Fic: Stay
“But mo-om! No one can stitch up lacerations like you!”
“Why do you need someone to-where are you calling from?”
House can hear a rustle of papers which must mean that Wilson’s moved from his desk to crane his neck out the balcony door to spy on him.
“Third floor stairwell,” he says. “Bring a suture kit.”
He hangs up and stares at the grey metal of the stairwell, wondering who designed this hospital. Someone who probably cared too much about looking pretty for outsiders, donors, and visitors. They had created operating rooms and patient rooms out of glass, adorned administrative offices with wood paneling, but left the stairwells blank, cold and ugly in their original steel gray. Bare bones, he thinks, radius and ulna, humerus, tibia, patella, femu-
The door crashes open; it’s Wilson, who freezes at the sight of him.
“House? Jeez.” He sounds part shocked and part horrified, and House is a little insulted. He’s sure he doesn’t look that bad. Wilson steps quickly down the stairs to the landing, halfway between floors, where House has propped himself up with the wall, legs splayed out in front of him.
“Hey honey.” House manages a smirk, craning his neck to look up at Wilson, even though the movement sends pain shooting through his muscles, and Wilson blurs into little black dots for a few seconds.
Wilson kneels down next to him and reaches out a hand-no gloves-to touch the gash on his temple, which had finally stopped bleeding about a minute ago, but not before completely destroying House’s favorite blue shirt first.
House closes his eyes as his head begins to throb at Wilson’s touch. He has a concussion, grade two, he thinks, not more. His head will be hurting for a while.
He must have winced, because Wilson says quietly, “Does it hurt when I touch it? You might have a concussion.”
House grins, just a little because his split lip hurts, and says, “I can remember all the bones in my arm. I was working through the leg bones when you walked in.”
“Sorry to have interrupted you, then,” Wilson says, but it’s in a clipped tone and he’s pulled his hand away, and this means he’s pissed off, so House opens his eyes to look at him.
He isn’t disappointed.
“What the hell happened?” Wilson nearly shouts, eyes dark and furious.
He has the suture bag in one hand, half opened, and House nearly smiles at that. Only Wilson could be angry with someone and try to take care of them at the same time.
“I fell down the stairs,” he says casually, and redundantly adds, “Duh.”
“Right,” he says, turning to rip open an alcohol swab. “And did you forget-hold still-that you only have one good leg? Or were you trying to prove-”
His voice is grating on House’s ears, too loud and close, but his hands are soft, fingers gently pushing away matted hair to wipe away the blood on his face.
“-endanger your life and-where’s your cane?” Wilson looks around, distracted from his ministrations, and his lecture.
House nods at the flight of stairs leading downward to the next landing. “Fell farther than I did.”
Wilson looks to where House is nodding, and House knows that he notices how far away the cane fell, the strange position, the awkward way it must have slipped from his hand. He knows how this must look. Wilson falls silent and stares at him heavily.
“House,” he says, voice too quiet and controlled. “Tell me this was an accident.”
House looks up at him sharply, at the set of his mouth, the tightness in his shoulders, and then looks away at the floor, at his leg. He doesn’t have an answer for Wilson; he cannot tell him that he’d been on the second step when it happened, how he’d placed his cane too close to the edge and it had slipped into air, how his leg had buckled like it was nothing, tipping him forward, heart jumping to his throat, cane clattering through a gap in the railing, nothing to cushion his fall but the metal railing and the hard, cold stairs. He didn’t miss the step on purpose, but he doesn’t have a good answer for what he was doing on the stairs in the first place; or at least, not an answer that would make Wilson happy.
Instead, he leans back against the wall, head hurting, every muscle screaming fire, and says, “I can think of easier ways to die.”
Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Wilson tense all over, and for a moment, House thinks he’s going to turn around and walk back up the stairs.
Don’t leave, House thinks, but he can’t make himself say it out loud.
A minute passes in absolute silence: Wilson stares at House, and House stares at the floor. He cannot bear to look at him.
Then Wilson moves, turns back to the suture kit, starts pulling out gauze, and House lets out a breath.
He wonders if it will always be like this: he sprawled on the floor after one stupid mistake or another, Wilson looking down on him with a mixture of heartbreak and anger on his face. At least, until the day he finally does this properly and won’t have to see Wilson look at him like that.
He feels Wilson’s fingers on his temple again, and something coldly metallic-the suture needle. “Do you want anesthetic?” he asks, quiet again.
House huffs a tired laugh, which Wilson takes as a no. He’s in so much pain already, he’ll barely feel this.
Wilson finishes suturing and leans back on his haunches. “Five stitches,” he says, shoving the dirty swabs into the empty suture kit bag. “How did you do that much damage, anyway?”
