While waiting for news on my father in law at the hospital this week, I watched A Christmas Carol. Here is my version. My regularly scheduled stories will return tomorrow.

It was Christmas Eve and the snow was falling when Jason returned to the coffee warehouse, inside Sonny was talking to Carly making plans for the boys to spend part of the day with him. When his boss snapped at him to deal with this Franco character after receiving yet another photo of Mikey killing his late wife, Jason looked at the present in Sonny's hand labeled for Olivia and wanted to snap at the man.

Instead he just nodded and went to find what Spinelli had found out. Seeing Sam there, he made plans to spend yet another evening killing time, wondering if that was what his life would be. An endless procession of killing and threatening people with minutes of numbness in between.

He saw Spinelli getting up and was starting to growl when he saw him letting Edward into the penthouse. The old man looked at the two closest people to his grandson and felt his heart ache at what Jason had become, but he didn't say a word, needing Jason's help with making the holiday's slightly brighter for Monica.

"May we speak, privately?" he asked Jason who send Sam out for coffee then suggested that Spinelli that his laptop up to his bedroom. "What can I do for you, Edward?"

"Tomorrow is Christmas and with Rebecca leaving town, Monica doesn't even have her memories to cling to tomorrow. I was hoping you could stop in at some point, maybe spend a few minutes with her. She could really use the company. She sees the Spencers and Tracy as a family, something she no longer has."

Seeing Jason's glare, he said "That wasn't a dig at you, just a statement of fact. But, Jason if you come, could you please come alone. I think Monica needs the one on one time like you used to spend with your grandmother."

Nodding, Jason let him leave, then ordered Spinelli to stop working. "We can pick this up tomorrow."

"Stone Cold, tomorrow is the day of the baby's birthday, a day of celebration." He pointed out. "I am sure that you and the fair Samantha have plans to enjoy this glorious occasion together, I would like to spend the day with the one I love as well."

Jason sighed, he didn't want to celebrate this holiday. For others they would be with their families, Carly with her children and Jax. Sonny with his woman of the moment, even Spinelli and Sam had a place to go for the holidays. He, he really didn't even want to think of Christmas, he wanted to go to bed and wake up the day after. He had tried enjoying the day, but that had only happened once, years ago.

"Fine, go spend the day with Maxie." he said then left the penthouse, needing to get away. Seeing Sam lurking by his bike, he approached and said "Go to your mothers, spend the day with your family and those you love."

"Jasin, that includes you. I know you are reeling from not having time with your son, with your own family. So we should make our own holiday, like we have done before. Get a tree, maybe a cute little one, or you could join me at Alexis' place or I could join you visiting the Quartermaines."

Not wanting to do either, Jason leaned down and kissed her, he had to admit, she did try at least. But she was not going to get her way. "No, spend the day with your family, Sam."

Going to his bike, he found he couldn't get on it, something just made him turn and leave. Seeing his car, he knew that Spinelli had to have had it tagged and while he appreciated his well meaning attempts at being there for him, Jason just wanted peace and quiet.

Hearing his phone ringing, Jason listened as Sonny ranted yet again about Franco, then Carly called telling him to stop over later while Jax was at the hotel. When the next call was Diane, requesting his presence the day after about his house purchase, Jason just tossed the phone into river and walked back to the towers just as Milo pulled up.

"Give me your keys." he told the guard then tossed his to the younger man.

"Okay." with that Jason drove away, knowing that Spinelli hadn't tagged any of the guards personal cars. Finding freedom, Jason saw the families, the mothers, the fathers and the children all seemed happy and were eagerly heading either home or elsewhere for the holiday.

Arriving at GH, he stood in the shadows, watching as Steven Webber read the Christmas story and Lucky held Jake. Elizabeth was no place to be seen, but Jason also saw the Nik was gone as well. That was the part that hurt, Lucky he could accept, he knew he was a smuck, but Nik? That he just didn't understand what Elizabeth was thinking.

He had wondered down the hallway, to the chapel and slipped in. Sitting down on the chair, he looked up at the cross and stood up ready to head out when it reminded him of Franco for a reason. He had just arrived at the door when it pushed open from the outside, knocking him out.

"Jason, Jason, come on. Wake up." Sitting up, Jason blinked his eyes repeatedly sure that he was seeing things. "Alan, what is going on?"

