Finding Cassie Crazy (20 page)

Dear Emily
Thanks for the report. It rocked. I had a great time with you that night and I thought about it a lot in the holidays, wondering what grade I got and how I could have improved.

I think you should have been more critical though, because how am I supposed to learn? Don't forget that the goal is to steal Christina Kratovac away from her arsehole boyfriend. He stole her from her previous boyfriend, so he deserves to lose her. But I need to be pretty trained up for it.

If you want an assessment of your own behaviour on the Date with a Boy, you just say the word.

Love
Charlie
PS My smile when I saw you was real, not pretend.

To: LYDIA JAACKSON-OBERMAN
SPECIAL COVERT OPERATION REPORT

OPERATION:
Operation Recognise Lydia First Assigned by Agent Lydia
RESULT:
Successful (see sunflower with diagonally cut stems/fresh water in Lydia's house)
FIELD NOTES:
AKA confirms that Lydia is gorgeous (as AKA originally predicted).
AKA has been questioned about top-secret surveillance techniques/explanation for how he achieved success at Operation Recognise Lydia First.

AKA cannot believe anyone is asking this.
He will respond only with rank and serial number.
RANK:
Number 1
SERIAL NO.:
01010101010101010101 (can't remember but it was something like that)
QUESTION:
What happens now?

Dear Cassie
Where was I?!?!?

You mean, where were
you
? I hung around at the reserve until, what, nine o'clock? I really wanted to meet you. I went home with blue balls and I don't just mean from the cold.

One of us must have f**ked up and got the wrong place. Sorry to hear you were also on your own there. Bet ya didn't wait as long as I did.

How was your holiday? Get some time in with your friends, Lydia and Emily? Been back to see Claire the Retarded Shrink?

My holiday kind of sucked the bag, cause I was pissed off with you. I was thinking I'd been stood up by another Ashbury princess. I guess I'm kind of bitter about it but I'm stoked now to see it was just mischance.

So, I'm going to give you a second chance to cock it up, I guess.

Kidding with you, Cass. I know it wasn't your fault.

Then again, I've probably f**ked up my chances in respect of my trumpet playing because what hope have I got of your mother helping me now she thinks I left you hanging around
the reserve like that? It's not a safe place for nice little Ashbury girls.

You want to give it another shot? We should be more specific about exactly where in the reserve to meet this time.

Matthew Dunlop

Dear Charlie
I am happy to be more critical of you, but I think you should ask yourself a question first: are you
sure
you want to go out with this Christina? Maybe you should just leave her where she is with this arsehole boyfriend of hers, where she is happy?

I had a nice conversation with Cass today. She is so secretive sometimes, like you wouldn't believe, about personal things, but very chatty about impersonal things. Lydia and I always feel like a high five when we get her to tell us something personal. Today she told me that she is going to meet with her penfriend from Brookfield and he is a guy and she thinks he might be nice in an intriguing kind of way. His name is Matthew Dunlop, apparently, and he must be in your English class, as it is an exchange of letters between our classes that is going on here.

It is so amazing because that will mean all three of us have met with our penfriends from Brookfield.

Did I tell you that Lydia met her penfriend from Brookfield on the same night as I was seeing the movie with you? I can't remember if I mentioned that on our Date, because we were mainly talking about us. Anyway, his name is Sebastian. Do you know him? What's he like and is he good enough for my friend Lydia? I doubt it.

Best wishes
Emily

Hey Seb
You're not in a prisoner-of-war camp.

It was me who gave you the assignment so you have to tell me how you did it.

What happens now? I'll let you know as soon as Ms Yen shuts her mouth about parabolic equations.

See you
Lydia
PS Hey, what can you tell me about a guy in your English class called Matthew Dunlop? Cass got him as her Brookfield penfriend.

Hi Matthew
I'm sorry you were waiting there at the reserve. That's pretty stupid that we were both there and didn't see each other. It's kind of weird.

You don't need to worry about my mother quitting on you, because I didn't tell her that you didn't show up. Actually, I didn't tell her where I was meeting you. I don't think she'd have let me go there.

Plus, I was okay in the reserve—a girl from my school, Liz Clarry, turned up and hung out with me for a while. She was training there, only she couldn't stay long because her mother was waiting to collect her.

She tried to make me leave the reserve with her, but I thought I should keep waiting in case you showed up.

Do you really want to try to meet at the reserve again? Em and Lyd would kill me if they knew I was meeting you there.

Cassie

Dear Emily
Seb Mantegna is a buddy of mine and you should feel relaxed about him seeing your friend Lydia. He's a good guy. I'd be happy if he went out with my sister or my daughter, for example, which is saying something.

But which is not saying I have a daughter. I know that's exactly what you're going to respond with: ‘Do you have a
daughter
?' is how you're going to respond. I know you, Em. So I'm getting in first here.

Matthew Dunlop, I couldn't say. I've never heard of Matthew Dunlop. Are you sure he's in my English class?

Charlie

Hey Lyd
Send me another assignment that involves meeting in person is my suggestion for what happens next. This time it might involve actual talking.
Seb
PS There's no one in my English class called Matthew Dunlop. Actually, I asked around a bit and nobody's heard of him. I don't know who your friend Cassie has been writing to but he's not at Brookfield High.

Dear Cassie,
Okay, new meeting place co-ordinates.

4.30 pm next Thursday—the third gate along from Pennant Hills Road—the fourth eucalyptus tree inside the
reserve (there are
only
eucalyptus trees in the reserve).

All is forgiven from this end for messing up last time. I hope all is forgiven from that end too. And once again, I can't wait to meet you.

Yours
Matthew Dunlop