BLACKWOOD FARM CHAPTER 31
Aug. 1st, 2017 08:41 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
a_sporking_ratI'm gonna do a more straightforward summary of this chapter than usual, without blow-by-blow and direct quotes, I just wanna...skip over all the unnecessary description and dialogue altogether. But suffice to say there is a LOT of words spent on the interior of the Mayfair home. I also tried to put things in a pretty sensible order, because some of the conversations just jumped around everywhere, as well as to remove a lot of things that just didn't matter. Rice is really the queen of irrelevant details.
BLACKWOOD FARM, CHAPTER 31
Rowan and Michael talk with Quinn. He tells them what Julien told him. They then inform him that the reason they don't want a relationship between him and Mona is that, due to giving birth to her mutant child, Mona now miscarries when she becomes pregnant, and each miscarriage weakens her much more so than it would a normal woman. She basically puts her life on the line with each pregnancy. She's in fact sick right now due to this, which is why she was at the hospital and why she hasn't come down to see him herself yet.
This is why they want her to "stop seducing her cousins" and having sex in general. Have they asked WHY she's doing that? I mean, the question of "why is a 15 year old trying to have this much sex, and why is ANYONE obsessed with incest" is pretty valid on its own (then again, I guess "she's a Mayfair and this shit is normalized to her and she's been sexually abused by at least one adult who is NOW HER GUARDIAN" really answers that) but now that Mona *knows* that her life is literally at risk from sex...why is she not stopping? She used protection with Quinn, sure, but as Rowan points out, that's a 100% guarantee. They also say they want her to cooperate with the blood tests and nutritional supplements and other things they're trying to do to help her.
I really, really think Mona has a problem. Teenagers don't have the best sense of consequences, but I feel like if she's been pregnant/miscarried enough times for them to have figured this out, she's been "weakened" enough times by these miscarriages to realize, THIS SHIT IS FOR REAL. But she continues to have sex, and to refuse medical help like the blood tests, supplements, etc. Why?
And why hasn't she had a hysterectomy to just prevent pregnancy altogether? If her life is at risk, and they don't want anymore mutant babies anyway, and she still wants to keep having sex, why wouldn't she sign up for that? Her family OWNS a fucking local hospital and has more money than God, yet it's not even suggested by anyone in this chapter. Maybe we'll get an answer later that she's a hemophiliac or something?
Michael and Rowan explain that this is why they acted like they did, because Mona puts herself in danger and it scares them. I have...very mixed feelings on this. I get where they're coming from. When I was a teenager, I too did things that put me in danger (albeit in a different way than Mona) due to my mental issues. My parents frequently didn't know how to react to my behavior, and I know it scared them greatly. Often, especially with my dad, this would manifest in being angry with me. Now, that's not the RIGHT reaction to a self-harming depressed teenager who runs away from school. But it wasn't abusive either, it was just normal parent/child conflict in an abnormal (well...not THAT abnormal, I guess, the teen goth who cuts herself is virtually a cliche at this point) situation.
Rowan and Michael, on the other hand, were acting like textbook abusers when they came to collect Mona, so much so it's chilling. So even though I get their motive and I believe it to be sincere (at least for Rowan, I don't trust MICHAEL has Mona's best interests at heart) I can't see them as benign as Quinn now does (he thinks they're TERRIFIC of course)
Here's what my theory is: Rice genuinely means them to be concerned for Mona, and to be good people. So she wrote how SHE thinks that good, concerned people would act. Unfortunately, like LKH, Rice's perspective of that is so warped that it came out like...that.
Oh, and Quinn doesn't even THINK of having a vasectomy, let alone bring up that he could have one (which from my POV would be ridiculous because I don't think he's as in love with her as he thinks, but *he* thinks he is) But what he *does* say to Michael and Rowan is that he's not a "pauper" or a "beggar" and isn't going to make Mona live in a "small cottage". Besides the fact that NO ONE ASKED, Quinn talking like this (especially the use of the term "small cottage" which frankly is NOT where poor people live these days) just makes me subscribe that much more to my friend's theory that this book was written originally to take place a century or two ago, and Rice changed that midway but forgot to adjust a lot of dialogue.