“That’s nothing. I’m going to lose all my street cred like this,” quips House indignantly, and when Wilson doesn’t respond, he says, “There was a sharp edge on the side of the railing.”
“You’re lucky it wasn’t deeper,” Wilson counters darkly.
“Think I’ll get another really cool scar?” House tries to sound off-hand and light, but can’t quite manage it; the pain makes his breath hitch in his throat.
“No,” Wilson says shortly, then cups House’s chin to angle his face toward him. “Let me look at your lip. And how did you do this?”
House winces a little as Wilson’s thumb presses down on his lower lip, pushing it out to examine the inside of his mouth, gums probably all bloodied now, but no teeth missing at least.
“Split against my teeth. Jaw hit the edge of a step.” He talks around Wilson’s thumb; his tongue touches it once in an accidental flick, but neither of them flinches. Wilson’s fingers probe his jaw gently and press lightly on his cheekbones, checking for fractures. He is too close to House now, dark eyes moving over his face, searching him out, and House has to look away. He’s glad suddenly that no one uses this stairwell; he doesn’t want anyone to see them like this: Wilson’s fingers too gentle against his skin, their denial too brittle to withstand a stranger’s scrutiny.
“No breaks,” Wilson says, pulling away.
“Yeah,” House nods, staring at the floor. He hears plastic rustling and turns to see Wilson packing away the used needle and bloodstained gauze. There’s a little spot of blood on the sleeve of his lab coat where it must have grazed against House’s temple.
“Can you walk?” he asks.
They both look at House’s leg stretched out in front of him.
“No,” says House, very firmly.
Wilson glances at him before he says, “Well, I could run down to emergency, I guess. We could get one of those stretchers and the EMT guys can carry you-”
He breaks off at House’s death glare and grins, just a little, “Kidding.”
House rolls his eyes and stretches his hand out to massage the right thigh muscle. It wouldn’t have been so bad if it was just the one leg; the problem was that his other leg now hurt like a bitch as well, along with his shoulders, his back, and pretty much every muscle in his body.
Wilson’s hands join his a moment later, kneading at the muscles, vastus lateralis, vastus medialis, gracilis, gastrocnemius. No one is allowed to touch House’s leg, but the rules are different for Wilson. House shuts his eyes against the little black dots of pain blossoming in his sight until slowly, slowly, the sharp ache dims into a dull throb.
And it’s fifteen, maybe twenty minutes later that they’ve massaged feeling into all his limbs, and House has sweat copiously through his t-shirt and his bloody overshirt, but he thinks he can finally walk. Wilson waits until House meets his eyes in assent, and then steps away to retrieve his cane. House shrugs off his overshirt gingerly, rolls it into a ball, and stuffs it in the used kit bag. He wants people to see as little as possible; with some luck, he might be able to get out of this with some shred of dignity left.
Wilson’s back now, holding out his cane. He bends down to take the kit bag and squeezes it into a lab coat pocket; it makes an odd bulge against his body. House accepts the proffered cane, takes a deep breath, but he can’t get up yet. There are seven steps ahead of him; he has counted them a hundred times in the past hour, and it makes him think of rehab, of those first few weeks, when just walking from his bedroom to the bathroom made him collapse, sweating and shaking with exertion.
Wilson kneels down next to him, and they wait together.
Finally, he’s ready, and he lets Wilson curve an arm around him so that he can put some weight on Wilson’s shoulders; his right hand grips his cane so hard that it shakes; and slowly, shakily, they stumble upright. House lists heavily toward Wilson, his vision swimming dangerously. If Wilson falls and makes him fall, he thinks in an odd, detached way, he won’t be able to get up again. They’ll have to bring that damn stretcher. But Wilson holds his weight, and they stand there for a second, House leaning on him, until he is sure that his legs won’t buckle, and then they creep slowly toward the stairs.
The first step is agony, and while House forces air in and out of his lungs heavily to keep from passing out, he glances and Wilson and has to say, “You could get me a morphine injection, or something.”
“I knew I should’ve called the stretcher,” sighs Wilson, and in that moment, House hates him enough to shove him away and take the next step on his own.
Stupid reverse psychology, House thinks, twenty minutes and 6 steps later. Wilson looks at him with an almost fond expression, pleased and a little smug. House rolls his eyes and tells him to check if the coast is clear before he lets Wilson help him down the corridor so he can collapse into the armchair in his office, shaking all over. Wilson draws all the blinds, pulls a chair toward him, and pushes a syringe full of buprenorphine into his arm. He waits until House’s breathing has evened out and he no long has to grip his thigh to stop the muscle from spasming, then gets up to leave; but House twists his fingers into a corner of his lab coat to stop him.
“Don’t leave,” he says, hoarse and tired.
And Wilson looks at him with heartbreak in his eyes and sits back down, and it’s almost, almost enough.
