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namasteTitle: Family, Friends and Other Complications
Chapter Fifteen: When Greg Was Shot
Author: Namaste
Rating: Gen, strong House and Wilson friendship, PG
Summary: Check the chapter title.
Author’s Note: This chapter went a little differently than I’d planned, but I’m not going to complain.
Sample: Blythe tried to hold back the sob that was suddenly there, deep in her chest, aching for release. She tried to swallow it down, but it broke free. It was followed by another, then another.
James was quiet on the other end of the phone as she fought for control. She knew he probably had places he needed to be, but he said nothing.
“Why him?” she finally asked. “Why is it always him?”
“I don’t know,” he said quietly.
Find links to previous chapters inside.
Previous chapters are here:
When Blythe Met Wilson
When Greg Got Sick
When Greg Went Home
When Stacy Left
When John and Blythe Moved
When Blythe Didn’t Meet Julie
When Days Were Bad
When Greg Got His Department
When Days Were Good
When John Retired
When Greg Went For A Visit
When They Weren’t Together
When John Took Blythe to Paris
When Wilson Lived With House
When Greg Was Shot
Blythe knew something was wrong as soon as she heard James’ voice.
He said just three words -- “Blythe, it’s James” -- the same words he’d use at the start of almost every call, but she knew it was something bad this time. It wasn’t the tone of his voice, though it was soft and shaken, reminding her of the way he’d sounded when Greg got sick. It wasn’t the time of day, though he rarely called her in the middle of the week.
Something had felt off all day long. The air felt heavy and thick like it sometimes did before a hurricane, although it was the wrong season, and the skies were clear.
Blythe hadn’t said anything to John. He would have told her it was just her imagination. Greg would have said the same thing if she’d called him, and he would have complained about idiots who believe in superstitions.
“They’re not omens,” he’d said one time. “They’re just connections that an irrational mind makes to try and explain something that he doesn’t understand.”
Now she sat and held onto the kitchen table as James told what had happened. Her mind raced from one question to another, trying to figure out what to ask first until he told her the one thing she really wanted to know.
“He’ll be all right,” he said. “His team was there, and they were able to start treatment right away. If they weren’t there ...” His voice faded away, but Blythe knew what he’d meant to say.
“How badly ...” she started, but couldn’t finish the question before her mind jumped again. “Where ... how?”
James explained what he could, that the bullet that hit Greg’s stomach didn’t hit anything that couldn’t be repaired, and repeated himself as he said that the team managed to save him from the damage done to the shot to his neck. He couldn’t say much about who had done it, or why.
“I don’t know,” he said. “Nobody knows. He just came in to the conference room, asked for Dr. House, and ...” His voice faded away again, and Blythe could hear him breathing heavily. She wondered if he was crying, or trying not to. “Then he left,” he said after a few moments.
First Blythe tried to imagine the scene, picturing Greg in his office, maybe with a cup of coffee in his hand. But once the scene began to play itself out, she couldn’t stop the images. She felt like she was trapped in a bad movie, forced to watch the killer stalking his victim. She stood and stepped up to the window, forcing herself to see something else: the flowers, the sky, the grass.
She tried to hold back the sob that was suddenly there, deep in her chest, aching for release. She tried to swallow it down, but it broke free. It was followed by another, then another.
James was quiet on the other end of the phone as she fought for control. She knew he probably had places he needed to be, but he said nothing.
“Why him?” she finally asked. “Why is it always him?”
“I don’t know,” he said quietly.
Blythe brushed the tears from her cheeks and looked out the window again. The roses she had planted a year ago were in bloom -- dark red against the green of the grass and blue of the sky, but she couldn’t look at them without comparing their color to blood. She turned away from the window.
“Tell him I’m coming,” she said.
“I will.”
She didn’t wait for John to make the arrangements. John had refused to get a cell phone, figuring he didn’t need one if she had one, so she called the club and told them to get him a message, then began packing.
John was there in twenty minutes, his golf glove still on his right hand. He stood in silence in the middle of the living room as she told him. For a moment, she thought he was going to accuse her of making it all up.
“They have security there,” he said. “Someone couldn’t just walk in and ...” He shook his head.
Blythe stepped up to him and wrapped her arms around him. She could feel him shaking and he pulled her close. “He’s going to be all right,” she said.
“He’s going to be all right,” he repeated. She wondered if he was trying to convince her, or himself.
-------------
Wilson stood with his back to the wall, watching Blythe as she spoke to House, and watching John as he watched his wife and son, and said nothing.