After a some other conversation (see the Other Stuff section at the end of this for interesting bits) Quinn goes up the stairs to see Mona. Rowan calls up the stairs for them to "remember my warnings" about the whole PLEASE DO NOT KEEP GETTING PREGNANT YOU WILL DIE thing, Mona calls back promising no penetration, and Quinn carries her to the bedroom. I cannot believe Rowan trusts either of them for two seconds, especially given that Mona thus far clearly hasn't listened has this.
Quinn: "Where do we go, Princess Mona of Mayfair? I have wrestled with angels and dragons to be with you!"
Mona: "To the very front of the house, Prince Tarquin of Blackwood! There is my bower among the branches of oaks."
They're clearly joking around so I can't make fun of them, but I think it says something for a second I thought Quinn was totally serious.
First things first, he fingers Mona to orgasm twice, which makes him come too. Honestly, Quinn's actual dynamic with Mona, whatever it may be in his head, just mainly seems sexual to me in action? When he first meets her at the hospital they have very little interaction besides establishing Mona can see Goblin and Quinn deciding on the spot he'll marry her. Then he visits her the next day and they have sex and he brings her home and continues to be absurdly obsessed with her. But their interactions...well, you've read them. It's mostly just talking either about ghosts or Mona's awful family or her baby...which, granted, is indeed her opening up quite a lot to Quinn, I guess, but I still don't feel much interpersonal chemistry.
She asks him about Julien, saying she's jealous when he appears to someone else, making me automatically concerned about what goes on when he appears to her, and she's very happy to hear Julien confirmed her baby was alive (Michael and Rowan were enthralled by it as well). I'd like to know how Julien knows. Do ghosts just get to know what's happening everywhere somehow?
Quinn, to his credit, brings up the matter of a hysterectomy to Mona, and we learn why she doesn't have one: because then she couldn't have children. I have questions about this:
(1) I thought we didn't want any more mutant babies? And yet she is still marrying another relation of hers, apparently with family approval, perhaps even by family arrangement, and supposed to have children with him? Even if he's less related to her than Quinn and has no supernatural talent, that seems absurd.
(2) But how is she going to have children anyway if she keeps having miscarriages? Like isn't that the problem here, that she miscarries every time and that damages her body each time? So...it's not like she's going to be carrying a child to term either way. And even if she did, I wouldn't be surprised if that ended up being worse for her health than the miscarriages, given the strain that pregnancy and birth put on the body. Are they just hoping this is gonna clear up or something? Given that this is a fictional condition brought on by birthing a supernatural creature, I suppose there are no rules, but it sounds to me like her insides are fucked, that's why the goal is to AVOID pregnancy as Rowan said. Rowan does say they're trying to fix it but need time.
(3) Does Mona even really want children? Because it doesn't sound to me like the matter is her choice. Here's her wording, which also makes her condition even more bizarre with some new information about it:
"They don't know why. But I'm constantly ovulating, constantly fertile; I conceive constantly and I lose the offspring, and every time it happens I'm weakened. More calcium is pulled out of my bones. Now, it is extremely possible--totally possible, actually--that if they performed a hysterectomy on me, the problem would be solved, but then I'd never have children, and they're hoping that somehow they can solve the problem without that step."
JUST FREEZE HER EGGS OR SOMETHING!
But yeah, see, she doesn't say she wants children, she says "they're" hoping for it. Quinn is frightened for her and says she must do it if it means her life, she says she knows, she thinks about it constantly, but "Does the Lord of Blackwood Manor want a bride that can never have a child?"
So...she *is* marrying him now?
