This episode had like sixty things going on in it as the writers are clearly rushing to jam all their ideas in before the season ends week, so I'll do my best to sum it all up: the patient of the week is a star ballerina whose lungs keep collapsing. House treats her with antibiotics before confirming his diagnosis as usual, but this time that results in a rare reaction where all of her skin falls off. Whoops! The team works around this complication as well as possible until House figures out she has some kind of crazy gonorrhea that formed an abscess in her heart. House then takes off, leaving the Cottages to figure out how to get that abscess out while their patient is all septic. They do it with dopamine, which then turns right around and kills off all of her appendages. She refuses to allow Chase to amputate her hands and feet, which is a great decision since it allows Taub to come up with a way to save them and, thus, her career. Her relationship with her dance partner boyfriend, however, will not be saved because he really didn't appreciate getting the clap from her.
Meanwhile, Chase and Cameron's wedding plans come to yet another screeching halt when Cameron admits that she wants to hang onto her Poor Dead Husband's frozen sperm just in case things with Chase don't work out. He tells her to marry him when she's as sure about them as he is, although if he really felt that way he shouldn't have asked her and her crazy weirdness to marry him in the first place. It's not like this is anything new. House continues to see CTB and has no choice but to tell Wilson about it so he can keep House in check while they try to figure out what's wrong with him. This involves yet another near-death experience for House until the only possible hallucination cause remaining is the Vicodin. At this point, Wilson basically disappears and House goes to Cuddy to help him detox. After just one day of hell, he's feeling much better and CTB seems to be gone for good. He's so relieved that he has sex with Cuddy.
It's about time an opening on this show took us somewhere classy, wouldn't you say? This week, we go to the ballet, which has been made to look as music-video-exciting as possible. It's all too much for a male dancer, who complains to the conductor of the orchestra that he's "too fast." The conductor says his musicians are playing at the same speed as usual, and the rehearsal continues. The directors/producers/whoevers watching from the audience exposit that while the male dancer, Jeremy, is a whiny little bitch with a bad back no one cares about, his female partner, Penelope, is a superstar of the dancing world. With that, she leaps into Jeremy's arms and he holds her high above his head until his back gives out and they both fall to the floor. While he clutches his back in pain, she's gasping for air, and the Magic Schoolbus Cam zooms in to show us her collapsing lungs.
House is watching nature shows on TV in his PJs and a bathrobe and eating cereal while, in the corner, CTB went to the hallucination music store and bought herself a hallucination ukulele that she plays for attention. She will not be ignored, and House says he's not going to listen to her because she tried to kill Chase, even if that apparently is what he wants subconsciously. As he gets up to answer a knock at the door, CTB warns him that he isn't being rational. At least, "not completely."
House answers the door to find Foreman, who would have called ahead except that House left his phone off. He says they've got a new case and the patient is high profile -- the star of the New York Ballet. House doesn't care and insists that he's taking a personal day, even when Foreman says Cuddy threatened to fire House if he refused to come in. Oddly enough, CTB seems to take Cuddy's threats seriously, which is ridiculous since we all know, both consciously and subconsciously, that Cuddy would never ever fire House. When CTB points out that she's not going to disappear anytime soon to allow him to go back to work, he decides he might as well put in an appearance. I guess even hallucinations can get boring if you hang out with them in your miserable apartment for too long.
In the meeting room, the Cottages exposit that Penelope continues to suffer collapsed lungs no matter what they do, and they can't find any evidence as to why. CTB lets us know that House isn't paying attention to any of this before suggesting dehydration. House ignores her and suggests a pulmonary contusion. Hadley says there's no evidence of that on any of the scans, and CTB persists that the dehydration is masking an existing infection. House has no choice but to put that suggestion forward, and sends the Cottages off to give Penelope fluids and antibiotics. "We're like Magic [Johnson] and Kareem [Abdul-Jabbar]!" CTB says, holding a hand up for a high-five. House leaves her hanging while probably hoping that he gets to be the Kareem, since Magic kind of has HIV and stuff. Then again, he also owns half the businesses in Inglewood, so it's not so bad.
Meanwhile, Wilson is informing a patient with a long last name and a silly wig that he has kidney cancer. "Wow. Is that a bad one?" Mr. Petramalaersafdadingdong asks. That's when House walks in unannounced and says he needs to talk to Wilson. Mr. Petramalaersafdadingdong says he just found out he has cancer, so he'd like House to get in line. "I'm hallucinating!" House says. If I had the kidney cancer, I'd still tell him to get in line, but Wilson decides to take this one, leaving Mr. Petramalaersafdadingdong to wonder if a hospital with a hallucinating doctor and an oncologist who doesn't understand how to prioritize is really the best place for him.
