Touched By You

Author: Janet (SkyGirl5)

Genre: S/V, AU

Summary: Similar to the movie Just Like Heaven...but with my own personal twists. Something very strange is going on in Sydney Bristow's new office...

Disclaimer: Sydney, Vaughn, etc are properties of JJ Abrams and ABC. Just Like Heaven is property of whoever made that movie & book.

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Chapters 1-10 // Chapters 11 - 18 + Epilogue

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Chapter 1

“…Well, that about sums it up. If you have any more questions feel free to ask and welcome to Thomson Publishing, Miss Bristow,” Mr. Thomson smiled as he shook the hand of the woman sitting across from him.

“Thank you very much,” Sydney Bristow smiled back at him. The first day on a new job was always very nerve-wracking and stressful, but Mr. Thomson had been so kind to her, her nerves were quickly abating. She still had some reservations about her job, though. After all, she was starting a new career in a new state half a country away from her parents and everything she had ever known. That, in itself, was very scary.

“Come with me; I’ll show you to your office,” Mr. Thomson waved Sydney towards him as he left his office. Sydney stood, grabbing her oversized purse on the way, and followed him. Unlike many of the employees in that office, she was getting an actual office with a door instead of a cubical. When she’d first applied for the position at Thomson she’d been seeking one of the more entry-level cubical positions since they were all that was available, but as the interview process progressed, she found she was actually in the running for a higher level position. She had no idea how she’d made it into the pool being considered for that position.

“Well, this is it,” Mr. Thomson said when he paused in the doorway of a very sparse looking office. Only an empty desk (save the computer atop it) and two chairs filled the tiny room, but still Sydney smiled because it was her office.

“Thank you very much,” she smiled at her boss when she stepped inside.

“I’ll let you get settled then… don’t forget the staff meeting at eleven o’clock!” he reminded her before walking away from the office. Sydney shut the door behind him, leaned back against it and sighed. Working in the quiet of the single office was definitely preferable than working out in a cubical, where there would always be a murmur of noise.

“This is it, my new life,” she sighed as she walked over to her desk. She set her purse down and walked around to sit in the leather chair behind the desk. Just as she was about to sit down though, she found herself on the floor, the chair banging against the wall behind her. Utterly stunned from her bottom slamming painfully into the ground, she turned around slowly to look at the chair. Her brow furrowed as she mentally reviewed what she’d just done. She was sure she had been holding onto the chair before sitting onto it, but maybe she had not been; she could not remember.

Sighing, she climbed to her feet and dragged the rolling chair back to its proper position. That time, she sat down very carefully and thankfully the chair didn’t roll out from underneath her. Once seated, she reached for her purse and began unloading some of her personal belongings into the desk drawers. All the drawers were empty except for the drawer in the center of the desk, right on top of Sydney’s lap. When she pulled that drawer open, a man’s watch skidded out from one of the far back corners. Sydney picked it up, looked at it, and noticed that the second hand was no longer moving. Shrugging, she put the watch back into the desk, figuring the owner (most likely the person who occupied that office before her, a person she knew nothing about) would come looking for it sooner or later if he wanted it.

Sydney’s job description was fairly simple and involved two parts. The first and lesser part, of her job was calling (and sometimes driving around) potential new clients to try and get them to purchase publishing from Thompson. Thompson mostly published flyers, leaflets, internal magazines or newsletters for other businesses, not large scale things like books or large circulation magazines. This involved other part of Sydney’s job description: to meet with existing clients and discuss what they wanted printed, appropriate pricing and other assorted printing issues. For the most part, clients came to her office to discuss these things, but she occasionally had to go to them, which gave her the variety she was looking for in her job.

After Sydney arranged her things in the drawers of her desk, she put her purse away in the bottom drawer before standing from her desk chair and heading towards the office exit. Just as she was about to open the door, a loud slamming noise from behind her caused her to jump and scream. When she turned around, she saw nothing out of the ordinary: nothing had fallen, nothing, as far as she could tell, had moved at all. “Weird,” she muttered to herself before walking out of the office.

~*~

After a long day at work, Sydney went home to her brand new, yet sparse apartment. She had moved in only two days earlier, so, though her apartment was cluttered with lots of things, those things happened to be boxes waiting to be unpacked. After changing out of her work clothes and into more comfortable sweats, she headed to the kitchen to heat up some soup for dinner. While her apartment was still in disarray, she was sticking to easy-to-prepare meals so as not to waste time making elegant dinners when there was unpacking to be done. The only unpacking she’d completed so far was her clothing, which was necessary for work. That evening, she set to work on the boxes of books she had and began to place them on the bookshelves built into the walls of her apartment, which were one of the main reasons she’d purchased that place.

To her, the apartment seemed massive, but then again she was used to living in a cramped tiny apartment with a roommate, the only way to survive in a big city where she’d lived for the previous three years of her life, ever since graduating college. As much as the empty space made her lonely at times, she was glad not to have a roommate for once in her life. Peace and quiet surrounded her and, most importantly, no arguing lovers were within earshot.



Chapter 2

Within a month, Sydney had fallen into an even pattern regarding her new life. She’d finally finished unpacking every last box in her apartment and the previous week her parents had come to visit to see her new living arrangements. Shockingly, she’d managed to escape with only two nagging sessions from her mother about her new living space. Unfortunately, her mother’s favorite pastime seemed to be criticizing every little thing she did, so when her mother came to visit, Sydney was prepared for the worst. Much to her surprise though, her mother found her apartment to be adorable and her only complaint stemmed from its far distance from her own home. Ironically, Sydney considered that to be one of the positive things about her apartment.

As for her work life, things were going well. She enjoyed her job greatly and was even making friends at work. The only tiny downside to her work was that her office was rather…well, strange. On her first day of work, she thought that the incident involving the chair slipping out from under her was a total fluke; a result of her own clumsiness. However, she couldn’t have been more wrong. Ever since that first day, strange little things would happen around her office. First, her chair slid out from under her on what seemed to be a weekly basis, if not more frequently than that. Of course, Sydney, being a logical person, chalked it up to the chair having particularly slippery wheels.

The chair wasn’t the only strange thing, though. There were often many unexplainable creaks and crashes. Not to mention the fact that her computer would randomly shut itself off. If Sydney didn’t know any better, she would have thought her office was haunted. She didn’t believe in ghosts though, so in her mind, that was an impossibility. Still, there was something strange going on; she just couldn’t figure out what.

One day, Sydney was sitting in her office reviewing a client’s file, squirming constantly in her seat. The reason for her discomfort was simple: her new shoes were killing her, or rather, killing her feet. She was convinced that once she took them off, not only would she never be able to get them back on again (due to the swelling of her feet), but that her feet would be permanently deformed. Finally, she could take it no longer and she had to kick off her shoes. She sighed with relief and rolled her ankles around, stretching out her aching extremities. In continuing with her relaxation, she leaned back in her chair and propped her feet up on the desk, sinking into a more comfortable position to read.

