House TV Show - Cheaters Never Win (Except For Sometimes) - House Photos & Videos, House Reviews & House Recaps | TWoP

Aired 11-14-2005

A star bicyclist collapses during a race. House suspects performance-enhancing drug abuse, and while the cyclist freely admits to doping his blood with extra red cells, electrolytes, and diuretics, he denies using the erythropoietin that seems to be the only explanation for his symptoms. Cameron breaks out her oft-used high horse and fumes over how unfair it is that her patient lies to his fans by cheating. Wilson catches her breaking a few rules of her own by almost leaking the story to press, and likens the athlete's cheating to his own cheating on his wife, which somehow stops Cameron from going through with it. House does some fuming of his own over Stacy's interference with his job due to, he thinks, her still being in love with him and unhappy with her wheelchair-bound husband. House will do anything to find out the truth, up to and including messing with husband Mark's group therapy session, outright asking her, and sneaking into her therapist's office to read her file. In the end, the cyclist's problems were caused by a tumor on his thymus gland that his blood doping was actually controlling the symptoms of, so he gets away with cheating and even gets a free pass to do some more. And he gets rid of his manager and her pesky demands for 10% of his income. He wins! Cameron tells Wilson that she thought about cheating on her poor dead husband with his best friend, but didn't. Wilson assures her that he lives with his cheating self just fine. And Cuddy's preferred online dating service is revealed: DocMixer.com.

Bicycles race through a cheering crowd. Two boys leap out of a van, excited to see the race. They run off to "turn six," one of them trailing behind and holding his chest. Does anyone fall for the victim fake-out anymore? I think it's safe to say that if someone's showing scary symptoms in before the opening credits, they are definitely not going to be House's patient. The kid has asthma, but is too thrilled to see his favorite cyclist to care. Jeff and his magical bike that switches from mountain to racing tires in the blink of an eye race by them, and they cheer for him, since most young boys just love cycling. One of the boys notes that Jeff doesn't look so good. Then Jeff falls off his bike and gets run over by all the racers behind him, and he looks a lot worse.

House is working hard today -- although not at his actual job. Instead, he has constructed a device equal parts Rube Goldberg and dominos in which CD cases knock into each other and then into some books, which then knock over what appears to be a candlestick, which in turn hits House's favorite giant tennis ball into a Vicodin bottle, which falls into House's waiting hand. There was a roll of tape and some scales involved somewhere along the way, too. House's happiness at the success of his time-filler is dampened by the arrival of Stacy, who needs to talk. House's doctor credentials need updating RIGHT NOW even though the deadline isn't for another two months. House exposits that Stacy was lot more fun when she was having sex with him. Then she had to go off and get married. Also, she's wearing a really unattractive headband. Is it an effort to look younger by adopting a style preferred by pre-teen girls? A clever way to tighten whatever loose forehead skin the Botox didn't get? Whatever the reason, I think it's safe to say that it didn't work out. Stacy starts in on House for using his only female employee to do his clerical work, since it looks like sexual harassment. Yeah, on Cameron's part, since we all know she's only stuck doing that stuff because she volunteered to do it in order to get closer to her boss. Cuddy interrupts to tell House he has a new patient. House is happy to has a reason to leave Stacy.

House joins Cuddy in the hall and demands that she fire Stacy. Cuddy ignores him and tells him about his new patient, Jeff, a "world-class" cyclist who races on dirt roads to an eager audience of, like, ten people. Jeff went into respiratory arrest. House is tired of Stacy making him do pointless paperwork. And, he adds, she's hostile, which makes him shrink up like...well, like something sexual that House apparently finds it inappropriate to say, so you know it must have been really, really inappropriate. Cuddy continues telling House about Jeff, but House says he already knows how this case is going to play out: it's a professional athlete who will deny using performance-enhancing drugs. Then House will do tests and prove that he is, in fact, doing drugs. Except that, based on experience, those drugs will be cadmium-soil-grown weed, not steroids. Does House even pay attention to his own patients anymore? House insists that it is impossible for him to work with his ex-girlfriend. Cuddy can see how Stacy's having a thing for House makes it impossible for her to work with him -- except for the fact that it's House who has the thing for Stacy and finds it impossible to work with her. House starts to hobble away, but then Cuddy tells him the one thing that will interest him enough to take the Jeff's case: Jeff admitted to using drugs.

