Secrets

[dr_j_wilson]

Who: House, Wilson
Where: House's office
What: Wilson wants some answers
When: early afternoon, 29 May

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[dr_j_wilson]

"Compared to you, I'm an open book," Wilson retorted. He flung his hands to the side as if to illustrate just how open he was. And sure, that was maybe a bit of an exaggeration. He'd had his secrets but right now none of them were significant. None of them had to do with House.

Wilson had gone into this relationship the way he always did, with the desire for a strong, solid partnership. One where secrets wouldn't be welcome or necessary. It was even more important to him this time, because he had the gut feeling that if he couldn't make this thing with House work, that would be it. It would be the last time he ever tried to have a relationship.

Wilson pushed up from the chair and paced toward the door. This was going all wrong, and quickly. He'd come to House's office intending to give House a little grief over Cuddy's birthday present. Intending to needle him a bit for being such a secretive ass. Now he knew there was something more significant that House was hiding. Maybe Wilson was overreacting. Maybe he was letting his imagination run away with him. Or maybe he knew House too well and knew House was capable of doing things Wilson wouldn't imagine. He certainly had never imagined he'd walk in on House with a hooker.

He turned back toward House, one hand on his hip, the other rubbing at his neck. "You told me you did something wrong, just now. The fact that you don't want me to know about it is proof enough." Wilson gave a dry, almost bitter chuckle as he let his hand drop from neck to his hip.

"And here's the kicker--I have no idea what it is you did."

[dr_gregoryhouse]

House thought Wilson was going to leave at first, and part of him wanted Wilson to leave so he could just avoid this whole... thing. But when Wilson faced back around and said House had done something wrong, House's defensive spiked a further few degrees.

"I didn't do anything!" he replied, his tone just a couple of notches below yelling level. And by 'do', he was referring to doing anything with Cade specifically. He pushed himself up from his chair, a feeling of bewilderment settling in. If Cade wasn't what Wilson had come to confront him over... then what was he here for? What secret was Wilson otherwise accusing him of?

He gave his face a fretful rub. He wanted to ask why the hell Wilson was here - but he was pretty sure Wilson wasn't going to answer him directly, not now that House had successfully managed to corner himself. How the hell was he going to get out of this? He could either keep evading and hope Wilson will come out with the reason he was here, or he could just come out with it himself. Either way, it wasn't going to be good for him.

He looked down to his desk and felt his stomach churn with dread as he mustered the courage to just come clean. God, and at work, too, where anyone could walk in on them.

"I didn't do anything," he repeated in a calmer voice. He raised his eyes to Wilson. He drew in a deep breath and then looked away again. "Nothing happened."

[dr_j_wilson]

Wilson's heart sank a bit. He'd used that "nothing happened" line with his wives, too. It's not what you think. Nothing happened. Perfectly good statements except that Wilson had unfortunately had too much experience of those words meaning just the opposite. He was starting to think he was the target of some kind of cosmic retribution. All these years he'd been the one inflicting the hurt, however unintentional, and now he was getting all kinds of lessons in how it felt from the other side.

Of course, there had been times when 'nothing happened' really meant nothing had happened. Times when he'd been accused of straying before he'd actually strayed. Sometimes even before he'd consciously been aware of the fact that he was close to straying. Still, his wives had probably noticed something that made them suspicious, just like he was now suspicious of House.

If that were the case, if it were only House's thoughts that had strayed, how would he feel about it? Well, the fact that House might be looking elsewhere certainly made him feel incredibly insecure, and hurt. On the other hand, he'd much rather find out before anything happened. If he could find out exactly what House was thinking, maybe they could deal with it before anything could happen.

"I'm going to take you at your word and believe that nothing happened." Wilson's voice was low, just barely loud enough for House to hear. He wanted to get to the bottom of this but he didn't want the entire hospital listening in. "I also believe that you thought about something happening, and we do need to talk about that."

[dr_gregoryhouse]

House didn't want the rest of the hospital knowing, either, and he certainly didn't want to be having this kind of conversation in his office. Or at home. Or anywhere, ever. He couldn't meet Wilson's eyes, just remained staring across at the empty conference room. Wilson had managed to cut right to the core of it: House had thought about something happening, but not because he was looking anywhere else. Only because he was curious. Still trying to figure out his sexuality.

