Right, y'all! I need to apologise for my disappearing spell. I've started a new job at Seven Seas (they make Cod Liver Oil!) and I spend my days in the HR department sorting out personel files. Mucho fun, but two months of not working and suddenly I can't seem to function properly. Enough excuses - I just wanted to say sorry for not updating sooner and I hope y'all forgive me!

Eeron-Kyandeisu - I actually watched the episode and got really confused - my fault for mixing fiction with... fact? But I do have plot bunnies breeding on the topic. I want to incorporate it, but I think I will have to put my own twist on it! I hope you got caught up!

Bmangaka - lol - maybe I'll have to have Mac take them all on for a bit of fun!

Nienna Tinehtele - I had to write something, cryptic as that sounds, and for the purpose of the next couple of chapters, Maddy and Aiden won't really be about for the ghosts, just because it didn't work.

Carrie Michelle - Things are different, some of it will be explained in this chapter, and that's why Maddy and Aiden aren't around. But I'm not writing them out of the story!

demolished-soul - I love that idea, and I am certainly playing with it. If you have any more ideas, let me know!!

Trizzy - I hope your gimp leg is better by now! I wouldn't dare let anyone at my phone (it houses my music) because some of the music it on it is beyond embarassing! And I love her album! lol at that image!

Madison Bellows - The talk was needed - I think that it always is with me though (:s) I love that song too!

sparkyCSI - I have sooo much planned and not enough time to write it. I think I may need to talk the latter part out with you, because I didn't write down my thoughts at the time, and now I can't remember anything!

joy1791 - Glad you liked and I'm sorry that it took so long to update - I know I suck! I hope this chapter answers some questions

meadow567 - He definately is - that's how I see him anyway. Lol, her mother would probably call out for an exorcism!

ambercsiny - Thanks hun! Gonna get that chapter back to you tonight!

What The Eyes Can't See

Chapter 209: Talking to myself in public, Dodging glances on the train

'You're up early,' Flack said, looking over at Taylor with a worried expression on his face as he sat down in the chair Marty had occupied not so long ago, as soon as Taylor's mother had vacated the room.

'I couldn't sleep,' Taylor told him.

'Because of Robin? Or because of what happened?'

'A little of both,' Taylor admitted.

Flack reached across the table and grabbed her hand. 'You know I'm not going to let anything like that happen to you again, don't you?'

Taylor nodded. 'I know. I just... sometimes I fall asleep and I can see him in my dreams.'

'Reggie,' Flack said, his response a statement rather than a question.

'Yeah,' Taylor sighed.

Flack took a long swig of his coffee. 'Would it help to talk to someone about it?'

Taylor looked down at the drink in her hands that had long since gone cold. 'I don't want to relive it,' she whispered.

Flack studied her, blue eyes meeting brown ones. 'I can understand that,' he told her. 'But it might help.'

Taylor shook her head. 'I'm not ready for that.'

'I'm not surprised,' Flack murmured. 'Just don't make yourself ill from it.'

Taylor nodded, although her head barely seemed like it was moving.

Flack frowned, noticing her tense up. 'The ghost is back, isn't he?'

Taylor nodded again.

'Have you spoken to him?'

'No,' Taylor admitted, shaking her head.

Flack inhaled deeply. 'Why?'

'Because I'm still hanging onto the idea that this is just some side effect to the coma and it's all going to go away,' she whispered, her eyes already tearing up.

'So let's call Maddy or Aiden and just ask them?' he suggested. 'Maddy? Aiden?'

The two ghosts appeared. 'Hola, chica,' Maddy greeted Taylor. Knowing Flack couldn't hear them, she gave him a finger wave, whilst Aiden nodded her head at the pair.

'Maddy, I need to ask you something,' Taylor said quietly. 'Is it right that I can see ghosts?'

Maddy pulled a face. 'You're questioning the fact you can see us now?'

Taylor shook her head. 'I look down the street and I see ghosts.'

'You can?' Maddy asked, sounding surprised.

'You mean I shouldn't be able to?' she asked, feeling as worried as Flack looked from the one sided conversation he was listening to.

'Well,' Aiden started. 'We were a little concerned this might happen.'

'You were "concerned"?' Taylor repeated in disbelief.

'Well, you're kind of a unique case,' Maddy offered.

'And what the hell am I supposed to do?'

Aiden shrugged at her. 'Sorry, but we have no clue. This is clean out of our jurisdiction.'

'I beg your pardon?' Taylor asked slowly. 'Out of your jurisdiction?'

'Yeah,' Maddy nodded. 'I can only help those who have recently died, and Aiden.'

'I help you,' Aiden told her.

'So help me,' Taylor shot at her.

'You don't need helping. He's five – what's he gonna do?'

