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Rainy Tuesdays
by Roo
Fic: Rainy Tuesdays
Fandom: House, M.D.
Author: Roo
Pairing: House/Wilson implied
Rating: General audiences
Pages: 2. (555 words.)
Warnings: AU. Just a tad maudlin. Not in normal character.
Summary: Drabble exercise. Mood piece: fatigue, rain, fatalism. In response to a House community acknowledgment that it's only a matter of time before someone close to House gets sick.
Beep.
Beep.
Breathe in.
Beep.
Breathe out.
Beep.
Beep.
House rarely sleeps anymore.
At night, the streetlamps' lights stream through the blinds in his bedroom. Wedges of yellow-orange fall across his bed like bars. He stares at the linear patterns sometimes. Gives him something focus on as the pain ricochets round his leg, tangles through his caustica, shoots up his spine, and then just sort of dissipates into a pang throughout the rest of his body.
Pain, like a sonar pulse. Pain, like whiskey-thunder and fire.
Pain, until a gentle hand pulls him onto the bed one rainy Tuesday night; until he has someone to wrap around, cling to, mold with. It doesn't take long until he can't sleep without that comfort.
He's been trying to cut back on the Vicodin. Really trying. Mostly because a pair of big brown eyes stare up at him one rainy Tuesday afternoon, a fatal mixture of filial concern and hero worship and puppy love silently lobbed in his general direction, and it's either try and be a better man or shoulder the weight of that stare for the rest of his life.
He has a bum leg. He can't carry anymore baggage.
House never wanted love. Never wanted anything that even resembled the species of love. He didn't want endearments. He didn't appreciate tender looks. He had no use for soft touches or tearful confessions. He didn't believe in soul mates. His pain was his lover - there wasn't room for anyone else.
Until that rainy Tuesday night.
Vicodin and Wilson. Both eased the pain. Neither fixed the problem.
House hasn't popped a single pill since it happened. Since he got the news, his ducklings literally running through the clinic to catch him in the cafeteria. He wants to be clear, sharp, focused, while the hours count down. He wants to get the job done, like he doesn't care who the patient is this time. Pull a differential diagnosis out of thin air, a magician with a rabbit up his sleeve, a doctor with the cure, and then all this would be one of those dreams he hasn't been having, because he hasn't been sleeping, because his bed's been empty.
He hasn't popped a single pill because he wants to suffer, too. Wants to feel himself die, too.
Doesn't deserve a moment's reprieve until he figures out how to fix this. Until Wilson gets up from this bed that is not their bed, blinks those big brown eyes at him, and comes up with something equally pithy and affectionate to sling at him. "Couldn't stay away?" And then that sheepish smile that's got a gut-punch waiting at the end of its curve.
He's too tired to resent the young man in the bed - it takes too much effort to question the invisible thread that ties him to this white room, the sterile sheets, the face, pale as ash. Illness is the absence of color.
He stares at Wilson because it gives him something to focus on when the pain comes. He's a good enough doctor to know - Wilson is going to die. That gorgeous body is attacking itself and not even he can figure out how to stop it.
House definitely won't sleep tonight.
Beep.
Beep.
Breathe in.
Beep.
Breathe out.
Beep.
Beep.
It rains. But today is Thursday.
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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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