With The Time We Have Left

“Remy La Champagne,” House announces himself to the motel clerk even though she didn’t ask, “heir to the Louisiana molasses empire.” He lays the accent on thick and uses the head of his cane to tip an imaginary hat. She gives him a once over, a look telling him that he’s not even the strangest person she’s met today.

Beside him Wilson purses his lips, keeps his eyes firmly fixed on the clerk as he hands over his credit card. “Just the one night,” he tells the woman.

Five minutes later in a room done up in 70’s browns and oranges Wilson shakes his head. “That’s your worst one yet.”

“Worse than Burton Trilby Jr. the Third?” House asks, pressing every button on the TV remote to find which one will actually turn the damn thing on.

Wilson squints and tilts his head as he remembers Burton Trilby Jr. the Third. “It’s a toss-up.”

House settles on a Real Housewives of Whatever episode and Wilson doesn’t even protest. What meager energy kept his feet moving on the walk from the parking lot through the door of this room leaves him and he drops ungracefully onto the bed. The motorcycles do all the real work but hours upon hours on the road takes it out of both of them.

House manages his feet better – he moves to unpack the plastic bag of Chinese food onto the cheap nightstand between them. Wilson eyes it warily, which is entirely fair. There’d been a debate over the authenticity of Chinese food found in the great wilds of Northern Vermont but House won the coin toss.

House sets the sesame chicken and beef and broccoli out, not bothering with the rice. He breaks a pair of chopsticks apart and rubs them together before digging into the chicken.

“I want some of that, don’t eat it all,” Wilson says, though he makes no move towards the food himself.

House digs out a bite that’s almost too heavy for the chopsticks and shoves it in his mouth, pointedly watching Wilson as he does it. Wilson just sighs, though the quirk of his lips betrays how much he isn’t bothered. It’s been hard to bother Wilson on this trip, even with the absurd aliases.

House knows it’s ridiculous to miss it but he does. It was normal; he’s trying not to miss normal.

“New York, New York,” he says through a mouthful, “Six hours, give or take pee breaks.”

Wilson’s tipped his head back against the pillow, eyes half lidded. “We can skip New York. Seen it.”

A catfight breaks out on the TV and they watch for a minute until the talking heads ruin the action.

“Eat,” House insists, plunking what he’s saved of the sesame chicken on Wilson’s end of the nightstand. He even breaks open a pair of chopsticks for him just to be extra nice. Wilson pulls himself up into a sitting position and takes both chicken and sticks and doesn’t even grimace as he eats.

The TV drones on for a while as they eat, an easy quiet between them. It’s always been easy with Wilson.

House gets crumbs all over the queasy paisley of the comforter as he cracks open a fortune cookie. “’If you’re riding ahead of the herd, look back to make sure it’s still there. Lucky numbers 43-2-25-7-0.’” He waggles his eyebrows, “-in bed.”

Wilson opens his own cookie more carefully over a napkin. “’You will be spending time outdoors, in the mountains, near a lake.’”

“In bed,” House supplies for him.

“Sounds good,” Wilson says, and before House can say it – “the outdoors part.” His tone is pleased, his plans already far ahead of the cookie’s prescience. “Lucky numbers 43-2-25-7-1.”

“All the same except for 1, lazy.” House dusts off the blanket and doesn’t dwell on how much he wishes the fortunes said anything worthwhile. They’re just cookies.

Wilson starts coughing in the middle of the night and can’t stop until morning, reminding them both who’s actually dying.

House almost suggests they stay another night – Wilson hardly slept – but keeps his mouth shut. He’s gotten pretty good at keeping his mouth shut over the last week and change; a lesson 53 years in the learning, all it took was his best friend getting lung cancer.

So he didn’t say anything when they’d hiked the Devil’s Gulch trail and he’d thought maybe Wilson was getting too winded. Didn’t say that it might be more than the fact they were both too out of shape to go traipsing around the woods, that they were much older than they were the last time they did this. Admittedly House wasn’t one to talk; his leg started aching more than its usual amount a mile in. But he’d kept his mouth shut about that too.

They’d made it to the end and back, sweaty and covered in bug bites. Four-point-two miles according to Wilson, barely anything compared to the other ones he’s got planned. House tries not to think that far ahead. Funnily, not thinking too far ahead is something House is usually good at; this trip is straining his capability for ignorance.

There hasn’t been any discussion about other future things, not yet, saved for some future date neither of them want to talk about but both know is coming; a notched arrow without a bullseye.

So the next morning they saddle up and House revs his engine obnoxiously loud as he does every single time and Wilson shakes his head but he’s still grinning.

As part of Wilson’s road trip bucket list is the mission to eat at as many greasy spoon roadside diners as their stomachs can handle. Every one that boasts having ‘The Best Pie in the County’ gets bonus points. Ella’s Home Cooking is ten miles outside of Niagara, doesn’t boast of pie, smells like the birthplace of cholesterol, and in terms of cleanliness it ranks 5^th overall.

“Heart attack on a plate,” Wilson says as House grins when a plate with a mound of soggy bread, cheese, and ground beef the restaurant calls a patty melt is placed in front of him.

“Least you’ll die happy,” the waitress says with a smirk, setting Wilson’s BLT in front of him. House watches her ass as she swishes away.

“Sassy. Automatic five stars.”

Wilson hums as he inspects his sandwich. “Lettuce is wilting, knock one off.”

“So picky,” House rolls his eyes. The patty melts drips grease in rivulets onto the plate as he takes a bite. It’s delicious and he is, indeed, very happy. He groans appreciatively.

“If you pull a When Harry Met Sally I’m calling Foreman and telling him you’re alive.”

“What’s the differential diagnosis for zombie-ism?”

Wilson huffs. “Stop talking with your mouth full.”

House finishes his sandwich when Wilson’s only halfway through his.

“We’re seeing Niagara,” Wilson says, “tourist trap or not.”

“It’s a bunch of water. Falling. We could go watch them turn on the sink in the kitchen.”

“I’m sure that waitress would be happy to show you.”

House actually does want to see Niagara but he wouldn’t be him if he didn’t kick up a fuss for tradition’s sake. Just because he’s dialed it down doesn’t mean he’s turned it off. “Eat faster.”

Wilson makes a decent effort on the second half of the sandwich but can’t shove down the scraps or all of the fries. House steals the rest of them off his plate.

“Fries knock it back up to five.”

Wilson pays the check and House chucks a 20 on the table as tip. He couldn’t touch his bank account after he’d “died” so he’d had to pawn off his guitars, some rare books, vintage medical equipment in that brief time where he could still get into his apartment before they came to gut it. Someone who knew him well would notice the stuff gone, but that someone is sitting across from him at Ella’s and funding most of the trip with his remaining life savings and whichever credit card he pulls out first. He can max them out 5 times over and in a couple months, well, who’re they gonna come collect from?

House had hesitated before he’d opened the pawn shop door; he knew he’d never be coming back for any of it. A moment later, a half moment, he’d reminded himself it would be worth it.

They arrive at the Falls in late afternoon among the influx of tourists who waited until the heat subsided. They ditch the leather jackets in the cycles’ saddlebags.

“Maid of the Mist?” House looks over Wilson’s shoulder at the pamphlet, “This whole town is made of mist.” He scrubs a hand over his face to wipe away the dampness.

“It’ll be like a ride at a waterpark,” Wilson tells him, folding up the pamphlet and heading down to the dock. House has never even been to a waterpark.

He trudges behind even more trudgingly than he normally does and takes the proffered poncho from a smiling woman at the gate who chirps ‘welcome!’. Wilson’s got a spot right up against the railing, poncho already donned. House makes a mess of putting his own on, Wilson doesn’t bother to help.

“That guy’s gonna propose,” House says, gesturing with his cane to a man a few feet ahead of him.

Wilson looks the guy over, trying to see what House sees.

“He’s fidgeting,” House explains, “looks like he has to take a piss. Hand keeps patting his front pocket, and I’m assuming that suspicious lump is a ring unless he gets his jollies off on large amounts of water.”

“The girlfriend’s pretty,” Wilson muses about the woman standing next to him, grinning and snapping pictures with a digital camera in a Ziploc bag.

She is pretty but House doesn’t really want to hear it from Wilson. He doesn’t want to spend their last months together chasing more women for Wilson to philander around with. House has claimed this time; he doesn’t think his heart could take it to lose a moment.

But Wilson doesn’t spend any more time looking, turning back to House and asking how much does he think the ring cost. Looking at the man House tells him no less than $5,000.

The closer they get to the Falls the more House feels like the animals that didn’t survive Noah’s flood. The ponchos do absolutely nothing and he knows his jeans won’t dry out for two days.

“Just like a waterpark, huh?” he shouts over the roar of the pounding water.

Wilson’s smiling the kind of smile you can’t help, unreserved and bare hearted in enjoyment. Despite the millions upon millions of gallons of water dropping on their heads House smiles too, watching Wilson’s eyes and the wet curls stuck to his forehead.

Behind them people shuffle around, a minute later there’s clapping and cheering, and they watch the girlfriend-now-fiancé jump into the man’s arms and he twirls her around. Wilson lets go of the railing to clap but the boat shifts, and he shifts, and House drops his cane as he reaches to catch him. Wilson sways on his feet, keeps his eyes closed as he tries to find his balance. House watches him with his stomach in a knot.

But Wilson steadies, takes a deep breath, opens his eyes and reaches for the railing. House hasn’t let go of his arm, he still doesn’t. He doesn’t need to ask the question before Wilson’s answering.

“I’m fine.”

Loss of equilibrium isn’t a symptom of lung cancer but every stumble, wheeze, or hangnail keeps House on edge. More on edge, and he’s already walking a razor wire.

He should let go of Wilson, should try and find his cane, but he can’t get his fingers to loosen. Wilson’s find the railing, wrap around it and hold tight but House doesn’t trust it, doesn’t trust Wilson with anything that isn’t himself.

“Klutz!” he shouts, and crowds Wilson up against the railing, drags him in and loops his own arm around Wilson’s back to hold the railing on his opposite side, effectively caging him in, his back to House’s front.

House expects to hear a protest, expects a snarky remark – ‘are you going to propose next?’ – expects to be pushed away, but none of that happens. Wilson turns back to the Falls with grin back in place. House lets himself be distracted, Wilson close and safe, and accepts that he may never be dry again.

Back in port the newly minted groom-to-be asks, “Is this yours?” holding up House’s cane.

“Always get a pre-nup,” House says as a thank you.

“Gabriel Peter,” House introduces himself to the receptionist at the Blue Falls hotel.

“Lazy,” Wilson says.

It’s a shame they can’t go north, because who knows what would happen if he were to cross the border into Canada. His passport’s still valid but it belongs to a dead man.

Kyle Calloway has been firmly shunted into the past and Wilson is Wilson again and Wilson doesn’t want to take the risk.

“You’ll be in prison for a decade,” he says.

“If they catch us,” House says with an arched brow. Wilson sighs.

