Auntie's mouth dropped open. Meredith closed hers tight, but it must've been too late. She hadn't meant to play see food. "You said, 'say when,' and I said, 'when.' If'n I'd chewed and swallowed first it coulda got too full."

"I wouldn't have let it overflow."

"It's already too full for me."

"But not for Santa—"

"That's poppycock. You're trying to lie to me!" Meredith curled her fingers up against her palm. She wanted to tip the whole big glass over like she would've done while she and Mom stayed here, and Auntie spent a lot of time having sleepovers at her friend's house instead of listening to Mom cry. Meredith didn't have any friends with houses. Now, she does, but Mommy doesn't cry, so it doesn't make a matter.

"Sweetie, I'm sorry." Auntie crouched down to Meredith's level. She had hair the same color as Mommy's, but she wore it long and loose. Not doctor hair. She smiled bright, and there were little v's at the corners of her eyes. "I didn't know you didn't believe. Did someone at school tell you the secret?"

Meredith rocked off her knees onto her bottom, pulling her knees up under her chin. "Esther Abrams. She does Hh-Hanukah," she says, trying to pronounce the "hch" like Esther did. "She asked her parents, and they said it'd be nice to tell me, because what I thought."

"What did you—?"

"Do not unpack it, do you hear me?" Mommy snapped into the phone.

"She means an 'cision," Meredith explained. "She packed an abdomenian 'cision, so I got to help pack the suitcase. I put clothes from my call-room suitcase into the big one with Mommy's, and she said my foldings were almost acceptable." Auntie's smile squiggled a little. "That was all yesterday."

Mommy hadn't gone to work at all today; there was just a patient who'd had a very big surgery and was having to have an intern watch her. The least Mommy could do was check in by phone. 'Specially because she was a tending now—she had to tend to everyone. Patients, residents, interns. She was a boss! Tending on the phone only meant calling while Meredith ate her Eggos, and then they went ice-skating, and Mommy held her hands, because ice was slippery even if you had blades on your shoes. (Could a really good surgeon do an operation with ice-skating shoes? It'd be cool to be the first surgeon to use feet make the 'cisions.) While they'd gotten their overnight suitcase, and driven to Everett there'd been a shift change, and Mommy still didn't go in. She was phone tending with the night-time intern. That was nothing.

She'd wanted to tell Auntie that when Mom picked up the phone and she'd said, "Ellis, aren't you off today?" because Mommy hadn't gone to work at all, or had to make up on sleep, or read-search, or clean. Nothing where she'd ask Meredith to keep herself occupied in her room. Before she could explain that, Auntie's Friend Rachel had touched Auntie's arm and said, "Meredith, you have on such a nice smile. Did you have a good day?"

Meredith had told them all about skating, and how she'd done almost half the circle…the rink herself. Auntie's Friend Rachel had stayed for dinner, but had to go be with her family's after that.

While she'd been getting ready to leave, Meredith had been sitting on the other side of the Christmas tree with a toy she'd gotten at her class's Winter Holidays party. It was called a kaleidoscope prism, but it wasn't a real kaleidoscope with it's own colors. It was more like an eye-piece in a cone shape. It made the tree lights super pretty.

They hadn't noticed her there while they took Auntie's Friend Rachel's bags to the door, and she hadn't come out, because before they went to the new house Auntie sometimes said Meredith creeping was creepy, and she'd learned they weren't the same.

"I'll be fine, doll. It's Hanukkah over at Pop's place. I wouldn't be going over there eight nights in a row if they asked questions like Mother did last year."

"I'd take it over the Recitation of Ellis Grey's Achievements for 1984. I don't know why I….She came here so broken, and she let me take her in. She hadn't let me do anything for her since that one driving lesson in '69. Next thing I knew, she'd gotten her license. All Dad's little genius needed me to teach her was which the buttons did what."

"That's not all. I'm sure you've taught her plenty—"

"—and told her more—"

"But you can't control what someone listens to." Meredith had flattened her back against the wall. Did Auntie's Friend Rachel knew she was listening? "She came to you."

"Please. She came for MGH. That Dr. Avery. I was convenient, and what was I going to do? She's my sister, and that baby girl…."

