On the third day of Christmas, my true love gave to me…

"Sara? Your next patient is here." Sara looked up from her paperwork to see Katie's head peering around the frame of the infirmary door. Distracted, Sara nodded and waved, indicating the patient could enter.

"Dr Tancredi?"

Looking up from her desk again, she saw Michael Scofield now standing at the door.

Smiling slightly, she replied, "You sound surprised."

"I didn't expect to see you here today."

"It's Thursday. I always work on Thursdays." She retorted, a hint of irritation in her voice.

"It's also Christmas Day." Michael replied, his eyes silently searching hers.

"I've never really been big on Christmas." She said, standing up from her desk to walk over to the cabinet containing the prison's medical equipment.

"No?"

He walked routinely over to the bed and sat down, his eyes still watching as she opened the cabinet.

"When I was little, my mum made a big deal out of it. But after she died, and once my father began to make his way up the political ladder it became less of a celebration and more of an obligation. Half of the time my father was away on business and I'd spend the day with my nanny, else he'd drag me to one of his associate's dinner parties. Not the most fun way for a young girl to spend Christmas."

"And now?"

"We barely even talk, let alone exchange Christmas cards, or have Christmas dinner together." Suddenly realising she was sharing a little too much of her personal life with her patient, Sara feel quiet, turning slightly pink.

There was a moment of comfortable silence while Sara set up the injection.

"My mother loved Christmas too. I was too young to remember, but she used to buy us a tree every year, help us decorate it, put presents under it, bake us cookies to leave out for Santa on Christmas Eve. All the traditional stuff. After she died and our father left, Linc and I were sent to a foster home, and some of the families would celebrate, some of the parents couldn't have cared less, and some didn't have enough money to scrape together to buy a Christmas tree, let a lone presents."

As Michael paused, Sara took the opportunity to plunge the tiny needle into his arm and inject the insulin. He flinched briefly, before setting his face back into its composed expression.

"Linc never let me forget Mother's Christmases though. Wherever we were, we'd stay up late in Christmas Eve and he'd tell me about her. How she'd laugh and dance around singing Christmas carols."

"And now?" she asked, smiling playfully.

"Now I'm in prison." He replied, smirking back up at her.

He fell silent again, his observant eyes watching her again. She looked back for a moment, before softly saying, "You're all done."

He nodded slowly, then gracefully slid off of the bed. When he reached the infirmary door, he paused and softly wished her a Merry Christmas.

It wasn't until she had finished packing up and turned back to her desk that she saw them. Three paper cranes sitting on top of her paperwork. One made from red paper, one from green, and one from white.

Feeling butterflies in her stomach that she knew were inappropriate, she gently picked them up and cradled them in her hand.

"Merry Christmas Michael," she whispered to the empty room.

three paper cranes.