In the hallway, House already has the solution to his problem: he'll just make Wilson sit in on all of his differentials to make sure that he's still able to treat patients properly. Obviously, Wilson doesn't think it's a good idea for House to be practicing medicine at all, but House says he probably just has sleep apnea, which means that he doesn't get a good night's sleep no matter how much sleep he thinks he gets. Ah, yes, one of those cases of sudden-onset sleep apnea with no symptoms except hallucinations. Sure. Wilson asks if House has any other weird neurological symptoms while CTB tells House to be nicer to his friend, who is only trying to help. "Enough!" House says to her. Wilson is offended, so House has to clear up that he was yelling at the hallucination, not Wilson. But he won't say who he's actually hallucinating up, which is probably a good idea. When pressed, he says it's Kumar, and CTB says that's a good lie, since Wilson now feels bad and will be disposed to helping him out. Sure enough, Wilson agrees.
Chase and Cameron are having an evening in of take-out food, wine, and some whine, as Cameron passive-aggressively mentions that they eat take-out from the same place almost every night because of Chase's apparent lack of restaurant originality. And then she comes up with this doozy: "I have my husband's sperm." This is not appropriate dinner conversation. Chase isn't quite sure what Cameron's trying to say, here. She says she and her Poor Dead Husband decided to freeze his sperm after his cancer diagnosis, although I'm not sure why since I thought she met him or at least only wanted to marry him AFTER he was diagnosed and BECAUSE of that diagnosis. And apparently Cameron held onto the stuff after he died just in case she ever wanted a child and couldn't find another, less dead man to give it to her. And even though Chase is on the scene, she still wants to hold onto the sperm just in case things don't work out with him. After all, as she says, "nobody plans on getting divorced." True, but then Cameron says she didn't plan on her husband dying either, which is not true since, again, I'm pretty sure it was established that she married him BECAUSE he was dying and she wanted to keep him company. Meanwhile, Chase should not have planned on wearing a short-sleeve dress shirt with a sweater vest because it is ugly. I think I've said everything I can possibly say about Cameron's craziness, which this storyline has taken to epic new levels, so I'll leave it at that.
House spends the night in the sleep lab to confirm his silly diagnosis of sleep apnea. Wilson appeals to him to consider other reasons for the hallucination, like his drug addiction or a late effect of his recent motorcycle accident. He thinks House should be admitted so they can really find out. CTB knows that the apnea diagnosis is wrong and thinks House should tell Wilson that he's scared. "Can't sleep with you here," House says. If you rearrange the letters in that, you almost get "I'm scared." But not quite. Wilson sighs and leaves the room.
The morning, House enters Wilson's office to announce that he's still hallucinating and the apnea test was negative. Sure enough, CTB appears to House along with a very real Foreman, who reminds House that he still has a patient and the antibiotics aren't helping. House wants to test her for pneumonia, but the standard test can't be done because her lungs are in such bad condition. House suggests an alternative way to test for it that Wilson compares to water-boarding and CTB seems to like the idea of very much, which tells you all you need to know about how unpleasant it'll be for poor Penelope. House subtlely checks with Wilson to make sure that he's suggesting something within his normal realm of insanity and not super hallucination insanity, and Wilson gives him the green light. Foreman detects there's something going on between them, but can't be bothered to really find out what. He leaves to torture Penelope and House hands Wilson some differentials he wrote for himself on the back of an envelope, which should make the Whiteboard O'Symptoms really jealous: infection, trauma, MS, schizophrenia, and, he adds verbally, pills. CTB informs House that he wrote infection at the top not because it's the most likely candidate, but because that's what it'll be since it's curable and means House will be able t
o go back to his normal miserable non-hallucinatory self.With Jeremy at her bedside, Penelope gets ready for some torture. Foreman explains they're going to cut a hole in her trachea and inject water in there. She'll feel like she's drowning, but it will be over soon enough. I hope they numbed the area first, as Foreman cuts a nice gash into her throat, sticks a tube in there, and fills her up with water. She starts to choke and pitches forward, even though Taub is supposed to be holding her down. He explains that holding Penelope down is currently a bit difficult, as her skin is coming off in his hands. Penelope just sobs, as would any of us.
