A/N: You know, I intended to get this out days after I ended season three, and I don't know what happened. Life, I guess. So sorry, everyone!

Turning Tables

When One Heart Opens

With only one day left before Christmas, the church looked like a holiday bomb had exploded. Gold garland garnished the pulpit, while strands of silver garland flanked the backs of the pews and on either end of each pew were large bouquets of poinsettias. Just off to the right of the church organ was a seven foot Douglas fir Christmas tree. The latter was decked tip to trunk in tinsel, 101 Dalmatians McDonald's happy meal dogs that had been strung with embroidery thread, shiny metal bobbles in every color of the rainbow, plenty of handmade decorations in shapes of crookedly cut stars and macaroni hearts made by the children in Sunday school, and topped with a serene Christmas angel – this year it was a Latina angel, as the church had several and rotated them every year to be ethnically inclusive – whose wings lit in time with the blinking of the lights.

The new reverend was speaking – new being debatable, since he'd been at the church for over six months now, yet he still felt like a diet replacement for Reverend Stone – but he was a dull background noise to Grace Bowman's thoughts, which were currently on her son. She felt guilty for being at church when he was all alone in the hospital, still in critical condition just the same as he had been since his birth ten days earlier. He'd actually worsened within the first three days that he'd been in the NICU, but he'd evened out and had neither improved nor worsened in the week that had followed.

Grace had been allowed to leave after three days in the hospital and for the first week following the birth, she'd been sentenced to Percocet for the pain and had been gradually trying to wean herself off them and onto Ibuprofen except for during the night, so she wouldn't be too wiped out on painkillers over the holiday. She'd also spent exorbitant amounts of time either in the NICU, watching her son from behind the shield of an incubator. This had gone on for so long that both Dr. Ottavi and her mother had come together and insisted she spend some time resting in her own bed, with the promise that Dr. Ottavi would call if there was any change in the newborn's condition.

"…and lastly, I would like us all to take a moment to pray for the safe and speedy recovery of Miss Bowman's little boy."

Kathleen Bowman touched her daughter's shoulder, distracting the seventeen-year-old from her plaguing guilt.

Grace closed her eyes and bowed her head, imagining her little boy's still body in her mind's eye. It was difficult for her to be at church for a special pre-Christmas sermons that her mother had been dragging her to all week, let alone praying to the God who had allowed so much pain to befall her young life. First her father, then Grant, and now her son all in the space of a year-and-a-half period. She thought her faith had been tested before, but with death looming over a second member of her family – one she hadn't even gotten to know – she couldn't bring herself to ask God for help again, because as far as she was concerned, He was no longer listening.

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"So I guess you paid the electric bill."

"Yeah, didn't I tell you that? I'm sure I told you that," Ben Boykewich said, squinting as though he wasn't as sure as he wanted to be. "But maybe with everything that's happened this week–"

"You did tell me," Adrian Lee interrupted. "But what you failed to mention was that it doubled since last month. Last month which was twenty bucks more than the month before that!"

"I'm sorry."

"You're sorry? Really, Ben? You're so sorry that you were going to tell me when, exactly?"

Ben wilted like a tulip left in a hot car. "The first time was an accident. I lost the bill, so I just sent the same amount from the bill before. They contacted me after and said I'd underpaid and it was only by twenty dollars, so it didn't seem like something big enough to stress you out about so I just paid it."

"And the second time?"

"I didn't know how to tell you. I knew you'd be upset."

"And you'd be right! I can't believe I had to find out by calling the electric company because I thought this month's bill hadn't arrived at all. You can't hide things like this from me! Ben, we're living together, we're supposed to be a team. How can we be a team if you're keeping secrets from me?"

"I'm sorry," he repeated guiltily.

Adrian rubbed her head exasperatedly. "What are we going to do about this?" she asked, not truly expecting an answer.

"I guess we'll need to work at keeping the heat down, turning the lights off, and not falling asleep with the TV on." Ben came to sit down on the couch beside his girlfriend. "It's going to be fine, Adrian. I know it's a hundred dollars, but I can just take it out of my savings. As long as this doesn't become the norm, it'll be okay."

"But it's not! Ben, if I'd known we had an extra hundred dollars to pay in electricity this month, I would've done our Christmas shopping differently. I wouldn't have splurged, I would've bought less expensive gifts. You should've told me."