By Sara M

House meets Jeff and his manager and is his typical rude self to them both. He asks Jeff if he's using erythropoietin, which shall henceforth be known as "EPO," the performance-enhancing drug du jour. Jeff denies it, saying that EPO is dangerous, and House smugly remarks to Cuddy that this is, in fact, the same old movie about the lying druggie athlete. Then Jeff admits to "blood doping." "Plot twist!" Cuddy sing-songs in what might be the best line delivery this show has ever had, which is saying a lot. Manager says she's sure Jeff's admission will be kept confidential, and House threatens that it won't, but no one really believes him. Cuddy buries her face in her hand. Jeff gasps that he hasn't done any blood doping lately, since the race he was in was a charity ride, not a competition. That explains why some bikers chose to ride on their mountain bikes, I guess. House wants to know what Jeff does when he's preparing for a real race, and Jeff admits to sleeping in a hyperbaric chamber and injecting electrolytes, anabolic herbal supplements, amphetamines, and diuretics into his blood. Whatever happened to Gatorade? House snarks that he can't imagine why Jeff isn't feeling well, and Jeff says he knows that doping has risks, but that he does what he thinks he has to do to "kick ass" at his job. "Don't you?" he asks House. House can't respond, since his mouth is full of painkillers.

We go to the whiteboard, where House tells the Cottages that this case is a little different: instead of giving them a whole bunch of symptoms and trying to figure out the cause, this time he has a whole bunch of causes and only one symptom. Foreman thinks the extra red blood cells Jeff's been injecting into his blood stream to boost his endurance have thickened his blood and caused a clot, leading to his respiratory distress. Cameron thinks the hyperbaric chamber naps have over-oxygenated Jeff's blood, damaging his cells and causing a pulmonary edema. Chase thinks the yomhimbine in Jeff's supplements caused nerve paralysis, specifically, the nerves that control Jeff's lungs. All of their theories have already been disproved by various tests. There's something wrong with Jeff that they can't see. Foreman is the first to figure out what House is saying: Jeff shoots up several times a day. Just one slip could put an air bubble into Jeff's veins, causing his respiratory problems. The Cottages are off to check Jeff's veins. House is confident that he's solved the mystery.

Foreman gives Jeff some radioactive goo that will allow his doctors to trace both his air and blood flow. If his air flow is good and his blood flow is bad, they'll know the bubble is there. Jeff just wants to know whether his accident made the news. You wouldn't think a cyclist falling off his bike would really be that special to anyone, but Foreman says that it did, in fact, get a lot of media attention, so apparently this show actually takes place in a future where people really care about cycling. Jeff thinks this test is unnecessary; he's always very careful when shoving crap into his veins. Foreman gives Jeff some of the trademark "I disapprove of you" attitude he usually reserves for homeless people.

Over in what I hope is a soundproof booth, Cameron and Chase have their own discussion on the ethics of using performance-enhancing drugs. Chase doesn't see anything wrong with it. Cameron, of course, does. Chase thinks the issue isn't as black and white as Cameron says it is; after all, doesn't everyone use drugs to alter their bodies in some way in order to perform their best? Like drinking coffee to stay awake during med school? Despite his attitude three seconds ago, Foreman is now of the opinion that it doesn't really matter what athletes do to perform better, since they're only playing stupid, meaningless games anyway. Cameron says she cares, because these athletes are ripping their fans off, and most of their fans are kids. Foreman thinks people who pay all that money to watch a stupid game deserve to be ripped off, no matter how old or young they are. "Life isn't fair," he says. And then they see a bubble in Jeff's lung, and Cameron comments that maybe life is fair after all. Because if you cheat at sports, you totally deserve to almost die.

