Title: Let It Be Me
Author: M.E.W. & luridlurker
Pairing: House/Wilson
Summary: Takes place after "Remorse"
Word Count: 1082
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: not ours
Let It Be Me
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When Wilson returned home, he found House already deeply asleep. For a moment he remained standing in the doorway to his bedroom, smiling at him, unable to hold onto his feelings of jealousy and anger at the sight. Somehow he liked watching him sleep, especially in their shared apartment, looking so peaceful and relaxed. He only hoped House would forget all the things he had said about Cuddy earlier as well as all the bullshit about deserved apologies. She certainly didn't need or deserve any, not after having treated him the way she had before and after Mayfield.
House and Cuddy were more than even, weren't they? Yes, they were. Wilson had made sure of that himself by punishing her, taking the very apartment she craved for himself and House, making it their home. He sighed and promised himself never to act on his emotional insecurities by hiding behind Cuddy (or anyone else) ever again but to speak up for himself.
What a stupid idea it was to suggest House might want to apologize to her of all the people in the world, to push him at Cuddy again, risking to make him rethink the choices he'd made, risking to lose him to her when all Wilson had really wanted was...He sighed.
It had been part of House's therapy to pick someone he hurt in the past to apologize to, and who did he choose? Some guy he wronged at med school by swapping their papers. A person Wilson had never even heard of in his whole life. Why didn't he pick me to open up to, to say he was sorry?
Then again...Did Wilson really need or want an apology? For anything?
What if House had merely taken Nolan's assignment seriously, for once not trying to cheat his way out of an emotionally tricky situation by simply writing to his best friend, telling him he was sorry for something that didn't need an apology anymore anyway? Because House had already done that. And more than once. As far as Wilson knew, he had been the only one House had ever apologized to. And he certainly didn't need another one after the medical conference where House stopped Wilson from ending his career by giving the controversial paper on euthanasia himself, under a fake name, speaking his heart in front of the attendees while looking directly at Wilson.
If he was honest to himself, there was an entirely different reason why he overreacted so much. It had nothing to do with apologies; it was the knowledge that House had written a letter to someone outside of Mayfield, the only contact to the outside world he was allowed to have that time. And he wrote to an (for Wilson) inconsequential stranger, and not...to him. He could not help but feel jealous and even a bit betrayed, as illogical as it was. He would have given anything for a personal note, a letter, a phone call, whatever, from House after he had to hang up on him when House tried to con him into a total harebrained scheme to get out of Mayfield. And how much it had reminded him of Danny, how he had felt like he had just repeated the worst mistake of his life, the receiver pressed to his hurting heart as tears of shame and remorse leaked out of his eyes. It was totally selfish of him, he realized, to feel that way, yet he could not help it. But that wasn't the point, was it?
House must think him totally illogical again, his lectures apropos of nothing. Could not know that his overreaction was fueled by what he had lived through while House was in Mayfield. Suddenly the thought came to him that House wasn't even aware of his side of this, and had never asked how it been for Wilson. For House the outside world had just ceased to exist in the asylum. And for Wilson it had become an endless time of helpless worry, of finding himself sitting before a plate of too much food, eating none of it in the end, trapping himself again and again in thinking House would come around the corner and thieve his rightful portion of food, coke, coffee and sweets. And Wilson himself. He had never told House about how he had slept beside the phone to never ever miss his call, should it come. How he had opened the letterbox each day with illogical hope...How desperately sick with worry he was and how desperately lonely.
He had started talking to Amber regularly then, turning it into a nightly ritual while it had only been sporadic before. Because he had no one else to talk to, no one to share his life with.
House did not know any of this, and was there a point of letting him know? The House he knew before would not have cared about anything Wilson went through, shut behind his shield of emotional scars, physical pain and Vicodin as he was. But House had changed since then, maybe he would listen now. Perhaps he would say nothing to it, but he would listen. And perhaps he would understand how messed up Wilson's feelings were, that he himself did not know why he pushed him to Cuddy one day and pulled him back the next. Was jealous of a guy House was a jerk to thirty years ago. Why he was still shielding himself, protecting himself from hurt and rejection and losing-and was talking about Cuddy when meaning himself. And had meant himself for so long. Had meant to say: Go and ask me to go out. Go ask me to be with you. Go and take what you want (and let it be me). And never could say that, could never take that step. Sighing he rubbed his eyes. He knew what he longed for.
And House...had come back to him, then and today, hadn't he? To him. So maybe, just maybe it wasn't as hopeless as he feared.
Looking at House, who was barely visible in the darkness, Wilson smiled softly, knowing that all he'd ever wanted or needed was right there, only a few steps away, sleeping peacefully. And maybe, maybe he would finally find a way to let him know.
Quietly he let himself into House's room and closed the door.