By Sara M
The son of a man in a vegetative state suddenly falls ill, and House thinks the only way to diagnose him is to use some magic drugs to wake his father up to get a family medical history. The drugs work, but only for a day, and the dad decides to spend his one day among the living in Atlantic City instead of with his dying son. House agrees to take him there in exchange for information that could save his patient. Wilson tags along, since they're taking his car. It also gives Wilson a chance to confront House about stealing his prescription pad. Back at PPTH, Tritter interrogates the Cottages and then freezes Wilson's bank account WHICH IS ABSOLUTELY INSANE AND RIDICULOUS, BY THE WAY. House finally figures out what's wrong with Vegetative State Guy's son, but it's too late: his heart is giving out and his alcoholism means he won't get a replacement. Unless, of course, Vegetative State Guy just happens to die in such a way that his heart is still viable. Anyone got any suggestions? At this point, House sends Wilson out of the hotel room. He heads down to the casino and makes an impression on the floor patrons, along with some guy he pays off to walk around with a cane and pose as House. Alibis secured, he heads back up to the room, where House is waiting outside the door while Vegetative State Guy hangs himself (shudder). The son gets a new heart, but it's still a huge downer of an episode.
Have I ever said how much I love the guy who says "Viewer discretion is advised" before the show? He's awesome. His voice has this gravitas that makes every word seem so significant, like watching this show without discretion could kill you.
PPTH now has an entire room devoted to patients in comas/vegetative states. Considering the fact that someone goes into a coma almost every episode, I'd say this room was a wise investment. House likes it too, as it gives him a place to eat his lunch and watch television in silence, except for the occasional beeping of heart monitors, which I'm kind of surprised that House -- in his supreme selfishness -- hasn't turned off. He's watching an episode of Blind Date, and though we don't get to see much of the show, I'm guessing it features a mismatched couple going out and trying to eat food without choking on all the non-sexual tension while cute cartoon pop-ups tell the audience what fools they are. That's just a guess, though. Wilson enters and asks House why he's having lunch to "Vegetative State Guy" instead of his usual lunchtime companion "Coma Guy." House says that Vegetative State Guy is better company. Wilson seems content that none of the patients in the room, nor anyone who happens to be passing by, can hear him as he yells at House about stealing his prescription pad and forging his name. House is only concerned about whether or not Wilson told on him. Wilson says that he lied to Tritter, and House says that they have nothing to worry about. Wilson thinks he does: he lied to the police, so now he'll be in trouble, too. And he's pretty sure that Tritter won't give up so easily.
The argument ends when a young man enters the room. He's Vegetative State Guy's son, and he's pleased to see a doctor paying attention to his father, even if he is paying more attention to his sandwich. House starts flicking the lights on and off, confusing both Wilson and the guy. Then House stands up, saying that the guy's about to see something "really cool," and disappears, only to reappear again in front of the guy's face. I started thinking that the show was going to tell us that if ketamine can make someone use his nonexistent thigh muscle, then Vicodin can give you invisibility powers, but this is actually just a symptom of the disease House thinks the guy has, based on observing him tripping over people when he left the other day but having no problem opening the door. This is called akinatopsia, although I'm not sure if it's spelled that way. I know it better as "the thing that saved everyone's life from the Tyrannosaurus Rex in Jurassic Park." That T-Rex couldn't see people unless they were moving. He was so weak. Anyway, House figures the guy's condition is an intermittent one, because if it weren't, the guy would have been hit by a bus by now. It's usually accompanied by seizures, so House was hoping to induce one with the flashing lights. He seems to have failed at this, though -- oh, wait a minute! The guy falls to the floor and has himself a grand mal. House just stands there and watches the poor guy slam his head into the ground while Wilson kneels down and tries to do something about it. I'm just glad that it would seem that the only reason why House was eating with Vegetative State Guy was to figure out what was wrong with his son, and not because he left Coma Guy for good.
