Standard Disclaimer
wanderingwidget has, is, and does not plan in the future to make any money on any of the fics here archived. They were written and are provided for pure entertainment purposes.
Author: wanderingwidget
Word Count: 4098
Rating: R
Pairings: House/male
Warnings: non-con, the requisit angst, cussing, probable out-of-characterness, and an ending that is probably not going to satisfy anybody.
Author's Note: Again, I've no idea where this fic came from. When I started writing it I didn't know what I was writing, or who I was writing about, and then suddenly it kind of exploded in my face and I was left holding this horrible malformed fic with what I thought was an interesting style and what I know is a very touchy subject, a subject that (given the statistics) affects everybody.
Disclaimer: I am not making money off of this, nor am I at all affliated with FOX or the creators of House MD.
ONE:
Two ten in the morning and the frantic beating of his own heart tears him awake. The world’s dark and painted in pink neon shadows from the strip club across the street. It doesn’t matter. His mouth tastes like ashes and copper pennies. The room’s empty, except for his almost-attempt at hyperventilation. It doesn’t matter, doesn’t matter, doesn’t matter.
Methods of treatment differ with location and immediate availability. Two fifteen and he’s standing cold and naked in the bathroom staring at a tub that could kill him in twenty or more less than pleasant ways. His reflection in the broken mirror is a funhouse horror, eyes red and shadowed. There’s a dark mark on his neck, just below his right ear. He gets in the shower and beats the knob into submission. The water takes tiny frozen bites out of his flesh. He shivers. It doesn’t matter.
T-shirt ripped across the shoulder and smelling like cheap beer and cheaper cologne. He thinks he recognizes AXE from a magazine sample but he’s not sure, and it doesn’t matter. He balls it up and lobs it at the overflowing trashcan. He manages about half of the buttons on his shirt, can’t find his other sock, jams his feet into his sneakers and tries to breathe through his mouth. It doesn’t matter. Two thirty-seven and he’s folded over the toilet wishing he were dead.
Hot moist air presses against the back of his neck like a lover’s breath as he pushes the door open and stares out at the world. He doesn’t remember the parking lot in front of him. It doesn’t matter, he can’t see his car. Two fifty-one and the clerk storms out and into his face, voice high and loud, and he wonders what the kid saw. He finds his wallet, hands it over, and half-sits half-collapses onto the curb. It doesn’t matter.
Three thirty-four and a pair of expensive loafers swim into focus under his nose. They’re connected to a pair of wrinkled slacks. Pale hands shoved into their pockets. White undershirt and pale lips pressed into a tight line. He looks away. He doesn’t want to see what’s in those eyes. It doesn’t matter.
Words don’t matter. A hand grips his elbow and he jerks away, ignores the narrowing eyes. Hands on hips. Three forty-seven and he manages to scrape himself off of the ground and throw up into the gutter. More words, hands again, he pushes them away. Concern hits him like a lukewarm sucker punch and he thinks that he prefers anger. At least it’s hot.
The car is frigid with air conditioning and uncomfortably small. He remembers there being more space between the seats. Four oh-four and he presses his forehead to the window, the world outside is full of streaking street lamps and hot neon, they turn down a side street, cutting through a lower middleclass neighborhood.
Four eighteen and he notices the radio is on, tuned to some eighties power ballad crap. He closes his eyes. It doesn’t matter.
Five oh-one. Five oh-two and his eyes pop open like spring loaded shutters, hands on him again. Fear makes him cold makes him lash out and the hands disappear with a stream of curses and recognition settles over him like a river soaked blanket. He’s outside his apartment, the sky cool gray, and the last remnants of a half-hearted morning mist already disappearing. His heart’s still beating too fast. Adrenaline. Or was it shock by now, he couldn’t remember, he didn’t think it mattered.
The hands come back at five oh-five, this time slower but firmer. There are more words which he doesn’t bother to translate but he likes the sound of them better, slow and deliberate and in control. Someone has to be in control and he doesn’t think that’s him. He doesn’t feel in control. But he can’t feel very much. The hands pull him up and he allows it. It doesn’t matter, he tells himself. And the hysterical laughter when they reach his door gets him a strange look he doesn’t want to see and so ignores.
