(no subject)
Title: In the Closet
Author: magie_05
Rating/Warnings: NC-17, ~voyeurism~
Summary: Another *late* post-ep, based on spoilers/speculation for tonight's ep, 6x13. ~Someone~ sneaks into House and Wilson's apartment, but the real joke is on him. (I wrote this just so I could use the title, lol wordplay)
Lucas had been willing to accept that House's subconscious had nailed his girlfriend.
Really, the guy had been hooked on painkillers at the time, and he'd even been locked up in the nuthouse for it, months after his employee's suicide and not even a year after going through all that shit with Wilson. Anybody could snap and fantasize about something as dramatic as doing Lisa Cuddy.
It happened to Lucas all the time.
But seriously, House had been being sort of a dick for no reason lately. It wasn't Lisa's fault that she hadn't slept with him in real life. And even if it sort of half-was, that didn't give House the right to be a jerk to her over it. He was getting a little tired of always being able to tell when House and Lisa had just had some sort of run-in. She became all cold and distant and more likely to go into long, screechy, ball-shriveling tirades about small domestic issues, like...bread.
It was the thing with the photograph that prompted action.
Seriously, House could only use the 'I'm crazy' excuse for so long before it just got annoying. So Lucas, like any good boyfriend, followed him home from the hospital.
He thought it was weird enough that House took a detour to some place in the suburbs on the way and then didn't even go inside, but it was even weirder when he drove back into the city and led Lucas to a familiar-looking part of town.
Familiar, because he'd been there not two weeks earlier.
So House was the one who had bought Lisa's top pick out from under them. As much of an ass as House was, this move still seemed out-of-character, too diabolical even for him. She had even called her mom about this place.
Lucas considered going straight home and bringing Lisa back here so she could see for herself...
...but then he thought about what it would be like being in an enclosed space with her when she found out.
So, instead, he just put a possum in House's bathtub.
He'd wanted to get a skunk, but those things were way harder to catch. He'd had a couple of bags of Corn Nuts in the glove compartment and a plastic bag in the floorboard. The hardest part was finding a box big enough to keep the thing in until Wilson and House both left for work the next morning.
Then it was simply a matter of dressing up like a maintenance worker and picking a few locks.
He felt much better afterwards, and it was much easier to help Lisa keep a level head once he'd forced a little karma.
Hearing that House and Wilson were squabbling over it, however, made the whole thing more interesting.
Obviously he needed a redo if House was enjoying this. He'd simply had to sneak back in and loosen the bathtub's safety bars, if just out of morbid curiosity. Sort of a bitch move to do that to a handicapped guy, but that was the point: it would be worth it to see if House blamed Wilson for it and what his retaliation would be.
Honestly, he didn't expect for House and Wilson both to come home in the middle of the day.
He'd retreated to the nearest open doorway the moment he heard the key in the front door, inwardly relieved that he'd remembered to re-lock the door on his way in. It was always awkward getting caught searching someone's home; he'd lost more clients that way.
The room he found himself in was neat and vaguely stylish and free of boxes, so obviously it was Wilson's. He ducked into the closet, screwdriver in hand, thinking that House and Wilson were probably just taking their lunch breaks so surely he wouldn't be here long -
“...who goes out and catches a possum?” Wilson was saying, his voice sort of shrill and quavery - Lucas had never him heard talk to anyone else like that. “I almost had to call Animal Control! We've been here two weeks and already the neighbors all think we're insane - ”
“There's nothing in our lease that says we can't have a pet,” House said gleefully. Lucas had never heard him talk to anyone else like that either.
“That thing could have bitten my arm off!” Lucas snorted to himself in the darkness between the numerous ties and sports jackets; Wilson could be such a drama queen -
“You're such a drama queen,” House announced proudly. From the direction of his voice, they were somewhere around the bathroom. “The thing was obviously more scared of your shrieking than you were of it. Look how many times you made it shit its pants.”
Wilson made a noise like “oh-ho” which, even without seeing his facial expression, sounded ominous. “Right, my mistake; next time I'll be more hospitable to the giant rats you leave lying around the apartment.”
“It's a marsupial.”
“Uh-huh. And any particular reason you invited said marsupial into our bathroom?”
Lucas figured this was where House would balk and admit he didn't do it, and then Lucas could relax and enjoy the resultant bitch match from the safety of the closet. He put his ear a little closer to the slightly open door, expecting a nice payoff -
“Why pick just one reason?” House asked, his voice traveling down the hall. “So many awesome ones to choose from. Like the fact that you keep 'forgetting' to close the bathroom door while you're blow-drying or that you ate all the Fruit Loops or that you've been a sanctimonious ass the last few days - ”
“I've been an ass? All I did was tell you to apologize to Cuddy - ”
“You didn't care about her,” House said, with a flare of the dramatic. “If anyone needs to apologize to her, it's you; you're the one who stole this little love-nest out from under her.”
Lucas almost swallowed his tongue.
“Separate issue,” Wilson said loftily. “What I did didn't involve the risk of rabies or the destruction of our new thirty-dollar bathmat -”
“You spent thirty dollars on a bathmat?”
“ - and it actually had a point, as opposed to whatever twisted psychological truth you hoped to demonstrate with the possum.”
“You spent thirty dollars on a bathmat?”
Wilson made a sound of frustration and pushed his way into his bedroom, causing Lucas to shrink back a few inches, hidden behind the door and an old suitcase. “I'm not arguing about this anymore. You can clean up the bathroom, or you can spend all your hooker money on a maid who enjoys a challenge. Your choice.”
Through the crack above the closet door hinge, Lucas had a telescopic view of Wilson as he slumped into his bedroom, his hair sticking up in erratic little tufts, as if he'd been grabbing at it throughout the overheard conversation. House hovered behind him in the bedroom doorway, one hand on his cane and the other propped casually on the door frame. “You remember the bowl of water?”