We return from the commercial to see Cameron waving a finger in the guy's face. The guy, named Kyle, says that he can see fine now, but Cameron will always wave her finger in his face. Kyle says that he's had seizures before, although none this bad. Doctors haven't been able to figure out what's wrong with him and apparently gave up. Cameron asks if he has a family history of epilepsy. Just "hutzpah" and "the ability to sleep for ten years," Kyle answers. "Hutzpah"? Who is this guy, Lou Grant? My grandmother? Who says that? Anyway, Kyle continues that he doesn't know much about his mother's side of the family, due to her being dead and his father not liking them very much and being in a vegetative state besides. As for his father's side of the family, his grandparents are dead and his father was an only child. Cameron notices that Kyle left the "emergency contact" section of his admission papers blank. He says that he has "plenty of friends," but none of them would care if he was having a medical emergency. Which I believe makes them "passing acquaintances" and not friends. Really, one of the definitions of a friend is someone who cares if you're in the hospital. Cameron tries to resist the urge to marry her lonely patient. Kyle asks Chase to give him his backpack. Chase picks it up and hears the telltale clanking of glass bottles. He opens it up to find a half-empty bottle of wine. "Hair of the dog," Kyle says sheepishly. Some alcoholic he is! It's called "vodka," Kyle. Cameron and Chase just stare at him with "oh, wonderful plan, Junior" looks on their faces.
Back at the meeting room, Chase thinks that they're looking at an alcoholic-related condition. But House is certain it's an inherited condition, based on the fact that both father and son have similar cortical seizures. Vegetative State Guy's vegetative state has nothing to do with an inherited disease, though, and everything to do with running back into his burning house to try to save his wife and collapsing from smoke inhalation, which cut off oxygen to his brain. House orders a DNA test and a B and E.
Chase returns to the lab, where Foreman and Cameron are either working hard or hardly working, and reports that Kyle's apartment had a single bed, which is weird since he seems to be having sex based on the condoms Chase found. Maybe Kyle just really liked the twin bed sex he had in college and decided to continue the tradition. Other than that, Chase didn't find anything important. House comes in and the Cottages report that their tests were all negative. House orders another DNA test for another condition, and Chase whines that DNA tests take forever. House says that's not a problem for him, since he'll be leaving early. The Cottages, we are left to assume, will be leaving late or not at all. The lab personnel will never be leaving since they never arrived at PPTH in the first place.
Foreman and Cameron ask Kyle if he's had any contact with someone who seemed sick. Kyle says that he works from home and none of those friends he claimed to have has visited him. "There's gotta be someone you're close to," Cameron says, growing more and more attracted to Kyle with each passing second. Kyle says that he's probably closest to his dad, who can't "stop" him. I'm assuming he means stop him from drinking all that wine. Dude, just move to France. You'll fit right in. Suddenly, Kyle feels sick. Cameron can't resist him any longer and rips his shirt open, only to find a big bruise over where his liver's supposed to be. "I think his liver's failing," she announces, scaring the shit out of Kyle. Then he starts coughing blood.
Back in the meeting room, Cameron reports that Kyle is unconscious and slipping into a coma. House orders them to stop their treatment, which is obviously not making Kyle better and could be hurting his liver along with Kyle's love of alcohol. Foreman walks in and reports that he just started Kyle on dialysis, so now his kidneys are failing, too. "Not too many people come back from that," Chase says with a glance at Cameron. How has she not sprinted off to book the minister and the chapel yet? Wedding invitations take time to print out, Cameron -- time you don't have! Get on it, sister! House still insists that they're looking at a genetic condition. "We need a better history," he says.
You'd think House would try to stay away from pharmacies during this whole investigation into his drug use, but no. He's raiding the hospital pharmacy for Levodopa, which he will use to wake up Vegetative State Guy. House says VSG is no "Terri Schiavo" -- his brain is intact and his muscles are barely atrophied. Some would argue that Terri Schiavo's brain was intact as well, but when I looked her up on Wikipedia, I found that someone had written that Terri Schiavo was "now served in V8 Juice," therefore causing me to doubt the veracity of the rest of the article.
