It had been almost 4 months since the night she had walked into my bathroom. On the floor with vicodin in hand I felt like I had lost everything and doing the right thing was not getting me anywhere.
The night had started out at that tragic sight. A crane had collapsed on a building in Trenton. There were still so many people unaccounted for. As we arrived I could hardly believe my eyes. They had reached the crane operator and pulled him from the wreakage and he was on his way to Princeton where my team awaited him.
Cuddy had been acting strange and I was trying to find out what was going on. I made a call to Wilson to see if there was trouble in paradise.
Then there came a clanging from somewhere. As I was trying to figure out where it was coming from I yelled to the crew that someone was down there. As they came over to search they didn’t hear anything. I knew I had heard something. I saw a sprinkler pipe and took my cane and beat up against the pipe and it was the same noise.
Is anyone down there? I know I heard something. This is such a small space. Maybe I should go back. What am I doing? What the h…? How am I going to get through here? Why am I doing this? I should just turn around and go back. There she was and as she grabbed my cane it startled me. I heard her say help me. Her leg is trapped and I can’t lift the beam and I can’t pull her out. I have got to get help. I know you are scared but I have to get help.
I finally get back out of the hole and reach some people to get down there to help. ForH annah a connection was made with me. I begin looking for Cuddy again because I have to find out what is going on.
As I approach her I want her to tell me she broke up with Lucas. I want her to give me a chance. But the words that rolled from her lips were anything but wha tI had imagined.
“I am getting married House.” The words were loosely penetrating my cerebral cortex. No! You can't marry him Cuddy. You love me I said to myself. I know you do.
Hannah’s situation is slowly escalated all night and they don’t know how long they can keep this building sured up and amputation was being considered. I would have argued to the death against the amputation.
They made one more desperate try to lift the beam but it caused another collapse and the debris flew and came close to an artery on my shoulder. Hannah I’ve got to go. I’ll be back.
As the worker approached he said we needed to get Hannah out and that required amputation. Cuddy continued arguing with me and i was arguing back.
”I know you're angry, but please don't put her life at risk just to get back at me House.
~House: Really? (standing up and towering over her) Wow. So this is all about you now.
~Cuddy: You took her side against me right after you heard about my engagement.
~House: Yeah. That must be it. It's not that you're a pathetic narcissist.
~Cuddy: I don't love you. So just... accept it and move on with your life instead of making everyone miserable.
~House: That's great. A life lesson from a middle-age single mom who's dating a man-child.
~Cuddy: Screw you. I'm sick of making excuses for you. I'm sick of other people having to tiptoe around you and make their own lives worse while they try to keep you from collapsing. I'm done. (She walks away from him)
~House: (calling after her) Fantastic. Just stay away from my patient.
~Cuddy: (turning around and coming back toward him) What are you clinging to, House? You're going to risk her life just to save her leg? Really worked out well for you, didn't it? What do you have in your life honestly? Tell me. I'm moving on. Wilson is moving on. And you... You've got nothing, House, nothing. I'm going down there, and I'm going to convince her to let me cut her leg off. If you have any decency left, you'll stay out of it.
"She doesn't love me." It felt like a knife had been run through me. "She’s right. It didn’t work out well for me." I have nothing. All those years I had wanted to be with her and I had really finally lost her. I had punished her and taken advantage of her and she had finally had enough. I can’t let her do that amputation. It would haunt her forever. The only thing I have is medicine.
As I went down in the hole I talked to Hannah. I told her that I made the wrong choice that the doctors had to do a risky surgery because I wanted my leg. I am in pain every day. It made me a harder person and a worse person. I am alone. You don’t want to be like me.
Cuddy I saw the release in your eyes and the tear slid down your cheek. I had hurt you so much over the years. I had said so many cruel things. Why couldn’t I just tell you that I was sorry and that I wanted to be with you? Why couldn't I just say those words? No it was too late.
I will take care of Hannah. I have got this. For all the pain you have suffered at my hands maybe I can take a little of it of from your shoulders this time.
I grasped Hannah’s hand as she asked me hw bad it would hurt and I told her it would hurt like nothing she had ever felt before. I can still hear her screaming. That saw cutting through the bones in her leg. I think I will always hear her screaming.
"In those ashes I made my choice to let you know that I was wrong and that all those years I was a jerk. I set you free from the guilt and the responsibility of fixing me and keeping me from hurting myself. When I shut those doors on the ambulance and I looked into your eyes I knew you were gone and any chance I might have had to be with you was gone."
In the ambulance ride to the hospital it really began to set in. She is engaged to Lucas. I had really lost you. You are getting married.
“I don’t love you.” The words kept repeating in my head cutting deeper each time.
"I’m moving on."
"Screw you."
"I am sick of making excuses for you."
She didn’t believe in me anymore and she wasn’t going to put her heart out there to be walked on by me anymore.
Then the EMT shouted the words, “her blood pressure is dropping."