But he won’t, they won’t, they’ll stay safe because they can’t afford not to be. Stay the speed limit, don’t trash the hotel room, don’t start a bar fight.

House doesn’t like playing by all the rules, he’s spent most of his life actively trying not to, and it feels itchy and frustrating that he has to stay in line; like being stuffed into a suit that’s too small for him.

“House,” is all Wilson says. Pleads.

House makes a show of rolling his eyes, huffing, and throwing his hands up. “I’ll be good.”

It would’ve just been for the cheap drugs anyway.

Wilson had managed to get a decent sized stock of Vicodin before he left. He spent a few days finishing out his paperwork, transferring files to new doctors, saying goodbye to his patients, and at the end went to Foreman and asked for a favor. Foreman filled out several scripts for him, begrudgingly although he understood Wilson wanting to go out on his own terms. If he could help make it easier for him he would, and without any indication he suspected they were for anyone else but Wilson.

House is trying to take them sparingly. Wilson’s still a doctor, there are ways he could probably get himself more if need really came to be, depending on the state, but self prescribing a level 2 controlled medication could end up being the kind of trouble they’re avoiding.

House is worried, he can’t help that, he’s worried when the time comes that the pills run out. His leg hurts, it’ll never not hurt.

“You just wanted to hike this one for the name, didn’t you?” House calls out to Wilson ahead of him.

“Of course,” Wilson says back.

Which is a reasonable reason to do it, how could they resist a trail called ‘Shades of Death’? They’d had to double back down to Pennsylvania for this and the Hickory Run trail, which ends up being only two hours northwest of Princeton, New Jersey. House doesn’t love the proximity despite the hundreds of miles between them.

“It’s a short one,” Wilson told him, but to House’s leg it’s starting to feel more like a long one, doing it and Hickory Run one after the other. He grits his teeth and avoids branches and brambles and poison ivy. He almost, almost wants to push Wilson into a big patch of it, already missing the pranks and tricks they’ve gone a whole two weeks without tormenting each other with. But his leg’s distracting him and that’s enough to deal with. He’d only taken one pill this morning, he should’ve taken two and not been so damn stupid.

Wilson doesn’t seem to notice, eight feet ahead of him keeping a decent pace. The fresh air has been good for him, getting away from Princeton has been good for him. His eyes have been bright, cheeks full, besides the occasional cough there’s nothing giving him away.

House totters up behind him when he finally comes to a stop; a waterfall, fifteen feet at most, pouring into a pool that connects to the running creek ahead of them.

“Didn’t we just see one of these?”

“This one’s made by a dam,” Wilson says, watching the water.

“Oh, well then,” House grumbles. “Now I can’t decide which one’s better.”

Wilson finally turns to him and he’s smiling again, that light hearted grin that’s nothing but joy and satisfaction and House’s heart beats heavy in his chest.

But the smile fades and Wilson scrunches his eyebrows together. “You don’t look good.”

“Gee, thanks,” House finally allows himself to lean heavy on his cane.

It doesn’t take any kind of second for Wilson to size him up; he already knows what’s wrong like he’s known it for all these years.

“Let’s turn around.”

House is hit with a jolt of regret, one he’s familiar with, one he hates. He doesn’t want to be the disabled one, the invalid, doesn’t want to be the one people look at with pity. And especially not here, not now.

“How much further?”

“Doesn’t matter,” Wilson says, turning away from the waterfall like it’s not even there.

“How much further?” House insists with a snap but Wilson’s already back on the trail, stopping and waiting for House to follow.

House sighs to himself, frustrated and angry. Not at Wilson – God how many times has he actually been mad at Wilson? Truly mad, not aggravated or annoyed or exasperated. Right now he’s pissed off that he can’t hack it, that he’s the one who’s making them turn back.

But Wilson won’t argue this, they’re going back and that’s the end of it. On the long list of things House is trying not to do in the coming months one of them is start an argument where one isn’t.

So House rejoins him on the trail and this time Wilson keeps his pace even if it is slow and pathetic. They talk like they have been talking, casual and easy, no more mention of legs or pain. House does try – but fails – to shove Wilson into the poison ivy.

House takes another pill that night in the hotel and watches Wilson sleep until it kicks in. He can’t be mad at Wilson, not honestly, not deeply. Every time he traces the feeling back it lands on himself, the weight of the emotion settling on his own shoulders. He’s not good at this, never has been never will be even in the time he has left; honesty’s not his strong suit, he’s practically allergic to the stuff. What honesty he manages to himself is hard won in fierce battles and most often thrown to the wayside at the first opportunity. But this he can admit: that whatever anger he’s ever tried to feel towards Wilson is an anger born in a mirror.

He has five months – four months and two weeks – left, he doesn’t need to hold onto anything but the truth anymore.

By mutual consensus they continue west instead of south, nothing worth seeing in D.C. They hit Pittsburgh and House insists on trying the sandwiches that stack as high as his forehead at a place called Primanti’s and then they spend another day recovering from the sandwiches.

On the way to Erie, Pennsylvania they hit two more diners, one that does have semi decent pie and one that rockets to the bottom of the list with compliments from a raw chicken sandwich. They up spending several days in Erie simply because the weather’s nice.

“I keep wondering,” Wilson says, “if I’ll miss it.” The wind from the lake is making his hair brush over his eyes. He pushes it away only for it to fall back. House has never told him he looks better when it’s a little on the longer side.

They’ve known each other so long – been friends just as long – that House knows immediately what he’s talking about, but it’s somewhere he doesn’t want to go.

Wilson looks at him like he’s expecting House to ask, but he doesn’t. The silence stretches for a long moment, like a cord waiting to snap.

Finally Wilson opens his mouth to say something but House cuts him off.

“Miss what? The traffic jams, the crying baby next door, losing your keys?” he digs his thumbnail into the soft wood of the picnic table they sit at. “Stubbing your toe, catching a cold from some snot nosed kid in the clinic? There’s a lot of stuff not worth missing. Besides, you won’t be able to miss anything, there’s-” House stops talking but the thought continues: ‘there’s nothing on the other side’.

Wilson thinks on it, eyes following the progress of some old sailing ship across the lake – the U.S.S. Niagara, they’d toured it yesterday.

“When I watch that transformation, sorry, I don't believe that we're just a bag of chemicals.”

House almost wishes Wilson hadn’t said that.

“There’s good stuff to miss,” Wilson says and he’s uncharacteristically quiet.

It’s on the tip of House’s tongue to ask ‘what?’, to make Wilson list all the things he’s going to miss so that House can shoot down every one. Sunsets get boring, the first sip of coffee’s often stale, patients get well but a sicker one’s in the door right behind them. Hair gets tangled by the wind in your face.

“Don’t say people,” House threatens. He’s got the rebuttal to that one locked and loaded.

Wilson eyebrows go up, hidden beneath the fringe, a look on his face like he’s also ready with a comeback. “You. I’ll miss you.”

‘Am I worth missing?’ “I’m hard to miss.”

Wilson shakes his head, laughs a little like he can’t believe House said that, that they’re saying any of this at all. House knows him well enough to hear it in his laugh.

“Hard to love, easy to miss,” Wilson’s looking back at the lake, can’t see how House’s whole world rocks on its axis.

He can’t say that word, it shouldn’t be allowed. Wilson had begged him to say it that night, needed his friend to say it, and House hadn’t, pathetic and weak as he’d been.

There’s a joke waiting to be said, something to undercut the emotion in this moment, to send them tumbling back into familiar waters. It hangs heavy over them that this is only being said because there’s an expiration date on these moments coming up in the rearview, ready to catch up to them.

“Easy to love, gonna be hard as hell to miss,” House says. Stupid, insipid, banal, and corny as hell. His voice cracks just enough to hear if Wilson knows him as much as he knows Wilson.

Wilson turns back to him, not with a smile but with his lips curved up in a soft way. Better than a smile. Then he sees what House has done to the picnic table.

The splinter under House’s nail is worth it for the way Wilson throws his head back and laughs at the crudely carved penis.

It goes without saying that they stop in Cleveland, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame at the top of the itinerary right above Vegas. House isn’t expecting a life changing experience, but it’d be stupid not to go. The only thing worth regretting is that they don’t have mushrooms to better enjoy Pink Floyd’s The Wall experience.

“I’m gonna rip it out of his hands,” House mutters, head ducked close to Wilson’s. A kid, probably 12 at the oldest, is picking away at an old Stratocaster on the second floor, ‘The Garage’ section where people are encouraged to pick up an instrument for themselves and either wow the crowd or…do whatever this kid is doing to the poor guitar.

“You weren’t always good at it,” Wilson says though he winces as the kid twangs out a sound that they didn’t realize a guitar could make. “You had your learning phase.”

“Nope, came out of the womb this good.”

“Let’s go upstairs.” Upstairs is memorabilia, costumes, vintage vinyls, and instruments not currently being tortured.

House’s fingers are tingling. “I need to save it.”

Wilson purses his lips at him but it’s half from holding back a grimace. It’s motivation enough for House.

“Hey kid! 20 bucks if you give me that and another 20 to promise never to pick up another one again.”

The boy stops, confused at first, but the promise of money does the trick. House ponies up the cash – the whole $40 though he’s tempted to short the kid – and the boy skips off to his mom and flashes his new found wealth. Before the mom can figure out to be upset by this House is already picking out the intro to ‘1952 Vincent Black Lightning’.

He’s good because of course he’s good because he was only partially exaggerating when he said he was born with it. As natural to him as picking apart symptoms and diagnosing illnesses that no one else sees.

Halfway through the bridge he realizes he has an audience, probably relieved to hear someone who actually knows what the hell they’re doing. ‘Vincent’ ends and before he gets applause he slides into Squeeze’s ‘Tempted’ and is pleased to see a rogue employee mouthing the words.

And Wilson’s watching, arms crossed and leaning against the wall, warm amusement across his face, and what can only be read as pride. Not an emotion House gets to see often, even when he was a kid, even when he was doing exactly what he’s doing now when he was 12 himself. To see it from Wilson – it wraps around him inside and out. When did he last feel this good – most definitely Wilson was the cause then too.

He closes out with ‘Lawyers Guns and Money’, is joined by a scraggly man in a Metallica shirt on bass earning the man House’s rare but valuable esteem. He slips the guitar off and purposefully hands it over to the employee to save it from grubbier hands. Wilson pushes off from the wall as House rejoins him.

“No encore?”

“The police would be after me for melting too many faces.”

“I assume we’re gonna try and escape that too?” Wilson points to a different side of the room where the boy from before is settling in behind a drum kit.

“Oh God,” House makes a break for the elevator. The brief touch of his hand at Wilson’s back, ostensibly to push him along, is unnecessary but it’s a fleeting thing and if House refuses to over think it then he’s hoping Wilson doesn’t either.

“But there’s a castle,” House says, holding the pamphlet under Wilson’s nose.