She’d barely been sitting that way for a minute before she heard a shockingly loud male voice. “What the hell are you doing?! Get your feet off my desk!” the voice boomed. Naturally, she was scared to death and reacted by screaming and jumping practically a foot. This, of course, caused her chair to rocket out from underneath her, meaning she landed with a painful thump on the ground, one of her feet still up on the desk.

Terrified, Sydney clambered to her knees and peered over her desk towards the sound of the voice she’d heard. Shockingly, there was no one there. She stared and stared around the room, but nothing had moved or changed. Her door was still shut and the chairs in front of her desk were still perfectly in order. Utterly confused, Sydney stood up and rearranged her chair, shaking her head as she did so. Thinking that perhaps she’d been reading too long, she painfully slipped her shoes back on before exiting her office, bound for the soda machine to get some sugar for her bloodstream.

While at the soda machine, Sydney was intercepted by one of her coworkers who immediately began discussing a work-related matter with her. This discussion completely distracted Sydney from her previous strange encounter and she was able to focus on her work for the rest of the afternoon. It wasn’t until later that evening at her house that she remembered the strange voice that had echoed around her, scaring her completely. At that time, though, she merely dismissed it as a hallucination; her mind was tired and playing tricks on her.

The next morning after a staff meeting, Sydney walked into her office, coffee cup in hand, reading a fax she’d received. She wasn’t really paying attention to where she was going and accidentally bumped into her desk rather painfully with her knee. In doing this, her whole body shook and she thus spilled coffee from her cup that splashed down onto her desk. “Damn it,” she groaned. She quickly set the coffee cup and fax down and reached for a few tissues.

As she was wiping up what she spilled, a loud, booming voice filled her office. “Now you spilled coffee! Jesus, you’re making a mess of everything!!” Startled by the noise, Sydney screamed and took a step back, tripping over her infamous rolling chair. This caused her to fall to her knees as she frantically looked around her office. There, standing by the chair on the opposite side of her desk, was a man. She blinked, wondering if he was really there, but when she opened her eyes again, there he stood. His arms were folded over his chest, his expression stern, obviously indicating how upset he was.

Though Sydney’s mouth was dry, she was about to speak (or attempt to) when Mary, a coworker, popped her head into Sydney’s office. “Are you alright? I heard you scream…”

“Yes, um,” Sydney croaked as her eyes drifted from Mary to where the man was standing. Much to her shock (and horror) the man was gone. “I, um… chair slipped…spilled coffee…” she managed to stammer.

“Oh ok,” Mary gave her a smile, albeit a confused one, before leaving the doorway to her office.

Sydney stood slowly, her eyes trained on the spot where the man had been. She took two steps around her desk and stood in a spot where she would have been practically nose-to-nose with the man, had he been there, of course. She circled the area twice, thinking a thousand different things in her mind. She had seen someone there, she was sure of it…wasn’t she? If there had been a man, where did he escape to so quickly? Mary had been blocking the doorway and he obviously wasn’t hiding under her desk somewhere.

Finally after nearly ten minutes of obsessing, Sydney shook her head and walked back to her desk. “It’s the stress,” she rationalized her hallucinations, both auditory and visual. “It has to be the stress.”



Chapter 3

When almost a week had passed without any more supernatural occurrences, Sydney thought she was in the clear. However, she couldn’t have been more wrong. As she was crossing her apartment from the bathroom to her bedroom after showering one evening, she spotted something in her apartment out of the corner of her eyes. Frozen in horror she turned and recognized immediately the strange man who’d yelled at her in her office the previous week. She shrieked at the top of her lungs and wrapped her towel tightly around her body after she’d nearly dropped it from pure astonishment, which would have exposed her entire body to this strange man.

“Oh my god!” she shrieked, her heart pounding so hard in her chest she was convinced it would fly out of her rib cage. “Who the hell are you?! What are you doing?! How’d you get in here?! WHY ARE YOU STALKING ME?!”

“I’m not stalking you!! You’re stalking me!!” the man retorted.

“WHAT?!” Sydney screamed. “This is my apartment!!! You were in my office!! Who the hell are you?!” she demanded.

“Look lady,” the man said as he took a step towards Sydney.

“NO!! No, stop!!” Sydney shouted as she backed away from him. She backed herself all the way back into the bathroom and panicked, realizing she’d trapped herself. Frantically looking around she grabbed the only weapon in sight: a toilet plunger. She held it up menacingly in front of her with one hand while holding on her towel with the other. “Stay back!! I mean it!”

“A plunger? What are you gonna do – plunge me to death?!” he asked, obviously not afraid at all.

“Either tell me who the hell you are or get the hell out of my apartment or – no, better yet – GET THE HELL OUT OF MY APARTMENT!” she demanded, taking a long range swipe at him with the plunger.

“Look,” the man said, holding up his hands so that his palms were facing her, “I’m not going to hurt you, I just-”

“OUT!” she shouted. She swung the plunger towards him, meaning to hit him on the head but the plunger didn’t hit the man at all. In fact, if Sydney didn’t know any better she would have said that she had hit him but for some inexplicable reason the plunger passed right through him. The man seemed entirely unfazed so Sydney took another swing. That time, she watched, utterly bewildered, as the plunger passed right through the center of his head.

With a scream Sydney exclaimed, “What the hell are you?!” But through her shouting, she glanced for one second at the plunger and when she looked back to the strange man he was gone. She let out a slight squeak of confusion as she rushed forward to the spot where he was standing and waved her arms wildly around as if trying to find him under some sort of cloak of invisibility.

“Oh my god…,” she sighed when she came to the only semi-rational conclusion she could think of. “My apartment is haunted!” she whimpered. She stood there for another few minutes until realizing she was still in her towel, at which point she quickly returned the plunger to the bathroom before going into her bedroom. Once there, she had a horrifying thought. If her apartment was haunted by the random man who kept showing up, did that mean he could see her at all times including when she was changing, sleeping and showering? Shivering at the thought, Sydney quickly changed her clothes a la high school gym class - doing everything possible under the towel and then doing the rest at lightening speed.

“This is great, just great,” Sydney muttered as she threw back the covers to her bed, glancing around as she did so. She flicked off the lamp beside her bed and slid underneath the covers, lying flat on her back and staring up at the ceiling. Why did she, of all people, have to have a haunted apartment? Even more so she wondered why she had to get stuck with a cute ghost? Oh no, she couldn’t have a scary ghoul with green skin and rotten teeth. No, no… her ghost had to be straight out of the pages of an Abercrombie catalog.

“If you’re listening Mr. Ghost-Man – I hate you!” Sydney shouted up to her ceiling.

~*~

The next morning when Sydney awoke her ‘oh my god, I’m being watched from the hot ghost in my apartment!’ paranoia took over. She retrieved the clothes she’d be wearing that day to work and crawled underneath the covers of her bed with them to change, praying ghosts didn’t have x-ray vision. As she brushed her teeth, her eyes darted around the mirror, waiting for him to pop up behind her, causing her to jam her toothbrush into the side of her mouth.