After the break, things have gotten a lot worse for Penelope, who now needs artificial skin grafts to cover her increasingly skin-less body. Taub does the work, which makes sense considering his plastic surgeon experience, while Foreman, House, and Hadley watch from the OR balcony. CTB gets a front-row seat on the floor, of course, since hallucinations are allowed in the OR without having to scrub in. House thinks they're looking at some form of cancer and since they've ruled out the lungs, he suggests doing an ultrasound of Penelope's liver to look for masses. I guess if you can't find cancer in the lungs, the liver is the best hiding place. Foreman says a cancer diagnosis ignores Penelope's newest symptom of literally jumping out of her skin. House says that might not be a symptom at all -- "I think we caused it." How? By the antibiotics that Penelope ultimately didn't even need that caused toxic epidermal necrolysis. Foreman says there's a one-in-a-million chance Penelope would have a reaction like that, but since House has probably prescribed unnecessary antibiotics a million times, I'd say he's due. House says they can confirm it by testing some of Penelope's sloughed-off skin. Hadley's reaction is a dubious slow blink.
House heads for Wilson, and finds him in the Clinic. Wilson has no doubt just finished telling his patient in the exam room that she has three months to live when House's cane bangs on the window and he takes off on her. He tells Wilson about Penelope's skin and that he feels guilty for having caused it. And since House feels guilt just about never, he's worried that this could mean that there's something wrong with the limbic area of his brain, which means MS. He's also probably just a little bit hopeful that it is MS, since blood tests have ruled out an infection and in House's mind, MS is better than schizophrenia or having to stop using Vicodin. He'll test the diagnosis by apologizing to Penelope. If he feels better, he'll know that the guilt was a real human emotion and not a symptom. If he doesn't, it means he has MS. This seems far-fetched and silly, but I'm all for House having an awkward interaction with his patient so I'll accept it.
House walks into the clean room where bandaged-up Penelope (whose face skin managed to stay relatively intact) is recovering from her skin grafts with Jeremy at her side. They exposit that the Cottages did indeed find a mass in her liver and think it's treatable cancer. Also, her artificial skin seems to be taking and she's hopeful that she'll be able to dance again. Happily ever after for Penelope, except that we're not even halfway through the episode so there are more horrors to come for her. While CTB questions Penelope's priorities, House apologizes to her for killing off her skin with unnecessary antibiotics. "Very nice," CTB says, patting House on the leg. The look he gives her is priceless. Too bad no one else can see CTB to really appreciate it. "Thank you?" Jeremy says/asks. He's about to become even more confused, as House mutters that he feels nothing and leaves the room. Outside, CTB is practicing her ballet moves and says perhaps House didn't mean his apology. He says he did, then moves onto Foreman, who says they can't confirm the liver cancer with a biopsy because Penelope's skin is so thin that she'd somehow bleed to death. How is the skin all that involved in a liver biopsy? Weird. Foreman also wants to know why House actually talked to a patient. He does not wonder why House just talked to a wall, even though he was right there when it happened. House orders Foreman to do some special kind of biopsy that will prevent Penelope from bleeding to death and also give Chase some more screentime. He looks to Wilson for approval, gets a nod, and Foreman wants to know what that's about before deciding he'd rather just give House a suspicious look on his way off to do his job. As soon as he's gone, House tells Wilson that he must have MS since he didn't feel better after apologizing. Wilson suggests doing an LP to actually confirm the diagnosis. You'd think that after making a patient's skin fall off with unnecessary antibiotics, House would understand the importance of confirmation before treatment. You'd also think that he'd rather do the LP than apologize to Penelope. For House, LPs are probably less painful than sincere human interaction.
Chase and Foreman perform the biopsy, which gives Chase a chance to tell Foreman about Cameron's little sperm collection. Foreman doesn't understand why Cameron isn't happy with the sperm she's about to marry, and neither does anyone else because this is insane, even for Cameron. Chase says Cameron is hedging her bets so that she'll be able to give birth to one of her husband's children if things don't work out with Chase. "Wow," Foreman says. He does not add "your fiancée is crazy ... it might be time to break things off, hmm?" so clearly he isn't a real friend to Chase. He does say "she married a dying guy. She has issues," although that's kind of rich coming from a guy who is currently dating someone with a terminal illness. He says if Chase forces Cameron to get rid of her Poor Dead Husband's sperm, then the pressure will be on him to make sure they always stay together, because if not, then Cameron will always have him to blame for killing off her potential kids, not to mention all those awesome Octomom endorsement deals and talk show appearances. At this point, Penelope decides that this is all very ridiculous and starts having heart problems to shut everyone up.