Maybe, because Mona also says she loves Quinn, that he is the first person she has fallen in love with, and it's because he's not a Mayfair. He may be one by blood but he wasn't raised in their clan with their customs. I realize Mona is very isolated under her family's thumb but I feel like Quinn is not the only person she knows like this? She hangs out with the Talamasca folks. They're not Mayfairs. But then again, the people in the Talamasca don't have the things Mona likes about Quinn, like "a strong name and tradition of your own" like Quinn, nor a "manor house with its own legend and grandeur" like Quinn. Between Quinn's main interest in her being sexual and seeing-ghosts, and basically talking to her family like he's going to buy her in a dowry, and what Mona's saying now, about loving him for what he's NOT and how he has a name and title and stuff, this relationship really does seem both truly shallow and also like something out of the 1800s or before.
Of course, she claims that this "came on me all last night after they brought me home" which makes me rather suspect she might just be using him to escape, or hoping to at least.
Quinn says he doesn't need children, and he tells her about Tommy, saying they can just have him. I guess Terry Sue won't have a say in that. I mean, I do want her kids removed if she's abusive, but something about this just rubbed me the wrong way, idk. Mona thinks it's a great idea though, saying it would be like Cinderella and Quinn could change Tommy's life. Quinn says now she doesn't need to "think of me anymore" in regards to the hysterectomy (BECAUSE THAT'S BEEN SUCH A CONCERN FOR HER FOR THE LAST...12 HOUR, I GUESS?) and how he's sorting everything out with getting Terry Sue all set up and so on and Mona says he sounds like the man of the house already.
Also it turns out she can't really go to Europe because she's in and out of the hospital all week getting hormone treatments and nutrients and is 'wired up for two or three hours at a stretch."
Quinn is invited to dinner. He tells us what Michael, Rowan, and Mona have all changed into for dinner, because they're fancy like that. I personally wouldn't eat dinner in "gorgeous white shirt with pillowing sleeves" combined with "tropical-print miniskirt-shorts" but hey, I'm not Mona. Don't get me wrong, it sounds cute, just, not to eat in. Also, Stirling Olivier comes over for supper too and we get to hear what he's wearing.
Stirling says he saw Goblin outside, and Quinn asks if he was "angry or bitter" to which Stirling responds he was neither but "glad to be seen."
Funnily enough, Quinn does not decide he must immediately marry Stirling :P
Mona suggests inviting Goblin in and making a place for him. Quinn says no, not tonight, that "I want to be selfish. He has his moments. This is one of mine."
Yeah, that IS amazingly selfish, considering that Quinn is always the center of attention but Goblin has never had anyone else in his whole life fucking see him and he's seldom even ACKNOWLEDGED by anyone but Quinn. Wow. Yeah, I can really tell you love him and care about him like you claim, Quinn.
Dinner conversation jumps around a lot, so I've divide the major points into bullets:
- Stuff about Europe (Michael and Rowan both suggest Italy), Quinn telling them about Rebecca (sans sex) and Lynelle and things like that, a lot of informed traits like Rowan being "modest for a doctor" and Michael being given to laughing at himself.
- Mona thinks that spirits are proof God exists. Rowan thinks there could be a Devil without a God. Mona thinks that would be too cruel. Michael says God exists and God is love. Mona says she supposes she'll find out soon enough
- Speaking of that, Mona wants to go out like Ophelia "on a boat of flowers in a softly running stream" because of course she does. Michael says the drowning part wouldn't be very peaceful, she says she'll settle for "a bed of flowers" with no tubes or morphine bottles or doctors around. This is the one time this Ophelia stuff isn't as annoying to me as usual because I think it might be her way of coping with this apparently very real risk of death. Though if it's something she's so scared of she needs to cope with it via romantic fantasies like this, why hasn't she stopped her sexual behavior? I really, really think Mona needs psychiatric help for this.
- Quinn saying he'll come by to visit her when she's in the hospital, to which Rowan says "That would be lovely, until you get tired of it, which would happen at some point." WELL, DAMN, ROWAN! Mona tells Quinn that if he does get tired of it, she'll understand. Quinn sulkily thinks about how he wants to vow he will never get tired, how he shall bring her flowers and books and poetry and whatall, "but I knew that the realist among us would think this all very lame, and so I let it go for the moment."
