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All the Effects of Intoxication
by Otter
This only happens when they're drunk, so far gone from sane and sober that just stumbling out of the cab and up the front walk takes serious effort. Wilson gets really happy when he's plastered, and House gets so mellow he's practically unconscious, and every movement they make is clumsy, fumbling, thick. So if House leans into Wilson's shoulder, maybe it's only to steady himself. And if Wilson's hand lingers a little too long against House's back, maybe it's only because Wilson is too drunk to realize what he's doing.
When Wilson crawls out of bed in the morning, there's a technicolor hickey over the point of his hip, and he moves gingerly, trying not to jostle his hangover. House stays in bed, sprawled on his back; he doesn't pretend to be asleep, but it doesn't matter, because Wilson doesn't look at him anyway.
Wilson avoids him for a whole day at work, as if he's afraid that House will want to talk about it. They've never talked about it before, though, and House depends on habit just as much as he depends on the painkillers. He doesn't go looking for Wilson, but he does take one extra pill beyond his usual daily allowance, and after work he goes home and spends the whole evening at the piano. The only songs he can think of are incredibly maudlin ones, and he finally drags himself to bed, refusing to be a cliche.
He thinks the sheets still smell a little bit like Wilson, but maybe that's just his imagination.
+++
House stays in his office after lunch the next day, because it's always exactly a day and a half before Wilson wanders in, sits down, makes himself at home and pretends -- quite convincingly, because he's had plenty of practice since the first time -- that nothing ever happened.
So House picks up his yo-yo, puts his feet up on the edge of the desk, and lets his mind wander while he waits.
Wilson opens the door at 1:03, drops into his usual chair, and says, "You wanna do something tonight? That crappy old theater downtown is playing double features of old martial arts flicks all week."
House says, "Sure. You're buying," and wonders about the differential diagnosis of selective amnesia.
They sneak out of work a half an hour early so they can catch the last matinee. House finds them seats in the nearly empty theater -- as close as possible to the absolute center, because Wilson is very particular about this -- while Wilson hits the concession stand. House is half-dozing through the pre-preview commercials when Wilson drops into the seat beside him, jostling his elbow and tossing a box of overpriced Milk Duds into his lap.
House didn't tell Wilson to get him anything -- he'd been intending to steal at least half of Wilson's popcorn -- but he says, "Thanks," and opens the box, and Wilson's popcorn is safe for the moment.
The movies are poorly dubbed, poorly filmed, and overall terrible. The theater stinks of imitation butter and stale cigarettes. The Milk Duds stick in House's teeth. It's just what he needed, but he wishes the concession stand offered liquor, so he could get rip-roaring drunk and have an excuse to ask Wilson to suck him off, right there in the theater, down on his knees with those expensive slacks sticking to the dirty floor.
He's still thinking about it when they make their way out of the theater and down the street to where Wilson's car is parked. Wilson pauses before he opens the driver's door, jingles the keys in his hand and says, "You know, I've been thinking. About the other night."
House prides himself on his unflappable cynicism, so he likes to think that nothing can really surprise him anymore, but this does. Everybody knows you don't talk about Fight Club. He manages to snap his jaw shut and erase the stunned-halibut expression from his face just as Wilson is looking down at the car, cheeks flushing as he opens the door and climbs inside. House does the same, settling into the passenger seat carefully, like he's waiting for the part where Rod Serling's voice pipes out of the stereo with some narration on the moral of the story.
Wilson has the key in the ignition, but he isn't starting the car. He stares down at the steering wheel and says, "You're taking too much Vicodin for us to be doing any hard drinking, and I'd be really pissed off if you died."
House frowns so deeply that he thinks his face might stick that way, and he says, "Oh, thank God. If only there'd been a doctor around before, to advise me of the dangers."
Wilson shakes his head, sighs, and starts the car. He doesn't say anything, but the downward twist of his lips and the tightness in his jaw speak volumes about the things he actually wants to say. They don't talk during the drive, and when Wilson drops House in the hospital parking structure, next to the 'Vette, he just says goodnight and drives away.
House is supposed to be a bit of a genius, but he doesn't realize until he's almost home that Wilson has just broken up with him.
+++
The only great thing about having a bum leg is that people assume a physical impairment is the worst thing in your life, and is therefore the root of all of your problems. When he snaps at Cameron for the third time in a half an hour, and she starts getting that thoughtful look on her face like she's trying to figure him out, all he has to do is put a hand in his pocket and fist it around the Vicodin bottle like he's really craving a pill, and then limp a little more heavily than normal when he retreats to his office.