After the break, Taub exposits that Chase and Foreman managed to get the liver biopsy despite Penelope's heart issues. It was negative for cancer, and now Penelope's heart rhythm is abnormal. Oops. Foreman would rather know why Wilson is in the meeting room. House lies that Wilson was there just in case the biopsy came back positive for cancer, and Taub says that they can't figure out what's going on with Penelope's heart because its abnormal rhythm makes it impossible to scan. Again, Foreman is more concerned about Wilson, asking if he's been appointed in charge of this case by Cuddy. Obviously, his feathers are all ruffled because he's usually the one who gets to be in charge when Cuddy is mad at House. Meanwhile, CTB is playing with a hallucination scalpel in House's office. Foreman decides that House himself must have put Wilson in the room with them because he can't trust himself for some reason. To prove that's not true (even though it is), House tells Wilson to leave. Nice going, Foreman. Now House still doesn't trust himself and he's been forced to get rid of the one person who knows why and how to deal with it. With Wilson gone, a seat has been left empty for CTB. She sits down and lays her forearm on the table and says that House knows he doesn't have MS, which means it's either mental illness or Vicodin. Either way, CTB says, House won't be able to practice medicine anymore. With that, she cuts a nice, deep gash into her arm with the scalpel. It bleeds all over the place, which is going to be such a bummer for the hallucination janitor.
House turns back to the real world, where Taub has left off suggesting that the only way to get a scan of Penelope's heart is to stop it. He said that a good five minutes ago, and then everyone sat around shooting nervous glances at each other while House got lost in his hallucination. House somehow got from CTB's self-mutilation th
at they can stop Penelope's heart for just a little while, take the scans they need of it, and then simply re-start it. Hadley becomes the voice of reason when she says there is a chance they won't be able to re-start the heart at all, which would kind of make them murderers. But Taub says they re-start hearts all the time, so no worries. Yeah, except that their expert bizarre circumstance defibrillator killed himself a few episodes back. Hadley points out that they'll need four minutes to scan the entire heart, but they can only keep Penelope's heart stopped for three before running the risk of brain damage. House tells them to do it anyway.He then runs right to Wilson to make sure this idea is his usual brand of crazy and not super hallucination crazy. He's so worried that he lets his guard down and refers to the ideas as "hers," a pronoun that Wilson notices isn't consistent with House's statement that his hallucination was of Kumar. "Kumar was secretly a woman. That's why he killed himself," House tries to lie. That's not going to cut it, especially since he referred to Kumar as "he" right there, so he has to admit that he's actually seeing CTB. Wilson seems to find this more amusing than he really should. "The irrational part of my brain works like the rational part of yours," House shrugs. "It raises questions," says Wilson. "It answers questions!" CTB says. Stop fighting, you two. This barely makes sense as it is. House ignores her and asks Wilson what he thinks of the heart-stopping plan. Wilson says it's within House's normal craziness and quickly adds what he really wants to talk about -- that he got the LP results back and House does not have MS but he does have really high levels of Vicodin in his system, which Wilson decided to test as a special lecture bonus. "It could still be schizophrenia," House says, apparently thinking that severe mental illness is better than having to go off the Vicodin. Wilson and CTB both think House is being stubborn and silly because he's terrified of the idea of living without Vicodin, and Wilson says that the electroshock therapy for schizophrenia wouldn't be any better, as it could lead to "death ... or worse!" House asks what could be worse than death -- "double death?" Wilson says no -- House would be alive, but without a rational mind. Because of the electroshock therapy, or because he has schizophrenia? I'm still trying to wrap my head around the fact that House would rather have schizophrenia than a Vicodin overdose, or how you can take enough Vicodin to give yourself hallucinations but no other symptoms, such as liver failure. And wasn't the hallucination a guilt response to Kumar's suicide anyway? If it's from a mental illness or Vicodin, then Kumar's suicide won't have any meaning after all, right? Then what's the point? House nods, and Wilson goes off to "make some calls," I'm assuming to rehab facilities.
Penelope is not exactly thrilled to find out that she'll be getting an MRI of DEATHH!! "I'll actually be dead?" she asks. Chase tries to make her feel better by saying only her heart will be dead, and just for a little while. Yes, that would certainly lift my spirits. With that, Chase defibrillates Penelope's heart stopped and the scan begins, although I'm not sure how safe it is to have all that metal equipment so close to the MRI tube like that.
House is in his office. He calls Wilson, who's down in the cafeteria. Wilson should already be suspicious that House isn't down in the cafeteria with him to steal his food, but he just asks House what's up. House has an idea: he's going to put himself into insulin shock and the resulting coma will somehow cure the psychosis he hopes he has. I have to doubt that this would actually work in real life, or else surely they'd be shooting the mentally ill up with insulin all the time, right? Wilson is pretty sure this is all just a Vicodin overdose, but House says he doesn't have any other symptoms of that besides the hallucinations and he's been on Vicodin for years, so why would he suddenly have a problem now? "Something changed," he says. Yeah, and suddenly coming down with crazy explains that better than suddenly coming down with a Vicodin overdose? Neither one of them seem to make sense, really. It kind of sucks, because it's keeping me from fully enjoying seeing CTB again. But whatever, House is determined to try the insulin shock thing out and tells Wilson to stop eating dinner to come save his life. Again. Wilson takes off, and he is going to get the worst stitch in his side from running so soon after eating.