“If that's a metaphor, I think you're getting a little rusty,” said Wilson, dropping his jacket to the foot of the bed, a look on his face which appeared to be a modified version of a pout.
“Fine - you remember the pants you ruined?” House sidled up behind him with a look of pure intent on his face - intent for what, Lucas had no idea. “The ones that finally got you to snap out of your denial and depression over your third divorce and finally act like yourself again?”
“The way I remember it, that was punishment for refusing to play your little game while we were living in your apartment.” Lucas mentally connected the idea of the two of them living together before with the mention of soiled pants, an intriguing scenario all around.
“And the chair,” House said, his voice suddenly softer, taking another step until he was hovering over Wilson's shoulder, “when you came back to work. And the fake hooker girlfriend, and the pile of empty syringes.”
“You're not going to guilt me into cleaning up possum crap,” Wilson said, occupied with plugging his cell phone into the charger on his night-table, even though Lucas could tell from the angle that he could feel House breathing on his neck, staring over his shoulder - standing practically on top of him.
“Wasn't trying to.” His voice was now so soft that Lucas could barely hear over his own shallow breathing, softer than he would have ever thought House could speak. “I'm just continuing the tradition. I mess with you, you mess with me. Sort of our version of a truce.”
So House was taking credit for the possum thing just to score cool points with Wilson - that didn't make any sense. Then again, most things about House and Wilson didn't make a lot of sense sometimes, like the way they were always together even when they were at each others' throats, or the way they kind of stared at and talked about each other a lot, or the reason Lucas had met them in the first place -
Or the way they were kissing in Wilson's bedroom.
It had taken an entire paragraph of thought for him to recognize that House wasn't just picking something out of Wilson's hair but rather running his fingers through it, dragging his thumb across Wilson's cheek, eventually leaning in to brush his mouth along Wilson's jaw. “You said you wanted an apology,” was about all Lucas caught before Wilson quite obviously caved, letting his eyes slip shut, opening his mouth for what was most definitely House's tongue.
Lucas felt his stomach fill with mercury. There was no way he was really seeing this. House wasn't really pressing determined little kisses against Wilson's open mouth, just like he wasn't slipping his hands down Wilson's back, tugging his hips slightly forward, pressing him slightly into the nightstand. “So the possum was just your way of christening this place?” Wilson asked when he had control of his own mouth, hiding a smile in House's shirt collar.
House mumbled something which Lucas immediately translated as 'did that already' directly into Wilson's ear, eliciting the kind of smile which was impossible to fake and, from what Lucas knew of Wilson, exceedingly rare. He grasped at House's shirt collar and pulled him in harder, and Lucas distinctly saw a flash of pink as his tongue skimmed along the corner of House's mouth.
This so wasn't happening. Lucas had slipped and fallen in House and Wilson's bathroom and banged his head on the sink and was lying there unconscious and bleeding, not trapped in the closet with a perfect side-view of two presumably straight guys making out against a nightstand, very slowly but steadily moving toward the bed. He thought maybe if he just closed his eyes and took a deep breath, this would all turn out to be some kind of grand and really, really convincing practical joke - but when he looked back, hands were up shirts, Wilson's tie was undone, House's cane lay forgotten on the floor. He was absolutely sure he had gone crazy when he thought he saw Wilson gently coaxing House to sit on the edge of the mattress and then slowly straddling him, his back to the closet, his lips (from the sounds of it) never leaving House's mouth. Then Wilson's shirt slipped slowly down his bare shoulders and Lucas had to look at the ceiling.
House and Wilson were going to have sex right next to him and there was really nothing he could do about it. All he could think about at the moment was getting out of this apartment and never thinking of this again. Not that he cared that they were sleeping together - it just sort of called into question his pre-established ideas about the two of them - like that House wanted to nail his girlfriend and that Wilson wanted to nail every needy blond in his general vicinity and that they weren't nailing each other in their free time -
“Ohhhh,” someone moaned loudly, as if in contradiction.
Lucas felt his head turn itself on his neck like The Exorcist, forcing him to look through the crack in the door. Wilson had obviously been the source of that deep, desperate sound, as House's mouth was currently engaged in a studious exploration of Wilson's neck. They were lying down already, Wilson on his back with House on top of him, both shirtless, with House's hand slowly undoing Wilson's zipper. Lucas was hit with a renewed wave of shock at how casual they were being about it all, smooth and eager and well-practiced, like it was something they did often and Lucas was just going to stop thinking right now.
Wilson moaned again when House's hand found its prize, the sound ending in a little 'squeak.' He slid his hands from House's shoulders and down the smooth arch of his back, gripping the waistband of his jeans to tug his hips closer, wrapping a leg around House's back and kissing him hungrily. The leg blocked Lucas's view - which, as he reminded himself, was a good thing - so he couldn't really see Wilson's hands as he confidently undid House's jeans. He could only see and hear the results.
“Ohgod,” one of them - presumably Wilson - croaked out as they started rocking gently against the mattress. As both of their flies were open and Wilson had both legs wrapped around House's hips and they were moving rather rhythmically, it didn't take much for Lucas to figure out the mechanics of what was going on down there, especially when Wilson slipped a hand in between them and House started sweating at his temples. Actually, Lucas spent more of his mental energy trying to figure out exactly why he was still looking -
“Not that I'm...complaining,” Wilson burbled out between steady, shallow rolls of House's hips against his, “but...what brought this on at 1:30 in the afternoon on a Monday, hm?”
“Oh, I dunno,” House said lowly right into his ear, sounding considerably more self-possessed than his friend but with a edge of breathlessness to his words, “you just sorta smell good and make me laugh.”
It must have been an inside thing, because Wilson laughed sheepishly to himself and even from ten feet away, Lucas could see the spots of color blossoming on his cheekbones. “I'm flattered,” he said airily, and then proved his words by reaching down to pull down House's jeans.
