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Name That Tune
by Miriam Heddy
Gregory House peered over the top of the piano, glass of wine in one hand, bottle of Vicodin open and on top of the piano like a tiny tip jar. House wasn't quite drunk, but then he wasn't quite sober, either, and James realized that they might be about to test his theory that the man would be a congenial drunk, revealing depths of warmth for humankind, or at least for him personally. Or, if not warmth, then a modicum of heat. Or, barring that, an incremental, almost imperceptible warming of the kind that would creep up on them all just before destroying the global ecosystem and signaling the end of life on earth.
Perhaps prolonged exposure to the man was corrupting his sense of optimism after all.
House played a run on the keys and the notes resolved themselves into something familiar that James couldn't quite place. "I'm not going to make you breakfast, y'know."
James looked up from scanning last month's Lancet and realized that trying for nonchalance was pointless. The only thing to do was stare, really. "I don't eat breakfast."
"'Course not. Never mind that nonsense about the dangers of low-blood sugar. I'm sure you know best."
Perhaps it was something in the way House was looking at him, but he suddenly recognized the tune. "I don't need breakfast. All I need is good sex and intelligent conversation."
"Lucky for me, all I need is sex."
"So it doesn't have to be good, then."
"I keep my expectations low. I find it diminishes the chances my partners will suffer from impotence. You don't suffer from impotence, do you?"
House's face gave nothing away, but James knew that, while people lied, a penis was a fairly reliable indicator of desire. "Not at the moment, no."
"Right. You're a young man, virile, at the peak of your health." And House smiled, an expression that turned his haggard, hooded face into something approximating handsome. "Right. Good. I say, Let's get it on.'"
"You're not going to ask about my wife?"
House's eyes widened slightly, which made him look somewhat more popeyed than usual. Oddly enough, that didn't lessen the attraction. "Do you want me to ask?"
"Do you want me to want you to ask?"
"I want you. Is that good enough? Or are we going to waste time indulging your sense of guilt at not feeling guilt?"
"I don't feel guilty. I feel." Nothing, he almost said, almost wishing that were true. How to explain that their marriage had formed a kind of stasis: the inertia of two objects that are so often apart that they barely affect each other anymore, except in passing, when he sometimes cast a broken shadow over their bed on his way out the door. Or when she left him a note on the fridge that said, "Buy cheese," and he tried to read into it some hidden meaning, but couldn't. Sometimes, at work, in the middle of examining a patient, he would think of her and then worry that he couldn't quite remember what her smile looked like. And then it would come to him, and he'd decide he was just tired. Right now, he felt anything but. "I don't feel guilty."
"Good. Right. Well that's settled, then. Take your clothes off and we'll get started."
Get started? "What about you?"
"Me?" A mock frown, and House continued, "Guilt that implies error, doesn't it?"
"To err is human. I meant your clothes," James clarified, realizing only after he said it that House was toying with him.
"Oh, that. Well, I like watching young, virile men take their clothes off. Particularly the socks. There's nothing quite as sexy as watching a grown man struggling with his socks."
"You're such a dick." But still, he laughed, which was the point. He got his shirt off.
"Hmm, yes."
For a moment, James considered pretending House wasn't there, which almost worked except that he couldn't figure out how to break eye contact without feeling like a coward. But somehow, he got off his slacks and, in his underwear, realized that he actually was going to have to take off his socks, eventually.
"Ah, go on. You can do it. Don't worry, I've seen it all before."
House was still, arrogantly, fully dressed. It was oddly exciting. He pulled down his own underwear, trying to step out of them without falling.
House whistled. "Now that's a new oneHa. Made you look."
"Christ, you're juvenile."
"And yet, you're standing in my living room in onlywhat are thoseknee high socks? They're not argyle, are they?"
"Fuck you."
"You can keep those on, actually. It's a good look for you. Are you sure your wife will understand all this?"
"I could really learn to hate you, Greg."
"Touch yourself while you're saying that, please. Your mohel did a fine job, by the way."
And that was enough to get him over to the piano, close enough to touch Greg, and maybe even hit him. He realized he hadn'tthat they hadn't kissed (and might not, and it was odd, but he couldn't imagine the kissing, perhaps because then House's mouth would be closed, and all that biting wit would be contained, a thousand cutting thoughts slicing him up silently. It was better, somehow, to suffer House's honesty aloud than to imagine what he might say, and, worse still, what he thought of himself, that knife turned inward with surgical precision.)
Still, he leaned over, put a hand on Greg's shoulder, pressing down hard, and Greg looked up at him and wasn't smirking or mocking, just looking. Interested.
"If I could, I'd get on my knees for you." Greg's voice was hushed and hoarse, and his hands, still resting on the keys, trembled a little before he tightened them into fists, resting them on his lap.
James shut off the urge to reassure him. "There's always the bed."
"Right. The bed." And Greg got up with some difficulty, using the piano for leverage before taking up his cane and walking slowly out of the room, expecting James to follow, although at first he couldn't bring himself to move. Greg looked a bit drunk, weaving slightly, though it was a little hard to tell if it was the drugs, the drink, or the erection hobbling his gait.