Meanwhile, it's been three minutes and the Cottages haven't found anything in their scan of Penelope's heart. Chase wants to "start her back up," but Hadley argues that it's worth risking brain damage to get the information they need. Oh really? Because I have a feeling Penelope would disagree. And even more important than both of these things, apparently, is arguing about it, since that's what Hadley's doing instead of looking at the scans. Fortunately, Taub and Foreman are still on the job and Foreman sees a shadow near Penelope's aorta. Chase stops the scan before Foreman can get much more information.
CTB is bumming out on the floor of House's office. He tells her she's only upset because she knows the insulin shock will work and then she'll be gone. Except that would mean that House is psychotic, so she'd just come back eventually, right? And then House will have to keep putting himself into insulin shock to get rid of her? I still don't get it. He shoots himself up while Chase zaps at Penelope over and over again. They'd better hope they get her back, or else someone is in trouble. House's vision starts to go. He smiles. I guess insulin shock is fun. Or maybe he's happy because CTB seems to be fading away, and in a really cool way where she's sort of sliding backwards into his office wall. Hooray for this show using cool camera tricks correctly! As Penelope comes back to life, House seizes all over the floor. And here comes Wilson to save him. You know, he really should have just let House die and finished his dinner. That'd teach him a lesson.
After the break, House is resting comfortably in his coma in some random area of the hospital. He wakes up, and Wilson is at his side to be pissed off. House doesn't care, because he's so happy that CTB appears to be gone for good. Yes, it's always a real mood-lifter when you find out that you're insane. House also notices that his pants are missing, although his T-shirt and watch are still on, so what was Wilson up to while House was unconscious, hmm? House has trouble remembering how to zip up his fly, but other than that seems none the worse for wear after his 34,542,034,524th near-death experience. He accuses Wilson of being disappointed that this worked since it means House won't have to detox off Vicodin. Or maybe Wilson is bummed that his friend has schizophrenia. If that's even what this means, which I still don't really know. House's pager goes off and he's back to work. How is any of this even allowed to happen? I know Wilson is the head of oncology or whatever, but can he really just sneak hospital employees into random patient areas to be treated for their self-inflicted comas? Where is Cuddy during all of this? Oh, nevermind -- even if she did know, all she'd do is allow it while making sad and concerned faces.
House meets the Cottages and Chase to look at Penelope's heart scans. Foreman is still mad at Chase for taking Penelope out of the MRI tube before he got a good chance to see the possible shadow in her heart. House sides with Foreman, of course, saying that since Penelope suffered no brain damage from her near-death experience (but has anyone tested whether or not she can zip up her fly?), she could have been kept dead for a little bit longer. Chase throws up his hands (which are probably sore from the effort of bringing Penelope back to life with those fifteen defibrillations) and leaves poor Penelope to the monsters with a "best of luck." The Cottages try to figure out what the shadow could be, with Foreman sug
gesting an abscess from an infection. "The problem with speculation is, you make a spec out of u and some guy named Lation. Which really doesn't affect me at all," House says in a line that I found hilarious for some reason. Taub says they have no choice but to speculate, since another biopsy will probably kill Penelope. "Which just leaves ... " House says. He walks away instead of finishing his sentence.House and the Cottages surface in the observation room, watching as Jeremy tends to Penelope while her new skin heals. "She lies there in pain. He sits there, worried," Hadley says; "the picture doesn't change." For real. How many times have we seen House lie around somewhere in pain (most likely self-inflicted) while everyone else sits there, worried? Surely, there has to be another way to keep the viewer interested. And no, I do NOT mean having Hadley lie around in pain while everyone else sits there, worried. Anyway, it gives House an idea. "I just had an epiphany. All by myself!" he says, very pleased to finally be coming up with ideas without the help of CTB. He says Jeremy is "too devoted," and perhaps his devotion is covering up for something. Well, he can't be feeling great about dropping her during rehearsal, which is when all of her health problems started in the first place. But House thinks he cheated on her and gave her gonorrhea. Hadley says they already tested Penelope for STDs, but House says they only tested her blood. If the gonorrhea disseminated to her heart and walled itself off from the rest of her body in an abscess, it would be invisible to their tests but somehow also manage to cause Penelope's lungs to collapse. House tells them to test Jeremy. If he has gonorrhea, then they'll know House was right.
