VIII

Wilson once had a dream about a hospital wedding. Amber was the bride.

She looked beautiful. She was beautiful; except she was the one dying and Wilson was the one standing there with the rings in his hands, heavy like boulders. The ICU was decorated as a church, a rabbi standing over them both and reciting The Psalms.

And he could feel God in the room with him, standing besides them both as they smiled at each other, a fragile kind of love in their eyes, sad and tender and adoring.

Useless, James had thought after he'd woken up. Fucking useless.

Then he'd cried about it, and thought about how House would have called him a little bitch if he were there, watching him break down over a stupid dream about a hospital wedding.

But now, he dreams of a hospital wedding again, where his hands are shaking with an effort that Wilson wasn't aware he was capable of making. He feels concave and sweaty, his chest heaving with pain, and he can feel people gawk silently as they walk past his room in the hospital.

House is standing over him, a smirk on his features, wearing a bowtie over one of his wrinkly, unironed dress shirts. Seemingly, he doesn't care that it looks like Wilson's been wrought inside out. He looks like shit himself, haggard, even, and it's down to Wilson to decide whether or not that's because he's stricken with grief or if he's just House, or if it's a little bit of both. He didn't even bother to shave, which made doing his hair nicely an outlying chance. House looks like absolute crap, which would make Wilson laugh if he wasn't so focused on inhaling and exhaling.

When House slips the ring onto Wilson's finger, faceless people around them silently clap, smiles on their features that Wilson knows - he just can't place a finger of them. They're unfocused and blurry and unrecognizable, treading softly against his memories. Names come to mind. Cameron. Chase. Danny. Mom. Foreman. Thirteen. She's dying, like me. Wilson feels six years old when he thinks about his death; sitting under the kitchen table so no one will ever find him. Death will search and search throughout his home, and he won't be found because he's hiding there. Terrified.

Somehow, House curls up besides Wilson in his hospital bed, although somewhere deep inside Wilson he recognizes that this is impracticable for multiple reasons. House says something that's clever and evasive but they hold each other tightly anyway, and he's soft, and gentle, and Wilson isn't entirely sure when he starts letting out sobs but it's somewhere between the point where he dreams that House is clenching onto him, refusing to let go, and between the point where he wakes up. He doesn't know if he's crying because he's going to miss House, or if he's crying because he's going to miss what House could've been.

Wilson wakes up and it is dark and cold and he's laying on a couch and he's not warm or with House and there are tears streaming down his face and he doesn't know why, and that's the worst bit: he knows there was no possibility of them ever spending their lives together but he's still so fucking sad about it; the fact that for a second, there was a utopia that he could run under his fingers like silk.

***

"House?" Wilson asks one night, as they're sitting on the couch, eating Chinese. The TV is running in the background, providing a constant hum for them to use as a segway, if they'd like. Wilson and House's eyes remain glued to the screen as they eat, offering up casual conversation and eating each other's shrimp and broccoli.

"Yeah, Wilson?" House shoves a chicken drumstick into his mouth, ripping off the meat and obnoxiously chewing.

"You have the tendency to negate everything, and I know I'm going to regret asking," Wilson says in a rush of words, eyes still on the TV screen. "So can you just... try, for once-"

"Just tell me, Wilson," House says, staring at a monster truck crush some old 1993 Audis.

"If you promise to keep your mouth shut."

"No. Wasn't that interested anyway," House says, leaning back into the couch, eating one half of a fortune cookie.

"So at work, today, Rebecca Adler - you know, the one we treated, she had tapeworms..."

"You told me she was your fucking cousin, I remember," House bites.

"She asked me if you cared about me."

House finally looks away from the television, a hand landing on his right leg and squeezing, hard. "Are you about to ask me if I care about you? Because that's a little 2nd grade-esque."

"I told her you did."

"Well, good." House turns his attention back to the monster trucks, putting his feet onto the coffee table. "Can we watch monster trucks now?"

"Do you care about me?" Wilson says, looking to House to gauge a reaction. House replies, "Yeah," but that's not Wilson hears, not really.