“I see that,” Wilson responds blandly, hitching his saddlebag back onto his bike.

House waves it around again. “It’s a castle.”

“In Ohio,” Wilson shrugs like it’s not a castle. “Besides we’d have to backtrack to get to it.”

House sputters, “It’s just outside of the city!”

“House, I just don’t think we need to see it,” Wilson picks up his helmet, as if that’s some period on the end of the conversation.

“We? No I think you-”It dawns on him the way a diagnosis does. “You don’t think we need to see it, because of me.”

Wilson makes a sound in his throat that sounds like frustration at being caught. He puts the helmet back down but doesn’t meet House’s eyes.

House knows what’s going on: that stupid Death trail. “You think I can’t handle it because of my leg.”

Wilson finally looks up. It’s not pity in his eyes, Wilson hasn’t bothered with pity for House in a long time and it’s one of the top reasons House wants anything to do with him. He’s seen too much of House to give him that and House has been thankful for it more times can he can count. But there’s still reluctance there.

“I think, maybe, we take it easy. That’s a seven mile trail, and it’s listed as medium difficulty.”

Despite the circumstances, despite self promises, House is pissed off. “This is going to be a really sad trip – sadder than it already is – if you decide to ix-nay every trail because you think I can’t handle any of them now.”

Wilson lets out a hard breath, taps his thumb against his helmet. This is his trip, this is supposed to be about what he wants, but the conflict isn’t what he wants, it’s what he’s willing to put House through.

“Fuck you,” House says, simply a necessary response, “I’ll take two Vicodin and we’ll go slow.”

Wilson still wavers, wants to waver anyway. He matches House’s eyes and there’s a silent battle between them; Wilson holding onto hesitation and House daring Wilson to let it go.

Finally Wilson gives a short quick sigh and a nod. “It better be a cool castle.”

“It’s Ohio,” House says and puts on his helmet.

House’s performance of ‘Walking in Memphis’ when they’re in Nashville is a little less impressive than his Hall of Fame set but they can’t just put a grand piano in the hotel lobby and expect him not to. They’ve splurged – well, Wilson’s splurged – on a real hotel instead of a fly-by-night motel this time and for all that it’s nice to sleep in something with a lesser threat of bedbugs they miss the charm. Same goes for the real restaurant they indulge in after the Grand Ole Opry tour. The sirloin is good, but that patty melt lives on in House’s dreams.

They didn’t pack their tuxes so they look out of place in their t-shirts and jeans, permanently dusty from the open road. They get looks but luckily as long as they’re paying the price the restaurant is happy to take their money.

Wilson ignores a text in the middle of dinner; takes a brief glance at it and then tucks his phone away in his pocket, returns to the remembering of a medical conference where Wilson was the one who crashed that time, not realizing House’s invitation wasn’t legitimate. They spend a lot of time reminiscing, but there’s a lot to reminisce about.

“Who was it?” House asks later, kicking his dirty boots up on the hotel’s spotless white duvet. Wilson gives a look that’s barely an admonishment, not like it’d make any impact.

“Foreman.”

House’s eyebrows scrunch together, “Should I find that interesting? What does he want?”

“Just checking in,” Wilson shucks his own boots before putting his feet up. “Nothing interesting.”

House pinches his lips together, “He’s done that before?”

“Since we left? No, but I bet he’s wanted to.”

Probably has. Foreman’s always been good at hiding how much he cares, about anything or anyone. He’s a lot of bluster in a suit with a candy center. Even when he hated House – and he most definitely hated House – he still cared. Maybe he didn’t always give a damn, but effort was made. It makes sense he’d check in with his dying former colleague.

“What’re you going to say back?” House asks. He holds out his hand, “Give me.”

Wilson gives him a look like he’s already annoyed with whatever thought House is having. “No.”

House gives a huff, “You’re boring. Dying and yet still boring.”

There’s the sound of a shutter click and when House looks over he’s looking right into the lens of the phone’s camera.

“What’re you doing?”

Wilson starts to type on the phone’s keyboard. “Going to send him a picture and tell him you say ‘hi’.”

He’s bluffing, he’s definitely bluffing, but that doesn’t stop the zing of anxiety that sizzles up House’s nerves. “You wouldn’t.” Wilson just raises his eyebrows in return.

“You’re right,” Wilson says, “But I am going to send it to Cameron.”

Somehow that might be worse. House makes a move to snatch the phone away and what follows is a pitiful scuffle between two middle aged men. By the time House gets a hold of it and deletes the picture he finds the whole thing hilarious. Wilson’s catching his breath as House texts Foreman, “In Tennessee, still dying.”

Wilson nabs the phone back, shakes his head at the text but can’t stop from looking amused. He flips the phone shut and puts it on the nightstand to be forgotten until morning. And with that they return to their bubble; just the two of them, far away from the lives they’ve left behind. There’s a weight to it when it settles, from Wilson’s soft silence House knows he feels it too.

They sleep well on the extra soft hotel beds, sleep through an ambitious alarm Wilson set the night before, and skip the fancy restaurant and ask the concierge for the nearest diner with the fewest stars.

On the road they set out for Memphis so House can sing the song in its appropriate setting, and it creeps up on him, as they fly down the back country highways, that when this is all over Princeton Plainsboro will still exist. Foreman, and Cameron, and Chase, and everyone who thinks he’s dead will still be out there, and he doesn’t have a plan for that.

That’s if he needs one, that’s if he changes his mind in four months.

They eat themselves sick across Louisiana, lament their timing that it’s not Mardi Gras, and get drunk three nights out of four.

“I cannot remember when was the last time I was-,” Wilson pauses, waits for his vision to stop spinning, “this drunk.”

House isn’t quite as drunk but that’s only in comparison. He could have drunk Wilson under the table but one of them had to lead the stumble back to the hotel. Sitting on the back patio the night is a sticky type of humid, they’re just far enough out of Baton Rouge proper that there are crickets chirping.

House grins wide, “The bachelor party.”

Wilson goes green, “Oh yeah.” House laughs at him.

“What happened to her? To Dominicka?”

House’s stomach flips, promising a very nauseous morning in his future. “Don’t know.”

Wilson’s whole faces scrunches. “You…I think you liked her, didn’t you?”

“Well, when I passed her the note that asked ‘do you like me?’ she checked the ‘no’ box.” House makes himself sip at the plastic cup of water in his hand.

This is apparently too complicated a zinger for Wilson to piece together. “You screwed that up.”

House glares at him, for all the good it does, “Yeah, thanks.”

Wilson hums, thoughtful; no doubt the thoughts are swimming around in his brain, bouncing against the walls. When he’s like this House can’t always follow those thoughts, what connections are making sense to him right now. He genuinely hates it.

After a few minutes Wilson must come across some mental trail to follow and he reaches across the distance between their two patio chairs and puts his hand over House’s.

“You’ve always been really bad at that stuff,” he says.

It doesn’t feel like electricity, not a spark or a shock, it’s not a flame or a flare. The world doesn’t come to a halt around them; the crickets carry on, a car passes on the highway. The touch is a warm, concentrated thing, calm and simple.

It doesn’t send House reeling, though he thinks it should. He should be upside down with his nerves in a tangle. Maybe it’s the alcohol dulling his panic synapses, or maybe it’s that there’s something else hanging over them that feels like comfort. He twists his hand around, curls his fingers around Wilson’s, and Wilson doesn’t pull away. It surprises him how easy it is, but it’s always been easy with Wilson.

They don’t say anything more, let the night hold quiet and the sentiment of the moment linger. It’s House who breaks it, though it’s reluctantly, when he notices Wilson nodding off. It won’t do any good for either of their backs to spend the night in these chairs. So he pulls his hand away, lets them slip apart, leans over and gives Wilson’s shoulder a shake.

Wilson makes a noise of protest but lets House corral him into the room and slips into bed with all his clothes on. House doesn’t bother with his own either as he gets into the other bed. For a few minutes he thinks he won’t be able to sleep but he’s out like a light soon enough.

They wake up in the afternoon with pounding headaches and stagger into the $5 a plate restaurant next door and order the first things they see on the menu. They get on their bikes and manage to get to the end of the road before turning around and calling it quits, double back to the hotel and watch Columbo for the rest of the day.

There’s no talk of last night; House is not even sure Wilson remembers it. He finds that it doesn’t matter, it happened and that’s good enough.

It’s hot as hell in Texas, the whole length of it. House wishes he could ditch the leathers but among all the bodies he’s seen – in emergency rooms and ICUs, heaps of human showcasing all the various ways a person can be mangled – he’s also seen a vast array of road rash that leave riders basically skinned alive. It’s hardly worth the risk in addition to what they’re already taking on just by getting on the ‘death cycles’.

It’d been Wilson’s decision, of course, the motorcycles, but then again House hadn’t put up any argument. He hadn’t been surprised enough in any measure that countered how little he’d actually been surprised by the choice. Wilson sold the convertible and thank God for it, he can’t imagine them touring the U.S. lurching along to his terrible grasp of manual transmission. Motorcycles are just as much a sign of a mid-life-slash-dying crisis.

It’s House’s decision to pull up to the biker bar, slotting in at the end of a long line of motorcycles of the rough and ready variety. Wilson comes in slow behind him.

“House,” he says with clear trepidation.

“Oh come on, we can’t not go,” House already has his helmet off, swinging his bad leg over and unhitching his cane from the special clip he’d had moved over from his old bike. “At least one.”

And what better place than Texas? They’ll be in New Mexico in a couple hours anyway.

Wilson takes a long time to follow, eyes casting warily on the bar’s lack of signage but still a window full of neon lights advertising every beer that would fit. Eventually he does follow.

The place smells like beer, sweat, and smoke and is filled with a midday crowd of 10 men in the standard uniform. House gives the room a once over before taking up a seat at the bar, making a point to put his cane up on the counter in front of him. It’s a conscious challenge, a showy display of ‘See me, a cripple among you, look upon ye tough guys and be humbled’. He’s just as capable as them, and then some.

Wilson takes the seat next to him, far more self conscious. House wonders then exactly how much they look like they come from a town called Princeton at a glance, if they do look as out of place as they are.

The bartender sidles up to them but doesn’t say anything, eyeing them behind gray stubble and a whiskey red nose.

“Your finest, garçon,” House says with a tap on the bartop. The bartender raises an eyebrow.

“Beer,” Wilson says quickly. It leaves the type open to interpretation, which is apparently the right order because the man pulls up two Lone Star bottles and pops the caps one handed on the edge of the bar.

Wilson picks his up and says, “Thank you so much,” realizes that probably makes them sound like they are indeed from a town called Princeton. House drinks to hide a grin.

“Passing through?” the bartender asks.

“Yeah, just…seeing the sights,” Wilson says and again regrets it.

“Huh,” the bartender says.

“Excuse him, he’s new to the lifestyle,” House says. Wilson purses his lips and if it weren’t for the dim lights and the thick smoky air House would definitely see that he’s flushed red.

“Huh,” the bartender says again.

