Chapter Text
House hasn’t attended many weddings; he generally doesn’t receive invites to them for the admittedly reasonable fear that his cynicism and inability to hold his tongue would make him a liability. On the rare occasions he is asked, he’ll know the cute little card he receives in the mail is likely a reluctant gesture of pity (and one that usually goes straight in the trash). Whilst he has little to compare Wilson’s wedding to Julie to - in fact, he thinks the last wedding he attended was also Wilson's, back when Bonnie was all the rage - he’s pretty sure this one is panning out a little strangely.
It starts with the way Wilson hesitates and reaches up to touch the back of his ear before reading his own written vows from a crumpled piece of paper. Julie memorised hers, and her eyebrows move in poorly concealed exasperation as Wilson mumbles and titters awkwardly through cliches and corny promises. His parents, already thoroughly unimpressed with this non-denominational ceremony in an extravagant hotel just out of town, tighten their folded arms and purse their lips as their son stammers his words. There's an audible whisper from the back. Someone coughs. House stands feet away from the entire spectacle, up at the front in his hired black tux. Such is the curse of the best man - a role he still maintains should start and end with the bachelor party.
By the time Wilson finishes, the guests’ silence is of the thick and muggy kind. No one whips out a handkerchief for their watery smiles. House can see Julie’s eyes glistening behind her ridiculously expensive veil. He seeks Cuddy’s face out in the crowd to find that she’s already staring back at him from under her stupid big hat, looking helpless and a little horrified. He merely offers a jaunty shrug as if to say, you surprised?
Oh, boy, the sweep of her fingertips across her forehead responds. This is bad.
It doesn’t surprise House that Wilson doesn’t really want to do this - but it does surprise him that Wilson seems to have suddenly realised it, unfortunate as it is that it happened right at the altar. It surprises House further still that he himself doesn’t feel triumphant, or sick with the need to cartwheel down the aisle, bum leg forgotten as he bellows, I FUCKING TOLD HIM SO. What he does feel, can be more accurately described as extremely irritated. And, despite everything, there's a little breakthrough jealousy - but that’s just par for the course these days. Just an annoying side effect of fucking a guy who proposes to any woman with a fleck of sadness in her eyes and a string of neurotic personality traits.
House has resigned himself to it now. The days he’d hoped things could be different are barely fragmented memories. It surprises him, what he can live without.
The ceremony signs off with something like a kiss, but it's more of an unsmiling, tentative brush of lips; Julie’s arms stiffen as Wilson’s hands graze the long silky sleeves of her white dress. The guest’s applause is more squeak than roar. House eyes the gleaming marble floor, gripping his cane with both hands until his knuckles whiten, sucking his lips between his teeth with the effort of forever holding his peace.
The things he does for Wilson.
Julie had been very clear prior to the event that she didn’t want House in any of the wedding photos. She even barred him from riding in any of the hired cars to the much fancier hotel where 300 guests were expected to party down in celebration of what they just witnessed. As a result, House makes his own way to the venue, and doesn’t see Wilson again until he safely tucks himself away in the corner of the grand windowed function room where pre-dinner champagne and socialising are to take place. He knows he won't actually be able to get anywhere near him, not yet at least, so he doesn’t try. Instead, he watches Wilson bob between crowds of uncles and cousins, wincing as he endures repeated congratulatory slaps on the back. A short while later, Cuddy accosts him and yanks him forward for a hug that goes on for a little too long. His hat is missing, he has confetti in his hair, and he looks exhausted. House sips at a bourbon on the rocks he purchased from the bar next door, ignoring the disapproving look he gets from an elderly woman in a red fascinator. She has weird eyes, so House presumes she’s Julie’s mother. Julie, however, is nowhere to be seen.
House massages his right leg with the heel of his palm. The ice in his glass scorches his top lip.
He continues to watch people congregate. Faces are ill at ease, conversation stilted, voices blending into a dull buzz rather than the special manic joy only a wedding can produce. He gets a fine view of the spectacular ass of one of the bridesmaids when she lingers near him for a moment, holding onto her friend as she changes out of her high heeled shoes. Occasionally, Wilson’s head will momentarily peek out among the throngs before he’s drowning in well-dressed, unfamiliar bodies again.