He never appeared that day, though. Or the next. He did appear the day after that, though, in Sydney’s office, just as she was about to take a bite of the soup she was eating for lunch. “Why must you eat on my desk?!” he demanded of her. Luckily she had yet to put the spoon in her mouth so, when she gasped as his appearance, she didn’t choke to death.

“You!” she hissed, dropping the spoon back into the soup cup. “You’re haunting my apartment and my office!! Can’t you just leave me alone?!”

“Whoa, lady calm down!” the man said. “What are you talking about… haunting?! I’m not haunting! This is my office!”

“Oh yeah?” Sydney exhaled. She was growing more and more irritated by the second with her chiseled jaw poltergeist. She balled up a scrap of paper from her desk and threw it at the man across from her. She had to admit even though she’d convinced herself two days earlier he was a ghost she was still shocked to see the paper fly right through his stomach as if he wasn’t even there.

The man looked down at the spot where the paper had passed through his body and then back up to her. “How’d you do that?!” he asked with confusion.

“WHAT?!” Sydney shrieked. “Hello!! You’re a ghost!! G-H-O-S-T ghost!! Now, do I have to call an exorcist? Ghost busters? WHAT?! Or are you just like Casper and you want to be my friend? Cause I gotta tell you, pal, I only befriend those with pulses and I am not,” she paused to pull something out of her top desk drawer (something she’d stashed the day before, “afraid of ghosts!”

“What is that?” the man squinted to look at what she had in her hand. “Is that… a cross?”

“Yes, yes it is!” she said as she held up the tiny charm in front of her. In her mind, she somehow figured that if she had a cross the ghost wouldn’t hurt her. The only problem was that the only cross she had was a very tiny one on a gold chain that she’d gotten for her tenth birthday from her grandparents. “So stay back!”

“Um…okay… look if you’d just get out of my office-”

“This is my office!” Sydney cut him off, her voice raising. “So, why don’t you get out of MY office you…you…freak!”

“Sydney,” Mary said from the doorway to Sydney’s office, “what are you yelling about?”

“Um…,” Sydney hesitated. Her eyes darted over towards where the man was standing but she noticed that, not surprisingly, he was gone. “Nothing…just a phone call… with my mother…,” she lied quickly with a nervous laugh. Mary nodded her head, though she gave Sydney a very peculiar look as she left her office. Sighing, Sydney collapsed back onto her chair wondering if there was really any legitimate way to un-haunt her office.



Chapter 4

Sydney spent most of the afternoon perusing internet websites for articles on ghosts and haunted areas instead of doing actual work. What she found was that her strong beliefs against ghost hindered any information she could have found. With each new website detailing sprits that hadn’t ‘crossed over’ she’d snort even louder with disbelieving laughter. For her whole life she’d been a firm believer that there was no such thing as ghosts, just like she believed magic and superstitions to be a complete and total waste of time. However, through hours of thinking, she had yet to find a rational explanation for the ghostly man in her office and apartment aside from the possibility that she’d lost her mind. In a choice between losing her mental sanity and believing in ghosts, she decided it was better to do the latter.

She eventually gave up her ghost information search after finding a website explaining chants that needed to be done to free the spirit. That was definitely too out there for her, so she got down to actual work for the rest of the day. Working in her office, she quickly found, became as difficult as living normally in her home. She was constantly on alert for the handsome ghost to appear and scare the living hell out of her like he’d done before on more than one occasion. He never showed up, though, at least, not at her office.

Later that evening, as she was preparing dinner for herself, she was walking back and forth between her kitchen stove and the table in the eating area of her apartment. The eating area, of course, left a clear view of where her sofa and television were set up. As she made one of these trips, she spotted the man standing right beside her sofa. This made her scream, jump and spill some of the lima beans from the bowl in her hand. “Jesus Christ, is it your goal to give me a heart attack?!!” she demanded of him. She was beginning to think that his main purpose in ghost form was not to haunt, but to increase her blood pressure to a permanent off-the-charts level.

“I mean,” she groaned as she bent over to pick up the spilt limas, “would it kill you to go, ‘Hey Sydney, I’m going to be dropping by to haunt you in a little bit!’ before just showing up!!”

“Sydney? Is that your name?” he asked, taking two steps towards her.

“Yes,” she grunted. She took the handful of lima beans that she’d picked up from the floor and tossed them into the trash can before spinning around to find him only inches away from her. She jumped back, startled, before groaning, “and it is not a pleasure to make your acquaintance. What is your name anyway, Casper?”

“Name…,” the man said slowly as his brow wrinkled. Sydney looked at him in surprise since he appeared to be truly thinking about her question. For the first time she truly looked at him. He wasn’t transparent like the ghosts from movies; he wasn’t even the slightest bit opaque. He looked just like an ordinary man, aside from the fact that she could have put her hand through him, that was. His hair was a sandy color and very messy, but not in an unkempt way; it was a very sexy messy. His jaw was strong and his skin a nice tan shade. She saw his soft green eyes filled with confusion and almost fear as he looked over at her and sighed, “I don’t know…”

“You don’t know your name, Casper?” she asked in surprise.

“Stop calling me that!” he snapped at her. “I’m not a ghost!”

“Oh really?” Sydney arched an eyebrow at him. He nodded firmly. “Hold out your arm like this,” she instructed as she held out her arm in front of her with her palm toward the ceiling. He gave her a confused look and she encouraged, “Go on.”

Sighing, the man did as she asked. She then reached out her own arm towards his and very quickly passed her hand straight through his. Upon doing this, she took a step back and looked down at her hand. It was a strange feeling passing through his hand. She wasn’t sure she’d feel anything but she did feel something. It was cool, cooler than the room around her, and it almost felt as though she was passing her hand through a fluffy white cloud; there was something there but yet there wasn’t anything at all.

“That’s… impossible,” the man said quietly, staring down at his hand with confusion.

“You’re tellin’ me,” Sydney muttered as she walked back to the dinner table she’d set up for herself. She sat down in her chair, picked up her fork and began stabbing at some of the lima beans on her plate. “Look, I’m starving, so we’ll figure out how to send you packing after I eat. Have a seat if you want.” She glanced up tentatively after she said this to see the man groping at the chair, trying to pull it out from the table, but each time he did so his hand passed right through.

“This is very strange,” he said finally.

“Don’t you remember dying?” Sydney mumbled through her mouthful of mashed potatoes.

“I don’t remember anything…,” he said in an almost distraught way.

“Yes you do. You kept yelling at me for being in your office so you must remember that the office is yours,” Sydney reminded him.

“I guess, but…,” his voice drifted off as his brow furrowed in thought. He was silent for a long time before his face finally relaxed. “Michael. My name is Michael.”

“Okay Michael… you got a last name that goes along with that?” Sydney asked him. He looked rather sheepishly towards the floor indicating a negative answer. “That’s okay, I mean, I don’t think we’ll need to know your last name to vanquish you.”

“Vanquish me?!” he asked with a mixture of confusion and horror.

Sydney shrugged casually as she scooped up another spoonful of mashed potatoes. “I used to watch Charmed.”

