Title: survivor's guilt
Fandom: House MD
Rating: PG-13
Length: 500 words
Content notes: Set after s04e16 Wilson's Heart. Death; mentions of sex & alcohol.
Author notes: House, sweetie, I'm so fucking sorry. Also fills the 'Choices' square in my FFW bingo.
Summary: House feels a new emotion after Amber's death.



House doesn’t recognize the feeling at first. He doesn’t think he’s ever felt it before— it crushes him, makes him not be able to sleep well after the month mark passes. He doesn’t think he’d ever admit it, much less to Wilson, but all he can think of is his own words at the bus.

He shouldn’t be alive right now. A part of him wants to believe Wilson would grieve him like he’s grieving Amber right now, but Amber is— was a genuinely good person. Sure, she was just as manipulative as him, but she tried to be a good person— and he’s still here. Maybe Wilson wouldn’t grieve him like he’s grieving her. Maybe all he would feel was some fucked up sort of relief, because House is just a burden on him at this point, maybe a smart but ultimately just a burden—

“Self pity isn’t like you,” he tells himself, parroting Amber as he takes another sip of scotch.

And it’s just ridiculous, how much he hates this turn of events. No one liked Amber— he didn’t like Amber. He staunchly refused to like Amber, because Wilson treasures her like she’s all there is in the world, like she’s twenty times more important than his friend of twenty-odd years. It’s like he’s jealous, jealous of all the attention a dead woman is getting from his best friend.

It’s ridiculous. It’s pathetic.

Everything wouldn’t have happened like this if he hadn’t made the choices he did. All because of his keys being taken by the bartender— all because he went on the bus instead of taking kindness to heart for once in his goddamn life. If he had followed Amber to her car, if he had—

Survivor guilt. He doesn’t think he’s ever felt guilty before, but it crushes him, makes him overthink every one of his choices of that night. Amber wouldn’t be dead, and the strain on his friendship with Wilson wouldn’t be getting bigger and bigger.

Maybe he shouldn’t have gotten off the bus. Maybe he should’ve stayed there.

He downs what’s left of the scotch, staring intently at the floor of his living room.

He’ll never admit it, but he wants to so bad. He wants to scream it’s his fault, that he hates it, he hates that he’s alive and that he’s barely talked to Wilson in a month and a half. He wants Wilson to indulge on his coping mechanisms— or lack thereof, have Wilson fuck him to deal with the grief that engulfs every part of him. Maybe that’s the closest thing to talking they’d do for a while.

He wants to say he’s sorry, that fuck, he’s so goddamn sorry, that he’s sorry that Amber is dead and he’s still alive and kicking when he shouldn’t.

But he won’t make it sound as honest as it is, and Wilson will never believe it.

House goes for more scotch, and calls a hooker on his way to the liquor cabinet.