There’s a sudden weight on his shoulder, and it feels tentative and annoying. He glances up with a grimace; the hand belongs to Robert Chase, who beams down at him. “How you going, House?”
“How am I going?” House hisses, jerking his shoulder violently. “Get off me. And the champagne, for that matter.”
“It is a party,” Chase says with a shrug, his Aussie vowels more elongated than usual. His gormless expression is more pronounced too. “You don’t wanna join in?”
“Have you ever met me?” House retorts, pointedly angling his head to look past him. If he can just catch Wilson’s eye…
Chase lingers; he shifts on his feet. He gives a perplexed jerk of his hands. “We’re Wilson's friends. We should…”
“Wilson is not your friend.” House’s gaze shoots up to his face to deliver this much needed clarification. “Your invite to this shambles was merely a product of his pathological politeness.”
Chase looks a bit hurt, but he hides it with a faint smile. He started working under House about six months ago, and House spends about 75% of his time tolerating him and the other 25 trying to puzzle him out. He’s not been completely successful with either endeavour. But his new fellow is eager to please - eager enough to break the law when House needs him to, at least - and he has a decent idea about once a fortnight. There’s no good reason to fire him just yet.
“I don’t know if I’d call it a shambles,” Chase says eventually. He sounds uncertain, then again he always does when he’s expressing an opinion.
“Then you and I were at different weddings.” House knocks back the last dregs of his bourbon, thrusting the empty glass into Chase’s hand as he hoists himself to his feet. He’s tired of this. “Now fuck off. Go hit on Julie’s fat sister. You’ll make her year.”
House doesn’t bother to mumble excuse me’s or coming through’s ; one advantage of walking with a cane is that annoying feet scatter out of your path very quickly. Someone he doesn’t recognise tries to speak to him; he ignores her and keeps moving through the crowds. He navigates the clumps of elaborate hats, shiny shoes, awkward greetings exchanged between distant relatives, family rifts politely forgotten for the sake of James and Julie. Warm sweat gathers down his back beneath the uncomfortable layers of his suit. Again, seriously - the things he does for Wilson.
He locates his friend eventually amongst a trio of oncology nurses, also invited out of a sense of polite duty House will never understand. Lauren stands the closest to Wilson, champagne glass pressed against her lips in fascination as he says something with his hands stuck in his pockets. His shoulders are slightly hunched, defensive, even though his audience of three is rapt. House doesn’t know the names of the other two, but wonders if the disastrous display they just witnessed has raised fresh hope that they might be in with a chance with their bumbling, baby faced department head. They can get in line, he thinks. I’ve been waiting for years.
“Party’s over,” House says, ignoring Lauren’s glare as he interrupts Wilson mid-boring sentence. The other two nurses, both in strapless dresses that hover modestly at their knees, glance at him with a nervous sort of hatred. “Wilson, I’ve got that instruction manual on mind blowing cunnilingus for newlyweds. Was thinking we could go read it together. It has some neat pictures.”
Wilson’s ears turn a little pink, but the corners of his mouth tremble with the effort of hiding a relieved smile. His nameless admirers touch their hats and look at the floor. Lauren, who has worked at Princeton Plainsboro for years, sips her champagne with resigned, irritated nonchalance.
“I think what House means is ‘excuse us,’” Wilson says mildly, although he grabs House’s arm like a drowning man scrabbling for a raft.
Once Wilson is beside House, no one else tries for his attention; they make it out into the hotel foyer, and Wilson releases a breath so violent House wonders if he's been holding it in his lungs since the ceremony ended. He glances up at the extravagant chandelier above them, and wonders what Wilson is trying to prove.
He slides the tip of his cane across the impossibly clean floor, notes the tasteful faux mosaic pattern. “What the hell happened?” he asks simply.
Wilson runs one hand through his hair, as the other finds his hip. “Do you expect a simple answer to that question?” he says eventually, sounding weary and bitter. His eyes stray to a piece of confetti on his well ironed blazer, but he doesn’t bother to brush it off.