Chase informs House that he was right about the bubble. House isn't at all surprised. He leaves Chase to remove the bubble while House gets lunch.

Wilson's already in the cafeteria, paying for his meal. House steals a bag of chips from Wilson's tray like an asshole. Wilson asks House if he has a light somewhere that goes on whenever Wilson is in possession of food. House says there is, and also one that turns on whenever Wilson thinks "impure thoughts." That light is on a lot. Can Wilson sue House for sexual harassment? I'm sure Stacy would take the case, seeing as she apparently has nothing better to do. Wilson changes the subject from his impure thoughts to House's high-profile patient, whose case they will be discussing in the middle of a busy cafeteria. Wilson doesn't think blood doping and massive Vicodin intake are really all that different. The subject is changed again when Stacy wheels Mark into the cafeteria. They both seem quite happy, but House tells Wilson it's all a front, which judgment he makes based on her "pissy" behavior earlier, a sure sign that she's frustrated and miserable with Mark, because Mark isn't House. "You really, really need to get some," Wilson responds. House says he gets plenty. That's why he's always broke. Ew.

By Sara M

Chase informs House that he was right about the bubble. House isn't at all surprised. He leaves Chase to remove the bubble while House gets lunch.

Stacy and Mark wheel up so that Stacy can nag House about his paperwork. House helps himself to a piece of Mark's apple pie, saying Mark owes him for the whole life-saving thing. Mark agrees that this is true, and tells House to help himself to Stacy: "Oh, wait -- she'd just leave you all over again." Ooooh! Wilson and Stacy exchange looks. House asks Mark if he's gotten his "small muscles" to work again. Mark says that the most important thing about his small muscle is that he gets to put it in Stacy. House makes the same face he made the last time Mark insulted him. Stacy speaks up before House can get out a witty retort, calling the two "Noel Coward and Oscar Wilde in the third grade." Way to compare your lovers to two gay men, there, Stacy. That says a lot more about you than it does Mark or House. I'm just sad that she didn't choose Paul Lynde and Charles Nelson Reilly. Stacy wheels Mark away, but not before he flashes House a triumphant grin.

"How awkward was that?" House asks Wilson, who just shakes his head. House wonders what Mark is even doing here today, since he's supposed to be in physiotherapy. It's not creepy at all that House has memorized Mark's schedule like that. Wilson -- who has also, apparently, memorized Mark's schedule -- says that Mark has his weekly Coping With Disability group-therapy session today. Apparently, Mark thought that would be better than becoming a drug addict, hint hint. Wilson is surprised when a joke about therapy isn't forthcoming from House, and then concerned when House gets all sincere and says that Mark is doing the "responsible" thing.

House instadiagnoses Jeff's drooling problem to Chase wearing his "short shorts." Chase says that Jeff's neck and jaw "muscle fatigue" is a sign that Jeff has other problems besides his air bubble. Just once, I want someone on this show to have one problem and one problem only, not seventy-five little things that have to be fixed before they can take care of the real disease. House says the other option is that Chase screwed up the air bubble removal and hit a nerve. Chase protests that his bubble-removal was totally clean, and that Jeff's leg muscle weakness points to a systemic problem. Funny how Jeff's legs weren't of any concern to Chase before he could use them to prove his innocence. Everyone takes a turn supplying the name of a muscle weakness-related disease Jeff could have, and House orders a full blood workup on Jeff, including a test for lupus and a muscle biopsy. He will be off attending his "session."

What session, you might ask? Why, a group therapy session on coping with disability, of course! House joins the group already in progress as Mark is wondering when he'll stop being so angry about being in a wheelchair. "Not today!" House says. He tells therapy leader Dr. Harper that he's got a bad leg and he's upset about it, making him a perfect candidate for this session. Mark is livid. House warmly greets the rest of the group, who are like, "What's going on here? And why does that Mark talk all the time and never let any of us get to say anything?" Dr. Harper suggests some other therapy sessions for House to attend that don't include his current arch-nemesis, but House's busy fake schedule makes this session the only one he can attend. Meanwhile, I hope his patient doesn't die while House is off satisfying his own petty need for revenge instead of doing his job. House volunteers to leave the session if it's such a problem that he's there, knowing full well that Dr. Harper won't let that happen after begging him to get some help for years. Again showing just how little Dr. Harper knows about House, she naively believes that for House and Mark to be in therapy together could help both men resolve their problems with each other and become disability allies. "I'm tired of fighting," House agrees. Mark just laughs, realizing that he has to let House stay or look like an asshole. I still would have said no.

