a brief presence · no harm
A phantom in sometemple is not a ghost in the inherited sense — it is not the bound spirit of a dead person. It is a kind of mild administrative residue: the trace left in a room by an arrangement of furniture that has not been there for thirty years; the sense that a particular chair was sat in often, by someone whose name no longer travels with the chair.
The keeper records phantoms briefly in the log. "Wednesday: a phantom in the south corridor, slight, brushed past the umbrella stand at 4:12." No further investigation. The labyrinth is hospitable to phantoms; it considers them junior staff.
field note · phantoms most often appear at exchange points — doorways, landings, the kitchen-corridor turning. they are presences between, more than presences at.