Feeling sorry for Celia

by Jaclyn Moriarty

  Jaclyn Moriarty grew up in Sydney’s north-west with four sisters, one brother, two dogs and twelve chickens. She studied English and Law at the University of Sydney, and then spent a year in the US doing a Masters at Yale, and a further three years in England, writing a PhD at Cambridge. When she returned home, the chickens had blown away in a thunderstorm.

  She now lives in Sydney with a handsome Canadian, and works as a media and entertainment lawyer. Her favourite things to do on weekends are sleeping in, going to the beach and eating popcorn at the cinema.

  Also by Jaclyn Moriarty

  Feeling Sorry for Celia

  Finding Cassie Crazy

  I Have a Bed Made of Buttermilk Pancakes

  Feeling sorry

  for Celia

  JACLYN MORIARTY

  Author photo credit: Michael McCabe

  Cover model: Nicola Moriarty

  The characters and events in this book are fictitious and any resemblance

  to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  First published 2000 in Pan by Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Limited

  St Martins Tower, 31 Market Street, Sydney

  Reprinted 2000 (twice), 2001, 2002, 2004 (three times), 2006

  Copyright © Jaclyn Moriarty 2000

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or

  by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any

  information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the

  publisher.

  National Library of Australia

  cataloguing-in-publication data:

  Moriarty, Jaclyn.

  Feeling sorry for Celia.

  ISBN 0 330 36210 0.

  I. Title.

  A823.3

  Typeset in 11/14pt New Baskerville by Midland Typesetters

  Printed in Australia by McPherson’s Printing Group

  These electronic editions published in 2007 by Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Ltd

  1 Market Street, Sydney 2000

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

  All rights reserved. This publication (or any part of it) may not be reproduced

  or transmitted, copied, stored, distributed or otherwise made available by any

  person or entity (including Google, Amazon or similar organisations), in any

  form (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical) or by any means (photocopying,

  recording, scanning or otherwise) without prior written permission from the

  publisher.

  Feeling Sorry for Celia

  Jaclyn Moriarty

  Adobe eReader format 978-1-74197-080-7

  Microsoft Reader format 978-1-74197-281-8

  Mobipocket format 978-1-74197-482-9

  Online format 978-1-74197-683-0

  Epub format 978-1-74262-395-5

  Macmillan Digital Australia

  www.macmillandigital.com.au

  Visit www.panmacmillan.com.au to read more about all our books and to buy

  both print and ebooks online. You will also find features, author interviews and

  news of any author events.

  To my family, including Grandma,

  and

  to Colin

  Contents

  PART one

  PART two

  PART three

  PART four

  PART five

  PART six

  PART seven

  PART eight

  PART nine

  PART ten

  PART eleven

  PART twelve

  PART

  one

  Dear Ms Clarry,

  It has come to our attention that you are incredibly bad at being a teenager.

  I mean, take a look at your bedroom.

  You haven’t got any posters on your wall. (Don’t try to tell us that that picture counts. A kitten drowning in a strawberry milkshake? Designed by your mother as an ad for carpet cleaner? Give us a break)

  You have a paper chain made of old Christmas cards hanging from your curtain rod. The only makeup you have is banana-flavoured lip gloss and it’s melting all over your Teletubbies quilt cover. (Actually, we don’t think that lip gloss counts as makeup at all.)

  Not to hurt your feelings or anything, but you are an embarrassment to teenagerhood. Therefore, could you please climb into the refrigerator and wait very quietly until your teenage years end?

  Thank you.

  Yours sincerely,

  The Association of Teenagers

  PS Also, you don’t seem to understand how to get a snow tan. You look like a slice of watermelon.

  !!!!! IMPORTANT !!!!! LOOK AT THIS NOTE !!!!

  !!! ELIZABETH! !!!! OVER HERE !!!! ON THE FRIDGE! !!!!

  LIBBY,

  I HOPE YOU SAW THIS NOTE.

  GOOD MORNING.