House was silent too. Groggy from the medications, exhausted by the trauma and the surgery, held together with gauze and stitches, he could do little more than blink in response, but he’d been awake when his parents arrived, and had nodded slightly when Wilson asked if he could handle seeing his mother for a minute or two.
Wilson hadn’t mentioned that John was there too, and House hadn’t even looked at his father.
Wilson stifled a yawn. It seemed like he could barely remember waking up that morning, getting to work, seeing patients, then lunch with House. House had been complaining about the clinic schedule. Cuddy had him working Thursday and Friday afternoons.
“No one wants to spend the weekend sick, but their own doctors don’t have any office hours available, so where do they come?” he’d asked.
Wilson had taken a bite of his salad, trying to finish it before House would make a move to steal his black olives. “I’ll take a wild guess and say: here.”
House nodded. “Bring us your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to wheeze free.”
House picked up his fork and took aim at Wilson’s plate. “I’ve got to find something that’ll keep me out of there for the next two days.”
Wilson had been on the second floor with a patient when he heard someone shouting out in the hallway about a shooting. He’d assumed it was a just a lousy joke until a security guard ran down the hall, shouting at everyone to stay in their rooms.
Then his beeper went off.
House was unconscious when Wilson got there. He saw him for just a minute, rushing alongside the gurney as they wheeled him into surgery. He’d already been intubated, and a surgical resident had one hand tight on his neck, his fingers slick with blood but clamped down tight against pale skin, holding shut the damaged vein.
Cameron had told him and Cuddy that House managed to say a few words, and even mocked her for trying to reassure him. Her hands were trembling, and she began scrubbing them on her lab coat, smearing House’s blood over the white cotton.
Chase had followed the surgical team into the OR. He hadn’t asked anyone for permission to scrub in, and no one stopped him.
Foreman paced in front of the operating room doors, then slammed his hand against a wall. He leaned his head against the concrete, then pushed himself away and announced he was going to go find the son of a bitch.
Cuddy stepped in front of him. “The police are already looking for him,” she said. “We don’t want to get in their way.”
“Cops are idiots,” Foreman said. “I need to do something.” His voice had gone loud, almost becoming a shout. He shook his head and managed to quiet himself, to pull his emotions back somewhere inside. “We just stood there,” he said, “we just stood there and didn’t do anything.”
“He had a gun,” Wilson said. “There wasn’t anything you could do.”
“I know that,” Foreman said. “I know.” He looked down at the floor. “I need to do something now.”
He looked up. “I’ll check on the patient.”
“What patient?” Wilson asked.
“House’s,” Foreman said.
Cameron looked up. “We can’t ...” she paused. “We don’t even know his name. The file’s in the conference room.”
“How hard can it be to find a guy in the clinic with a swollen tongue?” Foreman asked. He took a few steps down the hall, then turned back toward Cameron. “You coming?”
She shook her head.
“You’ll want to change first,” Cuddy said softly, and Foreman looked down at his own stained clothes. The knees of his pants were damp, and Wilson guessed he’d kneeled down next to House at some point.
Foreman nodded, and headed to the locker rooms.
Wilson’s legs suddenly felt weak, and he sat next to Cameron on the bench. He looked up at Cuddy and wondered how she managed to keep moving, then wondered what would happen when she actually did stop moving.
Cameron leaned forward, her elbows on her knees. “He said something about ketamine,” she said. She looked off to the right, as if she could picture something there -- picture House there, telling her something. “He said to tell Cuddy he wanted the ketamine.” She looked up. “Is that supposed to make sense?”
Cuddy shook her head. “No,” she said. She looked at Wilson. “Does it make sense to you?”
Wilson shrugged. “We can ask him later,” he said, hoping that it sounded like he believed House would wake up, and not betray his fears that he never would.
He hadn’t left the bench until the head of the vascular team emerged and pronounced House’s jugular repaired.
A second team had already scrubbed in, ready now to tackle the abdominal wound. Chase had been the one to step out and tell them that the damage wasn’t as bad as they had feared, then he went back inside.
Cameron said she was going to find Foreman and tell him, and headed toward the clinic. She’d showered and changed at some point after the surgery began, and her damp hair was pulled back in a ponytail that bounced against her shoulders as she jogged down the hall.
Cuddy finally sat, her arms wrapped tightly around her body. She had been pulled away again and again to talk to security, to talk to the police, to talk to doctors, to talk to the media relations spokesman. Each time she’d gone only a few feet down the hall, always within earshot.
