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namasteTitle: Family, Friends and Other Complications
Chapter Sixteen: When Blythe Met Steve McQueen
Author: Namaste
Rating: Gen, strong House and Wilson friendship, PG
Summary: Blythe and Wilson both try to keep busy to help time pass.
Sample:
Wilson stopped for a minute before he got to the door and wondered how much House had suffered without saying anything at all, and how often he’d spent the night awake, reading, or watching TV, or pacing, or playing video games in his own attempt to somehow make time pass faster, like Steve on his wheel.
And Wilson had never known. Not really. He sighed. All those times he’d told Blythe about the signs she should watch for, and he’d ignored them himself.
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
When Blythe Met Steve McQueen
“He’s cute, but not exactly the ideal image I had for a grandchild at this stage in my life.” Blythe looked up from the cage and smiled. James chuckled.
“He wasn’t my ideal image of a roommate either, something about listening to him run on a squeaking wheel all night got on my nerves.” James reached into the cupboard above the cage and pulled out a bag of dry rat food and poured some of the pellets into a dish. “Greg didn’t want him in his bedroom for the same reason.”
“But the kitchen?”
James shrugged. “It was a compromise,” he said. “Greg agreed to keep him on this side of the room, and I agreed to do all the cooking on the other side.”
He opened the door and slid the dish into the cage, then closed it again.
“I didn’t know you cooked,” Blythe said. She watched the way James moved around Greg’s kitchen now, how he knew which drawers held silverware, the way he maneuvered around the butcher block for a knife, and how he knew that the mug that had been on the dish drainer belonged in the gap on the second shelf of the cupboard, not the first. She could tell he felt at home here, in this space.
“I didn’t really tell anyone about it,” James said. “It was just something I did for myself.”
And for Greg, Blythe thought. She remembered now the discussion she’d heard between Greg and James, months ago, when they’d argued about breakfast. She told herself she should have picked up on the clues then.
James took the water bottle from the cage and dumped what was left in the sink and filled it. Blythe watched for a moment, then reached one finger through the wires. The rat’s fur felt softer than she’d expected, but he bolted to the other side of the cage at her touch.
“He’s still not used to people,” James said, and set the water bottle in place. “He tolerates Greg -- and me, I suppose, but just because he knows I’ll feed him.”
Greg had told James to check in on Steve. His voice still wasn’t much more than a harsh rasp, and hearing it made Blythe’s own throat tighten in sympathy. James had assured her that his voice would return to normal.
“His throat has been through a lot, just like the rest of him: trauma, bruising, swelling,” James had said, while Greg nodded in agreement. “It’s only been two days. He just needs to give it a rest.” He’d turned to Greg for that last part, and Greg rolled his eyes.
“I’d be giving it a rest now if you and Cuddy weren’t being so cautious,” he’d said.
“One more day -- two, at the most.” James gestured toward the IV bags hanging just over and behind Greg’s head. “These aren’t exactly the ideal conditions they mentioned in the study.”
“Start the ketamine, and we can get rid of the morphine,” Greg said, his voice dropping to a whisper. “That’ll make you happier.”
James had just turned away. Blythe hadn’t been able to read his emotions then, and it wasn’t any better now. She watched as he opened the refrigerator and took out an apple and picked up the knife.
He glanced over at her and shrugged. “Steve likes apples,” he explained, and opened the door to the cage. They both watched the rat gnaw on the fruit and James smiled at Blythe. “Sometimes I wonder if he realizes how good he’s got it now, compared to that attic.”
“Attic?” Blythe backed away from the cage. “He didn’t get him at a pet store?”
“Umm, no.” James squinted and looked embarrassed. “But he’s healthy ... well, he’s healthy now.”
“Maybe I don’t want to know.”
James smiled. “Maybe.”
He reached his own finger through the cage and stroked the rat’s fur a few times. James was right. It didn’t seem to mind his soft touch. Finally James turned and opened the refrigerator. “I should probably clean this out,” he said. “Everything’s going to go bad.” He turned to Blythe. “Do you mind if I do it now?”
