He dreamed he was in Egypt. He was nine years old, and had fallen asleep in the shade of the pyramids in the middle of the day. He could feel a drop of sweat making its way down the side of his face. It tickled, and he wanted to wipe it away, but moving took too much energy, his arms felt too heavy.

"Greg?"

He heard her voice, but she was far away.

"Greg?"

A little closer this time. He wondered why she was moving. It was too hot to move.

He felt a hand touch his cheek, then a cool cloth wiping away the sweat. It felt good, and he sighed, turned toward her. A flash of pain shot out from his leg as he moved and he heard himself whimper. He woke, feeling the soft sand that had been under his back in the dream harden into the hospital mattress.

He opened his eyes, and saw Stacy looking down at him.

"Greg?" She pulled her hand away from his face, but hesitated with it still in the air, as if she wasn't sure if he'd allow her touch. Since he'd woken from the surgery, she'd kept her distance, rarely holding his hand, and then only maintaining a soft contact, a light grip on his fingers as if she was unsure how he'd react.

House looked away, unable to look at her, not knowing what he should say, not knowing what she expected him to say. He'd walk away, if he could.

"I was sleeping," he said. "You woke me up."

Stacy put her hand on the rail. House could see her knuckles turn white as she gripped the plastic. "You were hot," she said. "I was worried that the fever was back."

"Let the doctors worry about that. You shouldn't be thinking about any of my medical issues anymore."

Stacy released the rail, put her hands in her lap. She sat back.

House closed his eyes, tried to will himself back into the dream, away from the pain. But the pain was here now, and it wouldn't be ignored.

"I was going to go get some lunch," Stacy said. "I thought I'd pick up some soup from the deli. Lisa said it would be all right for you to have some too."

House shook his head. "I'm not hungry."

"You weren't hungry at breakfast either." She leaned forward again, but kept her hands on her lap. "You need to eat."

"You're not my mother."

"Would you eat something if she asked you to? She'll do it."

House didn't answer, just closed his eyes again. Soft sand, he thought. Hot wind. The scent of Egypt in his nose -- of camels and fat tourists and diggers at the excavation sites. He took a deep breath but only picked up only the cool air conditioned scent of the hospital, the smell of cleansers and his own flesh. He wanted to take a shower, to stand there under his own power and feel the water washing over his skin, over his legs. The sponges and lukewarm water the nurses carried into his room each day were no good.

"Greg?" He heard the chair creak as Stacy pushed herself up, heard her steps as she moved toward the door, heard the door slide open. "Are you sure you don't need anything?"

He was quiet, didn't even bother to shake his head, just listened to her walk out the door.

"You should talk to her," Wilson said that night, after Stacy had gone home, after the nurse had hung another bag of IV antibiotics, another bag of Ringer's, and taken away his untouched dinner tray.

"I have," House said. He studied the way the fluid dripped from the IV tube into his arm, a steady mixture of sodium, potassium, calcium and antibiotics measured out drop by drop. If he wanted to, he could calculate the dosages, determine how much of each medication was in each drop.

"Not really," Wilson said. "Not about what matters."

House found himself counting the drops: one, two, three, four. It was easier than doing the calculations. It was like counting sheep, mindless, effortless. His head felt congested, stuffed full of pain meds and antibiotics and sedatives. He didn't want to think about what Stacy had done. It was easier not to think. Counting was all he could handle.

Wilson leaned forward. "She thinks you hate her," he said.

House looked away from the IV line, looked over at Wilson. The window was dark behind Wilson's head, the late summer sun already dropped below the horizon. He hadn't noticed when the sun set, when the hours slipped from unending day to an unending night. "Maybe I do," he said.

Wilson shook his head. "No, you don't."

"Just what I need," House said, "someone else telling me how to live my life."

"I'm not telling you anything you don't already know."

"Don't be so sure." House went back to watching the IV drip.

One. Two. Three. Four. He remembered the old game, pulling the petals off of daisies, and updated it with each drop. "I hate her," he thought to himself with the first drip. "I hate her not." Drip. "I hate her." Drip. "I hate her not." Drip.

"House." He heard Wilson's voice, but didn't look up.

"She hates me," he thought to himself, changing the game. Drip. "She hates me not." Drip. Maybe if he kept count until the bag emptied he'd finally have an answer.

"House?"

