Every Breath You Take

OK, so, quit your bitchin’, I combined the last two House episodes into one recap. Honestly, I found the Foreman-is-still-sick story a little boring. And, I don’t deal well with dead babies. Plus I had all of my fabulous TVgasm galas to attend, and I had to spend all the huge wads of cash that J-Unit and B-Side hand out to all the ‘gasm writers. In short: I’ll tolerate no complaints!

House storms into Cuddy’s office demanding to do an autopsy on the newly-dead Joe, but apparently Cuddy has already explained to him that because Joe died of an unknown infectious disease, cutting him open would “elevate the situation to a bio-safety level three.” House replies, “Should we call Jack Bauer?” Hah! Nice one. House reads TVgasm, too.
Cuddy cares more about public safety than Foreman (and it seems cold, but I see her point). So House decides to have Foreman do an old-timey pickaxe autopsy on Joe, as they’re still in quarantine together. But alas and alack, Foreman is already blind, and does a really effective autopsy on Joe’s…mattress. Foreman of course doesn’t yet know that he’s blind. Also, Foreman’s advancing quicker than Joe did, which means they have even less time to find a cure. In the office, House, Cameron and Chase are going over every possible disease option, and House decides to treat Foreman for all of those options. They give Foreman quite the drug cocktail, with about 15 different pills. He’s being a big brat about how they obviously have no idea what’s wrong, but dude? They’re trying.

House dons a hazmat suit himself and heads into Joe’s apartment with his pet rat, Steve McQueen. He has Foreman retrace his steps over the phone and exposes the rat to all potential toxins. This segues into Foreman Being Vulnerable, as he decides to call his dad and tell him he’s sick. Back in rat land, House has set up a webcam on Steve’s cage, though he tells Wilson it’s of Cuddy’s shower. He believes the rat is already euphoric because he’s climbing on his water bottle. Then, there’s a weird scene in the clinic that I really don’t want to go into, before we head to Foreman’s where his vision is returning. They want to wean him off his medications one at a time, but unfortunately they’re already ruining Foreman’s liver with the mai tai of drugs they’re giving him.

House is in mean mode as he asks Foreman if he wants to die four hours from now or 14 hours from now. Oh, the options! If he goes off the medications he’ll go blind again, but he’ll live longer because his pancreas won’t shut down. Later, Foreman lies to his dad about the pain level, saying that Joe died in his sleep without much suffering. Aw, that’s kind of sweer, and definitely sad. Things get even sadder as Foreman and his dad decide not to tell Foreman’s brother. Then, we learn that Foreman’s mom has Alzheimer’s. Foreman’s dad isn’t going to tell his wife that Foreman’s sick, because she’ll just get upset and then forget. Damn.

Montage of sadness as Foreman goes blind again, his dad prays in the chapel and Cuddy cries in her office. The doctors reconvene in the office to discuss variables in the case, and Cameron points out that Foreman’s black, and therefore more susceptible to certain ailments. Oh yeah, the writers went there! How daring!

Cuddy goes to visit Foreman and says they’re friends so she should be with him. Well. Not unexpectedly, this does not sit well with Foreman. He says he respects Cuddy for not letting herself get manipulated by House and change her mind just because House brought Foreman’s dad in. By that same token, Foreman won’t forgive her just because she’s showing concern. Now, I understand why everyone’s upset with Cuddy. However, Foreman shows his inate selfishness when he says he doesn’t care if Cuddy goes to jail, if it saves his life. I dunno, that seems a bit much.

House stops by with a vial of Legionella, the stuff that causes Legionnaire’s Disease, which Joe had. He figures that Legionnaire’s was the reason Joe’s disease spread slowly, so he’s going to infect Foreman to slow it down in him, too. Foreman says he doesn’t consent, but House just throws the vial into the room, the bottle breaks, Foreman is exposed. That was easy.

Later, Foreman is super rude some more, again, to Cameron as she tries to get his temperature and pain level. Back in the office, the reconfirm that Foreman doesn’t have any bacteria that could affect his brain. However, since lab tests actually check for antibodies rather than the actual disease, maybe Foreman just doesn’t have the antibodies. Since he has Legionnaires, his body is fighting that and the original infection is “caught in the crossfire.” Foreman is totally over antibiotics, though, and he wants House to do an even deeper brain biopsy. That? Not so safe.

