PATIENT - Chapter 20: Anger
Title: Patient
Author: zeppomarx
Characters: House, Wilson, Cuddy, plus the characters created for Priority’s Exigencies and zeppomarx’s A Gentle Knock at the Door.
Summary: House’s minions find a new patient, one who is reluctant to allow House to treat him. Begins three months after the opening scene of A Gentle Knock at the Door. Part of the Contract universe, which includes DIY Sheep’s intense and angsty The Contract, and Priority’s sequel Exigencies.
Thanks: To priority and houserocket7 for encouraging me to writing this side story to A Gentle Knock on the Door, and for their faithful diligence in copy editing my sloppy prose.
Warnings, etc.: Generally safe, but references to torture, rape and major character death that has happened in the past. Some chapters are pretty angsty.
Disclaimers: You know the drill. Don’t own `em, never did, never will. Wish I did.
This Chapter: Suddenly, House’s body began to twitch, his extremities flinging themselves randomly into the air. Almost as suddenly, his body collapsed back into its unnatural stillness. Then the monitors began to drone.
Start the story here:
Chapter 1
______________________________________
Chapter 20: Anger
Suddenly, House’s body began to twitch, his extremities flinging themselves randomly into the air. Almost as suddenly, his body collapsed back into its unnatural stillness. Then the monitors began to drone.
“Shit!” yelled Chase, while Foreman called, “Crash cart!”
Within seconds, they had ripped open House’s shirt and applied the paddles. Once. Twice. Three times… and his heart restarted. That was the good news. The bad news was that a few minutes later, he slipped into a coma.
“Oh, crap,” said Devi, panting with anxiety once everything calmed down again.
Chase and Foreman nodded. Once the five doctors had gotten House settled in a room, they had decided that House’s employees would take the first shift, because they had more experience with emergency situations. They would stay with House until he was more stable. Then Wilson and Cuddy would take over for a while. In the meantime, they were simply holding vigil, hoping House would wake up.
Half an hour later, Foreman was pacing the room, Chase sat in the corner with his head in his hands, and Devi sat by House’s side, holding his hand and watching both him and the monitors. Occasionally, she felt his muscles twitch; she kept a close eye on his lips and fingernails, which were still tinged blue.
An hour later, House began to moan, his eyelids fluttering slightly. Immediately, Foreman and Chase ran to his bedside, hoping he was about to regain consciousness. But then he settled back down, his breathing shallow and labored. Clearly, they were in for the long haul.
* * * *
Down the corridor, Rainie Adler stared blankly at the ceiling. Since House had left her room, she hadn’t spoken a word. Neither had she slept much; she just stared, her face a blank mask. Next to her sat Evan, gently holding her bandaged left hand, and psychiatrist Jacey Liu, who occasionally asked a question in hopes of getting an answer. None was forthcoming.
One floor up, Michael Tritter was awake again, methodically reading through the files fanned out over his bed. During the weeks he had built his case against House, he had taken no interest in House’s medical case history, never bothered to find out who he was as a doctor, never believed those who told him that House was an extraordinary physician, never accepted the idea that perhaps House’s physical pain was so intense that he took those drugs for a legitimate reason. Until now, all he’d ever looked at was House’s drug-taking, judging it as he would a junkie on the street.
He’d been so sure he was right, but now he was beginning to think he’d cut corners. He’d never even tried to put House into any kind of context.
So tired. Hard to think. Occasionally, over the last couple of days, he’d felt fear-fear that he had some incurable disease and would die. But now, when those feelings came upon him, he shoved them out of the way and renewed his efforts to find a way to force House to treat him fairly… to include him in that 95 percent success rate… never once considering the possibility that perhaps that was exactly what the doctor was already doing.
* * * *
At 3 a.m., Wilson dozed restlessly on the couch in his office. Downstairs, in her office, Cuddy did the same.
Around 4 a.m., House opened his eyes groggily, looked around the room, and then, feeling confused, closed his eyes and went to sleep. It happened so quickly that none of his guardians noticed.
At 6 a.m., Wilson and Cuddy appeared in House’s room, lugging enough breakfast-bagels, cream cheese, scrambled eggs, bacon, coffee, juice-to keep a small army traveling. Devi, Foreman and Chase accepted their share gratefully, and the five of them chatted briefly about House’s condition before their shift change. Then, Devi went back to the Diagnostics office and curled up on the sofa near the conference table, Chase headed for the doctor’s lounge to sleep and Foreman went home.
Down the hall, Rainie slept fitfully, Evan still at her side. Jacey Liu had gone home to catch a few hours of sleep, unaware that she might soon have to counsel a suicidal patient… if that patient survived long enough to be counseled.
Upstairs, Tritter woke with a start. This time he remembered his dream. It was about House, of course. But the House in this dream wasn’t the arrogant son-of-a-bitch who had flaunted his drug addiction in the clinic and refused to apologize for the thermometer incident, obliging Tritter to teach him a lesson. This House was very different.
The face in this dream was bruised and sliced and broken and shattered, sheer terror flooding out of his haunted eyes. This was House as he’d hoped to see him, beaten up, chewed up and spit out, the superiority squashed out of him.
As sleep left him, Tritter realized he’d seen that House before, in glimpses at a news conference and as paparazzi tackled him coming out of a courtroom. He thought about that face, conjuring it in his imagination, satisfied, thinking about how the man deserved it… and occasionally wondering how much House would blame him for wishing that kind of damage on him.
