Okay, so it's been a little while since I've posted anything. I've had a little trouble finding the time to sit down and writing anything. I've also been struggling with writers' block when it comes to my other stories so I thought I'd work on this Christmas piece to try and get back into it all again.

This is just a little fun. A twist on Charles Dickens' Christmas Carol. Please review and let me know what you think!

Enjoy!

Three Ghosts

"Marshall!"

"Don't, Mary…" He held up his hand but stopped walking, almost making her crash into him. "Just don't."

"I'm sorry but I didn't know this would happen." She folded her arms.

One of Mary's witnesses had always dreamed of living in New York and since he played a huge part in sending down a big drugs dealer, they were granting his wish. The trouble was, he was the nervous type and they had wanted Mary to accompany him to New York for three days while he settled in with his new inspectors. She was not happy about this planned and let it show, so much that the witness made a compliant and now she had been replaced by Marshall.

She knew that normally Marshall wouldn't have cared about the trip. He liked travelling to new places also her witness Kevin was a computer geek and Marshall got on well with him.

The problem was, it was the 23rd of December and Marshall would be flying out to New York on Christmas Eve. He did have plans to go home for Christmas to spend some time with his family. He didn't get chance to see them much due to work commitments and his oldest brother, Tommy was in the army and this was the first time Marshall would see him in years.

"Look, I'll talk to Stan…" Mary said. "Kevin might not want me to go but Stan will be able to find someone else…."

"He's already gone." Eleanor said from her desk.

"What?" Mary turned around quickly to look at her.

"Stan." She glanced up at them. "He's already left for that Christmas event in Washington."

"No, I need to talk to him…" Mary's eyes widened. "I need him to fix this."

Marshall groaned and sat on the edge of his desk, rubbing his eyes.

Eleanor shrugged. "Who do you think you'll get to take Marshall's place? Even if it wasn't two days before Christmas, there is no one in this state who has the experience to handle a high level witness other than you or Marshall and there is no way they will let you go after everything you said."

Mary thought for a few seconds before turning back to Marshall. "I'm sorry…"

Marshall just sighed and pushed himself to his feet, gathering his belongings.

She leaned her hands onto his desk. "I'll make it up to you…Tonight, dinner is on me."

"No, I just want to go home." He told her.

"Come on, Marshall…It'll be fun…We can go anywhere you want."

"No, Mary." He shook his head. "I need to call my parents to let them know, then I've got to pack and get an early night…"

"I'll drive you to the airport in the morning then." Mary offered.

"You would have to pick me up at 4:30am." Marshall claimed, shaking his head. "Just forget it, Mare…I'll see you in a few days…I hope you have a nice Christmas."

"Marshall…" Mary called after him as he walked out the door. "Marshall!"

"It's such a shame…" Eleanor said softly. "It's been a long year…He could have done with some time away."

Mary turned and glared at her. "You don't need to try and make me feel bad about it…"

Eleanor held up her hands. "I was just saying…"

"Well don't." Mary snapped. "You're not helping."

Eleanor stood up and reached for her own coat. "You know, if you would just think about things before you spoke then you wouldn't be this mess…"

"I really don't need a lecture." Mary told her. "I need some help making this right."

"Unless you have the power to grant Christmas miracles then there is nothing you can do." Eleanor wrapped her scarf around her neck. "Stan said I could take tomorrow off unless something comes up…so I will see you on the 27th."

Mary sighed loudly and dropped down onto her desk chair as Eleanor left. She knew Marshall loved Christmas and always made a big deal out of it, every year even though he hardly ever got chance to go home and it was normally just the two of them. She mocked him about it but she secretly loved it. Even though she had Jinx and Brandi living with her now, they had never really done the traditional thing. They didn't buy gifts or watch Christmas movies and dinner was normally several bottles of wine but now Jinx was on the wagon and there was Raph and Peter around, Mary knew they wanted to do something different. It was part of the reason she had been in such a bad mood the last few days. She had been hoping to use the fact she spent Christmas with Marshall for the past five years as an excuse to escape her family but then she found out he was going home and she was actually disappointed. Going to New York with Kevin would have given her the perfect chance to get away from them and also allow Marshall to have the Christmas he wanted. Now she had wrecked everything,

XxXxX

When she got home, she found Brandi and Peter at the kitchen table wrapping gifts. She rolled her eyes at all the colored paper, bows and ribbons.

"You do know that none of us are little kids and don't actually care about all that crap." Mary gestured to box her sister was currently tying a giant red bow on top of.

"I care." Brandi claimed, adjusting the bow so it was perfect.

"Not a Christmas person then Mary?" Peter looked up at her; being Jewish he had never celebrated Christmas but could not help get swapped away by his girlfriend's holiday sprite.