The thoughtful look turns to a sympathetic one, and Cameron turns back to her paperwork. She runs interference for the rest of the morning, redirecting people away from his office so he can stretch out on the floor with his leg up and his headphones in, free from interruption.
He wallows in his own misery most effectively when he's flat on his back. He's had a lot of practice.
Foreman comes in around noon and says something that House can't hear over the music in his ears; Roger Daltrey's singing "La, la la, la la la la," like it really means something, and House is feeling it, closing his eyes and riding the swell of it like he's just released his stroke and feathered the blade of his oar, lingering in that moment before the next catch, gliding along on momentum alone.
But he hasn't rowed in a long time, so it's possible that he's just high.
When Foreman unplugs House's headphones and kicks the iPod across the room, House's pleasant coast comes to an abrupt halt, checking it down, oars in the water for an emergency stop. Before House can say anything suitably pithy and/or biting, Foreman says, "What's up with Cameron? I practically had to sign a liability waiver before she'd let me in here."
House props himself up on his elbows, looking about as put out as he feels, and says, "Mandatory sexual harassment training made her paranoid; now she's convinced my office is a den of iniquity. Thank God, I won't have to use a rusty old van and a cute puppy to lure my victims in anymore. The furniture in here is way more comfortable."
Foreman shrugs and says, "Whatever. I found you a case." He drops the folder -- the thick, entirely too complex-looking folder -- onto the floor next to House's shoulder.
House ignores the folder, and Foreman along with it; he's eyeing his desk and wondering if he can get to his Gameboy without actually getting up off the floor. "That's funny," he says. "I don't remember losing any cases. You should take it down to the lost and found... there might be a reward."
Foreman ignores him right back and says, "23-year-old female, complaining of dizziness and severe joint pain, as well as intermittent numbness in the right arm, constant fatigue--"
"I'm not going to get any more interested than I was before you came in here," House says. "Especially not after you punted The Who."
Foreman spreads his hands, disarming, like he's giving up, but House has always figured Foreman for the type who'll wave a white flag just to distract you so you don't see the knife coming. "Alright," Foreman says, and he drops into the nearest guest chair, where he can still look House in the face. "You don't want to talk about the case, we don't have to. I've been meaning to ask you what's up with you and Doctor Wilson lately, anyway."
House raises his eyebrows in a way that says, 'et tu, Foreman?' and then he sighs and picks up the file. "Joint pain, huh?" he says.
"And numbness in the arm," Foreman adds, like numbness is the cherry-and-fudge topping on the diagnostic desert.
House hauls himself up off the floor with slightly exaggerated care -- just so Foreman will notice how very inconvenient this all is -- and says, "Alright. Where's Chase? His suggestions are usually as asinine as yours, but at least he delivers them with an exotic accent." He limps across the floor sans cane and retrieves his iPod, makes a show of polishing it up with his shirt tails, and then places it reverently back in its docking station on his desk.
"Chase is on his way," Foreman says, already stepping through to the conference room. "And Cameron's putting on a fresh pot of coffee."
Their patient nearly dies just after lunch, which is almost -- but not quite -- distracting enough to keep House from dwelling on the fact that he hasn't seen Wilson all day.
+++
It's 9 o'clock by the time House makes his way up to oncology, but Wilson's office door is only half-shut, and there are lights on inside. House pushes the door open without knocking, and finds Wilson at his desk, bent over a hefty collection of paperwork.
"Let me guess," House says, as he's closing the door behind him. "That argument you had with your wife the other night? The one that you didn't want to talk about, the one we went out drinking to distract you from? She asked for a divorce."
Wilson sighs and puts down his pen carefully, with the same deliberate precision he uses for scalpels and needles. "Why no, Doctor House," he says, "I'm not busy. Come in, sit down, ask me all the probing personal questions you like." He leans his elbows on the edge of the desk, knits his fingers together, and he's gripping himself hard enough that his knuckles are already paling to white.
"Sometimes I suspect that you're actually Canadian," House says. "All that passive-aggressive politeness. What brings you to New Jersey, Doctor Wilson? On the run from the Mounties?"
Wilson leans back in his chair, tries and fails to shake the tension out of his shoulders, and says, "Actually, it's the opposite; I'm working on passing for Canadian so I can flee there after I murder you. I have an excellent plan for escaping the authorities. It involves sled dogs."
"Sounds like too much effort," House says. He drops himself into one of Wilson's visitor chairs, stretches out his right leg and traps his cane between his palms, lazily rolling it back and forth. "How about instead of that, you just tell me what's going on so things can go back to normal?"
Wilson weaves his fingers together again -- this time across his stomach -- and drops his chin, like he's bracing himself. "I've been thinking about getting new furniture in here," he says. "I'm starting to hate those chairs."
