Checking out documents using a link to a document checks out link, not document

Reposting to another group:

We are saving documents in one directory of SharePoint.  We are creating another group of directories for Projects and create a link in these directories to the document in the directory where the documents are saved.

The links work fine, what the problem is that where we have a link, it does not display whether the document is checked out or not.  If you try to check out the document using the link, it does not check out the document in the directory where the document is stored, it only checks out the link.  This means that 2 people could be editing and saving the same file.

Is it possible where we have the link, it reflects and updates the status of the actual document? 

Thank you

Cindy