“I should call his folks,” Wilson said.
Cuddy looked up. “I should probably do that,” she said.
“No. You’ve done enough.”
Cuddy looked away from him and toward the OR doors. “No I haven’t.”
Wilson sat next to her. “Don’t blame yourself.”
“I don’t,” she said, but Wilson didn’t think she sounded sure of that.
He put a hand on her knee. He could feel shaking under his hand, but wasn’t sure if it was coming from him, or from her. “You should take a few minutes,” he said. “Sneak up to the roof and get some fresh air, or go yell at some med student.”
She smiled a little and turned back toward him. “Thanks,” she said, “but I’ve got things I need to do.” She stood again, then looked back at him and shrugged. “Being busy keeps me from thinking too much about ... about everything I can’t do,” she sighed, “and about everything I haven’t done.”
House’s office and the diagnostics room were sealed off with yellow tape when he finally made it up there, once House was out of surgery. Wilson stared past it to see the figures inside who seemed to be collecting one of everything inside the glass walls: papers, case notes, books. Someone picked up one of the red mugs from the table and put it in a plastic bag.
Wilson jumped as a camera flash went off, capturing the white board on the floor and one of the shelves that had been pushed out of place. He reached for the door as someone picked up House’s cane.
“You can’t go in there, sir.” A uniformed officer stood next to the door, his hand held out in front of Wilson.
“They’re his things,” Wilson said, still watching the men and women inside. “He needs them.”
“He’ll get them back,” the man said. His voice was quieter, but his arm still blocked the entrance.
Wilson had nodded slightly, then took a step back from the glass, turned away and went to his office.
It had taken him more than ten minutes to calm himself enough to find Blythe’s number, then he’d misdialed three times before he finally made the connection.
After he’d hung up, Wilson turned on his computer and started searching for ketamine. He knew House was thinking about something specific. House probably knew exactly what he wanted, even if one else did.
He found a rough translation about a German study and printed it out to read while he sat next to House’s bed.
When House woke from the anesthesia, he’d looked confused. He’d stared at the ceiling, then over at Wilson. He opened his mouth to say something.
“Don’t,” Wilson warned. “I know it goes against your nature, but it’ll be better if you don’t say anything for a few hours.”
House closed his mouth and raised his eyebrows at Wilson.
“You remember what happened?”
House nodded slightly, then winced. He reached up to touch the bandage around his throat.
“The vascular guys are going to be pissed if you screw up their work,” Wilson said.
House waved his hand in Wilson’s direction. His middle finger was slightly raised. Wilson smiled.
House looked him in the eye and carefully mouthed the word “ketamine.”
Wilson nodded. “The German study?”
House didn’t nod, but Wilson could read the answer in his eyes.
“We still need a little time to look it over,” he said, “and you can use some time to get stronger before we do anything.”
House raised his hand again and Wilson put his hand on House’s shoulder.
“Not long,” he said. “Just give us a few days, all right?”
House blinked and then blinked again, longer this time.
“You get some rest,” Wilson said. “I called your Mom. They’re on their way here.”
House stared at him, then rolled his eyes.
“Yes, I had to tell her. Believe it or not, shootings in hospitals aren’t that common. It’s better that she heard it from me than from CNN.”
House shrugged, then closed his eyes again.
“I’ll see you later,” Wilson said.
House had woken twice more through the evening, but now, after a few minutes with his parents, he was fighting to stay awake and Wilson stepped forward and nodded toward Blythe.
“We should let him rest,” he said, and she glanced at him and nodded. John stood at the door, watching as she kissed House’s forehead, then stepped away.
Wilson watched House drop into a deep sleep, then slid the door closed. He turned to Blythe and John.
“You must be tired,” he said.
“So are you,” Blythe said. She stepped up and hugged him, holding tighter to him than Wilson could remember. He squeezed her back.
“Have you got a hotel?”
Blythe nodded.
Wilson turned toward the elevator at the far end of the hall. “I’ll walk you out,” he said. He wanted to make sure they didn’t try to stop by House’s office.
There was a police officer at the nurse’s station, keeping watch on House’s room. Blythe came to a stop when she saw him.
“It’s just a precaution,” Wilson said, and touched her elbow to lead her away.
They were all quiet in the elevator, and Wilson watched the numbers change from the second floor to the first. He yawned again. He was too tired to drive to his hotel. Maybe he’d just sleep in his office tonight. But that would mean spending the night just around the corner from the conference room, and he didn’t know if he could do that.