“Of course not,” she said. “John won’t be expecting me for a while. Would you like some help?”
“No, I’m fine.” He nodded toward the living room. “Make yourself comfortable.”
Blythe walked into the other room, but didn’t sit. The room seemed stuffy, and the air was stale, making the entire apartment seem empty and lonely.
She walked past the piano and to the window, pulled open a blind, then unlocked and pushed open the window. A cool breeze blew in. It was still spring in Princeton, the temperatures swinging wildly from the 70s to the 30s just in the two days they’d been there. She could see the light green of fresh leaves covering the tree branches in front Greg’s building.
Blythe turned back into the room and watched dust motes racing through shafts of sunshine, pushed along by the blast of fresh air. She moved over to the next window and opened it too.
She closed her eyes and tried to let the breeze blow through the tangled thoughts in her mind. She had barely slept the first night in the uncomfortable hotel bed. Every time she would begin to drift into sleep, she was woken by the same nightmare, of someone sneaking past the police and into Greg’s room, someone in the shadows who no one saw and no one heard and Greg, unable to call for help.
Even John was restless that night, and she knew he wished he were out there, somewhere, doing something -- anything -- rather than just watching and waiting. John had never been patient, had never been happy standing by while others worked. It was why he’d fought an office job for so long, and why he’d lose patience with Greg when he was a boy, whenever he tried to teach him something new.
“You’re doing it wrong,” John would say, and take the hammer or the screwdriver or the pliers out of Greg’s small hand.
“Let him do it,” Blythe would tell him. “He can learn from his mistakes.”
“It’s faster if I do it myself,” he’d say, and Greg would step aside and stare down at the ground.
Blythe wondered sometimes if that was the reason John always felt out of place in Princeton -- or in Baltimore or Chicago or Pittsburgh or anyplace else Greg had lived. There was no place for him in Greg’s world. He had no role, no required duties. There was nothing for him to do.
When Greg was sick, John had seemed lost, with nothing there that he could fix. So he had gone back to the life he knew, the one where he was needed, the one where he was in control.
But now he had no job to return to, and there was nothing here for him to pour his energy into.
He’d seemed relieved this afternoon when Blythe told him that she could use a sweater, or maybe a jacket since she had forgotten to pack anything warm. John may have known that it was just an excuse to give him something that would keep him busy, but he didn’t complain. Instead he put together a list of anything they could need for at least a week or more.
He’d left Greg’s room happy to have a job, to have something to do, but Blythe knew his good mood wouldn’t last for long, and they all had a long way to go.
James had warned them that it could be another three days until Greg was strong enough to begin the treatment that he wanted -- and another five days of waiting once that began. Blythe still wasn’t sure she understood it all, but she wanted to be there for him this time -- for all of it. And so did John.
She just wasn’t sure how well they’d hold together waiting until they knew what would come after that. All she had been able to do so far was to get them through each day as it came, trying to find something that would occupy her hands and distract her mind.
Blythe looked into the kitchen and saw James carrying containers across the room and into the garbage. She glanced around the living room and saw the stacks of magazines and books splayed across the coffee table. There was a layer of dust on the piano, and wadded napkins on an end table that apparently had never made it into the garbage.
She put her purse on the couch and selected a few magazines to take to the hospital. She picked up a book and found a spot on the shelf where it belonged. She picked up the napkins and took them into the kitchen. James had pulled the garbage can out into the middle of the room. The cabinet under the sink was open and she spotted a bucket filled with dust rags, sponges and other cleaning supplies. She pulled it out.
“You don’t have to do that,” James said.
“I know,” she said.
It was quiet in the kitchen except for a faint squeaking noise from the far side of the room. Blythe looked over and saw Steve moving slowly on his wheel inside the cage -- going nowhere, but gradually picking up speed. She looked down at the bucket in her hand.
“I’m no better than John,” she said. “Keeping busy is something we do to help the time pass.” She smiled and looked over at the cage. “Even Steve knows that.” She nodded at James, a nearly empty milk carton in his hand. “And so do you.”