'They're not all five,' she told her.

'Look,' Aiden said, holding her hands out. 'If they pose a threat, I'm going to be there in a shot. But the souls that walk the streets – they're lost. Most of them don't even know why they're there, let alone the fact that they are there.'

'You're on your own on this one,' Maddy told her sympathetically. 'Sorry,' she added before the pair of them disappeared.

'They don't have a clue, do they?' Flack asked her.

Taylor shook her head. 'Nope. This is something I'm going to have to figure out by myself.'

From the kitchen counter, her cell phone, which had been charging overnight, began ringing. She got up to grab it and slid it open.

'Where are you?'

'Who is this?' she asked, before pulling her phone away from her ear to check the ID. Work.

'Nancy Wicker. And you're late.'

Taylor glanced at the clock on the cooker. It was only five after nine. And as far as she was aware, she didn't have a meeting scheduled. 'Late for what?'

'Work,' Nancy declared.

Taylor frowned feeling thoroughly confused. 'What work?'

'Correct me if I am wrong, but you are a columnist for the New York Daily?'

'Yes,' Taylor replied, drawing out the word.

'And you said that you had had enough of sick leave?'

'Yes,' Taylor said again, not sure she was liking the tone Nancy was using.

'Then if you say you want to be back at work, I expect you there.'

'I work from home most of the time,' Taylor explained.

'Not anymore you don't. I expect you in this office within the hour,' and with that, she hung up.

'What was that about?' Flack asked her.

'Apparently I'm late for work,' Taylor told him, staring at her phone in disbelief.

'Since when?'

'Since the new editor took over,' Taylor muttered, finally lowering the phone. 'Alex has left.'

'Why?'

'For his health,' Taylor sighed. 'I guess I had better get dressed.'

---

'From now on, you work nine to five Monday through Thursday, and until four on Fridays,' Nancy told her as they walked down the corridor to Taylor's office. 'And your office is big enough for two. I want a detailed plan of your next four articles,' she added, before Taylor could protest. 'By the end of the day.' And with that, she turned and left, leaving Taylor glaring after her, mouth hanging open.

Shaking her head, she pushed open the door and walked into her office, horrified to find it had been reorganized. The couch was gone to be replaced with another desk, and a lot of her things had been dumped unceremoniously on and around her desk. She was about to let stream a choice selection of curses and cuss words, but the fact that someone was staring up at her from behind the new desk made her stop. 'Who are you?' she asked bluntly.

'Reed Garrett,' he said as he got up and walked around his desk to offer his hand.

'Did you do this?' Taylor asked, ignoring the hand as she waved hers in the direction of her desk.

Reed shook his head. 'Maintenance, I think.'

Taylor pursed her lips and eyed him up and down. He didn't look long out of college – if at all – and she was wondering if this was an elaborate prank of some description. 'And what do you do?'

'I'm a reporter,' he said, a hint of stubbornness to his tone, as if he was tired of being asked that question. 'Mainly online, but Nancy has said that I might be able to get an article published every once in a while. I'm not here to replace you,' he added, finally figuring out why Taylor was being so defensive.

'You're not?'

Reed shook his head. 'I want to make my own name, and I want to do it by writing about what's happening now – not through past cases and how-to's.' He frowned. 'No offence.'

Taylor headed over to her desk. 'No worries,' she muttered as she removed a box from her chair and dumped it on the floor. That was her same response to the majority of what had been placed on the desk. Finally finding her desk under the clutter, she pulled out a notepad. If Nancy wanted a plan, damnit, she was going to get one.

---

By five o'clock, Taylor was exhausted – and all she had done was sit behind a desk and write. Her body was clearly telling her that she had returned to work far too soon but she wasn't going to admit that to anyone. Not even herself.

She wrapped herself up and headed outside to wait for Flack who had insisted that he pick her up. Truth be told, she was extremely grateful. She wasn't ready to tackle the subway yet and she just wanted to be sat with someone she knew who wouldn't ask her pointless questions.

A beep of her phone told her that Flack was running a couple of minutes late and would soon be there. She wasn't too bothered. She was busy listening to a busker singing an old Sinatra ballad just down from her building's entrance. He wasn't too bad.

'You can see him, can't you?'

Taylor turned to see where the voice had originated from. A young woman: Curvy with pale skin, big brown eyes, and golden brown hair cut in the Jennifer Aniston style. As she stared at the woman dressed all in blue, she realized that both she and the busker were dead. Thankfully, at that moment, Flack chose to arrive, beeping his horn to get her attention. Taylor quickly hurried over and got in the front seat.

'You alright?' he asked her.

Taylor nodded. 'I'm just tired. And hungry.'

'You can see me, can't you?' said the blue ghost. Casually glancing in the wing mirror, Taylor caught sight of the ghost sitting in the back.