“I don’t want you to vanquish me!”

“Well, you can’t stay here!” she countered. “You could be watching me in the shower – watching me naked, you sick freak! Ugh,” she groaned in frustration, “if I could hit you I would.”

“Excuse me,” Michael said in an almost offended way. “I have not watched you in the shower, nor have I seen you naked.”

“Oh yeah, so where do you go when you’re not… here?! What do you do? Lurk in the walls?” she questioned.

“I…,” he began slowly. “I don’t know…I don’t know!!”

“Well, you’d better figure it out!” she shouted.

“Don’t yell at me!! This is hard for me too, you know. Hello – I’m dead! That’s pretty bad, if you ask me,” he pointed out.

Sydney sighed slightly. He did have a point. He was nice enough, for a ghost anyway, and she didn’t wish anyone dead, not even her enemies. “Well… who knows how long ago you died. It could have been years – decades even.”

“Um,” Michael paused to look down at his t-shirt from a concert tour that had taken place in the years 2004-2005, “I doubt it’s been decades.”

“Oh,” Sydney said in a short tone when she noticed what he was looking at and read it herself. “Well, you still could have died in 2004 – that’s two years ago.”

“True… oh, I don’t know, this is so frustrating!” he groaned.

“Um, yeah,” Sydney said as she stood and carried her dinner plate into the kitchen. “It is for me…too,” she let her voice drift off when she turned back around and Michael was gone. “Damn it, I hate it when he does that!” she groaned.



Chapter 5

The following day at work, a Friday, Sydney could hardly concentrate on what she was doing. She kept waiting and waiting for Michael to randomly pop up and scare her half to death. Sitting at her desk, her mind scanned through the things she knew about him. She knew that at one point in time he’d had that office as his own, presumably around the time he died, but how long ago was that? It could have been years. She shivered at the thought that possibly he died in that very room. It seemed logical since that was the first place she’d seen him, but how did he end up at her house? She had no idea.

Without knowing anything more specific about when he died aside from it was after the year 2003 sometime, it was impossible to find out who he was. There had to have been dozens of men named Michael who died in that time. Granted, by looking at him she guessed his age to be definitely less than thirty-five though most likely older than herself (she was twenty-seven). That age range certainly narrowed the field considerably, but was it enough to find out who he was? She wasn’t sure.

Finally, at two o’clock she was forced from her thoughts by a meeting with a client. The meeting went well and, when it was over, Sydney walked her client out. On her way back to her office, she stopped in the break room to get a cup of coffee. On the wall of the break room was a large bulletin board where employees posted pictures of their family, notices about things or anything really. She’d been in there dozens of times, but she’d never really looked at the bulletin board before. Sure, occasionally there was a neon yellow piece of paper with a message on it tacked up there and she’d read that, but she never bothered to take a look at the pictures until now. As she sipped on her coffee, she nearly choked at the sight of one of the pictures.

The picture in question was located at the top right corner of the bulletin board. It was a group of five people standing around a picnic bench. The sun was obviously bright on the day the photo was taken, because all the people were wearing sunglasses, which made determining their identities even more difficult. Two of the people in the picture Sydney managed to make out as people she currently worked with: George from accounting and his secretary, Meredith. Two of the other people she didn’t recognize at all. Much to her shock, though, the fifth person in the picture was none other than Michael, her ghost. Sure, his hair was darker, he was smiling, something she’d never seen him do in ghost form, and his sunglasses were obstructing his perfectly green eyes but it was most definitely him.

Just as she was gaping at the picture, wondering even more about the person Michael had been, Mary walked into the break room, also in search of coffee. “Whatcha doin’, Syd?” she asked with an amused laugh at her coworker’s glazed expression.

“Wha? Oh… nothing, just – do you know who this man is?” she asked. She lifted up her right hand and pointed to Michael in the picture with her index finger.

Mary squinted up at the picture for a moment before relaxing her face and looking away. “Yeah, that’s Michael Vaughn. He used to work here… in your office actually, until… well, until the accident, that is.”

“Accident?” Sydney asked cautiously, knowing from Mary’s tone it wasn’t something she was comfortable talking about.

“Yeah, it was ‘bout… oh, not quite four months ago now. Walking down the sidewalk…,” she sighed heavily. “It was such a shame; he was a really great guy,” Mary told her before walking out of the break room, coffee cup in hand.

Once she was gone, Sydney looked back up to the photograph once more. She studied every inch of his smile from the very subtle dimples on both sides of his lips to how very straight his teeth were. She then looked down at his body, or at least what was visible of it in the photo which was cut off at approximately his waist. He was wearing a light blue t-shirt with a logo on it she couldn’t make out. His arm was flexed in front of him, his hand gripping a soda can, revealing a strong bicep that caused her heart to twinge. Seeing him so happy in the picture, she couldn’t help but feel very, very sad. He died so young and that was always a tragedy. More than that, though, she felt sorry she was never able to know him when he was alive.

After staring at the picture for ten minutes, Sydney walked slowly back to her office, dragging her feet along the carpet as she went. She felt terrible at the realization that she’d have to tell Michael what she found out about him the next time she saw him, whenever that was. She continued to work throughout the day at a sluggish pace until finally she was ready to go home. Just before she left, though, a thought entered her mind.

If Michael had died not quite four months earlier, that would have been only a month or so before she came to work there. That meant it was possible there had been no one using her office between the time he left and she arrived. If that was true then the watch in her desk most likely belonged to him.

The more she thought about it, the more it made sense. That explained why no one came to claim it. If its owner was dead, who would know it was missing? Whatever family member of Michael’s who cleaned out his desk probably missed it. Smiling softly to herself, Sydney pocked the watch before leaving the office, hoping that maybe it might trigger a memory for Michael.



Chapter 6

“Michael? Michael are you, um, here?” Sydney called out when she walked into her apartment that evening. In her mind, she was insulting herself, saying how stupid she was for calling out to a very unpredictable ghost. There was no rhyme or reason to his appearances, so what made her think he would just show up when she called to him?

Much to her surprise, though, she received an answer. “Over here,” he said softly. She looked in the direction of his voice and saw him sitting at a chair by one of the windows in her apartment. His elbows were propped up on his knees and his chin rested in his hands.

“What’s the matter?” she asked as she approached him. His posture and tone indicated that he was depressed about something, though given his less-than-alive status, that wasn’t exactly a shocking thing.

“Oh, I dunno… I was just sitting here trying to remember things,” he sighed.

“And?” she asked hopefully. He gave her a graven expression. “Oh…well, I found something that might help you – two things, actually. I’ll be right back,” she smiled before disappearing into her bedroom to change out of her work attire. She returned a few minutes later to find Michael standing beside the chair he’d been sitting in.

“Come over here,” Sydney said as she walked towards the couch. She sat down and waited for Michael to sit beside her before continuing. Watching him sit was a very strange experience for her. Watching him, she anticipated the couch to move when he touched it, but it didn’t move at all, not even an inch. That was rather unnerving.