Hey! Meredith had cupped her hand over her mouth to keep the objection in. She wasn't a baby. If she was very good and still, sometimes a late-late night nurse at the new hospital would let her hold a babybottle. This month, the girl babies wore Christmas headbands. They could've put them on the boy babies, wouldn't know, and they'd still be so cute. It could be candy canes for them, and holly for the girls, just so you didn't have to look in the diapers to tell. Except, did you ever need to tell, if the diaper was on? She'd ask Mom.

"…like she'd planned it. Remember? She was adamant about us going to your mom's for Thanksgiving, and the next thing I knew, it was done. She'd become an icicle again!"

"What woman wouldn't? There's a human heart in her. Otherwise, would she be here? It must remind her."

"I offered to go to their new—"

"Shh. I know."

Meredith had put her toy in her lap. She'd been five, last year. She didn't like thinking about five. Six was better. Six was first grade at a big, new school, and she did good on math, and science, and reading. She didn't like answering questions, because she didn't want to say something wrong, but she didn't have to play by herself at recess, because she could turn the rope perfectly.

Five hadn't been like that. All the decorations made Auntie's apartment look so different that Meredith could almost forget the kindergarten where no one wanted to play ER or Surgery, and said she did playing House wrong. Auntie hadn't liked her very much when she was five.

"—decorate the place. She's too busy and important. Remind me to hold some of them back next year. Meri should get some experience."

Meredith stuck her finger in the open end of her toy. Her name wasn't "Meri." She'd gotten her first in trouble all year for screaming at some of the boys for calling her 'Meri Christmas.'

"—more engaged, seems like she could talk your ear off, and sew it back on."

Meredith hadn't listened well after that. Auntie's Friend Rachel thought she could do that? Sew like a surgeon? Not like Mom; she didn't do ears, but maybe Meredith one day could!

"Meredith? What did you think?" Auntie asked, sounding as sweet as when she'd said 'bye to her friend Rachel and given her an in-love kiss.

Meredith thought Auntie's Friend Rachel might be an uncle, if uncles could be girls, but that wasn't what Auntie was asking about. "Um, first I thought he musta skipped me by accident, because we got out of your hair to our new, big house."

"Is that what Mom said?"

"I did get in the way."

Auntie had tripped on her when Mom said, out of my sight for five minutes, and she lay to listen at the door. She'd said stop staring, and stop hanging on my apron strings, and stop screaming, Meredith, for the love! Sometimes being quiet had been so hard, she'd had to scream, and scream, and scream—Those memories were all kind of wiggly, and some must've been from Seattle. Otherwise, why would both Daddy and Dr. Richard have decided to go away from her? She'd hoped that once she got good, they'd come visit and take her and Mom back to Seattle. That hadn't happened, yet, but Mom yelled a lot less, and talked to her more. They didn't talk about the time she was what the books called 'a sniveling little brat.' Adults didn't like you to remember being bad, once you were good. They didn't like you to remember anyone being bad. If she didn't know that how rude and disobedient she'd been was a problem, she wouldn't have tried so hard to stop.

"My room is huge," she said. "I'm gonna have a sleepover, once Mom has more senior'ty, and I'm bigger. Sitters don't wanna watch many little girls at once."

"Great idea! It's a big place for two people."

"You and your friend Rachel could come to live with us."

Auntie did one ha! laugh, like Mom. "I don't think that would turn out very well, sweet pea. I'd get in Ellis's way a lot more than you do."

Maybe, but the house was bigger than in Seattle and they'd had three people.

"Meredith, you were saying you thought Santa didn't get your change of address?"

"Oh, yeah. I'm sorry, I don't always stay on topic."

"It's all right. I'm sure you're excited for tomorrow."

Meredith nodded, but topics were hard for her even if it wasn't Christmas Eve. She had a lot of thoughts. Some were Not for School, some were Don't Tell Anyone, and some were Save it For Later, and she had to get through those before making sure that what she did say would Answer the Question Appropriately.