The Cottages follow House to VSG's bedside as he prepares a syringe of Levodopa. They protest that the amount of amphetamines he'd have to shoot VSG up with could kill him. House says that he saw the movie Awakenings, based on a true story of a doctor who woke up a bunch of comatose patients using Levodopa. House is no Robin Williams, but he's pretty sure he can do the same thing. Why isn't everyone going around shooting people in vegetative states up with this stuff, then? It's a miracle!
Before House can put the syringe in the IV, Cuddy and her amazing psychic House-is-up-to- no-good sense walks in and orders him to put it down and stop experimenting on helpless patients. Even if House did accomplish the impossible, VSG would only be awake for a day at the most. That would be torture for both the patient and his family, Cuddy says. So I guess that's why they don't go around shooting people up with Levodopa. Still, if I was in a vegetative state, I'd rather have one day awake than none at all. House says that there's nothing to worry about: the only family VSG has who can sue PPTH is lying upstairs in his own coma. Cuddy runs over to take the syringe away from House, but it's too late: he injects it into the IV. And...nothing happens. Cuddy starts ordering a twenty-four hour watch on the patient and tells House she wants him in her office immediately. She's interrupted by VSG, who says he's starving. Eyes bug out all over the room. Even House looks a little surprised that this actually worked. VSG sits up and says he'd love a steak. So not only are we to believe that Levodopa can temporarily revive patients who have been in a vegetative state for ten years, but those patients are totally normal and appear to have simply slept for one night rather than thirty-six hundred of them. How is he able to talk so well and so soon? The fact is, we're going to have to suspend a lot of disbelief in this episode, but since it's a pretty good one, it's worth it.
Back from commercial, Cuddy is flashing a light in VSG's eyes. VSG, by the way, is played by John Larroquette, a.k.a. Dan Fielding from Night Court. This is the second Night Court cast member to appear on this show, which gives me great hope for a cameo from Marsha Warfield. At the very least, Harry Anderson could show up and get a differential diagnosis for that medically impossible head of hair he suddenly sprouted in the seventh season. Every time I think Hugh Laurie's hairpiece is silly, I think of Harry Anderson's hair. Not showing up is Selma Diamond, because she died during the show's second season. Cuddy asks Dan Fielding some questions to assess his brain functions, and he passes them with flying colors. House is thrilled with himself, pronouncing this "the coolest thing ever." Then he starts asking Dan for a family medical history. Dan would rather know what year it is; he has a feeling he hasn't been conscious in a long time. House is impressed with Dan's running internal clock during his vegetative state and asks if Dan picked up any conversations people around him have had, like about doctors stealing prescription pads and forging signatures or gossip about how Cuddy dresses "like a trollop." Cuddy just gives House a slightly amused expression, which, if it were me, would have been accompanied by a punch in the crotch. Dan says he picked up the fact that his wife is dead, which certainly brings the room down. He says the last thing he remembers is saving Kyle from the house fire and then going back in for his wife, who had taken a sleeping pill and was out cold. He didn't make it and now it's ten years later. "I'm sorry," Cuddy says, all sympathetic. House just wants to know about Dan's dead wife's medical history. Cuddy explains that Kyle is a patient at PPTH in very serious condition. Dan asks for a steak. I'm sure his stomach will have absolutely no problem digesting for the first time in ten years.
Wilson finds House in a hallway and says the hospital cafeteria is abuzz with the news that "caustic guy" awoke "coma guy." House says that it's actually "vegetative state guy" although he will agree with the "caustic guy" label. He tells Wilson that he has to get Dan a steak before he'll help him with Kyle, which Wilson chalks up to brain damage and House chalks up to a father not loving his son. House doesn't believe in unconditional love, of course, but Wilson puts it in terms House can understand and will have an important double meaning House might want to start picking up on: it's an evolutionary incentive for people to sacrifice their lives for their children and their friends who are totally going to get in trouble with the police. "Everything is conditional," House says. Wilson, he's telling you to get lost and stop being such a doormat. Pay attention. If you're going to let this guy get away with murder, fine. But don't turn around and complain about it.