But once in the bedroom, with Greg lying flat on his back, still fully clothed, it was surprisingly easy to climb on top of him, to press him down flat, pinning his thin arms up against the pillows. Even kissing seemed possible, although he didn't, at firstnot until Greg himself initiated it. His beard was rough, but he was a soft kisser, open-mouthed and eager, humming while he kissed, using his hands to grip James' hair.
It made it a little awkward, getting Greg's clothes off in that position without losing the rhythm they'd established, and without any assistance from Greg, who seemed oblivious to his attempts to disrobe him. It was like trying to pull a tablecloth out from under a table of dishes while pouring coffee, and he suddenly had a vision of himself just before his bar mitzvah, trying to do just that, because he'd seen someone doing it on TV and wanted to impress his parents. It was easier, it turned out, to become a doctor than a magician, although there were days he wondered if it didn't amount to the same thing after all.
Then there was trying to figure out just what Gregory House would do, or could do, or wanted to do, sexually, without actually coming out and asking. What lies might Greg tell, if you asked him flat out what he wanted? What did a man with low expectations actually expect? The catch was, if he screwed this up, he might not get a second chance.
But finally, Greg solved the problem himself by spooning up behind James and muttering, "I certainly hope you've done this before," before sticking a lubricated finger inside of him with all the grace of a man used to doing rectal exams on unwilling patients. At least you could count on a doctor to know where the prostate was and, once he'd found it, James really couldn't think about anything but the intensity of it, admiring Gregory's surprisingly soft, knobby fingers reaching around with a firm grip and long, knowing strokes, nothing serviceable or clinical about that hand, gripping him with the familiarity of long practice.
He drew his legs up, but Greg whispered, "Not that way. I want to see you when you come," and he was roughly pulled over and encouraged to straddle Greg's hips, Greg's penis a slick, insistent pressure against his perineum before he lifted himself up and lowered himself down on it, trusting Greg to stay still, pretty sure that, given his limited mobility, he didn't have much of a choice.
His own thighs were trembling, the backs of his knees sweating with the effort of not putting pressure on House's bad leg while keeping himself from being roughly impaled before he was ready for it. The room was too warm, the wine they'd drunk hitting him suddenly hard, making him both dizzy and nauseated, though none of that seemed to diminish the desire that was urging him down and up again, in time with his own hands on his cock, keeping himself erect until the discomfort turned into pleasure. It had been a while.
Greg might have wanted to watch, but his eyes were squeezed shut now, his head tipped back, so James could watch him. Greg's body was thin, angular, paleyet, stretched on his back, he looked taller than when he was curved around his cane, somehow managing to both study the floor and stare down challengers at the same time.
But then James' legs gave way, and he took Greg in fully, the steady pressure of him almost too intense, and he took his hands off his own cock because he wasn't ready to come yet, although Greg looked closevery closeeyes shut tightly, muscles tensing, nipples taut, a pink flush spreading across his lower belly and up his torso, a sharp contrast with the pale skin of his belly, just above the line of hair, dark crisp curls of it slick with his pre-ejaculate now.
James tightened up around Greg, until he could at last feel him ejaculating inside, wondering that Greg hadn't put a condom onthat neither of them haddefiant stupidity of the highest order, but oh did it feel wonderful, the purest contact of skin on skin, and maybe they were both a little suicidal tonight, but that was part of the rush, a dare that wasn't really a dare, because they were both clean enough for the clean room. But fuck medicine, fuck marriage, fuck everything, it was just thisthe contraction of time and watching his own come rain down on the bastard.
He almost said, "I love you," but didn't. Wouldn't.
But for the first time in a long time, he felt a little of what House must feel like every day, challenging the world, one person at a time, even if you knew you'd never win.
The next morning, which was actually only a few hours later, he stood in the doorway, watching House shave, and had another chance to study him. He was wearing a towel, low-slung on his hips, and with one hand still on his razor, House popped another pill
"You're addicted to those."
House frowned, then smoothed his expression, talking awkwardly while shaving the sharp planes of his face. "Wow. And to think they say you're only a middling diagnostician!"
"And you shouldn't be drinking while taking them."
"Belated advice from the cuckold. I'm touched by your concern. And you, cheating on your wife is one thing, but with" House looked down, unwrapping his towel and making a show of it "a gentile? You should be ashamed of yourself."
"But you're not going to change."
"Hmm. I think I have eggs somewhere. Ouch. Dammit."
The cut was small, but surprisingly deep, and House's fingers fumbled with it because of the angle, before James tended to it, smiling as House tipped his head up and added, "Thanks."
"You're welcome."
And it was enough, really, because it had to be.
The End.
Feed the Muse.
Thanks to Perpetual Motion for betaing and giving me the confidence to post. And to Hugh Laurie and Robert Sean Leonard for flirting every week.
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Legal Disclaimer: The authors published here make no claims on the ownership of Dr. Gregory House and the other fictional residents of Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital. Like the television show House (and quite possibly Dr. Wilson's pocket protector), they are the property of Fox Television, David Shore and undoubtedly other individuals of whom I am only peripherally aware. The fan fiction authors published here receive no monetary benefit from their work and intend no copyright infringement nor slight to the actual owners. We love the characters and we love the show, otherwise we wouldn't be here.
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