"I did think that. I worried he'd take my stuff to Seattle where my other…our old stuff we don't need is. Everyone said that was possi-blutely impossible. Other kids had moved, too, or went to a 'spen, or a 'broad…they said those were far, and Santa always found them. Other kids don't go to church either, and they get Santa. They said I must've been bad, and I wasn't as good as I know how to be. But there wasn't coal in my stocking we bought the day I chose my two-wheeler. Before they were picked over."

"That wasn't your only present, was it?"

"Mommy gave me books, and crayons, and a puzzle. I got the toy horses from you, and I play with them all the time! My bike was best is all. Christmas Day I rode it in our living room, and Mom watched me, and I can ride in front and back of us with supervising, but nowhere else. In nice weather we took it down to the Common once.

"Oh, but, um, last Christmas Eve I got up after Mommy's door closed to do cookies. No Santa had traded them for presents. I had them for breakfast, as a treat. So, I was a lot confused, and I was brand-new. Esther said she knew I wasn't bad. Then the end, her mom and dad said to say I should talk to Mommy, but she could tell me the truth if I promised not to tell other kids. I'd never make someone sad about who brings them presents. I got good things, and it was nice of Mommy to get them for me, because she didn't feel well from all the moving stress."

Auntie smoothed down Meredith's hair. "That's very thoughtful for a little girl. Have you talked to your mom about Santa?"

"I gave her my list 'Dear Mommy,' and put all the catalogs and pages."

"Wow! That sounds like an endeavor."

"I'm in first grade, Auntie. I don't get a lot of homework."

Her aunt laughed, and made an omph, I'm old noise as she stood up. Meredith grabbed her wrist. She had on a jangling bangle kind of bracelet Mom would never wear, maybe because it could fall into an abdomen.

"I shoulda figured it out myself 'cause of Mommy not feeling well. If Santa was real, she could've let him bring my presents while she got rest."

"That's good logic. Your mother's a little stubborn about letting other people do things for her."

Meredith didn't have to look around to know that Mom had come into the doorway of the kitchen. She put another cookie in her mouth so that no one would ask her anything else.

Mommy put her to bed in the extra bedroom, but didn't stay. Meredith hadn't been lying there long before the low voices became loud ones, and she pulled the quilt over her head. It must've helped her go to sleep, because when she pushed it off, the sun was up. She sat up fast. Before, she'd always woken close to her mom, and she'd liked knowing for sure she was there. She was, though, lying on her side in the same place as always. Maybe being used to her smaller bed made this one feel bigger.

Mom and Auntie were nice to each other. Meredith didn't think she had to worry that they'd start fighting if she was too loud. She still tried not to make too much of a mess opening her presents, but every time she got one open enough to find out what was in it, she got too excited to be careful.

"Mommy, thank you!" she exclaimed, tugging the top off a box that held a whole set of the children's encyclopedias her new school had in the library.

"I think they'll fit nicely on the shelf over your desk, don't you? As will what's in the next package."

Meredith nodded. These books weren't identical like the encyclopedias. She stacked them up as she read each title. They all had the same words as the ones on Mommy's bookshelves. "Medical," "Anatomy," "Human." A couple were like other books she already had; obviously for kids, like The Story of Your Ear—She could be an ear surgeon!—The Story of Your Mouth—Brain Power! -but they weren't all like that, with pen-drawn illustrations and short words.

She held up The Gift of Magic Sleep: Early Experiments in Anesthesia. "This one's for surgeons!"

"You might have to grow into that, sweetie," Auntie commented.

"She has a dictionary."

"Yeah, I do," Meredith agreed. The Gift of Magic Sleep might also be a book Mommy would read to her. She said it was better for Meredith to hear her speak facts. A few of the remaining packages looked book-shaped, too, so those were probably stories that would be just hers.

The last book in the box was biggest of all, and it was exactly like one Mom kept at home, except brand new. She didn't use it as much as the smaller ones with nicer pictures, but it was the one that had everything. The one you had to have if you want to be a doctor.

"Gray's Anatomy," Meredith read, touching the bumpy letters on the cover.

"Ever consider switching out that vowel, Ellis?"

"I'll make history myself, thank you."

Meredith laughed, and then jumped up. There were more boxes, but these were her big presents. She'd seen the Time Life commercials for encyclopedias. They cost lots of money, and you paid more than once. She started to climb onto Mom's lap, but then hesitated. "I don't want to spill your coffee."

