"Hey Doyle, think fast!"

Maggie barely had time to duck after the warning before a snowball flew over her head, hitting the side of the building and exploding on impact. "What the hell, Morris?" she asked, looking over at the ER's chief resident in annoyance.

She'd come out to the ambulance bay for a few minutes just to clear her head - and her lungs. She had just finished treating a 65 year-old woman who had come into the ER complaining of shortness of breath; just by the smell alone Maggie figured that the woman probably smoked like a chimney. It was all she could do not to gag as she'd examined her, and as soon as her patient had been sent upstairs for a chest film Maggie had darted outside for some fresh air.

Only to find herself nearly assaulted by Morris' snowball.

"C'mon, Maggie, where's your winter spirit?" asked Archie as he bent down to make another snowball.

"Stuck under the smog," Maggie retorted, inhaling deeply in order to clear her lungs and head. Morris nodded in understanding; Maggie hadn't been the only one to notice the odor of cigarette smoke from her patient. Her sarcasm to the contrary she truly did like this time of year. She'd already taken Inga ice skating as an after-Christmas treat, before Christmas break ended.

After a few more minutes, and several more deep breaths, Maggie felt ready to head back inside; besides, her patient would probably be back from x-ray by now. Before she headed inside she looked over at Morris who was still in the ambulance bay talking to one of the ER interns. Smirking, Maggie bent over and stealthily scooped up a handful of snow, packing it into a ball.

"Hey Morris, heads up!" Morris yelped as Maggie's snowball hit him in the shoulder. Grinning, she waved at him before slipping back inside.

Thanksgiving with a picky eater is not easy, let me tell you. This year, like we always have, Inga and I had dinner at my parents' house, with my brother and a couple of his housemates. And it was a battle to get Inga to eat everything on her plate. She didn't want any cranberry sauce, didn't want to eat the sweet potatoes and forget about trying the green bean casserole. The only things she was interested in eating was the turkey and the rolls. Oh, and the pumpkin pie. She definitely had no problem with the pumpkin pie.

Despite my protests to let me handle it, Mom and Dad tried everything to get Inga to eat more of her Thanksgiving dinner. Mom even busted out that old chestnut about children in some third-world country who would be glad to have the food that Inga wasn't eating. Somehow, someway, we managed to convince Inga to eat at least half of what was on her plate. After that she said she was full (although not too full for pie).

An hour after we got home, as I was getting Inga ready for bed, she told me she was hungry again.

Contrary to the belief of some of my coworkers, I do have my own share of fears; after all, I'm just as human as the rest of them (no matter what they may have heard).

The worst fear I've ever felt was after my sister and her husband went missing over five years ago. It was supposed to be a simple trip out to California; Dave's company had sent him out there on business, and he decided to take Mary along and turn the trip into a second honeymoon for the two of them. Good plan, fairly straightforward, nothing out of the ordinary.

None of us had any idea that three days after they left, everything would go to hell in a hand basket.

I lived in fear for nearly a month after my brother-in-law's body was found, while the authorities and my own parents searched Los Angeles for any trace of Mary. My biggest fear was that Mary was alive and in hiding, because she had been the one who murdered Dave. It frightened me to think that my sweet older sister was a killer, and even moreso to think that I had missed it.

When Mary's body was found in January, I think I was actually relieved.

A chorus of groans and jeers went up from the crowd gathered around the table at Ike's, halting Morris' tale right in its tracks. "What?" he asked cluelessly.

"Come on, Morris. 'It was a dark and stormy night', really?" Grady said. "You can't get more cliche than that." He and Sanchez exchanged a high five for his burn on Morris. From her seat a few feet away Maggie rolled her eyes, and wondered not for the first time how she had been roped into this.

"This" was Halloween at County General, the brainchild the new head of the Pedes unit. In past years the staff at County had made do with helping the kids who had to spend October 31 there go trick or treating from floor to floor. Sometimes staff from other units, like the ER, would be asked to help but usually all of the staff on Pediatrics was able to handle everything.

But that was before the coming of Dr. Wendy Murphy and all of her new and bright ideas. For Halloween they included decorating the Pedes ward like a haunted house (tame enough to not frighten the patients too badly, of course), a costume contest and, the event at which Morris was apparently failing, scary storytelling.

"Someone's gotta know a good one," continued Grady. Spying Maggie he said, "Hey Maggie, how about you?"

Momentarily caught off guard at being singled out, Maggie quickly recovered. "I think I might know one," she replied, smirking back at the ER intern.

