Amber's different from his exes in that she's not as much a basketcase as Bonnie, but she's still not as interesting as House, and therefore the relationship would have ended eventually. She's not as good a doctor, he's not a genius, she's not a gifted musician, she doesn't need Wilson long-term like House does... she's just a cheap substitute. Also, she's better adjusted and could do better. I guess I got a different vibe from Wilson in this ep. To me, she did not end up being House's proxy to Wilson. She was Amber. Boffle, I agree that House also has Cuddy and that they have lots to explore, too. But like you, even if they both love each other, and I don't know if that's where they'll go, but even if they do, I don't see it working out for long. House needs Cuddy to be his boss, and I don't think she can juggle that many relationship hats. The only relationship I've ever been able to picture lasting the distance without destroying the dynamic of the show is House and Wilson, however one defines it. I'm having a little more trouble now . . .

Wilson should have to answer as to why a 4 month relationship outweighed a 20 year friendship, because to me and a lot of others, that smacks of disloyalty. I said this before and I'll say it again, I don't think time matters when it comes to love. Time and history obviously play into a relationship a lot, it makes you know a lot more about a person. House and Wilson have this. They have a long history together. They love each other, that's not even a question. That does not mean that Wilson can't love Amber just as much (in a different way) as House and I DID NOT get that Wilson loved Amber more in this ep. I am 10 years older than my little sister. My parents have an extra 10 years worth of memories and experiences with me. They've been through more with me than they have with her. That absolutely does not mean that they love me more than they love her and I don't get any "disloyalty" because they love her as much as me. Again, I didn't see Amber's relationship with Wilson "trumping" his relationship with House, what I saw was the severity of Amber's situation trumping the severity of House's. That's the difference to me. We've seen Wilson prove time and time again how much he loves House. He was willing to go to prison for him. We've seen him go through so much and House always just expected him to do it and take all of House's crap. I don't think Wilson expected House to do the procedure, he did not try to guilt trip him, he didn't say that he owed him anything, he did not remind him of the times that he's been there when House needed it, he said that House may have missed something (which he did) and that House himself wanted to try it first. Wilson was desperate and panicked, especially in that moment because House was going ahead with a plan that Wilson didn't want him to do. Again, it's not as if he sat down and made a rational decision that he loved Amber more than he loved House.

The decision didn't have to be rational or verbalized. Wilson's actions showed it. I think I must be an optimist because I can't see House harboring any resentment over being asked to do the DBS. I think he does understand the context in which he was asked; that Amber's pending death was the impetus and that Wilson did believe in House's ability to solve the case, to to mine his brain for the answer. I guess I think that House will understand how Wilson's need for the answer/cure outweighed anything else in that moment-something that House has lived by time and again. I think the onus of this will lie fully with Wilson and his own guilt over asking. He might question how he can ever ask House to watch his pill intake or to keep from self-destructing when he himself put House at risk. For me, the ending on the bus and House's fear of having Wilson hate him reiterated the still deep bond between them.

I'm a few pages behind, so sorry if I'm dredging up stuff that's already been left by the road, but this has been occupying my mind all day at work today. I originally said no one believed Wilson pressured House into it, but I'm actually starting to think that might have been an issue after all. Perhaps "pressured" isn't the right word, and I certainly don't think it was intentional on Wilson's part, but I keep coming back to that "barely coherent" line. Sure, House has turned Wilson down plenty of times in the past -- but we're not seeing everyday!House in this ep. Everyday!House is used to working through pain and does it so well that both the audience and the people around him forget he's in pain. But the House in this ep is one who's in _such_ bad condition that he actually _says_, out loud, "I'm barely coherent. I need your help right now." And he follows it up by... snipping a whole verbosity of supporting evidence, but the point is, this is NOT our normal stubborn House who fights for what he wants. This is a House who's injured and exhausted and knows his judgment is impaired and is being very easily swayed by the people around him and _extremely_ easily swayed by Wilson in particular. Yes, I'm sure House was willing to do it, for all the reasons that have been stated. But I've now convinced myself (with a lot of help from HL's eyes) that he didn't want to do it, and I don't think he thought it was necessary for any reason other than Wilson's well-being. While I can believe he thought the other reasons were worth risking death, I don't believe he'd think the other reasons were worth risking life with brain damage. Ultimately, I don't think it will matter to House -- I believe he would have done it for Wilson alone even if he hadn't been concussed and otherwise impaired. But I wonder whether and how that impairment will factor into Wilson's eventual understanding of their actions. ETA: Starting to catch up now, so I'll just add a great big "What they said!" to 99% of what Boffle and Jair said on the last four pages. Except that I'm more optimistic than Jair, for reasons I'll explore if I ever get a chance to come here before midnight again.

