Watching House

Wow - an amazing episode tonight. Let’s get to it, shall we?

We open with a 10 year old African American suiting up to go see his brother, who has recieved the same radiation treatment that last week’s patient did (remember, the one that died?) to kill his bone marrow. The 10 year old will be giving the 14 year old his bone marrow in order to cure his lukemia. We find out later that this is his third resurgence of the disease.

Right before Wilson is set to take him to surgery, he sneezes. Bad news. He has an infection and therefore can not go under the knife.

Cut to House, who is awakened by…a dog. Now, I admit, at first I had high hopes that he was in Cuddy’s house, but alas, it’s Wilson’s ex-wife’s dog, Hector. The dog has chewed EVERYTHING in the apartment, including House’s cane! House.not.happy.

House heads into work to be told the situation of the brothers by Wilson. He marks the board with a large 5, because the 14 year old has only 5 days to live, max, before he dies. House notices that Foreman isn’t in the meeting, and so, goes searching for him.

He finds him in the hospital chapel and says, “If you’re done playing with your imaginary friend…”. House wants to pinpoint the infection by making the boy sicker - basically he wants to get him cold, wet, and run his blood through a machine that separates out the white cells so that he can not fight off any infection. Foreman thinks he’s crazy and wants to check the boy’s home for a biological reason for the infection, and though House disagrees with him, he tells him to go.

The rest of the recap after the break!

House and Wilson meet with the parents to discuss the options and when they ask Wilson, “what should we do”, Wilson demurs and makes them make their own decision. House tells Wilson that he needs to use the “power” he holds over the patients who trust him to make them choose the right decisions.

They make the boy sick while Foreman and Chase are examining the house. After a philosophical discussion where Foreman tells Chase that he’s upset he can’t remember the color of the top of the girl who he killed, he notices an old hand pump. He pumps it and some nasty brown water comes out. The 10 year old says that he drank it - a year ago, so they let that one slide.

The infection starts getting worse in the kid, and Chase suspects a problem with his heart. They do a check and find a growth on a valve. House tells the team that they want to do open heart surgery to remove the infection from the heart so that they will be able to make his marrow better in time to help his brother, and Foreman tells House that he’s going to talk to Cuddy. “Let’s all go”, House replies.

Foreman argues his side, Wilson argues his side, and when Cuddy asks House’s opinion he replies, “Foreman’s wrong, Wilson’s right, and your top is way too low for business hours.” Cuddy sides with House and Wilson but stops House before he leaves her office. She asks him why he’s going easy on Foreman.

“He’s got the yips.” he replies. He goes on to explain that all great athletes that get the yips don’t get over them, and that he is going to give Foreman 4 days, and then fire him.

We get a quick shot of the boy on the table for surgery, and then it’s House, passed out on the couch when the phone is ringing. It’s Wilson. He says that they biopsied the growth before they removed everything and that it was not an infection. House notices that Hector seems to have eaten half of his stash of Vicodin, and thinks (hopes) that he’s dead. Hector looks at him and then lays back down.

“He’s not dead…he’s stoned,” House says.

It’s back to the office to try to figure out what infection is killing the boy. Foreman, who has double-checked the registry, has found a 4 out of 6 match - to which House and Wilson both object, stating that a 4 out of 6 match is not enough. Cameron is worried about the 14 year old - his blood is thinning and it is causing massive bruising to the skin. If it bleeds in his brain, he’s done for. Cameron thinks that the boy has an autoimmune disease, so they start checking him for that. Unfortunately, all of the autoimmune diseases come up as negative, so they’re back to square one.

At one point here, House is walking down the hallway and his cane, which had been chewed by Hector, collapses and he lands on the ground. “It wasn’t me”, Wilson says. And now House is back to the ugly orthopedic cane.

At this point they discover that Foreman has gone behind their backs and told the parents about the 4 out of 6 match. Wilson and House try to do damage control with the parents to get them to not agree to the bone marrow transplant, but nothing they can say will dissuade the parents.

House, pissed, calls Wilson a coward and storms away.

The bone marrow transplant happens, but the 10 year old is getting sicker, and nothing the team can think of is helping him. House calls Wilson to a Cigar shop, and when Wilson asks why House asked him there, he replies that Wilson is buying him a new cane, because it was his dog that destroyed the old one. Wilson turns to walk out and house says, “I’m sorry”. Two words that rarely ever come out of his mouth.

House looks at the canes (including a halarous bull penis walking stick) and ends up with a “Bitchin’” black cane that has flames rising from the bottom of the cane.

The 14 year old is dying. The bone marrow did not match and so he is dying a slow, painful death. House comes up with the plan to put the 10 year old in with the 14 year old to get him sick. The infection will spread quickly through the 14 year old, and House believes it will give them a chance to identify what is killing the 10 year old.

They explain their plan to the parents, who want nothing to do with it. Wilson even tries to persuade them to agree with the plan, but they say “No”.

House goes into the 14 year old’s room, and he’s whimpering in pain. He gives the father a new script for pain medication and explains to the 14 year old that he’s dying. He says he knows. He then explains that he can do something to save his brother before he dies.

The boy talks the parents into letting him be a “sacrificial goat” for his brother’s benefit.

Meanwhile, Wilson and Foreman are in the lab talking. Wilson tells Foreman that House is going to fire him, but Foreman ignores him. He starts talking himself through the possibilities, and when he comes upon the hand pump, Wilson seems to think that it is a bit odd.

The 14 year old is wheeled into the 10 year old’s room, with a mask on his face. They are getting ready to infect him with his brother’s infection when Foreman runs in and stops Cuddy. He explains that the boy has an infection from chicken droppings that have been fermenting in the soil for years - that the entire area was built on a chicken farm. Good news for the 10 year old - it’s curable. Bad news for the 14 year old - it’s infecting the 10 year old’s bone marrow, and Cuddy tells them that there will not be enough left for a bone marrow transplant.

Foreman and the 10 year old are in a treatment room, and Foreman is administering the IV medication. When the 10 year old asks if his brother is going to die, Foreman tells him that his brother was willing to risk his life for him - and asks if he’s willing to do the same for his brother. He nods. Foreman tells him that because he is so weak he can not sedate him, and he nods again.

Then Foreman takes one of the biggest needles I have seen in my life and, after strapping the 10 year old down, sticks it straight into his thigh. The boys starts crying, “Please, stop!”, but Foreman says “I’m sorry, I’m going to need a lot more.” and drives the needle into his arm.

House is in his office when Wilson walks in. House asks how the parents are, and Wilson replies that they’re fine - especially since both of their sons are awake and eating. He tells House that he should go “praise” Foreman for his good job. He also says that his Ex is able to take Hector back, and House, somewhat reluctantly, lets him go (but not after the dog walking on three legs in a perfect imitation of House! The cutest thing ever!).

House meets up with Foreman, who is watching the two boys in their joined isolation rooms, and tells him that he did a good job. Foreman says that he’s becoming like house.

House replies, “You’re not. You’ve been like me since you were eight years old.”

“You are going to cure more people, but I’ll be happy if I don’t kill as many. Consider this my 2 week notice,” Foreman says as he walks off.

EXCELLENT episode! Being a parent, it’s always hard for me to watch episodes that have kids suffering, but, thankfully, they both survived.

Will Foreman…err..Omar Epps…stay on the show?! What do you think about this episode?! Chime in here!

House, Recaps, Family Recap