The Social Contract - Recap

Author Timothy Moore is attending a banquet in to kick off his book tour. His publisher Elaine introduces him and he starts to speak, but his editor Nick Greenwald says the book won’t sell. Timothy is surprised and Nick explains that Elaine is trying to keep him happy. When Nick’s wife Audrey interrupts, Nick is puzzled about what he’s said but starts insulting his boss. His nose bleeds and then he collapses.

The team briefs House on Nick’s case, which involves frontal lobe inhibition. He has them run a nose up Nick’s nose to check his brain for nasal cancer. Taub and Kutner interrupt Nick playing cards with his daughter Marika. Audrey explains that she has an auditory processing problem. Nick insults the doctors and his wife, and Audrey leaves. He begs them to make his condition go away.

House invites Wilson to go to a monster truck rally but Wilson refuses. He claims he doesn’t like monster truck rallies and only tolerates them so he can be with House. House thinks he’s hiding something but is interrupted when Kutner reports the test for nasal cancer proves negatives. Wilson wonders if Nick is creating a persona and House accuses him of doing so as well. House insists that Nick has brain damage and tells Kutner to run more tests.

Foreman and Thirteen prepare to test Nick by asking him questions while they run a scan. Cuddy arrives and Nick describes her and Thirteen, much to House’s amusement since he paged Cuddy. Foreman and Thirteen run the tests and discuss sexual attraction, then ask Nick about his voting record. He admits he never votes and they notice a black spot near the brain stem. They recommend steroid treatment to see if it clears up.

Taub is in the cafeteria obsessing about his nose to Kutner. He wonders if anyone else thinks it’s too big and notes the social contract means most people will lie so he’ll lie to them. House eats with Wilson and wonders why he feels compelled to be so nice. Wilson admits he’s playing racquetball with Taub but didn’t want to rub it in that House couldn’t do it. He storms off, angry.

Nick’s kidneys start to shut down and Foreman puts him on dialysis. The team goes back over the symptoms but House is more interested in interrogating Taub about his racquetball date with Wilson. Taub suggests diabetes and House orders a test for neurological damage… on the daughter. He sends Kutner to do it and has Taub to do the blood draws every couple of hours. House insists he’s punishing him because he’s lying just like Wilson is.

As Kutner administers the heat/cold tests to Marika, Ashley admits she’s not sure if Nick is the man she always knew. Marika screams in pain and admits she didn’t say anything because she thought it would help her father. Meanwhile, Taub takes the blood tests while Nick explains he has ignoble thoughts that he doesn’t want to share with his wife. When he says he never cheated on Ashley, he notices Taub looking guilty and figures he cheated on his wife.

House summons Taub to the morgue since it’s the only room large enough for him to demonstrate his racquetball skills. He blackmails Taub into doing it and Taub makes a mess of things. The blood draws test negative for diabetes. Taub messes up and he claims that he’s trying to suck up to Wilson. House doesn’t believe that either and tells Taub to have Kutner run more tests. As Kutner explains, Nick says that Marika doesn’t have an auditory disability: she’s simply below average. Marika runs away, angry, and Ashley goes after him. Nick’s lungs start to fill with fluid as his temperature goes up.

The team concludes the fever is from an infection aggravated by the steroid treatment. House has Kutner go over Nick’s medical history and then sends Taub to see Wilson. Taub invites Wilson to lunch but admits that House sent him as a double-agent. Kutner checks Nick and notices a redness of the eyes. Nick asks Ashley to leave, warning that he doesn’t know what he’s going to say next. Kutner finds House watching Wilson’s office and tells him that he’s determined Ashley recently rescued a stray dog. He figures that the dog marked his territory and contaminated Nick’s juice, causing an infection. House agrees and orders doxycycline. Taub comes out and admits to House that he told Wilson what was going on. Wilson let Taub print out his e-mails and Taub admits he printed Wilson’s deleted e-mails. Among them is an e-mail to a J. Gonzalez at a hospital in New York and there’s a Gonzalez who works in oncology. House wonders why Wilson would go to see an oncologist three hours away and Taub wonders if Wilson might be depressed. House doesn’t believe it.

Nick shows improvement from the doxycycline but Kutner and Foreman warn him that he’ll have to live with the existing damage caused by the infection. They tell him they’d need to remove the damaged section and it’s risky, but Nick insists on getting treatment and orders them out.

Wilson comes in from outside without his coat. House is waiting for him and tells him he knows about Gonzalez. He wonders why Wilson left his coat behind and chose to be uncomfortable. Wilson snaps at him and insists he might just not want every bit of his life examined by House.

House finds Nick in his office. Nick asks for the surgery so he can have his normal life back. House considers and then goes to see Chase. He asks Chase to approach his boss, neurosurgeon Dr. Kapur, and get him to operate. Chase refuses to cooperate until House explains why he cares. House admits that Nick will lose his family and alienate his co-workers and any friends he manages to make. Chase agrees to do what he can.

Chase and Kapur operate while House watches from the gallery. Wilson comes in to apologize to House for overreacting. House informs him that he checked and there’s a Gonzalez who is a nurse on the psych ward. Wilson’s brother, a schizophrenic, is on new anti-psychotics and Wilson is going to visit him that night so they can talk. Wilson explains they don’t have the normal social contract and he knows House won’t lie out of sympathy. House admits he’s right and things could go wrong, then asks if Wilson wants some company.

Foreman and Taub check on Nick after the surgery. He’s in good physical condition but still suffering from disinhibition. He starts insulting Audrey again and his temperature drops. Audrey demands answers from him and he has no choice but to answer.

The team goes back over the case and discovers that House is gone and isn’t answering his phone. Foreman orders a full body scan despite the fact it will take longer than they have before Nick dies of hypothermia. Meanwhile, Wilson and House wait at the psych ward in New York. Wilson explains that he caught a glimpse of his brother once at Princeton and that’s why he took the job when House mentioned it.

The team goes over the scans and they find a cyst and prepare to treat it. Taub texts their plan to House, who is busy analyzing Wilson. He figures Wilson left his coat behind so he could feel the weather like his brother, and he feels guilty about something. Wilson admits that Daniel called him throughout college when Wilson was in med school. Wilson finally hung up on him so he could study. The next day he got word that Daniel ran away without his medications. House figures that Wilson has developed his people-pleasing skills as an overreaction. He tries to assure his friend that Daniel overreacted but then remembers that Nick’s glucose was normal. House calls the team and Daniel is forced to go see his brother on his own. House explains that the cyst is a fibroma which is acting as insulin, lowering his glucose. The fibroma is normally benign but Nick’s body is fighting against it, causing the other symptoms. House tells them to remove the fibroma and then turns to discover that Wilson has left.

Later, a cured Nick is checking out and apologizes to Taub. Ashley comes to get him and tells him she has a new position. He congratulates her and Ashley takes him out while saying that Marika has probably forgotten the entire thing.

House talks to Wilson, who says he’ll be talking to Daniel next week and would like House to meet him. Wilson admits that his brother is just a stranger now and the whole thing was anti-climactic. House wonders if it bothers Wilson that they don’t have a social contract, and Wilson admits that it’s a relief to have someone he doesn’t have to worry about lying to. As they leave, House tells him the absolute truth: it won’t be Wilson’s fault if things go badly for his brother.

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