Lucas found a convoluted tie to stare at. He had sort of been half-hoping that the grinding was as far as it would go, because that, at least, was something he chalk up to pure, instinctual horniness. The idea of House and Wilson being naked together on what appeared to be a regular basis was something he was still trying to process, and it was all moving a little fast for him.
He heard the soft flump that meant that somebody’s pants had hit the floor, heard House curse under his breath and then more wet sounds of very insistent kissing. Pure, sick curiosity forced him to crack one eye open and glance through the slot to see House's hands gripping Wilson's hair, holding him still for an all-out assault of kisses - Wilson's fingertips digging into the now-exposed flesh of House's ass, leaving little white marks in their wake - Wilson's slacks very slowly receding down his hips, as he squirmed out of them under House's weight -
It was at this point it hit Lucas the hardest: the two of them were going to fuck, pure and simple and right next to him. It was insane - no more than twenty minutes ago, he was sabotaging House for being an ass (and yeah, okay, for being competition) for his girlfriend and now House was in the process of screwing a guy, his best friend, a person he'd been so desperate to keep that he'd hired a professional stalker just to keep tabs on him, just to make sure he was happy -
Insane, except that it made perfect sense.
All the looks and the obsession and the tongue-in-cheek innuendo suddenly took on a new meaning, now that Lucas was watching - er, being forced to watch as House slid his hands under Wilson's shoulders, holding him close and pushing most of his tongue into Wilson's mouth, his eyes squeezed shut, his brow furrowed as if in the best kind of pain. They were under the covers now, which - luckily, Lucas reminded himself - blocked his view of what was happening between their hips, even though the rhythmic squeaking of the mattress and Wilson's erratic, stifled grunts really didn't leave a whole lot to the imagination. His hands worked down the sweat-gleaming skin of House's back and disappeared below the sheets, settling somewhere around House's ass, holding on as he was ground steadily into the mattress, sound and speed and heat building with every quick, rough rotation, making him need to break the kiss to moan freely to the stuffy, overheated air -
It was hot. In the closet, Lucas meant, the air in the closet was warm and humid. Nothing was hot about what he was seeing, not 'hot' in the pop-culture sense anyway. What he was seeing was sort of like walking in on your parents - if your parents weren't your parents and were both male and were making all kinds of interesting noises into to sweat-dampened sheets -
He watched House mumble something inaudible into Wilson's ear, but judging from the smug, clever look on House's face and the sheepish, awkward blush on Wilson's, it was something particularly creative. Whatever it was seemed to cause an instant and mutual reaction in both men: they both reached out to the night-table at precisely the same moment, nearly pulling out the drawer in their combined haste. Lucas felt his eyes bug out a little when Wilson finally extracted a familiar-looking bottle from the drawer and forced it into House's hand, pushing aside the pillows so he could lie flat on his back, his eyes flicking intently from House's mouth to this hands to some point well below his navel, the pink tip of his tongue darting out to wet his lips.
“Fuck,” House gasped in an unfettered display of arousal, which was something Lucas didn't think he'd ever forget. Something about Wilson obviously made him feel completely comfortable, at least in these situations. There was this unguarded lust in his eyes as he snapped the bottle open, as his fingers disappeared below the sheets, as he started nipping harshly along Wilson's neck -
“Don't leave any marks,” Wilson breathed, and before the sentence was even out of his mouth, House had moved on to his collarbone. Regardless of whose fingers were where, it was clear who was in control. Above the blanket that was steadily slipping down House's back, Lucas could see his bare shoulder working, the minute little muscle movements of someone playing a kind of musical instrument.
In this case, Wilson.
He started crooning softly in his throat, long and drawn-out notes that were in perfect rhythm to the slow, circular movement of House's shoulder. Lucas didn't need to see to know where those fingers were, and when, and how much Wilson was enjoying it. His eyes were closed and he was biting his lip and one hand was clenched on House's shoulder, arcing slightly off the mattress to - presumably - deepen the angle. He could tell when House started doing something Wilson really liked by the way he squeezed his eyes shut even tighter and started babbling, soft non-sequitur nonsense in which words were only intermittently decipherable, pleas and demands and only one name.
The only really distinguishable request was “fuck me.”
The shoe caddy Lucas was sitting on suddenly became even more uncomfortable. And, really, the guys should start thinking about turning the thermostat down a little bit when they weren't planning to be home, because the air had become so thick that Lucas could barely breathe. Little streams of sweat were pouring down his temples as House pushed one of Wilson's legs up onto his shoulder, moving shakily, kissing Wilson with almost manic desperation. It was, of course, matched by the increasing rhythm of Wilson's hips as he - one imagined - took full advantage of House's long fingers.
Even with the sheets covering their hips, Lucas could pinpoint the precise moment House pushed into him.
Wilson cried out and arched his back, his eyes rolling back and fluttering shut, his teeth clamping down on his lower lip to restrain any further noise. They lay that way for what seemed like forever - Wilson bent in half with his legs over House's shoulders, House's arms pinned underneath him, House's face buried in his neck. Lucas could sense rather than see that they were both trembling, panting deeply, one or both of them letting out the occasional note of pleasure. Then Wilson grabbed House's face, kissed him more intensely than anyone Lucas had ever seen and started jogging his hips against the mattress.
House made this impossible-to-stifle noise and braced his hands on the mattress at either side of Wilson's head, thrusting forward experimentally. This made Wilson cry out in what sounded like German and reach back for the headboard, giving himself better leverage. His ankles slipped from House's shoulders to his hips, taking the blanket with them.
So there was nothing at all blocking Lucas's view.
House's head was bowed and his back was heaving, his shoulder blades jutting out and his hips pressed forward, his arms shaking with the effort of supporting his weight. Wilson was just a mess, his head lolling back and forth, sweat plastering the tips of his hair to his forehead, writhing around in an advanced state of pleasurable distress. And, from what Lucas could see sandwiched between their abdomens, loving it.
