Relative Motion Pt. 1

[toolazytowork.livejournal.com]

Title: Relative Motion Pt. 1
Author:toolazytowork
Character/Pairing(s): House, Wilson
Word Count: 1985
Rating: PG
Summary: Wilson's moved and left no forwarding address
Author's Notes beta'd by the very helpful and awake at all hours ardenta4477 written for the we_take_five challenge
Prompt: #42 velocity

He had always been too organized. So determined to keep his life in order. He was good with the tangible stuff. Phone and keys in his right pocket. Wallet in his left. With a compulsive tendency that had annoyed House on more occasions than he could count, he would check his pockets for the necessary items. If his phone spent the night on the seat of the Volvo or he had to turn around to retrieve his wallet from the nightstand, he would spend the rest of the day distracted. Those days he was lousy company and more prone to nagging then usual.

*********


It was early Saturday afternoon when House's phone rang from an unfamiliar number. He ignored it. He ignored the second call an hour later, too. The caller didn't leave a message. The third time the number popped up on the caller ID he took the damn call. "What?" He snarled.

"Doctor House?"

"Yeah."

"Doctor House, do you know a Doctor James Wilson?"




When he didn't recognize a number he expected to hear questions about whether or not he was happy with his long distance service or if he had a leaky basement. He didn't expect to hear a worried sounding woman inquiring about Wilson. "Who wants to know?"

"My name's Natasha. I manage the hotel where Doctor Wilson has been staying. When our housekeeping services went into Doctor Wilson's room this morning we...The thing is, he hadn't paid for the room for next week. Otherwise we wouldn't have gone in. He'd specifically requested no housekeeping other than fresh linens left outside of his door twice a week."

"OK."

"We thought maybe he'd just lost track of the time. He's never been late before. We've gotten to know him over the last few months. He doesn't say much. Seems like he works all the time. He seems...lonely. But very nice.




His chest hurt, but it wasn't worry; it was annoyance. There would have to be something to be concerned about in order for him to feel anything but put out. "Can you get to the point?"

"I'm sorry, Doctor. We're all concerned. His things were all in his room. His luggage and briefcase. Even his wallet and his cell phone."

"Why are you calling me? He probably just went for a run or to the store."

"That was our first thought, too. But none of the staff can remember seeing him in the last few days. Have you talked to him in the last day or two?"

House figured he must have seen Wilson at some point on Friday. But he'd spent most of Thursday and Friday holed up in his office working on a case. On Wednesday he'd done a begrudging stint in the Clinic and spent the rest of the day pretending to do research for a journal article he'd been pretending to write for close to a year. He'd sort of looked for Wilson around lunch time. That was the last thought he'd given him. Pretty much the only time he'd thought about him. "I don't think I've seen him this week."

"We waited. For a couple of hours. Housekeeping starts work at 8am. The woman working on Doctor Wilson's floor knew not to disturb him under normal circumstances. But, today...since he hadn't paid..."

"She knocked. He didn't answer because someone has to be present to answer and you found he'd moved and left no forwarding address."

"We waited. He'd have to come back. He didn't have his wallet. Or his phone."

"Are his keys there?"

"Room and car. Yes. His car's still in the lot. Wherever he is, he couldn't have gone far."

"Who else have you called?" That feeling that wasn't worry increased in intensity until it could best be equated to the sensation of having a Great Dane napping on his chest.

The woman sighed. "I thought he'd have some family he talked to regularly, but the only calls to people in his phone book from the last two months are to you and the hospital. We did call the hospital. He's not there."

"I'm on my way."

Due to a possible reverse tilt of the earth on its axis, Princeton's basketball team had managed to make it all the way to the Final Four. House's fair-weather fondness for the home-team was dulled a great deal by his annoyance at the additional traffic. Even sticking to side roads on his bike, the trip took close to an hour. His leg hurt and the pressure in his chest had upgraded from Great Dane to Triceratops levels. If something had happened to Wilson, and he refused to think that was the case, but if something had happened he'd could have died in the time it took House to drive across town. He left his bike in the check-in lane, pulled his cane out from where he had it stowed, and reminded himself that Wilson had two sets of keys and might have more than one wallet. There was a logical explanation. One that left everyone in one piece and relatively sane.

The woman behind the desk looked like an Elsie, but her name tag claimed she was the Natasha to whom he had spoken. "Let me into Doctor Wilson's room."

"Sir?"

"I'm Doctor House. You called me. I need to get into Wilson's room so that I can figure out where he is."

"I'm sorry. I'm sure you're worried." She handed House a keycard. "Room 533. Turn left out of the elevator."