"I know. I see that now and I don't know what else I can say. I really am sorry, Adrian. You know I'm still new to this budget thing. I wasn't trying to hurt you, I just – I just screwed up. That's all I can say."

"I guess it is." Adrian pressed her palms to the edge of the couch cushion and pushed herself into a standing position. "Look, I was going to pick up Heather and we were going to drop by Grace's to see how she's doing, so can you keep Mercy? The last thing Grace needs is a baby running around her room."

"Sure," Ben nodded, feeling like their previous conversation was still unfinished. "Give her my best."

"I will."

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"How's Palm Springs?" Ricky Underwood asked, watching one of his best friends, Ashley Juergens, from the monitor on his laptop.

"Warmer than Valley Glen," Ashley replied with a grin.

"And what about your grandmother?"

"She keeps asking Amy when she dyed her hair."

"What?"

"She thinks Amy's my mom."

Ricky nodded. "Awkward."

"Eugene is doing better though," she said, referring to her grandmother's husband. "His hip healed up better than the doctors expected after his fall back in May, but it still hurts him when there's cold weather. He says he's a weather rod now because he can predict when a storm's coming in. Eugene seems to think that now that he's back on his feet, he can continue taking care of Mimsy full time again, but my mom has her doubts."

"What's she gonna do?"

Ashley shrugged on screen, then there was a shout in the background but it was impossible to tell who the voice belonged to. She turned her head away from the screen, then back again with a scowl. "I gotta go," she sighed. "Talk to you tonight?"

"Catch ya later, Ash." When the screen went black, Ricky reached up to turn off his webcam. Soon after there was a knock at his door. "It's unlocked!"

Margaret Shakur descended the stairs. "I wanted to talk to you about Heather's Christmas present."

"You mean the lack of present?" Ricky grunted. "I feel really bad that you already paid for it and now we can't even take her. Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to blame this on Grace, it just sucks. Everything about this last week-and-a-half sucks."

"Actually," Margaret winked, "I managed to pull a few strings."

Ricky lifted a curious brow. "Seriously?"

"I guess there is some magic left in the season, because a message was left on my phone yesterday. We're being given the option to reschedule, so what do you think?"

Ricky picked up his cell phone to consult his calendar. "Heather's birthday isn't until May and Spring Break doesn't happen until April." He mulled over the months. "There aren't any major breaks between now and the end of the school year. There's Martin Luther King Day on the seventeenth, but that might be too soon. Grant's trial starts this month."

"Presidents' Day is a three day weekend," Margaret suggested.

"Third week of February," Ricky nodded. "It's not as good as a full week–"

"But better than nothing."

"You want to book it?"

"After I confirm it with your father," Margaret nodded.

Ricky made an electronic note in his calendar and set aside his phone. "She's going to freak. I just hope she likes her replacement gift until we can spring this on her."

Margaret rested her hand on his knee. "I trust she will."

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"Going somewhere?" Adrian asked, her heels rooted in the middle of the former Bowman guest house while her head rotated a near three-hundred-sixty degrees as she watched her best friend scurry around the room.

"You know perfectly well the answer to that," Grace remarked.

Adrian finally uprooted herself and cornered Grace as the blonde pulled a protein shake out of the fridge. "Grace. Come on, this isn't good for you and you know it."

"So you're telling me I shouldn't go and see him at the hospital?" Grace snapped.

"I'm not saying that, but look at what it's doing to you. This is why your mom and Dr. Ottavi told you to go home and rest. You're wearing yourself down to nub."

Grace slammed the refrigerator door and tossed the vanilla protein shake into her backpack, which already contained various books, snack foods, a few sharpened pencils, notebook paper, and her pain medications. "Can you look me in the eyes and tell me you wouldn't be offended right now if it was Mercy in critical condition and I was standing here telling you not to go be with her?"

Adrian deflated in a single breath and stepped back to allow Grace to continue packing. "Still no change?" she asked quietly.

"No," Grace said in a whisper. She zipped up her backpack and threw it over her shoulders.

"At least let me give you a ride so you don't have to take the bus," Adrian said, knowing that Grace shouldn't be driving because of her stitches and medications.