House heads over the hospital chapel to talk to Foreman’s dad, where he learns that Foreman called him both a manipulative bastard and the best doctor he’s ever known. Pops also doesn’t want any responsibility for Foreman’s medical choices. Which is convenient, because Foreman wants Cameron as his medical proxy anyway. Weird, but true. She agrees to it but says they’re still not friends.

Foreman’s dad goes to visit him as they put Foreman in a coma. It’s emotional. Eh, actually it’s boring. Also, Cameron is lame and weak and accepts Foreman’s apology right before he goes under. And as Foreman’s decision-maker, Cameron demands that they do the brain surgery. However, House hopes to go back to Joe’s apartment and find a dead animal they can operate on first. He spots a blind pigeon but it gets away, which must be kind of embarrassing. House finally figures out that the source of the disease was a stagnant, open water well that Joe was stealing water from. He tests it there and calls Cameron to tell her, but she already knows – she’s gone ahead with the surgery. Apparently, Foreman has primary anemic ninja encephalitis. They’ll be able to treat him, no problem, with drugs and nunchucks.

The next step is to see if he made it out of surgery without any complications. As he comes to, everything looks fine until they ask him to wiggle his toes. Whoops-a-daisy! His nerves are all crossed, and left is right and up is down, etc. That’s how they end the episode, so we must push on to the next!

There’s a couple with a baby getting ready for the day. The dad seems really disinterested, and also almost vomits as he gets ready, claiming a stomach bug. Then he kisses his wife and baby goodbye, which is disgusting and I thought for sure this would end up being the cause of his baby’s health troubles. As he heads down the stairs he barfs all over, so he rethinks his decision to go to work. Which is nice, because when he comes back in his wife is having a seizure and his baby is drowning in the bathtub. Fortuitous.

Y’all, I’ll say it again, I do not want to deal with dying babies. That’s not quite “entertainment,” I don’t think. Besides, we have sexier things to deal with in another wing of the hospital, where Wilson is gloating over his upcoming date with…Cuddy. Hey, that gives House two reasons to be jealous! In the office, Cameron informs us and House that Cuddy put Chase on a two-week rotation in the sick baby department. Oh, GREAT. That’ll be barrel of monkeys.

But yay, Foreman comes back, looking all refreshed and dapper and hey, I had forgotten how hot Omar Epps is. He has short term memory loss but is getting better. House is testing him every little thing, from doctoring to coffee making. They do have to move on to the baby and mother eventually, so they go do doctor stuff before House gets bored and decides to break into Cuddy’s office for shits and giggles. She’s being rather surreptitious with a small oblong box, and between that and House’s “you’re late” comment, I thought for sure Cuddy was pregnant. I was only a little off the mark. I also thought Chase was the father. Tee hee!

In the less fun part of the hospital, Foreman is assisting Cameron. He is remarkably good natured about everything, saying that if he doesn’t become fully functional again, he can always teach. Hey, that’s not very surly! Where’s Foreman? Before we can reflect too deeply on life giving us lemons and what to do with them, the baby starts losing oxygen in one room and the mom goes all Exorcist in the MRI lab. The baby’s lung collapsed and Chase had to jab a tiny tube in his chest to breathe through. The mom’s gymnastic routine is a mystery.

House is way more concerned with Foreman’s general lack of anger than he is with the patients. He’s also all het up about Chase trying to break up with him. House isn’t letting go without a fight, even though Chase won’t give him the real reason. In life and death matters, they have to clean out the baby’s blood. Gack.

House has literally gone through Cuddy’s trash, and dumps it out on Wilson’s desk. They discover the box she was hiding was red clover. Wilson says that it’s “also used to treat asthma, psoriasis, joint pain…” so we don’t know what its primary use is. House does seem to think she has cancer, since Wilson is an oncologist. Cameron comes in to report that the mom patient has a sub-arachnoid bleed. I got all panicky, thinking they were bringing spiders into the mix too.

Foreman went to the family’s house and found a bottle of vodka hidden away in a drawer. They figure it’s the mom’s, and Foreman is happy to go on his way and treat her appropriately. He forgets that it’s all about House, who is pissed at this new complacent, agreeable Foreman. House even tries a little racism to provoke Foreman, but he’s not biting. Speaking of not biting (or something) Cuddy and Wilson are in the running for World’s Most Awkward Date. Cuddy is being really obvious about how she’s testing Wilson on his interest in kids. Wilson is either avoiding like a champ or truly oblivious; I can’t tell.

