This is my first foray into writing House M.D. fan fiction, so feedback is definitely welcome.

Chapter 1

It was a cold, gray day. The light mist falling was periodically morphed into tiny stings when swirling wind gusts grabbed and whipped the moisture against exposed skin.

Dr. Lisa Cuddy, former Dean of Medicine at Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital, barely noticed though. Her umbrella shielded her from most of the precipitation and what got through was inconsequential compared to the tears leaving burning trails down her cheeks.

The service concluded, most of the mourners had already drifted away, heading to their cars and leaving Cuddy alone at the graveside. Her eyes were on the headstone, reading and re-reading the name chiseled into the gray granite as if it might somehow change if she just kept looking.

James Evan Wilson
1968-2012

Life was wholly unfair, fate an absolute bastard. That an oncologist should die of cancer...

Wilson had been, in her opinion, what all physicians should strive to be - concerned, compassionate, and caring towards their patients. Those qualities are what prompted her to name him head of the oncology department at her former hospital.

Of course, it was pure irony that Wilson had been recommended to her by a mutual friend and colleague, Dr. Gregory House, a physician who exhibited anything but those qualities to patients.

Cuddy shivered as she thought of House, the tall, blue-eyed, sharp-tongued genius whom she'd first met in college then hired to ultimately create a world-class diagnostics department for the hospital. She would blame the physical reaction on the weather if she could, but that would be a lie. Thoughts of House always provoked some sort of physical response in her, and now was no different, even as she stood by the grave of his best friend.

House and Wilson. Wilson and House. Wherever one had been, the other had been also. They had been quite the pair, often times the equivalent of frat boys or little boys in the bodies of grown men. Both had been her friends and both had injected her well-ordered, well-planned life with a chaotic mixture of happiness, laughter, frustration, anger, and sorrow during her years with them at Princeton-Plainsboro. Some of it had been professional. Some of it deeply personal. But not a moment of it had been boring.

Cuddy missed those days and at the moment, felt the absence of that special camaraderie that had endured and spawned many a prank, heated arguments, and honest heart-to-heart discussions. She wished so many things had turned out differently. She wished that cancer was a curable disease, that past events could be altered saving them all from the landslide of grief and sorrow that began nearly two years ago. Without a doubt, she would make different choices if she could do it all over again, especially in regards to House.

Memories of her former lover drew more tears from Cuddy. She had never known a more infuriating man. Egotistical, narcissistic, crass, crude, lewd, manipulative - he had been all those things during the years she'd spent in his company in Princeton. But he'd also been more.

She'd loved the self-labeled misanthrope from the moment she'd met him on the University of Michigan campus. He'd been so different then. Still an ass, still arrogant, still smarter than everyone else around him, but kinder, gentler, more carefree, and without the debilitating physical pain. He'd been her friend there, her first love and first real lover. The bond they'd formed there had remained strong even after he'd departed for residency leaving her to finish her education.

When he'd shown up on her proverbial doorstep at Princeton in need of a job a decade later, she'd hired him despite his work history. When no one else would, so she'd dared give him a job and a real chance to use his unique gifts. He'd been with Stacy Warner at the time, so they'd renewed their friendship, starting with a part that most people had never understood - the playful and challenging banter.

After Stacy left, it changed, banter becoming all-out verbal sparring. It had been legendary in the hospital halls. She'd kept him in check and he'd challenged her at almost every turn. But all that ... all that had been a dance, an echo of the past that became a prelude to a second love affair that had burned bright and hot, and yet been underscored by a sweet, mature tenderness no one would have expected from the social menace that was House.

But Cuddy knew. She'd known his kisses, his touches, the sound of his breath, and beat of his heart. She'd known what it was like to be enraged by him one moment and left longing for him the next. She'd seen him vulnerable, loving, and caring. Even now, memories of him in those moments took her breath away and made her already aching heart ache all the more.

God how she wished things could be different, for Wilson, for House, and for herself. She felt alone and not a little bit lost. It was strange living in a world without him in it. It just didn't seem—

"Dr. Cuddy?"

The gentle uttering of her name drew Cuddy from her thoughts and her gaze to the young black man approaching on her right. Eric Foreman. He had been a young and promising neurologist when he joined the Princeton-Plainsboro diagnostics department. Since her departure from the hospital, though, he'd moved into administration and now held her former position as Dean of Medicine.

She gave him a wan smile as he nodded to her. His normally stoic expression bore signs of his grief. She wasn't surprised. Everyone had loved and respected Wilson.

"Dr. Foreman," she greeted as he came to a halt beside her. She looked down when he held out an envelope. It was cream in color and had her name written on the front. She recognized Wilson's handwriting.

"Dr. Wilson asked that I give this to you today," Foreman said softly.

Cuddy took the envelope from him, her smile dissipating and her heart clenching within her breast at knowing that it likely held the final words she'd ever hear from her friend.

"Thank you," she replied.

Beside her, Foreman shifted his weight from one foot to the other. "We are going into town for drinks," he began, "You're welcome to join us."

Her smile returning, at least in part, Cuddy looked up at her former employee and shook her head. Although she appreciated the invitation, grief had always been a private thing for her and she just wasn't up to socializing with so much weighing on her heart.

"Thank you for the invitation, but I...," she trailed off not sure what else to say. Foreman seemed to understand, though, his dark eyes acknowledging what went unspoken.

With a tilt of his head, he murmured, "Dr. Cuddy," then eased away to join Drs. Chase and Cameron, and several others who'd been a part of the diagnostics department over the years. Cameron alone looked back and gave her a small wave before they loaded up into several cars and headed out.

Cuddy sighed then looked back at Wilson's headstone before flitting her gaze over at the coffin that contained his body. A lump forming in her throat, she whispered a soft "goodbye" and made her way to her car, clutching the envelope to her breast, both eager and fearful of what it contained.