“He has cancer,” House tells him. “His Make A Wish was to see Texas.” Wilson’s no doubt turning even redder.

The bartender doesn’t repeat himself, offers only a long beat of silence, before reaching down and grabbing his crotch and hiking himself up. “Testicular cancer, five years ago. Took the left one.”

He’s used the magic word and Wilson noticeably relaxes just enough for House to tell. “Smart choice, with testicular cancer it’s usually better to just remove it all together than risk it spreading.” He adds quickly: “I was an oncologist.”

“Faster too,” the bartender says, “didn’t have to do chemo or nothin’ like that.”

And, against House’s expectations and wishes, the two talk about fucking cancer for a whole ten minutes.

“A cancer doctor getting cancer. What’s the word?” the bartender asks.

“Irony,” Wilson says with the whole weight of it on him.

The bartender nods. “Beer’s on the house,” he says.

House gives a satisfied tip of his bottle to the man before the look on his face makes it clear that doesn’t include his.

House challenges Wilson once the pool table clears and Wilson joins him with less hesitation than he usually would have, wading across the bar and past the small crowd of bikers who are still giving them a suspicious eye. The bartender gives a whistle and as heads turn he gives them a look that says without saying that the two of them are okay and to not bother with hassling them.

Wilson puts up a good fight on the pool table and the fifth game turns tiebreaker. House only barely pulls out a win and with money from a vintage Gray’s Anatomy buys a round for the room, which earns them a begrudging respect. House pays up and tips generously and the bartender gives him a nod and shakes Wilson’s hand.

“Enjoy the sights,” he tells him.

Wilson looks genuinely touched as some kind of understanding passes between them. House doesn’t love it, but he’ll let it slide.

That night, sitting outside the motel House says, “Should’ve told him it was our honeymoon. Bet he would’ve loved that.”

Wilson only gives a huff of a laugh in return, pulls out a pack of cigarettes from his pocket.

House blinks in confusion. “Where’d you get those?”

“Machine in the bar bathroom,” Wilson pulls out a lighter from his other pocket and picks a cigarette from the box.

House didn’t even know those still existed, then again if they do that’s exactly where one would be. Is. He watches Wilson put the cigarette to his lips, flick the lighter.

“You’re not actually going to smoke that,” House says, not a question but an expectation.

Wilson just raises his eyebrows, gives a casual shrug and puts the flame to the cigarette. He takes a deep inhale and proceeds to cough himself into a fit.

House would find this funnier if it weren’t a little too on the nose. “Seriously?”

Wilson takes a minute to catch his breath, when he speaks it’s hoarse. “I figure I deserve to at least try them.”

He takes another drag and there’s minimal coughing this time, even less on the third. House watches with a sick feeling. He’s right, in way; these things’ll kill ya but why worry if you’re already dead? In House logic it makes perfect sense, he just hates that it makes cosmic sense too.

“Give me one,” House holds out his hand and takes it when it’s passed to him. He puts it in his mouth and goes to take the lighter but Wilson’s flicking it on between them. House leans over and puts the tip of the cigarette to it until it starts to burn.

It’s intimate in a way neither of them seems to have hesitated over. Probably should have, probably should have taken a second or two to ponder it, consider what’s passing between them that isn’t just tobacco and nicotine. House will, later.

House has never smoked as a habit but one or two after a night of drinking and one or two after good sex was a nice indulgence. He hasn’t done it in years but he takes it back up like nothing. Does a lot better than Wilson anyway. He leans back in the plastic patio chair and lets the smoke swirl around in front of his nose.

It takes another few drags before Wilson gets the hang of it, and they sit in comfortable silence for another one each. Around midnight they stub them out and shuffle off to bed. It’s a half hour past midnight when Wilson starts coughing past a smoke raw throat and can’t stop. House brings him water with a hand on his back and yells at the neighbor who pounds on the wall.

The next morning House deduces which car belongs to the neighbor and keys it deep from bow to stern. He fishes out the pack of cigarettes from Wilson’s bag when he’s not looking and chucks in the trash at the next rest stop.

For as much as he’s trying to will himself not to, he can’t help but count the days. Started late May, it’s mid July: 56 days. All their lingering only just now gets them to Zion National Park. Another four days doing those trails: 60 days. Two to recover: 62.

He’d prefer to count the number of hotels: 38. Or the diners: 41. Number of stupid waterfalls: 12. Number of beers: well, those there’s too many to count. Hours to Vegas: six and a half. Amount of money they lose over the course of two days in Vegas: $4000.

But that’s still two more days: 64.

They haven’t done a lot of camping on the trip despite minor bluster that they’re perfectly capable of it. But facing facts is inevitable and the reality is they’re creatures of comfort and have spent many years spoiled by townhouses and king sized beds. House considers they’ve paid their dues as doctors; so many years of telling people the worst thing they’ve ever heard, and seeing all those worst things firsthand means they’ve earned real pillows. But Joshua Tree can’t be experienced from a hotel room.

They buy bed rolls and quick start fire logs and firestarters from a local camping store and drive out into the great Mojave Desert. There are several clusters of campsites dotted throughout and they choose the first one they come across. There’s a system of note writing and good faith payments made through a wooden box at the entrance and then they find an open spot to claim. It’s late afternoon so they figure it’s as good a time as any to start the fire, which takes a fair amount of bickering but of course it does.

Wilson smiles wide and shakes his head when House breaks out a pack of Oreos, acquired from the local grocery store.

“Of course,” he says.

“You ever have s’mores made with Oreos?” House asks and when Wilson answers ‘no’: “Me neither, we’re going to be innovators tonight.”

A sharp cry in the distance makes them both look up, squint into the setting sun to a ridge in the distance. A coyote.

“If we survive the night.”

“Aww, they won’t bother us,” a voice says behind them. A man with dreads and a tie-dyed poncho looks over at them from the next campsite. “Too many people.”

“And no babies,” House says. Wilson ducks his head as he tries not to laugh.

“Nice bikes,” the man says, “I rode a motorcycle once.”

Even from the 20-ish feet between them House can make out his red eyes and it doesn’t take his super skills at diagnosing to figure the guy’s high as several kites.

“Did you have fun?” House asks like he’s talking to a child. The man doesn’t register it as he answers excitedly.

“Yeah, I did!”

Another whooping call from off in the distance, high and wild. Knowing it won’t get closer makes it easy to appreciate, an animal running loose and free.

“Stars are gonna be real pretty tonight,” the man says. He turns to his tent and shuffles inside, after a minute smoke seeps out from the opening in the flap.

“Bet he’d take $10 for a joint,” House says, eyebrows raised questioningly towards Wilson.

Wilson leans back a rock that’s cropped up from the sand. “I think I want to see them with a clear head.”

House wants to tell him he’s being boring again. Who doesn’t want to get high at Joshua Tree? But that’s only a first thought and the second thought is that he agrees. Stars, real true stars at their wildest and freest, should be appreciated in their purest form when the opportunity comes, which it didn’t in New Jersey.

Sitting on the ground isn’t conducive to comfort when it comes to his leg but he holds back on taking another Vicodin. Number of pills left: 30. They’ll have to figure out something eventually but it’s not worth the words to say tonight.

It doesn’t even take until full dark for the sky to start to light up with tiny white pinpricks, emerging from the blackness that creeps up beyond the ridge. Their conversation keeps getting distracted watching them appear like a slow rolling tide across the sky. Eventually the world is fully blanketed.

“Time for these,” House says, dragging over the bag of marshmallows and two roasting forks. They’d forgone the hotdogs, instead opting for beef jerky and trail mix to keep the fuss minimal. They’ll be starving come tomorrow morning but there’s sure to be some desert diner advertising huevos rancheros once they get back on the highway proper.

“Not bad,” Wilson says, semi burnt marshmallow squeezing out between the Oreo halves, threatening the cleanliness of his jacket.

“Experiment successful,” House says, mouth always full before answering, a new tradition.

Then Wilson’s eyes light up, more than just the reflection of the fire in them, as he points above their heads. A star streaks across the sky. Another. A dot bursting into the black velvet and running with its tail burning only to vanish back into the far darkness.

They hadn’t planned it but by some stroke of luck they’ve come right in time for a meteor shower. Probably would’ve known had they’d thought to look it up but it hits hard to see it completely unplanned. House isn’t a romantic but of all the nights, of all the chances, what were the odds?

“Told ya,” the hippie says from behind them, grinning like a kid.

It goes on and on and they make more s’mores saying ‘that one over there’ ‘where? I didn’t see it’ and ‘there’s another’. There’s no way to count them, darting out like fireflies, teasing their eyes. They could look at their watches, their low battery phones, but they don’t, the time inconsequential.

House watches the sky and Wilson. Wilson’s features are painted orange and yellow by firelight and dark at the edges. He’s not some ethereal vision, some unearthly thing; he’s just human, painfully human. House is mesmerized; for the first time on this trip it actually hurts to look at him; a mix of reverence and being absolutely terrified because he’s reminded how fragile humans are.

Wilson is the first to yawn. He climbs to his feet and pulls out the bed rolls and slaps them down on the ground, chucking sleeping bags over them.

“That’ll be safe, right?” he asks with a tired skeptical expression as he looks at the fire.

“Yeah, probably,” House says, clears his throat of the lump stuck there, “But it’s not like we can burn down a desert.”

House notices then how chilled it’s become. He shuffles over to a bed roll and throws a sleeping bag over himself, chasing warmth. Beside him Wilson does the same. He’s set the bedrolls next to each other, side by side like twin beds pushed together. Above them the meteor shower is slowing, only the occasional comet running between the constellations. It feels like something should be said, maybe some crack about gay cowboys or how bad their backs will be in the morning, but House swallows back words.

Their shoulders touch, the warmest thing House as ever felt. It’s up to him to move, and against all smarter, better judgment he does. He pulls his arm away just far enough to slip it over Wilson’s head, settle it behind his shoulders. It’s a gesture on the edge of too friendly. But Wilson doesn’t push him away, lets his head drop back over his arm.

“Cold,” House mutters as if it’ll dispel whatever awkwardness should come from such an intimate gesture. Wilson hums in agreement like he’s doing his part. Now that they’ve done their due diligence House lets his breath out. Again he’s sure he won’t sleep through the night but again he’s proven wrong.

The sun in their eyes and the shuffling of pans wake them. The hippie notices they’re awake the second they sit up and, sounding far too energetic, invites them over for breakfast.

“I’ll make you guys eggs if you give me some of those Oreos?” he says hopefully.

Oreo and scrambled egg is a breakfast for champions and House is surprised how much he doesn’t hate it, any of it – the hippie, the sand in his jacket, the way he knows he’s going to be fucking exhausted in a couple hours. Wilson nods along to the hippie’s stories and shares glances with House when the man says he’ll realign their chakras for them. House almost indulges him.

There’s no awkwardness between them. It goes unmentioned but it doesn’t hang over them like it should. They get back on the road the same way they’ve done since they’ve started, that shifting thing having shifted a little bit more. It’s only later that House thinks he really should have kissed him.