- Rowan assures him that he absolutely didn't miss anything by not having a conventional education, that the only the ultra-rich receive a decent one (but Quinn *is* ultra-rich?) and they all agree it's a good idea to give Tommy and his siblings "every chance" and that it's not "playing God" to do so. I was not aware that "playing God" was a common argument levied against giving poor kids educational opportunities, who knew.
Quinn wants to stay here with these people forever, but he also wants to go home to tell Nash and Aunt Queen everything, how he'll agree to go to Italy with her and it will "quiet" her for a little while and how Mona will be waiting for him when he returns...which is an odd thing to assume given that it's just been established she's SUPER SICK but okay.
Mona and Quinn have some lovey-dovey dialogue on the porch about how they love each other "passionately and undyingly" and arrange good times for Quinn to visit her at Mayfair Medical. If she actually does consistently go, good on him for that. He's spending time with her that isn't based around sex, and during a period where she really needs it. That's a lot more to base a relationship on than manor houses and grand traditions and seeing ghosts.
As soon as Quinn is in the limo, he bursts into tears and can't stop crying. Goblin puts his arms around him and says, "I'm sorry Quinn; if I were human, I'd cry too."
OTHER STUFF
- When Quinn asks them to tell Mona he's here, Michael tells Quinn that Mona knows he's here, that she's the one who told them he was here, because "her powers of clairvoyance are tremendous" and she knew when he walked through the front gate. I'll be frank, in a novel with ghosts and vampires and all, that...actually doesn't sound tremendous. I mean, Rice vampires can set shit on fire with their minds. He does also say that when Julien told Quinn that Mona's baby was alive, she "heard" it too, which is a bit cooler.
- Michael can read minds. Quinn figures this out when he's thinking about how he'd like some real cocoa, and Michael gets up and says he'll get some, that he wants some himself. Then, when Quinn finds out that Mona told them Quinn was talking with Julien, he wonders mentally why Rowan and Michael interrupted when they did, why they didn't let him continue the conversation. Michael says they don't have an answer for that. Both times, Quinn knows Michael has read his mind, but doesn't care at all. Now, it's up to Quinn if he minds at all, but as an X-Men fan who is no stranger to the discourse of ethics in telepathy, I have to point out that Michael is very much violating some very deep boundaries by reading Quinn's mind without consent, and doing so very casually to boot.
- Also Quinn concludes that their reason for interrupting was to stop Julien from spilling more family secrets. This seems a bit of a leap to me, they may have just wanted to, y'know, come see Quinn, and maybe even been worried Julien might be inappropriate with him given his history of incest and rape (Julien is bisexual, like all Rice men) but nope Quinn is totally right, Rowan admits it
- Rowan asks Quinn to submit to genetic testing to see if he has a chance of producing mutation in his offspring like Mona did, Quinn agrees
- The china and silver that Julien made materialize is in fact a copy of a real set called "Royal Antoinette" they have in the house, despite not having had it in his time and Mona says he must have "snatched the image out of the pantry" and that he is a "clever ghost"
- Quinn tells Michael and Rowan about Goblin and Rebecca, and he insists that he and Mona "belong together" because only they can understand each other due to both being able to see ghosts. Quinn, Mona comes from an entire family that can see ghosts, and belongs to an organization that studies them. She already knows other people who "understand" her in that regard, and she can introduce you to them. It's not only not a basis for a relationship, it's not even the case you're making it out to be. Why has no one pointed this out to him? Hey, Stirling saw Goblin, how come Quinn's not flipping out over HIM?
But instead of pointing this out to him, Michael advises him that he and Mona should just try to find normality separately. Quinn argues that this is impossible, and even if it is possible, perhaps they will have a better chance of finding it together. This "incidental intelligence" stuns Michael and Rowan into silence as they are "pondering my words" cuz wow that was soooo wise I guess.
