"Healthy people get what they want with candor, not cruelty." ❤️

You nailed it with the word "abandonment". Ghosting triggers fear of abandonment. Apart from being hardwired to "belong" to a clan which kept us alive, having someone disappear can be very difficult. What matters is how we take care of ourselves to heal this wound and not fall prey to being hurtful. As you noted well, the ghost is gone.