Hannah began struggling to get her breath. She couldn’t breathe. I thought it was a clot but as I tried to bust it I found it wasn’t a clot. I fell back. Oh no!! I looked at her almost pleading but there was nobody there for me to plead to. It was a fat embolism and there was nothing I could do. "Oh Hannah", as you looked at me I could hardly hold back my anger and frustration.
"Oh Hannah I am so sorry."
I had broken my own rules about making connections with patients and I had gave you false hope. I had told you that the amputation was the only way to save your life and now you were looking up at me as if to tell me you knew I had done everything I could. All I could do was watch you take your last breath. Everything I touch I destroy.
"I sat there for a while inside the ambulance as Foreman tried to help but there was just no way to help me. The entire night sinking in to my brain. I had lost everything that I had been working so hard to gain. I had tried to prove myself worthy only to find out I wasn't worthy of anything. I had done everything right and I still had nothing."
Foreman is following me through the hospital into the lobby still trying to help me but I was far beyond any help.
I had followed Dr. Nolan’s advice to the letter and I still had nothing. Well not quite nothing, I had one more thing. I had always been able to depend on the………….
I got on my bike and I left the hospital. She is marrying Lucas. Wilson is moving in with Sam and I my patient is dead. More loss in one night then I could take. I can't take this anymore.
As I arrived at the apartment I had fixed a hole in the wall behind the mirror in the bathroom years ago in case something happened and I couldn’t get any pills. I stood there looking in the mirror for any reason not to take this pain away and on the verge of completely breaking down. The struggle of being clean for a year ripping at my heart and the desire to have something to take away the pain and the loss I had suffered tonight taunting me, tearing at my soul. I jerked the mirror off the wall and threw it into the bathtub shattering it into pieces. There, in the hole was the crutch I had depended on for almost several years of my life. I had left one crutch (in the form of my cane and all my excuses) in the hole underground that night now just to be reaching out for the another. I had freed the people I had imprisoned for so many years. I grabbed the bottles and fell to the floor. My hands were shaking and water filling my eyes as I opened the bottle and poured two vicodin in my hand. Go ahead, take them, you tried, you still have nothing, take them! It will make the pain go away.
My hand started upward and then I saw her shadow and I looked at her wondering if she really was there. Are you going to leap across the room and jerk them out of my hand? As you began talking I still wasn’t sure you were there. I was listening but still not sure that this was real. Did I really hear you say you had broke it off with Lucas? What?! Did you really say that? Are you really here? Did you really say that you loved me? As I held his hand up youhelped me up. Am I hallucinating this. Are you really here?
I leaned down and softly brushed your lips across yours. You feel real but I pulled back to make sure that I wasn’t hallucinating.
How do I know I am not hallucinating?
“Did you take the vicodin” you asked me?
“As I looked in my hand the vicodin were still there.” I threw them down as I moved in closer to you and leaned down and I abandoned all thinking and all logic and I deepened my kiss this time.
“I need to change the bandage” I thought I heard you say.
“It’ll wait.” I need to be close to you I thought to myself. I was too tired to hide my feelings anymore. I was afraid to let you in but I was more afraid of letting you walk away out of my arms or out of my life. As you touched my chest I leaned into you. Your hand sent waves of electricity through every part of me. Being in the room with you always made me feel a little funny. Earlier that night I thought I had lost you. Now you were standing just inches away from me. Softly my lips met yours again and I brushed my lips back and forth across yours as the honesty of the moment was overwhelming for us both. I could barely breathe or get my bearings. The feel of you unlike anything I had ever felt. The moment was raw and like two battle worn soldiers as our hands and fingers interlocked the kiss deepened. There were no words and not really any actions that could describe the emotions that were pouring out of my soul.
You pulled away and led me to the bedroom. You helped me take my jacket off and you checked the wound. As you undressed me you washed me with a cloth and when you came to the scar you embraced all that we had been through as the healing began for us both. For a moment it was more than I could take in but as you looked into my eyes all my fears melted with your words and as I pulled you back up I had never known a love as faithful as what you had given me for so long. As I lowered my head and my lips met with yours again I drank you in like water for someone dying of thirst.
You were a dream, a fantasy, and before this moment I thought you were out of my reach.
When I picked you up as much as it hurt I wanted you to know I would never let you fall again. I will go through the pain and the fear that rest deep inside my soul to be with you. Inside you that night I couldn't get close enough.
And now here we are 4 months later and you have just forgiven me again. Maybe you just needed to hear an apology because of all the times I didn’t say it. I lied to you about a case and although I didn’t think I was wrong I knew you were upset and for the first time in my life I needed you more than I needed to be right. More than needing to make my point I needed you.
You are opening your beautiful stormy gray eyes and as I brush your hair behind your ear I look at your beautiful face and I still find it hard to believe that you’re here. I promise you I am learning from my mistakes.
Cuddy I love you for what I am when I am with you and for the man you make me want to be. You loved me long enough and strong enough until I could no longer be without you. One day I will tell you this but for now these words are the ones that come from my lips:
"Are you planning on sleeping all day." No one needs this much beauty sleep. I couldn't be with you if you were that ugly.
Shut-up House.
As I lean down to kiss you your beauty washes over me and after 20 years you still take my breath away.