  EAT THE PORRIDGE IN THE BIG, SILVER SAUCEPAN ON THE STOVE.

  PUT SOME AMOLIN ON YOUR FACE.

  DON’T BURN YOUR FACE LIKE THAT AGAIN. YOUR SKIN WILL

  ALL PEEL AWAY AND THERE WILL BE NOTHING LEFT BUT

  BONES AND BRAIN AND EYEBALLS.

  IT IS VERY AND EXTREMELY COLD TODAY. WEAR SEVEN PAIRS OF STOCKINGS.

  HAVE A NICE FIRST DAY BACK AT SCHOOL.

  LOVE FROM YOUR THOUGHTFUL AND CONSIDERATE MOTHER

  Mum,

  Take it easy. I saw the note.

  I didn’t eat the porridge, I gave it to Lochie. I hate porridge. If you really cared about me, you would know that.

  I am not wearing any stockings at all. It’s not that cold. You have some kind of body temperature problem.

  The really weird thing is that I didn’t burn my face like this on purpose.

  And I’m not using Amolin because it’s disgusting. Thank you for your nice warning about the bones and brains and eyeballs though.

  WITH LOTS OF LOVE FROM YOUR DAUGHTER ELIZABETH

  Dear Ms Clarry,

  It is with great pleasure that we invite you to join our Society.

  We have just found out about your holiday. It’s so impressive! You had four assignments, an English essay and a chapter of Maths to do. And you didn’t do one single piece of homework!

  Fabulous!

  Also, we have a feeling that you have a History test today. And you’re trying to study now? On the bus? With the Brookfield boys climbing onto each other’s shoulders to get to the emergency roof exit? And with Celia about to get on the bus at any moment? And you think that’s going to make a difference!!!

  That’s really very amusing, Elizabeth. We like you for it.

  You’re perfect for our Society and we’re very excited about having you join.

  Yours sincerely,

  The Manager

  Society of People who are Definitely Going to Fail High School (And Most Probably Life as Well!)

  A Letter To A Complete and Utter Stranger

  Dear Complete and Utter Stranger,

  The first thing that I have to say is that I hate porridge. I really hate it. And you know what? If you like porridge at all? I mean even the tiniest bit? I mean, say you were lost in the Himalayas, right, and you hadn’t eaten anything except a Mars Bar for about seven years, right, and you’re really cold and your fingers are all dropping off, right, and you look behind this rock, and there’s this bowl of porridge?

  Say you would even think about eating the porridge?

  Well, JUST DON’T BOTHER WRITING TO ME, OKAY?

  I don’t want to hurt your feelings or anything, but I don’t want to have anything to do with you.

  I really hate porridge.

  The second thing that I have to say is that it’
s okay if you don’t want to read this. If you want to just tear it into tiny little pieces and throw it away? Or you want to tip sulphuric acid all over it, or whatever?

  That’s okay.

  I’m only writing it because of Mr Bother it. He’s our new English teacher and he seems really upset that the Art of Letter Writing is lost to the Internet generation, so he’s going to rekindle the joy of the ENVELOPE. Next he’s going to bring in a club and a sabre tooth tiger and rekindle the joy of the STONE AGE.

  Anyway, but Mr Bother it also organised the letter exchange because he’s upset that our school has nothing to do with your school. He said that if two schools are exactly one block away from each other they should forge ties. I don’t want to hurt your feelings or anything, but I think we’ve been okay so far without any tie forging. I think you’ve been okay without us too.

  The good thing about this is that Mr Bother it doesn’t seem to know that Mrs Cheerson, our old teacher? She gave us an essay to write over the holiday. It was on To Kill a Mockingbird, which I read and it was good, and I think it’s stupid to spoil a good book by writing an essay on it. So I didn’t do it.

  Mr Bother it wrote these things on the board and he says we should put them in here. So I have to say them to you and I’m very sorry.