He doesn’t tell Wilson but he doesn’t have to. It’s easier to get things like this in Los Angeles and it’s the main reason House insists they stop. Wilson stays in a motel in the middle of Hollywood while House goes out. He doesn’t know the city but he doesn’t really have to, he’s gotten this stuff before, it and worse even, and he knows where to look and who seems like the right person to talk to. It’s a risk but it was always going to be.

It takes longer than he’d like but he does indeed find someone somewhere. The pills aren’t cheap but he cleans the guy out. Another three month supply. Should be enough for now, he’ll still need more later.

The Pacific Coast Highway is a stunning drive, stretching nearly the length of California, hugging the coast from south of Long Beach up all the way to Canada. They veer off of it before they hit the Oregon border, which is a shame to lose the sight but the trees make up for it.

They start seeing the redwoods around Sacramento but once north of the city they become a staple of the landscape. They tower like – as the cliché goes – giants around them, daunting in the same measure as mysterious and it’s almost otherworldly to be in their presence.

“Isn’t it supposed to be raining up here?” House looks up as if addressing his question to the sky.

“It’s July, House,” Wilson tells him, eyes on the trees as they have been since they started seeing them, looking at them the same way he had the meteor shower.

“It’s supposed to be raining,” House insists. In the image of the Pacific Northwest in his head it’s always raining. Instead it’s a pleasant, and dry, 60 degrees out and it doesn’t matter that they bought rain gear. It feels like a fake out.

Wilson shakes his head at him which should be hurting his neck by now. Luckily it’s always an amused ‘I can’t believe it but here I am, by choice’ gesture. House loves to see it.

The Redwood Creek trail has been on their list from the beginning. It’s a long one, should take them all day going at House’s pace. When it comes to hiking they’ve come to an unspoken agreement: shut up about House’s leg. It might come up when they get to that steep edge or that slippery slope but until they’re on the trail Wilson keeps his mouth closed. House hasn’t begged off a single hike so far – the only one they hadn’t finished was the one in Pennsylvania and that one still sticks in his craw. Wilson’s not allowed to make a fuss before there’s a fuss to be made. House has taken an extra Vicodin, they’re well rested, and they’re not hungover, he’ll be fine.

“Creeks are fine, I’m not bored of creeks yet,” House says. “Not like waterfalls.”

“What have you got against waterfalls? There has to be some psychological reason behind this. Let me guess: a waterfall bullied you in school.” Wilson’s in front of him a couple feet but he never gets too far ahead.

“Stole my prom date,” House keeps watching his feet, though he wishes he didn’t have to, picking the best place to stick the cane. He never thought he’d actually appreciate how easy walking on his leg on normal terrain is compared to this. He’s hurting but luckily no more than the usual ache; he can handle that, even like this. “They got married and had a whole bunch of little streams.”

Wilson laughs. He’s been doing that a lot on this trip, House has noticed.

He’s also noticed every time Wilson can’t catch his breath right away, but like House’s leg they don’t talk about it. There’re a lot of things they haven’t talked about.

The path leads them a winding way until they can hear running water, another few feet and the tree line breaks, revealing the creek. Or at least some water in the shape of a creek.

“Huh,” Wilson says.

“Must be low tide,” House says.

Wilson crunches out across the rocky bank, a shoal of gray white rocks abutting water that’s at most a few feet deep. It’s not that it’s not nice, it’s still picturesque, surrounded as it is by the forest, the sun glinting off of it.

“It’s probably bigger further down,” Wilson says, hands on his hips as he inspects the water.

“That’s what they all say,” House says, coming up to his side, cane failing to find stable ground on the rocks.

Standing this close House strains to listen to Wilson’s breathing over the crinkling of the water but can tell that it’s suitably normal.

Wilson’s not even looking at him so House feels sufficiently caught when he says: “I know what you’re doing.”

House gives a shrug, “Enjoying nature?”

Wilson turns to him with that expression that says House hasn’t gotten away with shit. “You’re observing me.”

House doesn’t have a quick answer to that one. He leans on his cane. “Observing you like what? Looking at you?”

“Observing me like I’m a patient,” Wilson says. “Want to check my vitals when we get back?”

He doesn’t sound fully annoyed, not the way that House would expect; although House would like to check his vitals when they get back.

“House, you don’t have to do that,” Wilson continues. “I don’t expect you to do that.”

House could lie, he’s really good at it, a gold medalist. But: “I’m going to do it, whether you like it or not.” A further truth slips away from him, “Whether I want to do it or not.”

The curse of being a doctor, the curse of caring about someone else more than he ever has, more than even himself.

Wilson looks to the ground, the water, the trees. “It’s not like I’m not- not doing it myself.” His voice cracks.

“This is why doctors shouldn’t be their own doctors,” House tells him, but that’s something he knows neither of them are capable of not being. House lives in a permanent state of self medication, Wilson could’ve killed himself that day in House’s apartment hooked up to an IV of poison, they’re each other’s worst psychoanalysts.

“I can’t help it,” Wilson says and it’s quiet. Wilson doesn’t do quiet; he doesn’t whisper or murmur or mumble, in a different life he was probably a theater kid.

House shuffles closer, touches his shoulder to his. Another thing they didn’t do; but that was before, things change.

“Let me then,” House says, “I’ll do all the observing, I’ll keep track of the- the breathing and coughing and whatever. I mean, why else am I here?”

“That’s not why,” Wilson turns back to him. “It’s because I want you here. I need you here with me, with all of this.”

And House needs to be with him. He’d burned his whole life down – literally – to prove to that to him. Hell, to prove it to himself.

“Wouldn’t be anywhere else.” Couldn’t be.

This is the moment, that moment, and House sees it, knows that it’s finally arrived. There’s a breath, another and another and dammit if Wilson’s not going to make the first move –

It’s not the smoothest move because Wilson’s standing next to him and he has to pivot the cane as he turns, has to lean forward on his bad leg so he can reach for Wilson’s chin and pull him closer to kiss him.

There’s no grand band playing, no fireworks, the heavens don’t open up above their heads and shine light down upon them. It’s a rolling wave finally crashing against the shore, that shifting thing finally falling into place, all the years tumbling over each other to find them standing here.

Wilson kisses back and whatever small bead of fear that he wouldn’t evaporates. He brings his hand up to House’s elbow, just a gentle touch of fingertips. And they stay like that, let it linger long enough for it to stick. They pull away at the same time.

“Well, finally got that over with,” House says though he’s definitely flustered. For all the lead up and the knowing that it would happen it doesn’t make it less exciting now that it has.

“Took us a while,” Wilson says, cheeks reddened, nodding, also failing to play it cool. His hand is still on House’s arm.

There’s no awkwardness to be found, just the settling in of the fact. They stay a minute more like that, watching the creek.

“Still not boring,” House says.

They spring for a cabin instead of their usual motel fair; House gives the clerk the name ‘Remy Hadley’. Wilson fails to hold back a laugh.

Number of ridiculous names: 36. The number of times they sleep together starts now.

At 6 a.m. it’s not raining but it’s not warm either, fog thick between the trees, the breaking sunlight finding only gaps in the haze. House finds Wilson standing on the cabin’s porch, leaning on the railing in pajama pants and a t-shirt.

“Put on a sweater,” House says without any force behind it. House can’t talk, not having bothered with one either, or shoes. The deck is cold and misted with dew under his feet.

Wilson looks over his shoulder as he comes close, gives a gentle smile that makes House’s heart flip. House comes to stand behind him, kisses his shoulder before resting his chin there, one hand on Wilson’s hip. An echo of the Maid of the Mist, which feels so long ago and yesterday at the same time.

“It’s quiet, isn’t it?” Wilson says. His voice doesn’t carry through the thickness of the air.

It’s the real kind of quiet, the kind that makes them feel even more enveloped and sheltered in their own part of the world, nothing else getting in. Things are pounding at the metaphorical door, a line of them shouting and kicking up a fuss, but it’s early and the two of them are alone. When House breathes in he smells tree bark and fresh air and Wilson’s warm skin.

“Makes me miss New Jersey,” House says. Wilson gives a breathy laugh and House’s chin moves with his shoulder.

“House,” he says then pauses. House can practically feel the way he’s pulling his thoughts together, “what if we had done this sooner?”

‘This’ – what if they’d crossed this line sooner? What if they’d let this thing between them happen years ago, given up all the pretenses they’d held onto so tight and just accepted that this was the way it was going to go?

He’d chased the question through his brain last night, with Wilson tucked against his side, breathing soft and even in sleep. He’d been afraid he wouldn’t find the answer; he finds it now, coming to him as sharp and clear as a diagnosis.

“We weren’t ready,” House says, without anger or frustration, just the knowledge that it’s the truth.

They hadn’t been ready, simple as that. Stupid as that. It might be some cosmic joke, the universe playing with them for kicks, finally giving in, saying ‘alright alright, go ahead’. It might’ve been the world around them swirling too hard in the undertow, dragging them away from the right current to follow. It might’ve been – probably was – them themselves. Two compacted messes of feelings and contradictions, crashing into each other in all the ways two people can collide. Except in this one way. Not until everything was forgiven, until all the unnecessary stuff got left behind and the other stuff was set free.

Wilson doesn’t say anything for a bit, then hums in agreement. No further discussion needed for him to understand.

Little by little the sun breaks through, the fog evaporating into the canopy over their heads. Wilson leans his head back on House’s shoulder and House moves his arm further around his waist. Whether they’d been ready or not House still wishes they’d gotten to have this sooner. No use in wasting regret on something they didn’t know they could have but he can still mourn versions of them that did.

There’s a thump and a clang from the cabin to their left, the muffled voices of two people waking each other up. From their other side the sound of footsteps on stairs, the crunching of gravel under boots: early morning hikers getting ready to set out for the trails. The rest of the world coming to life, ready to intrude on their sanctuary.

House doesn’t want to move, wants to hold onto this blessed small moment, live in it and act like it can stay like this, but he’s too smart to be that dumb. Time careens on.

He pulls away, takes Wilson’s hand and guides them inside.

“Come back to bed.”

“Aren’t there supposed to be witches and things? They’re really not capitalizing on the theme here,” House says when they’re in Salem, Oregon. Wilson rolls his eyes more dramatically than he usually does when he’s not tipsy.

They’d bypassed Napa Valley when they’d rode through California – and Humbolt county because House hadn’t won that debate – so they’ve taken advantage of Willamete County’s many winery tours and are indeed taking full advantage of it. They’re at the point of inebriation where everything is pleasantly amusing and their brains are just starting to swim in their heads.

“Taxi was smart,” Wilson says, blinking down at his glass before swigging the dregs.

House is trying to goad the server into topping off his glass of a particularly heady sauvignon. She tells him with a patient smile to just wait for the next wine and that he’ll probably love it.