"I am here to give you a warning. They allowed me to return, to give you a chance to fix things before it is too late, but I am sorry, it took too long to find you. Seems like our timing is always off, doesn't it."

"Alan? Dad?" he finally allowed himself to say. "What are you talking about? Am I dead?"

"No, but if you don't change your ways, you are going to end up where I am. I don't want that for you. Alone, with only sad memories to carry you through the rest of your life. You have enough of that in the world you are living in. Please, head my warning."

"What warning, is this about visiting Monica, about Michael?"

Shaking his head, Alan said "I am sorry son. The clock just struck midnight. It is too late. You are going to be visited by three ghosts. As the bell strikes one, the first ghost will appear. Heed what they are trying to teach you, before everything you love, slips out of reach. Understand this, Jason. You only have one life to live... don't waste it on those who are selfish, … that is my own regret. All my children paid for my mistakes. AJ, Skye, Emily and you. You most of all." Alan faded away, still telling Jason to heed his warnings.

Jason woke up and saw he was lying in a hospital bed and decided he must have hit his head rather hard. As he drifted off into an uneasy sleep, he hoped that she was home with the boys tonight. She had always loved Christmas.

Chapter Two

The man at the foot of the bed, leaned against it, waiting for the sound of the loud bell to ring the One O'Clock hour. As it did, he made it loud enough for it to wake up the man lying sleeping in the bed. "So, are you ready?"

Looking at the familiar looking man, Jason asked "Ready for what?"

"To see where you have gone wrong in the past and how it has led you to this bleak and pitiful moment. Shall we?" he asked.

Jason sat up in the hospital bed and rubbed his eyes, trying to clear away the sleep. "This is just some sort of weird dream, isn't it."

"Jason, I told you years ago, you will never dream. Never really understand colors. Shall we?" he asked again.

"Why would I go anyplace with you?" he asked the man.

"Because I am the ghost of Christmas, past, specifically your past." he said then opened a book and looked through the pages, saying no, not that moment, no that one won't do. WAIT! Here is the perfect one."

Jason went to take the offered book and found himself suddenly in a well lit hospital corridor as the annual Port Charles Christmas party reading of the first Christmas happened.. Judging from the clothes, he would have placed it as being the early eighties.

As the two men walked around, Jason was stunned to see his grandmother Lila alive and talking to two little boys that he soon identified as AJ and him. Watching he saw as his parents held his brother and him, talked to them about what was going on and seemed to be very happily married.

The man with him said "You don't remember this time, but your family, this is only one of many happy moments. Contrary to what you believe, there were more happy than angry moments." Jason felt the air tighten and next he was in the back yard swimming with AJ and flirting with young girls.

Seeing one sitting off to the side, Jason was surprised to see that it was Robin. When he moved closer, he saw that AJ was the only one who seemed to realize she wasn't joining in. He was rather shocked to see that it was he who wasn't happy she came to join them.

"AJ, what are you doing?" he asked when Robin slipped into the pool. "You know how she has been following me around. I am trying to discourage her without hurting her feelings."

"So letting a guest sit all alone and made to feel like an outsider doesn't hurt her. How is that working out Jason?" he asked. "No, what you should have done is be honest. Tell her that she is a friend, that you don't feel that way about her instead of chasing after Karen whom you know is in love with Jagger anyhow. She only came to the house to make her dad happy."

Jason saw his other self ignore his brother's warnings then they switched to another party, one where Emily was off by herself. He saw his younger self sit down by his sister and ask what is the matter?"

"Nothing, just happy for the family I have." she said hugging him then saying "Thanks for coming over Jason. It has really made grandmother's day."

Following his sister, Jason saw her enter her room and take a pill. "Wait, her drug use was going on even then?"

"Yup, and where were you? I know, shall we?" he asked and showed Jason bedding Carly then going home to Robin. "You were doing what Jason Morgan does best. Taking the easy way out, at least in your personal life. What you have never learned, is that struggling, learned and striving for what you want, makes getting it all the more sweet."

The next scene was Carly shopping for the holidays with Jason's card. When she snapped at a hapless clerk because an elderly lady was taking so long, he saw himself come up and take her away. "And no apology for the young clerk your friend got fired the next day. Nor for the elderly woman who she would meet up with later at another store. After a twenty minute tirade during which the blond drops the name of her mobster boyfriend at least twice and promises retribution for her not letting Carly have what she wanted, the elderly woman didn't make it to Christmas. She had a heart attack and died, still scared of what you would do on your so called best friend's behalf."