  1. My Name: just look at the bottom of the letter, and it says it there.

  2. My Interests: long-distance running, netball, making macrame plant holders (not really) (but really about the running and netball.)

  3. My Friends: my best friend is Celia Buckley. (But she’s not at school today – she didn’t get on the bus this morning. You might not think that’s very important but that’s because you don’t know Celia Buckley.) My other best friend is my dog, Lochie.

  4. My Holiday: I went skiing with my dad to Thredbo.

  There are about twenty-five million other things on the list but this is boring and stupid. You don’t care. You have probably put the sulphuric acid on this by now anyway and all my words are being wasted.

  Yours sincerely,

  Elizabeth Clarcy

  Dear Ms Clarry,

  I know what you’re planning to do right now. You’re planning to get the bus straight to Celia’s place. Aren’t you?

  You’re going to check that she’s okay, right? And if she’s had a relapse of typhoid fever you’re going to mop her brow and bring her cans of Diet Coke, right? And if she’s run away to make a living busking on her recorder then you’re going to buy her a tiedyed rug to stand on, right?

  The Manager,

  Best Friends Club

  Dear Elizabeth,

  I know just what you’re going to do this afternoon. You’re going to do a 10k run, aren’t you?

  The Trail Run is just eight weeks away now. You want to finish first, don’t you? Or finish in the top ten? Or finish?

  Don’t you?

  Yours ever,

  The Society of High School Runners Who Aren’t Very Good At Long Distance Running but Would Be if they Just Trained.

  !!!! OVER HERE!!!! ELIZABETH!!! ON THE TABLE HERE!!! A NOTE FOR YOU!!!

  DEAR LIBBY,

  THANK YOU FOR YOUR NOTE THIS MORNING. I WOULD JUST LIKE TO SAY THAT IF YOUR LEGS GET FROSTBITTEN AND PURPLE FROM NOT WEARING STOCKINGS, AND YOUR FACE PEELS AWAY LEAVING YOU WITH NOTHING BUT BRAINS AND BLOOD AND EYEBALLS FROM NOT PUTTING AMOLIN ON IT, THEN DON’T COME CRYING TO ME.

  I HOPE YOUR FIRST DAY BACK AT SCHOOL WAS GOOD. I’M AT THE ALEXANDER TECHNIQUE CLASS LEARNING HOW TO MAKE MY NECK STOP MAKING THAT CRUNCHING SOUND WHEN I TURN AROUND.

  IF YOU’RE BORED TONIGHT WHY DON’T YOU WRITE DOWN EVERYTHING THAT COMES INTO YOUR MIND WHEN YOU HEAR THE WORD TOOTHPASTE?

  WITH LOTS OF LOVE FROM YOUR MUM.

  Dear Mum,

  I’m going to bed now. I hope your neck has stopped crunching.

  My first day back was okay. But Celia wasn’t there.

  !!!

  I went for a run over to her place and Mrs Buckley says she climbed out of her bedroom window last night and disappeared again. Mrs Buckley said she heard her climbing out the window because she fell on top of Benjamin’s drum kit which he has in the garden so that he can practise by moonlight. But Mrs Buckley just pretended not to hear. She says we should all just breathe in and out and stop stressing, and leave Celia to figure out Celia’s own thing.

  Thank you for your exciting suggestion about how to spend my night tonight.

  Here is what comes into my mind when I hear the word TOOTHPASTE:

  teeth.

  Lots of love,

  Elizabeth

  A Letter From A Complete and Utter Stranger

  Dear Elizabeth Clarry,

  Actually I think porridge is cool. You probably just haven’t had good porridge. It has to be steaming like a shower so it burns the tastebuds off of your tongue, and you have to tip a packet of brown sugar on top of it.

  I wrote an essay on To Kill A Mockingbird last term. If you need it, I’ll send it to you. I think the best way to forge ties between our schools is for us to swap homework. Have you ever done an assignment on the human immune system?

