“Oh come on,” Charlotte said, “it’s the same thing. You just renamed it.”
“What can you expect from a cat,” Sheldon said.
“Hey!” Charlotte said, “there’s no call for that sort of thing. Cats are people too. Just look at you, so big on ghosts’ rights, yet so quick to attack another misunderstood minority.”
Sheldon was dumbstruck. “Gee, I never thought of it that way. I’m, um, sorry,” he said uncertainly, not sure whether to apologize to the cat or to Charlotte.
“It’s quite all right,” the cat said, “I get a lot of that sort of thing. Humans can become quite upset when they encounter other creatures that talk. And former humans can be even worse,” the cat added, giving Sheldon a pointed look.
Sheldon looked stricken.
Charlotte nodded sympathetically. “Maybe we’re just jealous of our linguistic heritage. It can be hard to accept that you’re not unique in the universe.”
“Only if you assume a single universe,” said the cat. “Which brings us back to our point of disagreement.”
Charlotte started to respond, but was interrupted by a loud crashing noise. They all turned to see what it was.
“We’re so sorry dear,” said Charlotte’s mom, wiping bits of plaster off her shoulder.
Charlotte’s dad was doing the same. “It seems,” he said, “we are better at exits than at entrances.” He glanced guiltily in the rather large ragged hole they had left in the ceiling.
“Mom, where did you and dad go?” Charlotte asked. “I thought you’d disappeared.”
“Well, technically we did.”