House flipped the card over and under his fingers.

"Do you want me to go with you, sir?"

"No."

He had to share the elevator with a mother and her two bored children. The little girl tugged on his cane the whole ride. Her mother feigned obliviousness to her daughter's insensitivity towards the less capable. House had a series of thoroughly vulgar comments formulated and was about to unleash the lot when the doors opened at the fifth floor.

He slid the key into the slot and pushed on the handle twice before the light changed from red to green. There were no outward signs that someone had been living in the room for months. The bed looked as if it had never been slept on, much less in. The ice bucket was wrapped in plastic. Not even the pen or the three pages of hotel paper had been moved from their position under the ashtray with the "No Smoking" logo on the bottom. House picked up the receiver and punched 0.

"Did you clean the room?"

"What room?"

"Did you have housekeeping clean Doctor Wilson's room?"

"We straightened it up a little. Just fresh linens and a quick once over. I promise you, Doctor, we left all of his belongings as we found them."

"You obviously didn't. Leaving everything where you found it would imply leaving the same sheets on the bed and the empty beer bottles strewn around the room."

"There were no empty beer bottles."

"You see. That's something you wouldn't have had to tell me if you hadn't messed with the room."

"It's not a crime scene, sir."

"You don't know that!" He didn't bother trying to keep his voice down. The pain in his chest had spread throughout the rest of his body. He sat down on the edge of the bed and dug his palm into the scar tissue on his leg. "You don't know how long he's been gone! You don't know anything!" He hung up the phone before the woman could answer. "Damn," he muttered.

He went through the room anyway. Maybe he would find something useful. No one, not even Wilson, could be so organized as to disappear completely. The bathroom was stocked with fresh, white towels and hotel supplied toiletries. House picked up the miniature shampoo bottle and noticed a faint layer of dust surrounded the clean space where the bottle had been sitting. He pushed back the shower curtain, hoping to see the familiar bottles of Wilson's over-priced shampoo and conditioner. But there was only a disposable razor resting on top of a neatly folded, washcloth.

The washcloth was still wet. He held it up to his nose. It smelled soapy, with just a hint of spice. That aroma had lingered in the House's bathroom after Wilson had moved out. It had seeped into the fiber of the towels and clung to the walls. Not an unpleasant scent at all, but definitely one attached to one person. He dropped the towel onto the counter next to the sink. There was nothing to find.

Wilson's wallet and keys were sitting on the nightstand. House picked up the brown leather wallet and opened it. Wilson's driver's license and his credit cards were gone. There was no money, just a few grocery store loyal shopper cards, a library card and a spare copy of his room keycard. He'd either been robbed by an unscrupulous member of the staff or he'd left the wallet intentionally. Either way, he had his credit cards and House knew the PINs. Unless they'd been changed. If Wilson had planned this, planned on being hard to find he might have closed them or taken them with no intention of using them. He could have done any number of things to make sure he dropped off the grid. He wouldn't be the first member of his family to do it. He wouldn't make the same mistakes his brother had. Whatever those mistake may have been, Wilson wouldn't make them. House began to mentally run though the list of ways Wilson could cover his tracks. Here they were, in a world where the government had the ability to wiretap every phone and cameras caught the most mundane details of a person's day. At every grocery store pre-paid phones and pre-loaded credit cards were stacked right next to the candy rack. For all the unavoidable surveillance, there were just as many ways to fade into anonymity. There was so much surveillance on groups of people individuals ceased to matter.

House stuck Wilson's phone into his pocket. A table tent stated that the hotel would be happy to sell the towels for ridiculous prices should the guest deem it necessary to abscond with them. He went back into the bathroom and took the washcloth off the counter. He looked around the room once more before he zipped the suitcase and tipped it off the bed. He rode the elevator down to the lobby and stopped at the desk. "I'm taking Doctor Wilson's things and his car. Don't tow my bike."

"His room is rented for the night, anyway. We would've had to put his things in lost and found if you hadn't come. Doctor House, please let us know if you hear from him."

"You'll be the first person I call."

House dragged Wilson's suitcase up the steps and into his apartment. He left the bag on the table and went into the kitchen for a drink.

"All right, unless you've done something really stupid like gotten yourself killed you left a clue. So, what is it you're hiding?" House asked the content of the suitcase. Aside from a few dress shirts and a rubber banded stack of patient files the suitcase was as picked over as the hotel room had been. He flipped through a couple of the patient files. A Post-It note was stuck to the bottom folder.

"House," it read, "I'll call when I have something to say. -Wilson."

He crumpled the paper up and threw it across the room. What that hell was that supposed to mean?