“Well, first, I found a picture of you in the break room at work today and I asked someone about it. Your name is Michael Vaughn and… and you had an accident about four months ago,” Sydney told him in a gentle tone.

Michael breathed in sharply as he looked away from her. “Accident? What kind of accident?”

“I don’t know… all she said was accident and something about a sidewalk. She didn’t seem to want to talk about it,” Sydney told him. “Maybe you were out walking and a car hit you,” Sydney offered, though it was just a guess.

“I don’t know… I don’t know,” he sighed, shaking his head. “Four months? It’s been four months?! Where…where’ve I been since then?” he wondered aloud, not really expecting an answer.

“I don’t know,” Sydney shrugged. He looked so lost and confused that she felt awful, wishing she could help him. “What… what’s the last thing you remember?”

“Talking to you last night,” Michael told her.

“And… before that?”

He sighed as his brow furrowed once more. “Nothing…I don’t understand, how can there be nothing?!”

“Maybe this will help,” Sydney said. She stood from the couch and walked over to her purse that was resting on the table by the door. She pulled the watch from it and returned to the couch with it in her outstretched hand. “I think this is yours,” she told him. Michael instinctively reached for it, but of course his hand went right through hers. “Oops, sorry, forgot,” Sydney cringed. Then she held the watch up in front of him so he could look at it.

Michael stared at the watch long and hard for a moment before suddenly a light bulb flashed in his head. “Yes, yes this is mine. I remember… I remember it broke the day…the day I died,” his voice drifted off sadly.

“What do you remember?” Sydney asked cautiously.

“Not much,” he said with a weak smile. “I just have these flashes… I was sitting at my desk, looked down at my watch and noticed that the second hand had stopped moving…I was late for something so I just stashed it in the top drawer of my desk….”

“Do you… do you remember dying?” Sydney asked him.

He shook his head. “I don’t remember much… I almost remember going back to my apartment after work, but I really don’t know. Somehow I just know that was the day I died. Sounds ridiculous, huh?”

“Michael, you’re a ghost. All of this is ridiculous,” Sydney told him with a slight laugh. He laughed as well and, for the first time, Sydney saw his smile. Her heart fluttered in her chest and she looked away quickly. She then cleared her throat and stood, walking into the kitchen. “Well, I guess I’m going to make some dinner… will you be sticking around?”

“You mean because I have lots of other places to go?” he asked with a raised eyebrow, following her into the kitchen.

“Well, no. You tend to vanish,” Sydney reminded him.

“I do?” he asked, his tone indicating he had no idea this was true. Sydney nodded. “Oh well… I dunno about that, but I’m not planning on leaving.”

“Okay,” she gave him a soft smile before looking in her refrigerator.

“How about you tell me something about yourself,” Michael suggested. “I’d tell you about myself but…”

“Right,” Sydney laughed softly. “Well, um, I don’t know… what do you want to know?”

Michael shrugged. “How long have you lived here?”

“’bout a month and half,” she told him. “That’s the same amount of time I’ve lived in this city too. I used to live further out West.”

“Why’d you move?” he asked.

She shrugged. “Needed a change… sick of home, you know?”

Though being ghostly didn’t give him the benefit of much physical perception, he was able to tell by the tone of her voice there was much more to the story. She was covering something up; hiding something. “Did something happen at home?” he asked carefully.

Her eyes snapped up in an almost questioning ‘how did you know?’ manner before she shrugged the question off quickly. “Just some old boyfriend crap- no big deal. So anyway, did you want me to help you with the whole…moving on thing? I don’t know much about ghosts but I’m thinking you’re not supposed to stay here.”

Michael was stunned slightly by her abrupt change of subject. “Um… I don’t know… aren’t ghosts around because they have unfinished business, like avenging their death or something?”

Sydney shrugged. She’d heard something similar to that before but, of courses, since she was a non-believer in ghosts she’d never paid much attention. “I guess…. Do you have unfinished business?”

“I don’t remember,” he stated simply.

“Right, well… maybe we can figure something out tomorrow then. It’s Saturday and I don’t work so I have the whole day.”

“Okay,” Michael agreed softly. Then he hung back in the kitchen as she finished preparing her meal. They were silent as she ate and Michael scanned the titles on her bookshelves. “You sure have a lot of these,” he laughed, pointing to the books.

“Yeah, I like ‘em,” Sydney told him. “Right now I’m reading that one,” she said, pointing to her coffee table. Michael glanced down at it and just from the cover he knew it wasn’t his type of book.

After her kitchen was cleaned up, Sydney sat on her couch with the book from her coffee table in her lap, reading. Michael sat on the opposite side of the couch from her, not really knowing what to do. Sydney was so tense from him sitting there doing nothing she could hardly read. Finally, she broke their silence by asking, “Do ghosts sleep?”

“I don’t think so…,” Michael said slowly.

“So, um…where will you go, when I go to bed?” she asked. He shrugged silently. “Oh well…um…okay then,” Sydney sighed. She put her book down on the coffee table, making sure to mark the page she’d stopped reading on, before walking over to her apartment door and locking it security. Then she walked towards her bedroom with a soft, “Goodnight Michael.”

“Goodnight,” he echoed, but when she looked back towards him, he was gone.



Chapter 7

The next morning when Sydney opened her eyes, she found Michael sitting at the chair across from her bed and jumped. “God! You have to stop that!” she exclaimed as she pulled the covers up to her neck so he wouldn’t see her in her revealing PJs.

“Sorry,” Michael said sheepishly. “I can’t knock.”

Sydney grumbled at him as she rubbed her eyes with her fists. “What did you do all night? Please don’t tell me you watched me sleep,” she said, shivering slightly at that creepy factor.

“No, no I’ve only been here for about twenty minutes. Some of the night I looked out the windows and the rest… I dunno,” he shrugged.

“What’d you see outside?” Sydney asked through a yawn.

“Nothin’ much…an ambulance went past and a bunch of cars…that’s about it.”

“Oh,” Sydney sighed, rolling over onto her back and staring up at the ceiling, debating whether or not to get up.

“So what are we doing today?”

“We?” Sydney turned her head to the side and looked at him. “What is this ‘we’?”

“Well…I thought you said you were going to vanquish me or send me forth into the next realm or whatever,” Michael reminded her.

“Oh… well… yeah, I guess I should,” Sydney said sadly as she sat up. Truthfully she was beginning to like him being around. Well, maybe not like, but tolerate.

“You want me to stay?” he questioned.

Sydney swallowed hard at the fact that he sounded hopeful. “Well, no, not exactly. I mean, if you’re trapped as a ghost I don’t want you to be trapped anymore but I still feel bad… killing you.”

“You can’t kill me, I’m already dead… I guess,” he laughed slightly.

“Well, you know what I meant,” she said. “Anyway, we can figure something out, but I gotta um…,” she gestured with her sheets. Michael nodded knowingly, got off the chair and walked towards the door. The door to Sydney’s bedroom was shut, but that didn’t stop Michael; he walked right through it as if it wasn’t even there. Sydney shook her head as she got out of bed. “As soon as this is over, I’m getting a CAT scan.”

