The stethoscope was hanging from the doorknob when Wilson got home. For the third night in a row. He didn't believe for a minute that House actually had someone in there with him, nor did he believe that there was anything even remotely sexual happening inside the apartment. But they'd made the arrangement when he'd first moved in that the stethoscope meant `alone time', and he felt he had no choice but to go along with it. He was a guest, after all.

With a sigh of resignation, Wilson did what he'd done the previous two nights and slipped a note under the door, asking House to page him when it was safe to come home. He then walked the two blocks to the nearest bar for a drink. Much to his dismay, he was becoming a regular at The Taphouse. Aaron, the bartender, was a long-haired surfer wannabe barely old enough to be drinking himself, and had gotten into the unfortunate habit of calling him `Jimbo'.

Wilson pushed open the heavy wooden door and entered the dimly lit establishment. It was Thursday night and the place was nearly deserted. The only other patron was a bleary-eyed fellow in the corner booth who raised his glass to Wilson as he passed by. He'd been sitting in that booth since the dawn of time, as far as Wilson could tell, and it didn't bode well that the man seemed to think of him as a kindred spirit.

"Hey, Jimbo," said Aaron from his stool behind the counter. "Get you the usual, dude?"

"Might as well," said Wilson, taking a seat at the bar and doing his best to keep his back to the drunk in the booth, who looked like he was in a chatty mood.

Aaron set a frosted mug and a bottle of beer down in front of Wilson. "In the doghouse again?" he asked, shaking his head. "This is the third time she's kicked you out this week."

"He," said Wilson. "And he didn't kick me out; he just...wanted to be alone."

Aaron's eyebrows shot up, but he did his best to remain neutral. "So...he?"

For once Wilson was grateful for the dim lights as he felt the heat rise up in his cheeks. "My friend," he said. "He took me in after my wife and I broke up. It's temporary." Wilson felt slightly ridiculous having to explain himself to some post-pubescent barkeep.

"Uh huh," said Aaron, thinking that if Wilson's frequent visits over the last two months were anything to go by, there was nothing temporary about it. But that was an opinion he thought unwise to share at the moment. "Think you'll need a menu tonight?"

"Do you even need to ask?" asked Wilson.

"According to the rulebook, yeah," said Aaron with a loose nod and a toothy smile as he pushed a menu towards him across the counter. "The burgers are on special tonight," he said, knowing Wilson would refuse the offer in favour of either soup or a salad as usual, but offering anyway.

The hours ticked by, and Wilson's dinner was a distant memory, made fuzzier by the subsequent imbibing of copious amounts of alcohol. He was drunk, and in the morning he would regret it, but for now he didn't care. He was pissed in every sense of the word, and he wanted to stay that way until he got home to House.

It was pushing eleven o'clock by the time Wilson's pager went off. Scowling at the little contraption as if it was somehow to blame for everything, Wilson collected his jacket and briefcase and paid his tab. He gave Aaron a substantial tip (`Hey, thanks Jimbo, dude!'), not so much because he deserved it, but because he was too fried to do the math.

As he staggered home, Wilson rehearsed the lecture he planned to unleash on House. He nearly didn't make it up the step to the front door, swearing loudly at the raised slab of cement as he stubbed his toe on it. He made it through the outer door okay and was trying to get his key in the lock of House's apartment when the door was suddenly yanked open from the inside. Thrown off balance by the unexpected absence of door, Wilson fell headfirst into the condo, landing in a tangled heap of limbs at House's feet.

"You're a very loud drunk," said House as he limped over to the couch to sit down.

Wilson dragged himself off the floor, so furious that his face turned beet red and he completely lost the ability to speak.

"Looks like you had fun tonight," House said from the safety of half a room's distance.

Still fuming, Wilson advanced on House, finger pointing at him accusingly. But before he could get there to ream him out, he barked his shin painfully on the corner of the coffee table and lapsed into a string of curses that would have put most Tourette's sufferers to shame.

"Cool. You're not just a loud drunk," said House. "You're also clumsy and profane. Is it weird that I find that strangely endearing?"

"Are you trying to get me to move out?" asked Wilson, finally calming down enough to speak intelligibly. "You tell me you want me to stay, you sabotage my attempts to leave...and yet you clearly don't want me around."