Cameron walks into Shitter's police badge, which he apparently walks around holding high up in the air for all to acknowledge and bow to his power. They have a secret meeting where Shitter asks Cameron how many pills her boss takes and Cameron wisely tries to get out of answering. Then she remembers that not doing what Shitter wants will mark her for a traffic stop and a trumped-up charge and tells him six. She says that House has never asked her to prescribe Vicodin to him and that his charges against House are ridiculous. Shitter says he's surprised at Cameron's loyalty to House, who isn't a very loyal friend to anyone else, judging by what he did to Wilson. Cameron is confused, and Shitter says it's strange that she didn't know about that. Not really; I tend not to be kept informed about ridiculous police investigations into my boss's personal life. Cameron's beeper goes off.
Cameron runs into Kyle's room to find Chase and Foreman sitting there not in the middle of the medical emergency she was paged to. They say they just paged her to get her away from Shitter and ask her what he wanted. She says that he's going to be talking to all of them about how many pills House takes a day. She told him six and thinks it wise of them to stay consistent. Chase is freaking out at the thought of talking to an authority figure, and thinks they should tell House what's going on. But Cameron says Shitter told her not to. If they don't tell House, House will make their lives miserable. If they do, Shitter will make their lives miserable. This storyline continues to progress solely on the fuel of ridiculous contrivances. House pokes his head in the room and asks for an update on Kyle's condition. He's hanging on, but getting worse.
Dan Fielding went and got himself a haircut. "Your barber sucks," he complains. PPTH has its own barber? If so, whoever he is certainly does suck. I hate Chase's hair. Dan's ain't so great either. It's better than that pompadour he was sporting in the last two seasons of Night Court, though. Man, no one had good hair on that show. Remember Markie Post's blonde mullet? Marsha Warfield 's stylin' fade was pretty sweet, though. Dan also notes that the coma has had a slimming effect on him, although, really, it's nothing to brag about. I still see a pot belly there. Cuddy gave Dan the clothes he was admitted in, which are remarkably free of soot. Dan guesses that he'll have to buy a new wardrobe since he's thinner and all his old clothes burned up and are ten years out of fashion besides. House says that in the future, we wear "recyclable clothes" that you wear once and then eat. Hee hee hee. It would have been awesome if House had rented a jetpack to fly around in to make the future look even cooler. Although that would probably be inappropriate.
House drills Dan about his son's medical history again, and Dan calls House a "piece of work" for not telling him that his awakening is only temporary, which Cuddy spilled the beans about earlier. Dan has a day to live and he's not going to spend it in a hospital saving his son's life. House asks him where he's planning on going: his wife is dead, his home is burned to the ground, and his business was sold off. All he has left is the one person he refuses to see. Dan says he's going to a restaurant that serves the best hoagies in the world and then Atlantic City. House points out that Dan doesn't have money or a car to do these things.
Wilson takes some money out of the hospital ATM. House limps up and takes some money out of his own personal ATM: Wilson, who hands over some cash and his car keys.
House and Dan leave the hospital and walk up to Wilson's car. Wilson hands House the keys and asks him not to eat in his car, even though he knows that House won't listen to him and will now probably be sure to eat in his car. Dan wants to drive. Wilson tries to protest, but House just tosses the keys to Dan. He tells Wilson that Dan is so drugged up that he's got better reflexes than Dale Earnhardt, Jr. I hope they're better than Dale Earnhardt, Sr.'s. Dan holds up Wilson's iPod (no doubt packed with showtunes) and asks what an "ip-pod" is. I love it when people are confused about the future. It's my favorite part of time travel movies. Wilson says that he's coming with them and takes a seat in the back. Ha ha! He doesn't even get shotgun in his own car. There's no one else in the back seat and I'll bet Wilson is still sitting bitch.
