i spent three years driving around

* * *

EPILOGUE

* * *

When the time for the appointment came, House and Wilson stood at the door, ready to enter.

“I don’t think this is healthy,” House suddenly interrupted.

“You don’t think this is healthy?” Wilson glanced pointedly down to his pocket, where House stopped fiddling with the regretfully empty Vicodin container.  “I told you, you didn’t have to come.”

“Right.  Then I’d just listen to you complain about how I didn’t.”

Wilson shook his head, turning away.  He reached out from his own windbreaker pockets and almost opened the door, but then stopped.

“Cameron told me she organized a memorial service at St. Jude’s this evening,” he said quietly.

House looked away from Wilson’s hands.  “And you’re telling me I shouldn’t go to that either?”

“No.  I think you should.  We should.”

“Kind of morbid visiting his grave on Halloween.”

“It’s a year since, House.”

“Do you think I’m an idiot?” he snapped.       

 “I just think it might help.”

“Like this will?  Like anything has?”

The door opened for them.  A large silver-haired woman in her fifties stood in the entrance of the small room.  Bead curtains hung along the walls, colored by tinted lights.  A table, set with cards and three chairs, waited.

She smiled sadly at the two of them and offered seats.

House gingerly sat down, gripping his cane from the throb of his right thigh and the distant, intermittent ache of his left.  He thought of the shower seat Wilson suggested installing in their bathroom, an idea that had gone over so badly that House had the apartment all to himself for nearly two weeks.

The silence was enormous, but welcome.  House figured they weren’t meant to function in one another’s space all the time.  They couldn’t.  They were reminded.  Sometimes sharing the burden just wasn’t smart, and House needed and craved silence as long as it was only temporary.

Wilson settled next to him and kept his hands folded beneath the table.

The woman shuffled the deck, her nails making faint clicking sounds on the cards.  When she’d finished, she placed them down in the center.

“Dr. Wilson?” she asked.  He nodded and she stretched out her hand.  “Let me see your palm.”

“Actually, I would just like you to read my cards, thanks.”

“Guess what that subtle euphemism means,” House interjected with an ogling wink.  Wilson glared but the woman observed House carefully, eyes traveling across his face.

“Something happened to you both,” she said after a pause.

“Your specificity is astounding,” House lauded.  “Now tell his damn fortune, or do you charge by the hour?”

“House, stop it.”  Wilson threw him a disgusted look.  House shut his mouth.

The woman considered them both patiently.  At first House was afraid she was going to pursue her observations, but then she focused back to Wilson.

She prepared the deck.

“Are you ready?” she asked.

Something faltered on Wilson’s face.  Instinctively House reached under the table and grabbed his hand, the scars uneven but familiar against his palm and fingers.

Wilson nodded, and the first card flipped over.

END