Maybe he’d just bunk down in the on-call room for a couple of hours. The residents wouldn’t dare bother him, and he’d still be close if House needed him.
The elevator door opened and he waited for Blythe and John to walk into the lobby first. There were no patients, only more police. They’d claimed the area as their command center within moments of their arrival, Cuddy had said. There were a half-dozen of them lounging around the room, drinking coffee, eating sandwiches. He clenched his jaw when he heard someone laugh, fighting to keep himself from yelling at them to get out there, to find the guy.
“So what did he do anyway?” It was the first time John had spoken since they arrived. His voice was harsh and Wilson could hear the anger behind his words.
“Who, the shooter?” Wilson shrugged toward the cops. “Ask them.”
“No,” John said. “What did Greg do to piss this guy off in the first place?”
Wilson grabbed John’s shoulder and swung him around to face him. “Don’t,” he said. He felt his own anger and frustration and worry rise, and he didn’t even try to stamp it down. It was too close to the surface, and ready to break. “Don’t say another word.”
“I just want to know ...”
“You just want to blame him, like always.” Wilson gripped John’s shoulder tighter. He knew he shouldn’t say anything. He knew patients’ families often said the wrong thing. He knew that you shouldn’t judge them. He knew he didn’t know everything that had happened between House and his father, but he knew enough. And right now, he didn’t care about what he should do.
“I’m not blaming ...”
“Yes, you are. And this is not his fault. Nothing here has been his fault. None of it has ever been his fault.”
John reached up and pushed Wilson’s hand away. Wilson was surprised by his strength, but knew he shouldn’t have been. He may have been an old man, but he was still a Marine. “I’m just trying to make sense of all this,” John said.
“A crazy man with a gun came in here and shot your son twice, for no reason,” Wilson said. He knew he was shouting, but couldn’t stop himself. “You can’t make sense of that no matter how much you may wish you could twist the facts for your own satisfaction.”
Wilson could see a couple of the cops moving in their direction and he stepped back and put his hands on his hips. He took a deep breath and tried to latch on to some kind of control.
“John, it’s been a long day.” Blythe’s voice was quiet. She seemed to occupy the only calm spot in the room. “I know you’re worried. We all are.”
The cops slowed down and came to a stop, waiting to see how things played out.
Blythe had one hand on her husband’s arm. “Getting angry isn’t going to help anything.”
Wilson noticed she hadn’t said anything to him, and he worried that he’d upset her. Maybe she couldn't’ stand to look at him. He didn’t care about John, but Blythe didn’t deserve any of this. It seemed like she was always caught in the middle.
“Let’s go to the hotel and get some sleep,” Blythe said to her husband.
John finally nodded and took her hand. Wilson could still see the anger on his face, but he wasn’t sure if the man was mad only at him or the entire world.
Then Blythe turned to Wilson and gave him a slight smile. “You should get some sleep too, James,” she said, and reached out with her other hand to squeeze his arm for a moment. “Greg’s going to need you,” she said. “We all will.”
Chapter Fifteen: When Greg Was Shot
Author: Namaste
Rating: Gen, strong House and Wilson friendship, PG
Summary: Check the chapter title.
Author’s Note: This chapter went a little differently than I’d planned, but I’m not going to complain.
Sample: Blythe tried to hold back the sob that was suddenly there, deep in her chest, aching for release. She tried to swallow it down, but it broke free. It was followed by another, then another.
James was quiet on the other end of the phone as she fought for control. She knew he probably had places he needed to be, but he said nothing.
“Why him?” she finally asked. “Why is it always him?”
“I don’t know,” he said quietly.
Find links to previous chapters inside.
Previous chapters are here:
When Blythe Met Wilson
When Greg Got Sick
When Greg Went Home
When Stacy Left
When John and Blythe Moved
When Blythe Didn’t Meet Julie
When Days Were Bad
When Greg Got His Department
When Days Were Good
When John Retired
When Greg Went For A Visit
When They Weren’t Together
When John Took Blythe to Paris
When Wilson Lived With House
When Greg Was Shot
Blythe knew something was wrong as soon as she heard James’ voice.
He said just three words -- “Blythe, it’s James” -- the same words he’d use at the start of almost every call, but she knew it was something bad this time. It wasn’t the tone of his voice, though it was soft and shaken, reminding her of the way he’d sounded when Greg got sick. It wasn’t the time of day, though he rarely called her in the middle of the week.