While Wilson is stuck paying the gasoline pumper, House and Dan raid the gas station store. I'm surprised that Dan hasn't gone back into a coma at the shock of how high gas prices are these days. I almost do every time I slide my credit card into the pump. Instead, he's furious that M&Ms have new colors and dumped the light brown one. Preach it, Dan! Light brown was my favorite M&M color. Why'd they get rid of it? It always seemed to taste more like milk chocolate than the other colors. House is more interested in Dan's medical history. Dan wants to have fun on his one day of life, not answer all of House's questions. Dan decides that for every question of House's he answers, House has to answer one of his questions. Apparently being in a vegetative state for ten years turns you into an eleven-year-old girl at a sleepover who wants to play Truth or Dare. Dan explains that he used to be a successful and powerful factory owner, and this is his way of preserving some of that power.
Back at PPTH, Cameron tells the guys that she took "Wilson's assistant" out for coffee to ask her about what's going on with Shitter and Wilson. When did Wilson get an assistant?! He doesn't do enough work to merit an assistant! He doesn't even do enough for anyone to notice that he just took off for Atlantic City in the middle of the day! Whatever happened to Cuddy's assistant? I miss him. The assistant filled Cameron in on Wilson's legal difficulties and House's involvement with them. Foreman says that he believes House would forge a prescription and jeopardize Wilson's career. Cameron doesn't believe this. She does, however, believe in unicorns and rainbows. Foreman says that junkies do whatever they have to to get what they need. Chase, whose mother was an alcoholic, has no contribution to this discussion.
In the car, Wilson wants to know why Dan is trying to get as far away from his son as possible. House tells him to zip it; he doesn't need Wilson riling his patient up and endangering his investigation. Plus, the road trip makes for better television. House asks Dan what his factory used to produce. Dan tries to think of a question to ask House first. Wilson and House start squabbling over Wilson's legal difficulties. "What is up with you two?" Dan asks; "keep it up and I will turn this car around!" Actually, that last part was my mother yelling at my brother and me when we fought in the car on the way to Grandma's for Thanksgiving. One year we called her bluff and she never tried that again unless the car ride was to Dairy Queen for treats, when the threat was very real and very scary. House tells Dan all about Wilson's police difficulties much to Wilson's horror, until House points out that Dan won't be able to do much with the information. And now that Dan used up his question, he has to answer House's. Dan says his factory made luxury boats. How boring.
Dan asks House if he's ever been in love, because men love to know these things about each other. I hope they play light as a feather, stuff as a board . House says that he has. Dan has to describe his luxury boats. He does. He asks House how he and his love met. House says it was a lawyers vs. doctors paintball tournament. This contradicts what he said about how they met before, although I don't think either story is true, so it doesn't really matter. Dan says that Kyle used to run around the factory all the time, and House says he now knows what's wrong with Kyle. He was exposed to spray paint for the boats, giving him mercury poisoning which was then aggravated by Kyle's alcoholism. House calls Foreman and tells him to test Kyle for mercury poisoning. He asks to speak with Chase, but Chase isn't in the room; he's with Shitter. Unfortunately, Foreman does not try to imitate Chase on the phone, but just says Chase is in the lab.
Shitter asks Chase how many pills House takes a day. Chase says anywhere from six to ten. He also admits to writing prescriptions for House when he asked him to. Why does Cuddy allow detectives to interrogate her employees like this? Get a lawyer, preferably not the kind who participates in paintball tournaments. Shitter says that the medical profession tends to attract people who love power, unlike being a police officer, which attracts people who really, really love power. So he doubts that House would ask for anything, and thinks that Chase is lying to the police to "cover up something [Chase] didn't want to do." The scene ends here so we can all suspect Chase of turning House in.
Wilson's car drives through the Fox Mulberry St. backlot. The search for the best hoagies in the world has been unsuccessful. Apparently, with their best customer in a vegetative state, Giancarlo's couldn't survive. Kind of like the restaurant the Night Corut gang occasionally visited that was owned by a different person every time but still managed to serve horrible food that made everyone sick. And then Mac and Quon-Le tried to buy it but needed to borrow money from Mac's grandpa, who disapproved of his marriage to Quon-Le. Man, everyone learned a lesson that day. A heartfelt lesson delivered in a light-hearted way.
