she finds nothing to worry about on his testes.
"Are you circumcised?" she asks, observing the widest part of his chest, his breathing quickening marginally.
"Find out for yourself, Darling." He draws out her first name, making it sound even more like a term of endearment. How childish.
She sighs, palming her forehead. "I told you, it's Dr. Melina. Please remove your boxers for me."
"It's not any fun if I'm the only one undressing," he complains, but wiggles his hips and loses the stretchy fabric shorts. The piece he hid under that fabric was surprisingly long, not what she expected. She tries not to let it show on her face, but she has trouble controlling those muscles. She doesn't even notice she's doing it. Focusing on the uncircumcised head of the penis, pulling back the foreskin gently. He groans in a way that makes it impossible to know whether its a good or bad groan.
She checks for any blockages in the urethra by running her fingers along the length of his penis and giving it very soft squeezes each half inch. If it feels swollen or enlarged at all, it may be sign of a blockage.
"There-" he swallows when she reaches the head, it's slippery surface sliding against her fingertips and making her grip move too far down, back to his shaft. He breathes in deeply before speaking. "There's nothing like a sexy urologist checking you for Urethral plaque, as I always say. Some people say librarians are hotter, but I disagree."
Her eyebrows raise slightly, her fingers pressing into the lymph nodes at the sides of his pubis, sweeping away the dark hairs from the crease of his thighs."I wasn't aware. I've met a number of ugly librarians." She hasn't, or maybe she has. She wouldn't know, on account of not recalling their faces. Maybe some of them were ugly.
"Like I said, it doesn't align with my personal opinion."
"I'll need to examine your prostate once I'm done here, unless I can relieve-"
"Just prescribe me some Alfuzosin," he begs, scrubbing his hand over his face roughly.
"Uroxatral? Why?" She narrowed her gaze, moving from the lymph nodes to the bladder. The area does feel a little distended, making her think it really could be a prostate problem. Gregory is just the right age for it, too. She ought to prepare him for the eventuality that it may be prostate cancer, so he won't be upset with her later. She's seen it happen to too many people.
"I need to pee and I need to not be in pain." His long fingers seem unable to let go of his pants, keeping them pinned just below his buttocks.
"There are many other treatments that could-"
He protests, "I don't want another treatment. I just want to manage my symptoms, pop this balloon so to speak." She would never be able to treat him properly because he hadn't given her all the information.
He acts like he's the doctor. How much could this guy possibly know about prescribing Uroxatral? It's a complex business.
"You'd be risking a lot of other symptoms for no good reason. Just, let me try something, okay?"
He blows air out his nose, rolling his eyes. "Depends what it is."
"I'm going to massage the areas around your bladder and see if I can get your body to urinate."
"Tried that."
"I want to rule out everything before going to the prostate, and sometimes it works better when done by another party," she assures her patient, her gloved hands reaching for his pelvis. Rubbing soft circles into his hip flexors, she slowly brings her thumbs further in. "Close your eyes. Try to relax the muscles in your bladder."
"Aren't you a little too young and pretty to be a urologist?"
"I'm 34." She presses her fingers into his abdominal muscles, just above his bladder, pressing it down toward his feet, not too rough, peeling another groan from him. She tries not to focus on the fact that he keeps mentioning how pretty or sexy she is.
"Is that supposed to explain away everything else?" He opens one eye to stare down at her, but not at her face. Lower. "You look great. You're a bombshell, but for some reason you're messing around with a bunch of old men's genitals. I'm curious."
"I thought you weren't here for an interview," she countered, not sure what to make of his advances.
"Well, to be honest, I-"
Warm, trickling liquid squirts onto her bosom. The ambient temp causes steam to rise from the hot urine, it's scent wafting into her nose. The intoxicating closeness, mostly limp member twitching in front of her eyes. Her mouth hangs agape, shocked, and, in a moment of weakness, she wishes a drop of it had splashed on her tongue.
Both of them are quiet, as if waiting for the other to break the silence. Melina reigning in her inappropriate arousal and House trying to hold back the sounds of relief as he empties his bladder.
She thought she was done with the strange yet complex cripple after their last appointment.
However, she's far from disappointed to hear Greg's voice from over her shoulder. In fact, she's pleased to see him again. Turning her head swiftly, she accidentally catches his powder blue gaze.
Wrinkled skin sits deep around his striking blue eyes. Melina is mesmerized by them. The scruffy hair on his chin looks delectable, the kind she wants to feel caressing her neck, scratching her delicate skin with the fibers. His lips look perfect for kissing the daylights out of, his graying brown hair barely long enough to grab.
