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A high school senior named Abby comes down with a pulmonary edema right in the middle of a boring planetarium lecture and is admitted to PPTH, where the Cottages find something wrong with her heart valve, necessitating emergency open-heart surgery. They suspect that she's allergic to her boyfriend's sperm, which is surprising news to Abby's mother and her boyfriend's dad, who is just as concerned about her welfare as his son is. SUSPICIOUSly so, in fact. Abby isn't allergic to the sperm, and when she begins to hallucinate and have near-fatal seizures, House is out of options, so he decides to do this experimental brain thing where her thoughts can sort of be seen on a monitor. Everyone finds this super cool except Foreman, who pronounces Abby's memories of her dead father to be boring. In the end, it does help them reach the diagnosis, as House's conversations with Taub remind him that people cheat on each other, and while Abby herself was never in a position to be exposed to their best diagnosis -- a parasite found in the Middle East -- her boyfriend's father was, and spread it to her via sex, which he hastens to point out he only had with her because he was drunk and his son and Abby were broken up at the time. So that makes it all okay, then. The parasite died, but left behind enough of a shell to give Abby a massive allergic reaction that caused all of her symptoms. As for her memory of her dead father, it was actually a memory of her boyfriend's dad, who may not be living for much longer after Abby's boyfriend (now fiancé -- so forgiving!) and/or Abby's mother are through with him. Also, House is able to get out of buying furniture for the apartment Wilson paid for by convincing Wilson that he needs to work out his issues with furnishing a home by buying it all himself.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!You know this week's House is going to be on the boring side when we begin in a planetarium show, where a teacher lectures to his class of high school seniors. At least two of them aren't paying attention, instead talking to each other about how the girl, Abby, is going off to Stanford for college and will be 3,000 miles away from the boy, her boyfriend Nick. Nick promises he'll visit every weekend using his dad's plentiful frequent flier miles (SUSPICIOUS) as someone passes him a thermos full of vodka. He drinks and passes it Abby, who can't take a sip without coughing and making enough noise to get the attention of their teacher. Abby plays it off well, saying she knows they're not allowed to have food or drinks in the planetarium but she brought in a thermos of water because of her nagging cough. Nick is impressed with her lying ability (SUSPICIOUS), and says so loudly enough to again get their teacher's attention, who asks him a question to see if he's been paying attention to the lecture thus far. Nick's answer shows us why Abby was accepted to Stanford and he was not. And that's when foamy pink stuff starts pouring out of Abby's mouth.
And because someone is really into space this week, the planetarium show transitions into the opening credits. And yet, the credits themselves remain unchanged, so we still get to see Jennifer Morrison's name and image even though she hasn't been on the show in years.
House pours some milk into his cereal, which is part of a complete breakfast, including toast and jelly and what appear to be orange peels, all of which are sitting, plate-less, on the couch. Wilson objects to this, although I don't know why since the couch is so ugly that jelly smears and toast crumbs can only make it look better, and House says this is part of his protest against Wilson not owning a table yet. Wilson asks House to buy a table, seeing as Wilson has already spent plenty of money on the apartment itself. House thinks for a second and comes up with a way to get out of paying for new furniture: by turning the simple act of buying furniture into a life lesson for Wilson, who House maintains has never furnished his own home before. Rather, he depended on his ex-wives or dead girlfriends to do the decorating. Wilson sees through House's plan to get out of spending money and time on furniture, but not enough to threaten to kick House out if he doesn't do it. "Buy some furniture or admit you're empty inside," House says.