* * * *
Pain was what finally woke House up around 11 a.m. Slowly, he scanned the room, looking puzzled to see Wilson and Cuddy suddenly rushing to his side.
After a moment, once his two medical sentinels had examined him and given him a slightly higher dose of methadone for his pain, Cuddy looked down at him sadly, brushing her hand gently along the side of his face, and quietly asked, “Why?”
House flinched, jerking his head away. “First, do no harm,” he mumbled, whispering the words so quietly she wasn’t sure she’d even heard him say anything.
She and Wilson exchanged confused glances. Did he feel they’d harmed him by stopping his suicide attempt?
“I don’t understand,” said Wilson, trying not to let frustration seep into his voice. He couldn’t comprehend how House could have done this, after all the time Wilson had spent trying to help House put his life back together again.
House continued to look away from them. “Should have left well enough alone.” And then, as if needing to reiterate the idea, he added, “Why didn’t you leave me be?” That was all he said before his eyelids shut and he slid back into an unnaturally deep sleep.
Four hours later, he woke up again. Within seconds, Cuddy was by his side, examining his pupils and noting with relief that his nails and lips had begun to regain a more natural hue. House stared at her, his expression a mixture of anger and disappointment. After a long moment, he swallowed, then spoke.
“Why didn’t you leave well enough alone?” he repeated, as if he hadn’t said it earlier, his voice raspier than usual. “You should have let me die.” Then his eyes met hers, pleading. “Why didn’t you let me die?”
Her breath stuttered, and Cuddy felt her heart thumping in her chest as tears sprang to her eyes. She opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out. Searching his face for an answer, she finally replied, “You know we couldn’t do that. We… we couldn’t stand to lose you.”
“Selfish,” he muttered, his expressionless eyes drifting downward, as if daring her to disagree. “It was selfish of you, Cuddy.” Tilting his head slightly, House turned toward the wall, smashing his face into the pillow. Stunned and overcome by exhaustion and strong emotion, Cuddy remained still a moment. He was right, of course. She and Wilson, and the others to a lesser extent, wanted House alive for their own reasons, not his-alive at all costs, even if those costs meant that he would spend the rest of his life in unbearable physical and emotional pain. They hadn’t taken into account what might be best for him. When she tried again to engage him, he refused to speak, pursing his lips so tightly she could see his cheek muscles throbbing.
Wilson watched as Cuddy stood uselessly next to House’s bed, her shoulders slumped and her head bowed. He lowered his head to pick at a spot of what was probably, he realized, dried vomit on his trousers. Then, as if waking from a dream, he slowly looked up and dragged himself over to the bed. Gently but firmly, he turned House’s face toward him.
House tried to wrench his head from Wilson’s firm grasp, but didn’t have the strength to do so. A trickle of fear crossed his face. Shit, thought Wilson, lessening his grip just slightly, trying to smile reassuringly at the man who had been restrained enough for one lifetime. “Leave me alone,” House muttered through gritted teeth. “If you can’t let me die, then just leave me alone.”
An unnatural silence followed, painful, intense, intolerable. Why? Why now? Wilson wondered. Have we done the right thing? Should we have let him die?
“Not a chance,” replied Wilson finally. “Not until you tell us why.”
Again, House tried unsuccessfully to wrest his head from Wilson’s hands. Huffing an angry breath through his nose, he glared at his captor, rearing back into the mattress.
“Sorry, House, but you don’t get a pass on this,” said Wilson firmly, not letting go. “You know what we’re legally required to do in this situation. I don’t think you want that any more than we do. So if we’re going to leave you alone, then first you have to talk… you have to tell us why you did this.”
With no warning, tears welled up in House’s eyes, making them glisten and threatening to spill over onto his cheeks. Wilson felt House’s facial muscles contract and his whole head began to tremble as he gasped for air. His own emotions bubbling to the surface, Wilson loosened his uncertain grip even more, allowing House some freedom to move his head slightly. Slipping his left arm around the back of House’s head, he cradled House in the crook of his left elbow and held his face steady with his right hand.
“I-I c-can’t keep you s-safe,” House sighed at last, to Wilson’s horror. As the mask of self-control melted, House’s stuttering voice was barely a whisper. Then he clamped his mouth shut again.
“Not really your job,” said Wilson carefully, unsure of where this was going. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Cuddy standing stock-still, clasping House’s left hand between hers. She didn’t seem to be breathing; the scene from Wilson’s vantage point looked like a Victorian-era tableau: The Bedside Vigil.
House’s eyes looked past Wilson, briefly making contact with Cuddy and then fixing back on Wilson. “Dangerous,” was all he said at first. Then his gaze returned to Cuddy, whose face registered confusion. “You once said that anyone who knows me is bound to get hurt.” Cuddy nodded slowly, unable to fathom why that regrettable ancient conversation might precipitate something so drastic. Then he added, “You were right.”
Cuddy’s heart stopped a moment, and then stuttered forward again. “You don’t seriously think you’re some sort of jinx, do you? That… if you were…” She didn’t want to say the word, after they’d almost lost him just hours earlier. She could barely bring herself to think it, much less utter it. “…d-dead…” It caught in her throat. “…that we wouldn’t get hurt?”
“Something like that,” he said, the slightest of nods issuing forth.