In the hospital, the mom comes to and gets a visit from her baby and husband. She apologizes for almost killing the kid, and the dad is remarkably forgiving. He might change his mind though, because as soon as he leaves, mom is at it again. Geez, mom, ever heard of yoga? Killing your baby is kind of Extreme Stress Relief. House and Foreman run in and stop it, but things aren’t looking so good for the kid. The dad really, really doesn’t want to believe it, insisting that she fell asleep and rolled onto the baby. The mom is in her room telling Cameron that voices told her to kill the baby. Yeah, not likely. The doctors decide to force a seizure to see if she actually has them or if she’s a big fat phony.

This test is like a psych ward nightmare. She’s got a skullcap on, with all kinds of wires coming out of it, and she has to look directly into a flashing light. Cameron has to come in and baby sit Foreman. Earlier, she was yelling at House for trying to get a reaction out of Foreman, but here she’s doing the same thing. It’s just a very watered-down version where her toughest comeback is “oh, give it a rest.”

Since the Outhouses are all busy, House goes to bother Wilson. He’s doing some sort of lab test, which House quickly deduces is a cancer test for Cuddy, that Wilson is doing off of her saliva from a spoon. As much as Wilson wants to believe their date was just a date, he’s obviously worried. House is too, even though he says he just doesn’t want to learn how to manipulate a new boss.

Back at work, the patient is having a seizure, even though it’s not the traditional freak-out kind. She’s just making fish faces. More pressing matters are occurring in the baby room, though. The little guy is having a heart attack. Cut back to the office, where they’re trying to find a cause for encephalopatic delirium, which is what they think the mom has. They can try and make her sane again, but it’ll be hard to be sane knowing you killed your kid. Which she did. Chase comes in to report the bad news. Nope, not very lightheated!

As the mom comes to, Foreman tells her she has delusions because a vitamin deficiency. She admits to hearing voices and remembers hurting her kid. She does look truly distraught, and when she finds out that her son is dead, her reaction is actually hard to watch. Good actress there, but damn. Then she starts throwing up blood. Wow, Method acting!

In the office, Chase is upset that he didn’t do enough to save the baby. House has one of his patented stare-into-space moments, and he asks the baby’s dad if he can do a test on the body, on the chance that baby and mom had the same illness. The dad refuses, as he’s pretty pissed at his wife right now. House berates him something good, and deduces that dad is the alcoholic, not mom like they thought before. He says it’s the dad’s fault too because the mom obviously had depression, but he didn’t help her.

Back in the office, House is uppity with Chase some more as he tries to figure out why Chase went to the NICU. He opens Chase’s paycheck and sees that he’s taking his paid vacation while doing time in the NICU. So perhaps Chase was cut out of his dad’s will, because he is no longer independently wealthy. I suppose that’ll come up again later.

Chase goes to do the autopsy on the baby, and finds weird stuff. House figures that mom and baby have (had) celiac disease, which makes it impossible to process wheat. The baby died because they use wheat gluten to bind the drugs the y use in NICU. I find it hard to believe that they’d use wheat to treat babies, what with all the food allergies infants have. Based on the mom’s condition now, she has progressed to cancer.

On a lighter note, let’s have some House’n'Cuddy banter. “You don’t have cancer,” he shares. “You don’t have dwarfism,” she retorts. Burns and Allen for our times, right here. She’s a little upset about having medical tests run on her without her permission. He says her estrogen levels are too high for this time in her cycle, and she’s understandably taken aback that he monitors her ovulation. He figures out with his Magic House Vision that she’s on fertility drugs and looking for a partner. She says she was looking for a donation, “not a party.”

I guess House has met his daily bitchery quota, because when he goes to talk to the guilt-ridden mom, he’s really nice to her. He assures her that she had no control over her actions, and she doesn’t deserve to die. She doesn’t really want to live, though, and refuses cancer treatment. House uses this to show Foreman that every day is not a gift, and to remind him to be miserable again since everything always sucks. He’s kind of persuasive. I think I’ll go drink myself into a stupor now, possibly followed by some degrading anonymous sex! Tra la la!

The husband comes into his wife’s room and sort of half-heartedly tells her to get treatment, but his heart’s not in it. Pretty quickly he tells her to go ahead and die, asking her to apologize to their son when she “sees him again.” Sigh. And House and Wilson head off the watch The L Word, and Foreman works on flashcards with increasing success. Two more episodes, left, people! What plotlines do you want to see a resolution to?