-----------
Wilson tied the garbage bag shut and carried it into the living room. The air was fresher than it had been when they first got there, and now there was a faint scent of lemon from the cleaner Blythe had used. It mixed with the smells brought in through the open window: fresh grass, new flowers and the steak that one of House’s neighbors was grilling out on a porch.
It smelled good, and Wilson wished he could just sit and take it all in, but Blythe was right. He had to keep busy, and it felt good to get something done, even if it was something as simple as cleaning up House’s kitchen.
Blythe was making her way down one of the bookshelves, wiping away dust that Wilson guessed had been there since he’d moved out, and since Lady had left for her new job. Blythe looked up at him as he passed through.
“I’ll be right back,” he said, and let himself out the door. The building’s garbage dumpster was hidden out of view, around the back of the building and Wilson followed the familiar steps out the door and around the building.
When House had first moved in, he’d just handed Wilson some empty boxes and ordered him to throw them out. A week later, it had been raining, and Wilson had offered to take out the trash. The next time House had said he was tired, and he’d do it later, so Wilson took the garbage out again.
Wilson somehow had fallen into a routine, and it never changed. Maybe, he thought as he turned into the alley, Blythe was right, and he was just like Steve on his wheel, and cleaning up after House somehow became something he did to keep busy, to pass the time.
He lifted the lid and tossed the bag up and inside. Maybe that could change, he thought. Maybe House would be able to take care of this himself soon -- if the ketamine actually worked -- and if the treatment didn’t just make things worse.
He had tried to ignore everything that could go wrong -- not just the potential medical side effects, but how House would react if it didn’t work. House had confessed about the morphine the day after the shootings, hissing out the details in a whisper: the dosage, the number of times he’d given himself an injection, the last time he’d taken it.
“You need to know,” he’d said.
Wilson knew he’d meant that they should know so they could better tailor his dosages now to avoid another addiction, but he guessed that he also needed Wilson to understand just how bad things had gotten.
And, Wilson thought to himself as he rounded the corner of the building back onto the sidewalk, so that he’d understand how much worse things could get if they didn’t take a chance on ketamine now.
He stopped for a minute before he got to the door and wondered how much House had suffered without saying anything at all, and how often he’d spent the night awake, reading or watching TV or pacing or playing video games just in his own attempt to somehow make time pass faster, like Steve on his wheel.
And Wilson had never known. Not really. He sighed. All those times he’d told Blythe about the signs she should watch for, and he’d ignored them himself.
He moved forward again, toward House’s door. He still hadn’t told Blythe or John how bad things had gotten, but Wilson could read the look in her eyes that said exactly how much she knew beyond what he had said. John had just turned away. He didn’t ask any questions and his face hadn’t given any hint of what he was thinking.
John had been quiet since the night they arrived, speaking only occasionally, and usually just to Blythe. He’d become the outsider in every discussion, in every room. He’d stand near the door while everyone else sat. He’d pace the hallway, while Blythe talked to House. He’d look out the window while everyone else looked at test results -- even as they explained them to Blythe.
Wilson wondered how much he should blame himself for that. John used to talk to him, used to give him a hint about what he was thinking. Now John had shut him out too. But every time Wilson remembered what the man had said, he could feel the embers of his own anger begin to build again, and he’d have to walk away before he said something else.
Wilson pushed open the door and stepped inside. Blythe had her back to the door , but glanced over at him as she dusted the piano. Wilson gave her a slight smile and went back into the kitchen. He checked on Steve one more time. The rat had gone back to his apple slices.
Wilson could hear Blythe in the other room, humming a tune that he couldn’t name, but one that he’d heard House pick out on the piano a few times. It wasn’t fair to her, he thought, to be divided between her husband and her son. Again. It wasn’t fair that she ended up playing referee between himself and John.
Maybe, Wilson thought, he hadn’t done anything to help House, but he could do something for House’s mother.
He walked over to the doorway and stood for a moment, watching her.
He took a deep breath. “I’m sorry,” he said, “about the other night.”
She turned to look at him.