The Cottages are off doing their jobs. Cameron reports that she chose to remove some of Jeff's thigh muscle for the biopsy, which just happens to be the most painful place to cut into. She's only nice to the patients who meet her high moral standards, you see. Chase calls Cameron out on drinking caffeine-filled coffee to enhance her performance. "Don't start her up again," Foreman pleads. I love him. Cameron says that caffeine is legal, while what Jeff uses is not, arbitrary as bike race rules may be. I don't think it's really all that arbitrary to outlaw steroids and blood doping, but that's just me. "So if you break an arbitrary rule, Cameron damns you to hell. But if you break a rule that has a reason, that's designed to protect people, Cameron develops a crazy crush on you," Foreman says. Have I mentioned that I love him? Cameron says the difference is that House does what he does to help people, not to glorify himself. Except...wasn't Jeff just racing in a charity race, using his fame and success to raise money for disadvantaged people? And you can't tell me that House doesn't use his medical victories to further inflate his ego there. So, again, it's really not as black-and-white as Cameron likes to think it is. Foreman tells Cameron to go report Jeff to the bike authorities if she's so up in arms about it, then. By her logic, the confidentiality rule she'd be breaking is far outweighed by the better place she'd be making the world by taking Cheatin' Jeff out of its bike races. Foreman and Chase share a laugh at Cameron's expense.

House and Mark continue to monopolize the group therapy session. Now they're playing the "who has it worse?" game, a slight variant on their usual "who's better for Stacy?" pissing contests. House says that Mark is better off, since he has Stacy's love to help him through his recovery. Although...that could also make things more difficult for Mark, couldn't it? House knows from experience that Stacy tells you not to rush the recovery process, but you know she knows that she got married to be a wife, not a nursemaid. Sooner or later, she's going to get sick of Mark's inability to have sex with her and get herself a real man. So sayeth House. The rest of the therapy group, including crappy Dr. Harper, just sit there all like "This could get so awesome. I can't wait to see what happens !" Well, except for that blind guy, who will have to settle for just hearing it. Mark's long-awaited response is that House is a "manipulative son of a bitch" that Stacy must have a made a huge mistake in life to have ever ended up with. House says that could be true, or maybe House wasn't a mistake, and Stacy got something from him that she doesn't get from Mark. Apparently, Stacy goes for manipulative sons of bitches. Too bad for Mark that he isn't one, eh? Mark screams that if House doesn't leave this session, he will, and Dr. Harper is forced to intervene, ruining the fun for everyone else. She tells House to try to clear his busy fake schedule and come to Monday sessions from now on.

House returns to the meeting room, feeling the high that only comes from the successful screwing with another person's mind. The Cottages are already there, keeping themselves busy by reading a magazine (Foreman) or using a laptop to fervently post at MoralOutrage.com (guess). They tell House that Jeff's muscle weakness is getting worse; he can barely move his arms and legs. All of their tests have come back negative. "Maybe his bike shorts are just on too tight," Cameron says. You just know it took her all day to come up with that one, and it's immediately ruined when Chase, seeing an opportunity to finally win the coveted title of House's Favorite, asks Cameron whether her belief that people should perform without aids extends to House's use of a cane. Cameron says that's different: House is just trying to achieve "normality." Thank you, writers for not making her say the made-up word "normalcy" there. Jeff, on the other hand, is trying to give himself "superpowers." Foreman just rolls his eyes, which is his superpower. House does not yell at everyone for talking about him like he isn't even there, or using his handicap to try to win a stupid argument, but instead wonders why, if Jeff is doing everything he can to improve his body chemistry, his lab results are only normal. At the very least, his red count should be high. Chase says it could be that Jeff's body chemistry is naturally lower than normal. Except that his white blood count is high, too, which could indicate an infection. Chase suggests encephalitis. "That's kind of a long shot," Cameron snorts. Chase give her an indignant glare double-take that was truly great, but still not as good as Cuddy's "plot twist!" head-pivot. House orders a lumbar puncture and antibiotics.