“But House,” said Wilson gently, “don’t you know that if you were…” Damn. He stumbled over it, too. “…dead… it would hurt us so much more than anything that could happen with you alive? Do you think it would do Rainie any good to know you killed yourself… especially when she’s looking to you for guidance on how she can recover?”
Something indeterminate flickered in House’s eyes. He slowly closed his eyelids, appearing to fight back tears. Time passed slowly, as Wilson and Cuddy leaned toward him, waiting, hovering, watching the measured, shuddery rise and fall of House’s chest. Waiting for what, they didn’t know. Desperate to release some of her anxious energy, Cuddy grabbed Wilson’s right upper arm, clutching it tightly, her polished nails digging sharply into his bicep in a move reminiscent of the way she’d clutched his arm at the police station.
“I can’t win,” House finally whispered, defeated. “No matter what I do, someone gets hurt. Just like before. It doesn’t matter what I do. I can’t win.”
No one said anything for a long minute. Wilson heard Cuddy sniff, and saw her shoulders tremble. He let go of House’s face, reached across House’s body and laid a soothing hand on Cuddy’s back, allowing it to rest there for a moment, warm and reassuring, until she regained control. Finally, he took a deep breath and ventured forth. “Yeah,” he said. “Pretty much. Sucks, doesn’t it?”
“It will hurt us more to lose you,” interjected Cuddy, a lump lodged in her throat as emotion threatened to overwhelm her again. “I-I… I can’t… I can’t… lose you… not again.”
As they focused on House’s tormented face, they saw a solitary tear spill over and run down the crevices of his face. Finally, House breathed in deeply and spoke again, averting his eyes.
“I wanted to kill him,” he mumbled. “When I saw what he’d done to Rainie, I wanted to go into his room and strangle him. Hit him. Electrocute him. Push as many drugs into his system as I could. I wanted him dead.” Then his voice got so quiet they could barely hear him. “But first, I wanted him to feel pain and fear-I wanted him to suffer.”
Wilson leaned closer. “You what?” he asked, unintentionally sounding as if he were horrified by what House had confessed. Reacting to the tone of Wilson’s voice, House recoiled. Damn it, thought Wilson as he realized how House had taken his question. “No, no,” he said apologetically. “Sorry… it was your voice… it’s soft… I didn’t hear….” House’s gaze drifted over his friend’s troubled features. Clearly doubtful, he ultimately seemed to accept this version of Wilson’s response and settled down again.
“I… I was plotting it out. How to cause him pain. I know how to do it-I’ve… I’ve felt it. The underarms, inside of the elbows, the waist, bottoms of feet, the neck. And fear… magnifies it. I wanted him so terrified of what might happen that the actual pain would be a relief… and that death would be liberation.” As they listened, Wilson and Cuddy heard the shift as House drifted into his own tortured memories. “I know it so well… that moment when you dream of a world without pain or fear. Dying seems like a triumph.” He looked up at them again, his blue eyes dark with some indeterminate emotion. Then, shaking it off and changing the subject, he pleaded again, “Why couldn’t you let me die? Why did you have to bring me back?”
Near Wilson’s right ear, Cuddy swallowed a hiccupped sob. Suddenly, Wilson got it. He was afraid of turning into a monster… of becoming like Thompson. Horrified, he asked softly, “First, do no harm?” When House slowly nodded, afraid to meet his eyes, Wilson wasn’t surprised.
“So that’s what was going on in your head? You decided to kill yourself to keep from torturing a patient?”
Again, House nodded.
“But House-don’t you think we all feel that way-don’t you think we’ve all wanted to kill him?” House’s breath caught. It was apparent he’d thought he was alone in his desire to do in Michael Tritter. “Really, House. We’ve all had those feelings.” At first, House seemed astonished. Then his face settled back into an impervious mask.
“There’s a difference,” he said weakly, exhaustion slowing his words and making even his slight movements sluggish. “I was… I was actually going to do it. The anger… I-I… couldn’t stop the anger…” his words drifted off, leaving no doubt about how he had come to the conclusion he had.
Wilson leaned forward, his upper body covering House’s as he laid his right hand comfortingly on House’s arm. House tensed for a moment, and then relaxed, as if resigned to his fate.
“Look, House,” Wilson said, forcing House to meet his gaze. “I’ve been waiting for you to get angry for more than a year.” House’s brow furrowed and he shook his head, baffled. “Yeah, really. You have so much to be angry about, and yet you’ve never allowed those feelings out. Frankly, I’m not surprised that when it happened you were overwhelmed. You had every right to feel angry with Tritter for what he’s done to you this week. And once it finally-finally-came to the surface, it was bound to engulf you. You’ve held it in for so long…”
When Cuddy spoke up, Wilson jumped; for a second, he’d almost forgotten she was in the room. “House, listen to Wilson on this. He’s right. That anger was bound to come out eventually, and Tritter just kept at you, it’s no wonder you finally got angry.”
Wilson caught the slight flicker of House’s eyelids and the convulsive gulp as he swallowed his emotions. “You need to talk to Jacey Liu about this, House. It’s her job to help you. Don’t shut people out… especially not when your emotions are so strong. We want to help. You don’t have to go through it all alone… not anymore.”