House decides to celebrate his life being back to its normal miserable and lonely self with a beer and some "extra well-done" onion rings, which sound gross. He warmly thanks Molly, the waitress, for bringing them and asks for another beer. "I'm celebrating!" he says. "Alone?" Molly asks. What the hell? You're a waitress, not a therapist! Mind your own damn business. I hope she gets less of a tip for this nosiness. "Thank goodness," is all House says, leaving Molly to assume that her customer just got divorced or something. He's not alone for long, though, as Foreman calls to say that Jeremy tested positive for gonorrhea. But it wasn't exactly like House suspected -- Jeremy still insists that he never cheated, and he's pretty angry to find out that he must have gotten an STD from his cheating girlfriend after spending all that time and energy being so devoted to her out of the goodness of his own heart. And also perhaps to take a break from ballet so his back could recover. But still. The news upsets House, who says if Jeremy didn't cheat on Penelope, then he wasn't right about the diagnosis after all -- it was a lucky guess. And now, the entertainment portion of the evening, as CTB (yes! I knew she wouldn't leave us so soon) takes the stage to sing spookily into an old-timey microphone to an audience of one very terrified and sad man. He calls Wilson and gasps out "come get me." His subconscious, on the other hand, is having a grand old time in the spotlight.
Wilson drives House home. He has a "nice facility" picked out for House, who thanks him sadly and then looks in the backseat. Yep, CTB is sitting right there, grinning away. House packs at home. CTB says it'll be "like living with Mom again. Delightful!" I guess House's subconscious didn't mind his childhood years. Or it's being sarcastic because it's still angry at House for trying to insulin shock it away. Wilson answers House's phone to tell Foreman that his boss is currently unavailable. Foreman doesn't care, saying that the infection has made Penelope septic and brought her BP down too low for them to be able to operate and remove the abscess. "He's off the case," Wilson says, and hangs up. Sucks to be Penelope! House made her skin fall off and now he's abandoning her in her time of need, much like he's abandoned most of his patients these last few episodes. Wilson lies to House that everything is fine at PPTH, and both CTB and House know that isn't true but also don't care. House is more concerned about why he doesn't feel scared right now when his life is falling apart and he's on his way to a place that will take him off the pills he thinks he can't live without. "We've always been able to find a way to cheat," CTB purrs. House thinks for a moment, then shakes his head. CTB is right. "It won't work," he sighs. Wilson says it will, because this time House wants it to work. "Do we?" CTB asks with an angry edge in her voice. "It's your only option," Wilson says. House says that doesn't mean it'll work, which is probably why he's been so resistant to trying it in the first place. It's better to never know how you'd do than to try and know for sure you'd fail. House seems to have another idea. He leaves the apartment and Wilson leaves the episode.
Back at PPTH, the Cottages have to figure out what to do with Penelope. "We need a blood vessel holder-together machine," Hadley says very scientifically. Foreman says they could try shooting Penelope up with dopamine to close her blood vessels and thus raise her blood pressure enough to operate. Taub thinks Penelope's heart will "explode" with that much dopamine in it. Foreman says if they don't do it, her heart will fail anyway. Hadley wonders what happened to House. Foreman says it sounded like he was "done," and they should all be used to this by now anyway. That's enough to convince Hadley to go with the dopamine. Well, that and probably the fact that it was suggested by her boyfriend.
House limps into Cuddy's office looking lost and very serious. Cuddy doesn't notice it, figuring he's here to give her the usual hard time. He sighs and quits. She still doesn't get it, figuring this is his way of bargaining for vacation time or something and saying she has to get home before the nanny takes off. "You're gonna go suckle the little bastard child who makes you feel good about yourself," House says. Yeah, that's how you ask for a favor. "Screw you," Cuddy replies, and starts to walk out the door. CTB appears as House lets Cuddy get halfway through the door before telling her that he's hallucinating. Cuddy immediately figures it's from Vicodin and decides her foster daughter can wait. She wants to admit him to PPTH, but House says that a rehab facility won't work because he knows he'll find a way to cheat. "These people know what they're doing," Cuddy says, severely overestimating the capabilities of the PPTH rehab team as well as totally forgetting that House managed to cheat no problem the last time he was in rehab. House says they might know what they're doing, but they don't know him. And she does. House's subconscious tells him that Cuddy isn't his keeper. That doesn't mean she can't help, so House tells Cuddy he needs her. Yay! But also, why did it take forty-five minutes of the episode for this to happen? And why doesn't House need Wilson? He needed him for the first three-quarters of the episode, but when it comes down to it, he turns to someone who's been absent all episode instead? And then Wilson disappears for the rest of the episode, seemingly not caring what's going on with his best friend who was about to admit himself into rehab while his life was falling apart? That seems so unfair to fans of the House/Wilson relationship. But I'm not one of them! I like House and Cuddy, so this is great! Cuddy makes arrangements with a baby-sitter. She may have a daughter, but House is still obviously more important.