She looks down at her tray and the memory fizzles out. She pulls onto it a vegan burrito, a gravy-smothered slice of turkey with a side of asparagus, a fruit salad, some tapioca pudding and a slice of carrot cake.
"Eating for two, or just feeling peckish?" Greg asks, leaning over her to reach for a sizeable cut of steak with fries. They inch further down the line while he eyes the drink section. He snatches an energy drink when they pass.
"Neither. Variety is the spice of life," she answers, ignoring the obvious taunt to his words. She sets a white milk on her tray, proceeding to the register. He follows on her right and they pay for their meals.
He trails her steps to her usual table, setting his tray across from her and lowering himself slowly into the chair. "If you think variety makes life good, then you've got to try sex."
Unsure what kind of response that wagers, she stares at her meal, pulling a set of silverware from her inner coat pocket. "I've... had plenty."
She hadn't. She had experienced the odd foray into the connubial and the erotic but never the romance. Nobody stuck around for any real period of time and she wasn't fond of forcing it. Plus, she was damaged. She couldn't blame them for not wanting her. If nobody ever came around to love her, she would be just fine. She convinces herself of it everyday, she has to just to keep going.
"Sure you have." The table feels small, cramped with his larger frame blocking her view of the cafeteria. She tended to keep an eye on things and watch the only exit but now he blocked her view. He leans his elbows on either side of his plate, mouth hovering over the steak while he stabs the fries with his fork.
Thinking of what to say, she removes a small steno pad and pen from her pockets.
12:34 pm Arrived in Cafeteria. Followed through line by Greg. Sat at table 9c together.
"I'm surprised you're eating with me. Lose a bet?" she asks, replacing the notepad in her coat. He sips from the colorful can, the liquid inside sloshing when he sets it down. She hates how horribly wrinkled his button-down is, yet she appreciates the studly aura that surrounds him when confidently wearing such a disheveled garment.
He doesn't say anything for a moment, chewing on the fried starch. His brows lower and he speaks. "I can't just do things because I want to?"
Her brows raise at the implication. He wants to spend time with her, which shocks her. It isn't something she's used to hearing. "I'm-"
She closes her mouth on the words when a pager rings out loud and clear. Greg pulls the black box from his waistband, showing off a sliver of his toned stomach in the process. The teasing glimpse of his treasure trail made her jump, redirecting her gaze to her food. Before, she had been treating a patient and didn't think of him as anything to get nervous over. Now, he's a colleague, one that seems to enjoy her company and doesn't wear a wedding band.
He deflates, looking at the message. "I have to go. If you get a urine sample for a ten-year-old named Jessica Lang, can you move it to the top of the pile for me? Pretty please?" Rising with the help of his cane and only letting out a small grunt, he steadies himself and leaves the half-finished cut of beef on the table. "Let's do this again, sometime."
He moves fast for a cripple, and she's watching his back disappear in the crowd before she can even react.
Melina hates feeling like she needs anyone's help to get her job done. She's an accomplished urologist and surgeon, years of practice under her belt. She investigated the efficacy of a myriad of drugs and therapies that were now in the process of being approved by the FDA. Most importantly, her patients got better after she treated them.
She shouldn't have these shortcomings. But when they crop up, she has to do the adult thing and seek help, no excuses. The closest doctor happens to be in exam room one, her very own patient-turned-coworker. Muffled shouts filter from the closed door as she approaches it, most distinctly, a woman's voice.
"You think he's gonna want to touch me if I look like I've been gutted like a fish?"
Seconds later, a rotund woman storms out the door, slamming it shut and stomping through the waiting room. Melina wastes no time opening it back up. Two men are inside. One of them leans against the sink with a file in his arms. The white coat he wears means she isn't who she's searching for. The other figure sits on a stool, cane nowhere in sight.
She double checks the room number written on the front of the door before looking back inside. The man on the stool has no lab coat, which bodes well for her search. His legs are swathed in deep, navy denim, his crumpled cornflower blue oxford covered by a black jacket. What really gives it away is the stethoscope hiding under his blazer, marking him as a doctor. Only he would dress like that at work.
"Greg?"
He reaches his arm behind the door extracting his usual cane and rising. "My name is always a question with you."
She lets out a breath she didn't know she was holding. "I need you."
Creasing his forehead with the height of his brows, Greg looked at the other man in the room as if asking 'Did you hear that?'
"Oh, God. Say that again."