That did it. House’s shoulders began to quiver above Wilson’s crooked arm as he let go, huge heaving, wracking sobs overtaking him. Wilson leaned forward again, wrapping his other arm around his frail friend. To his right, Wilson sensed rather than felt Cuddy as she moved closer, touching as much of House as she could reach. After a couple of minutes, House settled down again. When Wilson pulled back, he saw tears streaming down Cuddy’s face. As he looked down, he realized that the psychedelic patterns spattering his sleeve came from his own tears.
Suddenly, Wilson was hit by a revelation. “House, think about this a minute. What finally made you angry? It was when Tritter hurt Rainie, right?” House nodded slowly, seeming to be unsure of where Wilson was going. “You got angry on her behalf. But instead of having a healthy outlet for your anger, you were so overwhelmed by it, you turned it inward, where it wasn’t going to do anyone, least of all Rainie, any good.”
Again, House nodded. Some combination of Thompson’s torture and House’s own inherent lack of self-worth kept him from the righteous indignation he had every right to feel.
“Look, one of these days you need to get angry on your own behalf. I know, I know. I’m lecturing.” A hint of a smile crossed House’s face. “But listen to me on this: Now that the anger floodgates are open, all that anger is going to pour out. Tell it to Jacey. Tell it to me. Tell it to Cuddy. I bet even Chase and Foreman and Devi would do anything they could to help when that happens. Okay?” He couldn’t read the expression on House’s face. Could it be… fear?
“We shouldn’t have given you this case,” admitted Cuddy finally, interrupting. “It’s our fault… my fault… not yours. There was no way this was going to end well. You’ve handled yourself admirably until now, but it’s not worth it. The man is crazy-probably always was. I’m… I’m sorry we didn’t see it eight years ago. This never should have happened.” Cuddy dropped her administrative mask long enough to allow him to see her personal sense of responsibility for the way the situation had turned out.
After a pause, House sighed. “Doesn’t matter,” he said, avoiding Wilson’s gaze. “Doesn’t matter if it shouldn’t have happened. It did…”
Scrutinizing House’s agonized face, Wilson’s stomach clenched. The last few days were like a Greek tragedy. Given the personalities involved, it seemed almost as if this trajectory was predestined.
“He’s not worth it,” said a loud voice from the back of the room. Speaking stridently and unexpectedly, Foreman stood in the doorway, where he had obviously been observing and listening for some time. “For all I care, let him die in his own filth.” Paling, House stared at him as if expecting Foreman to march forward and slap him again.
“Foreman!” hissed Cuddy, pivoting furiously to face him. “What the hell is the matter with you?!”
Foreman gasped as his jaw literally dropped. “No… no… no! Not you, House. Tritter. Tritter’s not worth it.” House’s eyes closed, and a few relieved tears slid out from under his lashes. He inhaled a suppressed sob.
Stepping forward, Foreman gently touched an exposed part of his boss’s arm. “Hey, man, you’re worth so much more than he is. Let it go. Let someone else treat the man.”
Once House swallowed his tears, he slowly shook his head. “No,” he said despondently. “It’s too late. If you had to bring me back, then I have to see this through-one way or the other.”
“Does that mean you won’t try… try to k-k-k… try something like this again?” asked Wilson tentatively, hopefully, as he intently scrutinized his friend’s face for answers. “We… I…”
House shrugged, looking again toward the wall.
Wilson found himself wanting to argue with House, to tell him that Tritter was no longer any of his responsibility, but he knew from years of experience there was no reasoning with House once his mind was made up. If House had decided that he had to continue to treat Tritter, nothing was going to alter his decision. And if House had decided to kill himself, then there was no way to stop him… Wilson couldn’t let his mind go where that thought was taking him.
Interestingly, Cuddy didn’t seem to have come to the same conclusion about House continuing with the case. “House, you may not have that choice. Given what you’ve just tried to do, I don’t know that you’re competent to treat him. You’re certainly not objective, which I know you prize above almost everything else.”
For a fraction of a second, House looked relieved, as if an SUV had been lifted from his chest. Then he half-closed his eyes again, and set his mouth in a grim line. “Sounds nice,” he mumbled, slipping back into an affectless monotone as he continued to stare lifelessly at the wall. “But we all know you’ll have to come to me eventually if you want the answer. I had my chance to get out of it, but you…” He looked accusingly from Cuddy to Wilson to Foreman. “…you interfered.” He shifted uncomfortably on the bed, his face set in angry lines.
“Look, House,” said Foreman, who had been watching House’s reactions closely, “whether you like it or not, we want you here with us for a long time. We don’t want you to die. Tritter, yes. You, no. Got that?” He took a quick breath, hearing what he was actually saying only as the words left his mouth. How could he ever have believed House was a cold man simply interested in solving a puzzle? Not only was House someone who would allow himself to be tortured to save the people he cared about, but he was someone who would rather kill himself than harm a patient, even one as malicious and twisted as Michael Tritter.
House raised his shoulders in another noncommittal shrug, his head rolling to one side in a show of indifference.
Having tried once to be the voice of logic in this impossible situation, Cuddy now decided to take a different approach. “Let us work with you, let us take some of the burden… and for God’s sake, let us try to protect you-and Rainie-better,” she said. “Look, I can’t have my best doctor offing himself just because his patient’s crazy and his boss is an idiot.”
A suggestion of a smile crossed House’s ravaged face. Then the abrupt nod they all knew so well, the nod that signaled acceptance on his part.
“Good,” said Cuddy. “Glad that’s settled.” Even though they all knew it wasn’t.