***

He reawakens to the sight of House drinking a beer in the sofa across from him.

"What time is it?" Wilson mumbles groggily, slowly making his way up from the reclining position and wiping his eyes from the sleep that's collected there. A wave of sharp dizziness comes over him, and he keels back and moans when the cutting throb of a headache suddenly hits his brain. Light is filtering in through the blinds, so he assumes that it must be 7:15, or something. "House," Wilson reiterates. "The time."

"4:30," House answers matter-of-factly, taking a sip of beer.

Wilson doesn't respond well, shooting up off the couch despite a strong dose of pain. He runs a hand through his hair, seemingly trying to ignore it, push past it. "Shit, House," Wilson snaps, "why would you let me sleep that long? You know that I'm trying to-"

House scoffs, "Calm down," and settles back in the reclining, which Wilson takes as a personal offense on his character.

"No, I will not calm down!" Wilson half-shouts, stopping his pacing for a moment to glare at House from where he's sitting. House pauses his drink, slowly lowering the dark brown bottle from his lips and squinting his eyes, as if running a differential. God, Wilson just woke up, he can't take it; "House," he hisses, "I swear to God, if you analyze me right now I will-"

"Buy a one-way ticket in my name?" House prods, annoyed. "You're actually pissed I didn't wake you up. Which, compared to how you're usually pissed at me, is fairly new."

"Did my pleasant bedside manner give it away?" Wilson says angrily, collapsing back onto the couch. "You're a jerk."

"Wilson, calm down. You still have, what, two months? Five or six weeks, maybe even seven?"

"Yes, the last three of those six I'll be spending wilting into agony," Wilson says caustically. "I don't want to miss out on a single day while I can still stand it. I need to jam my last month full of experiences, okay? Sue the dying man for wanting to enjoy himself a little."

"You could just do all the fun stuff and then kill yourself," House suggests nonchalantly, reaching into his jacket to produce a bottle of Vicodin. "Skip the unpleasant part. Being a coward suits you." He opens the cap and tips it into his mouth, counting out two and dry swallowing them. Wilson stares at him for a few seconds, gauging a response, and then he says, "Don't - don't do this." He should feel shaken, but oddly, he doesn't. It's good advice that he's not going to take.

"Do what?" House innocently shrugs, shoving his pills back into his jacket.

"You know what I'm talking about. Pretending you're in pain so you can dish out insensitive insults instead of dealing with the actual issue." Wilson sighs and leans back into the sofa. "When I'm dead, deal with the pain."

"When you're dead, I'm not going to have to deal with the pain," House exhales, a frown appearing on his features. "Or any pain, actually."

For a moment, Wilson's brain stops. He takes the moments that led to that sentence and he tries to rearrange them in a way that'll compensate, somehow; he pins his eyes shut and tries to work through the words, one letter at a time - and every way he breaks that sentence apart, it ends up meaning the same thing. He feels like he's had a compound fracture in his skull. "You don't mean..." Wilson pronounces slowly, his voice trailing off.

"Hey, Wilson," House interrupts, his voice mocking, "has anyone ever told you that overthinking things is one of your more negative qualities?"

"I wasn't overthinking anything," Wilson replies, bringing a hand to his eyes and rubbing them tiresomely. "You were serious, House. Weren't you? You're going to kill yourself after I'm dead."

House shoots back, "I know this plays into your Shakespearean fantasy and all, but I think the fact that we're actually living in Italy satisfies me marginally."

"You're not even going to use the round trip ticket I bought you," Wilson murmurs.

"'In fair Verona,'" House begins, "'where we lay our scene...'"

"House."

"'From ancient grudge break to new mutiny' - hey, you hard yet? 'Cause my 'Little Gregory' feels very happy right now."

"House," Wilson demands, his eyes locking on his friend's and practically straddling him down. "Are you thinking about killing yourself?" His voice is almost desperately hopeful. It'd be naïve of him to think it's not true. To speak for the purpose of filling the empty silence, Wilson continues, "If so, I need to know."

"No, you don't," House responds, shaking his head. "You wanna know."

