A/N: This is, by far, the strangest idea I've ever come up with for what will eventually be a slash fic, no matter how slowly it gets going. Because House and Wilson are an old married couple. Do enjoy.

Wilson looked up, the steady movements outside his office door were starting to distract him. The sight of House pacing the hallway outside was, perhaps, one of the most annoying things he had ever seen. "Pace somewhere else!" He called, trying to get back to his paperwork.

House, however, could not. This was one of the most nerve wracking moments of his life, after all. This was something he'd never done, and had never really planned on doing. He considered it, a few times, when he had been seeing Stacy, but that was a different thing entirely. That was going to be romantic, that was going to be sweet, and caring.

This, this was purely practical. He merely took a deep breath, and strode inside."Marry me."

"What?!" The word is a strangled yelp, and House merely grinned from where he was standing in the doorway.

"It's legal here, you know."

"Where-what-why?" Wilson couldn't say anything else, he was too incredibly caught off guard.

"In the courthouse, with a judge, because my grandfather's dying." Wilson tried to patch together the pieces of logic that went on with House's brain.

"You want me to marry you because your grandfather's dying? What do those two things have to do with one another?"

"Inheritance. Duh." Wilson merely gaped as House deposited himself on the couch in the office. "My grandfather is doling out his cash according to size of the family for us grandkids. And as a twosome, I get twice as much as a onesome."

"So you're asking me to marry you so that you can get rich?"

"That's the general idea."

"That'll never work."

"I already checked with a lawyer, so long as I am married, on paper, to someone, I get twice as much. Still much less than my other three cousins who all have kids, but it's still twice as much as I was going to get otherwise. I'll even cut you in on it."

"How much?" Wilson couldn't say no to a profit making scheme, if it really was as foolproof as this. Besides, they were best friends, he really wouldn't care if he was stuck moving back in and onto House's couch. Besides, what was another marriage under his belt, especially if it didn't mean anything.

"In the range of about twenty five k, and that would be your cut."

"What's yours?"

"About seventy five." Wilson rolled eyes. Of course House would take a much bigger cut for himself, it was House.

"I think this is a completely new definition of gold digger. Marrying someone to get someone else's money. You're absolutely sure that this is foolproof? That all we have to do is put our names down on paper, and it's twenty five thousand dollars in my pocket?"

"Go to the courthouse, put our names down on the paper, wait for Pawpaw to kick the bucket, collect."

"Isn't this cheating your family?"

"The rest of my family are getting plenty. The rest of it was going to go to charity anyway." He produced a copy of the will, and shoved it in Wilson's face. The house was going to someone Wilson assumed was House's uncle, other assets were being divided up between the children, and the liquid assets were being divided between the grandchildren. To the tune of fifty thousand dollars to each member of the immediate family.

"I don't know House-the idea of marrying someone for money-"

"We're pretty much an old married couple anyway." Wilson sighed dejectedly. House did have a point about that. They did act very much like an old married couple. Bicker, fight, but somehow always wind up making up. Able to communicate without speaking, and spend time in each other's company just enjoying the space-each of them doing two different things, but enjoying there being someone else there.

"You know, I swore I'd never get married again."

"But that's because I've never asked." There was a long pause as Wilson read, and re-read the will. If House had said he had a lawyer look it over, than he trusted House. Of course, the only way anyone could trust House was if it was on a matter that involved finding giant, glaring loopholes in the system.

"I refuse to change my last name." Wilson swore that he'd never seen House smile quite so brightly before. This wasn't the cat that ate the canary, this was the cat who had just poached the ostrich.