Chapter 21: Channeling Anger...
Author: zeppomarx
Characters: House, Wilson, Cuddy, plus the characters created for Priority’s Exigencies and zeppomarx’s A Gentle Knock at the Door.
Summary: House’s minions find a new patient, one who is reluctant to allow House to treat him. Begins three months after the opening scene of A Gentle Knock at the Door. Part of the Contract universe, which includes DIY Sheep’s intense and angsty The Contract, and Priority’s sequel Exigencies.
Thanks: To priority and houserocket7 for encouraging me to writing this side story to A Gentle Knock on the Door, and for their faithful diligence in copy editing my sloppy prose.
Warnings, etc.: Generally safe, but references to torture, rape and major character death that has happened in the past. Some chapters are pretty angsty.
Disclaimers: You know the drill. Don’t own `em, never did, never will. Wish I did.
This Chapter: Suddenly, House’s body began to twitch, his extremities flinging themselves randomly into the air. Almost as suddenly, his body collapsed back into its unnatural stillness. Then the monitors began to drone.
Start the story here:
Chapter 1
______________________________________
Chapter 20: Anger
Suddenly, House’s body began to twitch, his extremities flinging themselves randomly into the air. Almost as suddenly, his body collapsed back into its unnatural stillness. Then the monitors began to drone.
“Shit!” yelled Chase, while Foreman called, “Crash cart!”
Within seconds, they had ripped open House’s shirt and applied the paddles. Once. Twice. Three times… and his heart restarted. That was the good news. The bad news was that a few minutes later, he slipped into a coma.
“Oh, crap,” said Devi, panting with anxiety once everything calmed down again.
Chase and Foreman nodded. Once the five doctors had gotten House settled in a room, they had decided that House’s employees would take the first shift, because they had more experience with emergency situations. They would stay with House until he was more stable. Then Wilson and Cuddy would take over for a while. In the meantime, they were simply holding vigil, hoping House would wake up.
Half an hour later, Foreman was pacing the room, Chase sat in the corner with his head in his hands, and Devi sat by House’s side, holding his hand and watching both him and the monitors. Occasionally, she felt his muscles twitch; she kept a close eye on his lips and fingernails, which were still tinged blue.
An hour later, House began to moan, his eyelids fluttering slightly. Immediately, Foreman and Chase ran to his bedside, hoping he was about to regain consciousness. But then he settled back down, his breathing shallow and labored. Clearly, they were in for the long haul.
* * * *
Down the corridor, Rainie Adler stared blankly at the ceiling. Since House had left her room, she hadn’t spoken a word. Neither had she slept much; she just stared, her face a blank mask. Next to her sat Evan, gently holding her bandaged left hand, and psychiatrist Jacey Liu, who occasionally asked a question in hopes of getting an answer. None was forthcoming.
One floor up, Michael Tritter was awake again, methodically reading through the files fanned out over his bed. During the weeks he had built his case against House, he had taken no interest in House’s medical case history, never bothered to find out who he was as a doctor, never believed those who told him that House was an extraordinary physician, never accepted the idea that perhaps House’s physical pain was so intense that he took those drugs for a legitimate reason. Until now, all he’d ever looked at was House’s drug-taking, judging it as he would a junkie on the street.
He’d been so sure he was right, but now he was beginning to think he’d cut corners. He’d never even tried to put House into any kind of context.
So tired. Hard to think. Occasionally, over the last couple of days, he’d felt fear-fear that he had some incurable disease and would die. But now, when those feelings came upon him, he shoved them out of the way and renewed his efforts to find a way to force House to treat him fairly… to include him in that 95 percent success rate… never once considering the possibility that perhaps that was exactly what the doctor was already doing.
* * * *
At 3 a.m., Wilson dozed restlessly on the couch in his office. Downstairs, in her office, Cuddy did the same.
Around 4 a.m., House opened his eyes groggily, looked around the room, and then, feeling confused, closed his eyes and went to sleep. It happened so quickly that none of his guardians noticed.
At 6 a.m., Wilson and Cuddy appeared in House’s room, lugging enough breakfast-bagels, cream cheese, scrambled eggs, bacon, coffee, juice-to keep a small army traveling. Devi, Foreman and Chase accepted their share gratefully, and the five of them chatted briefly about House’s condition before their shift change. Then, Devi went back to the Diagnostics office and curled up on the sofa near the conference table, Chase headed for the doctor’s lounge to sleep and Foreman went home.
Down the hall, Rainie slept fitfully, Evan still at her side. Jacey Liu had gone home to catch a few hours of sleep, unaware that she might soon have to counsel a suicidal patient… if that patient survived long enough to be counseled.
Upstairs, Tritter woke with a start. This time he remembered his dream. It was about House, of course. But the House in this dream wasn’t the arrogant son-of-a-bitch who had flaunted his drug addiction in the clinic and refused to apologize for the thermometer incident, obliging Tritter to teach him a lesson. This House was very different.
The face in this dream was bruised and sliced and broken and shattered, sheer terror flooding out of his haunted eyes. This was House as he’d hoped to see him, beaten up, chewed up and spit out, the superiority squashed out of him.
As sleep left him, Tritter realized he’d seen that House before, in glimpses at a news conference and as paparazzi tackled him coming out of a courtroom. He thought about that face, conjuring it in his imagination, satisfied, thinking about how the man deserved it… and occasionally wondering how much House would blame him for wishing that kind of damage on him.