Wilson crossed his arms over his chest. “I was tired, and I took it out on you ,” he said, “you and John.”
Blythe shook her head. “You don’t have anything to be sorry about,” she said. “I love John, but I know he’s not perfect.” She looked down at the rag in her hands and folded it in half, then in half again. “He doesn’t always think about what he’s doing, and sometimes he says the wrong thing.”
Her words took Wilson by surprise, and he remembered how many times House had surprised him -- his thoughts going in circles that no one else expected.
Blythe put the rag down and took two steps toward Wilson. She put a hand on his arm. “Sometimes, people need to tell him when he’s wrong.” She gave him a slight smile, just for a moment, then it was gone. “Sometimes it’s good for him to remember that he’s not always right.”
She stepped away again, back to the piano. She seemed to be studying something in the dark wood, but Wilson couldn’t see anything but her reflection in the newly polished surface.
“Sometimes I think he would have been a better man if someone,” she paused for a moment, shook her head again, “if I,” she said quietly, “if I would have challenged him more often.”
Wilson found himself remembering every time that House had pushed his fellows to ask more questions, to make him justify his diagnosis, to force him to explain why he wanted tests. He wondered if House had ever wished that someone would have challenged John the same way, though he didn’t think Blythe could have changed anything.
“I’m sure you did the best you could,” Wilson said.
Blythe turned to him. “Thank you,” she said.
They both stood quietly, the sounds from the street coming in through the open windows: passing cars, the idling engine of a bus at the corner, a snatch of a conversation between two girls. Wilson imagined for a moment that he could hear House’s motorcycle off in the distance, then realized he was just wishing he could hear it -- the whine of its engine loud and obnoxious.
Blythe was the first to move. She picked up her rag and put it in the bucket with the other cleaning supplies. “I guess I’m done here,” she said. “I should get back to John, and I should let you get back to everything you need to do.”
She stepped into the kitchen, then turned back toward Wilson. “And we can let Steve get back to running on his wheel.”
“Keeping busy,” Wilson said quietly, “and helping time to pass.”
Chapter Sixteen: When Blythe Met Steve McQueen
Author: Namaste
Rating: Gen, strong House and Wilson friendship, PG
Summary: Blythe and Wilson both try to keep busy to help time pass.
Sample:
Wilson stopped for a minute before he got to the door and wondered how much House had suffered without saying anything at all, and how often he’d spent the night awake, reading, or watching TV, or pacing, or playing video games in his own attempt to somehow make time pass faster, like Steve on his wheel.
And Wilson had never known. Not really. He sighed. All those times he’d told Blythe about the signs she should watch for, and he’d ignored them himself.
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
When Blythe Met Steve McQueen
“He’s cute, but not exactly the ideal image I had for a grandchild at this stage in my life.” Blythe looked up from the cage and smiled. James chuckled.
“He wasn’t my ideal image of a roommate either, something about listening to him run on a squeaking wheel all night got on my nerves.” James reached into the cupboard above the cage and pulled out a bag of dry rat food and poured some of the pellets into a dish. “Greg didn’t want him in his bedroom for the same reason.”
“But the kitchen?”
James shrugged. “It was a compromise,” he said. “Greg agreed to keep him on this side of the room, and I agreed to do all the cooking on the other side.”
He opened the door and slid the dish into the cage, then closed it again.
“I didn’t know you cooked,” Blythe said. She watched the way James moved around Greg’s kitchen now, how he knew which drawers held silverware, the way he maneuvered around the butcher block for a knife, and how he knew that the mug that had been on the dish drainer belonged in the gap on the second shelf of the cupboard, not the first. She could tell he felt at home here, in this space.
“I didn’t really tell anyone about it,” James said. “It was just something I did for myself.”
And for Greg, Blythe thought. She remembered now the discussion she’d heard between Greg and James, months ago, when they’d argued about breakfast. She told herself she should have picked up on the clues then.
James took the water bottle from the cage and dumped what was left in the sink and filled it. Blythe watched for a moment, then reached one finger through the wires. The rat’s fur felt softer than she’d expected, but he bolted to the other side of the cage at her touch.