Not knowing where to put himself because of how awkward he felt, House resorted to slumping back down onto his seat and chanced a quick, guilty look at Wilson. "Like I said, it's not what you think," he said in a voice that was equally as low as Wilson's had been.

He made himself train his gaze on Wilson as he sat forward, propping his elbows on his desk and clasping his hands together. "Not going to talk about it here," he added. He dropped his eyes down to the medical journal left open in front of him. "Is that what you came in here for? Because if you have nothing else to say, then I guess I'll see you 'round."

[dr_j_wilson]

"Actually, I came in here to find out why you'd neglected to tell me about this birthday present 'we' gave Cuddy. But that seems rather insignificant now."

Wilson pressed his lips together in a thin line. He didn't want to talk about it here either. It was neither the time nor the place to air their personal problems...although that hadn't stopped House from ripping into Cuddy when he needed to unburden himself. Still, Wilson had never liked making a scene. He didn't like being the object of attention or idle curiosity. It was an attitude that made it difficult at times to be friends with House, given House's occasional tendency to be an instigator, not to mention drama queen.

However, Wilson didn't appreciate being summarily dismissed. He would've liked House to at least acknowledge that Wilson had a right to know what was going on. Maybe he didn't have a right to know everything House thought or did, but he did have a right to know about the things that affected their relationship. And there was no way House's thoughts about someone else could not have an affect on their relationship.

"Fine," he said tersely. Remembering how House had attacked Cuddy that Saturday made him all too aware that it wasn't a good idea to push it. He threw his hands up in frustration, though, as he turned toward the door. "You know where to find me...if you decide to pull your head out of your ass."

[dr_gregoryhouse]

House darted his eyes up to Wilson when Cuddy's birthday present was mentioned. Oh, crap. That was what Wilson had come up here to talk about? That was it? God, why didn't he even think about that? He'd been meaning to tell Wilson... at some point about the present. Maybe. Or maybe not. He dropped his face into his hands for a moment, wanting so badly to kick himself.

He wasn't sure there was any point in explaining why he'd never told Wilson about the gift. Not that there was really that much to explain, not in comparison to the explaining he was going to have to do about Cade. "I didn't want to make a thing of it," he said as he lifted his head to look at Wilson's back. He threw his hands up in annoyance at himself and sat back in his seat with a sigh, dropping his hands to his lap.

He stared down at the medical journal, feeling foolish, guilty and filled with unease. "Wanted to do something..." he said, his words almost a mumble. "I don't know, nice. For Cuddy. She deserved it..."

Wilson was right: that now seemed completely insignificant. Resting his elbow on the armrest of his chair, he braced his chin against his knuckles and peered absently down at his desk.

[dr_j_wilson]

Wilson turned back when House spoke. He leaned back against the door as House explained, and tried to pretend there wasn't more than a room's length of space between them. A few feet in actual distance, much more than that in psychological terms.

"Only you would feel uncomfortable about doing something nice," he said with a sigh. He really didn't understand it. Was House afraid of ruining his reputation as a bastard? Was he afraid people might actually like him? Or was he just afraid people would expect him to do more nice things?

"It worked, by the way. She really enjoyed her weekend." It would've been nice if Wilson could've enjoyed her enjoyment without being distracted by the fact that he supposed to know about it and didn't. He supposed he should be grateful it was Cuddy he'd been talking to. She knew how House operated and, aside from that typical 'what the hell?' feeling one got from dealing with House, she hadn't been too surprised or curious about Wilson's lack of knowledge. He hadn't had to waste a lot of time and energy trying to pretend he had a clue.

Hell, maybe he should be grateful House had decided to keep that little secret, since that's what had clued Wilson into the larger one. Vaguely suspicious feelings were normal when dealing with House. Wilson probably would've put them down to his own feelings of uncertainty and insecurity. It was unlikely he would've pressed House on the matter without something more substantial on which to base his suspicions.

"I fail to see how telling me would've made it a 'thing'," Wilson said. "In fact, not telling me seems to have created an even bigger thing."