Penelope survives the surgery and the abscess is removed. But then a nurse notices that her fingers and toes are starting to turn black. This is typically bad news for people who like their appendages.
Back at House's house (sans Wilson. I guess he let himself out), the detox has begun in record time as House barfs into a bucket. Cuddy rubs his shoulder much more than she has any right to and goes to make him tea. While she's gone, he desperately checks various hiding spots for pills. But Cuddy's already been there and found them all. I guess they've been at House's place for some time, then, since it would take days to find and clear out all of House's Vicodin cubby holes. This also brings up the question of why they're doing this at House's place at all. Go to a hotel room! The worst thing you'll find stashed away there is a Bible. Cuddy asks House where to look for pills in the kitchen. Shaking and sweaty, he stammers out the coffee cup on the top shelf. Ah, but that was only a test, Cuddy says. She already swept the kitchen and found the pills. CTB smiles that House made it through this round. Now Cuddy will think he's come clean about everything, which he obviously has not. You know, if CTB would just shut up, she'd have a much better chance of surviving this. House is likely to tell Cuddy where every single pill is hidden just to beat her at this point. Over CTB's protests, he tells Cuddy to search his shoes in the closet. "It's like I don't even know who you are anymore!" CTB says. Hee. House groans and suffers on the couch. Cuddy holds his hand. This should be good practice for when she'll have to do the same thing for her daughter, whose drug addiction problems can be traced back to a childhood full of abandonment.
Chase wakes Penelope up in the OR to tell her that they've finished the surgery on her heart, but there's more! The dopamine that saved her life also shut down the blood vessels in her hands and feet, so they'll have to be amputated. Penelope refuses, of course, since dancing is her life. It's cool to have a passion and all, but what is Penelope supposed to do ten years from now when she's too old to be a star ballerina?
Chase and the Cottages return to the meeting room to figure out what to do . Hadley suggests getting Jeremy to convince his girlfriend to agree to the amputations, but Chase reminds her that Jeremy took off as soon as he found out that his girlfriend gave him gonorrhea. Good for Jeremy. While people like Chase and Cuddy allow Cameron and House to stomp all over them repeatedly and without consequence, Jeremy takes a stand and says NO MORE! Foreman decides that he's done with doctoring for the day. They got the diagnosis and cured Penelope, so who cares that she'll probably die anyway? And that's just another reason why Foreman is a shitty doctor. Taub is a good doctor, so he says that they have to stay until they've figured out a way to save Penelope's hands and feet. Chase adds that if Penelope dies, it'll be because House wasn't around to save her and they weren't smart enough to do it themselves. That convinces Foreman to stay. Penelope's life wasn't enough for Foreman, but the chance to prove he's just as good as House was. Interesting priorities all around this week.
House hovers over the toilet bowl, waiting to throw up again. Ah, that's always fun. Cuddy hands him some ginger for his nausea. He says he'd rather have Vicodin. Or pot. Or a coma. He's tried two out of three of those suggestions in this episode alone. And with that, he sees a lone Vicodin pill on the bathroom floor. Way to clean up, Cuddy. Have you ever dropped a pill on a tile floor? It's pretty noisy. How could she mis
s something so important? CTB appears to give House some advice on how to get the pill without Cuddy knowing. If he can just think of an excuse to get Cuddy out of the room, it'll be happy fun time again. House complains that the ginger is "too bitter," and she kindly (yet stupidly) goes off to put some honey in it. So much for knowing House well enough to save him from cheating. With Cuddy gone, CTB starts in on House, saying that he can't bring himself to admit defeat in front of Cuddy, but he also can't stop himself from taking that Vicodin. And, ultimately, he can't. With one look back to make sure Cuddy's out of sight, House crawls towards the pill. CTB watches from her position standing on the bathtub wall and says this is an interesting dilemma: if House takes the pill, then he "doesn't deserve" Cuddy. And if he takes it and doesn't tell her, then he doesn't deserve anyone. I'm starting to think that House's subconscious is kind of dark, you guys. It hates and resents everyone else, but it saves the worst of it for House himself. House gives up and reaches for the pill, but he was able to stop himself long enough for Cuddy to return and catch him in time with a dramatic "NO!" She grabs the pill and flushes it while House pathetically, but just as dramatically, screams "no!" And then, just to reach one of his lower points of existence, he sticks his hand in the toilet bowl to try to get the pill before it takes to the sewers and ultimately pollutes our drinking water and is the subject of one of those "there are millions of drugs in your water!" news specials. When the pill is gone, House recovers somewhat and seems as relieved and grateful as one can while feeling like absolute shit.Off-camera because we really don't have time to adequately cover all the storylines this week, Taub came up with a way to save Penelope's hands and feet: inject her with vasodilators (think Viagra) and hopefully open her blood vessels back up and somehow cause the dead tissue to come back to life. Chase is certain it won't work -- until it does because we don't have time for anything but miracles.