“He’s still not used to people,” James said, and set the water bottle in place. “He tolerates Greg -- and me, I suppose, but just because he knows I’ll feed him.”
Greg had told James to check in on Steve. His voice still wasn’t much more than a harsh rasp, and hearing it made Blythe’s own throat tighten in sympathy. James had assured her that his voice would return to normal.
“His throat has been through a lot, just like the rest of him: trauma, bruising, swelling,” James had said, while Greg nodded in agreement. “It’s only been two days. He just needs to give it a rest.” He’d turned to Greg for that last part, and Greg rolled his eyes.
“I’d be giving it a rest now if you and Cuddy weren’t being so cautious,” he’d said.
“One more day -- two, at the most.” James gestured toward the IV bags hanging just over and behind Greg’s head. “These aren’t exactly the ideal conditions they mentioned in the study.”
“Start the ketamine, and we can get rid of the morphine,” Greg said, his voice dropping to a whisper. “That’ll make you happier.”
James had just turned away. Blythe hadn’t been able to read his emotions then, and it wasn’t any better now. She watched as he opened the refrigerator and took out an apple and picked up the knife.
He glanced over at her and shrugged. “Steve likes apples,” he explained, and opened the door to the cage. They both watched the rat gnaw on the fruit and James smiled at Blythe. “Sometimes I wonder if he realizes how good he’s got it now, compared to that attic.”
“Attic?” Blythe backed away from the cage. “He didn’t get him at a pet store?”
“Umm, no.” James squinted and looked embarrassed. “But he’s healthy ... well, he’s healthy now.”
“Maybe I don’t want to know.”
James smiled. “Maybe.”
He reached his own finger through the cage and stroked the rat’s fur a few times. James was right. It didn’t seem to mind his soft touch. Finally James turned and opened the refrigerator. “I should probably clean this out,” he said. “Everything’s going to go bad.” He turned to Blythe. “Do you mind if I do it now?”
“Of course not,” she said. “John won’t be expecting me for a while. Would you like some help?”
“No, I’m fine.” He nodded toward the living room. “Make yourself comfortable.”
Blythe walked into the other room, but didn’t sit. The room seemed stuffy, and the air was stale, making the entire apartment seem empty and lonely.
She walked past the piano and to the window, pulled open a blind, then unlocked and pushed open the window. A cool breeze blew in. It was still spring in Princeton, the temperatures swinging wildly from the 70s to the 30s just in the two days they’d been there. She could see the light green of fresh leaves covering the tree branches in front Greg’s building.
Blythe turned back into the room and watched dust motes racing through shafts of sunshine, pushed along by the blast of fresh air. She moved over to the next window and opened it too.
She closed her eyes and tried to let the breeze blow through the tangled thoughts in her mind. She had barely slept the first night in the uncomfortable hotel bed. Every time she would begin to drift into sleep, she was woken by the same nightmare, of someone sneaking past the police and into Greg’s room, someone in the shadows who no one saw and no one heard and Greg, unable to call for help.
Even John was restless that night, and she knew he wished he were out there, somewhere, doing something -- anything -- rather than just watching and waiting. John had never been patient, had never been happy standing by while others worked. It was why he’d fought an office job for so long, and why he’d lose patience with Greg when he was a boy, whenever he tried to teach him something new.
“You’re doing it wrong,” John would say, and take the hammer or the screwdriver or the pliers out of Greg’s small hand.
“Let him do it,” Blythe would tell him. “He can learn from his mistakes.”
“It’s faster if I do it myself,” he’d say, and Greg would step aside and stare down at the ground.
Blythe wondered sometimes if that was the reason John always felt out of place in Princeton -- or in Baltimore or Chicago or Pittsburgh or anyplace else Greg had lived. There was no place for him in Greg’s world. He had no role, no required duties. There was nothing for him to do.
When Greg was sick, John had seemed lost, with nothing there that he could fix. So he had gone back to the life he knew, the one where he was needed, the one where he was in control.
But now he had no job to return to, and there was nothing here for him to pour his energy into.