House considers this for a moment. “Guess not,” he says. Then, “where’s Julie?”
“We got into a fight.” Wilson shrugs; doesn’t elaborate. “She’s upstairs fixing her makeup.”
“Oh. I see.” House narrowly stops himself from asking, did you break down and tell her?
In the ensuing pause, Wilson tugs on his tie, but doesn't loosen it. House taps his cane on the ground. Their eyes don’t quite meet. It’s bizarre, unreal. Conversation usually flows so easily between them; their banter is effortless, their enjoyment of bitchy gossip mutual. Wilson can make any topic sound fascinating even if House previously felt he could care less about it (though he'd never tell him that - wouldn't want it to go to his head). They bicker like a couple in a nursing home, assassinate one another’s characters like sworn enemies, then have a beer and forget about it. It’s their usual intensity that makes silences like these disconcerting, tense, with guilt on Wilson’s part and unanswered questions on House’s. And, somewhere among all of it, there's just pure, ugly need.
They shouldn't. Not today. It's Wilson’s wedding day, and even House can see the line they're about to cross, glaring, illuminated. It's just that one glance into Wilson’s sad, lost eyes makes him sick with the urge to provide the comfort he needs, the only sort of solace he's good at. The only kind that Wilson actively seeks from him, knowing he'll deliver.
House's room is on the third floor, his stay paid for by Wilson. He and Julie insisted that all guests must spend the night at the hotel, even though a good percentage of them, including House, only live a few miles away. When they enter for the first time, House notices there are some abstract art prints on the walls, set in glass frames bearing not a smudge; the wardrobes are made of stained oak, with a matching desk built into the wall. Wilson closes the door, and that’s about as much as House takes in before there’s two needy hands on his waist, a gust of warm breath on his neck. He shudders.
He lets his cane drop to the floor as he turns around, inadvertently backing Wilson against the door; they go with it. He lets Wilson’s fingers curl around the lapels of his blazer, cling until they tremble. His eyes are wide. He's fearful of this today; they both have moments like that. Afraid of what they’re doing. Of what this has become.
Of course, they knew that last night’s "goodbye fuck" would turn out to be a mere formality, a meaningless gesture. They always are. Wilson insists on every occasion that this can’t happen again, citing reasons such as Julie and I’m getting married soon and this isn’t healthy. But it never stops him. Given the leash he keeps wound so tightly on himself, House imagines it must be disconcerting to feel so completely powerless to something.
House is grateful that he himself has no such leash.
Wilson is crying a little bit when House kisses him, but he meets his lips with no hesitation, seeking whatever it is that Julie clearly can’t give him. He seems immediately soothed. His hands flatten against House’s chest, his hips arch forward; he tastes a little like mint, but more like champagne. House gives a little grunt, running splayed fingers through Wilson’s hair as he cups his chin in his other hand. He finds himself wanting to be gentle, knowing that Wilson is truly so damaged at his core. He's loathe to be responsible for any more cracks, ruptures. Is this how all of his other conquests, his dirty secrets, have felt? he wonders as he sucks at Wilson’s bottom lip. House is unfamiliar with not thinking of himself first. It feels like he’s trying on a pair of pants that don’t quite fit.
But then again, it’s not as if Wilson really wants him anyway. House destroys himself a little more every time he gives into this, and that part of the equation, in contrast, feels perfectly natural. It all evens out. Give and take, and so on.
“House,” Wilson breathes, drawing back; his head collides with the door with a slight thump, but he doesn’t seem to notice. “House, what have I done?”
“Your dirty talk is getting worse, Jimmy,” House murmurs. He dismisses Wilson's miserable lamenting, because it won't do him any good; he grazes his fingertips up the sides of his neck as he nips at his chin, enjoying the shiver he evokes.
But then Wilson shakes his head, displacing him. “I’ve made such an ass of myself. I-I should have learned the vows… but then I read them and I, I didn’t want…”
“Ssh.” House covers Wilson’s hands, still splayed on his chest, with his own, and Wilson doesn’t protest as he quickly manoeuvres them above his head against the door. “We’re not gonna think about that right now, okay?”
