“Miss Lucas?” Bea blinked and looked up sharply. Her professor was looking at her expectantly, dry-erase pen poised to write on the board. “If you could answer, please.”
“Uh,” she stammered, mentally scrambling to recall what the man had been talking about.
“It’s intellectual property law,” came a bored voice from behind her. Bea waited for the professor to praise the answerer and scold her for her inattention, but when he simply continued to look at her expectantly she repeated the answer.
“Yes, right.” The professor scrawled ‘intellectual property’ on the board. “Now, intellectual property covers abstract ideas – music, art, ideas in and of themselves – but it can also be used to protect trade secrets, which in the restaurant industry . . .” Bea made a note, relieved to be out from under the professor’s focus, and swiveled around in her seat to try to discern who had answered the question. The ghost in the coveralls, his feet up on the desk, waved cheerfully while the girl next to him assumed Bea was looking at her and glared at her from behind her purple compact. Bea hastily turned back around and paid attention to the remainder of the lecture as best she could.
After the class had drawn to a close, she made a show of highlighting portions of her notes and organizing her bag until the remainder of the class and the professor himself had trickled out. Only then did she turn to the ghost. “Thanks,” she said. “I, uh, I wasn’t paying attention.”
The man nodded and shrugged. “It happens. This guy gives the same lecture every year and he always calls on whoever is in that seat.” He motioned to where Bea was sitting. “Thought for fun this year I might try and spook out whoever was there, just to see what happened.”
“Ah. Sorry.”
“No trouble. There’s always next year.” He twiddled his thumbs. “You a witch?”
“Not . . . exactly.”
He smirked, the expression twisting its way across his weathered features. “Aha. You’re a bit mixed up, aren’t you?” He swung his boots down to the floor and disintegrated again before reappearing right next to her. He motioned to himself. “This all new to you?”
“How’d you do that?”
“It’s a ghost thing, going to mist. Easy as you please.” He snapped his fingers, silently, and vanished again. Seconds later, Bea realized the chair felt distinctly cold, and a little damp. The hairs on the back of her neck stood up and she leapt to her feet. The man smirked at her from the chair. “I have to say, very nice,” he said, staring off into some middle distance, replacing his Brooklyn accent for a mock British one. “Good show, dear.”
Bea glared and snatched her bag from the desk, storming out of the room. “Creeper,” she called over her shoulder.
“Come on, it’s been fifteen years!” He paused. “And four months!”
Physics accidents and sexual harassment ghosts. You know you can't wait.
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