Blind Carnival

Some More Revelations

"My father is Thomas Greaves."

Oh gods. She has nothing else to say, or to think, and she just stares at him.

Then she takes a deep breath and rasps out, "Thomas Greaves? As in the Booker Prize winning writer Thomas Greaves?"

The crinkle between his eyebrows becomes deeper.

"As in the author of the viral article on 'brainless' literature polluting the literary world, including the 'I just want to shag a man I can't have' love novels?" 

Her tone is surprisingly even. John nods.

"Oh..."

Yeah, maybe Thomas Greaves is right after all. If that's all you can say to this revelation, you shouldn't call yourself a writer, Olivia. Her head feels properly empty.

"And your Mum?" she asks in a small voice. "Does she happen to be a literary critic? A critic who also considers the likes of me 'the leeches hungry for readers' blood?'"

It's funny how much she remembers from his Dad's article. Something tells her it's not her photographic memory that keeps it all fresh in her mind.

"My Mum is a mathematician. She's retired. Used to teach at uni." He's watching her face attentively. "Liv, it honestly doesn't matter. I just had this unpleasant conversation with them the other day, and something Dad said made me think you wouldn't want to know who he was."

The next symptom kicks in. Hello, anxiety, my old friend. Her ears are ringing, and her throat feels restricted.

A. His Dad is Thomas Greaves.

B. His Mum is a super smart lady who has been defying the gender stereotypes at her workplace, and clearly has some badarse postgrad degrees.

C. They had an unpleasant conversation about something related to her.

"Was I mentioned in that unpleasant conversation?"

And here's the good old tremor in the right hand. Your therapist would be so proud of you, Olive.

"Mum told him about you. She set us up, remember? She reads your books. Dad... doesn't approve. And they had an argument." Oh god, oh god, oh god. He sighs. "And Mum said that if you ever were to visit, he needed to–"

Be civilised? Behave? Refrain from throwing rotten tomatoes at me?

"Yes?"

"Keep his opinion on your books to himself."

So, Thomas Greaves has an opinion specifically on her books. Brill. She wonders if she'll actually throw up now, or there'll be just dry heaves.

"Liv, it really doesn't matter–"

"It matters to me!" She's very, very shrieky. "Oh god, Thomas Greaves..."

She jumps to her feet and rushes to the washroom. There's no vomiting, but it takes more than ten minutes of measured inhaling and exhaling, and keeping her hands under running warm water, for her to take an unobstructed breath in.

John knocks at the door. "Liv?"

"I'm OK... I think... I am just hysterically comparing my washed out, alcoholic, manwhore of a father with your genius, Booker winner, humanitarian one..."

She sounds very, very cheery. It's a very bad sign. That's the defence mechanism against panic attacks - which never works, by the way.

"He's also an overbearing, self-righteous prick."