"I want you around," said House in a placating way. "Just not when I'm trying to work. You distract me."

"All you have to do is ask--I can be quiet. You don't have to kick me out."

"Wouldn't work," said House.

"Then I could lock myself up in your bedroom with a book or something--I wouldn't be in your way at all," said Wilson.

"That's even worse," said House.

"How?"

"I couldn't concentrate on work knowing you're in my bedroom doing God knows what."

"This is ridiculous!" Wilson exclaimed, starting to pace to burn off some of his frustration. "You never had a problem working around me before."

"That's because I never lived with you before."

Wilson stopped mid-pace and glared at House. "What's that supposed to mean?"

House hesitated, studying his friend carefully, noting the alcohol-induced swaying and the droopy-lidded gaze, and decided Wilson was probably so drunk he wouldn't remember this conversation in the morning anyways, so...what the hell.

"What I mean," House said, getting to his feet for dramatic emphasis, "is that I've never had to put up with your early morning hair-drying rituals before. I've never had to fight for the remote control before. Never had to share my couch 24/7 with a man who uses anti-wrinkle cream and a loofah on a regular basis. You comb your eyebrows with a toothbrush! Who the hell does that? And worst of all, three times now I've seen your naked ass wandering down the hall and the image is permanently burned into my brain. So now, thanks to you, every time I look at you or even think of you, I end up picturing you naked. And picturing you naked--in my bedroom--makes it pretty much impossible to get any work done." House limped off to bed, leaving Wilson to sort that one out for himself.

Wilson awoke on the couch the next morning with a pounding headache and a carpet of fur on his tongue. He was still wearing the undershirt and pants he'd had on the night before, and he hadn't even bothered to get under the blankets. He had to rack his brain just to figure out what day it was. He was praying that it was Saturday so that he could go back to sleep, but no such luck. It was Friday, and that meant (he checked his watch) he had less than an hour to get ready for work.

A wave of nausea washed over him and he half ran, half stumbled to the bathroom, barely making it there in time to reach the toilet. He clung to the refreshingly cool, white porcelain long after the heaving subsided, mentally chastising himself for getting so drunk on a weeknight. He vaguely remembered leaving The Taphouse the night before, ready to tear a strip off House, and then... Wilson desperately tried to remember the rest, but all he could come up with was a bizarre and unsettling image of himself waltzing through the apartment naked and cracking open a bottle of scotch. Perhaps, he thought, ignorance was bliss.

By the time he could stand up again without feeling the need to vomit, he had only a few minutes left to get ready. He took a tentative look in the mirror and didn't like what he saw. The hair was the least of his problems. Sure, it was plastered to one side of his head and was sticking up in unruly spikes on the other, but a little bit of water and a good brushing would take care of that. It was the pinkness of his eyes and the darkness under them that concerned him most. He might as well show up at work wearing a sign that read: `mock me, I'm hung over'.

"Great," he muttered at his reflection He ran the tap until the water was icy cold, and then he doused his entire head in it. When he looked into the mirror again, House was standing right behind him and Wilson nearly jumped out of his skin.

"Jesus, House! Don't sneak up on me like that!" he said, water flying off his hair as he spun around to confront the older man.

"You look like shit," said House, squeezing past Wilson to get to his toothbrush. "And you owe me half a bottle of scotch. The good stuff--not that cheap screech you bought last time."

Wilson closed his eyes and groaned. "That explains the elephants trampling around behind my eyes." He pushed his way back to the sink and plucked his own toothbrush out of the holder. As he squirted way too much toothpaste onto his brush, he noticed House watching him in an unusual way. "What?" he asked.

"What, what?" House countered through a mouthful of Crest foam.

"You're staring at me."

"So?"

"In a really weird way," Wilson added.

House spat out his toothpaste and rinsed. "You're delusional. And if you don't move your ass, you'll be late for work."

Wilson was late for work, and as he feared, everyone instantly knew he was hung over and they made a point of teasing him about it. After that, things got worse. He spent as much of the day as possible holed up in his office with the blinds drawn--the darkness and the vast volumes of water he poured down his throat made his headache manageable, but he knew he'd have to do his rounds eventually. To his chagrin, Cuddy chose this day, of all days, to tag along on his rounds, and it didn't take her long to figure out why he wasn't at the top of his form. He soon found himself on the receiving end of a full-out Cuddy lecture, in front of House and his whole team. And to top it off, he'd forgotten his wallet at home and had to beg lunch money off of Cameron.