Grace withered under her friend's insistence. "Fine." But she didn't wait for Adrian, she just beelined right out the door and waited at the red convertible until the Latina finally got close—presumably after locking up and setting the alarm—enough for her alarm remote to unlock the electric doors. She climbed inside and winced as she pulled the seatbelt around her aching stomach. When Adrian got in, Grace turned her face to the window and stared at the road as they drove. She was thankful when Adrian didn't turn on the radio, because the only thing that seemed to be on every channel was Christmas music, but this year she couldn't stand it. The fact that "Silent Night" got played at least five times on every station, every day, was the worst.

"You can just pull up to the doors," Grace said, motioning her hand when Adrian finally turned into the hospital parking lot. "They only allow family into the NICU anyway. And even at that, they don't allow us to spend the night," she added bitterly. The blonde pushed the door open even before the car had completely stopped and got out without a goodbye.

"What time do you want me to—"

Grace cut her off: "I'll call my mom."

Adrian nodded. "Okay. I – I hope he's doing better."

"Yeah," Grace muttered before shutting the door and heading through the electronic doors. She made it up to the elevator, only to be flagged down by Jason Treacy. Her silver eyes nearly bugged out of her head when she saw him. "Jason! Wh – what are you doing here?"

"Waiting for you," he smiled and then instinctively moved in for a hug, but stopped himself. "Is a hug okay?" he asked.

Grace felt her eyes grow hot as she contemplated his question. "I – I think so," she said, unsure. She let him wrap his arms around her, holding her like a priceless museum piece. Tentatively, she slid her arms around him in return, instantly breathing in the cologne he wore on their first official date. She shuddered and pulled away.

"I'm sorry," Jason said. "Did I–"

"The stitches," she lied. "They're sensitive."

Jason nodded. "Right. Sorry." He accompanied her to the elevator.

"How did you know I'd be here?"

"I was visiting my dad and I thought I might drop by to see you, but when I called your mom said you'd already left for the hospital. I haven't been here long, but I was hanging by the front desk so I would see you when you walked in." Jason laughed. "You walked by so fast you didn't even notice me."

Grace stepped into the elevator behind him and pressed the button for her floor. "I just try to get in and out as fast as I can. Nobody wants to be here if they don't have to be, right?"

Jason nodded. "Unless you want to be a doctor."

Grace smiled sadly. "Or that." She scuffed her heels together until the doors opened. "I'm sorry, but the NICU doesn't allow non-family."

Jason stepped out with her. "I know the drill, I've already been up here and turned away. I just wanted to see you…and see how everything was going. I've been meaning to catch you all week, but with the holidays and everything…How is he?" He rolled his eyes. "I say 'he,' but I'm sure he has a name—"

"Actually," Grace said slowly, "he doesn't. Not yet. I know. That must make me a terrible mother from the outset, but right now he's just 'Baby Bowman,' at least according to his wrist bracelet. It's been ten days and I just…I thought about naming him after my dad, but what if I do and then it's bad karma?" Grace shook her head. "I don't know. I just don't even know anymore."

Jason instinctively wrapped his hand around Grace's. "Taking the time to make a good decision doesn't make you a bad mom."

The truth was not so much the decision, but the reality that such a decision would have: she was already attached to her son, there was no denying that, but she couldn't bear the thought of giving a name to that attachment, only to end up carving that name into a headstone shortly thereafter. But Grace didn't want to explain that anyone yet, least of all in the middle of a hospital hallway, so she tugged her hand away and tried to smile. "Thanks. And there's been no change, not since the sixteenth."

Jason nodded. "I'll keep him in my prayers."

"Thank you." Grace fidgeted with the straps of her backpack. "I should get in there."

"Yeah. Tell him I said 'hi.'"

Grace cracked a tiny smile. "I will."

"See you, Grace."

"See you, Jason."

Grace watched him climb back into the elevator and wave as the doors shut. She waited another minute until someone came up and pressed the down arrow, then she buzzed the NICU door, announced herself, and waited until the door clicked to allow her admittance a few moments following. She tried to tunnel her vision, ignoring the other mothers and babies in the NICU, and eventually reached her son's incubator and sat down in a chair beside him.

He looked like a giant compared to most of the other babies in the NICU, many of whom had been born premature. He had a thicket of golden hair atop his head and wore a diaper adorned with little pink and blue monkeys. His bare skin, however, had a yellowish hue that made Grace wish she could just reach inside and bathe him until he was a healthy pink. But the breathing tubes stuck to his mouth with several strips of white medical tape and all the wires connecting to his chest made that impossible.

