It was an odd feeling. For someone who was dead, you’d think that she wouldn’t feel anything at all. But she did.

Pure, venomous hatred. That’s what she felt. And it writhed inside her like a snake bending back on itself, turning her insides out.

But she had no ‘insides’. She was a ghost - a spirit.

‘I would do well to remember that,’ she thought to herself as her lipped curled. Her choices had become somewhat… restricted.

Even so, she had options. Like jumping down the throat of the man who stepped inside the room at that very moment. His pallid, sweaty face bulged out of his tight collar as he shuffled in and dropped an enormous pile of old, dusty manilla wallets onto his already cluttered desk.

He paused to catch his breath.

‘Just twenty steps to and from the storage room and the vile little toad is already out of breath.’ Her nose twitched, a look of repulsion replacing the hatred that had shadowed her face a second ago.

She had once thought that being there, unnoticed, would be fun. That standing over someone’s shoulder as they flinched and looked behind them would send a surge of power through her ghostly veins.

But all it did was frustrate her more. All it did was squeeze that chokehold on her even tighter. For how much could you do when you no longer had a corporeal existence?

‘Madness.’ she thought, a slight smile appearing on her lips. ‘Incessant. Punishment.’

Disjointed thoughts. But the meanings made sense. For if she could not physically touch him, then she would drive him to insanity. She would plague him until he lived his last breath, and beyond.

She smiled and moved around his desk to get a better look at him. He’d sat down and, by the looks of it, wasn’t having a good day, poor love.

He pulled out a crumpled handkerchief from his pocket and dabbed his sweaty forehead. He peered behind him. Of course, he saw nothing but the wall about a foot behind his chair. Then he stood up, the edge of his chubby fingers barely touching his desk. His beady eyes scanned the room for a few moments, and then he sat back down and looked dejectedly at the pile of folders before him.

Her grin widened at the thought of causing him even an ounce of discomfort. ‘Oh yes, there’s someone here, alright,’ she thought to herself. And with that, her spiritual form shot up in the air above him.

He must have sensed something because he looked up, gaping. And just as he did, she graciously swan-dived directly into his mouth and landed, nestled in his heart.

His heart skipped a beat, of course. He noticed, alright - hard not to when a spirit moves in. But he resumed breathing after a moment or two. No, she wouldn’t be able to *end* him as such. But she would have a wonderful time torturing his mind. After all, she did have *eternity*, didn’t she?

Why yes.

She did.