[dr_gregoryhouse]

Well, it was good to know Cuddy enjoyed the weekend, except House was too distracted to really pay much attention to that little detail right now. He shifted on his seat uncomfortably when Wilson said he failed to see the 'thing' in Cuddy's present. It was a 'thing' to House, a big thing, to try and make amends and wish her a happy birthday, let alone giving her the damn present. Telling Wilson would've just made it an even bigger thing to House, but in hindsight he should've told Wilson about it instead of leaving him in the dark. Because, yes, not telling him certainly did create a much bigger thing.

He lifted a hand and scratched his head, then dropped his hand to his desk with a slap. "Doesn't really matter now, whether it was a 'thing' or not, seeing you now know," House said. He shot Wilson a look as he slapped his medical journal shut. He knew resentment wasn't something he should be feeling, seeing he was the one who was guilty for lying, but House tended to place blame rather than admit that he was sorry or guilty. He was definitely resentful that Wilson hadn't been upfront about why he'd actually come here in the first place because if he had, then House wouldn't be worried so much about the Cade thing.

"Speaking of things," he said, his tone turning slightly cynical, "haven't you got any cancer 'things' to deal with?"

He pushed himself back up from the chair, picking the medical journal up with one hand and reaching for his cane with his other. "Me, I got a lunch 'thing', followed by a clinic duty 'thing', so why you go and do your 'thing' and we'll worry about other 'things' later."

[dr_j_wilson]

Wilson bit back an immediate retort. House seemed to think as long as everything sort of worked out in the end, it didn't matter how they got there. But it did matter. It mattered that Wilson had felt like an idiot. It mattered that he'd looked foolish in front of Cuddy who was, among other things, his boss. And it had been totally unnecessary except for the fact that House couldn't or wouldn't act like a normal human being.

Of course, Wilson was also feeling like an idiot that he hadn't been more aware of House's other secret. In that sense, it was better that he'd found out now because the longer it went on, the longer House spent looking elsewhere, the more stupid Wilson would've felt when he did finally discovered the secret. He wasn't in the mood to be grateful for lesser degrees of idiocy, though.

"Of course I've got things to do. I just happen to think the us thing was more important. But don't let me keep you," Wilson said. He made a sweeping and unmistakably sarcastic gesture at the door. "I know how important the clinic thing is to you."

[dr_gregoryhouse]

House had rounded his desk and was heading towards the door when Wilson said about the 'us thing' being important. House frowned slightly and came to a stop a feet or so in front of Wilson. Hearing him say the us thing was more important caused House to feel another stab of guilt.

Of course it was important. If his guilt was anything to go by, this thing between them was insanely important to House. He kept telling himself that nothing had happened between Cade and himself, except then his mind would remind him of the fact that he'd lied to Wilson and the fact that he'd thought about something happening between Cade and himself. Only for curiosity reasons, though, that was all. At least, he was pretty certain that was all.

He frowned further at Wilson's sarcastic words, his guilt quickly turning into annoyance and defensiveness again. "Who said the clinic thing was a matter of importance?" House snapped. "I told you, I'm not discussing the us thing here, so importance has nothing to do with it."

Well, maybe refusing to talk about it at work was a cop out, a way to stall for time because a discussion about the us thing in context of what he'd been hiding from Wilson was a conversation House didn't particularly want to have.

[dr_j_wilson]

"Since when do you get to unilaterally decide when and where and what we'll discuss? Seems to me you've had time to mention this before at your convenience but you didn't."

Wilson clenched his jaw to avoid saying any more. He knew--he knew pushing House was only going to make it worse but damn it, he got tired of having to defer to House's wishes. He also knew he was at least partly at fault for that because he had so often deferred to House in the past.

Judging by House's recent behavior, he'd had this little 'secret' for at least a week. He could've talked to Wilson at any time, any place and he hadn't. Probably wouldn't be talking about it now if Wilson hadn't tricked him into it. Wilson was utterly frustrated, and worried. Hadn't House learned anything from the hooker incident? They had to talk about this kind of thing or the relationship wasn't going to work.

"Fine," he said with a heavy sigh. Maybe he was the one who never learned because he wasn't going to push it, not here in the hospital. Maybe he hadn't learned anything from the hooker incident either because here he was, surprised and hurt all over again.

"You come find me when you are ready to talk," he said as he reached for the door handle. "But House--don't wait too long."