"Uh, as long as it's clean," Sam reminded as Maggie pulled her chair closer. "Most of our audience is going to be under fourteen."

"Don't worry, Sam; it'll be appropriate," Maggie assured her. "It's called 'Taily Bone.'" She waited for Morris, Grady and Sanchez to stop snickering before beginning the tale. "It was a dark and stormy night - and so help me Grady, if you say one word I will come over there and slug you - and an old man was sitting alone in his cabin, making stew. But he didn't have any meat to put into the stew. Well, it just so happened that a big possum crawled down into the chimney over the stew pot. Thinking quickly, the man grabbed his carving knife and cut off the possum's tail. The tail fell into the stew pot, and the old man cooked it with his stew."

Maggie made her voice softer as she continued. "Later that evening, after the man had eaten his dinner, he heard something scratching at his front door. 'Taily bone...taily bone...I want my taily bone...'," she said in a Southern accent. "Then, the man heard something scratching at his window. 'Taily bone...taily bone...I want my taily bone...'"

She was speaking even softer now, enough so that her audience had to lean in to hear her. "And then...the man heard something scratching inside of his chimney. 'Taily bone...taily bone...I want my taily bone...and I want it NOW!"

Maggie yelled rather than whispered the final word of the story, and at the same time jumped out of her chair and slammed her hand onto the table like she was going to pounce on Grady. Everyone gathered around jumped in fright, but only Grady yelped and almost fell out of his own chair. Maggie sat back down, arms folded across her chest, smirking.

"Not bad, Doyle," he conceded once he'd caught his breath.

"Maggie! Maggie, over here!"

Catching a glimpse of Jeanie waving to her from a booth as she walked through the doorway at Ike's, Maggie waved back and quickly made her way over.

The two women had managed to keep in touch over the last three years, ever since that day when they'd run into each other in the ER. Usually it was by way of e-mail or the occasional phone call, but every so often Maggie and Jeanie managed to find enough time in their busy schedules to have lunch together.

The waitress came over to take their orders almost as soon as Maggie had sat down, so conversation had to wait for a moment. After she had gone Maggie turned to look at Jeanie, "How's Carlos?" the first words out of her mouth.

The smile Jeanie gave her was bittersweet, and didn't quite meet her eyes. "He's hanging in there," she answered. "He hasn't been able to make it to school the last couple of months, so he's got a tutor coming in four times a week. What about you; anything new? How's Inga?"

Maggie recognized Jeanie's attempt at changing the subject but didn't call her on it. Even in front of a friend it was difficult for Jeanie to discuss her son's failing health. So she went along with it. "We're doing great. Inga started second grade a few weeks ago; she has regular classes for half of the day and cross-cat for the other half. So far everything seems to be working out."

"That's great!" exclaimed Jeanie. "Anything else?"

"Well, Banfield's still after me to start publishing and I think I actually might get something out by the end of the year, now that my schedule has settled down a bit..."

Recently Inga's developed a new habit that neither of us are thrilled with - falling out of bed. (At least it's not wetting the bed.) It usually happens once or twice a night, whether I'm at home, the sitter's there or she's spending the night at Mom and Dad's. She's never had any nightmares before she falls (at least, none that she's told me about) so that cause is ruled out.

It wasn't until a couple of nights ago, however, that I found out about my daughter's ingenious way of dealing with the problem. She was supposed to be getting ready for bed and I assumed that was what she was doing, until I happened to look out the corner of my eye and saw her dragging a spare blanket from the linen closet to her bedroom. Curious, I followed Inga to her room to see what she was up to.

What she was doing, it turned out, was building herself a safety net. Inga had piled not only a few extra blankets but some spare pillows on the side of her bed that wasn't up against the wall. Her logic was pretty sound, too, when I asked her about it: "So I have a soft place to land when I fall out of bed."

Well, I couldn't very well argue with that so I let Inga go ahead and finish fixing up her nest before putting her to bed. Even though I knew the chances of my being woken up in the middle of the night to help Inga back into bed were pretty good that night, I have to admit that knowing my daughter had a softer place to land put my mind a little more at ease.

Letting go of Emily was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do. Even five years after she went to live with her other grandparents I still feel her absence.

Mary and Dave's living will stipulated that if anything were to happen to them then custody of Emily would be given to Dave's parents. Emily had been living with me since before her parents disappeared, because they had asked me to babysit while they went on their second honeymoon.