Wilson suggests turning the car around and going back to PPTH, but Dan says that he has come too far not to get a hoagie. Wilson points out that if Kyle does have mercury poisoning, he should respond well to treatment, maybe in time for Dan to see him before he goes back into his vegetative state. Dan asks Wilson why he's so concerned about him. I don't know Dan, why are you so concerned about House's love life? Wilson says he isn't concerned; he just finds Dan's behavior to be a little odd. He asks Dan what Kyle could have possibly done for Dan to not want to use his only opportunity to see him. Dan says that his son is a drunken loser just like everyone on his mother's side. Wilson says that's true, but Dan didn't know about it until after he left PPTH, so it doesn't explain anything. Dan tells them to shut up; they are in Atlantic City and they're going to a hotel with a casino.
Meanwhile, Kyle's getting worse. His heart is failing.
Stock shot of Atlantic City. The guys are in a ridiculously over-decorated hotel room. Wilson is calling room service to try to get Dan a hoagie. House is trying to ask Dan questions again and also pointing out to Wilson that he's running dangerously low on Vicodin. Dan is spending his only day of consciousness sitting around a nasty hotel room. House asks Dan how aware of the outside world he was in his vegetative state. Dan says he knew that time had passed and he recognized House's voice. Wilson interrupts this possibly medically significant discussion of vegetative state awareness to ask House a real question: why did he steal Wilson's pad? He could have taken one of the Cottages' pads. Wilson thinks House took his because they're friends, and House was trying to test their relationship and see how far he could push it until it broke. I don't think House really wanted Wilson to find out about this or expected the truth to come out in this way. Dan wonders if he's really going to spend his last day of awareness listening to them squabble about a legal matter he has nothing to do with.
House's cell rings. "House's House of Whining. State your complaint!" he answers. Foreman tells him that the mercury poisoning diagnosis was wrong and Kyle's heart is failing. House hangs up and tells Dan that it's time to talk about all of Kyle's relatives and how they died. They don't have time to trade questions, so House says Dan can just ask a really big one at the end. "Destroy my privacy; my dignity," he says, looking at Wilson. Oh, quit being such a drama queen, House. If you don't like the question Dan asks you, just lie or insist on Wilson leaving the room before answering. I'm pretty sure your secret will be safe with Dan.
After the commercials, Wilson is back on the phone with room service after the chef's attempt at a hoagie came out very wrong. Dan reports that his sister-in-law died in what he assumed was an alcohol-related traffic accident. His father died of old age. His wife's father died when hit by a car while walking "the incompetent dog." Wow, Dan hates his in-laws so much that he even hates their pets. Wilson finally gets on the phone with a place that will make the hoagie Dan wants and deliver it to their room when Wilson promises a hundred dollar tip. Dan cheers that the night is "finally going [his] way." Then he tries to catch a can of soda Wilson tosses to him and fails miserably. His reflexes aren't so great anymore. Looks like he won't be driving them home. Also, no one should try to open that soda for the twenty minutes.
Shitter sneaks up on Foreman and when the hell does this guy's shift end? And why is he allowed in the hospital lab, a restricted area? Why why why? Foreman doesn't need to talk to Shitter in a private room; he says House is an ass, but it's not Shitter's call whether or not he needs the Vicodin. Shitter says that he's been a cop for twenty years and he knows when someone is telling him a "self-serving story." "If you had my job, you'd know," Shitter says; "everybody lies." Okay, Shitter and House are both equally dogged in their pursuit of what they think is right. WE GET IT. This storyline better lead somewhere really great that's worth all of this.
House has run out of relatives to quiz Dan on, so Dan gets to ask his big, personal question. And it is: why did House become a doctor? House is disappointed by this question, which isn't as humiliating as he thought it would be. Dan really wants to know why someone who hates people so much chose a job that would require him to work with them. The expression on Wilson's face suggests that he would like to know this as well. House gets all serious and answers that when he was fourteen, his father was stationed in Japan. House and a kid from school (notice he does not refer to him as a friend) went rock climbing. The kid fell and House had to bring him to the hospital. The kid came down with an infection in the hospital and none of the doctors knew what to do, so they called in their last resort: a guy who House thought was a janitor but who was really a doctor and a Buraku, a member of Japan's untouchable class. No one on the staff liked him because of this, which makes me wonder how the guy even passed medical school to become a doctor in the first place, so he didn't even try to be liked or fit in. But the hospital needed him and he was right, so none of that mattered. That explanation is way too complicated and involved for me. That's a lot of work and school just to turn into the American version of an untouchable Japanese janitor/doctor.