- Quinn has "spoilt" Mona's lace baby quilt with his "overspilled love" from coming when he fingers her. Well that's just charming
- Mona wears long sleeves to hide her IV marks
- Mona asks if Quinn has ever read Hamlet and if he will read it to her as the hospital, and he gushes about the Brannagh film that it turns out they have all seen and all love. This Hamlet thing is really getting to be a running theme and I don't know why.
BLACKWOOD FARM, CHAPTER 31
Rowan and Michael talk with Quinn. He tells them what Julien told him. They then inform him that the reason they don't want a relationship between him and Mona is that, due to giving birth to her mutant child, Mona now miscarries when she becomes pregnant, and each miscarriage weakens her much more so than it would a normal woman. She basically puts her life on the line with each pregnancy. She's in fact sick right now due to this, which is why she was at the hospital and why she hasn't come down to see him herself yet.
This is why they want her to "stop seducing her cousins" and having sex in general. Have they asked WHY she's doing that? I mean, the question of "why is a 15 year old trying to have this much sex, and why is ANYONE obsessed with incest" is pretty valid on its own (then again, I guess "she's a Mayfair and this shit is normalized to her and she's been sexually abused by at least one adult who is NOW HER GUARDIAN" really answers that) but now that Mona *knows* that her life is literally at risk from sex...why is she not stopping? She used protection with Quinn, sure, but as Rowan points out, that's a 100% guarantee. They also say they want her to cooperate with the blood tests and nutritional supplements and other things they're trying to do to help her.
I really, really think Mona has a problem. Teenagers don't have the best sense of consequences, but I feel like if she's been pregnant/miscarried enough times for them to have figured this out, she's been "weakened" enough times by these miscarriages to realize, THIS SHIT IS FOR REAL. But she continues to have sex, and to refuse medical help like the blood tests, supplements, etc. Why?
And why hasn't she had a hysterectomy to just prevent pregnancy altogether? If her life is at risk, and they don't want anymore mutant babies anyway, and she still wants to keep having sex, why wouldn't she sign up for that? Her family OWNS a fucking local hospital and has more money than God, yet it's not even suggested by anyone in this chapter. Maybe we'll get an answer later that she's a hemophiliac or something?
Michael and Rowan explain that this is why they acted like they did, because Mona puts herself in danger and it scares them. I have...very mixed feelings on this. I get where they're coming from. When I was a teenager, I too did things that put me in danger (albeit in a different way than Mona) due to my mental issues. My parents frequently didn't know how to react to my behavior, and I know it scared them greatly. Often, especially with my dad, this would manifest in being angry with me. Now, that's not the RIGHT reaction to a self-harming depressed teenager who runs away from school. But it wasn't abusive either, it was just normal parent/child conflict in an abnormal (well...not THAT abnormal, I guess, the teen goth who cuts herself is virtually a cliche at this point) situation.
Rowan and Michael, on the other hand, were acting like textbook abusers when they came to collect Mona, so much so it's chilling. So even though I get their motive and I believe it to be sincere (at least for Rowan, I don't trust MICHAEL has Mona's best interests at heart) I can't see them as benign as Quinn now does (he thinks they're TERRIFIC of course)
Here's what my theory is: Rice genuinely means them to be concerned for Mona, and to be good people. So she wrote how SHE thinks that good, concerned people would act. Unfortunately, like LKH, Rice's perspective of that is so warped that it came out like...that.
Oh, and Quinn doesn't even THINK of having a vasectomy, let alone bring up that he could have one (which from my POV would be ridiculous because I don't think he's as in love with her as he thinks, but *he* thinks he is) But what he *does* say to Michael and Rowan is that he's not a "pauper" or a "beggar" and isn't going to make Mona live in a "small cottage". Besides the fact that NO ONE ASKED, Quinn talking like this (especially the use of the term "small cottage" which frankly is NOT where poor people live these days) just makes me subscribe that much more to my friend's theory that this book was written originally to take place a century or two ago, and Rice changed that midway but forgot to adjust a lot of dialogue.
