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The upstairs ghosts, save Humphrey and Jemima, were crowded around the art piece that would decorate the hall during the latest client's birthday party. Alison and Mike were stood in their middle, right in front of it, regarding the art.
"Hm. I like it. Is very modern." Robin said.
"Modern?" Julian scoffed. "How would you know, you were around during dinosaur times!"
"Was not!" Robin paused. "What is dinosaur?"
"Yes, I'd quite like to know as well!" Kitty chimed in.
"Surely it's nothing important if Julian knows about it." Thomas attempted, gaining no more than a half-hearted eye roll from the other man.
"Oh hohoh, it's very important! You're gonna love this!" Pat said. "Alison, you have got to put on a documentary."
Alison sighed. This was her life now.
"Huh." Thomas said. "Well, that's surprising. But hardly important, I don't see how it's relevant to us."
"Tis not as interesting as the mens who walked the moon."
"I did like it but it sounds very gruesome, doesn't it?" Kitty looked to Alison. "Wouldn't you agree?"
"Well, it is a little bit, yeah. But you don't have to watch it, that's why I only put on the trailer. If nobody's interested, I'll just get back to the preparations now."
Most of the ghosts mumbled agreements, dispersing, until only one of them remained.
Robin looked at Alison, eyes shining. "I wanna watch it."
The dinosaur on the screen fell to the ground, its wound proving fatal.
"Maybe Tyrannosaurus Rex wasn't quite so invincible after all..." the narrator concluded in voiceover as the other dinosaur could be seen turning and walking away from the corpse of its enemy.
There was a brief pause during which Robin stared at the screen, mouth open. Then, the narrator spoke again.
"In the next program, I'm gonna be investigating the two legged meat eater Velociraptor!"
Robin jumped up, not even catching the rest of the preview as he ran downstairs, yelling for Alison.
About a week had passed since Robin had first learned about dinosaurs. The other ghosts tended to avoid him now, each eventually getting annoyed at his constant explaining.
The Captain had been the first. "Now look here, Robin. I appreciate the intel but it simply isn't relevant. And you're talking excessively to the point where it's really starting to get on my nerves. So go bother someone else. Maybe Patrick will be interested."
But Pat wasn't interested. "Look mate, it's great that you're taking an interest in this and I appreciate you sharing it with me, it's just... well, you won't stop talking. It's a bit much, honestly. I'm not saying you can't talk about it at all, but maybe try spacing it out a bit. Just... little bits, you know?"
"Yes, yes, I already know all that crap." Julian had said. "The important bits anyway. And there really aren't that many!"
Thomas had sighed at him. "Robin, I already didn't care when I was getting the information first hand. I really don't want to know!"
Fanny had barely made it through two minutes before telling him off and calling him an "unwashed ape" in the same breath.
Kitty had smiled at him and nodded for almost an hour before getting up and leaving wordlessly.
Mary had simply stuck her fingers in her ears and run away.
Even Humphrey, who was usually bored out of his mind, was uninterested.
That only left Alison who was simply trying to tune him out as she worked on preparing the birthday party with only days left to do so.
"So biggest dino was bigger than most common flyplane. Had hollow bones so could get bigger!" Robin told her, bouncing excitedly up and down. She gave him a small, exasperated nod.
"Oh! And birds come from dinos! Is why they have hollow bones. Is why they can fly!"
She couldn't tell him off now, not with the florist in the room. So she simply sighed and kept working.
"And new found out: at least one dino had only one hole in bum, but not like other bum holes! Is called Sika... Sita... Psikaka..."
As Robin kept trying to pronounce the dinosaur's name, she couldn't help a little smile sneaking onto her face. Sure, life with the ghosts was exhausting and sometimes very irritating. It was like being around a bunch of overexcited children. Robin especially. But just like with kids, in a way, it was worth it. After all, they were part of her family.