Thanks for reading!
“Why do you need someone to-where are you calling from?”
House can hear a rustle of papers which must mean that Wilson’s moved from his desk to crane his neck out the balcony door to spy on him.
“Third floor stairwell,” he says. “Bring a suture kit.”
He hangs up and stares at the grey metal of the stairwell, wondering who designed this hospital. Someone who probably cared too much about looking pretty for outsiders, donors, and visitors. They had created operating rooms and patient rooms out of glass, adorned administrative offices with wood paneling, but left the stairwells blank, cold and ugly in their original steel gray. Bare bones, he thinks, radius and ulna, humerus, tibia, patella, femu-
The door crashes open; it’s Wilson, who freezes at the sight of him.
“House? Jeez.” He sounds part shocked and part horrified, and House is a little insulted. He’s sure he doesn’t look that bad. Wilson steps quickly down the stairs to the landing, halfway between floors, where House has propped himself up with the wall, legs splayed out in front of him.
“Hey honey.” House manages a smirk, craning his neck to look up at Wilson, even though the movement sends pain shooting through his muscles, and Wilson blurs into little black dots for a few seconds.
Wilson kneels down next to him and reaches out a hand-no gloves-to touch the gash on his temple, which had finally stopped bleeding about a minute ago, but not before completely destroying House’s favorite blue shirt first.
House closes his eyes as his head begins to throb at Wilson’s touch. He has a concussion, grade two, he thinks, not more. His head will be hurting for a while.
He must have winced, because Wilson says quietly, “Does it hurt when I touch it? You might have a concussion.”
House grins, just a little because his split lip hurts, and says, “I can remember all the bones in my arm. I was working through the leg bones when you walked in.”
“Sorry to have interrupted you, then,” Wilson says, but it’s in a clipped tone and he’s pulled his hand away, and this means he’s pissed off, so House opens his eyes to look at him.
He isn’t disappointed.
“What the hell happened?” Wilson nearly shouts, eyes dark and furious.
He has the suture bag in one hand, half opened, and House nearly smiles at that. Only Wilson could be angry with someone and try to take care of them at the same time.
“I fell down the stairs,” he says casually, and redundantly adds, “Duh.”
“Right,” he says, turning to rip open an alcohol swab. “And did you forget-hold still-that you only have one good leg? Or were you trying to prove-”
His voice is grating on House’s ears, too loud and close, but his hands are soft, fingers gently pushing away matted hair to wipe away the blood on his face.
“-endanger your life and-where’s your cane?” Wilson looks around, distracted from his ministrations, and his lecture.
House nods at the flight of stairs leading downward to the next landing. “Fell farther than I did.”
Wilson looks to where House is nodding, and House knows that he notices how far away the cane fell, the strange position, the awkward way it must have slipped from his hand. He knows how this must look. Wilson falls silent and stares at him heavily.
“House,” he says, voice too quiet and controlled. “Tell me this was an accident.”
House looks up at him sharply, at the set of his mouth, the tightness in his shoulders, and then looks away at the floor, at his leg. He doesn’t have an answer for Wilson; he cannot tell him that he’d been on the second step when it happened, how he’d placed his cane too close to the edge and it had slipped into air, how his leg had buckled like it was nothing, tipping him forward, heart jumping to his throat, cane clattering through a gap in the railing, nothing to cushion his fall but the metal railing and the hard, cold stairs. He didn’t miss the step on purpose, but he doesn’t have a good answer for what he was doing on the stairs in the first place; or at least, not an answer that would make Wilson happy.
Instead, he leans back against the wall, head hurting, every muscle screaming fire, and says, “I can think of easier ways to die.”
Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Wilson tense all over, and for a moment, House thinks he’s going to turn around and walk back up the stairs.
Don’t leave, House thinks, but he can’t make himself say it out loud.
A minute passes in absolute silence: Wilson stares at House, and House stares at the floor. He cannot bear to look at him.
Then Wilson moves, turns back to the suture kit, starts pulling out gauze, and House lets out a breath.
He wonders if it will always be like this: he sprawled on the floor after one stupid mistake or another, Wilson looking down on him with a mixture of heartbreak and anger on his face. At least, until the day he finally does this properly and won’t have to see Wilson look at him like that.
He feels Wilson’s fingers on his temple again, and something coldly metallic-the suture needle. “Do you want anesthetic?” he asks, quiet again.
House huffs a tired laugh, which Wilson takes as a no. He’s in so much pain already, he’ll barely feel this.
Wilson finishes suturing and leans back on his haunches. “Five stitches,” he says, shoving the dirty swabs into the empty suture kit bag. “How did you do that much damage, anyway?”
“That’s nothing. I’m going to lose all my street cred like this,” quips House indignantly, and when Wilson doesn’t respond, he says, “There was a sharp edge on the side of the railing.”