"That's appreciated." Mom put the coffee down and took Meredith's hands. "You're going to make good use of those, I hope?"

"I'll be the best doctor!"

"Why don't you start with bringing up that citizenship grade?" Mom tucked Meredith's hair away from her face. "You do fine telling me all about the pointless things that happen with your friends. Your grades show that you're absorbing the information. If you don't learn to raise your hand, and respond immediately, you won't make it to medical school. That's not what you want."

"I know."

"Your teachers expect girls to do well. That's better than I had it."

"Can I take my Anatomy for show and tell?" she asked. She could explain about it having all the information a doctor needed, and—Mommy turned to Auntie with an amused look. They were both giggling. What was funny?

"We'll see. Why don't you open that box from your aunt?"

"And Rachel helped me pick it for you." Aunt Rachel?

"You'll have to put your aunt's friend on the thank you note," Mom said. And Rachel. Meredith didn't get it. Auntie Marie was Mom's roommate in college, and Meredith had called her "Auntie" when she hadn't even moved up to Boston, yet.

She knelt in front of the box and turned it over to find a seam. At the front, she felt the give of a plastic window, like a Barbie. A Barbie set, maybe. The girls in her class had bunches of those, but all you did was change their clothe's and—

"Really? For me?" The side of the box was pale yellow with green writing Meredith didn't have to look at to recognize. She tore the paper off the front. "She's so cute!"

The tape on the flap was already broken. Meredith untucked it, and then carefully took her Cabbage Patch Doll out of the box. Her yarn-hair was red, not blond like Meredith's, which made sense, because adopted babies could look different than their parents. A boy from school lived next door, and his baby sister was from a different country. She slid the paper out of the box next.

"Her adoption certificate says her name is Fran…Francesca," she said. "There was a girl at day-care named that, remember, Mommy? I know how to read the 'ch.'"

"Yes," Mom said, evenly.

Meredith turned around quickly. "Thank you so much, Auntie! I love her!"

"The kids Rachel workx with said those are popular—I didn't know anything about them, but I heard you might want a doll."

Meredith held Francesca closer. Mommy had noticed Jane was gone? She…she must not have been able to tell the moving men, and she liked buying things to make Meredith smart. That's why Jane hadn't been a baby doll. You should learn more than how to take care of a baby. So, Meredith hadn't asked for a new one, or for a teddy bear, or anything babyishly soft like that.

It didn't count as replacing Jane, if she hadn't asked. You didn't replace friends by getting new ones, her teachers said so. She wasn't good at talking to her teachers, always, but she did listen.

"I need to call the hospital," Mom said, standing up.

"Mommy, there's still…." Meredith didn't finish, which Mom wouldn't like if she'd been listening, but she'd already picked the phone up. The gift Meredith had made for her in art class was still under the tree. Other than the stories, the rest for her were clothes, probably, and stockings had small stuff. She could wait.

"I'm sorry, sweet pea."

Meredith looked up at her aunt, wide-eyed. "For what?"

Auntie smiled, thin, and picked up the two coffee mugs. "Would you like a hot cocoa during this intermission?"

"No, thank you." Meredith put one of her new books down under the tree and sprawled out on her belly to look at it, holding her doll tucked under her chin. "We're gonna read about brains."

"All right. Let me know if there's anything you need."

"Uh-huh." She listened, waiting for the whoosh of the faucet, and her mother's clipped sentences rising over it. "You let me know if there's anything you need," she said, squeezing the doll's cloth body. "You make three people in our home. Mommy and I are Greys-with-an-E. And Rachel is family, even if she's not a husband, or wife, or girlfriend, because a very best friend can be family. You don't have to worry about stories and lies.

"And...and we won't have secrets, but I'll tell you mine later, okay? Maybe you can hold on it, and I won't slip at school. But the big thing is, if I get took from Mommy, you'll come, too. I'm going to look out for you so close. Promise." She kissed the soft plastic of her new friend's face. "Merry Christmas, sweet pea."

A/B My thoughts on this chapter and a manip of little Meredith can be found on my Tumblr.