“I’ll take your word for it, but expect a full refund if I don’t,” he tells her before she moves on to middle aged couple from some middle America state at the table next to them.

“How do you think Chase is doing?” Wilson asks, eyeing his empty glass wistfully. “Being in charge of the department.”

“Fine. Maybe.” House says, leaning back in his chair and nabbing a stack of crackers and cheese from the plate in front of them. “Not as good as me.”

“Could anyone ever be?” Wilson asks. His lips are just slightly tinged purple and it’s highly endearing. House thinks if only his past self had figured this shit out so much sooner.

“In bed,” House answers.

Wilson gives a humming noise, shrugs one shoulder. House balks.

“We can go back to Princeton, see if Chase is up for the challenge.”

Wilson shakes his head, “Nah, the accent turns me off.”

Damn right it does. Now that they’ve finally made the leap into bed – not literally, they’re not young men and House’s leg doesn’t allowing for leaping – House will fight to the death to keep his place there.

Asking about Chase isn’t a question that comes completely out of the blue; it makes sense for either of them to wonder about the state of the people back at Plainsboro. For all that they want to leave it all behind the ties that bind aren’t always that easy to cut completely, even just in musings.

“They probably miss us,” Wilson says, head tilted, “right?”

“Miss you, probably,” House says. And they probably do. For all his years there House hadn’t exactly ingratiated himself among his colleagues. “Dr. Beck probably threw a party once they confirmed the dental records.”

“How did you sneak those in, by the way?” Wilson asks.

House waggles his eyebrows at him, “Always keep some secrets in a relationship, keeps the mystery alive.”

Wilson leans forward. “I know everything about you.”

“You wish.”

He’s not wrong though, not entirely. He does know almost everything there is to know, even if House had only doled the facts out little by little through the years and a good half of them had been forced into the open against his will.

“You know everything about me,” Wilson says.

“True,” House eagerly raises his glass to the passing server as she pours the next wine. She gives a smirk as she adds perhaps a little more than she should to both of them.

“A taxi, right?” she asks, nods approvingly when they tell her yes, of course. She was right about the wine, House does indeed really like this one.

“That’s mildly terrifying,” Wilson continues the conversation after a long sip of the new wine.

House will agree to that. Having someone know everything – nearly everything – about him is strange and intimidating, even if it is Wilson. House has tried to keep so much locked up and has raged against anyone who went looking for the key.

“Thank you,” House says and he’s not entirely sure where it comes from or what he means by it. Everything, he supposes. For trying to know him, for letting him know so much.

Wilson smiles tipsily, honestly, and maybe it’s the wine – it’s definitely the wine – that pushes his bravery forward and he leans to give House a chaste kiss.

It’s very public, and there’s no passing it off as anything other than what it is. Wilson goes red, surprised at his own gall, but House grins, beams, very happy with his gall.

“Thank you,” he says again, and Wilson laughs at him.

They return to their wine, Wilson still flustered and trying to play casual, but House feels practically cocky. He puts a hand at the back of Wilson’s chair, further cementing to anyone looking that they are exactly what they are. But looking around it seems like the only people who’ve noticed are the couple next to them who both give little jumps when House spots them.

“Oh, uhm, sorry,” the wife dithers, “It’s fine, you know.” It’s on the tip of House’s tongue to argue that of course it’s fine and they can fuck off, when she says, “My brother’s like that. Had a civil ceremony with his partner last May, it was lovely.”

House wants to say something snarky but finds he doesn’t feel the need to bother. “Good wine, huh?”

“Yes, very!” the husband nods, tipping it back in one go with his wife muttering: “Ron, really.”

When House turns back to Wilson with an expression that immediately gives him away Wilson’s already pointing a warning finger at him.

“Don’t you dare. If you propose to me right now-” The threat is unfinished but it’s no doubt very real.

House doesn’t, instead sips innocently at his glass, and gets him later when they’re walking out of the winery next to the couple.

“He’s gonna be the one limping tomorrow, huh?” he says far too loudly and elbowing the man.

Wilson makes him sleep on the other bed that night and doesn’t let him touch him until morning.

Outside of Portland as they get on their bikes House winks at a trio of onlookers and says: “He’s gonna be too sore to ride that tomorrow.”

Wilson locks him out of the hotel room until 1 a.m. and then makes him sleep in the tub.

Day 73 and House notices Wilson getting out of breath faster on a trail. They take longer breaks. By the time they make it the seven miles Wilson’s coughing and light headed. It takes a half hour before House considers he’s stable enough to ride his bike. Wilson gives a weak protest but doesn’t argue much.

Day 74 they don’t leave the motel room, House insisting they stay in bed and make up for lost time; Wilson doesn’t protest that. They order pizza that isn’t half bad and watch reality TV and repeat episodes of Matlock when they’re not having sex.

When Wilson’s catching his breath in the afterglow House declares: “I’ve officially taken your breath away three times in the last 24 hours, I’m two up on the cancer.”

“So you’re in a contest with the cancer?”

“And I’m kicking its ass.”

“Give it time,” Wilson says. It’s light hearted, joking, but House feels it like an arrow in his chest. Barbed so it can’t be pulled out without rending his heart into pieces.

“Give me time,” he says, with a deadly serious smirk. He looks over to the clock on the nightstand. “Like an hour.”

Hours after that House runs his fingertips over Wilson’s arm, who’s asleep with his head on House’s shoulder. The curtains are closed but the lamplight from the post in the parking lot pokes through, illuminating a sliver of the wall opposite and their keys and helmets next to the TV. A pile of theirs and them heaped together carelessly.

He wishes he could sleep at the same time that he doesn’t. The days are passing by steady and sure, he feels like he’s losing time even to sleep.

There’d been no rush to move on earlier, no reason not to stay in, in fact there’d been very good reasons to stay in; it had been his idea even, and yet House feels like they’ve stopped too long. Every time they stop House worries it’ll be the last time.

Only there’s no outrunning this.

North, then east; following the coast up through Washington and then skirting the Canadian border. House again teases about sneaking over under the cover of maple trees and a bad accent. Diner number 61 in Grand Forks, North Dakota lands somewhere in the middle of the list, no more than okay but at least clean. Wilson doesn’t eat much of his turkey club, leaves half of his fries on his plate, which House doesn’t bother with, unimpressed by them.

Now that he’s seeing more of Wilson on a nightly basis it’s impossible not to notice. It’s a slow progression but his ribs are becoming more defined, the curves of his pelvis, collarbones more pronounced. As much as House gets distracted in the heat of the moment he adds it all to his doctor’s notes in his head later.

He tries not to think of where they’d be if Wilson had accepted the chemo. He’d be hooked up to an I.V., hair long gone, paler than he already is. He’d be sicker now from the treatment than the disease. Only with the chemo there’d still be some hope being dragged through the mud, bits of time being torn away from the clutches of death. Or something dramatic like that.

Wilson hadn’t wanted that; had railed against it as much as any other patient House has ever seen accept their own death. House won’t argue, promised Wilson and himself that he wouldn’t. A line was drawn in the concrete, more final than sand, and this is the one line Wilson won’t allow him to cross.

They return to their bikes, waiting for them like good horses outside the diner. Wilson squints against the midday sun, pockets his wallet, brushes his ever longer hair back as he picks up his helmet.

“Six hours to Superior,” he says.

House watches him and hates that his eyes are watering. “You’re so fucking stupid.”

Wilson looks to him with confusion, but House doesn’t have anything more to say. His chest feels tight and his throat hurts, as if the pain is stuck there. It must show on his face because Wilson’s expression slips gently to understanding; seeing right through House in a way no one else ever has.

“Sorry,” he offers, a gently sympathetic tilt to his lips.

House clears his throat, keeps from swiping at his eyes, grateful he doesn’t make more of an idiot of himself by outright crying. “You’re not forgiven.”

Wilson gives a huff of a laugh, a small shrug. He puts on his helmet as House does, the bikes dutifully roar to life. Six hours to the city of Duluth and Lake Superior, third on the checklist of great lakes; they’ll go east to Michigan to get to the Huron and Lake Michigan.

Milwaukee has great beer and Chicago has great pizza. Wilson believes one and House believes the other and it’s the one time they both break the no arguing rule. The Brewers win and the Cubs lose, this they’re both okay with. They bypass the House of Blues and opt for an old jazz club where the house band is made up of whichever of their musicians was able to get off work that night. House says something too medical near the bartender who comes to sit with them and tells them he’s going to Loyola for cardiology. He lights up when House offers to write a recommendation and Wilson slaps his arm with the back of his hand.

Chicago has a population of nearly 3 million so the odds of running into Allison Cameron are almost ridiculously low, but House has always worked with odds that are ridiculously low.

He sees her before she sees him, and he has just enough time to hobble around a corner in the tiny coffee shop they’ve ducked into. Wilson’s standing front and center though and at the sight of him Cameron stops, clear dumb struck surprise on her face that’s matched on Wilson’s.

“Oh wow, hi,” she says.

“Hi,” Wilson blinks, walks into the hug she offers. “This is- this is-.” He laughs and shrugs. House might’ve gone with ‘ridiculous’.

“Yeah,” she says, nodding. “What’re you doing here?”

“Passing through,” Wilson answers, motioning towards his bike outside. She glances at it and gives an impressed nod.

“Very nice,” with that grin she gives that always made House feel like she was proud in a motherly way.

They take a considerate step to the side, getting out of the flow of other customers. House puts his back against the wall. He’s far enough away that he can’t hear, grumbles to himself about it. Not that he really needs to hear, just from watching them he can tell what they’re saying almost word for word.

‘How have you been, how’s work, how’s Chicago?’ ‘I’m fine, Chicago’s great, I’m really happy here’ ‘how’s the husband, how’s the kid’ ‘he’s fine and she’s started talking’, and on and on like that.

After the pleasantries House sees the shift on Cameron’s face, a clear lead up to the next question that she’s of course going to ask: ‘How are you?’

Wilson’s expression changes appropriately, his side of this dance. An almost shrug, a dismissive smile, ‘I’m doing okay.’

Gentle concern Cameron’s part, that genuine keen care that she’s held onto despite all the things she’s seen, put up with. A lot of which was House’s fault, he’ll readily admit it. He made her a better doctor, his ego will allow that and defend it, but she’d taken a lot of blows too.

House gets lost in his thoughts long enough to miss more of the conversation, when he tunes back in Cameron’s hand is on Wilson’s arm, Wilson’s hand on top of hers, both holding on as the conversation finishes. It almost makes House jealous in a shallow, ‘back off he’s mine’ way.

‘Take care of yourself’ she probably says, ‘You too,’ he answers. There’s no ‘let’s keep in touch’, they both know this will be the last time they’ll ever talk to each other, and because of that Cameron says something off script that House can’t make out, something that makes Wilson give a small laugh, squeeze her hand.

They let go and Cameron goes back out the door without getting coffee, a need to leave practically radiating off her. They’ve said their goodbyes. Wilson watches her go, they both give a final wave.

