The House Fan Fiction Archive

 

Train Wreck


by Gulessable


He sits slumped in an armchair, so tired it feels as if his very skin is crumpled around him instead of just his clothes. His knees are canted up as his slump puts his weight into his feet. The Vicodin are across the room on the piano with his jacket. The Scotch is in the kitchen cabinet. Both are tempting, but not if he has to move. Besides, the Scotch will eventually necessitate another trip to the bathroom. He slumps further and wishes he hadn't turned on the lights; a migraine of stunning proportions is building behind his left eye. No matter. Sleeping here, or simply sitting the entire night will suffice. There is the added bonus of how shitty this will make him feel tomorrow. New apathy, now with extra self-flagellation. I'll buy that for a dollar he thinks.

There is a knock at the door and he stiffens. It doesn't sound like Cameron's insistent little double rap. He can't deal with her again tonight, not another round of dewy eyed hero-worship. He's only human. He doesn't think he can turn her away again. If he doesn't answer maybe they'll go away.

After five minutes there is the sound of a key in the lock. Either she went to the super and begged a key or she went to Wilson and begged his spare. Or it's Wilson himself. He's too tired to look.

Behind him he hears a jacket go into the closet. Shoes come off and keys hit the piano top. The pill bottle rattles its siren call as his jacket is picked up and put away.

Pills and plastic rattle again, he can see Wilson in his mind's eye counting the pills and checking the date on the bottle. He rests his head back on the chair and sighs. It's no more than he deserves.

Lights are turned off or down behind him and he is left in darkness edged in pools of muted light. Wilson moves to the kitchen and he hears dishes rattling and water running. The fridge opens and shuts hastily. He should call a Hazmat team out one of these days to clean it.

A clean, blunt hand appears under his nose. It presents him with three pills. One is Vicodin, the other two appear to nothing more than over-the-counter Ibuprofen. They don't work, he wants to whine. Give me the good stuff.

"Yes, they do." He didn't speak, but Wilson has never had much trouble reading him. An annoying street that usually runs both ways. Not tonight. The hand shakes insistently and he takes the damned pills, and the glass of water that follows them. The glass goes back to the kitchen and he braces himself for the conversation to follow.

"She quit. She quit and I broke her heart. Why couldn't she have fallen for you? You could have tumbled her, and loved her, like you love them all, then left and then you'd be a heartless bastard but she wouldn't...She wouldn't blame herself because she can't blame me. She wouldn't wonder..."

Wilson sits on the footstool and begins unlacing House's sneakers. "I just had a visit from a pretty girl in tears. While my wife might understand late night call-outs from the hospital, she is not inclined to look in favour on pretty girls crying on our doorstep at two am." Wilson talks as if he didn't hear House. "My wife has given me permission to kill you, saying she will stand up in court and attest to the fact that I was in bed with her all night. Foreman, whom I called to take the pretty girl home, offered to help me hide the body. Cuddy left a message on my mobile stating that she has the commitment papers ready to be signed. One more physician's signature and you're in a nice, quiet low stimulation room and a comfy white jacket that does up in back. Vogler probably has a little voodoo doll of you stuck full of pins. In the history of the world I don't think there's anyone as fired as you probably are right now." He has finished with the shoes and removes the socks, placing both to one side. "And the pretty girl, whilst crying and heart-broken, requested that I come and make sure you were okay. At the very least I was to check you weren't face down in a pool of your own vomit. So, Greg. It's three am and we're sitting in the dark with no witnesses. What the fuck am I supposed to do for you this time?"

James' voice is tight and hard. There's a desperate edge to the unaccustomed swear- word. House doesn't know what to say. He's thinking maybe he'll start crying, except James has never dealt well with tears. That's how he keeps ending up married. There are hands on his knees, hot and dry through his pants leg. The fingers of one disappearing from his senses into nerve damaged flesh.

"Ah, Jimmy..." He doesn't weep, but it's a near thing. Because it always ends like this. He always hits whatever fucking wall he was aiming at and goes splat, and James always scrapes him up off the ground. And it's usually merely self-destructive. This time, though, he's screwed other people as well. He's waiting for Wilson to get up and walk away for good.

He turns his hands palm up, exposing the veins along his wrists. Waits for Wilson's disgusted snort and his retreating footsteps. They don't come. Why won't he leave? Why doesn't he go?

"You really are the most dumb-ass genius I've ever fallen in love with." And there are lips. Moist and warm and lingering over his radial artery. They stay long enough to feel his quickening pulse then move to follow the hands that trace up his inner thighs to his zipper. As House's erection kicks upwards and out, Wilson's hands ease his pants open. He can feel James' breath, hot and moist through the gaping front of his boxers. Greg wants to make some objection to part of that last statement but he can't form a sentence, not if his life depended on it. Eloquence, wit and sarcasm have all deserted him. "Ah, Jimmy..." And then he can't think at all, because, oh! Hands! Wilson's hands, in new places he never knew he wanted Wilson's hands before. And that's plain wrong, that he could have been hiding this from himself for the last decade. But there is no room for panic. James' hands and James' mouth leave no room for words or self-scrutiny. He is sucked and stroked and licked to cathartic orgasm, spilling into his best friend's willing, strangely talented mouth. "Jimmy..." He gasps the nick name as if it's the only word he knows. In the low light he can see James' glittering eyes meeting his as he pulls back from Greg's cock. He stares at his friend, wet lipped and hot eyed between his knees, and brings a hand out to trace along one flushed cheek. And watches as those black eyes close and his best friend in life comes from the brush of Greg's fingers across his cheek.

Silence stretches out and a clock somewhere chimes four. As James' breathing returns to normal he tucks Greg back into his pants and climbs off the floor. House waits for the door, waits for James to leave forever. Instead he hears footsteps head toward the bedroom, and then water in the bathroom. James returns moments later and holds out a hand. Together they lever Greg to his feet. He lets James keep hold of his hips for a few extra seconds, pretending to himself he would fall otherwise. His arms are only around James to catch his balance. And it's not a kiss James presses to his cheek, his lips tripped.

He is moved slowly to bed. His shirt and trousers are removed and he is settled with a pillow beneath is bad leg. The lights are turned off and he waits again for the sound of the door. It doesn't come. He can hear James undressing and then the bed dips beside him and suddenly his frozen heart begins to thaw. He begins to think he really is stupid. There doesn't seem to be anything he can do to drive James away.

James' hand finds his beneath the covers and Greg grasps it and brings it to his lips before resting it over his heart. He starts shaking.

"Greg?" Wilson's voice is light, uncertain.

"Your lips tripped." Greg gasps before succumbing to hysterical laughter. Wilson snorts. "Maybe, tomorrow, my dick can trip too." He says, before he, too, begins to laugh.

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Legal Disclaimer: The authors published here make no claims on the ownership of Dr. Gregory House and the other fictional residents of Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital. Like the television show House (and quite possibly Dr. Wilson's pocket protector), they are the property of Fox Television, David Shore and undoubtedly other individuals of whom I am only peripherally aware. The fan fiction authors published here receive no monetary benefit from their work and intend no copyright infringement nor slight to the actual owners. We love the characters and we love the show, otherwise we wouldn't be here.