Chapter 8:

House woke to the sun beating down through the window, Wilson's warmth filling him and his scent surrounding House in a cocoon of safety and familiarity. Instinctively he wrapped his arm tighter around Wilson's side, cuddling as close to the most important person as he could.

Wilson gasped and groaned loudly in his sleep causing House to immediately release him. Had he really hurt Wilson? No, it was a dream – a hallucination. Gently, he lifted Wilson's shirt to reveal the cane-shaped, purple, green and red bruise he had seen in his dream.

House dropped the shirt in surprised and horror. He'd hoped that it hadn't been true; He couldn't believe he'd actually hit Wilson and he felt worse than ever about it.

Wilson groggily opened his eyes. He was aware that possessive, comforting hands wrapped around him, pulling him closer then he was aware of sharp, throbbing pain piercing his side and reverberating through his back.

He looked up to find House staring at him, sadness, anger, regret and love reflecting in his soft blue eyes, battling for domination. "Hey," he greeted sleepily.

House blinked, completely wiping the emotions out of his eyes. He hadn't been aware that Wilson was awake and could see EVERYTHING he was feeling. While he knew that erasing emotions from his eyes wouldn't help with the fact that Wilson had noticed, it made him feel better to do it none the less. "Hey,"

"We should probably get ready for work." Wilson supplied, filling the strange silence that surrounded the room.

"You're not going to work." House answered immediately, his eyes flashing in warning. "And before you start arguing that you're fine, let me remind you that I am your physician and I do know that you are not fine."

House's phone sounded, alerting him that someone was trying to get a hold of him. He groaned but picked up his phone to check and see who it was. A smirk appeared on his face when CUDDY flashed over and over on the phone, almost angrily. "Why good morning Dr. Cuddy, how may I help you?" House answered sarcastically.

"House, you were supposed to be in my office thirty minutes ago." She snapped wearily.

"Well, I would have been, but I do have a wounded Boy Wonder Oncologist here that I need to take care of." He answered angelically.

"House, you're the one who wounded him!" Cuddy growled angrily. Apparently she was still mad at House for having hurt Wilson.

"Exactly! I should be the one to make him feel better." House supplied trying to make the suggestion sound logical though he was almost prepared to beg to be allowed to stay home with Wilson.

Wilson rolled his eyes and House's "logical" statement and Cuddy loudly groaned, "House, I want you in my office within the next thirty minutes or I will move YOUR office into the clinic where you will spend every waking moment you're at work for the next month." She threatened, her voice letting House know that she would indeed do it, "After we are done talking, then MAYBE I will let you go back and take care of Wilson. While you're gone, I will send Chase there to keep an eye on him and help him when needed."

It stung that she trusted Chase to take care of Wilson but he kept the acid comment which lay on the tip of his tongue to himself. "Okay," he said as lightly as he could after taking another minute to "consider" following her orders. "Send Chase over now, I'll be there in less than twenty."

He hung up, slamming his phone shut as loudly as he possibly could with out actually breaking it. He was furious that he had to leave just so Cuddy could feel like she was in charge and actually cared when he knew that she really didn't give a damn other than the fact that her Head of Oncology was hurt and out of commission for a few days.

"Are you in trouble?" Wilson asked, watching House's anger deepen. He didn't understand why his friend was angry but he wasn't going to ask either. He'd been on the receiving end of that anger enough to know that he didn't want to be on the end of it this time.

"No, Cuddy's PMSing and wants to yell at someone." He shrugged lightly while he pulled a t-shirt on. "I just happen to be the one lucky enough to supply her with a "reason"."

"You don't think she has a reason?" Wilson countered, playing devil's advocate while trying to weasel what was going on out of his friend at the same time.

House spun around to face Wilson, ice blue eyes flashing with deep seeded anger and an even deeper hurt. "Do you?"

Wilson smiled tiredly, the pain in his body had been escalating from tolerable to deep, painful throbbing since he'd been awake and it was getting harder to fight. "No but that doesn't mean that SHE agrees. House, I know you didn't mean to hit me but the fact is that you did and she knows about it."

"Pfft, she's not mad about that." House answered with a dismissive roll of the eyes. He quickly hid the apology in his eyes when a hurt look briefly crossed his friend's face. "She's mad because you're out of commission for a few days and she has to rearrange your schedule and find someone to take your patients."

The hurt, which had never left Wilson's eyes, deepened. "House, despite what you might think, she does care about me."

"Does she? Or was she only using you to get to me?" House countered angrily, immediately regretting it when Wilson looked like he was about to cry. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean that. Look, Chase is going to come over and help you out while I get scolded by Cuddy." He filled in, limping over to give Wilson a kiss on the forehead, "No kissing," he added with a smile.

Wilson managed a weak smile but it didn't reach his eyes. "I promise."

"You're welcome to do other things though!" House called out before closing the door behind him.

Chase was about to enter the building when House came out of it with a sneer on his face. It made him relatively uneasy to see his boss so happy yet not.

House approached him, allowing his full height to tower over Chase, "I've already told him so I'll tell you. No kissing. You can do whatever else you want but no kissing."

Chase stared dumbfounded at the scruffy doctor, "Uh, alright," was all he was able to scrounge out.

House offered a minute nod then climbed on to his bike and drove away leaving a very stunned Chase standing on the sidewalk.

"I am here oh master. Punish me at your will. Preferably with chains, whip and some leather on." House announced as he entered Cuddy's office. He was pleased to find a well dressed couple sitting in the two seats across from her desk looking appalled and shocked.