~*~

When Sydney emerged from her bedroom fully dressed and ready for the day, she found Michael looking out the window once more. “Really like that thing, huh?”

“What? Oh…,” he shrugged as he walked away from the window. “It’s the only thing I can do really… I mean, I can’t pick up a book and read or turn on the TV.”

“Right….forgot,” she mumbled, making her way to the kitchen to find something to eat. “Listen, I have to run some errands this morning but, uh, you could come if you’d like. I mean, who knows something might jog your memory and you might remember something about your family…”

“My family?” he questioned with a furrowed brow.

“Well yeah, I figure they might be the key to… setting you free,” she said with a waving hand gesture. He gave her a perplexed look. “Okay, I have absolutely no idea!!! It’s not like I’ve ever dealt with a ghost before… or met a ghost before – I never even believed in ghosts before!!!”

“Okay, okay… calm down, Sydney,” Michael said softly to her.

“I’m sorry, I just… I feel like I’m losing my mind!!” she groaned.

“Why?!”

“HELLO!!! Talking to a ghost!!!!!” she screamed.

“Okay, okay, deep breath,” he said, raising his hands up in front of him, trying to move as little as possible. “I can just leave if you want… I’ll try to find someone else to help me-”

“No… wait,” she cut him off. “No, no, I’m sorry, I don’t want you to go, I just… I feel like I’m having some sort of psychotic break here.”

“No you’re not,” Michael told her. Sydney gave him a look. “No, what I mean is, when people have psychotic breaks they hallucinate things that don’t exist, like little demons or fairies or elves. I, on the other hand, am a real person… well, was a real person,” he said rather painfully.

“Oh…,” Sydney sighed, feeling slightly better. “Oh, oh yes, that’s a very good point. Good. Okay… we can go now if you want,” she sighed as she walked over towards her purse. Looking over her shoulder, she saw that Michael was following her, so she headed out the door.

~*~

“This is kinda weird… do you think this is weird?” she mumbled to Michael as they walked through the aisles of the grocery store.

“Um, no, but people might think you’re weird if you’re talking to something that doesn’t exist,” Michael pointed out. Sydney gave him a confused look. “Um, no one else can see me.”

“How do you know?!” she questioned rather loudly, causing a few heads to turn her way.

Michael took a few steps away from her so that he was in the middle of the grocery aisle. He then began waving his hands above his head wildly, jumping up and down and shouting, “CAN ANYBODY SEE ME?!!!!”

Sydney shrank, mortified, but absolutely no one else in the grocery store moved an inch. “See,” Michael said with a proud look. Sydney shook her head at him before continuing her shopping.

Though during their shopping excursion Michael remembered absolutely nothing, Sydney was convinced that about half a dozen people thought she had schizophrenia. She just couldn’t help it: speaking to him, that was. It was too awkward for her not to talk to him. Besides, she actually wanted to talk with him to see if he was remembering anything (of course he wasn’t).

“Wait, can you stop here, please,” Michael asked softly when Sydney drove past a lookout area beside a large river. She pulled her car into the lot and stopped.

“You remember something?” she asked softly.

“I’m not sure,” he sighed. He got out of the car (without using the door, of course) and Sydney quickly followed him as he walked down towards the river. She was silent, wanting to give him some space, but yet at the same time not wanting to be too far away in case he wanted to speak to her, so she stayed a few steps behind.

Michael walked over to the railing right beside the river and rested his hands on it. Sydney imagined him gripping it so tightly his knuckles turned white, assuming he could grip, that was. They were silent for almost a full five minutes before Michael faintly began softly. “It’s just…it’s finally hitting me, you know? I’m dead. I’m dead,” he repeated the words as if he was trying to convince himself. “I’ll never have a family or get married… nothing.”

Sydney went to place her hand on his shoulder, but of course, that didn’t work, so she had to settle for comforting words. “I’m sorry Michael, I really am,” she told him.

He turned his head to look at her and managed a half-smile. “I know you are….listen, I think I’m going to stay here for a while… you go on back.”

“Are you sure? I mean, can you find your way to my apartment again?” she asked.

He nodded. “I’m pretty sure I can.”

“Okay then…,” Sydney said softly. She hesitated for a moment before walking slowly towards her car, getting inside and then driving away. In her rear view mirror, she caught a glimpse of him fading into the distance, hunched over the railing looking more sad than she’d ever seen anyone look in her whole life.



Chapter 8

By the time Sydney arrived home, her need to help Michael was more overwhelming than ever, so she went directly to her computer. After signing onto the internet, she pulled up the website belonging to the local newspaper and entered ‘Michael Vaughn’ into the search engine. Her search returned dozens of results since, apparently, it brought up any article that had the name ‘Michael’ or ‘Vaughn’ in it. In order to narrow her search, she restricted it to the month of November, four months earlier. That time she found a match. Man Hit On Sidewalk… the article title read. “This is it,” Sydney sighed. She took a deep breath before clicking on the link. When the article appeared, she began to read.

Man Hit On Sidewalk By Falling Couch

On Wednesday evening, twenty-nine-year-old Michael Vaughn was walking along the sidewalk of East Avenue when he was struck by a couch. Authorities say that the couch was thrown out of the fifth story apartment of Bonnie and Mario Gomez during an argument between the couple.

Eye witnesses say that Vaughn was struck squarely on the head before collapsing onto the ground. Vaughn was rushed to Community Hospital, where he is listed in critical condition. At press time, he was still in surgery. The Gomez’s have been arrested and charged with the crime. More information will be released when available.

“Oh my god,” Sydney sighed after reading the article through three times. She merely stared at the screen, unsure how she should react. Idiots had killed Michael Vaughn. A pair of complete and total idiots who had thrown their couch out the window had killed Michael Vaughn.

Sydney was pulled from her shock by Michael’s soft voice. “Sydney? Are you alright?”

“Wha…,” she croaked when she looked towards the sound of his voice. He was standing by the window he loved so much looking rather concerned. “Oh, I…I’m not sure.”

“What’s wrong? You look pale,” he said with concern as he approached her.

“I, um, I found out how you died…,” she said carefully.

“Oh,” he said, his tone very short. He sat down slowly on the opposite end of the couch from her, obviously trying to breathe deeply. “Well?” he said finally.

Instead of giving him a verbal answer, Sydney merely turned her laptop computer towards him. The article was still visible on the page so he could see for himself what she found out with her having to explain it to him. With a furrowed brow, Michael leaned forward and Sydney watched his eyes scan over the page. Once finished reading, he sat back against the back of the sofa and stared down at the screen. “I was killed,” he began slowly, “by a couch… I was killed by a couch…”

At this repetition, Sydney let out a choked bit of laughter. Quickly, she covered her mouth with her hands, trying to muffle her laughter. She fought harder not to laugh as he turned his head and looked at her strangely. She did not find his death funny in the least, it was merely the way he said how he died she found amusing.