Something had felt off all day long. The air felt heavy and thick like it sometimes did before a hurricane, although it was the wrong season, and the skies were clear.
Blythe hadn’t said anything to John. He would have told her it was just her imagination. Greg would have said the same thing if she’d called him, and he would have complained about idiots who believe in superstitions.
“They’re not omens,” he’d said one time. “They’re just connections that an irrational mind makes to try and explain something that he doesn’t understand.”
Now she sat and held onto the kitchen table as James told what had happened. Her mind raced from one question to another, trying to figure out what to ask first until he told her the one thing she really wanted to know.
“He’ll be all right,” he said. “His team was there, and they were able to start treatment right away. If they weren’t there ...” His voice faded away, but Blythe knew what he’d meant to say.
“How badly ...” she started, but couldn’t finish the question before her mind jumped again. “Where ... how?”
James explained what he could, that the bullet that hit Greg’s stomach didn’t hit anything that couldn’t be repaired, and repeated himself as he said that the team managed to save him from the damage done to the shot to his neck. He couldn’t say much about who had done it, or why.
“I don’t know,” he said. “Nobody knows. He just came in to the conference room, asked for Dr. House, and ...” His voice faded away again, and Blythe could hear him breathing heavily. She wondered if he was crying, or trying not to. “Then he left,” he said after a few moments.
First Blythe tried to imagine the scene, picturing Greg in his office, maybe with a cup of coffee in his hand. But once the scene began to play itself out, she couldn’t stop the images. She felt like she was trapped in a bad movie, forced to watch the killer stalking his victim. She stood and stepped up to the window, forcing herself to see something else: the flowers, the sky, the grass.
She tried to hold back the sob that was suddenly there, deep in her chest, aching for release. She tried to swallow it down, but it broke free. It was followed by another, then another.
James was quiet on the other end of the phone as she fought for control. She knew he probably had places he needed to be, but he said nothing.
“Why him?” she finally asked. “Why is it always him?”
“I don’t know,” he said quietly.
Blythe brushed the tears from her cheeks and looked out the window again. The roses she had planted a year ago were in bloom -- dark red against the green of the grass and blue of the sky, but she couldn’t look at them without comparing their color to blood. She turned away from the window.
“Tell him I’m coming,” she said.
“I will.”
She didn’t wait for John to make the arrangements. John had refused to get a cell phone, figuring he didn’t need one if she had one, so she called the club and told them to get him a message, then began packing.
John was there in twenty minutes, his golf glove still on his right hand. He stood in silence in the middle of the living room as she told him. For a moment, she thought he was going to accuse her of making it all up.
“They have security there,” he said. “Someone couldn’t just walk in and ...” He shook his head.
Blythe stepped up to him and wrapped her arms around him. She could feel him shaking and he pulled her close. “He’s going to be all right,” she said.
“He’s going to be all right,” he repeated. She wondered if he was trying to convince her, or himself.
-------------
Wilson stood with his back to the wall, watching Blythe as she spoke to House, and watching John as he watched his wife and son, and said nothing.
House was silent too. Groggy from the medications, exhausted by the trauma and the surgery, held together with gauze and stitches, he could do little more than blink in response, but he’d been awake when his parents arrived, and had nodded slightly when Wilson asked if he could handle seeing his mother for a minute or two.
Wilson hadn’t mentioned that John was there too, and House hadn’t even looked at his father.
Wilson stifled a yawn. It seemed like he could barely remember waking up that morning, getting to work, seeing patients, then lunch with House. House had been complaining about the clinic schedule. Cuddy had him working Thursday and Friday afternoons.
“No one wants to spend the weekend sick, but their own doctors don’t have any office hours available, so where do they come?” he’d asked.
Wilson had taken a bite of his salad, trying to finish it before House would make a move to steal his black olives. “I’ll take a wild guess and say: here.”
House nodded. “Bring us your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to wheeze free.”
House picked up his fork and took aim at Wilson’s plate. “I’ve got to find something that’ll keep me out of there for the next two days.”
Wilson had been on the second floor with a patient when he heard someone shouting out in the hallway about a shooting. He’d assumed it was a just a lousy joke until a security guard ran down the hall, shouting at everyone to stay in their rooms.
Then his beeper went off.
House was unconscious when Wilson got there. He saw him for just a minute, rushing alongside the gurney as they wheeled him into surgery. He’d already been intubated, and a surgical resident had one hand tight on his neck, his fingers slick with blood but clamped down tight against pale skin, holding shut the damaged vein.
