[mst]

You can only rmdir an empty directory and then after that it's gone and can't have files created in it.

Provided you didn't need concurrent access, what you could do is create a temp file, unlink it, then treat the contents of the now-anonymous temp file as e.g. a zip file or a tar file or similar. But that strikes me as one of those "time to rethink the life choices that led you to this moment" situations rather than a remotely good idea.