She rolls her eyes, something she found herself doing often around Greg. "I have a patient in the other room and... I thought I knew what was wrong, but I didn't. Please help."
"Well, alright. But only because you asked nicely." He doesn't say goodbye, but raises his eyebrows at the other man in the room before limping off with the redhead. It's a short stride across the hallway to room two.
"Who's that?" questions the patient inside, his puffy cheeks obfuscating his voice. His neck is bent, spine hunched over on the exam table.
"This is Dr. Greg, he'll be consulting," she says to the unfortunate patient before she turns back to Greg. "Doug came in with a numb hand earlier today. It's not a stroke and he's negative for cancer. He hasn't had any recent trauma, no cold weather, no fever, and he doesn't drink. No alcohol in his system, period, and he's a male so it can't be cervical."
"That's Dr. House to you," he warns mockingly, though he's mostly serious, and pulls on some gloves. "Sounds like you covered almost all your bases."
She squints at the chart in her hands, pink lips reciting silent musings as she searched for her error.
"How long since you were last tested for diabetes?"
The blonde patient is taken aback, staring off into the distance, perturbed. "Well, never. I don't have diabetes, so I-"
"You never tested for diabetes at 5'10, 300 pounds?" House's voice rises, looking shocked. "Too bad there's no cure for stupid."
"Hey. He just called me stupid." Doug turns to Melina, looking for anyone to be on his side. She's more concerned with the issue at hand, which happens to be his health, and holds out a finger in response. The patient's insulted by the behavior from not one, but two board-certified doctors.
"You have cataracts," House begins, holding an opthalmascope up to the patients eye. He seems assured, but still checks closely. "Only one thing causes cataracts and a loss of sensation in the limbs."
"Diabetes." She shakes her head, loose hair swinging as she presses against her temple. A distasteful upward curve overtakes her lips, but it is no smile. He was right and she screwed up. A stupid mistake like this is something amateur doctors make. Not her. Not Dr. Sweety who'd performed almost 1,000 surgeries over the years. Was she losing her touch?
The patient, flummoxed and worried, tried to ask them more but they told him to relax and wait for the nurse. She'd administer the test and make it an official diagnosis when his results came back positive.
The two doctors walk out and it's not until they're on the empty elevator car that he opens his mouth again, asking her, "Did you even look at his eyes?"
She doesn't trust her voice, so she shakes her head in the negative.
"You didn't get forced into clinic duty." It's a statement, not a question. His chest turns but his feet remain stationary, his blue jewels trailing up and down her form. "Not unless you ask for them. You aren't used to this part, the dealing with people part."
Melina swallows the extra saliva in her mouth, hoping she's not being obvious about her nerves. He's bluffing, she tells herself. "Is there a point to this or are you just hounding me for my mistake?"
"You asked for these clinic hours. I want to know why."
She wants to try, to say anything, but her tongue is tied and her stomach is in knots. What could she say? What would be okay to say? That she wasn't ready to let go? That she didn't want that appointment to be their last, not just yet?
"You've worked here for, what, six, almost seven years? If you were in the clinic for two hours once a week, you'd have spent at least 600 hours here. You would have guessed diabetes much faster, at least stumbled on the diagnosis." House
"Greg, I didn't look. I missed a symptom, let it go."
He's getting to close, breath ghosting by her cheek. "You've probably never worked on this side of the hospital, either, since Urology is on the opposite side of the building. That's why you were late to the clinic when I first saw you; You'd never been here before, got lost. You don't work there regularly, which means you must have taken someone's shift and, even weirder, you continued to take those shifts after I started bugging you."
The fact that he thinks he bothers her is enough to tell her he has no idea about her little work crush. He's bluffing, trying to goad her into reacting. He may have figured it out from what she did so far, but she tries to reign in her emotions anyway. She has time to think about how to broach this, so she'll wait longer and hope her feelings don't grow. It's just infatuation, she assures herself. Simple.
"You don't bug me," she insists through quivering lips. He knew she took on clinic duty to meet him again, but not much else. "I took these shifts as a favor."
"Deny it all you want, Sweety," He suggests, walking off the elevator at the offices on level two, leaving her alone to ride to the third. "You can't get enough of me."
She can't stop thinking about him. Sure, they'd known each other for a month or so, but what did that amount to? Three visits, a few meetings in the clinic, and a shared lunch. Was that enough time to get to know someone? To develop a crush on them?
She knows it's not normal, what happened between them. Anybody else in her position would be put off by that kind of accident, not to mention the rest of his transgressions. He'd lied to her and took pills he knew he shouldn't, but he eventually came clean, which she respected, and she was never all that bothered by his attitude.