House pushed into him again and Lucas knew he should stop watching, but there was something blindly fascinating about the reactions he got; the air shook with a full-fledged shout as he knocked Wilson another inch up the mattress, a loud brass note that tempered into little staccato whines as House found what was apparently a good rhythm, his hips moving in slow, shallow circles, the bedsprings making a long and continuous whine, each thrust knocking deep, masculine sounds from Wilson's chest.
When he started moaning 'House' in a voice just a half-octave up from Barry White's, things started getting a little out of hand.
House groaned - loudly - and ran his tongue up the side of Wilson's neck, laying sloppy kiss around his Adam's apple. The bed started squeaking in earnest, sounding not dissimilar to a washing machine on the spin cycle. Wilson started groaning with what seemed to be no regard for his cool, professional persona, shouting obscenities to God or the ceiling - Lucas was having trouble keeping track. Probably because House chose this moment to grab Wilson's shoulders, kiss him fiercely, and start moaning unreservedly into Wilson's hair.
Lucas shut his eyes and buried his face in the corner. He shouldn't be watching this, and he definitely shouldn't be sort of...intrigued by this. He'd just come in here to sabotage the safety of House's bathroom, not to get free porn and sort of half-question the nuances of his own sexuality...
But hey, free porn.
He couldn't have ignored those noises anyway. House was no longer holding back, moaning on almost every exhale, a nearly-continuous sound that was so raw and reckless and un-House-like that Lucas pretty much had to know what was causing it.
It was a good thing the guys were both making noises, because what Lucas saw made an involuntary grunt rise in his throat.
Wilson had apparently gotten tired of House's slow, grinding torture because they'd switched positions: House sitting up against the pillows with Wilson on his lap, vigorously fucking himself on House's dick.
The situation was made worse (better?) by the fact that he could see the several inches of space between them each time Wilson lifted his hips, that the position allowed them to make out furiously, that they were both moaning with each slap of hips. House worked a hand in between them and grabbed Wilson's cock and Lucas felt his own anatomy twitch in empathy, although that would probably stay between him and the closet door. Wilson's head snapped back on his shoulders and his knees spread further apart and Lucas's mouth was suddenly dry, because those desperate little grunts could only mean -
“House!”
Seeing a guy come for the first time wasn't nearly as shocking as Lucas might have thought, even though he wasn't sure if Wilson was a reliable test case - he started crying out and working his hips and trembling on House's lap long before Lucas noticed the thick fluid running down House's knuckles. Wilson's final frenzied movements clearly had their intended biological effect: House grabbed Wilson's thighs hard enough to potentially bruise and arched up sharply into him, both making noises of such high caliber that Lucas couldn't help but wonder if his own sexual repertoire could use some updating.
He sat there with his knees pressed firmly together while House and Wilson recovered, foreheads pressed together, passing the same hot breath back and forth. House's hands were sliding up and down the damp-looking skin of Wilson's back and Wilson was kissing House's temple, his eyes closed, a tiny smile on his face. Once they both stopped panting, Wilson pulled back and lay down on his side, his back (and everything else) facing Lucas in the closet.
A second later, House was pulling the covers over him, pushing him to his back, kissing him quietly on the mouth.
“Mmm,” Wilson said, a sleepy sort of laugh in his voice, “I hope you know you're still cleaning up the bathroom.”
House smiled. Actually, honestly, smiled. “Apology accepted, then,” he said, not a question. Then he kissed Wilson softly between his eyes, along his cheek, on his lips -
A little worm of discomfort squirmed through Lucas's chest and he turned away. For the first time, he was spying on something too private.
He looked up only when he heard the bed shifting, in time to catch House settling half on top of Wilson's chest, his eyes closed and his breathing slow. “Don't fall asleep,” Wilson mumbled, right before promptly falling asleep himself.
Lucas waited ten minutes before deciding that they were too exhausted to wake up, before taking a deep breath and standing up in utter silence. It took him a full minute to get out of the closet quietly - it was a good thing the guys had been too busy to remember to close the bedroom door. He slipped into the hall, taking a step maybe once every thirty seconds, cursing the hard wood flooring. Ten more feet and he'd be home free, and no one would ever have to know what he'd witnessed or that he'd kind of, sort of, in a really abstract way, enjoyed it a little -
The bedroom door closed behind him.
“Leaving so soon?”
He spun around to see a half-dressed, smug, sticky, sexually satisfied House, standing proudly in the hall with his cane and his pajama pants. “You should stick around for the encore. I have a feeling it's going to be a good one.”
There were literally no words. Lucas gaped for several seconds, in which time his heart stopped and his lungs started clamping down and his stomach dropped several feet. “I - you - ”
House smirked, keeping his voice low, presumably for Wilson's benefit. “Thanks for the possum; you saved me the trouble of actually sitting down and apologizing to him. Wilson would thank you too, but he's never going to find out about this, right?”
Lucas would sooner talk to Wilson about this than he would his own grandmother. “R-right. No problem.”
House nodded, still smiling evilly. “The next time you break into someone's home, it might be a good idea not to wear so much of that god-awful cologne.”
Lucas swallowed his heart again. “You knew? The whole time?”
House shrugged. “I knew that you had been here. That you stayed in the closet the whole time is something you'll have to figure out on your own.”
He turned towards the bathroom, where he was presumably going to clean up possum turds. “See you around the steam room,” he said in an especially sarcastic tone, jerking his head towards the front door -
“Hey, House,” Lucas said, suddenly needing to say something, to put the lid on a suspicion he'd had since the day House hired him to follow the wayward oncologist. “...Congratulations, you know? Just - don't screw it up.”
House stared at him for a long time, a glimpse of something real poking out around the edges. “Same to you,” he said slowly, then shut the bathroom door.
Lucas left with a smile and a sense of finality. He was going to have to remember the thing about the aftershave.
He was also going to have to have sex with Lisa as soon as possible, for reasons he would keep to himself.