After seeing the scene, Jason felt sick, but then felt the air tighten and then feel extremely light. "Where are we?"

"The house of someone whose life you are going to ruin." he said then opened the huge double doors to the even larger family room where a lonely girl sat looking out at the snow. Hearing her name being shouted, Elizabeth joined her family as her mother started to complain right away.

"Can't you even do anything right. What are you wearing? That isn't the dress I put out for you to wear."

"It was too long." she said only for her mother to tell her to go upstairs and change.

Jeff entered just then and said "We don't have time for Elizabeth to change and she looked quite lovely wearing green. The Anders only said to wear red or green."

Flashing her dad a quick smile, Elizabeth felt her mother grabbing her arm then whispering. "We will be discussing this when we get home young lady. I wanted all of us girls to match."

Seeing the fussy fuzzy long dresses that the two blonds were wearing, Jason said "But Elizabeth would looked washed out in that."

"And that was the point." said his guide. Arriving at the party, Jason saw what he meant when people made such a fuss over how pretty Elizabeth was, Carolyn seemed to grow angrier and angrier and kept asking for their opinions on Sarah.

When Jeff told her to give it a rest, she snapped "I don't know what you mean, just what do you mean?"

"Stop it, Carolyn, We both know that you loath for Elizabeth to outshine Sarah in anything. It's why you stopped the skating lessons, the gymnastic lessons, the music lessons. Well enough, either you get over this jealousy or I will file for a divorce Do you understand me?"

"Dr Webber is a man of action in his career, but when it comes to his family. He is all words, let me show you how this evening ends.

A drink spilled on Elizabeth by Sarah later, followed by her mother berating her. Then Jeff had to leave to go to the hospital. Sarah and Carolyn left complaining about Elizabeth disappearing, when Jason had seen her sister looking in on where Elizabeth was talking to the elderly grandmother of her hostess.

Then Carolyn showing up the next day while Elizabeth sat forlornly watching as her family opened up presents while she was forced to wait until she wasn't grounded. The very next day, showed Jeff turning up and Carolyn claiming the reason she was returning Elizabeth' presents was because she hadn't liked any of them.

Swearing as Sarah taunted her sister, Jason saw Elizabeth sitting in her room crying saying "Daddy promised he would try. He swore he would be here this year."

The next year showed Elizabeth coming home to the news that her parents were moving overseas. As well as showed Carolyn lying to Jeff that Elizabeth's grades weren't good enough for her to transfer to Port Charles with Sarah.

Sarah's hurtful remarks as Elizabeth watched her family drive away then a month later, the family she was staying with calling DSS one day not knowing she was there. It broke Jason's heart and terrified him to see her hitchhiking across the country and thankfully arriving safely at her grandmother''s who was less than thrilled to see her.

Audrey's sitting Elizabeth down and said that she was there on a trial basis and if she wasn't well behaved. That if she caused the least amount of trouble she was being sent back to Colorado shocked Jason who had always assumed the elderly woman's attitude with Elizabeth was over him.

But the worst part was Christmas when presents arrived for Sarah from her parents and nothing for Elizabeth. Audrey's saying that maybe the box got lost and Elizabeth accepting it, knowing the truth, hurt Jason when she went to her room after Audrey promised to try and find out what went wrong.

"Try, they always promise to try." she said as she dried her tears and buried her head in her pillow.

Jason didn't want to see anymore but instead he got a crash course in Elizabeth's Christmas' since meeting him. The one in the studio, the next year while he was gone and she played nice when it was clear she didn't want to with Lucky. Followed by the year they were engaged and he got to hear her inner most thoughts on marry the putz.

Jason had been shocked to figure out that she had considered him an obligation and that she had to be in love with him instead of actually being in love with the man. But the next year was the one that hurt as he saw Carly and Courtney making an already miserable Elizabeth's life worse.

The part that truly made him furious was watching himself tell them half heartedly to leave her alone. He had been in pain, that year, a mess that he had created.

Watching Elizabeth in her undecorated studio wearing her leather coat and crying herself to sleep as she talked about how he had promised to try. Jason could take no more, but the ghost of Christmas past wasn't finished.

After showing him the next few years, including the one with Cam's toy, Jason didn't feel so sick until he saw Elizabeth tucking in the boys, and heading downstairs in the house he had bought for her.

