Directed by: Jim Hayman
Written by: Pamela Davis and Leonard Dick
Some factory workers are arguing about some personal matter when one of them falls on a conveyor belt, foaming at the mouth and perilously close to a guillotine blade.
The patient turns out to be a 16-year-old girl (emancipated minor) with fluid in her lungs. After investigating, the team discovers a bong in her apartment, and that her name is Sofia Vallet.
After the MRI, Dr. Kutner figures out that the patient's parents are not actually dead. She admits that she wishes they were dead: her father raped her, and her mother looked the other way.
Thirteen tells the patient about her diagnosis with Huntington's. The patient counters with "Have you ever been raped?"
Dr. Foreman heads up a clinical drug trial, but House doesn't approve.
While Dr. Wilson is scrubbing up for surgery, House talks to him about his visit to Dr. Cuddy's house in the previous episode.
Thirteen tracks down the patient's parents and visits them. There is a girl at that house, about Sofia's age, and her name is also Sofia Vallet. The patient is an identity thief who forged her emancipation papers.
House gets the patient to confess that she killed her brother. Apparently, the patient hoped that someone would tell her it was just an accident.
This episode contains examples of the following tropes:
- Accidental Child-Killer Backstory: House's teenage patient needs a bone marrow transplant from a family member, but she lies about her identity to avoid seeing her parents. House guesses that something happened that makes her think she doesn't deserve to live, so she confesses that she ran away from home because her little brother drowned in the bathtub when she was supposed to be looking after him. She assumes her parents must hate her, but House convinces her to call them by pointing out they really will hate her if she lets herself die.
- Dr. Foreman has an "Eureka!" Moment while talking to Dr. Cameron and Dr. Chase over coffee in the hospital cafeteria.
- Münchausen Syndrome by proxy: Dr. Chase mentions this as a possible diagnosis.