* * * *
Pain was what finally woke House up around 11 a.m. Slowly, he scanned the room, looking puzzled to see Wilson and Cuddy suddenly rushing to his side.
After a moment, once his two medical sentinels had examined him and given him a slightly higher dose of methadone for his pain, Cuddy looked down at him sadly, brushing her hand gently along the side of his face, and quietly asked, “Why?”
House flinched, jerking his head away. “First, do no harm,” he mumbled, whispering the words so quietly she wasn’t sure she’d even heard him say anything.
She and Wilson exchanged confused glances. Did he feel they’d harmed him by stopping his suicide attempt?
“I don’t understand,” said Wilson, trying not to let frustration seep into his voice. He couldn’t comprehend how House could have done this, after all the time Wilson had spent trying to help House put his life back together again.
House continued to look away from them. “Should have left well enough alone.” And then, as if needing to reiterate the idea, he added, “Why didn’t you leave me be?” That was all he said before his eyelids shut and he slid back into an unnaturally deep sleep.
Four hours later, he woke up again. Within seconds, Cuddy was by his side, examining his pupils and noting with relief that his nails and lips had begun to regain a more natural hue. House stared at her, his expression a mixture of anger and disappointment. After a long moment, he swallowed, then spoke.
“Why didn’t you leave well enough alone?” he repeated, as if he hadn’t said it earlier, his voice raspier than usual. “You should have let me die.” Then his eyes met hers, pleading. “Why didn’t you let me die?”
Her breath stuttered, and Cuddy felt her heart thumping in her chest as tears sprang to her eyes. She opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out. Searching his face for an answer, she finally replied, “You know we couldn’t do that. We… we couldn’t stand to lose you.”
“Selfish,” he muttered, his expressionless eyes drifting downward, as if daring her to disagree. “It was selfish of you, Cuddy.” Tilting his head slightly, House turned toward the wall, smashing his face into the pillow. Stunned and overcome by exhaustion and strong emotion, Cuddy remained still a moment. He was right, of course. She and Wilson, and the others to a lesser extent, wanted House alive for their own reasons, not his-alive at all costs, even if those costs meant that he would spend the rest of his life in unbearable physical and emotional pain. They hadn’t taken into account what might be best for him. When she tried again to engage him, he refused to speak, pursing his lips so tightly she could see his cheek muscles throbbing.
Wilson watched as Cuddy stood uselessly next to House’s bed, her shoulders slumped and her head bowed. He lowered his head to pick at a spot of what was probably, he realized, dried vomit on his trousers. Then, as if waking from a dream, he slowly looked up and dragged himself over to the bed. Gently but firmly, he turned House’s face toward him.
House tried to wrench his head from Wilson’s firm grasp, but didn’t have the strength to do so. A trickle of fear crossed his face. Shit, thought Wilson, lessening his grip just slightly, trying to smile reassuringly at the man who had been restrained enough for one lifetime. “Leave me alone,” House muttered through gritted teeth. “If you can’t let me die, then just leave me alone.”
An unnatural silence followed, painful, intense, intolerable. Why? Why now? Wilson wondered. Have we done the right thing? Should we have let him die?
“Not a chance,” replied Wilson finally. “Not until you tell us why.”
Again, House tried unsuccessfully to wrest his head from Wilson’s hands. Huffing an angry breath through his nose, he glared at his captor, rearing back into the mattress.
“Sorry, House, but you don’t get a pass on this,” said Wilson firmly, not letting go. “You know what we’re legally required to do in this situation. I don’t think you want that any more than we do. So if we’re going to leave you alone, then first you have to talk… you have to tell us why you did this.”
With no warning, tears welled up in House’s eyes, making them glisten and threatening to spill over onto his cheeks. Wilson felt House’s facial muscles contract and his whole head began to tremble as he gasped for air. His own emotions bubbling to the surface, Wilson loosened his uncertain grip even more, allowing House some freedom to move his head slightly. Slipping his left arm around the back of House’s head, he cradled House in the crook of his left elbow and held his face steady with his right hand.
“I-I c-can’t keep you s-safe,” House sighed at last, to Wilson’s horror. As the mask of self-control melted, House’s stuttering voice was barely a whisper. Then he clamped his mouth shut again.
“Not really your job,” said Wilson carefully, unsure of where this was going. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Cuddy standing stock-still, clasping House’s left hand between hers. She didn’t seem to be breathing; the scene from Wilson’s vantage point looked like a Victorian-era tableau: The Bedside Vigil.
House’s eyes looked past Wilson, briefly making contact with Cuddy and then fixing back on Wilson. “Dangerous,” was all he said at first. Then his gaze returned to Cuddy, whose face registered confusion. “You once said that anyone who knows me is bound to get hurt.” Cuddy nodded slowly, unable to fathom why that regrettable ancient conversation might precipitate something so drastic. Then he added, “You were right.”
Cuddy’s heart stopped a moment, and then stuttered forward again. “You don’t seriously think you’re some sort of jinx, do you? That… if you were…” She didn’t want to say the word, after they’d almost lost him just hours earlier. She could barely bring herself to think it, much less utter it. “…d-dead…” It caught in her throat. “…that we wouldn’t get hurt?”
“Something like that,” he said, the slightest of nods issuing forth.