"Hello, Handsome," Grace whispered as she leaned over to the plastic wall. She saw her breath fog up a circle of plastic and waited until it disappeared. "It's Mommy. Can you hear me? I'm waiting for you to get better, Young Man." Grace sniffed and dug into the front pocket of her backpack, searching for a packet of tissues that was nearly out. She wiped her running nose, dabbed her eyes, then pressed the tips of her fingers to the incubator. "It's time to get better…" She wanted to finish that sentence, but instead her eyes saw the translucent blue band on her son's wrist: Baby Bowman.

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"Something wrong?" Ben asked, pacing back and forth down the hallway. He was on his cell phone and he could hear the faint hum of music from Mercy's room.

"I'd rather not talk about it over the phone," Amy Juergens's voice answered back.

"Fair enough." Ben stopped at Mercy's closed door when he heard the music run out and leaned his ear close to listen. Silence. He carefully walked out of the hallway and into the living room. "How's vacation?"

"It's not really vacation. Everyone's took high strung right now."

Ben chuckled. "In other words, you and your mom?"

"Ha ha."

"I'll take that as a 'yes.'" He heard her snort, but she didn't contradict him.

"Anyway, how about you?"

Ben flung himself back against the cushions. That was something he didn't want to talk about over the phone. Or at all. "Same old, same old. Adrian went to work after she stopped over to see Grace so she won't be home for a while and I just put Mercy down for a nap before I called you."

"Isn't today a Thursday?"

"Yes. Why?"

"I thought you worked Thursdays?"

"It's the twenty-third. My dad gives everyone the twenty-third through the twenty-sixth off every year and runs the shop himself on the day before Christmas Eve and the day after Christmas unless they want to work for overtime."

"And you didn't want to overtime?"

"It's cheaper to stay home with Merce instead of paying the nanny to, because Adrian has to work."

"Oh, yeah. Stanley's a pig like that."

"Yeah." Ben paused and scratched his chin. "Wait, how did you know about Stanley?" He thought he heard an intake of breath on the other end of the line, but he couldn't be sure.

"Grace told me."

"Grace?"

"Yeah, you know. Grace said that's what Adrian told to her."

This time Ben scratched his head. Something felt off about the explanation, but Grace was friends with both Adrian and Amy, so it seemed plausible. "He's a real piece of work," he finally agreed.

"So I've heard. Uh, hey, Ben, sorry, but I have to get going, dinner's nearly ready. I'll talk to you later, 'kay?"

"Tell everyone I said 'hello.'"

"I will. Bye!"

Ben heard the phone disconnect before he even got the chance to reciprocate. He frowned and set his phone on to the coffee table. With Mercy taking a nap, Adrian at work, and Henry having dinner over at Alice's, he had nothing to do. He considered surfing the web, but it didn't appeal, and he'd already tried television, but nothing good was on. He strummed his fingers on the armrest before getting up and heading to the kitchen to see if there was anything he might be able to try his hand at fixing up before Adrian got home.

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"Ten minutes to Christmas Eve," Heather said as Ricky walked into the kitchen and caught her trying to open a bottle of sparkling apple cider with a bottle opener.

"You know those screw off, don't you?"

"Yes, but they like to cut me." She managed to finish prying off the metal top and tossed it into the recycling bin. "Who bought this stuff anyway?" she asked, pouring a large wine glass full of the translucent yellow liquid. "It looks like bubbly pee and it tastes terrible."

Ricky pulled out a coffee mug and wiggled his fingers, motioning for her to pass it to him. "It was a gift from one of Dad's patients. The guy sends it every year because Dad always makes the mistake of sending him an overly gracious thank you card."

"The only apple cider worth buying is Martinelli's and this ain't it."

"It's sugar free," Ricky said grimly. He pressed the mug to his lips and his Adam's apple bobbed until the mug was empty.

"Then why are you drinking it?"

"Why are you?" Ricky challenged as he filled his glass again.

"I'm taking one for the team. You don't really want to drink this stuff with Christmas dinner, do you?" Heather polished off the glass and took the half empty bottle from Ricky to refill her glass.

Ricky snorted.

"What?"

"It's funny, because usually I'm the one who does this."

"Get out."

