Feeling Sorry for Celia (3 page)

It’s funny that your friend runs away, and you go running like a billion kilometres just for fun. It makes you both a bit weird. I think you should listen to people who tell you not to run long distances, and not just because your bones will fall to pieces. Because you’re out of your mind. 15ks? You’re insane.

Anyway, I’m sorry to make jokes about your friend running away. That’s a serious thing.

Actually, Celia sounds a bit like my cousin Maddie. Mad-die’s always getting into trouble and running away too, but it’s not cos she’s bored. It’s always cos of love.

Maddie’s always falling in love with a different guy. Except the different guys are always the same. I mean, they’re always kind of wild. She really goes for the wild type. And they always get her into trouble, like going to the casino all night, or they get her to run away to Surfers’ with them. Then her dad says she can’t see them any more and she gets into even more trouble climbing out of their top
floor apartment window and trying to slide down the drain pipe.

If you really want to know about my brothers and sisters I’ll tell you. Do you really? Okay, I’m going to tell you right now, and if you only asked to be polite or something, you should skip the next bit. Okay?

Well, first there’s my brother, Nick. He’s twelve, eats nothing except raw spaghetti, and hasn’t said a word for the last two years. Well, he has said about five words but only when I got hold of his neck and squeezed it till his face went purple. Then he spoke until I let go. But only in swear words. He used to be kind of like a friend of mine – well, he used to be my slave, anyway, because he worshipped me when he was small.

Then there’s Renee. She’s eight and she’s an angel. She’s smart too – last year my grandmother had a heart attack right in front of Renee’s eyes, when they were alone in the house, and Renee dialled triple 0 and got an ambulance and SAVED GRANDMA’S LIFE. Cool, huh? For a seven-year-old. She also remembered to switch off the stove where Grandma was boiling rhubarb so it wouldn’t all boil away into mulch.

Then there’s Robbo, who’s five, and he’s the devil.

Last there’s the baby, Lauren, and she just turned one. She can run but she can’t walk, because if she slows down to a walk she loses her balance and tips over sideways. She can also talk but only in a completely unknown language.

My mum had two miscarriages between Robbo and Lauren too, so I guess there’d be seven of us, and this letter would go on forever.

My dad came over here from Slovenia when he was about
sixteen, and he met my mum picking grapes up at Mudgee. Mum’s family’s Italian.

Sorry, I accidentally started telling you my whole family history. Anyway, I can hear Derek coming (he’s whistling Pearl Jam’s ‘Alive’ and it sounds
exactly like the original
– you have to admit that it’s a real talent and I don’t see why they don’t let him in the school band) so I’m gonna tell Radison that I’ve got a headache and get out of here.

See ya.

Don’t forget to write back.

Christina

Dear Ms Clarry,

I see you have a pimple just beneath your nose today.

That’s a good start and we’d like to compliment you on that. Teenagers are supposed to have pimples.

BUT YOU KNOW WHAT?

That’s the
MOST DISGUSTING ZIT WE HAVE EVER SEEN.

And you know what else?
Real
teenagers cleanse their faces every day to avoid that kind of thing.

Get into the fridge, and put your head in a paper bag.

All the best,

The Association of Teenagers

!!! ELIZABETH !!!

I’M NOT COMING HOME TILL LATE TONIGHT. GET YOURSELF A BARBECUED CHICKEN AT THE FISH AND CHIPS SHOP AND DO SOME FROZEN VEGETABLES.

(ON THE WAY TO GETTING THE CHICKEN YOU COULD TAKE LOCHIE TO THE VET FOR HIS INJECTION. THAT COULD BE FUN. YOU NEVER KNOW WHO YOU MIGHT MEET IN A VET’S WAITING ROOM.)

YOUR DAD CALLED ME AT WORK YESTERDAY LOOKING FOR YOU. I TOLD HIM YOU HADN’T FINISHED HIGH SCHOOL YET SO WHAT WOULD YOU BE DOING IN AN ADVERTISING AGENCY?

HE SAYS YOU HAVEN’T PHONED HIM BACK YET. CAN YOU CALL HIM AT HIS SYDNEY NUMBER BECAUSE I DON’T WANT HIM CALLING ME ANY MORE.

HAVE A NICE DAY.

LOVE FROM YOUR MUM

PS HAVE YOU HEARD FROM CELIA YET?

Mum,

There’s leftover chicken if you want it.

I called Dad and he wants to take me to dinner on the weekend.

I called Celia’s mum and she told me to take it easy and breathe more. But she seemed a bit surprised that I hadn’t heard from Celia myself yet.

See ya,

Elizabeth

Dear Miss Clarry,

You think
real
distance runners miss training just because they have a sore throat?

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

Letter to a Stranger

Dear Christina,

Thanks for your letter, I really liked it, and I’m really glad you told me about your family. It wasn’t boring at all, it was cool. I haven’t got any brothers or sisters (except for a stepbrother who I’ve never met) and I’d LOVE to have one, so if you have any to spare send one to me in your next letter. The baby sounds cute, for example. And that smart one, Renee, she sounds useful to have around in case of emergencies.

I’m writing this in Maths because I don’t believe in coordinate geometry. I don’t think it’s healthy really.

For one thing, it’s bad for my brain. I know it’s bad for my brain because it gives me a headache. I have a headache right now, and there’s no reason for me to have a headache. I haven’t been bashing my head against a brick wall or anything, for instance. Also, I don’t know why I have to find out the midpoint between two dots on a piece of paper. Excuse me, but who needs to know? And if they do need to know why can’t they do it themselves? Or just look
it up in the back of the book? THE ANSWERS ARE THERE.

For another thing, everyone in this entire room’s sick; they’re all coughing and sneezing and making disgusting snorting, snotty noises, and the guy who sits next to me just coughed and I saw a little splat of gooey green stuff land on my Maths book. I don’t know if anything as disgusting as that has ever happened to you.

So I’m not going to do Maths. Anyway, I’m depressed. Sorry if I always sound depressed. It’s for these reasons:

But I hate going out to dinner with my dad. I can never think of anything to say. And you can see him sitting there trying to figure out really
teenage
stuff to talk about. And we always go somewhere posh and he gets me a glass of wine, even though I hate wine, and then we have conversations where he goes something like, ‘Elizabeth? How about the nose on this shiraz, hmm?’ and I think he’s talking about the waiter or something, so I look around for the one with the big nose, and he goes, ‘I mean the wine, darling’ and then I feel stupid.

Then he goes, ‘Have a sniff of it, what does it smell like to you, sweetheart?’

And I go, ‘Um. Wine.’

And he goes, ‘Mmm. Yes, but what else? Come on!’

‘Um. Red wine.’

‘Nothing else? You can’t smell a fruit in there? Come on now, what kind of a fruit is there?’

‘Apples?’

‘Apples? Really? Interesting. I don’t get that myself. You don’t, by any chance, get strawberries, do you?’

‘Um.’

‘Raspberries?’

‘I guess.’ (Even though it smells exactly like red wine.)

‘Blackberries?’

‘Maybe.’ (Even though it still smells exactly like red wine.)

‘Nutmeg?’

‘Mmm.’ (What’s nutmeg smell like anyhow?)

‘That’s it! That’s a girl! It’s delirious, isn’t it? It’s like summer pudding and Christmas cake all mixed up into one glorious flavour celebration, isn’t it? Isn’t it? !’