All in all, Wilson's day had pretty much sucked. So when he got home and found the stethoscope hanging over the doorknob--again--it felt as if a giant boot had descended from the heavens to stomp him into the ground for good. He sank down to the pavement and cradled his aching head in his hands.

He couldn't stomach the thought of going back to The Taphouse (`Hey, Jimbo! Four nights in a row--that totally blows, dude!'), and why should he, he asked himself. He knew the only thing going on in House's condo was work, and there was no logical reason why House couldn't do that with him there.

Something about that last thought triggered a buried memory from the previous night, and Wilson began picking away at it, trying to uncover more. He suddenly bolted to his feet. Fumbling for his key, he finally got the door open and burst inside. House looked up from his book in annoyance.

"I left the stethoscope out," said House. "That means you should be out getting hammered with your drinking buddies by now."

"You picture me naked?!" Wilson exclaimed. Loudly.

"Thanks, Wilson. I don't think they heard you in Boston--could you say that a little louder?"

Wilson blinked at House in confusion. "You admit it?" he asked. "Seriously--you admit that you constantly imagine me naked?"

"Whoa, whoa--I never said `constantly'," said House. "It's more like on rare occasions."

"No. You said `whenever you see me or even think about me'," said Wilson, his sharp brown eyes pinning House in place like a specimen ready for dissection.

"Ah," said House, squirming ever so slightly. "Now, you see, you weren't supposed to remember that."

Wilson crossed his arms and stared down at his friend. "So you've been fantasizing about me...and because of this I get punished?"

"Fantasizing is a pretty strong word..."

"Are you picturing me naked now?" asked Wilson with just a hint of mischief lighting his dark eyes.

"Well I wasn't until you said that," House said, placing the medical journal he'd been reading over his lap and shifting uncomfortably in his seat.

Wilson started loosening his tie. "Have you ever thought that maybe, instead of kicking me out every night, you could have talked to me about it?" The tie fell to the floor at Wilson's feet, and House's eyes locked onto the striped scrap of silk as if he expected it to come to life and attack him. "Did you ever think, even for a moment," Wilson continued, unbuttoning his shirt, "that I might have understood?"

When the rumpled white dress shirt joined the tie on the floor, House snapped his head up to stare wide-eyed at Wilson. "What are you doing?" he asked.

The metallic clink of a belt buckle being opened drew House's eyes down to Wilson's pants. He watched, mesmerized, as the black leather strap slithered out of the belt loops and coiled up on the floor with the other pieces of discarded clothing. House licked his suddenly dry lips and brought his eyes back up to meet Wilson's. "What are you doing?" he asked again.

Wilson slowly unzipped his fly, leaving it open just enough to reveal the white boxers that lay underneath. He felt House's eyes on him like a physical presence, leaving him warm and tingly, and his mouth curled up in a wide smile. "Maybe if you knew I was actually naked you wouldn't have to imagine it. Then maybe you could get some work done, and I wouldn't have to deal with hangovers at work anymore. What do you think?" Wilson kicked off his shoes and toed off his socks and padded away down the hall to House's bedroom.

House watched his friend disappear into his bedroom and close the door behind him. Wilson's little striptease had definitely put an end to all thoughts of medical journals and diagnostics. The book on his lap slid off and landed with a thunk on the floor. He barely noticed. His attention was riveted to the door at the end of the hall.

From the bedroom, he heard Wilson's muffled voice: "I'm naked in your bedroom," it said. "You don't have to picture it--you can come in and see for yourself."

House looked at the pile of clothes and the medical journal that had fallen onto the floor next to it. There was no contest--Wilson naked in his bedroom trumped work any day. He quickly levered himself out of his chair, and, feeling the increasing restriction of his own clothes, he followed Wilson's lead and started to remove them. Down to his boxers and a t-shirt, House strode as quickly as his leg allowed down the hallway. He paused at the door to his bedroom, his hand pressed against the wooden barrier, and took a moment to close his eyes and imagine what waited for him on the other side.

