I stared at my body, fuming. I wasn’t sure how long I’d been dead. It had been long enough for me to touch base on all the stages of grief 100 times over. Anger is where I’d ended up, and it didn’t feel like that would change soon. I couldn’t believe my luck. There were a billion other ways the universe could have taken me out. A brain aneurysm would’ve been nice or an instant death via car crash. Car crashes are classic. No one questions car crashes. Everyone would question this.

I floated forward, something that had taken me far too long to figure out. For about the umpteenth time, I tried jumping back into my body. Instead of landing inside, I fell through myself and into the floor below. I growled in frustration and shot back up to the ceiling. I didn’t land in my body this time either.

“Oh, come on!”

I wasn’t shouting at anyone in particular. Hell, I was certain no one could even hear me. I’d figured that out the first half hour of my new existence. Still, I raised my head towards the heavens.

“I’m not asking for much here!”

I wasn’t. I tried again. Failed again. Then, got angrier. I let out a slew of impressive and colorful phrases before shooting daggers at the ceiling with my eyes.

“Seriously!”

A high-pitched popping sounded to my right. In an instant, an elderly woman dressed in what had to be the ugliest nightgown in existence appeared beside me. She steadied me with a look and frowned.

“Oh, don’t bother with that dearie, it’s useless. You’re dead, no going back now.”

I blinked at her, mostly because I had to. The muumuu was a weird mustard color with lilies in every shade of 70s horror plastered all over it. I couldn’t help myself. I had to ask.

“What in God’s name are you wearing?”

She looked down at herself and let out a chuckle.

“I know. Terrible isn’t it?” She eyed me. “Of course, it could be worse.”

I glanced down at my outfit. I was in my comfy Hello Kitty sweats. They were a Pepto pink with the lovable character in white. There were also several orange splotchy stains. They’d been there since the spaghetti fight my sister, and I’d had in high school. I should have thrown the sweats out years ago, but I never could bring myself to do so. I nodded at my abomination before replying.

“Touché.”

I turned back to my corpse and gave the old lady my full attention.

“Hey, you’re dead right?”

She held up a mostly see-through arm.

“Been so for fifty years, give or take.”

Awesome! So, she was not only another ghost; she was an experienced ghost.

“Fantastic! So, how do I get back in there?”

She looked from me to my body and shook her head.

“You don’t. I thought we already went over this.”

“Then, how do I fix myself?”

She eyed me cautiously for a moment, then blinked.

“Sweetie,” she said slowly, with the voice one might use to soothe a crazy person, “you’re dead. You can’t fix dead.”