The clock on the mantle reads five ten as he stumbles through the living room. Then he’s in the bedroom staring at another bed and he doesn’t know what to do but he thinks he’s going to be sick again. The phone rings. He flinches. It’s loud and seems to be attacking him from both sides. He closes his eyes, opens them, the phone’s silent. He can taste salt on the back of his tongue and turns towards the bathroom.
Five twenty-one and he’s bent over another toilet trying to spit up his stomach and wondering why he’s not dead yet. Noises, words, his name he thinks, then the hands again and he tries to jerk away but his stomach’s contracting again. The hands don’t go away and he tries to believe that they don’t matter don’t matter don’t matter but has a half-formed suspicion that they do.
According to the alarm clock by the bed it’s five forty-nine and he’s ready to fall but the hands wont let him, push him to sit, fumble at his shirt. And he tells himself that it doesn’t matter but it does and he can’t push the hands away because they keep coming back and there are words. Soft and hard at the same time and really it’s just easier to let them have their way.
He stares at the glowing green numbers by the bed because they’re easier than the eyes and more interesting than the shadows around him. Five fifty-one and the hands stop, the words stop, then start, then stop. And they’re gone and he hears more words in the other room fast and angry and thinks that he should care more but he doesn’t.
Five fifty-three and the hands come back. The words come back and they sound like breaking and that makes his breath hitch and the hands are pressing now. Here along his collar bone, there across his shoulder blade, and he thinks of himself as an instrument. It doesn’t matter. It’s easier that way.
Five fifty-eight and the phone rings again. He doesn’t answer but the hands do and there are more words in the other room. Quieter this time. He closes his eyes. It doesn’t matter.
TWO:
It’s seven oh-four and he opens his eyes. He’s lying on his stomach on the couch and he doesn’t remember how he got there but his body feels half-dead and half-chewed up and there’s white gauze wrapped around his knuckles, small spots of red soaking through. He tries to push himself up and forgets about gravity. Gravity reminds him. Everything aches. He closes his eyes. There’s something important clawing at his mind, trying to tell him what’s wrong. Self-diagnosis. He tries to block it out.
A door opens.
“No, he’s still out.” The voice is familiar and he doesn’t feel like opening his eyes. Or moving. Or breathing.
“If I can get him to. He’s not very coherent but he knows what he doesn’t want. Yeah.”
The blanket is pulled back up over him and he tenses involuntarily. “Look, I’m gonna have to call you back. Uh-huh. Thanks.”
He keeps his eyes closed even when he feels the couch dip, a hand rest gently on his shoulder. He thinks his muscles must be pulled tight enough to snap his bones.
“I know you’re awake, Greg. We need to talk.”
Seven twelve and the world implodes leaving him shaking with cold and something very much like disgust. He can’t pinpoint about what. Wilson takes his hand away but doesn’t stand and that seems to make things better. He can feel Wilson’s hip pressed into his side like a branding iron but it’s okay, it doesn’t matter. He makes himself breathe.
“Nothing to talk about.” He says, staring at the fireplace over Wilson’s knee.
Wilson frowns. “We need to go to the hospital. You need some stitches and I want to run some tests.”
Hospitals mean people seeing him and tests mean paperwork and paperwork would mean it was real. He can’t deal with that and a darting glance at Wilson’s face tells him he can’t argue. He tries denial. “I don’t need any tests.” It’s a blatant lie. He’s lying on his stomach on his own couch, weak as a kitten from pain and god knows what else and his best friend is looking at him like he’s breakable and he hates being treated like that even when it feels like the truth and he can tell from Wilson’s face that it doesn’t matter. He looks back to the fireplace, it’s as indifferent as ever.
“Yes. You do.” Wilson tries and fails to make him meet his eyes, dipping his head down into his line of sight.
He shuts his eyes. “All I need are some antibiotics and something to help me sleep.” He tries. “I promise I’ll take every one and eat all my vegetables.” He hears the slip half a second after he says it and cracks his eyes, trying to see if Wilson caught it.
He doesn’t look like he caught it, but it’s hard to tell with all of that damn concern in the way. “Greg. You’re going to the Hospital. I should have taken you last night.”