By Sara M

Back from commercial, Jeff is on a ventilator. The air bubble was not, apparently, responsible for Jeff's breathing problems after all. What are the odds that someone would have an air bubble AND something else that put him in respiratory distress? On this show, I'd say even money, actually. Cameron reports that the encephalitis test was negative, and also that Jeff's red count is falling, although not his white. So, either Chase did screw up the air-bubble removal, or there's something wrong with Jeff's body that makes it unable to produce its own red blood cells. And that something is perennial wrong diagnosis favorite paraneoplastic syndrome, caused by cancer.

House reports to Clinic Duty, where his patient has been suffering from very frequent diarrhea ever since he quit smoking. He doesn't get to say much else before Stacy angrily barges into a patient room without so much as a warning knock and smacks House on the shoulder. Nothing says "pissed off" like a rather playful shoulder-swat. Stacy and House get into it over House's visit to Mark and his lingering feelings for Stacy. House says that he just wants to be able to do his job without Stacy's interrupting. Stacy leaves in a huff, and House goes back to his patient, who, of course, wants to more about the fun personal confrontation he just witnessed. House asks the patient how much replacement oral fixation gum he chews a day. The patient responds six, maybe seven PACKS. Stacy comes back into the room to carry on some more about how she and Cuddy are just trying to protect House. From what? Not filing his recertification stuff on time? Shut up, Stacy. And where is Evil Nurse Brenda to take care of this? I would have thought she'd have come in to karate-chop Stacy into unconsciousness in the initial seconds of Stacy's first interruption. House accuses Stacy of being pissy because she still has feelings for him. Stacy does not appreciate the condescension, and asks him at least to try to empathize with Mark, since House does, after all, know what it's like to be crippled. And to have to wake up to Stacy every morning. "LET IT GO," she growls through her teeth. She leaves, and House tells his patient that the sugarless gum he's chewing contains the sweetener sorbitol, which is also a laxative.

Wilson gives Jeff a bone marrow biopsy and tells his worried manager that they now believe Jeff either has cancer, or that his problems were caused by someone screwing up a medical procedure. Better go call your bank and have that check you wrote to Cuddy cancelled, Manager, although something tells me Cuddy went directly to the bank with it right after she told the Cottages they had to stay late to do a lumbar puncture. Jeff wants to speak, but he still has the tube down his throat, so he has to write it down. "Did I do this to myself?" he asks in an odd choice of cursive handwriting. Wilson says that if Jeff does have cancer, then it may indeed have been caused by his cheating.

By Sara M

There is also no end to the people who will let Jeff cheat others because it's most advantageous from them to do so, as we cut to nighttime at PPTH, where the Cottages have been forced to stay late for Jeff's lumbar puncture. Very smart of Jeff to piss off the people who will be performing a delicate and extremely painful medical procedure on him. And now he has to endure something that might be even more painful than the puncture: Cameron and her soapbox. She asks Jeff if he feels like a hero, deceiving all his fans. Jeff says he got a letter from a guy whose son "worships" him. And worship, Jeff dictionaries, means to love unquestioningly and uncritically. Cameron accuses Jeff of taking advantage of that, and Jeff asks Cameron if he's supposed to write back and tell the guy and his son that they're stupid for loving a guy just because he's good at riding a bike. Then he goes into respiratory arrest. Way to go, Cameron.