I wanted to sue for custody of Emily. I wanted her to stay with me in Chicago rather than moving to Schaumburg where her other grandparents were. Emily had lived in Chicago her entire life; her friends where there, her school her family. I was halfway convinced that Emily would be better off staying with me rather than Dave's parents.

But after a while I realized that maybe living with me wasn't the best thing for Emily. Not with the hours I worked in the ER, working three weeks of day shifts followed by three weeks of nights before my schedule changed all over again. Em needed someone who would be there every day when she came home after school, not having to spend her afternoons doing homework in the staff lounge or hanging out in an empty apartment until I got off work. She needed to wake up in the same place every night when she had a nightmare instead of hopping between my apartment and Mom and Dad's house.

So, I kept my mouth shut about my true feelings. When the day came for Emily to leave I wasn't sure that I'd be strong enough to let her go out the door. But somehow I did it. And over time I've accepted that I did the right thing.

It's late at night. The phone rings. Who is it and what do they want?

She thought it was a dream at first. No, strike that; she hoped it was a dream. She prayed that she was dreaming that her phone was ringing at - quick check of her alarm clock - 2:30 in the morning on the night when she and Inga had gotten back from a Doyle Family Reunion down state.

But no. She wasn't. The phone really was ringing.

Damnit all to hell.

Although she was sorely tempted to let the call go to the answering machine, with a groan she rolled over and grabbed the receiver before the machine could pick up. "Hello?" she said, hoping that she didn't sound as incoherent as she felt.

It was Banfield. At least the woman had the decency to sound apologetic for waking Maggie up.

"No, it's okay; I've only been asleep for a couple of hours." Okay, that was a lie on Maggie's part - she'd actually managed to get in about four hours of sleep since she and Inga had gotten home from vacation - but Banfield didn't need to know that. "What's up?"

It was just what Maggie was afraid of: Banfield needed her to come in to work.

"Seriously?" Maggie groaned. "Cate, we just got back, like, five hours ago and it took me an hour to get Inga into bed. I- I'm literally still running on fumes here. Can't you find somebody else? What about Grady? Or Laverne? Hell, what about Carter?"

A second groan was suppressed as Maggie dropped her head back onto her pillow in frustration. For each name she brought up Banfield had a reason why she couldn't have called them. Admittedly they were good reasons, like Laverne already being on-shift and Grady out with food poisoning, but still...

"All right, all right. Can you at least give me half an hour to shower, and get Inga up and ready?" She caved. Running on only four hours' sleep there was only so much that Maggie could stand. "Yeah. Yeah, okay. Thanks, Cate."

Hanging up the phone, Maggie stretched and tried to wake up. "Little girl's not going to be happy about this," she muttered to herself as she got out of bed and shuffled to the bathroom.

Muse: Maggie Doyle
Fandom: ER
Word count: 371 (not counting prompt)

There are five graves located in the Doyle family "area" of Mount Olivet Cemetery. Two graves belong to my grandparents, two belong to my older sister Mary and her husband, Dave. The fifth has a headstone, but there is no one buried there. That is the grave of James Doyle, dad's brother and my brother Jimmy's namesake. But unlike the first four graves, there's no one buried in Uncle James' grave.

James was Dad's younger brother who served in the US Army. Uncle James disappeared in 1974 when his unit was attacked by Vietcong. Most of the soldiers were killed or wounded but there were a few that were unaccounted for, including James. Our family was told that James had more than likely been taken prisoner by the Vietcong. A couple of years later James was officially declared dead by the U.S. Army.

Even though Uncle James had been declared dead, his body was never recovered. Regardless of that the family had a memorial service for him. Grandma and Grandpa purchased the burial plot and the tombstone, just in case his body was ever found.

I didn't know Uncle James very well; I was pretty young when he and his unit were sent over to Vietnam in the early 70s. Most of what I do know about him I heard from my grandparents when they were alive, from my dad and a little bit from Mary. He was a pretty funny guy from what I remember; he always had a new knock-knock joke for Mary and me every time he visited.

It doesn't feel weird to me knowing that Uncle James' grave is empty, probably because I've known that fact since I was old enough to understand it. Or maybe it's because I was so young when he went away.

I'm for it. And I'm not saying that just because I'm the daughter of a cop, either; it's my own personal opinion.

I'm not saying that everyone who commits a crime should be put on death row. That would be overkill (my apologies for the unintentional pun). I believe it should only be reserved for the worst and most heinous of criminals, like serial killers or child murderers.