They were still in the honeymoon phase, wherein new couples are having much more sex than usual, more forgiving of each others faults, still learning about each other. There hasn't been enough time for their faults to grate on each other. I give a lot more credit to old married couples that might be less sentimental than idealistic new couples. Well, my parents married two months after they met and thirty years later are still going strong. I myself got engaged a month after I met the love of my life. So I find the notion that people can't be in love because of some arbitrary time limit personally offensive. Are you saying my feelings for my fiancee aren't genuine? Or my parents'? I knew more about my fiancee in a week than a friend of mine knew about her boyfriend in a seven months. That doesn't mean her way was "wrong" or that their relationship is not genuine. Love is not a race and it does not have an incubation period.

I can't see House harboring any resentment over being asked to do the DBS. I agree and so far he hasn't. All he was concerned about was Wilson hating him, I think it probably did hurt to have Wilson ask this of him and it might make him a little more reserved around him, but I don't think he will really hold it against him. I think the onus of this will lie fully with Wilson and his own guilt over asking. He might question how he can ever ask House to watch his pill intake or to keep from self-destructing when he himself put House at risk. Now that would be interesting to watch. Seeing if Wilson can really ever comment on House's self-destructive tendencies again since he asked House to risk his life. OTOH, technically House's self-destructive behavior got Amber killed (I AM NOT blaming House, but his actions set the thing in motion). So maybe now Wilson's concern about House's self-destruction will be more about concern that House will hurt someone else rather than himself, at least for a while. I keep coming back to that "barely coherent" line. Be all that as it may (I won't quote the whole thing), a "barely coherent" House was about to go against Wilson's wishes wrt Amber right before Wilson stormed out and then came back and asked. If he were that easily swayed than why wasn't Wilson's "you can't do this" nonargument enough for him? He'd been doing what he asked up until that point.

So I find the notion that people can't be in love because of some arbitrary time limit personally offensive. I don't think it's so much that they couldn't be in "real" love, it's that given Wilson's record we have reason to doubt it and until this ep, no real reason to believe it. I don't think the series ever showed us that Amber was The One Woman for Wilson or that their relationship was going to last. What it tried to show us was that the potential for that future was there, and the potential alone was enough to freak House out. If he were that easily swayed than why wasn't Wilson's "you can't do this" nonargument enough for him? He'd been doing what he asked up until that point. Because Cuddy had only just left the room seconds before, after pointing out why Wilson was too irrational to be making medical decisions. Wilson easily trumps Foreman and normally Wilson would trump Cuddy, but in this case it's Cuddy + Foreman + House (probably) vs. an irrational Wilson. And even so, House still doesn't really argue with Wilson. He just sort of verbally treads water for a bit before Wilson storms off.

