ER

Gates: Dr. Banfield, I get this whole tough boss thing, and it works for you. It really does. But cut me some slack. I need your help. (she looks at him for a long moment, then signs the MRI order)

(Andrew is deeply shaken after Bertha bleeds out) Banfield: There's no way to be ready for something like this, but in the end it'll make you a better doctor. You can't be a great doctor until you've killed a patient. Andrew: I've heard that before, and it's a cold rationalization.

Greene: Listen! I need you to be the mom now, okay? And I'll be the doctor. It works best that way. Russell Banfield: He's right. Cate Banfield: Where's the Chief? Who's running the floor? Greene: I am, and I've been doing this job for a while. So you need to trust me.

Russell Banfield: You said this was a fever. You said he didn't need anything! Cate Banfield: Ninety-nine out of a hundred times... Russell Banfield: (interrupting) Stop talking like a doctor. That's our son, dammit!

Greene: I know, uhm, nothing I can say will probably mean much to you right now, but I've seen enough grief in my life to (pause) know how devastating it can be (long pause) how hard it can be to find the resilience...

(in the doctor's lounge) Morris Those are the ones you never forget. (walks over to the couch with a beer in his hand) I keep a secret stash in the back of the fridge, crack one open when something really amazing happens. (he opens the beer) In five years here, this is, like, the third one I've drunk. Banfield: One beer every twenty months I can overlook.

Morris: So, forgive me for asking, but what happened in there? Something changed. Banfield: The situation evolved. Morris: (after a long pause) It was a kid, right? We all have one; some case you blew, patient you should have saved. Yours was a kid. Banfield: Yeah. Morris: How old? Banfield: He was five years old. Morris: Those are the worst. Banfield: He was my son. He died here, (there's a look of shock on Morris' face) in Trauma 1. Morris: (astonished) Your son died in this ER (pauses) and you're working here? Banfield: (awkwardly) I'm not sure why I've done anything I've done since that day. Why'd I not leave my apartment for almost two years? Then I see the news about the tsunami, and I fly to a place ten thousand miles away. Why'd I do that? (genuinely perplexed) Why'd I come back? (pause, then with bitterness) Why did my son have leukemia? I never understood any of it.

Cate: I used to think every day that, if God told me I could die and go to heaven and be with Daryl, I would do it. (pause) I wondered if that made me an awful person (another pause) that I'd give up my life with you, give up everything we could still have in the future. (long pause) I never really (hwsitates) got away from the feeling like I need to be with him, dreaming of him. Never got away from the idea, that somehow I'd be able to hold him again. (she pictures him, outside on a beautiful, sunny day, running towards her, into her arms, and they are both smiling, laughing, joyful) I've, I've been so afraid for so long. I don't want to be... afraid... anymore. (she breaks down and cries softly, Russell gently comforting her)

Banfield: When your parents are gone, you're an orphan. Spouse dies, you're a widow or widower. But when you lose your baby (long, painful pause; and then almost whispered) there's no word for that.