"I like Christmas just fine…It's all the madness that goes with it that I can't stand."

"But this year is our first Christmas together." Raphael appeared from behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist.

She rolled his eyes and pushed away from him. "We were together last year…"

"Not really we weren't…" Raph replied. "We didn't spend Christmas day together."

"Yeah, you missed a good day, Mare…" Brandi added. "We played twister."

"Oh, I'm just devastated." She replied sarcastically.

"Were you working?" Peter asked.

"No."

"No?" Raph looked at her. "I thought you were working…"

"I was on call but no, I wasn't working…" Mary grabbed a bottle of water out the fridge. "I was at Marshall's."

"When you told me that, I thought you meant you were working…"

"Well, I wasn't…" She shrugged. "He cooked dinner and made me watched It's a Wonderful Life."

"So you wanted to spend Christmas with him and not us."

She rolled his eyes. "He would have been alone and anyway, we've be doing it for years before I knew you or family got here."

"What is he doing this year?" Brandi questioned. "Is he joining us?"

"No." Raph cut in before Mary had chance to reply.

She slowly turned to look at him. "Excuse me?"

"I thought we agreed we would have a family Christmas." Raph replied. "Just the four of us and Jinx…"

"You really think I would have a good time knowing that my best friend was sat at home alone? During his favorite time of the year?!" She glared at him, her arms folded.

"Of course not." Brandi jumped up from her seat, keen to stop an argument starting. "Marshall is great fun…It'll be nice to have him join us, right Raph?"

"Yeah, fine…the more the merrier." He relented, forcing a smile knowing that he wouldn't win now Brandi sided with Mary.

"Well, it doesn't matter because he's away with work anyway." Mary turned away and looked back in the fridge.

"Do you have to work to?" Brandi asked.

"Unfortunately not." She muttered.

"So, all this was for nothing?" Raph through his hands up in the air. "You just wanted an argument?"

Mary slammed the fridge shut again. "Yes, Raph, that's what I wanted, yet another night of fighting."

"Come on, guys…It's Christmas." Brandi started. "Can't we just have a nice time?"

"I'm going to bed."

"Mary!" Raph called after her but she pushed passed him, slamming the bedroom door shut on her way.

She threw herself down onto the bed; she was so tired of everything. This was one of the busiest times at the office. The chance of a witness contacting a family member or an old friend was higher during the festive season.

She was tired of all the arguments with Raph; the fun never came easy for them. Not like it did with Marshall; that was when she wasn't screwing up his life, that is.

Sighing, she led back and stared up at the ceiling, there must be some way to make it up to him…

XxXxX

"Hey…hey…wake up!"

"Knock it off!" Mary shoved the hand away that was poking her, burying her face deeper into the pillow.

"Wake up!"

Mary bolted up after a sharp poke to the ribs and blinked rapidly when she came face to face with a small blonde girl.

"Who the hell are you?"

"We don't have time for this…" The girl claimed, grabbing her arms and pulled her off the bed.

"Hey!" Mary protested, pulling out of the girl's grasp when she was on her feet. "What is going on? Who are you and what are you doing here?"

The girl rolled her eyes. "Isn't it obvious?"

"That some strange kid would turn up in my bedroom and drag me out bed? No, not really." Mary replied sarcastically. "I'll ask you again, who are you and what are you doing here?"

"I'm you." She crossed her arms.

"What?"

"I'm the Ghost of Christmas Past." She stated. "Geez, don't you know anything?!"

Mary stared at her for a few seconds before laughing. "Okay, right…very funny…Who put you up to this?"

"Are you really that dumb?"

"Was it Brandi? Trying to get me in the Christmas sprite?" Mary asked and then shook her head. "No, couldn't be Brandi…this is too clever for her. I bet she hasn't even heard of Charles Dickens, let alone read A Christmas Carol…"

"Look, lady you're wasting both of our time here."

"It has be Marshall...He did this, right?" Mary asked. "Payback for getting stuck on the New York trip? Man, he's good."

"This isn't a joke, numbnuts." The girl insisted.

"I have to hand it to him, he got the right girl to play the role…You actually look like I did and the attitude is probably about right too…"

The girl sighed loudly and grabbed Mary hand again. "God, you're so annoying!"

"What are you doing?!" Mary tried to pull away when the girl started to drag her towards the door.

"Just follow me…"

"Look, just tell Marshall I didn't fall for it…" Mary started but then trailed off as they crossed the threshold of her bedroom into the hall. She was immediately hit with the smell of cheap gin and vomit. "What the hell…?"

She looked around stunned to see she wasn't stood in the hallway of her house in Albuquerque but the house she had lived in up until she was 8 when they were evicted because Jinx never paid the rent.