“Why didn’t you?” His eyes focus on the mantle clock again. Seven eighteen and he wants to crawl out of his skin and out of his life. Maybe a vacation in the Bahamas.
Wilson sighs, rubs at his eyes. He waits. “You asked me not to.”
He doesn’t remember that. “I’m asking again.”
“And I’m telling you no.”
“Wilson.”
“House.” And when he risks another look into those eyes he sees tiredness and concern and an edge of annoyance. Annoyance is good, he can work with annoyance.
“You’re not my dad.” He says.
Wilson nods. “Or your brother or your lover.” He agrees. “But I’m your friend. And your prescribing physician.” He adds.
“You can’t make me.”
Seven twenty-one and Wilson drops his head, shoulders tensing and then slowly loosening. “Is that what this is about?” He says to himself. He looks up and House can’t escape his eyes. “I don’t want to make you do anything.”
And on the long list of reasons to crack that sentence has to be so far down it’s out the other side of the world and floating somewhere over China. But he doesn’t notice he’s shaking until he tries to curl himself into the fetal position and pain shoots from his heel to the base of his skull.
Seven thirty and he tells himself that the tears on his cheeks are from the pain and that the pain is from spending the night on the couch. It’s a good fantasy, but a fragile one, and it shatters when he catches sight of his bandaged knuckles again.
Wilson’s still next to him, elbows on knees, head still bowed. He watches as Wilson clenches and unclenches his hands, fascinated by the play of muscle beneath skin. He’s still staring when Wilson finally looks back up. There’s pain and anger and a thousand other sharpened emotions in those eyes and he thinks that he can feel each one biting into his brain.
Seven forty-one and House closes his eyes, inclines his head. Not a nod, not acceptance, acquiescence maybe. The air explodes out of Wilson’s lungs and he reaches out, fingers hovering a hair’s breadth away from House’s cheek, but doesn’t touch. When House feels his hand move away he opens his eyes and watches Wilson stand. He moves like an old man.
THREE:
It’s almost a quarter after ten when the damned nurse finally steps back, murmurs that she’s done, honey, and leaves him alone on the cold hospital bed surrounded by the flimsy ‘privacy’ curtain. PPTH would have put him in his own room, probably even one with a view, but Wilson had brought him to General because he’d told him he would jump out of the fucking car if he didn’t. He’s facing away when Wilson lets himself back in, he can tell it’s Wilson because he’s wearing Old Spice and his left shoe squeaks. He’s wearing a dressing gown and covered with a paper thin sheet and all he wants is to get dressed and leave. And maybe get drunk and high and maybe get into a fight and maybe he wants to scream but that’s not really an option here, or maybe Wilson talked whoever admitted him into giving him some of the good drugs because the pain has pulled back to someplace a little number than usual and taken all of the hard feelings with it.
Squeak squeak and now Wilson’s standing at the foot of the bed. “Dr. House.”
Not Wilson, not the nurse or one of the other doctors who’ve been paraded through, not panicking. It doesn’t matter, doesn’t matter, doesn’t matter.
“I’m Detective Jeffries, I’d like to ask you a few questions.”
“No. Don’t know. No. And no.” Ten nineteen and he tries to push himself up, ends up halfway to the floor and the IV needle in his arm jumps and there are arms wrapped around him pushing him back up onto the bed and it doesn’t matter but he lashes out anyways.
All he gets for his trouble is a grunt. “It’s okay, okay. I’m just going to go get the doctor, be right back.” House watches Detective Jeffries leave, he’s tall and black and there’s gray in his close cropped hair and the back of his blue collar is sweat soaked. A minute later he reappears with another nurse and Wilson with his brows furrowed, rolling up his sleeves.
“I was just about to take this out anyway sweetie.” The nurse says, pressing her rubber clad thumb over the entry point and pulling the needle out in one smooth move. She presses a square of cotton over the tiny wound and he replaces her fingers with his own, doesn’t look up.
The nurse excuses herself and the curtain’s pulled closed, shutting the three of them into an antiseptic coffin. House stares at the cotton because it gives him something to focus on.
Jeffries cleared his throat. “Dr. House.” He says.