When he finally took the plunge and pushed open the door, the sight that met his eyes made the picture in his mind pale in comparison. Wilson stood, his back towards him, neatly folding his boxers on House's dresser. The warm light of the fading sun bathed his backside in gold and amber, dark shadows carving out the `s' of his spine and delving into the rounded contours of his ass.

Wilson peered back at him over his shoulder, his high, sharp cheekbone the only part of his face not completely lost to the shadows. "Do you want to see more?" he asked quietly. House couldn't trust his voice, so he simply nodded his head and pleaded with his eyes.

Wilson turned around to fully face him, his head dropping like a shy schoolboy under House's intense gaze. He knew what it was House was staring at, but he didn't know what he thought about it. Had he gone too far? Had he misinterpreted the situation? Timidly, Wilson lifted his eyes enough to check out House's reaction. The expression on his friend's face was difficult to read...there was surprise and curiosity, but was that all? He got his answer when his eyes drifted further south. The erection straining to escape House's cotton briefs gave away what his expression did not--that the feeling was mutual.

"You know..." said Wilson, slowly approaching him, "the nice thing about having me here instead of at The Taphouse is that you can do more than just picture me. You can touch me, too."

House swallowed hard, his heartbeat pounding in his ears as Wilson--naked Wilson--got close enough for him to feel the heat rising off his skin. With uncharacteristic hesitation, House brought a hand up and placed it on Wilson's shoulder, as if testing to see if it was real or not. When the solidness that met his fingertips assured him that it was really happening, he got a little bolder. His other hand came up and slid around the back of Wilson's neck, stroking back and forth along his hairline, savouring the texture of soft skin and hair under his fingers. He closed the distance between them so slowly it made his entire body ache with anticipation, and when they finally kissed, it was like he'd been waiting for it all his life.

Wilson pulled away and climbed up onto the bed, leaving House blinking and doped up in the wake of their kiss. It took House a minute to recuperate enough to move. Then the rest of his clothes immediately came off, and he hopped the short distance to the bed.

"Not too late to change your mind," said House, praying to a God he didn't even believe in that Wilson wouldn't back out now.

"If you don't get your ass onto this bed right now, I just might," Wilson threatened.

House leered at him playfully, feeling for the first time that he was on familiar ground. He crawled up onto the bed and continued crawling until he was poised precariously over Wilson. It was a painful position to maintain, but that was the point. As his weak leg gave out, he allowed himself to sink down on top of his friend, revelling in the feel of the other man's body as it came into contact with his.

Their mouths met again in a greedy clashing of tongues and lips, but with House on top, there wasn't enough friction to satisfy either of them. In a decisive move, Wilson flipped House onto his back and straddled him. The sudden move caused a knifing pain to shoot through House's thigh and he grunted, but Wilson ignored it and continued what he was doing. House grinned, relieved more than he could have thought possible that he wasn't being coddled. For the first time since the infarction he felt like an equal in bed. And dear God it felt incredible.

It didn't last nearly as long as House hoped it would, but considering how long he'd waited for this moment, he was glad it lasted as long as it did. Just a handful of thrusts and the glorious friction had brought about a quick conclusion to their first sexual encounter. As they lay side by side in bed, their breathing slowing back to a normal pace, House turned his face towards Wilson, his thumb tracing the long line of the other man's lips. It was the perfect moment. Sweet and calm, and full of tenderness--and House couldn't have that.

"You do realise that I still have a lot of work to do, right?" House asked. "A patient's life at stake, and all that."

Wilson's brown eyes blinked back at him contentedly until he realised what House was suggesting. "I don't believe it!" Wilson said, lifting himself up on one elbow to look down on him. "Are you telling me you want me to go away?"

"Just for an hour or two," said House reasonably.

Wilson's jaw dropped open. "After what just happened here...I can't believe you're kicking me out again!"

"It's your own fault," House replied. "You think it was hard concentrating on work when all I had to fuel my imagination was a few brief glimpses of your butt..."

Wilson shook his head in disbelief and rolled out of bed. "Fine," he said, grabbing his shorts off of House's dresser and pulling them on. "You know where to find me. But I'm not staying there all night. If you don't page me in two hours I'm coming home, and you'll just have to deal with it."

House watched his fiery-eyed new lover pick up his pants and storm out of the room, and he smiled serenely to himself. A couple of hours were all he needed, and then he'd be in much better shape to deal with Wilson properly.