After a some other conversation (see the Other Stuff section at the end of this for interesting bits) Quinn goes up the stairs to see Mona. Rowan calls up the stairs for them to "remember my warnings" about the whole PLEASE DO NOT KEEP GETTING PREGNANT YOU WILL DIE thing, Mona calls back promising no penetration, and Quinn carries her to the bedroom. I cannot believe Rowan trusts either of them for two seconds, especially given that Mona thus far clearly hasn't listened has this.
Quinn: "Where do we go, Princess Mona of Mayfair? I have wrestled with angels and dragons to be with you!"
Mona: "To the very front of the house, Prince Tarquin of Blackwood! There is my bower among the branches of oaks."
They're clearly joking around so I can't make fun of them, but I think it says something for a second I thought Quinn was totally serious.
First things first, he fingers Mona to orgasm twice, which makes him come too. Honestly, Quinn's actual dynamic with Mona, whatever it may be in his head, just mainly seems sexual to me in action? When he first meets her at the hospital they have very little interaction besides establishing Mona can see Goblin and Quinn deciding on the spot he'll marry her. Then he visits her the next day and they have sex and he brings her home and continues to be absurdly obsessed with her. But their interactions...well, you've read them. It's mostly just talking either about ghosts or Mona's awful family or her baby...which, granted, is indeed her opening up quite a lot to Quinn, I guess, but I still don't feel much interpersonal chemistry.
She asks him about Julien, saying she's jealous when he appears to someone else, making me automatically concerned about what goes on when he appears to her, and she's very happy to hear Julien confirmed her baby was alive (Michael and Rowan were enthralled by it as well). I'd like to know how Julien knows. Do ghosts just get to know what's happening everywhere somehow?
Quinn, to his credit, brings up the matter of a hysterectomy to Mona, and we learn why she doesn't have one: because then she couldn't have children. I have questions about this:
(1) I thought we didn't want any more mutant babies? And yet she is still marrying another relation of hers, apparently with family approval, perhaps even by family arrangement, and supposed to have children with him? Even if he's less related to her than Quinn and has no supernatural talent, that seems absurd.
(2) But how is she going to have children anyway if she keeps having miscarriages? Like isn't that the problem here, that she miscarries every time and that damages her body each time? So...it's not like she's going to be carrying a child to term either way. And even if she did, I wouldn't be surprised if that ended up being worse for her health than the miscarriages, given the strain that pregnancy and birth put on the body. Are they just hoping this is gonna clear up or something? Given that this is a fictional condition brought on by birthing a supernatural creature, I suppose there are no rules, but it sounds to me like her insides are fucked, that's why the goal is to AVOID pregnancy as Rowan said. Rowan does say they're trying to fix it but need time.
(3) Does Mona even really want children? Because it doesn't sound to me like the matter is her choice. Here's her wording, which also makes her condition even more bizarre with some new information about it:
"They don't know why. But I'm constantly ovulating, constantly fertile; I conceive constantly and I lose the offspring, and every time it happens I'm weakened. More calcium is pulled out of my bones. Now, it is extremely possible--totally possible, actually--that if they performed a hysterectomy on me, the problem would be solved, but then I'd never have children, and they're hoping that somehow they can solve the problem without that step."
JUST FREEZE HER EGGS OR SOMETHING!
But yeah, see, she doesn't say she wants children, she says "they're" hoping for it. Quinn is frightened for her and says she must do it if it means her life, she says she knows, she thinks about it constantly, but "Does the Lord of Blackwood Manor want a bride that can never have a child?"
So...she *is* marrying him now?
Maybe, because Mona also says she loves Quinn, that he is the first person she has fallen in love with, and it's because he's not a Mayfair. He may be one by blood but he wasn't raised in their clan with their customs. I realize Mona is very isolated under her family's thumb but I feel like Quinn is not the only person she knows like this? She hangs out with the Talamasca folks. They're not Mayfairs. But then again, the people in the Talamasca don't have the things Mona likes about Quinn, like "a strong name and tradition of your own" like Quinn, nor a "manor house with its own legend and grandeur" like Quinn. Between Quinn's main interest in her being sexual and seeing-ghosts, and basically talking to her family like he's going to buy her in a dowry, and what Mona's saying now, about loving him for what he's NOT and how he has a name and title and stuff, this relationship really does seem both truly shallow and also like something out of the 1800s or before.