Author: magie_05
Rating/Warnings: NC-17, ~voyeurism~
Summary: Another *late* post-ep, based on spoilers/speculation for tonight's ep, 6x13. ~Someone~ sneaks into House and Wilson's apartment, but the real joke is on him. (I wrote this just so I could use the title, lol wordplay)
Lucas had been willing to accept that House's subconscious had nailed his girlfriend.
Really, the guy had been hooked on painkillers at the time, and he'd even been locked up in the nuthouse for it, months after his employee's suicide and not even a year after going through all that shit with Wilson. Anybody could snap and fantasize about something as dramatic as doing Lisa Cuddy.
It happened to Lucas all the time.
But seriously, House had been being sort of a dick for no reason lately. It wasn't Lisa's fault that she hadn't slept with him in real life. And even if it sort of half-was, that didn't give House the right to be a jerk to her over it. He was getting a little tired of always being able to tell when House and Lisa had just had some sort of run-in. She became all cold and distant and more likely to go into long, screechy, ball-shriveling tirades about small domestic issues, like...bread.
It was the thing with the photograph that prompted action.
Seriously, House could only use the 'I'm crazy' excuse for so long before it just got annoying. So Lucas, like any good boyfriend, followed him home from the hospital.
He thought it was weird enough that House took a detour to some place in the suburbs on the way and then didn't even go inside, but it was even weirder when he drove back into the city and led Lucas to a familiar-looking part of town.
Familiar, because he'd been there not two weeks earlier.
So House was the one who had bought Lisa's top pick out from under them. As much of an ass as House was, this move still seemed out-of-character, too diabolical even for him. She had even called her mom about this place.
Lucas considered going straight home and bringing Lisa back here so she could see for herself...
...but then he thought about what it would be like being in an enclosed space with her when she found out.
So, instead, he just put a possum in House's bathtub.
He'd wanted to get a skunk, but those things were way harder to catch. He'd had a couple of bags of Corn Nuts in the glove compartment and a plastic bag in the floorboard. The hardest part was finding a box big enough to keep the thing in until Wilson and House both left for work the next morning.
Then it was simply a matter of dressing up like a maintenance worker and picking a few locks.
He felt much better afterwards, and it was much easier to help Lisa keep a level head once he'd forced a little karma.
Hearing that House and Wilson were squabbling over it, however, made the whole thing more interesting.
Obviously he needed a redo if House was enjoying this. He'd simply had to sneak back in and loosen the bathtub's safety bars, if just out of morbid curiosity. Sort of a bitch move to do that to a handicapped guy, but that was the point: it would be worth it to see if House blamed Wilson for it and what his retaliation would be.
Honestly, he didn't expect for House and Wilson both to come home in the middle of the day.
He'd retreated to the nearest open doorway the moment he heard the key in the front door, inwardly relieved that he'd remembered to re-lock the door on his way in. It was always awkward getting caught searching someone's home; he'd lost more clients that way.
The room he found himself in was neat and vaguely stylish and free of boxes, so obviously it was Wilson's. He ducked into the closet, screwdriver in hand, thinking that House and Wilson were probably just taking their lunch breaks so surely he wouldn't be here long -
“...who goes out and catches a possum?” Wilson was saying, his voice sort of shrill and quavery - Lucas had never him heard talk to anyone else like that. “I almost had to call Animal Control! We've been here two weeks and already the neighbors all think we're insane - ”
“There's nothing in our lease that says we can't have a pet,” House said gleefully. Lucas had never heard him talk to anyone else like that either.
“That thing could have bitten my arm off!” Lucas snorted to himself in the darkness between the numerous ties and sports jackets; Wilson could be such a drama queen -
“You're such a drama queen,” House announced proudly. From the direction of his voice, they were somewhere around the bathroom. “The thing was obviously more scared of your shrieking than you were of it. Look how many times you made it shit its pants.”
Wilson made a noise like “oh-ho” which, even without seeing his facial expression, sounded ominous. “Right, my mistake; next time I'll be more hospitable to the giant rats you leave lying around the apartment.”
“It's a marsupial.”
“Uh-huh. And any particular reason you invited said marsupial into our bathroom?”
Lucas figured this was where House would balk and admit he didn't do it, and then Lucas could relax and enjoy the resultant bitch match from the safety of the closet. He put his ear a little closer to the slightly open door, expecting a nice payoff -
“Why pick just one reason?” House asked, his voice traveling down the hall. “So many awesome ones to choose from. Like the fact that you keep 'forgetting' to close the bathroom door while you're blow-drying or that you ate all the Fruit Loops or that you've been a sanctimonious ass the last few days - ”
“I've been an ass? All I did was tell you to apologize to Cuddy - ”
“You didn't care about her,” House said, with a flare of the dramatic. “If anyone needs to apologize to her, it's you; you're the one who stole this little love-nest out from under her.”
Lucas almost swallowed his tongue.
“Separate issue,” Wilson said loftily. “What I did didn't involve the risk of rabies or the destruction of our new thirty-dollar bathmat -”
“You spent thirty dollars on a bathmat?”
“ - and it actually had a point, as opposed to whatever twisted psychological truth you hoped to demonstrate with the possum.”
“You spent thirty dollars on a bathmat?”
Wilson made a sound of frustration and pushed his way into his bedroom, causing Lucas to shrink back a few inches, hidden behind the door and an old suitcase. “I'm not arguing about this anymore. You can clean up the bathroom, or you can spend all your hooker money on a maid who enjoys a challenge. Your choice.”
Through the crack above the closet door hinge, Lucas had a telescopic view of Wilson as he slumped into his bedroom, his hair sticking up in erratic little tufts, as if he'd been grabbing at it throughout the overheard conversation. House hovered behind him in the bedroom doorway, one hand on his cane and the other propped casually on the door frame. “You remember the bowl of water?”