“But House,” said Wilson gently, “don’t you know that if you were…” Damn. He stumbled over it, too. “…dead… it would hurt us so much more than anything that could happen with you alive? Do you think it would do Rainie any good to know you killed yourself… especially when she’s looking to you for guidance on how she can recover?”
Something indeterminate flickered in House’s eyes. He slowly closed his eyelids, appearing to fight back tears. Time passed slowly, as Wilson and Cuddy leaned toward him, waiting, hovering, watching the measured, shuddery rise and fall of House’s chest. Waiting for what, they didn’t know. Desperate to release some of her anxious energy, Cuddy grabbed Wilson’s right upper arm, clutching it tightly, her polished nails digging sharply into his bicep in a move reminiscent of the way she’d clutched his arm at the police station.
“I can’t win,” House finally whispered, defeated. “No matter what I do, someone gets hurt. Just like before. It doesn’t matter what I do. I can’t win.”
No one said anything for a long minute. Wilson heard Cuddy sniff, and saw her shoulders tremble. He let go of House’s face, reached across House’s body and laid a soothing hand on Cuddy’s back, allowing it to rest there for a moment, warm and reassuring, until she regained control. Finally, he took a deep breath and ventured forth. “Yeah,” he said. “Pretty much. Sucks, doesn’t it?”
“It will hurt us more to lose you,” interjected Cuddy, a lump lodged in her throat as emotion threatened to overwhelm her again. “I-I… I can’t… I can’t… lose you… not again.”
As they focused on House’s tormented face, they saw a solitary tear spill over and run down the crevices of his face. Finally, House breathed in deeply and spoke again, averting his eyes.
“I wanted to kill him,” he mumbled. “When I saw what he’d done to Rainie, I wanted to go into his room and strangle him. Hit him. Electrocute him. Push as many drugs into his system as I could. I wanted him dead.” Then his voice got so quiet they could barely hear him. “But first, I wanted him to feel pain and fear-I wanted him to suffer.”
Wilson leaned closer. “You what?” he asked, unintentionally sounding as if he were horrified by what House had confessed. Reacting to the tone of Wilson’s voice, House recoiled. Damn it, thought Wilson as he realized how House had taken his question. “No, no,” he said apologetically. “Sorry… it was your voice… it’s soft… I didn’t hear….” House’s gaze drifted over his friend’s troubled features. Clearly doubtful, he ultimately seemed to accept this version of Wilson’s response and settled down again.
“I… I was plotting it out. How to cause him pain. I know how to do it-I’ve… I’ve felt it. The underarms, inside of the elbows, the waist, bottoms of feet, the neck. And fear… magnifies it. I wanted him so terrified of what might happen that the actual pain would be a relief… and that death would be liberation.” As they listened, Wilson and Cuddy heard the shift as House drifted into his own tortured memories. “I know it so well… that moment when you dream of a world without pain or fear. Dying seems like a triumph.” He looked up at them again, his blue eyes dark with some indeterminate emotion. Then, shaking it off and changing the subject, he pleaded again, “Why couldn’t you let me die? Why did you have to bring me back?”
Near Wilson’s right ear, Cuddy swallowed a hiccupped sob. Suddenly, Wilson got it. He was afraid of turning into a monster… of becoming like Thompson. Horrified, he asked softly, “First, do no harm?” When House slowly nodded, afraid to meet his eyes, Wilson wasn’t surprised.
“So that’s what was going on in your head? You decided to kill yourself to keep from torturing a patient?”
Again, House nodded.
“But House-don’t you think we all feel that way-don’t you think we’ve all wanted to kill him?” House’s breath caught. It was apparent he’d thought he was alone in his desire to do in Michael Tritter. “Really, House. We’ve all had those feelings.” At first, House seemed astonished. Then his face settled back into an impervious mask.
“There’s a difference,” he said weakly, exhaustion slowing his words and making even his slight movements sluggish. “I was… I was actually going to do it. The anger… I-I… couldn’t stop the anger…” his words drifted off, leaving no doubt about how he had come to the conclusion he had.
Wilson leaned forward, his upper body covering House’s as he laid his right hand comfortingly on House’s arm. House tensed for a moment, and then relaxed, as if resigned to his fate.
“Look, House,” Wilson said, forcing House to meet his gaze. “I’ve been waiting for you to get angry for more than a year.” House’s brow furrowed and he shook his head, baffled. “Yeah, really. You have so much to be angry about, and yet you’ve never allowed those feelings out. Frankly, I’m not surprised that when it happened you were overwhelmed. You had every right to feel angry with Tritter for what he’s done to you this week. And once it finally-finally-came to the surface, it was bound to engulf you. You’ve held it in for so long…”
When Cuddy spoke up, Wilson jumped; for a second, he’d almost forgotten she was in the room. “House, listen to Wilson on this. He’s right. That anger was bound to come out eventually, and Tritter just kept at you, it’s no wonder you finally got angry.”
Wilson caught the slight flicker of House’s eyelids and the convulsive gulp as he swallowed his emotions. “You need to talk to Jacey Liu about this, House. It’s her job to help you. Don’t shut people out… especially not when your emotions are so strong. We want to help. You don’t have to go through it all alone… not anymore.”