Cameron had told him and Cuddy that House managed to say a few words, and even mocked her for trying to reassure him. Her hands were trembling, and she began scrubbing them on her lab coat, smearing House’s blood over the white cotton.
Chase had followed the surgical team into the OR. He hadn’t asked anyone for permission to scrub in, and no one stopped him.
Foreman paced in front of the operating room doors, then slammed his hand against a wall. He leaned his head against the concrete, then pushed himself away and announced he was going to go find the son of a bitch.
Cuddy stepped in front of him. “The police are already looking for him,” she said. “We don’t want to get in their way.”
“Cops are idiots,” Foreman said. “I need to do something.” His voice had gone loud, almost becoming a shout. He shook his head and managed to quiet himself, to pull his emotions back somewhere inside. “We just stood there,” he said, “we just stood there and didn’t do anything.”
“He had a gun,” Wilson said. “There wasn’t anything you could do.”
“I know that,” Foreman said. “I know.” He looked down at the floor. “I need to do something now.”
He looked up. “I’ll check on the patient.”
“What patient?” Wilson asked.
“House’s,” Foreman said.
Cameron looked up. “We can’t ...” she paused. “We don’t even know his name. The file’s in the conference room.”
“How hard can it be to find a guy in the clinic with a swollen tongue?” Foreman asked. He took a few steps down the hall, then turned back toward Cameron. “You coming?”
She shook her head.
“You’ll want to change first,” Cuddy said softly, and Foreman looked down at his own stained clothes. The knees of his pants were damp, and Wilson guessed he’d kneeled down next to House at some point.
Foreman nodded, and headed to the locker rooms.
Wilson’s legs suddenly felt weak, and he sat next to Cameron on the bench. He looked up at Cuddy and wondered how she managed to keep moving, then wondered what would happen when she actually did stop moving.
Cameron leaned forward, her elbows on her knees. “He said something about ketamine,” she said. She looked off to the right, as if she could picture something there -- picture House there, telling her something. “He said to tell Cuddy he wanted the ketamine.” She looked up. “Is that supposed to make sense?”
Cuddy shook her head. “No,” she said. She looked at Wilson. “Does it make sense to you?”
Wilson shrugged. “We can ask him later,” he said, hoping that it sounded like he believed House would wake up, and not betray his fears that he never would.
He hadn’t left the bench until the head of the vascular team emerged and pronounced House’s jugular repaired.
A second team had already scrubbed in, ready now to tackle the abdominal wound. Chase had been the one to step out and tell them that the damage wasn’t as bad as they had feared, then he went back inside.
Cameron said she was going to find Foreman and tell him, and headed toward the clinic. She’d showered and changed at some point after the surgery began, and her damp hair was pulled back in a ponytail that bounced against her shoulders as she jogged down the hall.
Cuddy finally sat, her arms wrapped tightly around her body. She had been pulled away again and again to talk to security, to talk to the police, to talk to doctors, to talk to the media relations spokesman. Each time she’d gone only a few feet down the hall, always within earshot.
“I should call his folks,” Wilson said.
Cuddy looked up. “I should probably do that,” she said.
“No. You’ve done enough.”
Cuddy looked away from him and toward the OR doors. “No I haven’t.”
Wilson sat next to her. “Don’t blame yourself.”
“I don’t,” she said, but Wilson didn’t think she sounded sure of that.
He put a hand on her knee. He could feel shaking under his hand, but wasn’t sure if it was coming from him, or from her. “You should take a few minutes,” he said. “Sneak up to the roof and get some fresh air, or go yell at some med student.”
She smiled a little and turned back toward him. “Thanks,” she said, “but I’ve got things I need to do.” She stood again, then looked back at him and shrugged. “Being busy keeps me from thinking too much about ... about everything I can’t do,” she sighed, “and about everything I haven’t done.”
House’s office and the diagnostics room were sealed off with yellow tape when he finally made it up there, once House was out of surgery. Wilson stared past it to see the figures inside who seemed to be collecting one of everything inside the glass walls: papers, case notes, books. Someone picked up one of the red mugs from the table and put it in a plastic bag.
Wilson jumped as a camera flash went off, capturing the white board on the floor and one of the shelves that had been pushed out of place. He reached for the door as someone picked up House’s cane.
“You can’t go in there, sir.” A uniformed officer stood next to the door, his hand held out in front of Wilson.