He’d seemed relieved this afternoon when Blythe told him that she could use a sweater, or maybe a jacket since she had forgotten to pack anything warm. John may have known that it was just an excuse to give him something that would keep him busy, but he didn’t complain. Instead he put together a list of anything they could need for at least a week or more.
He’d left Greg’s room happy to have a job, to have something to do, but Blythe knew his good mood wouldn’t last for long, and they all had a long way to go.
James had warned them that it could be another three days until Greg was strong enough to begin the treatment that he wanted -- and another five days of waiting once that began. Blythe still wasn’t sure she understood it all, but she wanted to be there for him this time -- for all of it. And so did John.
She just wasn’t sure how well they’d hold together waiting until they knew what would come after that. All she had been able to do so far was to get them through each day as it came, trying to find something that would occupy her hands and distract her mind.
Blythe looked into the kitchen and saw James carrying containers across the room and into the garbage. She glanced around the living room and saw the stacks of magazines and books splayed across the coffee table. There was a layer of dust on the piano, and wadded napkins on an end table that apparently had never made it into the garbage.
She put her purse on the couch and selected a few magazines to take to the hospital. She picked up a book and found a spot on the shelf where it belonged. She picked up the napkins and took them into the kitchen. James had pulled the garbage can out into the middle of the room. The cabinet under the sink was open and she spotted a bucket filled with dust rags, sponges and other cleaning supplies. She pulled it out.
“You don’t have to do that,” James said.
“I know,” she said.
It was quiet in the kitchen except for a faint squeaking noise from the far side of the room. Blythe looked over and saw Steve moving slowly on his wheel inside the cage -- going nowhere, but gradually picking up speed. She looked down at the bucket in her hand.
“I’m no better than John,” she said. “Keeping busy is something we do to help the time pass.” She smiled and looked over at the cage. “Even Steve knows that.” She nodded at James, a nearly empty milk carton in his hand. “And so do you.”
-----------
Wilson tied the garbage bag shut and carried it into the living room. The air was fresher than it had been when they first got there, and now there was a faint scent of lemon from the cleaner Blythe had used. It mixed with the smells brought in through the open window: fresh grass, new flowers and the steak that one of House’s neighbors was grilling out on a porch.
It smelled good, and Wilson wished he could just sit and take it all in, but Blythe was right. He had to keep busy, and it felt good to get something done, even if it was something as simple as cleaning up House’s kitchen.
Blythe was making her way down one of the bookshelves, wiping away dust that Wilson guessed had been there since he’d moved out, and since Lady had left for her new job. Blythe looked up at him as he passed through.
“I’ll be right back,” he said, and let himself out the door. The building’s garbage dumpster was hidden out of view, around the back of the building and Wilson followed the familiar steps out the door and around the building.
When House had first moved in, he’d just handed Wilson some empty boxes and ordered him to throw them out. A week later, it had been raining, and Wilson had offered to take out the trash. The next time House had said he was tired, and he’d do it later, so Wilson took the garbage out again.
Wilson somehow had fallen into a routine, and it never changed. Maybe, he thought as he turned into the alley, Blythe was right, and he was just like Steve on his wheel, and cleaning up after House somehow became something he did to keep busy, to pass the time.
He lifted the lid and tossed the bag up and inside. Maybe that could change, he thought. Maybe House would be able to take care of this himself soon -- if the ketamine actually worked -- and if the treatment didn’t just make things worse.
He had tried to ignore everything that could go wrong -- not just the potential medical side effects, but how House would react if it didn’t work. House had confessed about the morphine the day after the shootings, hissing out the details in a whisper: the dosage, the number of times he’d given himself an injection, the last time he’d taken it.
“You need to know,” he’d said.
Wilson knew he’d meant that they should know so they could better tailor his dosages now to avoid another addiction, but he guessed that he also needed Wilson to understand just how bad things had gotten.
And, Wilson thought to himself as he rounded the corner of the building back onto the sidewalk, so that he’d understand how much worse things could get if they didn’t take a chance on ketamine now.