"Seriously! The first year we got it, Mom opened it for Christmas dinner and refused to open another one until it was gone. You'd think eating it with the other food might wash out the taste in your mouth, but no."

Heather shook her head. "Yeah, my dad bought a bunch of these on clearance after New Year's once. I thought we'd never be rid of them! We tried them with everything. I realized they're best on an empty stomach, before you get a chance to remember what something good tastes like."

Ricky nodded and refilled his mug. As he lifted the glass to his mouth, he let out a belch and heard Heather snicker, then break into a laugh until Heather belched too, putting his to shame. He calmed himself down. "We're laughing at belching. Are we really this juvenile?"

"Maybe, maybe not. Are we sure this stuff is non-alcoholic?"

Ricky laughed again, felt the pressure bubbles rising in his chest, and washed them down with another bitter drink.

Heather turned over the empty bottle and watched as a few stray beads of cider dribbled off the rim of the bottle. She then rinsed it out and dropped it into the recycle. "You can't tell me it's not fun to be a little juvenile sometimes."

"Nope, I cannot."

"Sometimes it's easier to be a juvenile and laugh at dick and fart jokes and belching whatever else juveniles do. Sometimes it's better than being an adult."

"You're not an adult."

"Technicality."

"Touché." Ricky collected his empty mug and her empty glass and began to wash them out in the sink. All of the sudden he hiccupped. A few minutes later, he hiccupped again. "Shit."

"You sound like my first bike horn."

"Shove it."

Heather grabbed the mug from his, finished rinsing it out herself, then poured an obscene amount of sugar into it and filled it partially with water. Using a spoon from the drainer she mixed it into a cloudy swirl and handed it back to Ricky. "Drink."

"Wh – uh – ut?" he asked, interrupted mid-word by another hiccup.

"Sugar water, it'll cure them, trust me."

"That's disg – uh – uh – sting."

"It's kool-aid without the flavoring, now quit bellyaching if you want to get rid of those hiccups."

Ricky pinched his nose and downed the sugar water. Moments later he began to rinse out the cup as he waited for the hiccups to return, but they didn't. He chanced a glance at the redhead and sure enough, she looked as smug as Sherlock Holmes upon solving a mystery.

"Old trick my grandmother taught me."

"She sounds like someone I would have liked."

"You bet your ass she was. Best grandmother e-ver."

The clock from the dining room began to chime and Ricky looked in the direction of the sound, even though he couldn't see the clock from his vantage point. "Sounds like it's officially Christmas Eve."

"Sounds like." Heather put her hands on her hips. "So now what? We go creep into the living room and tear open our presents?"

"My foster brother did that the first year he was here. Never again."

"Ethan?"

"Yep. We have a policy: we only get to open one Christmas Eve gift, but the whole family has to be present."

"Pun intended?"

"Yes…Dad came up with it, he thinks it's very clever."

"I won't be the one responsible for making him the wiser."

"Thank you."

Heather grinned. "But seriously, I'm bored and I can't sleep."

"We could go rattle the boxes and take bets on what's inside."

Heather narrowed her eyes. "That's juvenile." Then her mouth curved into a Cheshire grin. "Race you to the living room!" She shoved a chair in front of him and took off.

"Cheater!"

"No, juvenile!"

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The first thing Adrian noticed when she trudged through the door after work was the smell of something burnt. When she walked into the kitchen, she realized the top of the trash was covered with blackened cookies and lying on a cooling rack near the microwave was a tray of overly browned, though not black, sugar cookies.

The Latina picked one up and bit into it, but immediately wished she hadn't: hard and tasteless. She spat it into the sink, rinsed it down with the faucet, and tossed the rest of the cookie into the trash on top of the burnt ones. She sighed heavily and made her way down the hall, stopping momentarily to peek into her daughter's room where Mercy Lee was sleeping peacefully. She got the door shut again without incident and entered the darkened bedroom she shared with Ben, currently lit only by the nightlight.

Adrian dropped her purse on her nightstand, stripped off the sweaty work uniform that was covered in ice cream stains, slipped into a pair of Happy Bunny pajama bottoms and an old long sleeved shirt, and climbed into bed. It was lukewarm, which suggested Ben had been there recently, before he eventually rolled over to the side on which he was currently fast asleep. She shivered as she closed her eyes, tired as hell, but unable to get to sleep.