From his vantage point House can make her out just enough to see her see the bikes, stop. Bikes, plural. He’s taught her well. She gives a glance back to Wilson, who’s already turning away to the counter, only House notices the question in her expression and the ‘what if’ on her mind.

Later House asks Wilson what’d she’d said and he tells him that it was nothing; Wilson’s keeping it to himself. House wants to keep needling at him but whatever it was doesn’t matter to anyone but him and Cameron anyway.

“Secrets keep a relationship exciting,” House repeats the earlier sentiment.

“Your relationships have certainly always been…interesting,” Wilson says, propped up on his elbow on the bed, hair a mess and fingerprints on his waist.

House drops all sarcasm, “But I always end up with you.”

There’s a trail outside St. Louis that they can’t finish. Wilson’s breathing too hard by mile three and he has to sit down. House makes a ruckus about his leg hurting, puts on a show of complaining, insists he can’t go on. Wilson grumbles at him but accepts defeat and they head back then sit at a picnic table passing trail mix between them until House declares himself – them – fit enough to ride.

In all honesty House’s leg hasn’t hurt any more than usual for most of the trip, or if it has House hasn’t noticed, he’s been distracted. It’s a grace, not having to focus on it, but the hurt comes in knowing why.

It’s after that day he starts taking fewer Vicodin.

They waste days idling across the Heartland, although ‘waste’ isn’t quite the word. It’s not wasting time if they have nowhere to be. House ignores the ticking clock, the itch in his fingers; Wilson’s in charge and House will go wherever he wants although he reserves the right to bitch and moan to keep appearances up. The hiking becomes less frequent; House says that the trails aren’t as interesting as the inside of hotel rooms, specifically the beds. Wilson protests until he doesn’t.

Wyoming is a gorgeous stretch of nothingness. Wilson makes the right call about filling their gas tanks at the South Dakota border because they find no sign of civilization for the next 111 miles. Signs mark the names of ranches but there are no ranches to see unless they’re miles off the road. Second better call is grabbing a hotel room in Casper before they hit even more landscapes of beautiful clay colored emptiness.

It’s 2 a.m. and House is swallowing back panic while Wilson shivers.

“Your fever’s gotta be 102 degrees,” House says, “It’s pneumonia.”

“Yeah,” Wilson says, “Probably.”

House presses his lips together, “At what point do you give in and we go to a clinic?”

Wilson cracks his eyelids open, raises his eyebrows as if House should already know this answer.

House throws his hands up. “It’s some antibiotics and cough medicine, it’s not chemo.”

“They’ll send me to the hospital and get blood tests and a chest x-ray,” Wilson says, closing his eyes. “Then we’ll spend two days explaining everything while I lie there in a hospital bed. No.”

“It’s 90 degrees out and you get pneumonia,” House grumbles.

“And you’ll get it too, you should get another room.”

Like Hell House will. “Like Hell I will.”

Wilson sighs, more exhausted than nagging. House sits on the other bed, staring down at him and debating how far he’s going to allow this to go before he calls an ambulance to force Wilson’s hand. Now they’ll stay here a few more days, stay holed up until it passes. If it passes. House doesn’t want to think about that. Wilson’s immune system is dwindling away and the world is a threat for him to exist in. Outside of a clean room there’s no way to keep this from happening and traveling through cities and staying in hotel rooms made it pretty much inevitable. House was just hoping it wasn’t quite this inevitable.

House goes to his bag and pulls out a Vicodin, fills up a plastic cup with water and comes back to the bed.

“Take it. Your chest must be killing you.”

Wilson makes like he’ll say something but it’s clear that his chest does indeed hurt enough to take the pill. He takes it and sits up to down it with the water then slumps back onto the pillow. In his head House counts how many more pills he has left.

House takes the water back and sets it on the nightstand before rounding the bed and picking up the covers.

“House,” Wilson warns, “you’ll get sick.”

House doesn’t have anything snappy to say so he only says, “Oh well.”

House doesn’t get sick, luckily, and the next day he goes out to a pharmacy and forces Wilson to take the bevy of medicines he forces on him. It takes four days but Wilson does eventually get better and House allows himself to let go of some of the worry that’s been twisting in his stomach. Not all, not even most, because it’s only getting more obvious:

Wilson’s getting worse, there’s nothing more to it.

Diner number 71 and House jokes about getting a sidecar.

“Absolutely not,” Wilson tells him.

House continues to steal the fries Wilson’s not eating. “You’re already the Robin to my Batman.”

“Robin never…” Wilson looks around, too aware of the people at the table next to them to finish the racy thought. House grins wide and debates finishing it for him.

A map’s half spread out between their plates showing Colorado. House puts his finger down on the general area they’re at.

“If we take this highway it’ll take us into Oklahoma and we get back to the east coast,” he says.

Wilson stares down at the map for a while, chewing his lip. “I want to go back west.”

“To Humboldt county, good idea.”

“No, I think…it’d be a good place to be.” Wilson looks up and the shine in his eyes says everything.

Oh. It’d be – will be – a good place for their journey to end. The idea sizzles through House’s nerves like a lightning strike, he can’t feel his hands. He’s locked up and staring, unable to move.

“Okay,” he says, a bare croak of a word. He clears his throat but can’t clear the ringing in his ears. “Okay.”

He doesn’t have a car and he won’t be getting a separate room so there’s nowhere for House to go to hide. It’s 2 a.m. and Wilson’s asleep so he doesn’t notice when House slips outside. He finds the motel’s vending machine situated under the concrete stairs and stares at the buttons for soda he doesn’t want. It comes over him like a quickly advancing wave and when it hits the shore he can’t hold it back anymore.

He cries under the dim bulb motel lights, choking back noises but letting the tears fall. He curls his hands into fists but knows that if he punches the machine he could break his fingers, make a bigger hassle of himself than he already is.

He doesn’t know how long he stands there before he wipes his face, for all the good it does, he must be beet red anyway. He gets himself together as best he can before returning to the room. He slips under the covers behind Wilson, curls his arm around him and brings him against his chest. Wilson doesn’t wake but House doesn’t sleep.

They don’t get a sidecar but they sell Wilson’s bike when he’s sure he’s not up to riding it himself anymore. He rides with his arms around House’s waist and House never stops teases about running them off the road.

124 days. House checks Wilson’s pulse in the parking lot a gas station off a highway exit. It’s as normal as it gets these days. It’s his breathing that’s worrying; he can’t take a deep breath without wheezing or without his chest hurting.

“How’s your head?” House asks.

“Still hurts,” Wilson says. The headache from last night hasn’t gone away; they’d dosed him up with ibuprofen, being careful with the Vicodin for now.

“The fucking bike’s not helping,” House says.

“The bike’s fine,” Wilson defends.

“The bike is loud,” House says loudly to match the sentiment, “and it vibrates. Not really great for headaches.”

His own hearing’s taken a hit since they’d started riding, he can still hear the roar of them in his ears even when they stop. He wishes they’d traded in both of them for a safe quiet sedan.

Wilson doesn’t argue; not because he doesn’t want to just that he’s not going to. It pisses House off. It’s not normal for them to go so long without a fight, even a petty one about something trivial. He shouldn’t miss it, what a thing to miss. He shouldn’t want to argue, what kind of relationship includes so much damn arguing anyway, but that was their relationship. And this isn’t trivial, it’s the farthest thing from it.

Wilson coughs. It’s only a short fit and it passes within a minute, but House watches him and his anger grows.

“You should be in a hospital.”

Wilson shoulders droop, somehow appears to fall back onto the bike’s seat even heavier. “No, House.” He sounds too damn tired.

“You should be in a hospital on a fucking ventilator,” House says, vehement like he’s accusing him. “Doped up on morphine. You should be in chemo.”

Wilson closes his eyes, sighs, opens his mouth to talk but House isn’t going to let him.

“We shouldn’t be here! Out here!” He stamps his cane into the dirt, gesturing violently with his other arm as if to refer to the whole of the world. “You should be at Plainsboro!”

“I don’t want to be in Plainsboro,” Wilson says and his voice is finally taking on an edge and House wants to hear it tip over.

“Too bad! Too fucking bad, you know it’s true.”

He pauses to let Wilson talk this time, but he doesn’t. House grits his teeth, shakes his head.

“Why do you have to be so stubborn?”

“You’re one to talk-” Wilson says but he missed his chance.

“Why’d you give up so easily? Don’t give me that shit about pain, I don’t care about your pain. You’re in pain now, and it’s going to get worse.” His grip on his cane is white knuckled, his leg hurts like it needs to make some kind of point.

“It’s not the same,” Wilson seethes at him, finally getting to House’s level. “You know that. You know it’s nothing compared to what I’d be going through back there.”

“I don’t fucking care!” House throws up his arms, has to turn away because he can’t stand to look at him. His eyes are prickling, his heart’s beating like a drum.

“You don’t care? Really?” there’s a note of hurt in there between the anger.

“Of course I fucking care!” House says this to horizon but he’s not seeing it. Only seeing an alternate reality where they’re not here, where they’re surrounded by hospital walls and machines and where the chemo works.

“This isn’t about you,” Wilson says. “None of this is about you. I thought, for once-”

“It is though,” House snaps, daring to look back at him. “it is about me. Right now, just…right now.” His voice drops, fails him. His throat is too tight.

Wilson’s expression shifts as the realization comes over him.

House has been good, has kept his mouth shut, hasn’t made a big deal about any of this, held himself back so many times. He’s wanted to say so much and he hasn’t. It’s not about him, it’s not, he knows that – but he can’t pretend anymore, he can’t.

This hurts.

And he wants Wilson to know that, to see it, if only for this moment. He wants Wilson to let him have this. He doesn’t want Wilson’s guilt or regret, he wants him to see that this is killing House to watch. It was his choice to be here and he’d given his own life up to be able to be here – he’d do it again – but that doesn’t mean it’s easy.

“I’m-” Wilson starts but again House cuts him off.

“I don’t want an apology,” House says and it comes out terse but it’s sincere. “You don’t owe me one.”

Wilson’s quiet again and it almost makes House mad again. Wilson’s not holding up his end of this argument but House has said everything he needs to say and he’s exhausted himself with saying it.

He limps back to Wilson and the bike, eyes on his feet and where his cane sticks into the dusty ground of this backwoods gas station in the middle of nowhere. He takes another breath and looks up to meet Wilson’s eyes.

“Promise I won’t do that again,” he says with a light hand.

Wilson smiles, laughs. “You get one.”

“Wait,” House says, looking to their right. They watch as the only other person at the station – a man who’s pointedly not looking at them – gets in his car and drives off. Once he’s gone House kisses Wilson there in the gas station lot.

He’ll go back to pretending, he has to.

It’s as if the redwoods welcome them back. There’s no slow lead in just suddenly a wall of giants burst onto the landscape in the distance and the two of them ride back into their territory. It’s comforting in a different way than the rest of the trip has been. A fair bonus to Wilson is how they’re exactly as far from Princeton as they can be. A fact that House still struggles with.