“If that's a metaphor, I think you're getting a little rusty,” said Wilson, dropping his jacket to the foot of the bed, a look on his face which appeared to be a modified version of a pout.
“Fine - you remember the pants you ruined?” House sidled up behind him with a look of pure intent on his face - intent for what, Lucas had no idea. “The ones that finally got you to snap out of your denial and depression over your third divorce and finally act like yourself again?”
“The way I remember it, that was punishment for refusing to play your little game while we were living in your apartment.” Lucas mentally connected the idea of the two of them living together before with the mention of soiled pants, an intriguing scenario all around.
“And the chair,” House said, his voice suddenly softer, taking another step until he was hovering over Wilson's shoulder, “when you came back to work. And the fake hooker girlfriend, and the pile of empty syringes.”
“You're not going to guilt me into cleaning up possum crap,” Wilson said, occupied with plugging his cell phone into the charger on his night-table, even though Lucas could tell from the angle that he could feel House breathing on his neck, staring over his shoulder - standing practically on top of him.
“Wasn't trying to.” His voice was now so soft that Lucas could barely hear over his own shallow breathing, softer than he would have ever thought House could speak. “I'm just continuing the tradition. I mess with you, you mess with me. Sort of our version of a truce.”
So House was taking credit for the possum thing just to score cool points with Wilson - that didn't make any sense. Then again, most things about House and Wilson didn't make a lot of sense sometimes, like the way they were always together even when they were at each others' throats, or the way they kind of stared at and talked about each other a lot, or the reason Lucas had met them in the first place -
Or the way they were kissing in Wilson's bedroom.
It had taken an entire paragraph of thought for him to recognize that House wasn't just picking something out of Wilson's hair but rather running his fingers through it, dragging his thumb across Wilson's cheek, eventually leaning in to brush his mouth along Wilson's jaw. “You said you wanted an apology,” was about all Lucas caught before Wilson quite obviously caved, letting his eyes slip shut, opening his mouth for what was most definitely House's tongue.
Lucas felt his stomach fill with mercury. There was no way he was really seeing this. House wasn't really pressing determined little kisses against Wilson's open mouth, just like he wasn't slipping his hands down Wilson's back, tugging his hips slightly forward, pressing him slightly into the nightstand. “So the possum was just your way of christening this place?” Wilson asked when he had control of his own mouth, hiding a smile in House's shirt collar.
House mumbled something which Lucas immediately translated as 'did that already' directly into Wilson's ear, eliciting the kind of smile which was impossible to fake and, from what Lucas knew of Wilson, exceedingly rare. He grasped at House's shirt collar and pulled him in harder, and Lucas distinctly saw a flash of pink as his tongue skimmed along the corner of House's mouth.
This so wasn't happening. Lucas had slipped and fallen in House and Wilson's bathroom and banged his head on the sink and was lying there unconscious and bleeding, not trapped in the closet with a perfect side-view of two presumably straight guys making out against a nightstand, very slowly but steadily moving toward the bed. He thought maybe if he just closed his eyes and took a deep breath, this would all turn out to be some kind of grand and really, really convincing practical joke - but when he looked back, hands were up shirts, Wilson's tie was undone, House's cane lay forgotten on the floor. He was absolutely sure he had gone crazy when he thought he saw Wilson gently coaxing House to sit on the edge of the mattress and then slowly straddling him, his back to the closet, his lips (from the sounds of it) never leaving House's mouth. Then Wilson's shirt slipped slowly down his bare shoulders and Lucas had to look at the ceiling.
House and Wilson were going to have sex right next to him and there was really nothing he could do about it. All he could think about at the moment was getting out of this apartment and never thinking of this again. Not that he cared that they were sleeping together - it just sort of called into question his pre-established ideas about the two of them - like that House wanted to nail his girlfriend and that Wilson wanted to nail every needy blond in his general vicinity and that they weren't nailing each other in their free time -
“Ohhhh,” someone moaned loudly, as if in contradiction.
Lucas felt his head turn itself on his neck like The Exorcist, forcing him to look through the crack in the door. Wilson had obviously been the source of that deep, desperate sound, as House's mouth was currently engaged in a studious exploration of Wilson's neck. They were lying down already, Wilson on his back with House on top of him, both shirtless, with House's hand slowly undoing Wilson's zipper. Lucas was hit with a renewed wave of shock at how casual they were being about it all, smooth and eager and well-practiced, like it was something they did often and Lucas was just going to stop thinking right now.
Wilson moaned again when House's hand found its prize, the sound ending in a little 'squeak.' He slid his hands from House's shoulders and down the smooth arch of his back, gripping the waistband of his jeans to tug his hips closer, wrapping a leg around House's back and kissing him hungrily. The leg blocked Lucas's view - which, as he reminded himself, was a good thing - so he couldn't really see Wilson's hands as he confidently undid House's jeans. He could only see and hear the results.
“Ohgod,” one of them - presumably Wilson - croaked out as they started rocking gently against the mattress. As both of their flies were open and Wilson had both legs wrapped around House's hips and they were moving rather rhythmically, it didn't take much for Lucas to figure out the mechanics of what was going on down there, especially when Wilson slipped a hand in between them and House started sweating at his temples. Actually, Lucas spent more of his mental energy trying to figure out exactly why he was still looking -
“Not that I'm...complaining,” Wilson burbled out between steady, shallow rolls of House's hips against his, “but...what brought this on at 1:30 in the afternoon on a Monday, hm?”
“Oh, I dunno,” House said lowly right into his ear, sounding considerably more self-possessed than his friend but with a edge of breathlessness to his words, “you just sorta smell good and make me laugh.”
It must have been an inside thing, because Wilson laughed sheepishly to himself and even from ten feet away, Lucas could see the spots of color blossoming on his cheekbones. “I'm flattered,” he said airily, and then proved his words by reaching down to pull down House's jeans.