He stopped for a minute before he got to the door and wondered how much House had suffered without saying anything at all, and how often he’d spent the night awake, reading or watching TV or pacing or playing video games just in his own attempt to somehow make time pass faster, like Steve on his wheel.
And Wilson had never known. Not really. He sighed. All those times he’d told Blythe about the signs she should watch for, and he’d ignored them himself.
He moved forward again, toward House’s door. He still hadn’t told Blythe or John how bad things had gotten, but Wilson could read the look in her eyes that said exactly how much she knew beyond what he had said. John had just turned away. He didn’t ask any questions and his face hadn’t given any hint of what he was thinking.
John had been quiet since the night they arrived, speaking only occasionally, and usually just to Blythe. He’d become the outsider in every discussion, in every room. He’d stand near the door while everyone else sat. He’d pace the hallway, while Blythe talked to House. He’d look out the window while everyone else looked at test results -- even as they explained them to Blythe.
Wilson wondered how much he should blame himself for that. John used to talk to him, used to give him a hint about what he was thinking. Now John had shut him out too. But every time Wilson remembered what the man had said, he could feel the embers of his own anger begin to build again, and he’d have to walk away before he said something else.
Wilson pushed open the door and stepped inside. Blythe had her back to the door , but glanced over at him as she dusted the piano. Wilson gave her a slight smile and went back into the kitchen. He checked on Steve one more time. The rat had gone back to his apple slices.
Wilson could hear Blythe in the other room, humming a tune that he couldn’t name, but one that he’d heard House pick out on the piano a few times. It wasn’t fair to her, he thought, to be divided between her husband and her son. Again. It wasn’t fair that she ended up playing referee between himself and John.
Maybe, Wilson thought, he hadn’t done anything to help House, but he could do something for House’s mother.
He walked over to the doorway and stood for a moment, watching her.
He took a deep breath. “I’m sorry,” he said, “about the other night.”
She turned to look at him.
Wilson crossed his arms over his chest. “I was tired, and I took it out on you ,” he said, “you and John.”
Blythe shook her head. “You don’t have anything to be sorry about,” she said. “I love John, but I know he’s not perfect.” She looked down at the rag in her hands and folded it in half, then in half again. “He doesn’t always think about what he’s doing, and sometimes he says the wrong thing.”
Her words took Wilson by surprise, and he remembered how many times House had surprised him -- his thoughts going in circles that no one else expected.
Blythe put the rag down and took two steps toward Wilson. She put a hand on his arm. “Sometimes, people need to tell him when he’s wrong.” She gave him a slight smile, just for a moment, then it was gone. “Sometimes it’s good for him to remember that he’s not always right.”
She stepped away again, back to the piano. She seemed to be studying something in the dark wood, but Wilson couldn’t see anything but her reflection in the newly polished surface.
“Sometimes I think he would have been a better man if someone,” she paused for a moment, shook her head again, “if I,” she said quietly, “if I would have challenged him more often.”
Wilson found himself remembering every time that House had pushed his fellows to ask more questions, to make him justify his diagnosis, to force him to explain why he wanted tests. He wondered if House had ever wished that someone would have challenged John the same way, though he didn’t think Blythe could have changed anything.
“I’m sure you did the best you could,” Wilson said.
Blythe turned to him. “Thank you,” she said.
They both stood quietly, the sounds from the street coming in through the open windows: passing cars, the idling engine of a bus at the corner, a snatch of a conversation between two girls. Wilson imagined for a moment that he could hear House’s motorcycle off in the distance, then realized he was just wishing he could hear it -- the whine of its engine loud and obnoxious.
Blythe was the first to move. She picked up her rag and put it in the bucket with the other cleaning supplies. “I guess I’m done here,” she said. “I should get back to John, and I should let you get back to everything you need to do.”
She stepped into the kitchen, then turned back toward Wilson. “And we can let Steve get back to running on his wheel.”
“Keeping busy,” Wilson said quietly, “and helping time to pass.”
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(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-30 12:33 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-03-30 02:49 pm (UTC)