Of course, she claims that this "came on me all last night after they brought me home" which makes me rather suspect she might just be using him to escape, or hoping to at least.
Quinn says he doesn't need children, and he tells her about Tommy, saying they can just have him. I guess Terry Sue won't have a say in that. I mean, I do want her kids removed if she's abusive, but something about this just rubbed me the wrong way, idk. Mona thinks it's a great idea though, saying it would be like Cinderella and Quinn could change Tommy's life. Quinn says now she doesn't need to "think of me anymore" in regards to the hysterectomy (BECAUSE THAT'S BEEN SUCH A CONCERN FOR HER FOR THE LAST...12 HOUR, I GUESS?) and how he's sorting everything out with getting Terry Sue all set up and so on and Mona says he sounds like the man of the house already.
Also it turns out she can't really go to Europe because she's in and out of the hospital all week getting hormone treatments and nutrients and is 'wired up for two or three hours at a stretch."
Quinn is invited to dinner. He tells us what Michael, Rowan, and Mona have all changed into for dinner, because they're fancy like that. I personally wouldn't eat dinner in "gorgeous white shirt with pillowing sleeves" combined with "tropical-print miniskirt-shorts" but hey, I'm not Mona. Don't get me wrong, it sounds cute, just, not to eat in. Also, Stirling Olivier comes over for supper too and we get to hear what he's wearing.
Stirling says he saw Goblin outside, and Quinn asks if he was "angry or bitter" to which Stirling responds he was neither but "glad to be seen."
Funnily enough, Quinn does not decide he must immediately marry Stirling :P
Mona suggests inviting Goblin in and making a place for him. Quinn says no, not tonight, that "I want to be selfish. He has his moments. This is one of mine."
Yeah, that IS amazingly selfish, considering that Quinn is always the center of attention but Goblin has never had anyone else in his whole life fucking see him and he's seldom even ACKNOWLEDGED by anyone but Quinn. Wow. Yeah, I can really tell you love him and care about him like you claim, Quinn.
Dinner conversation jumps around a lot, so I've divide the major points into bullets:
- Stuff about Europe (Michael and Rowan both suggest Italy), Quinn telling them about Rebecca (sans sex) and Lynelle and things like that, a lot of informed traits like Rowan being "modest for a doctor" and Michael being given to laughing at himself.
- Mona thinks that spirits are proof God exists. Rowan thinks there could be a Devil without a God. Mona thinks that would be too cruel. Michael says God exists and God is love. Mona says she supposes she'll find out soon enough
- Speaking of that, Mona wants to go out like Ophelia "on a boat of flowers in a softly running stream" because of course she does. Michael says the drowning part wouldn't be very peaceful, she says she'll settle for "a bed of flowers" with no tubes or morphine bottles or doctors around. This is the one time this Ophelia stuff isn't as annoying to me as usual because I think it might be her way of coping with this apparently very real risk of death. Though if it's something she's so scared of she needs to cope with it via romantic fantasies like this, why hasn't she stopped her sexual behavior? I really, really think Mona needs psychiatric help for this.
- Quinn saying he'll come by to visit her when she's in the hospital, to which Rowan says "That would be lovely, until you get tired of it, which would happen at some point." WELL, DAMN, ROWAN! Mona tells Quinn that if he does get tired of it, she'll understand. Quinn sulkily thinks about how he wants to vow he will never get tired, how he shall bring her flowers and books and poetry and whatall, "but I knew that the realist among us would think this all very lame, and so I let it go for the moment."
- Rowan assures him that he absolutely didn't miss anything by not having a conventional education, that the only the ultra-rich receive a decent one (but Quinn *is* ultra-rich?) and they all agree it's a good idea to give Tommy and his siblings "every chance" and that it's not "playing God" to do so. I was not aware that "playing God" was a common argument levied against giving poor kids educational opportunities, who knew.