Wilson shifts closer, rests his hand next to him on the bed and House doesn’t want to reach out and grab it like a lifeline but having Wilson between him and fucking Detective Jeffries makes him feel about ten thousand times better. He wants Wilson to tell him to go away. Wilson stays silent.
“I already gave you my answer.” He doesn’t look at Wilson because he doesn’t want to see what’s in those eyes right now. He doesn’t want to look at Jeffries because he’s pretty sure if he does he’ll have to throw something and the only thing handy is his cane and he’ll be needing that anyways. Ten twenty-three and a little red pinprick is seeping through the cotton and he moves his finger to cover it.
Jeffries shifts from one foot to the other. “Dr. House, I realize that you want nothing more right now than to get out of here and forget that any of this ever happened, but you have to realize that it did happen. And I really need to get your statement about it.”
It would be easier to hate him, but Jeffries is just doing his - shitty - job, and he can’t really be bothered to hate anything right now because the pain is just starting to edge back out of numb land into his awareness. Not too bad yet though, so he figures he can probably make it back home, providing he gets this over with.
He sighs. “I don’t want to give a statement. I don’t want to press charges. I just want to go home.”
“Greg.” Wilson says. He looks up at him and then away again, too many pointed things in those eyes and he feels like his skin is made out of the same flimsy stuff as those curtains. Jeffries is giving them both a considering look, the kind that says ‘I’m forming all the wrong conclusions, but feel free to prove me right.’ He closes his eyes.
“I want to go home.” He repeats.
What must be a silent exchange takes place while he’s staring at the backs of his eyelids because a few seconds later Wilson pats him on the arm and two pairs of squeaky shoes leave his immediate vicinity. They don’t go far though.
He opens his eyes and listens.
Jeffries’ voice, too low to make out, and then Wilson says something back. Jeffries again.
Wilson. “He’s just.”
“Trust me, Doctor, I understand.” Jeffries says something else. “Okay?”
Wilson doesn’t say anything, so he figures he must be nodding his head.
And squeaky shoes walk away and towards him at the same time. Ten thirty and Wilson sticks his head through the gap between the curtains. “I’ll see about getting your paperwork together. Do you need help?”
He looks at the open gym bag sitting on the chair by the bed. Wilson had packed it before they’d left. “I’ve got it.”
Wilson gives him a considering look, which makes him angry.
“I’m not two, I can dress myself.”
“Okay. Okay.” Wilson holds his hands up in surrender as he backed away. “I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
Ten fifty-one and he’s finally dressed, ignoring Wilson’s shadow on the other side of the curtain. The pain has reclaimed its roots in his thigh and spread out feelers to his hip and the base of his spine. Moving at all feels like someone’s ripping his nervous system out and the muscles between his shoulders and neck have evolved into broken glass.
Wilson’s got the file in hand and doesn’t look up as he pulls the curtain back. “Do you think you could keep anything down?”
“No.”
He looks like he wants to suggest trying anyways, but all he does is nod. “Okay. Let’s get you home.”
FOUR:
One twenty-one and the sound of breaking glass is echoing in his head because his apartment isn’t big enough for an echo and even if it were it couldn’t go on this long. He’s leaning on his cane and Wilson is watching him the way you watch people who’ve just thrown not-modestly-priced vases at the fireplace and he’s wishing for his pills but he doesn’t have them and doesn’t know where they are. He thinks Wilson took them, probably, but he’s not sure and he doesn’t want to ask because if he’s wrong then that means —
It doesn’t matter.
His neck is cramping and the stitches on his shoulder are pulling and he can feel his pulse in the crook of his left elbow where Nurse Sweetie stuck the damned IV and why wont Wilson open his mouth and say something? The echoes fade and it occurs to him that maybe Wilson’s staying quiet because he doesn’t want him to throw anything else. It makes sense. It doesn’t matter.
“I said ‘no’. What part of ‘no’ don’t you understand?” And if his voice is a little too high too pleading too desperate he doesn’t care because this is his apartment, his life, and it doesn’t matter doesn’t matter doesn’t matter. The apartment does a jig beneath his feet and when it stills it’s because Wilson’s got one hand on his hip and one under his elbow and is turning him towards his bedroom.
“Easy.” Wilson says when he freezes in the doorway.