“Oh, this is funny, is it? You think my death is funny?” Michael challenged. Sydney shook her head furiously, though her eyes clearly gave away that she was laughing. Suddenly, Michael burst out laughing as well. The two of them rolled around the couch in hysterics before Michael finally regained the ability to speak. “A couch!! God, I didn’t even die a really cool way like by a gunshot or even by a car!! Oh no, I was brought down by a couch. It probably wasn’t even a cool couch either, like a leather one. Oh no, I’m sure it was some big ugly sucker of a couch… probably pink with flowers… or some sort of fake furred thing from the sixties that had stains all over it… it was probably covered in beer and puke from too many parties and BAM it nailed me.”

“Stop it!” Sydney squeaked, gasping for breath as she wiped tears from her eyes. “You’re killing me!”

“I wanna see a picture of this couch. I bet it’s hideous!” Michael laughed. The two of them continued their giggles for a few minutes before they finally calmed themselves down.

“I’m really sorry, Michael,” Sydney managed with a straight face, actually sounding sincere.

“Sorry I’m dead or sorry I was killed by the ugly pee couch?” Michael asked, amazingly serious.

A small giggle escaped Sydney’s lips. “Both… but I’m really sorry this happened.”

He gave her a half-smile. “Thanks…I am too.”

They sat in silence as Sydney closed up her laptop and set it aside. “So, um, you think that now you know who killed you you’ll be able to… you know, go on?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” he said honestly.

“Well…try it,” she encouraged.

“Try what?”

“Moving on.”

“Okay,” he said in a tone of voice that made it clear he had no idea what to do. He sat up straight, closed his eyes and took a deep breath. As he did this, Sydney stared at him intently, trying desperately not to blink. She thought that maybe if she did blink, she’d miss him passing over into the great beyond. The two of them sat there for a few minutes before Michael opened one eye and looked at Sydney. “Am I gone?” he asked softly.

“Not even close,” Sydney sighed in defeat. “I guess that wasn’t it, huh?”

“No,” he sighed. “I’m sorry I’m stuck here.”

Sydney shook her head. “It’s not your fault; don’t worry about it. Hey… how’d you get here anyway? I mean… you were at the river and…”

“Oh… I dunno,” he smiled softly, “I just… thought of you and then I opened my eyes and I was here.”

“Seriously!?” Sydney asked in a very intrigued tone. Michael nodded. “That’s so cool!! I want to be able to do that – think of how much money I’d save on gas for my car!”

Michael laughed. “But, uh, then you’d have to be dead.

Sydney’s face fell. “Oh…right…never mind then, but it’s still cool!”

“Yeah, I guess it is,” Michael smiled.



Chapter 9

“So when I was at the river I remembered something,” Michael told Sydney after they’d been laughing about the couch once more. Sydney gave him an intrigued look and he continued, “Yeah, I really like dogs and running.”

“Okay,” Sydney laughed slightly at the randomness of his comment.

“Well… no… see… when I was standing there, I watched this guy jogging by with his dog on a leash and I was just like ‘wow, that’s so cool’ and then I remembered wanting to do that….and I sound like an idiot,” he laughed slightly.

“No, no you don’t at all. It’s sweet. I like dogs too…and cats… and anything really,” she laughed.

“Why don’t you have any then?” Michael questioned.

“Well, my old apartment didn’t allow pets and I just moved here, so I wanted to get settled and everything before getting a pet but I’m definitely going to get one, hopefully before summer.”

“Cool,” he smiled at her.

“Yeah… if I get a dog, I’ll totally name it Michael,” she told him very seriously.

Michael burst out laughing, a laugh that made Sydney’s heart swell in her chest. “Thanks, thanks a lot.”

“I’m kidding,” she laughed as she reached out to touch his arm. Of course her hand went right through his arm and, for the first time in a few minutes, she remembered that he was a ghost and not a real, live person she could touch. That realization dampened their light conversation mood. “I, um,” Sydney cleared her throat as she stood, “I guess I’m gonna get some lunch.”

“Yeah, sure, don’t let me stop ya,” he laughed slightly.

“And then, um, did you wanna watch some TV maybe a movie or something? We can watch whatever you want,” Sydney told him. She didn’t want to flat out tell him she was letting him watch whatever he want because it could be the very last time he was able to watch TV, although that was her intention.

“Are you sure? It’s your TV…”

“It’s fine, really,” Sydney smiled at him. She turned on the TV and set it to the TV guide channel so Michael could watch the different choices and pick the one he wanted. While he was watching, Sydney went to the kitchen and made herself a sandwich for lunch. She then went back to the couch and changed the channel so they could watch the movie Michael picked.

For most of the afternoon the two of them didn’t speak much except for occasional comments about the movie they were watching. The movie was not even remotely close to Sydney’s taste but, sitting there with Michael, watching it together, she didn’t even mind. Also in that time, she began to forget once more than Michael wasn’t of the living world. Once the first movie ended, Sydney and Michael began watching the movie that came on after it, though Michael was watching it more than Sydney was. She began cleaning up her apartment, picking up scattered newspapers and magazines and dusting off tables that had collected a thin layer of white film since the last time she’d dusted a week earlier.

After the second movie, Sydney began preparing dinner and she and Michael began talking once more. Their conversation bounced all around to the most random of topics. They started out talking about different wars (because of the movie they’d been watching) and continued on to topics including college experiences and pets. Their conversation followed easily and, before either of them knew it, night had fallen and it was completely dark outside.

“Oh… we missed the sunset,” Michael said sadly as he gazed out the window. Sydney looked at him with a confused expression, wondering why, exactly, he cared so much. “Oh well, I just thought it’d be nice to watch the sunset and sunrise…,” he let his voice drift off though the words ‘for the last time’ were implied.

“Yeah,” Sydney sighed as she walked over and stood at the window beside him. “I’ve never really watched a sunset or a sunrise…”

“Yeah,” Michael gave her a half-smile. “I always thought it’d be rather romantic.”

Sydney glanced over towards Michael and suddenly she could feel her face grow very hot. She was convinced she could feel his hot breath against her cheek even though that was entirely impossible. At his words, she felt two very strong, very different emotions. First, she felt strongly attracted to him, as though he was suggesting that they watch the sunset together and that the romanticism that came along with it would fall down upon them, enhancing their own preexisting feelings towards one another. The thought of them together that way made her second feeling only that much worse.

The other thing she felt was an intense sadness and loss, not just for Michael, but for the two of them. Though they hardly counted as a couple, Sydney couldn’t deny the fact that had Michael been just an ordinary guy she’d met at the grocery store or the mall, she definitely would have wanted to date him. She felt a connection even moreso after they’d talked for practically half the day.

Turning her back from the window, Sydney slowly walked away and into her bedroom, fearing she’d cry at any moment. Not only was she sad for losing the potential of her own happiness with Michael, but she was terribly sad for him. He would never be able to watch another sunset or sunrise with a woman. Well, maybe he could see them, but without any ability to feel, could he really experience them to their fullest? He’d never be married or have a life. He couldn’t have anything; everything was ripped away from him at only twenty-nine years of age.