House marches into Jeff's room and removes his breathing tube, saying he doesn't have time to watch the guy write his answers out. Way to follow through on your promise to make sure House doesn't violate any medical ethics, there, Stacy. House gives Jeff an oxygen mask and tells him that he has acute PRCA, which is caused by EPO. House removes Jeff's mask, and Jeff denies using EPO. House doesn't believe him. The manager, distraught, agrees with Jeff. House wonders if Manager has been giving Jeff any secret injections, and she tells him to give Jeff a drug test if he wants, but House points out that EPO is undetectable after six hours. Something that is detectable, however, are cell-phone calls. House wonders if Manager has a few calls to the newspaper that reported Jeff's cancer story on her outgoing list. He reaches for it to check, but she grabs it away from him, which is enough to out her. She admits to Jeff that she did leak the story, figuring cancer would look a lot better for Jeff's image and both of their careers than his doing something doping-related would. House wonders if the manager's unethical need to advance her career extended to injecting Jeff with EPO without his knowledge. As someone who does plenty of unethical things behind people's back to advance his own career, House should know all about that. Manager swears she didn't do it. House asks Jeff whether he really believes her over a doctor. Jeff takes the oxygen mask off, looks at Manager, and fires her. She's absolutely crushed as she collects her things and tells House that if he's basing his entire diagnosis on her slipping Jeff EPO, then Jeff will die.

Foreman has been assigned to guard Jeff, for some reason. He tells Jeff that the prednisone they've been giving him for the EPO PRCA seems to improving Jeff's condition. Then Jeff's breathing gets ragged and his monitors go off.

The morning, Foreman tells the crew that the prednisone is not, in fact, making Jeff better. In fact, he's getting worse. His red count is even lower than before. Cameron is very upset that it's starting to look like Jeff's ailments probably weren't caused by EPO, basing her medical opinion that EPO was the perfect answer on the fact that it meant Jeff's lying and cheating were coming back to haunt him. House informs Cameron that the world isn't fair. Case in point: Jeff's manager getting fired for no reason. Well, except for the fact that she leaked that story to the press behind Jeff's back. Foreman says that Jeff has been doing slightly better since getting a blood transfusion. And then House knows the answer. "Go forth and scan his neck," he orders.

House moves out to his balcony and tells a breakfast cereal-eating Wilson about Stacy's little visit to the Clinic yesterday. He says that Stacy is acting irrational and out of control, and that he needs to know why. Wilson warns him that this won't end well for anyone. Especially the viewers.

The Cottages do Jeff's neck scan, even though they know what they're supposed to find there. Chase asks if anyone wants to bet against finding anything at all, but it seems that they've finally learned that you should never bet against the House.

Sure enough, the Cottages return to House's office and say they found a thymoma -- a tumor on the thymus gland -- in Jeff's neck. Thymomas are almost always found in chests, which is why no one considered it when the chest x-rays were clear. Thymomas cause chronic PCRA. Jeff's seemed acute because it came on so suddenly -- as soon as he took a break from those red blood cell transfusion, which were actually only making his red blood count normal, and not artificially high.

House stabs Jeff's leg with a needle. He pronounces Jeff healed. Jeff is understandably skeptical, until his muscles suddenly start feeling stronger. House explains that Jeff's thymoma caused both the PRCA and an autoimmune disease called myasthenia gravis. Both of those conditions combined caused all of Jeff's symptoms, and the treatments both of those conditions -- blood transfusions and a hyperbaric chamber -- were things Jeff was doing anyway, thereby inadvertently curing him until he stopped doing them for the charity race. When Jeff asks him if he fired his manager for no reason, House replies, "Oops." Jeff decides he'd rather keep her 10% of his Nike contract instead of hiring her back, because he is, after all, a cheating dick. Even House seems disgusted. He says tells Jeff that all they need to do is remove his thymus and he'll be cured. Jeff thought he was already cured. No, says House, he just injected him with Tensilon, something that only temporarily erases MG's symptoms. They should be coming back any time now. Ah, here they are. House watches, amused, as Jeff gasps and falls violently to the floor, probably breaking his head open on the ground. "Clean up on Aisle 3!" House shouts in the direction of the nurse's station.