At PPTH, Kyle continues to die. His heart rate speeds up, and Chase says it's either an allergic reaction to the diazepam or Kyle's heart is "done."
House asks Dan how the house fire started. Dan says it was Christmas Eve and his wife had taken a sleeping pill and gone to bed, apparently anticipating the loud hoof beats of Santa's reindeer on her roof possibly interrupting her slumber. Kyle was popping popcorn in the fireplace and cruelly trying to burn Santa's ass. Somehow, Kyle knocked some tinder over and it touched the wrapping paper and that was it. Wilson thinks Dan blames his son for the fire and that's why he doesn't want to see him. Dan denies this, saying that Kyle was twelve and it was an accident. That, and someone made a bad decision to wrap the presents with kerosene-soaked paper. Dan says it doesn't matter if he sees his son or not; he couldn't save his wife and now there's nothing he can do to save his son. "Thank you SO MUCH for waking me up!" he shouts.
The sad piano music comes in and House asks Dan how Kyle managed to dislodge the tinder. Dan says Kyle dropped the popcorn tray after complaining that it was too heavy, a complaint that Dan didn't listen to. House asks if his father-in-law's hit and run happened at night. Dan says he thinks so, but he doesn't know why that's important. House asks if the car accident that killed the sister-in-law happened at night. Dan says it did. "Ragged red fiber," House blurts. Myoclonic epilepsy with ragged red fibers, or MERRF, is a rare genetic disease that can only be inherited from the mother. It causes muscle weakness and poor night vision, making its sufferers seem uncoordinated or drunk. Okay, so...all of Dan's in-laws had this undiagnosed condition and Dan just assumed they were all drunks when they weren't? That's...ridiculous. Really, it's just ridiculous. No one assumes someone is an alcoholic because of clumsiness. You assume it because of clumsiness and finding bottles of alcohol in their backpacks.
Wilson says that MERRF doesn't explain why Kyle's liver failed. House says that unlike his relatives, Kyle actually is a drunk, and so would you be if you thought you started a fire that killed your mother and turned your father into a vegetable. Which...yeah, probably. House calls PPTH and tells Foreman to test Kyle for MERRF. Foreman says there's no point in that; even if Kyle does have it, his heart is irreversibly damaged and as an alcoholic, he won't qualify for a transplant from the Evil Transplant Committee Overlords.
Sometime later, Dan's hoagie has arrived but he hasn't eaten a bite of it. Instead, he's staring out the window and thinking. Finally, he says he wants Kyle to have his heart. There's just one problem with that -- Dan is still alive, and he'll need his heart if he's going to stay that way. Wilson points out that someone could make a drug that gets Dan out of his vegetative state somewhere down the road and besides, MERRF is treatable, but it's not curable. And Wilson apparently doesn't hold out hope for a cure for that like he does for a cure for vegetative states. "He's my kid," Dan says. So they get Cuddy on the line, and she, of course, gives a resounding no to their plan to kill Dan and save Kyle. "Are you out of your mind?!" she asks. House says they'll just have to think of "something else." Uh oh. "I'm sorry," Cuddy genuinely says. Aw, she cares!
House hangs up and orders Wilson out of the room. "No," Wilson says. So he'll do everything House wants except the one thing that will benefit him? It's like Wilson wants to suffer for House's misdeeds. House says that Wilson lying to the cops was enough; "maybe I don't want to push this 'til it breaks." Yeah, because then you won't be able to use Wilson for everything. Good thinking, House.