Sydney curled up in a tight ball on her bed, rocking gently back and forth, almost forgetting Michael was still with her until he appeared in her bedroom doorway. He didn’t cast a shadow on the ground from the light in the other room. Instead, the light almost filtered right through him. “Sydney? Sydney, are you crying?” he asked softly, walking further into the bedroom.

“I’m sorry,” Sydney sniffed, rolling over so that she could face him.

He sat down on the bed beside her as he asked, “What’s wrong?”

“I just… I was thinking about you… and how you’re… dead,” she choked slightly, “and I just… I’m just so sorry.”

“Why? You didn’t throw that couch on me…”

“No, I know, but…but I don’t know,” she sighed.

Instinctively, Michael reached out to touch her arm, but his hand went right through her. Stupidly he tried again, that time for her face, and when his hand went through her cheek, she jumped slightly. “I’m sorry… I-I’m sorry,” Michael sighed, hanging his head. “I wish I could…”

“I know,” Sydney said softly. She looked down at his hand resting on the bedspread and stared at it so hard she thought she might stare right through it. It looked so real, so why couldn’t she touch it? “What would you do if you could really touch me?” she asked softly.

His eyes snapped up to hers, searching for permission to give an honest answer. “I’d… I’d wipe all your tears away,” he told her quietly.

Sydney sniffed slightly as butterflies filled her stomach. She shook her head and buried her face into the pillow beneath her, cursing herself for having feelings for a person that didn’t exist. After a few minutes, she rolled her head back so that she could look at Michael. “Will you… will you stay here with me for a while?” she asked softly. Michael nodded wordlessly as he climbed on the bed beside her, stretched out his body and lay right up against her as she shut her eyes and tried to sleep the pain away.



Chapter 10

When Sydney awoke, she wasn’t sure how much time had passed or how long she’d been asleep. Glancing at the clock beside her, though, she saw it was after nine o’clock; she’d been asleep for a little over two hours. With a slight groan, she stretched her back as she rolled over. “Michael, are you here?” she mumbled.

“Yeah, right here,” came his soft voice from beside her. Sydney groped behind her for the lamp so that she could see him (or anything) in the dark bedroom. When light flooded the room she saw Michael’s face on the pillow beside hers, a mere few inches from her own. “Hi,” he said softly.

“Hi,” she echoed. “I’m sorry about before…me freaking out…”

“It’s okay,” he assured her. “I understand… and I’m glad you’re not all ‘oh, I’m glad he’s gone,’” he said in a mock voice.

“Oh no, of course not; I’d never be that way,” Sydney assured him. They lay there in silence for a few moments before Sydney asked, “Are you scared?”

“Of what?”

“What’s next…whatever happens after you’re no longer a ghost,” she clarified.

“Oh…yeah, I guess so. I mean, yeah, yeah I am because… because I have no idea what’s next, you know? I don’t know how long I stay this way, but I assume it won’t be forever and then…then what happens? Where do I go? Wherever that is, will I remember being here on earth? … Will I remember you?” he mused aloud.

Sydney smiled softly. “You want to remember meeting me?”

“Of course! Of course… I wish I could have met you when I was…”

“I know,” she said softly, saving him from having to finish that thought. “I wish that too but, you know, at least we’re here now.”

“Do you, uh, want to get married and have kids?” he asked her.

“Yeah, sure,” she said, slightly surprised by his random question. “I mean, I’m getting to the age now where I’m really starting to think about finding someone to marry. I’d like to be married by the time I’m thirty, hopefully.”

“So that gives you what? Five years?” he laughed.

“What? Nooo, no, no,” she shook her head. “I’ll be twenty-eight in a few months.”

“Oh, then you’ve got plenty of time,” Michael rolled his eyes.

She laughed. “I guess…but it’s not like I’m gonna go out and find a husband tomorrow or anything…” she let her voice drift of with a sigh.

“Can I ask you something?” Michael asked softly. She looked up to him and nodded. “You said…you said before that you moved here because of something to do with a boyfriend…what happened?”

“Oh,” she said, turning her eyes downward, “well it’s stupid really…I’d been dating this guy for about six weeks or so and he started making things really serious between us, you know? And I wasn’t all that into him – I mean, he was a nice enough guy I suppose but… well, anyway, when I asked him to slow things down we got into an argument and he hit me…”

“What!?” Michael gasped. Sydney looked up as she nodded, noticing that a very protective and infuriated look had crossed his face. “Oh my god… what’d you do?”

“Ran away and never went back,” Sydney said with a slight laugh. “No, I told him that was the last straw and it was over and then I left his apartment… unfortunately he didn’t see it that way.”

“Uh oh…”

“Yeah,” Sydney cringed slightly. “I never went to the police since I left the first time – I figured there was no point, you know? I mean, he just slapped me and I didn’t want to be involved in trials or legal stuff, so I just left it alone…then he started showing up at my work and my apartment everywhere to the point where I was scared he was going to attack me or something, so I went to the police. It was an ugly mess and I just wanted to get out of there, you know? So I took a job out here, moved and that was it.”

“I’m sorry that happened,” Michael said sincerely.

“Thanks,” Sydney gave him a soft smile. “It’s behind me now, though. I hardly ever think about it unless my mother calls to remind me about it…”

“Why would she do that?” Michael asked with confusion.

“Oh, well she thinks it’s my fault for having bad taste in men, so she calls to remind me not to find another boyfriend like Trevor, who will beat me so much that he ends up killing me… you know, the usual,” Sydney sighed.

Michael cringed slightly. “So you and your mother get along well, then?”

“Oh yes, fantastically,” Sydney rolled her eyes. “She lives to criticize everything I do….what can I say – it’s how we bond.”

Michael laughed softly. “How sweet… you an only child?”

“Yeah.”

“Me too,” he responded casually.

Sydney sat up slightly, propping her head up on her fist. “You remember that?”

Michael furrowed his brow in thought for a moment. “I guess… I mean, I can’t remember it, I just know…just like I still know how to count to ten and name all the months, you know?”

“mm,” Sydney sighed as she lay her head back down. “What else do you just know?”

“Um…well, I was pretty close to my parents…they lived near by…oh! My mom was a teacher at the high school I went to and I always hated that,” he told her.

Sydney laughed. “I can only imagine; I’d hate that too…how embarrassing.”

“Tell me about it,” Michael groaned. “Its bad enough she’s there, but when she comes up to you at lunch and asks if you remembered to take your medication that morning…”

“Oh no!” Sydney exclaimed, though she couldn’t help but laugh.

“Yeah, yeah it so funny,” he muttered.

“The most embarrassing thing my mom ever did was on Prom night. She asked me if I’d packed extra tampons in my purse – in front of my date!!” Sydney exclaimed, shivering in horror at reliving that memory.

“Oh god,” Michael cringed. “That’s bad.”

“Tell me about it,” Sydney sighed. “Ah well, it’s not like I’m going to change her now…”

“Which is why you moved across the country…,” Michael continued for her.

“Exactly,” Sydney smiled.

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Chapters 11 - 18 + Epilogue