Observations in a Cafeteria

By Helen Adams

A/N: Series canon is a little inconsistent about how long House has worked at PPTH but assuming he was fired, rehired, etc, this is just one idea of how House and Wilson might have become friends. Comments more than welcome.

House watched intently from his table in the corner of the cafeteria as doctors, nurses, patients and families mingled together, sharing food and conversation in one of the Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital's few social settings. He often spent his lunch hours this way, pretending to browse through books and magazines but in fact just people-watching in an effort to figure out what made his fellow humans tick. The concealing literature allowed him to observe others while at the same time maintaining enough distance to insure that no one was aware of his interest and would therefore have no excuse to come over and try to engage him in conversation.

It wasn't that House objected to conversation, he could be as garrulous as anyone if the subject matter was interesting, but the subjects were rarely compelling and he had never been very good at chit-chat. He could hold his own when it came to a discussion of books, movies, television, music, art, sports and certainly medicine, but even that could get old and it was just too hard to drum up the pretense of interest in the more mundane aspects of another person's life. He simply did not care who was dating whom, what cute thing somebody's baby had done, the fact that someone's significant other could never remember to take out the garbage. Sooner or later he would wind up saying something that the other person considered rude or offensive, which usually led to either a reprimand or a mind-numbing lecture from the Dean of Medicine on the subject of improving his people skills.

God, he couldn't wait until Collins retired next year . . . maybe the next Dean would have a sense of humor.

House's wandering attention was captured by a young doctor who was moving his way along the lunch line, choosing and then rejecting items with every step he took. The man picked up a yogurt cup then exchanged it for an apple, only to decide that the bananas looked better. Next he chose a prepackaged salad, quickly rejected it for a sandwich, only to trade back said sandwich for a bowl of soup. The indecisive luncher wavered for a moment over a bag of Lay's potato chips, obviously wondering whether they really went with anything other than the sandwich. Eventually he decided that chips would be all right as long as he exchanged them for the healthier baked variety. He paused at the beverage area, hand hovering over the cups and containers on display. Would it be a cup of coffee or a can of soda? House silently bet on the coffee, smiling a bit when the subject of his scrutiny selected a cup, filled it and let it join the other items on the tray. Last, he chose a generous slab of chocolate cake. House's brows twitched with interest. No hesitation on that one! It threw his initial theory that the man was on a diet - not that he was fat but there were always medical factors such as cholesterol and diabetes to be considered - into flux.

The doctor paid for his lunch and turned around, brown eyes darting around the cafeteria in search of a likely place to sit. House frowned, realizing that he knew the guy from someplace, but couldn't immediately put his finger on where. Hadn’t they been introduced at a staff meeting or something? He observed for a few more seconds, trying to place him, and then it came to him. The newest hire to the cancer ward. What was his name ... Watson? ... Williams? ... Wilson, that was it! James Wilson, who had started working at PPTH last month and was supposedly something of a prodigy in his field, assuming that the gossip circle could be relied upon. Only thirty years old and already finished with a prestigious fellowship and being groomed to take the reins as assistant chief of Oncology, presumably with an eye toward eventual advancement to Department Head. That meant he had to be both smart and determined, which made his waffling over the lunch choices even more amusing.

The cafeteria was heavily populated today with no empty tables remaining. Dismay showed clearly on Wilson's lean face at realizing he would have to find someone to sit with or else take his lunch elsewhere. His reaction was surprising. He was young, good-looking in a puppy dog sort of way, and on the fast track to career advancement. There was no wedding ring visible on his hand and he was probably already making big bucks if he was as good a doctor as reported.

All those factors should have made Wilson something of a B.M.O.C. around the hospital, particularly considering how many of the nursing staff could smell fresh meat at 100 yards and were always ready to pounce. And yet, here he was, looking lost and forlorn as he searched for a friendly face in the crowd.

The young doctor's predicament was having a strange effect on House. He had never been the most empathetic of souls and normally he would have dismissed Wilson’s obvious distress as the sign of a pathetic loser, but somehow instead of feeling contemptuous he felt sorry for him. He was inexplicably reminded of his own long ago school days. How many cafeterias had a young Gregory passed through where none of the other kids wanted to make a place for him? He had never been welcome in their midst. Sometimes it was because he was the new kid, sometimes he was the weird show-off genius, now and then he was dismissed as the rude boy, and all too often as the creepy overly-serious geek with the bad complexion; there had always been something. He had learned not to care, at least on the surface, but something about the sight of Wilson looking so alone and indecisive brought those feelings back with a sharp pang, reminding him of how much it really had bothered him.

To his own surprise, House found himself putting his magazine aside and waving a hand to gain the other doctor’s attention. "Hey, over here! I saved you a seat," he called out when the younger man looked his way.

A confused frown creased Wilson's smooth features. He cast a surreptitious glance around himself to make sure that the man in the corner was not talking to somebody else, and then slowly made his way through the crowd until he reached the table.

"Are you sure you don’t mind?" he asked, not yet setting his tray down.