They get a different cabin from the one they were in the first time, a conscious effort to find one that’s off the main paths, as secluded as possible. It’s not exactly run down but it’s not exactly not run down either. Still, it has a television that gets three channels, a big bed, and the roof doesn’t leak. It’s finally raining in the Pacific Northwest, just as House always expected it to. Wilson tells him of course it is, it’s October not July.

They count up the diners and start the official rankings. House wishes he had his whiteboard so they could do an official bracket. There was one in New York that had the best pancakes, one in Illinois with the best fries, Nevada won for best pie (a surprise to them both), and the patty melt in Maine still lingers in House’s dreams. New York also wins for worst service, Wisconsin for the best (best meaning the sassiest waitress according to House’s rubric), and Louisiana for best décor care of a life sized Elvis animatronic that jiggled its hips and sang ‘Hound Dog’ when you put a quarter in; which House did 10 times.

The trails are impossible to rate, event the ones they couldn’t finish. None were bad and all that truly matters is that they exist and they got to see them. That’s all they asked of them. Hotels only fit into two categories: ‘good’ or ‘bad’ although House privately rates any of the ones they’d stayed in after he started sleeping with Wilson as ‘good’. They retrace their steps during these days in the cabin, remember and then remember again every part of the trip. House tells Wilson he should have kissed him in Joshua Tree, Wilson says, “You wimp.”

October. Wilson’s beaten the five month mark.

“You don’t have to get up,” House tells him, sitting on the edge of the bed where Wilson’s still fighting sleep.

Wilson hums, eyes closed. “I know.”

House wants him to get up; it’s noon and it’s 14 steps to the couch. It’s Sunday, he doesn’t have to get up but this isn’t weekend laziness. Wilson’s hurting, a deep kind of ache that means it’s spreading to his bones.

“I have to get some stuff,” House tells him. They’re low on food and beer, House’ll spring for some good scotch if he can find it. It’s only that he’s afraid to leave.

“Okay,” Wilson says. House almost demands he say more, give some sign that he won’t be gone by the time House comes back. The fear of it is practically electric in House’s nerves. The second worst thing he can think of is not being here when it happens. The first worst is that it has to happen at all.

He goes fast, breaks the speed limit against better judgment; buys the cheap scotch because it’s all that’s behind the counter at the store. He races back hoping not to skid out on the wet pavement but doesn’t slow down.

When he gets back Wilson’s standing on the porch, in the rain, staring out into the trees. That he’s still here makes House’s heart slow in relief, stop beating triple time.

He sits there a moment on his bike, staring. He should be shouting at Wilson to get back inside, for fuck’s sake, is he crazy or just stupid? He’s going to catch pneumonia for real this time. But the doctor in his brain takes a backseat for once and the words don’t make it out of his mouth.

For the first time this all feels less than real, like time has stopped and the world doesn’t exist outside them. Wilson stands like he doesn’t feel the cold, like it can’t touch him, looking like nothing can. And for House it’s the be-all end-all of everything, culminating here and now.

House almost can’t bring himself to intrude, to break the spell. But he does because he belongs in it too.

The paper bag is already soaked through, precariously holding up by will alone. House manages to get it up the stairs and through the screen door. Wilson watches him absently, waiting. House picks up the ancient radio that’s been left in the cabin and tunes it to a channel playing a Jimmie Dale Gilmore song, lets Jimmie’s twang follow him back outside and past the overhang of the roof, out into the rain. He comes to stand at Wilson’s side. And they stay like that for while, saying nothing as the song plays.

“We should go inside,” House says, obligation catching up to him but the sentiment’s gentle.

“House, I-,” Wilson says. He thinks, closes his eyes and lets out a breath, when he turns back to House there’s no conflict there. “I’m not scared.”

‘Good’, House thinks. He couldn’t stand it if he was. It’s a selfish thought, around the edges, because he knows that’d it’d hurt him almost as much as it would Wilson. He doesn’t want to watch him die scared, has been terrified himself that he might. It’s a relief that’s he’s found peace in this. House hasn’t found his yet, but he will.

“I do love you, you know,” he says.

Wilson smiles through the rain, “Me too, I guess.”

House laughs and shakes his head.

The song ends. “Come inside,” House tells him.

He reaches for Wilson’s hand and Wilson lets him lead them inside, back to bed.

House doesn’t dream. No one comes to see him; no ducklings dead or otherwise, no old partners, none of the people he could never actually hate despite her best efforts. He doesn’t get any visions of ‘what if’s, could have beens or would have beens, lives he missed out on. Old ghosts aren’t waiting to pester him, no echoes linger in the empty spaces to bring up regrets old or new. He wakes up in the morning, the man he was and yet not the same. Doctor Gregory House, shaped by everything he’s ever done and said and every person he’s met and every patient he’s saved, and by James Wilson. House has been saved by him, time and time again. And this is where they are.

It’s raining, the room’s slightly too cold, the TV plays Columbo.

“Dumbass,” House says as he watches, Wilson’s head on his shoulder, “of course he left fingerprints on the painting.” He gives a huff of a laugh, shakes his head.

He doesn’t get a response. Wilson’s heavy against him, and he’s still.

It’s a feeling. All of a sudden House knows.

His senses leave him, he becomes nothing more than a body full of static. His heart should stop, he feels like his heart should stop too, but instead it beats harder than it ever has.

“Wilson,” he says, it’s a bare whisper, a breath that slips through his lips.

Again there’s nothing. He knew there’d be nothing.

No, no wait. House wraps the arm that’s around Wilson’s shoulders tighter, pulls him even closer.

“Hey, come on,” House says, he sounds choked. “You missed the whole ending, you didn’t see how Columbo caught the guy.”

Turn back the clock, a few minutes, a few minutes more.

He turns his face against Wilson’s hair, presses his lips against it. His eyes are starting to water, emotions against the break wall.

“Don’t do this,” he says, he shouldn’t, doesn’t deserve to, “don’t do this to me.”

But that’s not fair. House wishes it were, wishes he could blame Wilson, hold it against him. Wishes this was all his fault so House could hate him. He’s the one who started this, made it happen, let it happen. Let himself die.

That isn’t the way it works, worked. This moment was etched in time, they’d been fumbling towards it since the beginning and House sees now that he’d hoped, he’d actually fucking hoped that some miracle, some fateful thing was going to save them from it. He’s a doctor, he’s himself, he knows better.

There’s a swell of emotion in his chest, every single one that’s possible to feel, every one that he’s meant to feel. It nearly takes him down, but it doesn’t, it won’t.

And then it ebbs, pulls away from him like the tide receding, because House knows what happens next. He finds his peace, it’s waiting for him.

He tries to remember what Wilson’s last words were. He needs to remember. They were only a few minutes ago; House strains his short term.

‘Just one more thing,’ he’d said as Columbo did his signature turn, predicting the detective’s famous phrase seconds before he said it.

Okay. “Okay,” House says. One more thing.

With all the gentleness and reluctance within him he pulls away from Wilson, extracts himself from the hold, careful in how he catches his head, lays him down on the battered old couch.

He doesn’t look dead. But do they ever? House can’t count how many people he’s seen like this, in their final form only seconds after changing. But it’s different now, now that it’s this person, his person. And he had been, in the end, he was House’s. House is selfish and greedy and Wilson is his and pride comes to him knowing that he got to have him. And he was Wilson’s, simple as that. Easy. Being with Wilson was always easy. Still is, will be.

He brushes Wilson’s too long hair away, sits there beside him with his hand against his face for a while. He’s still warm and that part of House that was hoping for something that won’t happen doesn’t exist anymore. He knows, there’s no fighting it.

He makes his way to where their bags are slumped over by the bed, looking like they’re comfortable there, in an odd way. If House looked out the window he’d see the bike patiently waiting for the next ride and despite himself House lets out a laugh at the realization he actually feels bad for the thing. Sorry, this is where the roads ends.

Getting what he needs from his bag he then takes out a pad of yellow legal paper and a pen that’s been stashed in a nightstand drawer, left behind by someone who didn’t know what it’d eventually be used for. House writes a short note, explains to the poor campground worker who will come knocking at their door when their reservation runs out about what he’ll find inside. Under that he signs his name, one last trick, a long con practical joke that’ll make its way back across the country to Princeton Plainsboro. It doesn’t get a laugh out of him but it makes him smile at the thought. He tapes the note to the door of the cabin and turns back inside. He doesn’t stop to appreciate the scenery, doesn’t take that last glance, everything he wants is inside.

He returns to the couch. Wilson looks the same, tucked up against the cushions, the pretense of sleep across his features. He’s wearing a gray sweater, bought at Niagara Falls, House finds that fitting.

There’s one pill bottle left but it’s mostly full and that should do it. House pops it open and puts the cap on the coffee table next to where a glass of water is already waiting for him.

House takes the first two pills without hesitating. Nothing in him tells him to wait or to second guess the action. This plan was a long time in the wings.

When he’d first thought about it he knew even then, months ago, that he was going to do this. As they’d traveled he’d prepared for it with every pill he did and didn’t take, made sure that eventually he’d have enough. His leg had made its protests to the plan every time it begged to be put out of its misery with that little white bastion of relief but House has been trying for years not to let the damn thing win. He’s spent too much time letting it run the show.

There were times House let the thought falter, that hope that he didn’t even realize he was holding onto getting through the cracks, getting the better of him. Maybe, it would say, maybe it doesn’t have to be that way. But it was always going to be this way and House accepted that a long time ago. Reluctantly, painfully, sometimes angrily, hot hatred towards the world and circumstance singing through his blood when he let it.

He takes the next two pills and sips at the water. He’d like to wash them down with a beer but that’d make him sick, he’d waste the pills and have to find some other way. He’d done that once already. God, he’d been an idiot then, Wilson was right to be pissed off. He’s glad now that it hadn’t worked, and what a weird feeling to be glad right now. He allows it and it builds in his chest. Happiness doesn’t counter the moment, doesn’t diminish it.

They got to have happiness here at the end, as they fell, finally, together into it.

In a steady rhythm he takes the rest of the pills. He feels queasy, light headed, he swallows past a throat that’s starting to constrict. Strength inching out of him he’s still gentle as he rearranges Wilson, lays back on the couch and settles Wilson’s head on his shoulder, a position they’ve found themselves in every morning of the past few months.

House takes Wilson’s hand in his, puts them together over a heart that’s slowing, will stop soon. If Wilson’s hope is right and that place beyond the atoms exists they’ll wake up on some other side like this, and maybe House is hoping just a little bit that he’s right, but if he’s not House accepts that this is enough. He closes his eyes.

Notes:

If you're interested, here are the songs House plays at the museum:
'52 Vincent Black Lightning' by Richard Thompson
Tempted' by Squeeze
'Lawyers, Guns and Money' by Warren Zevon
And the Jimmie Dale Gilmore song that plays: Nothing of the Kind

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