Feeling Sorry for Celia

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

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
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Epub format 978-1-74262-395-5

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To my family, including Grandma,
and
to Colin

Contents

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.

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?