People were often put off by her attitude as well, leading to a feeling of kinship with the doctor.
It was certainly special to her for a man to be not only attractive, but able to match and even beat her intelligence. The sexiest thing about Greg is his big brain.
She can't remember what he looks like but she knows he's hot. So hot she'd wanted to push him down and suck him dry. That's all she remembers about his face, what it made her feel. The color of his eyes, the angle of his cheekbones, she can't remember any of that, but it's the little things she holds onto. Sounds, voices, postures, mannerisms.
She knows he looked handsome enough to make her weak in the knees. He was tall enough to make her feel powerless in a good way, a sexy way. His disability isn't a turn off either. Rather, she finds the sleek, dark wooden rob to be somewhat masculine, making him look refined. The moist feeling in her thong told her it was time to reign in these inklings.
Her brain continues to ruminate while her hands move on autopilot. Typing up the study on a breakthrough therapy developed in Switzerland was taking most of her brain power. The other 15% was occupied with Gregory. In between plotting points on a line chart, she's reading his academic journals and checking out his hospital profile.
He went to Hopkins, same as her. He speaks at least six languages, many more than her. He has a subspecialty in nephrology, though he's listed as a diagnostician. He also has three fellows working under him and they have been for a while. Scrolling down, a face pops out at her. He's smooth-faced like he just shaved, his fringe curling over his hairline. Context clues tell her that's a picture of the same Greg she met in the exam room. She idly wonders if the picture was current, or if he had changed, but doesn't concern herself as it was a question she could never answer for herself.
Three simple knocks sound from her door and resonate through her moderately-sized office. Swiftly minimizing some windows and turning away from the monitor, Melina called out. "Come in."
The hinges squeak, rusted brass turning against itself. In steps an immense man, his chocolate skin shining on top of his bald head. A double-wide blue suit covered his body, accented with a yellow silk tie. She glosses right over his face, knowing she'd only forget it. He dons a well-practiced smile, attempting to charm the pants off her.
"Dr. Sweety?"
"I prefer Melina." She stands and leans over her desk, reaching out a hand which the man shakes firmly. She smooths down her skirt and seats herself again. "There's a chair."
"Thank you. I wanted to stop by and introduce myself." His large frame somehow fits in her comparatively minuscule armchair. "Edward Vogler. You might have heard of me, I'm the new Chairman of the Board."
"Oh." She isn't quick enough to hold back the startled noise, surprised he'd come to see her. She had indeed heard whispers of a change in management, but never suspected something this drastic. "No, no. I don't keep up with office gossip."
"Right. Patients to treat, huh?"
"That is my job." Pointing her nose at her desk, she shuffles a few papers idly.
"You think who your boss is doesn't matter, as long as you do your job." He reclines, leaning into the armchair. "You aren't worried?"
Melina's eyes dart to his face in disturbance, sizing up the man who spoke like a con artist.
If he wants the hospital to succeed, then he wants the doctors to succeed. If he wants the doctors to succeed, then he won't get in the way of the doctors getting their jobs done. If he doesn't get in their way medically, she'll be able to properly care for her patients and there will be no need for her to worry. No problem will arise.
"Cuddy is my boss," she tells him, insistent. "She's at least capable of grasping my medical diagnoses even when she doesn't agree with them."
"You're right. I'm not a doctor." Vogler's words astonish her, making her turn back to him in shock. She didn't think he would admit it so easily. He fans his hand in front of his face. "In that regard, I intend to stay out of your hair. I'm not interested in policing your patients or medical decisions."
"That would be preferable."
"Oh, and I should tell you. There was someone waiting outside when I got here. A Dr. House, I think?"
She knows he's lying. If Greg had come by, he wouldn't have waited silently outside until Vogler . He would've strolled inside like he sometimes does rather than pussyfoot around. What was Vogler playing at, making up stories about the nephrologist? Just trying to scare her, she hopes. "He has my number."
He slaps back on that smile, the fake one with no emotion, nodding to her. "Of course. This hospital, it's done a lot of good. But some individual doctors, they do bad." He stands, turning away and adjusting his lapels. "I'm told you're a very good doctor, Sweety. Don't fall in with the bad ones."
He walks out the door, closing it with an air of finality. The woman spins her chair around, carding a hand through her coppery hair. Finally, she notices the monitor: it still has Gregory's hospital profile on the screen, his portrait front and center.
A/N: Facebook stalker much? :P Ooh now Vogler's figuring out that they're friends! What will he do? :O