Quinn wants to stay here with these people forever, but he also wants to go home to tell Nash and Aunt Queen everything, how he'll agree to go to Italy with her and it will "quiet" her for a little while and how Mona will be waiting for him when he returns...which is an odd thing to assume given that it's just been established she's SUPER SICK but okay.
Mona and Quinn have some lovey-dovey dialogue on the porch about how they love each other "passionately and undyingly" and arrange good times for Quinn to visit her at Mayfair Medical. If she actually does consistently go, good on him for that. He's spending time with her that isn't based around sex, and during a period where she really needs it. That's a lot more to base a relationship on than manor houses and grand traditions and seeing ghosts.
As soon as Quinn is in the limo, he bursts into tears and can't stop crying. Goblin puts his arms around him and says, "I'm sorry Quinn; if I were human, I'd cry too."
OTHER STUFF
- When Quinn asks them to tell Mona he's here, Michael tells Quinn that Mona knows he's here, that she's the one who told them he was here, because "her powers of clairvoyance are tremendous" and she knew when he walked through the front gate. I'll be frank, in a novel with ghosts and vampires and all, that...actually doesn't sound tremendous. I mean, Rice vampires can set shit on fire with their minds. He does also say that when Julien told Quinn that Mona's baby was alive, she "heard" it too, which is a bit cooler.
- Michael can read minds. Quinn figures this out when he's thinking about how he'd like some real cocoa, and Michael gets up and says he'll get some, that he wants some himself. Then, when Quinn finds out that Mona told them Quinn was talking with Julien, he wonders mentally why Rowan and Michael interrupted when they did, why they didn't let him continue the conversation. Michael says they don't have an answer for that. Both times, Quinn knows Michael has read his mind, but doesn't care at all. Now, it's up to Quinn if he minds at all, but as an X-Men fan who is no stranger to the discourse of ethics in telepathy, I have to point out that Michael is very much violating some very deep boundaries by reading Quinn's mind without consent, and doing so very casually to boot.
- Also Quinn concludes that their reason for interrupting was to stop Julien from spilling more family secrets. This seems a bit of a leap to me, they may have just wanted to, y'know, come see Quinn, and maybe even been worried Julien might be inappropriate with him given his history of incest and rape (Julien is bisexual, like all Rice men) but nope Quinn is totally right, Rowan admits it
- Rowan asks Quinn to submit to genetic testing to see if he has a chance of producing mutation in his offspring like Mona did, Quinn agrees
- The china and silver that Julien made materialize is in fact a copy of a real set called "Royal Antoinette" they have in the house, despite not having had it in his time and Mona says he must have "snatched the image out of the pantry" and that he is a "clever ghost"
- Quinn tells Michael and Rowan about Goblin and Rebecca, and he insists that he and Mona "belong together" because only they can understand each other due to both being able to see ghosts. Quinn, Mona comes from an entire family that can see ghosts, and belongs to an organization that studies them. She already knows other people who "understand" her in that regard, and she can introduce you to them. It's not only not a basis for a relationship, it's not even the case you're making it out to be. Why has no one pointed this out to him? Hey, Stirling saw Goblin, how come Quinn's not flipping out over HIM?
But instead of pointing this out to him, Michael advises him that he and Mona should just try to find normality separately. Quinn argues that this is impossible, and even if it is possible, perhaps they will have a better chance of finding it together. This "incidental intelligence" stuns Michael and Rowan into silence as they are "pondering my words" cuz wow that was soooo wise I guess.
- Quinn has "spoilt" Mona's lace baby quilt with his "overspilled love" from coming when he fingers her. Well that's just charming
- Mona wears long sleeves to hide her IV marks
- Mona asks if Quinn has ever read Hamlet and if he will read it to her as the hospital, and he gushes about the Brannagh film that it turns out they have all seen and all love. This Hamlet thing is really getting to be a running theme and I don't know why.