Lucas found a convoluted tie to stare at. He had sort of been half-hoping that the grinding was as far as it would go, because that, at least, was something he chalk up to pure, instinctual horniness. The idea of House and Wilson being naked together on what appeared to be a regular basis was something he was still trying to process, and it was all moving a little fast for him.
He heard the soft flump that meant that somebody’s pants had hit the floor, heard House curse under his breath and then more wet sounds of very insistent kissing. Pure, sick curiosity forced him to crack one eye open and glance through the slot to see House's hands gripping Wilson's hair, holding him still for an all-out assault of kisses - Wilson's fingertips digging into the now-exposed flesh of House's ass, leaving little white marks in their wake - Wilson's slacks very slowly receding down his hips, as he squirmed out of them under House's weight -
It was at this point it hit Lucas the hardest: the two of them were going to fuck, pure and simple and right next to him. It was insane - no more than twenty minutes ago, he was sabotaging House for being an ass (and yeah, okay, for being competition) for his girlfriend and now House was in the process of screwing a guy, his best friend, a person he'd been so desperate to keep that he'd hired a professional stalker just to keep tabs on him, just to make sure he was happy -
Insane, except that it made perfect sense.
All the looks and the obsession and the tongue-in-cheek innuendo suddenly took on a new meaning, now that Lucas was watching - er, being forced to watch as House slid his hands under Wilson's shoulders, holding him close and pushing most of his tongue into Wilson's mouth, his eyes squeezed shut, his brow furrowed as if in the best kind of pain. They were under the covers now, which - luckily, Lucas reminded himself - blocked his view of what was happening between their hips, even though the rhythmic squeaking of the mattress and Wilson's erratic, stifled grunts really didn't leave a whole lot to the imagination. His hands worked down the sweat-gleaming skin of House's back and disappeared below the sheets, settling somewhere around House's ass, holding on as he was ground steadily into the mattress, sound and speed and heat building with every quick, rough rotation, making him need to break the kiss to moan freely to the stuffy, overheated air -
It was hot. In the closet, Lucas meant, the air in the closet was warm and humid. Nothing was hot about what he was seeing, not 'hot' in the pop-culture sense anyway. What he was seeing was sort of like walking in on your parents - if your parents weren't your parents and were both male and were making all kinds of interesting noises into to sweat-dampened sheets -
He watched House mumble something inaudible into Wilson's ear, but judging from the smug, clever look on House's face and the sheepish, awkward blush on Wilson's, it was something particularly creative. Whatever it was seemed to cause an instant and mutual reaction in both men: they both reached out to the night-table at precisely the same moment, nearly pulling out the drawer in their combined haste. Lucas felt his eyes bug out a little when Wilson finally extracted a familiar-looking bottle from the drawer and forced it into House's hand, pushing aside the pillows so he could lie flat on his back, his eyes flicking intently from House's mouth to this hands to some point well below his navel, the pink tip of his tongue darting out to wet his lips.
“Fuck,” House gasped in an unfettered display of arousal, which was something Lucas didn't think he'd ever forget. Something about Wilson obviously made him feel completely comfortable, at least in these situations. There was this unguarded lust in his eyes as he snapped the bottle open, as his fingers disappeared below the sheets, as he started nipping harshly along Wilson's neck -
“Don't leave any marks,” Wilson breathed, and before the sentence was even out of his mouth, House had moved on to his collarbone. Regardless of whose fingers were where, it was clear who was in control. Above the blanket that was steadily slipping down House's back, Lucas could see his bare shoulder working, the minute little muscle movements of someone playing a kind of musical instrument.
In this case, Wilson.
He started crooning softly in his throat, long and drawn-out notes that were in perfect rhythm to the slow, circular movement of House's shoulder. Lucas didn't need to see to know where those fingers were, and when, and how much Wilson was enjoying it. His eyes were closed and he was biting his lip and one hand was clenched on House's shoulder, arcing slightly off the mattress to - presumably - deepen the angle. He could tell when House started doing something Wilson really liked by the way he squeezed his eyes shut even tighter and started babbling, soft non-sequitur nonsense in which words were only intermittently decipherable, pleas and demands and only one name.
The only really distinguishable request was “fuck me.”
The shoe caddy Lucas was sitting on suddenly became even more uncomfortable. And, really, the guys should start thinking about turning the thermostat down a little bit when they weren't planning to be home, because the air had become so thick that Lucas could barely breathe. Little streams of sweat were pouring down his temples as House pushed one of Wilson's legs up onto his shoulder, moving shakily, kissing Wilson with almost manic desperation. It was, of course, matched by the increasing rhythm of Wilson's hips as he - one imagined - took full advantage of House's long fingers.
Even with the sheets covering their hips, Lucas could pinpoint the precise moment House pushed into him.
Wilson cried out and arched his back, his eyes rolling back and fluttering shut, his teeth clamping down on his lower lip to restrain any further noise. They lay that way for what seemed like forever - Wilson bent in half with his legs over House's shoulders, House's arms pinned underneath him, House's face buried in his neck. Lucas could sense rather than see that they were both trembling, panting deeply, one or both of them letting out the occasional note of pleasure. Then Wilson grabbed House's face, kissed him more intensely than anyone Lucas had ever seen and started jogging his hips against the mattress.
House made this impossible-to-stifle noise and braced his hands on the mattress at either side of Wilson's head, thrusting forward experimentally. This made Wilson cry out in what sounded like German and reach back for the headboard, giving himself better leverage. His ankles slipped from House's shoulders to his hips, taking the blanket with them.
So there was nothing at all blocking Lucas's view.
House's head was bowed and his back was heaving, his shoulder blades jutting out and his hips pressed forward, his arms shaking with the effort of supporting his weight. Wilson was just a mess, his head lolling back and forth, sweat plastering the tips of his hair to his forehead, writhing around in an advanced state of pleasurable distress. And, from what Lucas could see sandwiched between their abdomens, loving it.
