Drabbles, now with 97.4% less counting.

[odditycollector]

 
for m_butterfly:

House put down the phone. He walked back over, blinked, and then poked his finger into the mass of feathers.

"Ow, hey!" the patient said.

"Huh," said House. He moved his hand forward again, and the patient jumped from the clinic bed and flattened his wings against his back.

"You did say you wanted proof of my *credentials*." He sounded smug, but a British accent will do that to people.

"I never did," said House. "*You* were the one who brought up my dark, personal desires." He settled onto a stool. "Now, Mr. Crawfish-"

"That's *Crowley*," said the patient. "*Crow*. *Ley*."

"You sure?" House made a show of squinting at the file. "Huh. Well. Mr. *Crowley*, then. How long have you had wings?"

"It's coming up October, now," said the patient. "That makes it about, oh, six thousand bloody years."

House nodded and scribbled something in the file. "And how many non-bloody ones?"

"What?" The wings stretched slightly, shifted, and then settled again. House made another note. "And what are you writing about me?" the patient demanded.

There was a quick knock, and then Wilson stepped in and closed the clinic room door behind him. "You needed a consult?"

House nodded towards the patient. "This young man has the weirdest tumours I've seen in *months*."

Wilson stared.

"They're on his shoulders," House supplied helpfully.

The patient glanced between them. He shook his head, annoyed. "Bugger this." He grabbed his jacket from the bed. "You were looking at the better part of the deal. It's not like you were *using* your soul, anyway."

Wilson stared as he left. "Did that man have wings?"

"Nah," said House. "We're both highly stressed professionals with serious personality faults, and at least one of us is nominally stoned right now. We probably imagined it."

"Ah," said Wilson. He might have said something else, but then the door opened and the receptionist ushered in a girl with chronic acne.

House wadded up the last patient's file and tossed it in the trash. He pointed the new patient towards a chair. "I should have taken him up on that offer," he said to Wilson. "I imagine."

"No, everyone already thinks you're a soulless monster," said Wilson. "I can't imagine Cuddy would let you off that easy."

 

for hannahrorlove:

On their third date, Barry learned forward over the table and ran a fingertip across his wineglass. “Tell me about him,” he said.

“I’m not sure what you want to know,” said Rosalyn, staring into her own glass. Her reflection looked back at her, burnt gold in the candlelight.

So she told Barry everything instead: the colour of his eyes in the evening and his favourite songs and the rough callous on his thumb that she hated because he earned it practicing with his service revolver. She told Barry about their great broccoli buying adventure, and about the time he had saved money for three months to buy her a diamond necklace for her birthday. He had gotten involved in a street chase an hour after he bought it, and the necklace had slipped from his pocket, never found.

At the end of the conversation, Rosalyn was crying. Barry passed her his napkin.

“I understand,” Barry said, covering one of her hands with his own. “Being with you now, I almost feel that I know him. I think I love Ezekiel, too.”

 

for the other fine people I owe ficlets: I might have dropped them off in the future by accident. Sorry 'bout that.

Comments

[hannahrorlove.livejournal.com]

My apologies for the late feedback. These were both wonderful little stories.

We're both highly stressed professionals with serious personality faults, and at least one of us is nominally stoned right now.
I swear I can hear Laurie deliver this.

great broccoli buying adventure
So much is told with so few words.

Thank you for these.