Ok, so I decided to add to it. And it will be E/C, I promise. Feedback is welcome.
That said, let me state, for the record, that I hate when stories try to be serious and angsty and then involve a ghost.
Now, with that said, as a writer I know better than to try and force a story to go in the direction I think it should go. Better to let it run the course it intends.
And so it goes...
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One Year Earlier
Speed felt very warm, a comfortable sleepiness suffusing his body. The feeling reminded him of the times when he was a child and his father would take him to the local high school football games. They'd come in late, way past Speed's bedtime, and suddenly all the excitement and adrenaline would be sapped out of him. His father would have to lay him in his bed and pull his shoes off while Speed occasionally fluttered his eyelids open in an attempt to stay awake.
Speed had that same feeling now. He could hear his father's voice encouraging him to stay awake but for some reason the words made less and less sense. He tried to repeat them but found his lips paralyzed. In fact, his whole body seemed too heavy. He struggled, trying to lift his arms or kick his legs but it was no use. Panic washed over him; he realized he couldn't even move his chest to breath, he was going to suffocate, he was going to die, dear God no--!
His panic snapped and he felt free. He tried again to move his arms but this time there was an even more compelling sensation, it was so light it was as though it didn't even exist.
He tried to open his eyes to look at his body but there was only darkness. He continued trying until the thought suddenly occured to him that, if he didn't have arms, (which was an idea that was beginning to confirm itself to him) maybe he didn't have eyelids to open either.
As he puzzled over this, his surroundings began to lighten. He perceived a dark grayness at first, then lighter, until it seemed as though he were floating in mist. Suddenly, a figure appeared. It was a woman with long, curly hair, dressed in a robe that matched the color of the mist so exactly that it almost seemed to be made of it.
"Who are you?" Speed asked.
"That's not important. The question is, who are you?"
He raised what he suspected to be a non-existant eyebrow.
"Timothy Speedle. Why?"
She looked down as if saddened.
"Timothy, do you know what happened?"
He thought back. He remembered getting up that morning, going to work, walking with H into the jewelry store...then came the memory of being shot, almost elusive, flitting like a bird around his memory.
"Jesus! Am I dead?"
She nodded.
"Where am I then? Is this heaven or something?"
She shook her head.
"Purgatory?"
"If that's what you'd like to call it," she answered.
He didn't, actually. Purgatory was a religious thing and he hadn't been very religious in his life. However, he couldn't come up with anything else so he let it go. Purgatory it was.
"What am I doing here?"
"You died," she started, but Speed interrupted her.
"Really? I hadn't noticed."
She paused and then continued as though he hadn't spoken.
This is where all spirits come after death to come to terms with it."
"What does that mean?"
"It means you don't feel ready to die."
"You got that right," he mumbled.
Again she continued, "You still consider yourself Timothy Speedle. You still feel as though you have a body. You still feel compelled to have an earthly purpose."
"Is that so?" he asked, a hint of sarcasm in his voice.
"Yes. It is." A flash of annoyance crossed her face.
"Then what do I do here?"
"You watch. And listen."
"Right. Exactly. I should have figured that out myself," he said, looking at the mist around him.
"It really is very simple if you think about it. You haven't really gone that far, you're still on earth."
He stayed quiet this time, waiting for her to explain.
"Think of it as two seperate dimensions in the same location of the space-time continuum."
He thought about it for a moment and realized it was actually a simple thing to conceive. Death seemed to give one a whole new thought process, apparently.
While he was thinking, the mist began to recede. Soon it was completely gone and he saw that he stood in the jewelry store, now empty.
He furrowed his brow and looked at the woman again.
"Let me see if I'm following what's going on here. I'm dead, right?"
She nodded.
"And now I'm in some sort of purgatory, all because I did not want to die, I might add, and this purgatory thing is some weird dimension that coexists with the earthly dimension?"
Again she nodded.
"And, apparently, I'm supposed to wander around, watching life and that's going to make me accept death?"
"That's the gist of it, yes."
"Just exactly how does that work?" he asked angrily.
"It won't help to explain it to you so I won't."
He nodded vaguely, not really hearing her as he looked down and found he seemed to have his body back, even if it was only in spiritual form.
"And obviously I can see them but they can see me," he said, half to himself as he continued inspecting himself and the jewelry store.
"Yes, there is no interaction. You simply watch."
He felt a defeated weariness settle over him.
"Ok."
And so he watched, aware of the passage of time only through the turn of events he saw. He watched his own funeral, he watched his friends, he watched the crime lab, he even watched as crimes were committed, later wishing he could help the CSIs investigating.
Mostly though, he watched the woman he loved, Calleigh, with a longing that transcended mortality, immortality and everything in between.
He saw when Horatio, unknowing of the relationship between Calleigh and Speed, gave her the gun to process. He saw as she continued to live her life for the next few months, stoically betraying none of her inner turmoil until, finally, one day while stopped at a red light, she burst into tears and sighed his name.
And he also saw, over a year later, as she began to date his friend and coworker, Eric Delko.