It’s just his bed, in his bedroom, in his apartment. It’s nothing like — It’s not. He blinks, but he can’t make his eyes focus and he can’t keep track of when he is and what the fuck did they give him anyways.
Three oh-seven and a band of light has snuck past the blinds and across his hand. He stares at it and tries to remember laying down on the couch. He can’t. It doesn’t matter. The TV’s playing The Simpson’s in Spanish. Bart is telling off Principle Skinner.
“Greg?” Wilson walks into his field of vision, bending at the waist and tilting his head to meet his eyes.
He frowns. “What happened?” His throat hurts, voice sounds like a stranger’s, he wants to be surprised but isn’t.
“You don’t remember?” Wilson straightens and then drops into a crouch next to the couch when he tries to arch his neck to keep eye contact.
He tries for sarcasm and it comes out sounding like some little boy lost. “I don’t?” He rolls his eyes. “Jeez, wish someone would have told me.” He says, better, not much but better.
Wilson reaches towards his hand, stops. “I’m going to check your pulse.” He says.
“What are you, my doctor?”
Wilson takes his wrist, fingers hot against his skin. He keeps his voice even and his eyes on the second hand of his watch. “Yes.” He says.
“Since when?”
“Since you were signed out of Princeton General under my care.” He released his wrist. “Do you remember?”
No, he didn’t. Yes, he did. He tried swallowing and his throat stuck to itself.
“Greg.” Wilson snapped his fingers in front of his face. Loudly.
“Yeah, I remember. Not senile you know, are you?” He tries to push himself up, tries not to flinch when Wilson grips his arm to help him. It doesn’t matter but he almost sighs with relief when Wilson lets him go.
Three thirteen and Homer is growing a second head. This one had hair. “What do you remember?” Wilson puts the emphasis on ‘what’ instead of ‘remember’ and he thinks that’s significant and then he decides that he doesn’t care. Homer’s running around in a circle and screaming in a voice two octaves lower than it is in English. He thinks he remembers this episode.
“Doesn’t matter.”
“Yes. It does.”
“You mind, you’re blocking the view.” He tries to shoo him away but all Wilson does is turn around and turn the TV off.
Three fifteen and Wilson’s standing in front of him with one hand on his hip and the other pressed over his mouth and suddenly he notices that Wilson’s wearing a t-shirt. “Ignoring it doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.” He says.
“Why not. It worked for Clinton. Do you think it’ll get blown up if I get caught with Cameron under my desk?”
“Stop it.” Both hands on his hips now.
“You’re right, it’d probably have to be Chase or Foreman to get the heavy artillery into play. Who do you thinks gives better -”
Wilson strides forward and grabs his gesturing right hand, holding it out and still. It‘s like having hot steel wrapped around his wrist and he waits for the connection to burst into flame. “Stop it, Greg. Just.” He lets go of his hand, drops onto the couch next to him. “Just stop it.”
Too hot. He shifts away and he’s pretty sure that Wilson notices but he doesn’t comment and it doesn’t matter. Twelve inches of empty space feels equivalent to the grand canyon and he figures it’s enough. The silence feels like an ice cream headache.
Wilson rolls his head back, rests it on the couch and stares up at the ceiling. It’s a very boring ceiling and he figures he’ll get sick of it in about a minute. He figures he doesn’t want to hear what’s going to come out of his friend’s mouth next.
“Greg.” Wilson says, still staring up at the ceiling as if it contained all the answers he’d ever asked for, in conveniently mathematical form. “You were raped.”
Three nineteen and the world implodes starting somewhere between his spleen and his kidneys. Wilson and the world fade to white and he thinks that maybe - maybe - he’s the one disappearing instead. When Wilson and his living room fade back into being Wilson’s staring at him, two fingers massaging his right bicep, and a spent needle in his other hand.
It doesn’t matter. This is important. He opens his mouth, tries to speak, and realizes that he’s forgotten the words. It’s three thirty-six before they come marching back into his brain.
“No.” He grabs Wilson’s hand to make sure he pays attention. “I wasn’t.” The world starts fading to black, but before it goes he thinks he sees something like pity among the many needles in Wilson’s eyes.
THE END