House is surprised to hear such reassuring tones emerge from his own mouth; just for a moment, he stops to wonder who they’re really for. He tightens his grip on Wilson’s wrists, tilting his head to suckle on his throat. He can taste Wilson’s tears, feel the tension and resistance of his shame, but backing off, stopping, just isn't an option.
“It’s just,” Wilson moans a little, before continuing, “I love Julie. I do. I do, House.”
And then Wilson tugs his hands free and shoves at House's blazer, and House assumes the gesture absolves him of any responsibility to reply to that statement. He throws his arms back to assist, breaths escalating; his groin presses into Wilson’s of its own accord, his tongue drags across Wilson’s earlobe as he starts to fumble with the buttons on his perfect pure white shirt, and Wilson growls like he’s possessed as he grabs the back of House’s neck and wrenches him down for another kiss, aggressive with lust and despair.
House aches.
But God, he loves the feel of Wilson’s lips on his neck, urgent, forceful; the sneaky sleight of hand against his zipper, the fingers that fumble beneath his briefs for his hardening cock. He wishes he didn’t yield so easily to his touch, that the purr shuddering from his lips as Wilson’s teeth graze his Adam’s apple didn’t tremble with shameless longing. He grabs Wilson’s still-clothed crotch, quite suddenly, in an act of revenge; and Wilson’s gasp, the little roll of his eyes, is nowhere near as satisfactory as he’d hoped.
“Bed,” he breathes against Wilson’s lips, shrugging off his shirt completely. Wilson nods with a zeal that doesn’t match his guilty, watery-eyed expression.
The throw pillows glow white, stacked up like sandbags against House’s back. They’re only partially naked, open shirts and socks in situ. Wilson’s legs are wrapped around his hips, ass hovering over the gap between his slightly spread thighs. He has one hand on Wilson’s waist, the other meeting his around their cocks, trapping them together, creating friction with their palms and unrestrained cants of their hips. Wilson kisses him sloppily, and he’s wild and frantic, like his life depends on this. Choked little moans echo into House’s throat, and he swallows them down, he absorbs them all, he commits the little sounds and the tastes and the helpless claws of Wilson’s nails over his bare chest to memory. Perhaps it's unnecessary, but he never lets himself get cocky enough to deny the threat that this really could be the last time.
He shoves Wilson’s shirt out of the way with his nose to suckle on his bare shoulder, throwing an arm around his neck. Gestures of tenderness are safe in the throes of passion. It’s a bit like dancing too hard or saying something mortifying when you’re drunk; no one holds it against you really, writing it off as the expected product of you being completely out of your mind. Above him, Wilson’s teeth are clamped into his lip, his eyes misted over with pleasure and emotion. He’s the first to come, with a choked little sob, nails digging into House’s bicep as his head slumps against his shoulder.
In the ensuing seconds before his own orgasm, House registers that he’s back in limbo. Back to not knowing when, or even if, Wilson will want him next. Back to nights of getting buzzed alone on cheap beer, days that pass slowly, joyless.
House grabs onto Wilson’s hand and squeezes, ignoring the grunt of protest he evokes, until he’s rigid and breathless with white heat. For just a few glorious, fleeting seconds, nothing matters.
Hands and stomachs are cleaned; clothes are hastily restored. As Wilson stands before the mirror threading his tie, mouth drawn into a frown but the colour undeniably back in his cheeks, House debates whether or not to sidle up behind him and drape his arms around his waist. But Wilson is a married man now (again), and familiar, affectionate gestures mightn’t be allowed anymore. He remains perched on the edge of the bed, pulling at a loose thread on the sleeve of his blazer. He’ll wait until he knows the rules.
“I forgot to say,” Wilson says, casually, “there’s been a slight change of plan. Julie’s dad’s gonna do his speech before yours instead of after.”
House eyes the little patch of floor beneath his shoes, the soft white carpet. “I didn’t prepare a speech,” he says.
There’s a short pause; then Wilson says, “Oh.”
When he doesn’t follow it up with why the hell not?, House suspects it’s because he doesn’t really want to know.