House pushed into him again and Lucas knew he should stop watching, but there was something blindly fascinating about the reactions he got; the air shook with a full-fledged shout as he knocked Wilson another inch up the mattress, a loud brass note that tempered into little staccato whines as House found what was apparently a good rhythm, his hips moving in slow, shallow circles, the bedsprings making a long and continuous whine, each thrust knocking deep, masculine sounds from Wilson's chest.
When he started moaning 'House' in a voice just a half-octave up from Barry White's, things started getting a little out of hand.
House groaned - loudly - and ran his tongue up the side of Wilson's neck, laying sloppy kiss around his Adam's apple. The bed started squeaking in earnest, sounding not dissimilar to a washing machine on the spin cycle. Wilson started groaning with what seemed to be no regard for his cool, professional persona, shouting obscenities to God or the ceiling - Lucas was having trouble keeping track. Probably because House chose this moment to grab Wilson's shoulders, kiss him fiercely, and start moaning unreservedly into Wilson's hair.
Lucas shut his eyes and buried his face in the corner. He shouldn't be watching this, and he definitely shouldn't be sort of...intrigued by this. He'd just come in here to sabotage the safety of House's bathroom, not to get free porn and sort of half-question the nuances of his own sexuality...
But hey, free porn.
He couldn't have ignored those noises anyway. House was no longer holding back, moaning on almost every exhale, a nearly-continuous sound that was so raw and reckless and un-House-like that Lucas pretty much had to know what was causing it.
It was a good thing the guys were both making noises, because what Lucas saw made an involuntary grunt rise in his throat.
Wilson had apparently gotten tired of House's slow, grinding torture because they'd switched positions: House sitting up against the pillows with Wilson on his lap, vigorously fucking himself on House's dick.
The situation was made worse (better?) by the fact that he could see the several inches of space between them each time Wilson lifted his hips, that the position allowed them to make out furiously, that they were both moaning with each slap of hips. House worked a hand in between them and grabbed Wilson's cock and Lucas felt his own anatomy twitch in empathy, although that would probably stay between him and the closet door. Wilson's head snapped back on his shoulders and his knees spread further apart and Lucas's mouth was suddenly dry, because those desperate little grunts could only mean -
“House!”
Seeing a guy come for the first time wasn't nearly as shocking as Lucas might have thought, even though he wasn't sure if Wilson was a reliable test case - he started crying out and working his hips and trembling on House's lap long before Lucas noticed the thick fluid running down House's knuckles. Wilson's final frenzied movements clearly had their intended biological effect: House grabbed Wilson's thighs hard enough to potentially bruise and arched up sharply into him, both making noises of such high caliber that Lucas couldn't help but wonder if his own sexual repertoire could use some updating.
He sat there with his knees pressed firmly together while House and Wilson recovered, foreheads pressed together, passing the same hot breath back and forth. House's hands were sliding up and down the damp-looking skin of Wilson's back and Wilson was kissing House's temple, his eyes closed, a tiny smile on his face. Once they both stopped panting, Wilson pulled back and lay down on his side, his back (and everything else) facing Lucas in the closet.
A second later, House was pulling the covers over him, pushing him to his back, kissing him quietly on the mouth.
“Mmm,” Wilson said, a sleepy sort of laugh in his voice, “I hope you know you're still cleaning up the bathroom.”
House smiled. Actually, honestly, smiled. “Apology accepted, then,” he said, not a question. Then he kissed Wilson softly between his eyes, along his cheek, on his lips -
A little worm of discomfort squirmed through Lucas's chest and he turned away. For the first time, he was spying on something too private.
He looked up only when he heard the bed shifting, in time to catch House settling half on top of Wilson's chest, his eyes closed and his breathing slow. “Don't fall asleep,” Wilson mumbled, right before promptly falling asleep himself.
Lucas waited ten minutes before deciding that they were too exhausted to wake up, before taking a deep breath and standing up in utter silence. It took him a full minute to get out of the closet quietly - it was a good thing the guys had been too busy to remember to close the bedroom door. He slipped into the hall, taking a step maybe once every thirty seconds, cursing the hard wood flooring. Ten more feet and he'd be home free, and no one would ever have to know what he'd witnessed or that he'd kind of, sort of, in a really abstract way, enjoyed it a little -
The bedroom door closed behind him.
“Leaving so soon?”
He spun around to see a half-dressed, smug, sticky, sexually satisfied House, standing proudly in the hall with his cane and his pajama pants. “You should stick around for the encore. I have a feeling it's going to be a good one.”
There were literally no words. Lucas gaped for several seconds, in which time his heart stopped and his lungs started clamping down and his stomach dropped several feet. “I - you - ”
House smirked, keeping his voice low, presumably for Wilson's benefit. “Thanks for the possum; you saved me the trouble of actually sitting down and apologizing to him. Wilson would thank you too, but he's never going to find out about this, right?”
Lucas would sooner talk to Wilson about this than he would his own grandmother. “R-right. No problem.”
House nodded, still smiling evilly. “The next time you break into someone's home, it might be a good idea not to wear so much of that god-awful cologne.”
Lucas swallowed his heart again. “You knew? The whole time?”
House shrugged. “I knew that you had been here. That you stayed in the closet the whole time is something you'll have to figure out on your own.”
He turned towards the bathroom, where he was presumably going to clean up possum turds. “See you around the steam room,” he said in an especially sarcastic tone, jerking his head towards the front door -
“Hey, House,” Lucas said, suddenly needing to say something, to put the lid on a suspicion he'd had since the day House hired him to follow the wayward oncologist. “...Congratulations, you know? Just - don't screw it up.”
House stared at him for a long time, a glimpse of something real poking out around the edges. “Same to you,” he said slowly, then shut the bathroom door.
Lucas left with a smile and a sense of finality. He was going to have to remember the thing about the aftershave.
He was also going to have to have sex with Lisa as soon as possible, for reasons he would keep to himself.