"Yeah, and?" Wilson says, eyebrows creasing. "I know you're extremely adverse to the idea of anyone caring about you, but..."

"I'm not depressed."

"And I'm not dying."

"That's not... Wilson." House rakes his eyes painfully over his friend's body before taking another sip of beer. "I'm not suicidal."

"I never said that you were suicidal," Wilson sighs softly. "I asked if you were planning to kill yourself."

House meets his eyes, and his expression is pained, almost, as if he's suffering. "Of course not," he whispers. "Why would you - why'd you even think that?"

Wilson leans his back into the couch as a heaving cough racks its way into his mouth. He tastes pungent blood. He ignores it, and says nothing, finally shrugging noncommittally. "I don't know what to say to you, House," Wilson rasps, shaking his head. "It'd be like you to do something like that. Compulsive. Inconsiderate. Idiotic."

"But I thought we were describing you!" House derisively whines, taking another swig. Wilson stands up, swaying treacherously for a few instants afterwards, shrugging it off as House peers closer. Wilson inhales sharply as he starts to walk away. "Don't kill yourself," Wilson says from the next room, as if that'll help. Honestly, Wilson is telling the gospel truth: he doesn't know what to tell House, and that leaves him short on words, words that he feels need to be said. He's searching for something poignant and wonderful to bring House out of his haze, but he can't find anything, and that makes him guilty. He pins it down to tiredness. Exhaustion and fatigue is a better excuse (or rationalization) than the alternative.

"What?" Wilson hears from the living room. "No convoluted over-analysis of my psyche? No assumptions, or propositions, or proposals? I mean, you used to propose to me at least twice a week." House is popping his head into the door frame. "I didn't want you to know, but secretly, I liked the attention."

Wilson rubs his temples, stumbling to the coffee maker and blinking his eyes, slowly.

"Hey," House barks. "You okay?"

"Fine," Wilson replies, pouring water. "Headache from sleeping too long."

House limps over and puts two fingers to Wilson's pulse. "Too slow," he murmurs. "BP must be low." He pauses momentarily, thinking, and in response, Wilson tilts his head back from the sheer aggravation of it. "Can you not read into everything I do?" he almost begs, but House dismisses him.

"You didn't just blink," he begins. "Your eyelids... They drooped."

"I'm not losing motor control," Wilson insists as he preps his coffee. "I'm tired, I'm dying, I want to go to bed. Not MG."

"The Smiths were a shitty band," House protests as situates himself in front of him, checking for fever, blood pressure, pulse rate, asking questions meant to incriminate Wilson. "How bad's the headache?" "Trouble chewing?" "Double vision?"

"No, House," Wilson says, pushing him away and turning back to his coffee. He grumpily fetches his mug (World's Best Oncologist), and pours his coffee straight black, sipping it gingerly before putting it down and sliding it away from him.

"Do you feel nauseous?" House asks quietly.

"I always feel nauseous," he responds dejectedly, leaning back into a counter. It's only then that Wilson realizes that House is practically standing in between his legs, his face this close from Wilson's. They stand there, in this frozen state of uncertainty, swaying in and out, like stagnant tides.

Wilson could kiss him, right now, if he wanted. He does want to. What's stopping him? There is no sadistic writer typing out his story, controlling his every whim (if there were, that person would be a spiteful, horrible shithead). He has decisions, control - other worldly creatures are for the irrational and those afraid of making mistakes. Wilson isn't a coward. Kiss him. Kiss him.

He swears that he's about to when House initiates, "Do you remember last night?" He has an unreadable look in his eyes, and it's doing nothing to affect the coarsing of Wilson's belly. He feels like he's missing something, and that's making him incredibly anxious.

"What happened last night?" Wilson asks measuredly. He hoists himself onto the counter, putting space between him and House, and hopes he's wearing what could pass as an acceptable impartial expression.

"What do you think happened?"

"We got home, House. I got drunk and passed out on the couch."

House pauses to think, then nods, once, curtly, like his dad always did. "Yep," he says, unnerved, turning away. "Order some fucking Indian."

"We're in Italy," Wilson reminds him.

"And?" House calls from a different room as he walks away.