'I'm thinking of making a paella,' Flack told her.

'Stop ignoring me!' the ghost objected.

'Sounds good,' Taylor muttered.

'Are you sure you're alright?' Flack asked her as he turned to look at her whilst they were sat at a red.

'I've just had a weird day,' Taylor told him. 'I now have to share an office with some blogging kid. Who for some reason, I just want to call Beaver.'

'Does he in anyway resemble a dam building rodent?'

'I need your help,' the ghost told her, trying to poke Taylor, but having little more effect than sending her hand through her chair.

'No,' Taylor responded, a little harsher than intended.

'So why Beaver?' Is he unfortunate to have that as his surname?' Flack offered, a little surprised at her tone.

'I'm not going to leave you alone, you know. You're the first person that's been able to see me in so long I've forgotten,' the ghost informed her, folding her arms.

'I don't know what it is about Reed. Maybe I'm just bitter that I have to share an office. I like my own space,' she added, for the ghost's benefit.

'Like hell that's gonna bother me,' the ghost told her.

'Reed?' Flack gave her a sideways glance. 'What's the chance that there's more than one Reed in New York and you're not talking about Reed Garrett?'

'You're not gonna have a sex-life whilst I'm around,' said the ghost. 'Never mind be able to sleep.'

'How do you know Reed?' Taylor asked, surprised.

'He's Mac's kid. Just graduated Chelsea. Whilst you were in the hospital we got a case involving Chelsea's very own Secret Society. Reed was caught up in the middle of it.'

Taylor's eyes widened. 'That's Mac's stepson?'

'I know a song that will get on your nerves, get on your nerves,' the ghost in the back seat began singing.

'You knew Mac had a stepson?' Flack asked her, taken aback.

'Get on your nerves, get on your nerves.'

'Yeah, I just didn't realize it was him,' Taylor said as they finally arrived back at their house.

'I KNOW A SONG THAT-'

Taylor slammed the door with a little more force than was necessary.

'-WILL GET ON YOUR NERVES, GET ON YOU NERVES!' The ghost just phased through the door.

The singing carried on whilst Flack obliviously set to making the paella, and there was nothing Taylor could do to drown it out. By the time Flack had set the food down in front of her, Taylor was stabbing at the shrimp so venomously that the plates were in danger of splitting.

'Taylor? Have I done something?'

'You know,' said the ghost, momentarily taking a break in the singing. 'I don't actually have to breath, and combined with the fact I'm never going to get a sore throat, I literally could sing all night long.

Taylor picked up the salt shaker and hurled it at the ghost so hard it sailed through her (thankfully making her disappear), narrowly missed Flack's head, and shattered against the wall behind sending salt flying everywhere.

Flack gaped at her, mouth open, fork part way to his mouth.

Taylor shut her eyes and drew in a long, deep breath. Silence.

'That wasn't very nice.'

'FOR THE LOVE OF GOD! LEAVE ME THE HELL ALONE!!' Taylor bellowed.

'So you can see me!' the ghost cried.

'What did I do?' Flack asked her, complete confusion set in his face.

Taylor was about to say something but instead just held her hand up at him. Instead she turned to the ghost, meeting her gaze head on. 'Yes I can damn well see you. I am choosing to ignore you because I want to eat the wonderful meal that man,' she pointed at Flack,' has made for me. Now, I have no idea how long you've been dead, but I think you can hang on another half hour.' Her attention flicked to the small boy. 'And you can beat it too.'

'You can't talk to him like that,' the ghost objected. 'He's just a kid.'

'Yeah, because he died a kid. And I have no idea how long he's been dead for, but it isn't going to hurt him to stay dead a little longer. Now let me eat this damn rice.'

The ghost opened and closed her mouth a few times, clearly trying to come up with some witty repartee, and failed. 'Fine. Half an hour.'

And finally the two ghosts disappeared.

'Taylor?'

'I'm being haunted,' Taylor sighed.

---

'I can help you.'

Taylor whirled around at the sound of the ghost, making Flack turn to try to see what had startled her. 'Who are you?'

'There's another one in here, isn't there?' Flack asked her.

Taylor nodded, pointing to the doorway where the ghost was standing, not that Flack could see it.

'Who are you?'

The ghost frowned. 'I don't remember.'

'Okay, how long have you been dead?' Taylor asked.

The ghost shrugged. 'I don't remember that either.'

'Where did you come from?'

'I don't remember.'

Taylor frowned. 'Is there anything you do remember?'

'Rain,' the ghost told her. 'An excited man wearing shorts. And steps. Lots of steps.'

'That,' Taylor told her. 'Makes no sense.'

Cookies for anyone who can guess what the ghost is refering to!!