House looks down at the chair he's sitting in, and the identical one next to it, but they look pretty much like chairs to him, and they're of considerably better quality than the ones in House's office. Of course, House ordered really uncomfortable guest chairs on purpose; he wanted to discourage any guests from sticking around too long. "New furniture, huh? Maybe you should get everything in pink. It's so your color." He doesn't bother to slant a pointed look at Wilson's suspiciously pink tie; he trusts Wilson is smart enough to make the obvious connection.
Wilson scrubs a hand over his face, down his jaw and around to the back of his neck. He looks tired. "The color's fine," he says. "But I'm always delivering bad news to the people who sit in those chairs."
"I don't think new decor will change the fact that you're an oncologist," House says, "but I'm guessing that's not your point." He lets go of the cane with his left hand so he can drum his fingers against the chair's arm rest.
"Oh, I don't really have one," Wilson confesses. "I was just trying to avoid the other conversation." He shrugs, just a minute roll of the shoulders, and his lips curve with a little self-deprecating smile; it's the sort of innocent aw-shucks expression which has no doubt brought school principals and hospital administrators to their knees.
House likes the warmer looks, the groggy morning expressions that Wilson wears before his brain has turned on, the ones that aren't so calculated. House is always happy to get on his knees -- metaphorically speaking more than literally, because the leg doesn't really allow all the positions that House would just love to try out -- but Wilson never actually asks him to. He's starting to resent that.
"Ah, yes," House says, "the other conversation. You never did answer my question."
"Is my wife divorcing me?" Wilson's thumbs twitch, and he scrunches up his forehead like he really has to think about it. "Not yet. She asked if I'm sleeping with you, though."
"I told you not to get that 'I love ass-fucking' tattoo," House says, and he thumps his cane on the floor for emphasis.
Wilson ignores him, or at least pretends to ignore him, which is probably half the reason they get along so well. Wilson probably wouldn't be able to stand House if he actually listened to half the things House said. "I think she was kidding," Wilson says. He kind of twitches. Flinches, maybe. Definitely more of a flinch.
"But you gave the game away," House says, with a sage sort of nod. "You're a terrible liar, especially when somebody surprises you. There's stammering and blushing. It isn't pretty."
"Shut up," Wilson says, but he's flushing red as if to illustrate, and he looks down at his desk like it's the last friend he has that hasn't betrayed him.
House ignores him, too -- turnabout's always been fair play, or so the saying goes -- and twists his cane between his palms again, like he's getting ready to roll his lucky dice. "So she knows," he says.
"There's nothing to know," Wilson protests, but he still doesn't look up. "It's not like we're dating. I haven't asked you to the prom."
"I have high hopes, though," House says. He slouches a little further into his chair. "If you rent a limo and tell me how pretty I look, I'll definitely put out."
"Please," Wilson says, and he rolls his eyes, probably to disguise the fact that he's thinking about it. "Why would I spend all that cash when I can buy you three beers and get the same effect?"
"Why waste the money on beer when you can get it for free?" House says. He knows as soon as the words have left his mouth that he's crossed some kind of line, the inconveniently invisible kind. Luckily, it's been a very long time since he's cared much about lines, invisible or not, so he doesn't have to mumble out an apology and figure out how to beat a hasty retreat without stumbling over his cane. He just sits instead, and stares, and lets the words hang there between them like a challenge, like the time they'd had a bet that Wilson couldn't drink four shots in a row without falling off his bar stool.
If he's honest with himself -- and he never, ever lies, except when he does -- he proposed that bet in the first place so Wilson would get drunk faster, so they could go to bed faster. House only drank beer that night, and he wasn't really that drunk at all.
Wilson stares back, and House usually knows what people are thinking, but it's never worked with Wilson; Wilson's always retained a little mystery, which is probably why House likes being with him so much. That and the sex. And their mutual love of monster trucks. But mostly the sex.
"This rule-breaking fetish you have is getting a little irritating," Wilson says, after a few interminable moments of silence. "You can't ever just let things rest, can you?"
"That would be boring," House says. He pushes himself to his feet, using the chair and his cane as leverage, and starts toward the door. "You don't want boring. You love me because I'm so interesting." Halfway out, with his hand on the doorknob, he pauses and says, "You can pick me up at 10. The limo is optional, but I expect flowers."
He doesn't look back, and he closes the door behind him. He goes home and sits at the piano for awhile; it's 9:45 and he's in the middle of singing, "La, la la, la la la la," with a tone far more depressing than the original work, when somebody knocks on the door.
Wilson brings beer instead of flowers, but they never get around to drinking it.
the end
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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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