The stop on the House version of Sherman's March to the Sea is Stacy's office. She gets all pissy at seeing him, because if there's one thing House is right about in this episode, it's that Stacy is pissy. Even when she's not supposed to be, Sela Ward plays her pissy. She tells House that if he's there to search her office and find out all her personal information, he can go right ahead and start with her purse. But House likes to keep his snooping private, so he declines...for now. He's not there to get under Stacy's skin or gloat that his office was not actually responsible for the press leak. He's there to apologize. Whaaaa? But it's true! He puts on his sincere face and says that they've been punishing each other, and that they can't keep that up if they're going to work together. House wants to know if Stacy hates him or loves him. Either way, they have a problem. Stacy's face shows absolutely no discernible reaction. I really think it would have been cheaper and more dramatically effective if this show had just built a robot for the role of Stacy instead of hiring Sela Ward. Stacy's answer to House's difficult question is that she hates him...and loves him. This is what we call a "non-answer." Stacy says that she loves Mark, too. And she doesn't hate him at all. House doesn't think he and Stacy can work together, but Stacy is sure things will get easier. At least, that's what her therapist tells her. I hope Stacy's therapist gives her the same non-answers Stacy gave House: "It will get easier...and harder. When it's not easy, it will be hard. But when it's not hard, it will be easy. Your forty-five-minute hour is up; three hundred dollars please!" House leaves the office and smiles just a little bit. I thought it was because he was happy that Stacy told him she still loved him, but, as we later discover, it's actually a Smile of Nefarious-Deed Planning.

Wilson finds Cameron watching House's television. Jeff is on the screen, holding a press conference about his recently diagnosed medical condition that had absolutely nothing to do with performance-enhancing drugs at all. I can only assume Cameron is watching this on ESPN 73, which is available on House's television because it came with the only cable plan that had SoapNet on it. Cameron disgustedly turns off the television and says that Jeff's treatment is a blood transfusions every other week, allowing him to do all the blood doping he wants with a doctor's pass. "It's 'medicinal,'" Cameron scoffs. Except that, in this case, it is medicinal. Shut up, Cameron. Can't we just have ONE patient at this hospital who doesn't trigger a personal reaction in Cameron that we must spend half of the episode exploring? Just one. Please. And not a black person who will affect Foreman because of their shared blackness, either. Cameron is furious at how unfair the Jeff thing is. He cheated, and now he's being rewarded for it. "Life's more complicated than who gets to the finish line first," says the Wilsensei.

And then, out of seemingly nowhere, Cameron says that she fell in love with her Poor Dead Husband's best friend. When her Poor Dead Husband was Poor Dead Dying, she and his best friend Joe (apparently Poor Dead Husband wasn't as alone in the world as we were previously led to believe) were at the hospital all the time. They'd eat together, take walks together and, according to Cameron, they "clung onto each other," although I suspect it was more Cameron clinging onto Joe and Joe being all like, "I wish she would go away for one goddamn second. All she ever does is talk about how sad my best friend's dying is making her when she doesn't even know his name." Wilson desperately looks around for an escape route, but there are none, so he tries to steer the conversation toward previously unknown territory, a.k.a. someone besides those involved in Cameron's personal life. Wilson's wife wasn't dying or even sick when he met "someone" who made him feel "funny." Cameron makes an "I thought we were talking about me" face, which Wilson ignores. His special "someone" made him feel good, and he was too selfish to let that go. Interesting how this "someone" isn't given a female pronoun. Wilson tells Cameron that what she did was totally okay because she's a saint. And because "you can't control your emotions." "No...just your actions" is Cameron's response. She never acted on her feelings for Joe: "I couldn't have lived with myself." That, and the fact that if she had acted on her feelings, she couldn't have played the Poor Dead Husband sympathy card, which, as we know, is more important to Cameron than anything else is. I wonder why she didn't take up with Joe after her Poor Dead Husband died, though. Maybe if Joe had a terminal illness. I guess I can kind of see how Cameron would be resentful that someone like Jeff could cheat and get away with it when she was presented with a similar option (but not really) and didn't take it and wasn't rewarded at all except for her own self-canonization and repeated insistences to everyone within earshot of what a good person she is, which renders her good deed meaningless, in my opinion. What I don't see is why every single one of Cameron's issues has to relate directly back to her Poor Dead Husband. Did she live under a rock before she met him? Hasn't ANYTHING ELSE happened to her? Like, couldn't this have been about a fellow med-student classmate getting away with cheating on a test, while Cameron chose not to cheat and then failed the class? "You'd be surprised what you can live with," Wilson says. Unless, of course, you're married to Cameron. Then you're surprised at what you can die from. Cue the music montage!