That did it. House’s shoulders began to quiver above Wilson’s crooked arm as he let go, huge heaving, wracking sobs overtaking him. Wilson leaned forward again, wrapping his other arm around his frail friend. To his right, Wilson sensed rather than felt Cuddy as she moved closer, touching as much of House as she could reach. After a couple of minutes, House settled down again. When Wilson pulled back, he saw tears streaming down Cuddy’s face. As he looked down, he realized that the psychedelic patterns spattering his sleeve came from his own tears.
Suddenly, Wilson was hit by a revelation. “House, think about this a minute. What finally made you angry? It was when Tritter hurt Rainie, right?” House nodded slowly, seeming to be unsure of where Wilson was going. “You got angry on her behalf. But instead of having a healthy outlet for your anger, you were so overwhelmed by it, you turned it inward, where it wasn’t going to do anyone, least of all Rainie, any good.”
Again, House nodded. Some combination of Thompson’s torture and House’s own inherent lack of self-worth kept him from the righteous indignation he had every right to feel.
“Look, one of these days you need to get angry on your own behalf. I know, I know. I’m lecturing.” A hint of a smile crossed House’s face. “But listen to me on this: Now that the anger floodgates are open, all that anger is going to pour out. Tell it to Jacey. Tell it to me. Tell it to Cuddy. I bet even Chase and Foreman and Devi would do anything they could to help when that happens. Okay?” He couldn’t read the expression on House’s face. Could it be… fear?
“We shouldn’t have given you this case,” admitted Cuddy finally, interrupting. “It’s our fault… my fault… not yours. There was no way this was going to end well. You’ve handled yourself admirably until now, but it’s not worth it. The man is crazy-probably always was. I’m… I’m sorry we didn’t see it eight years ago. This never should have happened.” Cuddy dropped her administrative mask long enough to allow him to see her personal sense of responsibility for the way the situation had turned out.
After a pause, House sighed. “Doesn’t matter,” he said, avoiding Wilson’s gaze. “Doesn’t matter if it shouldn’t have happened. It did…”
Scrutinizing House’s agonized face, Wilson’s stomach clenched. The last few days were like a Greek tragedy. Given the personalities involved, it seemed almost as if this trajectory was predestined.
“He’s not worth it,” said a loud voice from the back of the room. Speaking stridently and unexpectedly, Foreman stood in the doorway, where he had obviously been observing and listening for some time. “For all I care, let him die in his own filth.” Paling, House stared at him as if expecting Foreman to march forward and slap him again.
“Foreman!” hissed Cuddy, pivoting furiously to face him. “What the hell is the matter with you?!”
Foreman gasped as his jaw literally dropped. “No… no… no! Not you, House. Tritter. Tritter’s not worth it.” House’s eyes closed, and a few relieved tears slid out from under his lashes. He inhaled a suppressed sob.
Stepping forward, Foreman gently touched an exposed part of his boss’s arm. “Hey, man, you’re worth so much more than he is. Let it go. Let someone else treat the man.”
Once House swallowed his tears, he slowly shook his head. “No,” he said despondently. “It’s too late. If you had to bring me back, then I have to see this through-one way or the other.”
“Does that mean you won’t try… try to k-k-k… try something like this again?” asked Wilson tentatively, hopefully, as he intently scrutinized his friend’s face for answers. “We… I…”
House shrugged, looking again toward the wall.
Wilson found himself wanting to argue with House, to tell him that Tritter was no longer any of his responsibility, but he knew from years of experience there was no reasoning with House once his mind was made up. If House had decided that he had to continue to treat Tritter, nothing was going to alter his decision. And if House had decided to kill himself, then there was no way to stop him… Wilson couldn’t let his mind go where that thought was taking him.
Interestingly, Cuddy didn’t seem to have come to the same conclusion about House continuing with the case. “House, you may not have that choice. Given what you’ve just tried to do, I don’t know that you’re competent to treat him. You’re certainly not objective, which I know you prize above almost everything else.”
For a fraction of a second, House looked relieved, as if an SUV had been lifted from his chest. Then he half-closed his eyes again, and set his mouth in a grim line. “Sounds nice,” he mumbled, slipping back into an affectless monotone as he continued to stare lifelessly at the wall. “But we all know you’ll have to come to me eventually if you want the answer. I had my chance to get out of it, but you…” He looked accusingly from Cuddy to Wilson to Foreman. “…you interfered.” He shifted uncomfortably on the bed, his face set in angry lines.
“Look, House,” said Foreman, who had been watching House’s reactions closely, “whether you like it or not, we want you here with us for a long time. We don’t want you to die. Tritter, yes. You, no. Got that?” He took a quick breath, hearing what he was actually saying only as the words left his mouth. How could he ever have believed House was a cold man simply interested in solving a puzzle? Not only was House someone who would allow himself to be tortured to save the people he cared about, but he was someone who would rather kill himself than harm a patient, even one as malicious and twisted as Michael Tritter.
House raised his shoulders in another noncommittal shrug, his head rolling to one side in a show of indifference.
Having tried once to be the voice of logic in this impossible situation, Cuddy now decided to take a different approach. “Let us work with you, let us take some of the burden… and for God’s sake, let us try to protect you-and Rainie-better,” she said. “Look, I can’t have my best doctor offing himself just because his patient’s crazy and his boss is an idiot.”
A suggestion of a smile crossed House’s ravaged face. Then the abrupt nod they all knew so well, the nod that signaled acceptance on his part.
“Good,” said Cuddy. “Glad that’s settled.” Even though they all knew it wasn’t.
Chapter 21: Channeling Anger...