“Gavin, what are you proposing? Leaving aside the fact that I owe William a lot and would be loathe to simply just pack up and go just when there are problems that could seriously jeopardize what we’ve already sunk into a couple of films, do you think that I could go and strike out on my own and …”

Gavin chuckled all of a sudden, interrupting Tina. “Wha-a-tt?”

“Sorry. I just remembered this funny thing about one of the last films you had an active role in, this unconventional movie directed by Scott? Made all kinds of money all over the world, really clever plot…”

A look of disgust passed over Tina’s face, which surprised Gavin. “What funny thing in that film?”

“The thought bubble illustrations, in the end, just before the credits rolled, that popped up over each of the main characters’ heads. It told the audience what the characters were thinking? Most of them were pretty funny…”

“And?”

Noting Tina’s still serious face, he said slowly, “OK, fine. The image made me think of the word “blurb.”

“Still waiting, Gavin.”

“And that the word “blurb” was coined by Gelett Burgess …”

“I’m lost…”

“Who wrote a book in 1906 called “Are You A Bromide?”

“Bromide … really, Gavin?”

“In which he was the first to use “bromide” to mean a tiresome person of unoriginal thoughts and trite conversation. After his book the word was extended to encompass other things that signified commonplace observations, or else the boring remarks you might expect from a bromide, like “pure as driven snow.””

“I still don’t know where you’re going with this, Gavin.”

He dipped his head back to wet his hair. The sun had been beating down on the terrace and he needed to cool off.

“How about you answer the question posed by the book?”

“About being a bromide?” Tina lifted her sunglasses up, her hazel eyes fixing on the grey-blue ones of this hunk who was not making any sense at all.

“Yeah.”

Tina frowned.

“Ok, I’ll answer. I don’t think you’re a bromide, Tina. William was not a bromide once, but he became one soon enough. You, however – from what I’ve learned about you, I think you are the opposite of a bromide. You are not an unoriginal person. You have talent; you have insight into what the audience could want to see, or appreciate, even if a story or theme was unsavory. You have a talent for making things unfold on the screen to bring the audience in, and convince them that life was happening before their eyes. What you need is to have the poetry of it unfurl also. Which I sincerely believe you have an eye for. So if you don’t want to become a “bromide” you need to strike out on your own before you lose that.”