With his right leg, House kicked out the chair across from him. "Take a load off. You look like you're about to collapse under the weight of all that chocolate cake."

Wilson grinned and took the offered chair. Picking up his knife he cut the sizable confection in half and tipped one onto a spare napkin. He held it out silently, his expression unknowingly hopeful, a solid gesture of thanks and a more metaphorical offer of friendship.

Accepting the slice, House smirked. "You know, if you're going to rent table space with food like this, you can eat here every day." He tensed as he spoke the words, wondering what on earth had possessed him to say such a thing. He didn’t know this guy. Wilson might be a whiner, a bleeding heart; or much worse, a complete bore!

Luckily the other man took his words as the joke House had intended them to be, countering with, "In that case, are there any food allergies I should know about? I'd hate to poison my benefactor before we ever got acquainted. Who knows where I'd find somebody else with a cheap table for rent?"

House's barely visible smile widened. What do you know; it seemed the boy-wonder oncologist had a sense of humor. "No allergies, but be careful if you ever think of offering a sandwich. I hate pickles and I believe mayonnaise should be outlawed in all 50 states."

"Good to know," he said deadpan, then smiled again and held out his right hand. "I'm Jim Wilson."

House considered the proffered appendage for a moment longer than was polite, but just as Wilson began to look uncomfortable and withdraw his hand, he reached out and grasped it firmly. "Greg House. Collins introduced us your first day here."

"Oh, I ... I'm sorry. I should have remembered. Uh..."

House was tempted to let him stew; there was something incredibly funny about watching another person go through the motions of embarrassed backpedaling, but instead he decided to cut the guy a break. "Don't worry about it. We didn't meet until late afternoon and you'd already been introduced to half the population of New Jersey by then. No reason you'd remember some guy from Nephrology who you talked to for all of five seconds." Imitating Dean Collins' deep nasal voice, he gestured between them and said, "Kidney Doc, this is Cancer Doc. He's new here and we'd like him to stay awhile, so keep your distance."

Wilson's face lit up with recognition at the second sentence. "I remember now! I spent all evening wondering what Collins had meant by that, considering how complimentary he'd been about every other doctor I met that day."

House snorted and popped a large section of the cake into his mouth. Speaking around the food, he garbled, "I'm too much of a bad boy to be trusted with the new kid in school. The Principal figured I'd have you smoking in the boy's room, hanging out in detention by the end of the week, and forging notes from your mother so you could skip class."

He hitched his eyebrows and Wilson laughed. "You're not that bad."

"What makes you so sure?" He asked the question archly, but found that he was genuinely curious to know why this stranger sounded so certain of his assessment.

Wilson munched thoughtfully on one of his potato chips. Then he smiled. "Because cool kids don't hang out with us nerds."

In spite of himself, House smiled back. “Maybe you’re right. By the way, what was with the eeney-meeney-miney-moe routine up at the lunch counter?”

“You saw that?” he asked, looking uncomfortable.

“That’s the reason you’re here,” House replied. “Figured I should find out if somebody had spit in the hors douvres before I placed my order.”

Watching him stuff the last of the cake slice into his mouth with a soft grunt of pleasure, Wilson’s eyes widened. The sarcastic comment seemed to make him realize for the first time that House did not actually have any food in front of him, nor was there any evidence that he’d had something before and finished it.

“You’re not eating,” he stated, not quite making it a question.

House smirked a bit as he watched Wilson’s freshly filled spoon pause halfway up to his mouth. Either this kid was too polite to eat in front of someone who had no food of his own, or he was now worried that some kamikaze chef had thrown poison into the soup. “Wanted a Reuben,” he said, “but they were out of rye bread. You didn’t answer my question.”

Wilson shrugged. “I’m used to bringing my own lunches. Just like my own cooking better than cafeteria food, but lately I’ve been so busy that I haven’t had any energy left for cooking at the end of the day. This is the first time I’ve even come down here instead of raiding the snack machine down the hall from Oncology.”

“Too much of that will really pack on the pounds,” House commented, casting a knowing look at Wilson’s midsection and suppressing a chuckle when the young man responded by blushing and scooting closer to the table to put more of his body out of sight. “Doesn’t look like you’re too far gone yet. Just eat a couple more meals down here and weight loss worries will be a thing of the past. By the way, is there a bathroom close to your office?”

For a moment, Wilson appeared to be on the edge of panic. Then he looked House in the eye and suddenly relaxed, even letting go a soft laugh. “You’re good.”

For the first time in longer than he could remember, Gregory House let go a genuine laugh, one that was neither mocking nor scornful. He liked this guy. Wilson seemed perceptive and at least vaguely interesting. It might be worthwhile to hang out with him for a few days, or however long it took to grow tired of with his company. If he was lucky, maybe the puzzle of this man would take as long as a month to solve.

If nothing else, he decided, noting that Wilson offered no protest as his hand darted out to steal the open bag of chips, at least he would be well fed for a few days.

THE END

Feedback: virginiacitygirl@comcast.net