The morning, House is feeling much better. Another miracle! The fastest detox ever. He still has a headache, though, and Cuddy's loud breathing isn't helping. "You're supposed to feel like crap. You're doing great," she says. Very encouraging. House asks what he's supposed to do once he's off the Vicodin, fearing that he'll be in too much pain to work. Cut the leg off. Why doesn't anyone ever suggest this? Cuddy thinks House will be surprised by how much less pain he has once he's off the Vicodin and that he'll be okay. House says she has no evidence of that, so it's meaningless. That's probably true. He adds that she only cares about House because he's PPTH's "biggest asset." That's clearly false. Even his subconscious knows that. Cuddy is rightly offended by this, and says she's not here for professional reasons and she really does think he'll be okay. She says he should trust that, since she hasn't lied to him in twenty years. House knows that's not true, and figures that Cuddy only said it to give her an opening to tell him what she lied to him about twenty years ago. "You're an ass," Cuddy says, as if she didn't think House would see through her transparent attempt to connect with him. So what was Cuddy's big lie twenty years ago? She was never enrolled in his endocrinology class, which is where I'm guessing they met and also where House copied off of Cuddy's midterm. But she was only auditing the class, which means she only took the test to give House something to cheat off of because of LOOOOOVVVEEEEEE! "I thought you were an interesting lunatic even then," Cuddy says. And you can't spell "I thought you were an interesting lunatic even then" without L-O-V-E! "I'm not here protecting hospital property," Cuddy says. At this point, House realizes that they're alone. CTB is gone. I will miss her again. Maybe she'll come back at the end of season too, somehow? Please?
Penelope wakes up to find her hands still attached to her arms. But, like House, she is also alone. She asks where Jeremy went. "He left," Taub explains. Well, what did you expect? It's not like Jeremy is a sucker who stays with a cheating significant other like, oh say, Taub's wife. By the way, this is going to make things very awkward at the ballet.
Cameron wakes up to find Chase in her living room. Clearly, he wants to talk. How about no? How about we wipe this storyline out of the episode entirely so that we don't have to all pretend that you can detox from a drug addiction so hardcore that it's making you hallucinate in just one night? Grr. Chase says he can't be married to Cameron while her Poor Dead Husband's sperm is waiting in the wings of a freezer just in case things don't work out. It means that Cameron must have doubts about them. And he doesn't. And I wonder how close this conversation is to the one Jesse Spencer and Jennifer Morrison had in real life when they broke off their engagement, especially because Jesse Spencer is selling the hurt so well in this scene. It makes me uncomfortable. Cameron tells Chase that she's sure that she loves him and wants to be with him forever right now, but she doesn't know that she'll always feel that way. "I'll wait until you do," Chase says. I guess the wedding's off? Cameron protests that no one can know for sure that a marriage will work out. "I do," Chase says. But how can he when he also knows the woman he wants to marry doesn't love him the same way? Gah! Nothing makes sense this week!
Cuddy and House get ready to go back to work. House is looking spiffy in his blazer and dress shirt, although he still won't shave so I guess he's not totally on the straight and narrow anymore. He sincerely thanks Cuddy and hopefully he offered to pay her substantial overnight baby-sitting bill off-camera. When Cuddy goes to open the door, House stands in front of her, staring. "You wanna kiss me, don't you?" Cuddy asks playfully. "I always want to kiss you," House says, not as playfully. The line is out of character for House, but Hugh Laurie sold it, didn't he? He sold everything this week. Emmy reel! Cuddy kisses him once on the lips and steps back. She's a bit surprised when House doesn't go running away like last time. Instead, he closes the door and makes out with her. I hope he brushed his teeth after all that barfing. Also, yay! Unless this goes terribly wrong and ruins the show!
You can read more from Sara Morrison at
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