“They’re his things,” Wilson said, still watching the men and women inside. “He needs them.”
“He’ll get them back,” the man said. His voice was quieter, but his arm still blocked the entrance.
Wilson had nodded slightly, then took a step back from the glass, turned away and went to his office.
It had taken him more than ten minutes to calm himself enough to find Blythe’s number, then he’d misdialed three times before he finally made the connection.
After he’d hung up, Wilson turned on his computer and started searching for ketamine. He knew House was thinking about something specific. House probably knew exactly what he wanted, even if one else did.
He found a rough translation about a German study and printed it out to read while he sat next to House’s bed.
When House woke from the anesthesia, he’d looked confused. He’d stared at the ceiling, then over at Wilson. He opened his mouth to say something.
“Don’t,” Wilson warned. “I know it goes against your nature, but it’ll be better if you don’t say anything for a few hours.”
House closed his mouth and raised his eyebrows at Wilson.
“You remember what happened?”
House nodded slightly, then winced. He reached up to touch the bandage around his throat.
“The vascular guys are going to be pissed if you screw up their work,” Wilson said.
House waved his hand in Wilson’s direction. His middle finger was slightly raised. Wilson smiled.
House looked him in the eye and carefully mouthed the word “ketamine.”
Wilson nodded. “The German study?”
House didn’t nod, but Wilson could read the answer in his eyes.
“We still need a little time to look it over,” he said, “and you can use some time to get stronger before we do anything.”
House raised his hand again and Wilson put his hand on House’s shoulder.
“Not long,” he said. “Just give us a few days, all right?”
House blinked and then blinked again, longer this time.
“You get some rest,” Wilson said. “I called your Mom. They’re on their way here.”
House stared at him, then rolled his eyes.
“Yes, I had to tell her. Believe it or not, shootings in hospitals aren’t that common. It’s better that she heard it from me than from CNN.”
House shrugged, then closed his eyes again.
“I’ll see you later,” Wilson said.
House had woken twice more through the evening, but now, after a few minutes with his parents, he was fighting to stay awake and Wilson stepped forward and nodded toward Blythe.
“We should let him rest,” he said, and she glanced at him and nodded. John stood at the door, watching as she kissed House’s forehead, then stepped away.
Wilson watched House drop into a deep sleep, then slid the door closed. He turned to Blythe and John.
“You must be tired,” he said.
“So are you,” Blythe said. She stepped up and hugged him, holding tighter to him than Wilson could remember. He squeezed her back.
“Have you got a hotel?”
Blythe nodded.
Wilson turned toward the elevator at the far end of the hall. “I’ll walk you out,” he said. He wanted to make sure they didn’t try to stop by House’s office.
There was a police officer at the nurse’s station, keeping watch on House’s room. Blythe came to a stop when she saw him.
“It’s just a precaution,” Wilson said, and touched her elbow to lead her away.
They were all quiet in the elevator, and Wilson watched the numbers change from the second floor to the first. He yawned again. He was too tired to drive to his hotel. Maybe he’d just sleep in his office tonight. But that would mean spending the night just around the corner from the conference room, and he didn’t know if he could do that.
Maybe he’d just bunk down in the on-call room for a couple of hours. The residents wouldn’t dare bother him, and he’d still be close if House needed him.
The elevator door opened and he waited for Blythe and John to walk into the lobby first. There were no patients, only more police. They’d claimed the area as their command center within moments of their arrival, Cuddy had said. There were a half-dozen of them lounging around the room, drinking coffee, eating sandwiches. He clenched his jaw when he heard someone laugh, fighting to keep himself from yelling at them to get out there, to find the guy.
“So what did he do anyway?” It was the first time John had spoken since they arrived. His voice was harsh and Wilson could hear the anger behind his words.
“Who, the shooter?” Wilson shrugged toward the cops. “Ask them.”
“No,” John said. “What did Greg do to piss this guy off in the first place?”
Wilson grabbed John’s shoulder and swung him around to face him. “Don’t,” he said. He felt his own anger and frustration and worry rise, and he didn’t even try to stamp it down. It was too close to the surface, and ready to break. “Don’t say another word.”
“I just want to know ...”
“You just want to blame him, like always.” Wilson gripped John’s shoulder tighter. He knew he shouldn’t say anything. He knew patients’ families often said the wrong thing. He knew that you shouldn’t judge them. He knew he didn’t know everything that had happened between House and his father, but he knew enough. And right now, he didn’t care about what he should do.
“I’m not blaming ...”