I remember reading a newspaper story a couple of months ago about a family in Illinois that was passing a petition around their town to deny parole to the man convicted of kidnapping, torturing and murdering their teenage son. The murder occurred in the 1970s, and every three years since the mid 1990s this monster has been eligible for parole. He's been denied parole every time thanks to the efforts of the family and friends of his victim, not to mention the community. But when I think of the pain this poor boy's family must go through every time, reliving the original crime, it just makes me see red. If this creep had been sentenced to death and then the sentence had been carried out, then they wouldn't have to relive that grief.

That's the way I see it, anyway.

I like to think that I don't play favorites, but I suppose I do without realizing it.

I know that there are some co-workers I get along with better than others, nurses and med students I prefer working with over others. It's my belief that if the doctor has a good relationship, or at least a good rapport, with the nurse he or she is working with then the visit to the ER goes smoothly for everyone, especially the patient. It's the same way when running a trauma; I'm sure it hasn't been scientifically proven, but I'm sure that having the right combination of people in a trauma room can mean the difference between life and death.

And there are some medical students in our current batch that, I'll admit, I tend to favor above others. They're the ones who catch on quickly, who actually pay attention and focus on what they're learning. And they don't irritate me; that's always key.

How do you act during a break-up?

Not very well, I must admit.

Even though I was the one who had initiated it, I didn't handle my break-up with Amy all that wonderfully. For days I was irritable, lost my temper easily; I was extremely lucky that none of my patients were on the receiving end of any of my tantrums or else my medical career would have ended long before I ever got to County.

It didn't help that Amy seemed to put it all behind her so quickly; while I was still fuming over the end of our relationship, she was already dating another woman. It shouldn't have been that surprising, now that I think back on it, considering that technically Amy had already started seeing that other woman while we were still together.

Oddly enough, I think transferring to County did more to help me get over the break-up than anything else. Being in a new environment and around people who didn't know about my past history with Amy (or even knew that I was a lesbian) helped as well.

By the time that Carter and I ran into Amy and her new girlfriend that day at the shooting range, I was almost completely over her.

There's one that my grandmother, God rest her soul, always used to whip out at every opportunity. "A watched pot never boils, Margaret," she'd always say. She'd always use my full name too, no matter how many times that I told her to call me by my nickname; drove me absolutely nuts.

But, I'm getting off track. I realize now what she really meant, that being impatient never pays off in the long run. It's something that I've learned many times over in the course of my career as an ER doctor. And it's not so much the impatience of my patients that annoys me, but the entitled attitudes of some who seem to believe that they can demand my full attention, as if I don't have any other patients to tend to but them.

When I was younger I actually tried to test that old cliche: I filled a pot with water, put it on the stove, turned the stove on then stepped back to watch, wait and see if it boiled or not. Sure enough it started boiling as I was watching it. I can't tell you how smug I was the next time I saw my grandmother and told her that, oh yes, a watched pot does boil.

The greatest gift I've ever received was the chance to become a mother.

Four years ago this month I signed a piece of paper that named me as Inga's legal guardian. Four years ago this month a little orphan girl that nobody wanted in the long term became Inga Doyle. And so far it's been the best four years of my life.

I know, I know; the whole thing sounds horribly cliche. I'm sure if certain people who knew me well enough could read this right now they'd be wondering, "Who is this woman, and what has she done with Maggie Doyle?" Don't worry; I'm still myself. This is just another facet of me.

To be honest motherhood was a milestone in my life I didn't think I would reach. Not because of my orientation, but because part of me still held to the ideal of a traditional family; children raised by two loving parents.

Two. Plural. Not one, on her own.

But you know what? Inga and I make a pretty damn good family, just the two of us.

What most everybody else in this country is listening to right now: Christmas music. And non-stop too, or at least it seems like it. If I don't have it on at home as I decorate, then its playing somewhere at work.

I'll just come right out and admit it: I love a good Christmas carol. There's just something about Christmas music that makes me feel different; happier, almost brighter in a way. There are very few Christmas songs that I don't like, not like mainstream music which has several genres that make me change the radio station with extreme prejudice.

I will admit that I do tend to favor older stuff as opposed to versions of songs done by newer artists out there today. Things like Nat King Cole singing 'The Christmas Song', Andy Williams proclaiming 'It's The Most Wonderful Time of the Year' or Eartha Kitt belting out 'Santa Baby' - that's what I grew up listening to, the Christmas music that played in the Doyle household every year from the first of December to Epiphany Sunday. That's part of what symbolizes Christmas for me.