“You’re lucky it wasn’t deeper,” Wilson counters darkly.
“Think I’ll get another really cool scar?” House tries to sound off-hand and light, but can’t quite manage it; the pain makes his breath hitch in his throat.
“No,” Wilson says shortly, then cups House’s chin to angle his face toward him. “Let me look at your lip. And how did you do this?”
House winces a little as Wilson’s thumb presses down on his lower lip, pushing it out to examine the inside of his mouth, gums probably all bloodied now, but no teeth missing at least.
“Split against my teeth. Jaw hit the edge of a step.” He talks around Wilson’s thumb; his tongue touches it once in an accidental flick, but neither of them flinches. Wilson’s fingers probe his jaw gently and press lightly on his cheekbones, checking for fractures. He is too close to House now, dark eyes moving over his face, searching him out, and House has to look away. He’s glad suddenly that no one uses this stairwell; he doesn’t want anyone to see them like this: Wilson’s fingers too gentle against his skin, their denial too brittle to withstand a stranger’s scrutiny.
“No breaks,” Wilson says, pulling away.
“Yeah,” House nods, staring at the floor. He hears plastic rustling and turns to see Wilson packing away the used needle and bloodstained gauze. There’s a little spot of blood on the sleeve of his lab coat where it must have grazed against House’s temple.
“Can you walk?” he asks.
They both look at House’s leg stretched out in front of him.
“No,” says House, very firmly.
Wilson glances at him before he says, “Well, I could run down to emergency, I guess. We could get one of those stretchers and the EMT guys can carry you-”
He breaks off at House’s death glare and grins, just a little, “Kidding.”
House rolls his eyes and stretches his hand out to massage the right thigh muscle. It wouldn’t have been so bad if it was just the one leg; the problem was that his other leg now hurt like a bitch as well, along with his shoulders, his back, and pretty much every muscle in his body.
Wilson’s hands join his a moment later, kneading at the muscles, vastus lateralis, vastus medialis, gracilis, gastrocnemius. No one is allowed to touch House’s leg, but the rules are different for Wilson. House shuts his eyes against the little black dots of pain blossoming in his sight until slowly, slowly, the sharp ache dims into a dull throb.
And it’s fifteen, maybe twenty minutes later that they’ve massaged feeling into all his limbs, and House has sweat copiously through his t-shirt and his bloody overshirt, but he thinks he can finally walk. Wilson waits until House meets his eyes in assent, and then steps away to retrieve his cane. House shrugs off his overshirt gingerly, rolls it into a ball, and stuffs it in the used kit bag. He wants people to see as little as possible; with some luck, he might be able to get out of this with some shred of dignity left.
Wilson’s back now, holding out his cane. He bends down to take the kit bag and squeezes it into a lab coat pocket; it makes an odd bulge against his body. House accepts the proffered cane, takes a deep breath, but he can’t get up yet. There are seven steps ahead of him; he has counted them a hundred times in the past hour, and it makes him think of rehab, of those first few weeks, when just walking from his bedroom to the bathroom made him collapse, sweating and shaking with exertion.
Wilson kneels down next to him, and they wait together.
Finally, he’s ready, and he lets Wilson curve an arm around him so that he can put some weight on Wilson’s shoulders; his right hand grips his cane so hard that it shakes; and slowly, shakily, they stumble upright. House lists heavily toward Wilson, his vision swimming dangerously. If Wilson falls and makes him fall, he thinks in an odd, detached way, he won’t be able to get up again. They’ll have to bring that damn stretcher. But Wilson holds his weight, and they stand there for a second, House leaning on him, until he is sure that his legs won’t buckle, and then they creep slowly toward the stairs.
The first step is agony, and while House forces air in and out of his lungs heavily to keep from passing out, he glances and Wilson and has to say, “You could get me a morphine injection, or something.”
“I knew I should’ve called the stretcher,” sighs Wilson, and in that moment, House hates him enough to shove him away and take the next step on his own.
Stupid reverse psychology, House thinks, twenty minutes and 6 steps later. Wilson looks at him with an almost fond expression, pleased and a little smug. House rolls his eyes and tells him to check if the coast is clear before he lets Wilson help him down the corridor so he can collapse into the armchair in his office, shaking all over. Wilson draws all the blinds, pulls a chair toward him, and pushes a syringe full of buprenorphine into his arm. He waits until House’s breathing has evened out and he no long has to grip his thigh to stop the muscle from spasming, then gets up to leave; but House twists his fingers into a corner of his lab coat to stop him.
“Don’t leave,” he says, hoarse and tired.
And Wilson looks at him with heartbreak in his eyes and sits back down, and it’s almost, almost enough.
Thanks for reading!