  1. My Name: It’s down the bottom. You can call me Chris if you want to but you can NEVER CALL ME TINA. If you do, I’ll break your face.

  2. My Interests: my butterfly collection (HA HA).

  3. My Friends: My best friend is my cousin, Maddie. She lives in Double Bay and goes to Trinity Ladies College, so I’ve talked to people from nice private schools like yours before, so I’m used to you. A lot of people in my class aren’t used to you so they were pissed off when Radison said we had to write letters, and some wouldn’t even take one of your letters out of the box. Tony Mason did take a letter but then he gave it straight back to Radison and said he could stick it up his arse. I don’t know if he stuck it up his arse or not.

  4. My Holiday: I stayed with my cousin Maddie in Double Bay and we watched videos and ate mango ripple ice cream. She has an ace stereo tv. You probably have one too, cos you’re a nice private school girl.

  5. My Boyfriend: You never said if you had a boyfriend or not. Do you? My boyfriend is called Derek. His main talent is whistling. He can whistle in perfect tune. His other main talent is his biceps. But he only flexes his muscles if he’s completely hammered, like off his brain, cos he thinks he looks like a walrus when he does.

  Also, I’ve got two brothers and two sisters and they’re all younger than me. So I’m the oldest.

  What’s the deal with ‘long-distance running’? How long is a long distance anyway? And how come you like that? Write back again cos I forgive you for being a nice private school girl.

  Christina Kratovac

  PS How come it’s important that your friend Celia didn’t get on the bus this morning? Is she like in a wheelchair or something?

  A Letter to Someone Who is Practically A Stranger

  Dear Christina Kratovac,

  I don’t know what to do about the porridge.

  Maybe we just shouldn’t talk about it?

  Thanks for writing back to me. I’m glad you got my letter and not that guy who told the teacher to stick it up his arse.

  Long distance running is like cross country or marathon running, and long distances are different lengths – like the City to Surf is 14k, and a marathon is around 42.2k, and an ultra-marathon is to the North Pole and back. People always tell me I shouldn’t run so far because I’m too young and my bones will fall to pieces. But I do it anyway – mainly because I love the bit when you finish and get to stop running. For example: The next race I’m going in is the Belongil Trail Run, which is 15k. Imagine stopping after 15k. It’ll be fantastic.

  A VERY IMPORTANT THING for you to know is that I’m NOT a nice private school girl. And I know I’m not, cause most of the other girls here are like that. They take clarinet lessons and go to pony club. And they do this thing whenever I’m talking to them where they blink their mascara’d lashes really quickly as if they need to take lots of little breaks from looking
at me.

  I’m writing this in Science and Mr Hoogenboom is going blah blah blah about the human skeleton. At the start of the lesson, before Mr Hoogenboom came in, this guy Martin Wilson turned around from the bench in front of mine and said, ‘Elizabeth! You look radiant!’

  So at first I think, ‘oh fantastic, Martin Wilson’s got a crush on me – now what?’ (Martin Wilson’s got orange hair which is crinkley like potato chips, and a chin like a cauliflower.)

  But then David Corruthers looks around too and says, ‘Man, is that red or what?’

  So then I remember that my face is so red that my own dog doesn’t recognise me anymore. It’s because I went skiing with my dad on the holidays and got sunburnt.

  I can tell you right now that if I was a nice-private-school-girl, I wouldn’t’ve got a bright red face from going skiing. I’d’ve got a perfect golden tan like I’d dipped my head in a jar of honey.

  Anyway, so Martin and David are staring at me like Mulder and Scully staring at the family of aliens they just discovered in the kitchen sink, when Mr Hoogenboom walks in.

  And Martin calls out, ‘Sir, look at Elizabeth’s face! She’s gonna get skin cancer, right? Maybe we should do a topic on diseases and use Elizabeth as our experiment?’

  Mr Hoogenboom looks straight at my face. So does the entire class. Then everyone’s calling out stuff like:

  ‘How can you get sunburnt like that and still be alive?’