House MD Fanfiction

Coming Clean

Hilson, Protective!House, kisses, 4740 words
By: faithfulpenelope

James Wilson was exhausted.

What had started out as a quiet Monday had morphed into a weeklong inundation. 3 stable patients suddenly taking a turn for the worse. A 40-car pile-up on the Turnpike. A single confirmed case of swine flu, and the hundreds of cases of supposed swine flu – mostly colds and sore throats – that followed. And House's case, which after a week wasn't any closer to being solved. He had left House at the hospital, poring over the file while his fellows struggled to keep awake and alert at the conference table. Wilson had felt bad, knew his friend was struggling, but also knew there was nothing he could do about it. They had ruled out cancer days before. House had to come to the answer on his own, and Wilson hovering around him was not going to help.

The door to the hotel room clicked shut behind him. Wilson dropped his briefcase to the floor and, after a moment's hesitation, undressed where he stood, letting everything just fall to the floor. His suit would be a mess in the morning, but his dry cleaner could worry about that. Wilson was too tired to care. The last working part of his brain was telling him to get his phone and plug it in, but then his body hit the bed and he was asleep.

What he was dreaming about, he'd never know, just that when he work up, he had The Pirates of Penzance in his head.

Three little maids from school are we / Pert as a school-girl well can be / Filled to the brim with girlish glee / Three little maids from school.

He blinked rapidly, trying to orient himself. The click read 2:17 a.m. What day had it been when he'd fallen asleep? What time had it been? Then he heard it again – Three little maids from school are we! – but slower, like a tape that was dying. A little light caught his eye and he remembered. House had stolen his phone last week and reset all the ring tones as show tunes. Three Little Maids meant House's fellows, and the fact that they were calling him meant Wilson's night was not going to get any better.

Wilson kicked off the covers – when did his covers become so heavy? – and grabbed his phone from where it had fallen out of his pants pocket. It beeped twice, flashed "LOW BATTERY", and died.

He sighed and rubbed the back of his neck.

Hauling himself off the floor, he sat back down on the bed and tried to remember Cameron's number, Chase's number, Foreman's number. Nothing came. He dialed House's conference room number instead, hoping they all hadn't left for the lab or called him in secret.

Foreman picked up. His voice sounded impossibly deep. "Diagnostics."

"You called me?" It was too late and they were all too tired for niceties.

"Cameron called you," Foreman stated, his tone making it obvious he hadn't approved. "Hold on." There was a shuffle and low voices, then Cameron's higher-pitched tone over the line.

"Dr. Wilson?"

"Dr. Cameron." There was a long pause and Wilson rubbed his face. "Dr. Cameron, it's late. Just tell me what he did."

"No," she rushed out. "He didn't do anything."

Wilson's eyebrows shot up. "Then…your patient?"

"Yes. No. Well, sort of. We figured it out. But… it's too late. There's nothing we can do. But House… he won't leave. He won't let us leave. He's convinced there's something we can still do, and when she dies, he's going to be convinced there's something we missed."

In the background, Foreman's voice rumbled, "And he's going freak the hell out on us."

The line scratched as Cameron put her hand over the received and hissed, "not helping," at Foreman.