"I don't understand…" She stuttered. "I must be dreaming…This isn't real."

"Well, duh!"

Mary narrowed her eyes at the girl. "Why have you brought me here? What is it that you want from me?"

"How am I meant to know? I'm seven years old." She replied. "It's you that's dreaming this."

"I thought you were meant to be me?"

"Yeah but I don't know what kind loser you grew up to be."

Mary was about to answer but a sound of a baby crying stopped her.

The girl rolled her eyes. "Oh great, the brat is up."

"Brandi?" Mary questioned.

"Yeah, all she does is cry." The girl when walked down the hall. "Come on."

Mary watched her for a second, still expecting someone to jump out and tell her it was all joke.

"Come on!"

Mary sighed and decided to just go along with it. The sooner she did, the sooner she would wake and she could forget all about this.

"Mary, honey, go get your sister."

Mary froze in the doorway when she saw the scene in front of her. Jinx was slumped on a ratty old couch wearing a threadbare bathrobe, rubbing her temples. There was pitiful Christmas tree in the corner of the room that was more brown then it was green and the only decoration on it were handmade paper snowflakes.

"I can't…"

Mary turned and saw herself as a young child stood with her nose pressed up against the window.

"I have a headache and her crying isn't helping…" Jinx groaned. "She probably needs a diaper change…"

"I'm busy….I waiting for Santa."

The Ghost of Christmas Past was now stood beside Mary and scoffed at the girl's answer. "Pfft, can you believe we were ever stupid enough to believe in something as cheesy as Santa Clause?"

Mary didn't answer because she knew what was coming…She remember this day every clearly.

"Please, Mary just go and quieten your sister." Jinx frustration grew as did Brandi's cries.

"I asked Santa for a bike when I saw him at the Mall…" Little Mary ignored her mother's request, still not turning away from the window.

"Can't you do as you're told for once?" Jinx snapped. "And you can forget about getting a bike…We can't afford food let alone toys…"

"But I asked Santa…He promised…"

"Oh grow up, Mary." Jinx finally got to her feet. "Santa isn't coming because Santa isn't real."

The little girl turned away from the window and watched stunned as Jinx left the room.

"Why…Why did I need to see that?" Mary whispered, a lump in her a throat and tears stinging her eyes just like it did all those years ago. "Why are you showing me this?"

The Ghost of Christmas Past shrugged. "You never asked Santa for a bike, did you?"

Mary stared down at her and shook her head. "I want to go…I don't want to be here…"

"You asked for Daddy to come home…Asked for a normal, happy family Christmas…"

"I don't understand why I'm here." Mary exclaimed, watching her younger self walk over the Christmas tree and start pulling off the paper snowflakes angrily.

"Because you have a chance for a happy family Christmas and you're ruining it." The Ghost of Christmas Past told her.

"Wait, you're talking about spending Christmas with Raph?"

"You really are dumb, aren't you?"

"Would you stop rolling your eyes and tell me what the hell it is I'm doing wrong?!" Mary snapped.

"You know what it is that you want." The Ghost of Christmas Past claimed. "You want the perfect Christmas and know who you want to spend it with but you're too afraid to admit it…"

"What am I meant to do?"

"That's for you to figure out…Just don't screw us all over by taking the easy option." The ghost shrugged. "Come on, it's time to go back now…"

"Wait," Mary looked back the 7 year old her, who had now dropped to the floor and was trying her hardest not to cry. "What about her?"

"She'll be okay?"

"How do you know?"

"Because she's us." The ghost claimed and led Mary back into the hallway. "You're really not getting the whole idea of this, are you?"

"Man, I can't believe everyone was right…I really was an obnoxious little brat." Mary replied, following her.

The ghost snorted. "What do you mean, was?"

She turned around to reply when she was pushed through a door. The next thing she knew, she was back in her bed.

"Wow that was some crazy dream…" She muttered to herself.

She turned on her side to see Raph wasn't in bed with her and she wondered whether he was still upset about the argument. She was just considering getting up to go look for him when the bedroom door was flung up.

"Come on, get up…We haven't got all day…"

"Eleanor?!" Mary sat up, shielding her eyes when Eleanor turned on all the lights. "What's going on? Has something happened? Is Marshall okay?"

"He's perfectly safe at his house." Eleanor claimed.

"Then what are you doing…?" Mary trailed off. "Oh god, don't tell…"

"Now, we have a lot of things to get through…"

"I'm still dreaming, aren't I?" Mary questioned. "You're the Ghost of the freaking Present, aren't you?"

Eleanor grinned at her. "Yes I am."

Mary groaned and flopped back down. "It's going to be a long night!"

TBC

My aim is to get this story complete by the 25th…Wish me luck!