Wilson leaves the room and House starts talking suicide. Pills are the simplest way to kill yourself, he says, but hanging has the best chance of not damaging the heart. And strangulation is better for the heart than breaking your neck. "This will be slow," House says. Dan asks if he has time to see Kyle, but they don't. That's what you get for driving to Atlantic City instead of sitting at your son's bedside, Dan. And you didn't even eat your hoagie. Dan asks House what message he should leave for his son because he doesn't know. How about "Here you go." Even better: "I (heart) you." Dan asks House what the one thing he wants to hear from his dad is. House says it doesn't really apply here, but he'd want to hear "You were right. You did the right thing." Dan agrees that that doesn't help him, and they laugh and then realize that they're in a very unfunny situation and look sad again.
Down at the casino floor, Wilson is creating an alibi. He slides up to a woman at a craps table and loudly and memorably introduces himself. The woman introduces herself as a "Mrs." "I'm from Princeton!" Wilson tells the world. "My husband and I and our three children are from Philadelphia," Mrs. Schaeffer says. Wilson rolls his eyes and says something that's sure to leave a lasting impression just in case the police ask: "So, uh...do you like to swing?" Mrs. Schaeffer laughs and says no. Wilson implements the second part of his alibi plan and asks his friend "House," some random guy about House's height and build holding a cane, which room they're in just in case Mrs. Schaeffer changes her mind. With that, he leaves the casino, paying off the fake House and taking the cane back on his way out.
Wilson finds House sitting in the hallway outside their hotel room and says he got him an alibi. House didn't even ask for one. Alibi or no, Shitter's going to have a field day with this if he finds out. With that, they sit in the hall. We hear a thump as Dan kicks the chair out from under him and begins the process of his slow horrible death begins. Damn. I guess the somber and powerful effect of this scene would be ruined if Mrs. Schaeffer and her husband were to show up and say they changed their minds after all.
Back at PPTH, Dan and Kyle are wheeled into surgery. I'm not going to question how they got Dan back to PPTH so quickly and how his heart could still be viable. Cuddy finds House and says they found an open bottle of aspirin to Dan's body. How lucky that Dan had a headache just before he killed himself and took an aspirin that would also reduce trauma to the heart and keep it viable for longer. She gives House an "I don't even know what to do here" look, shakes her head, and walks away. Some people thought that Dan committed suicide with the pills, but I'm pretty sure he didn't since he seemed pretty set on whatever would keep his heart viable for the longest amount of time, which was strangulation. He took an aspirin beforehand because it would preserve the heart. If you look carefully, you can see that red mark around Dan's neck when he's wheeled past the camera. So it seems pretty certain that that's what happened.
Kyle has managed to recover from the brink of death. He asks House if his dad had a message for him. "He said you were right. You did the right thing," House lies. Of course, Kyle has no idea what this means. House leaves him to try to find a meaning in it. Here's one: "You were right; the popcorn tray was too heavy."
House wanders over to his personal ATM, who's trying to take money out of a real ATM. Wilson tells House that Shitter was talking to the Cottages while they were in Atlantic City. House says he knew that, and since they all told him it means no one said anything he needs to worry about. House would rather talk about Wilson's determination to get Dan that hoagie he wanted, even though he thought the hoagie was just Dan's outlet for his real feelings about his son. House accuses Wilson of having an addiction to being needed that's worse than House's to Vicodin. Wilson tells House he's the last person who should complain about his enabling tendencies and calls his bank to ask why his ATM card isn't working. He is not pleased with their answer. "My accounts have been frozen as part of a police investigation," Wilson informs us. Dude, seriously? I mean, don't you have to be, like, at least a suspect for them to be able to do that? Wilson's just a friend of a suspect! And his accounts have nothing to do with whether or not he prescribed that Vicodin! This is extortion and there's just no way the police would be allowed to do it. It's a real shame that this episode had to be somewhat ruined by ridiculous impossibilities like that. I'll suspend my disbelief for them when they lead to a scene with House and Wilson sitting outside Dan's hotel room while he kills himself, but not for this. Wilson tells House that House will be paying for dinner tonight. House wonders if he can get away with serving him Top Ramen and tap water.