Cuddy quickly recovered from her horror at House's blunder and turned a polite smile toward her guests, "Excuse me a moment." She grabbed House's arm, hard, and escorted him out of her office and into the clinic. "Stay out here and be useful while I finish this meeting." She commanded.

"But mom, you said that doing clinic would be my punishment if I DIDN'T come on time." House whined loudly.

"I never said what your punishment would be for not showing up on time in the first place." Cuddy countered, turning around and heading back to her office.

House pouted his way into an empty exam room where he patiently waited for Cuddy to come fetch him. Sure enough, twenty minutes later she entered with a flourish, grabbed his PSP out of his hands and physically dragged him into her office.

"Sit!" She commanded harshly pointing to the couch. She may be furious with her head of diagnostic medicine but she wasn't about to cause him more pain by making him sit in a hard chair while she ranted, raved and lectured. "What happened?"

"Nothing," House dismissed.

"House," Cuddy replied tiredly, "I know something happened and while neither of you feel like telling me what, I'm tempted to call the police for abuse."

House's casual façade fell at Cuddy's last threat. "You wouldn't."

"Try me. From what I can see, you hit Wilson with your cane and for all I know, it wasn't the first time." She explained.

"I am not abusing Wilson!" House yelled, surprising both he and Cuddy with his volume.

Cuddy waited until House calmed down before continuing her inquiry. "Then tell me what happened."

House stared defiantly into Cuddy's slate blue eyes. Seeing that it was either admit what was going on or have a report filed against him for abuse, he chose the truth. "I saw him flirting with a nurse, got jealous and accidentally hit him."

"Accidentally?" Cuddy challenged, ignoring for now the jealous comment. "How do you accidentally swing your cane into someone's side?"

"I didn't realize I'd hit him until he was on the ground." House admitted with his head resting on the handle of his cane and his eyes downcast.

Cuddy wanted to push harder but she recognized the embarrassing truth when she saw it and decided to let it lie. She could see that he hadn't meant to cause Wilson harm and felt bad because he had. "Okay, go home and make sure you take care of him."

"There's a threat." House sniped.

"And, if I see another bruise on Wilson because of you, I will file a report." She warned just before he walked out the door.

Wilson was in the kitchen when Chase walked in. "Aren't you supposed to be resting?"

Wilson jumped in surprise at Chase's voice, "Geez!" He exclaimed, spilling scalding hot coffee over his hand.

"Sorry." Chase apologized.

"It's fine. Yes, I am supposed to be resting but it's hard to rest when you're hungry." Wilson replied, answering Chase's earlier question.

"Uh-huh, and the coffee? I'm pretty sure it's not considered food." Chase scolded lightly.

Wilson blushed, "No, but you can't have breakfast without coffee."

"And how do you plan on getting to the table?"

"I hadn't gotten that far yet." Wilson mumbled.

Chase stepped forward, his body heat pressing into Wilson and smothering him, and grabbed Wilson's breakfast. "Go back to bed. I'll bring everything on a tray."

"Chase, I don't need to be in bed." Wilson objected, crutching away from the counter.

"Probably not but House will murder me if he comes back and you're not resting in bed. You wouldn't want that on your conscience would you?"

Wilson drew his eyes to slits, giving Chase an appraising look, "That's low."

Chase shrugged, "I know but better that than House's wrath."

Wilson conceded the point with a heavy sigh and then made his way into the bedroom. He had just sat down when Chase entered carrying a tray that Wilson so often used for House when the diagnostician couldn't get out of bed for the pain in his leg.

Chase sat the tray down on a spare table and walked up to Wilson, "Scoot back."

Curious where Chase was going with his commanded, Wilson did as he was told. Soft, strong hands lifted his right leg, placing a soft pillow underneath the ankle as they did so. Wilson winced at the pain and pressure the action brought but since the sprain was mild, it wasn't too bad.

The hands repeated the process sans pillow with the other leg then grabbed a pillow and placed it behind the oncologist's back. "Better?" Chase asked, his accent making the word come out sounding like "Betta?"

"Yeah, thanks."

"Any time, do you need anything else?" Chase asked wishing he could ease the pain which coursed through the older man's body. He placed the TV tray over Wilson's lap then stepped back, giving the oncologist a patient look while he waited for an answer.

"No, I'm good. You are more than welcome to go if you have other things to do."

"You know," Chase began, ignoring the half-hearted dismissal, "House told me we could do anything but kiss?"

"Yeah, he told me the same thing." Wilson answered, taking a quick sip of coffee. "I think he was just messing with us."

"That's what I was thinking but with House, you never know." Chase responded, sitting himself down next to the bed.

The two men sat, chatting and laughing; passing the time until House came back. Thirty minutes later, the front door lock released, announcing loudly that someone was entering the apartment.

"If you're done chatting about boys and doing your nails, you can go Chase!" House yelled upon entering, limping his way to the couch.

Chase gave a Wilson a smile, "I guess that's my cue. I hope you feel better soon."

"Thanks Chase." Wilson answered sleepily.

Chase walked out into the living room, "He's going to need his pain meds soon." He updated.

"Okay." House replied simply.

Chase rolled his eyes and left. He hoped that House would take care of Wilson but it was no longer his nor anyone else's place to intervene. The two men knew what each other needed and would ask for help (well Wilson would) when they needed it.

~fin~