Seeing her drinking a glass of wine and crying, he knew he was the cause of that, but the part that really set him off was what the ghost showed him of earlier that day involving Sam talking to Maxie about how he had made plans with her for the holidays. He hadn't but from the shell shocked expression on Elizabeth's face she had believed it.

Seeing her crying as she burnt the tickets to Italy then the picture of him with Jake and Jason felt his heart break, but seeing the picture she cut from the frame covered in black paint tossed into the fireplace, and Jason finally got it. He had destroyed the woman he had loved.

Seeing her making a promise, he listened to what was in her head, and Jason knew.... he knew that he had done this.

"We have time for Christms memories of a couple others. But they are going to be more random. Jason was about to ask him what he was talking about until he saw the memory of Carly talking to Michael about how she was going to win Jason back. "He will forgive me, he always does. He loves us. He knows I made a mistake."

Followed by Sonny promising his sister that Jason would propose by the end of the holidays. Jason was shocked to realize he had done just that, but when Sonny promised the same to Sam a few years later, Jason felt slightly ill to realize that his partner seemed less than friendly to Elizabeth. Instead telling her that if she truly loved Jason, she would stay away. That her life wasn't for him.

Seeing the ritzy hotel, Jason didn't know what to expect, but what he saw made him sick as a badly beaten Sam was telling the cops how she had been attacked and raped. Next scene had her at the hospital, with what appeared to be her family. Jason hadn't thought Sam's family could have afforded that type of hotel, but figured maybe it had been some sort of deal.

Feeling bad, Jason couldn't help wishing she had told him about this. Raped by a man at thirteen, brutalized in that way, it shocked him. After what had happened to his sister and to Elizabeth, Jason felt sick about that happening to anyone let alone someone he knew.

"Don't worry, she isn't really a victim." said the man with him.

"How can you be that cold?" he asked in shock but then they were in a hotel meeting room as Sam's father was making a deal with the hotel lawyers. Jason wanted to slug the man until they were back in the hotel room and Sam asked "How much?"

"Five million." he said.

"So my share is what, eight hundred thousand, that isn't enough." she said looking at the price on the car in her catalog. "Go back and get more."

"Sammy, that isn't a good idea. We shouldn't get greedy." he said then after an hour he said "You are going to have to fake it good with the head shrink, if we want that kind of money."

"Get me the appointment, I will make it work." she said coolly. "Remember they think I am just a kid."

The next scene showed Sam in handcuffs being lead into the station while her father was berating her telling her that he told her they were being greedy. When the officer asked Sam confessed, putting all the blame on her parents, saying they had asked her to go along with it so they could support her brother.

Jason had a feeling of deja vu, but then all he felt was that he had been a fool as Sam confessed to be seventeen and that she had lied to get the old pervert into her hotel room. "Why him?"

"He was a known john, with a fetish for young hookers." she said then the man asked "Why not run with the money you had already got, why push this."

"Do you have any idea how little eight hundred thousand dollars is now day?" she asked.

"You were offered five million.

"We had to split it, the man who sent up the scam got a million, my dad and mother, then the bell boy who told us the perfect time for me to show up at the party. There was also the lawyer. I had plans for my money and I need at least two million. I told my father that going in. If I was going to screw this man, making it look like he took my virginity. Do you know how expensive it was to get a doctor to fix that. Besides, I was the one getting hit, I told them I wouldn't do it for less that two million."

"What could a young think like you need that much money for?"

"A boob job, there is a boat I want. Jewelry, clothes. Those things cost money, plus we needed money to set up our next job." she said.

"Enough. I get the point."

"No one more with Sam." he said then showed Lucky and Sam. AS Jason listened to her tell the man how she was in constant fear for her life around Jason, how she understood why he wanted to keep Jake away from that world, he could only think that wasn't the story she had been telling him.

But what truly gave him chills was a conversation between Elizabeth and Sam where Sam swore she would take away everything Elizabeth loved, then seeing the past two years in fast forward, Jason got it. "She did what she promised. She took everything away."

"And you, you dumb idiot, you helped her. Why? Because doing otherwise meant taking control of your life. Tell me one thing. Is she really that good in bed that you can forget her doing this to your son?"

With that Jason saw Jake's first kidnapping followed by the incident in the park and finally his walking away from Elizabeth telling her it was for her own good. "What have I done?"