"What?" He stopped counting, forced himself to turn away. Wilson was staring at him, as if he was trying to read House's mind. He leaned forward, didn't show any of the hesitation Stacy did, didn't show the sorrow that was always on his mother's face.

"It's going to be all right, you know," he said. "You'll figure it out, you and Stacy."

"You don't know that."

"She loves you, and one of these days, you're going to remember that you love her too."

"You don't know that, either."

House looked away from him and looked at the door, hoping to see the nurse coming through with his evening meds. He wished he still had the PDA pump, but Cuddy had said it was time to get off the morphine, find something else. He'd still been doped up at the time, and like an idiot, he'd agreed with her.

"You've got another thirty minutes to go," Wilson said as he checked his watch. He looked at House again, glanced up at the numbers on the monitor behind House's shoulder. "I could get her now, if you want."

House wanted to tell him no, to tell him that he could wait, that he could handle the pain for a little longer. It would have been a lie. He wanted to see the white cup in the nurse's hand when she walked through the door, to see the small white Percocet tablets and the smaller sleeping pill that let him make it through the night. He wanted to swallow them down, feel the real world grow fuzzy, let it slip away along with every question he didn't know how to answer.

He nodded. "Sure," he said. "Great."

Wilson got up, slid the door open and stepped out. House watched him turn left, toward the nurses' station, then disappear from view. He looked at the IV again. Drip. One. Drip. Two. Drip. Three. Drip. Four.

House dreamed he was in Mississippi, lying in the back of Crandall's car, trying to sleep as Crandall hit every bump in the road. It was dark and the windows were open, the hot, moist delta air streaming through the windows, spinning in humid whirlwinds over his body.

He rolled onto his side and wiped the sweat off his face with a t-shirt someone had thrown into the back of the car a day or two before. He wasn't sure if it was his or Crandall's. He was pretty sure there wasn't much of a difference anymore.

He felt the car shudder and gravel pinged up against the sheet metal. It suddenly jerked to the left.

"Jesus, Crandall, you trying to kill us?"

"Sorry," Crandall shouted back, his voice blending with the roar of the wind and the creaking of the rusted floorboards.

"If you're going to fall asleep, just pull over," House said, "or let me drive."

"I'm not falling asleep," Crandall said. "There was something on the road. A dog, or a skunk or something."

"You can't tell the difference?"

"I was concentrating on not hitting it, rather than identifying it, G-Man."

House pushed himself up until he was sitting with his back against the hard vinyl of the passenger's seat. Crandall hit another bump and his head banged against the window. "Jesus, Crandall."

"Sorry."

"Pull over and let me drive," House said. "I'm not going to be able to sleep anyway."

"What, and listen to you bitch some more about that test you've got next week, and how you're not going to have time to study if we don't break every speed limit on the way back? No way." House felt the car pick up speed as Crandall spoke. "If you were smart, you'd just blow it off. It's just a test."

Crandall hit another bump, and House heard the springs squeak under him. "Or better yet, quit school," Crandall yelled from the front seat. "Come back on the road full time."

House sighed, slumped against the upholstery. He could smell freshly turned earth, and guessed that there was a freshly planted field somewhere out there in the dark. "I can't quit."

"Why not?"

House just shook his head. He didn't know how to explain it, and Crandall would never understand anyway.

Crandall ignored his silence. "Just for a while," he said. "The band's really coming together now. Jack's brother-in-law says he knows a guy who thinks he can get us some time in the studio. The world needs a jazz musician more than it needs another doctor."

"I'll remind you of that next time I have to drag you into an emergency room with a broken nose."

"I'm serious, G-Man. Doctors are a dime a dozen, but real musicians -- we're a dying breed."

"Right," House said. "That's because we're all broke and starving to death."

Crandall was nearing the crest of the hill, the engine whining as he tried to push it harder. House saw the headlights of an approaching car in the other lane, saw them come closer. The other car topped the hill first and its headlights dropped down, the high beams glaring through Crandall's car.

House raised his arm to block the light.

"Sorry about that, Dr. House." The voice wasn't Crandall's. House cracked his eyes open and saw the tall form of the night nurse in the bright light of the fluorescents bulb next to his bed -- Randy or Ricky or something. "I was hoping this could wait until morning, but Dr. Cuddy left specific orders."

The nurse hung a fresh IV bag on the stand, then flicked off the light. "You try to get some more sleep." The nurse walked around the end of the bed in the dim light from the hall. "I'll leave you alone now," he said, and slid the door closed.