By Sara M

House stabs Jeff's leg with a needle. He pronounces Jeff healed. Jeff is understandably skeptical, until his muscles suddenly start feeling stronger. House explains that Jeff's thymoma caused both the PRCA and an autoimmune disease called myasthenia gravis. Both of those conditions combined caused all of Jeff's symptoms, and the treatments both of those conditions -- blood transfusions and a hyperbaric chamber -- were things Jeff was doing anyway, thereby inadvertently curing him until he stopped doing them for the charity race. When Jeff asks him if he fired his manager for no reason, House replies, "Oops." Jeff decides he'd rather keep her 10\% of his Nike contract instead of hiring her back, because he is, after all, a cheating dick. Even House seems disgusted. He says tells Jeff that all they need to do is remove his thymus and he'll be cured. Jeff thought he was already cured. No, says House, he just injected him with Tensilon, something that only temporarily erases MG's symptoms. They should be coming back any time now. Ah, here they are. House watches, amused, as Jeff gasps and falls violently to the floor, probably breaking his head open on the ground. "Clean up on Aisle 3!" House shouts in the direction of the nurse's station.

By Sara M

It's after hours in the Psychology wing, and House is up to no good. He asks a janitor to let him into a therapist's office, claiming he left his cane in there during a session. The janitor is reluctant until House plays the "poor crippled me!" card, which supersedes the ridiculousness of someone who needs a cane to walk leaving it somewhere and only realizing his mistake hours after the fact. The janitor lets House into the office.

Cameron drinks red wine and reads a book about how to get the hell over one's self and become a member of society who doesn't feel the need to personally identify with every single thing that happens and use it to justify doing something horrible and potentially dangerous like breaking doctor-patient confidentiality rules. Just kidding! She's wallowing in her sadness and looking at her wedding photos, of course. She looks right past her Poor Dead Husband and focuses on hunky best man Joe.

Wilson appears to be spending the night on his office couch, because his wife apparently kicked him out and he can't afford a hotel room even though he's a freaking doctor. He reads a baseball magazine, because if we're going to do an episode about athletes who cheat by using drugs, we can't leave those guys out.

Amazingly, that janitor isn't even bothering to watch House while he's in the office to make sure House doesn't do anything like, oh, say, read the therapist's private patient files. At least he isn't reporting their contents to Time, though. The file cabinet is locked, but House easily finds a trigger at the bottom of the cabinet that opens the drawers. I guess Cuddy spent all of Jeff's donations on some more windows instead of on file cabinets that are more secure than paper bags. Or hiring janitors who aren't complete morons. Or doctors who aren't morally bankrupt. House finds the file he's looking for: Warner, Stacy. He opens it and reads. I'm thinking it says something like "patient isn't smart enough to seek help from a professional who isn't affiliated with the hospital her extremely nosy ex-boyfriend is a doctor at." Solomon Burke sings about freedom and chains in a song probably wasn't originally intended to be about three asshole doctors who would rather hurt the people around them than come to terms with their own problems. But it'll do.

House TV Show - Cheaters Never Win (Except For Sometimes) - House Photos &amp; Videos, House Reviews &amp; House Recaps | TWoP

House TV Show - Cheaters Never Win (Except For Sometimes) - House Photos & Videos, House Reviews & House Recaps | TWoP