Wilson should have to answer as to why a 4 month relationship outweighed a 20 year friendship, because to me and a lot of others, that smacks of disloyalty. This seems like a relationship decision a drunken teenager would make, frankly. Well, too me, the whole idea of "weighing" love and deciding which person someone loves "better" or "more" seems a bit like something a child would do as well. Kind of like siblings who are convinced their parents love on child more than another because of some decision the parents have made based upon current circumstances. Love often does not work that way. People are capable of loving more than one person at a time - and yes, even in the same way sometimes. Remember Wilson, who cheats yet still "loves" his wives? Or Taub who cheats, yet still loves his wife enough to quit his job and start over? I think the real problem here is the asumption that Wilson SHOULD have loved House more, and in asking House to risk his life, people feel he did not demonstrate that. But it is not "obvious" to me that he loved Amber more, just that he was THAT desperate to save her. As always YMMV and for many folks, it certainly does! :)

I agree and so far he hasn't. All he was concerned about was Wilson hating him, I think it probably did hurt to have Wilson ask this of him and it might make him a little more reserved around him, but I don't think he will really hold it against him. I can't speak for others, but for me, the issue is not whether House will hold anything against Wilson. I don't think he will, for a couple of reasons. 1) He has already shown that he thinks his life is worth less than Amber's and that he feels he should have died in the crash. He's not going to hold it against Wilson that Wilson was willing to sacrifice House to save Amber. We already know his worry is that he has nothing left of Wilson at all. 2) The reality is that Wilson is free to love whomever he pleases. House is a realist and knows this, even if it hurts. The part that to me will linger on is that now House knows he feels more for Wilson than Wilson feels for him. Their friendship boundaries have changed. I know some others don't think that Wilson showed that if he had to have just one of the them in his life, he chose Amber, but to me, he did. And House knows he did. If there's a relationship out there that will allow House to trust it enough to go with it, in a way that changes his lack of hope for more in his life, it's not Wilson. Wilson needs to stick to those boundaries he's shown to House and allow himself the room to fall in love with another woman who will make him feel as Amber did. And House needs to allow the space in his life to recognise if there's anyone for him who will do the same. That's what came out of that request, for me. But it is not "obvious" to me that he loved Amber more, just that he was THAT desperate to save her. And not House, for whom the eventual outcome of the DBS was the known risk, and not a small one. Cuddy thought House doing the DBS in his condition would most likely be fatal. When Wilson is shown doing his final goodbye to Amber, House is in a coma from which he may never awaken. And that wasn't unexpected, given what he did. I don't see any need to blame Wilson, since as I said, we're free to love whomever makes us feel that way, but I think he made a choice. . If he were that easily swayed than why wasn't Wilson's "you can't do this" nonargument enough for him? He'd been doing what he asked up until that point. Because he had Cuddy's back up. Cuddy was the one who went toe to toe with Wilson and backed him off, while House limped over to his desk and let her. House hasn't the emotional reserves to do that scene himself. He hasn't stood up to Wilson all ep, to his team's astonishment. House wants to give Wilson what he wants, even when it isn't the right thing.

Anecdotal evidence doesn't change the fact that there are different stages in relationships (one example can be found here). Who ever said that love was rational? Want more anecdotal evidence? My parents met three months before they got married and other than war and hospitalizations were together every day of their lives for 64 years. More anecdotal evidence? I knew someone who got married six days after meeting his wife, and they just celebrated their 40th anniversary. Those are anecdotes that show there are exceptions to every single study written out there. Wilson definitely loves House, as we saw clearly in season 3. However, recently, and in this ep, he loved Amber more. That's putting it black and white, but it makes Wilson accountable. ... Love isn't rational, but he knew the weight of his request when House asked if he was serious. Nothing. Absolutely nothing in this world -- never mind love itself -- is black and white. You're seeking to quantify every second of a nearly 20-year friendship by one moment? Impossible. Trying to force the world to fit into simplistic terms of black and white is stuff out of "Dr. Kildare" or "Marcus Welby." Hell, you might as well be watching "The Lone Ranger" if you think it's as simple as black and white -- that's not what "House" is about. It's about just how messy and messed up this world is. Nothing is simple. Nothing is easy. Nothing is black and white.