“Yes, you are. And this is not his fault. Nothing here has been his fault. None of it has ever been his fault.”
John reached up and pushed Wilson’s hand away. Wilson was surprised by his strength, but knew he shouldn’t have been. He may have been an old man, but he was still a Marine. “I’m just trying to make sense of all this,” John said.
“A crazy man with a gun came in here and shot your son twice, for no reason,” Wilson said. He knew he was shouting, but couldn’t stop himself. “You can’t make sense of that no matter how much you may wish you could twist the facts for your own satisfaction.”
Wilson could see a couple of the cops moving in their direction and he stepped back and put his hands on his hips. He took a deep breath and tried to latch on to some kind of control.
“John, it’s been a long day.” Blythe’s voice was quiet. She seemed to occupy the only calm spot in the room. “I know you’re worried. We all are.”
The cops slowed down and came to a stop, waiting to see how things played out.
Blythe had one hand on her husband’s arm. “Getting angry isn’t going to help anything.”
Wilson noticed she hadn’t said anything to him, and he worried that he’d upset her. Maybe she couldn't’ stand to look at him. He didn’t care about John, but Blythe didn’t deserve any of this. It seemed like she was always caught in the middle.
“Let’s go to the hotel and get some sleep,” Blythe said to her husband.
John finally nodded and took her hand. Wilson could still see the anger on his face, but he wasn’t sure if the man was mad only at him or the entire world.
Then Blythe turned to Wilson and gave him a slight smile. “You should get some sleep too, James,” she said, and reached out with her other hand to squeeze his arm for a moment. “Greg’s going to need you,” she said. “We all will.”
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 01:42 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 01:54 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 01:51 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 01:55 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 01:57 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 02:06 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 02:41 am (UTC)As for the future, well. I have a few ideas of what might happen, but I'm sure you do too, so--I'll just wait and see.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 01:17 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 01:19 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 02:52 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 01:20 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 04:26 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 01:22 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 04:39 am (UTC)I love the reaction of the team. Chase following House into surgery and Foreman feeling helpless just seemed really IC.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 01:25 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 06:34 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 01:27 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 07:51 am (UTC)When I saw, "When Greg Was Shot", I did a little audible cheer. I've mentioned before that I love canon gapfills - and this has got to be THE HUGEST GAP left to date.
I loved this chapter, loved little details like Cuddy's perpetual movement vs. Wilson's difficult standing.
I will mentioned, however, that there's a small internal continuity issue:
Your first reference to Blythe seeing House after the shooting:
he could do little more than blink in response, but he’d been awake when his parents arrived, and had nodded slightly when Wilson asked if he could handle seeing his mother for a minute or two.
You seem to go on to detail how House was told his parents were visiting, and how that visit played out - and perhaps I'm missing something (which is definitely possible, since I've been writing all day and my brain hurts) - but that's not what ended up happening.
Eee...! Looking forward to more detail on Wilson taking care of House post-shooting!
(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 01:31 pm (UTC)I wrote the first four paragraphs of Wilson's POV, then it turned into the post-shooting thing complete with the team and Cuddy, then I had still bring Blythe and John back in and still get Wilson's confrontation with John in there. Whew. A lot ended up being squeezed into this chapter.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 09:22 am (UTC)as always there was many quote... worthy(?) parts. i particularly like this:
Wilson’s legs suddenly felt weak, and he sat next to Cameron on the bench. He looked up at Cuddy and wondered how she managed to keep moving, then wondered what would happen when she actually did stop moving.
you nailed cuddy in one sentence. ♥
(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 01:34 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 12:50 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 01:40 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 01:05 pm (UTC)I love, love, love this series!
(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 01:42 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 03:59 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 05:05 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 05:17 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 09:06 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-24 10:44 pm (UTC)You have done a great work. I enjoyed reading your story that much.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-25 02:51 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-25 04:45 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-25 02:53 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-25 04:07 pm (UTC)Which is bullshit. My mother subscribes to the same belief and I'd like nothing better than to show her how wrong she is.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-26 08:05 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-26 10:26 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-26 06:11 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-27 12:06 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-04-02 01:12 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-04-09 12:50 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-07-20 09:32 am (UTC)Powerful stuff! And I'm w/the others in cheering Wilson for pointing out that, evilly-meant or not, lines are still there and should not be crossed.
*shivers w/delight*
-Katrina
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-19 07:46 pm (UTC)Even if John wasn't completely evil, he still deserved it.