The last time I ran was almost a month ago, in the Bank of America Chicago Marathon.

I'm not really the marathon type of person; hell, I'm barely even a regular runner. Sometimes I'll go for short runs, like in the morning if I have the day off or I don't go in until the afternoon or evening I'll run around a few blocks of my neighborhood. Other than that, the most I ever run is at work to the ambulance bay or the ER during a trauma.

And yet, somehow, I got myself roped into running all over the entire city of Chicago.

I'm still not quite sure how it happened. I guess if I wanted to blame somebody it would be Anspaugh. The way I understand it, somebody from surgery was supposed to be running in the marathon to raise money for the Chicago Children's Hospital but had to drop out; all I know is that Anspaugh was going around asking various staff members at County whether or not they ran, and the minute I answered "A little-" Anspaugh practically signed me up on the spot.

So, how did it go? I'd like to say that I was one of the first people to finish, that I won a boatload of money for the Children's Hospital, that I might have set a record of some kind. Sadly, I did none of those things. Yeah, I helped raise money for my charity but I barely managed to finish within the 6 1/2 hour mark that rated an official time.

Thank God I had the next two days off to recuperate. I don't think I would have been able to run even halfway down the hallway to Trauma 1 if I had to after that race.

Drinking.

More specifically, the idea that drinking makes you cool and that drinking a lot makes you really cool. Or that it gives you more confidence/makes you more attractive/whatever other myths about alcohol exist out there in the ether.

Take it from someone who has had to take care of way too many drunk and disorderlies, and has seen too many kids come into the ER and die from alcohol poisoning - liquor does none of those things. It turns smart people into fools, and idiots into bigger idiots.

I blame commercials like the Dos Equis ad with "The Most Interesting Man in the World", that make alcohol look cool and give people the impression that they can be just as interesting if they drink the liquor that's advertised. Sure, the companies think they're being responsible by including some variation on "Please enjoy responsibly" at the end of the commercials. But it's the television equivalent of the fine print: no one really pays attention to it.

I haven't started publishing yet.

I've heard it countless times, from Banfield and from Carter; from Anspaugh and even Dubenko. I need to start submitting papers to medical journals for publication if I want to get ahead in my job, if someday I want to gain tenure here at County.

Honestly? I would love to do that. I can come up with about half a dozen ideas for papers off the top of my head. The problem is I don't have the time to actually sit down and write. I have work, of course. When I'm not working in the ER then I'm at home taking care of my daughter, whether it's doing her physical therapy or simply cooking dinner. By the time Inga goes to bed I'm too exhausted to do anything but sit and read or watch TV before I go to sleep myself.

So, for now, publishing just isn't in the cards for me.

Miracle of miracles I actually have a weekend off, so Inga and I are going to get out of the city. Our first and last chance at a real vacation before school starts next month.

I haven't worked out our exact itinerary yet but I do know that we're heading up northeast to Rockford, to some of the places that Mom and Dad took Mary, Jimmy and I when we were kids. I want to go visit the Tinker Swiss Cottage and Midway Village. Inga's been chattering non-stop for the past couple of days about "Jane the Dinosaur" at Burpee Museum, so we'll probably be heading there too.

Considering that this is the first significant amount of time off I'd been able to get for a while, I am stoked about the trip. I don't have to worry about patients, charts, or anything else to do with County for the next few days; all I have to worry about is being a mom.

That, and what restaurants we're going to eat supper at.

"What've you got to be so cheerful about?"

I've been hearing this question a lot lately, and the answer is fairly simple: Inga.

Every day my little girl is giving me countless reasons to be cheerful. Most would say that the odds have been against Inga from the very beginning: she was the smallest and weakest of a set of twins and was abandoned by her biological parents when they returned to their home country because they believed that she'd have a better life here in the United States. When I met her she was a cranky two year-old with an ear infection who had been brought to the ER by her social worker. At the time I had no inkling that by Christmas Inga and I would be a family.

It hasn't been an easy four years, but I wouldn't say that they've been extremely difficult either. Inga and I have both had our shares of setbacks and stressors, from physical therapy and braces to schedule juggling and going through four babysitters. And we've pulled through it (sometimes by the skin of our teeth, especially with the sitters).

Inga turned six at the beginning of the year. In the fall she starts first grade; she won't be completely mainstreamed, but we're excited nonetheless. Everyone in our household is happy and healthy; yes, even the cat.

I'd say that's plenty to be cheerful about.