Feeling Sorry for Celia (14 page)

Richard Clarry

15-2203 Trillium Avenue

Toronto, CANADA. M5S 2H3

Dear Richard,

DON’T BE SHOCKED.

Be prepared. Maybe you want to sit down to read this?

I am your stepsister.

You know Albert Clarry? Your stepfather? He happens to be my father.

Surely he has mentioned me to you?

Still, who knows. I’m very sorry if he hasn’t and this is a Major Shock to you.

Anyway, has he mentioned that he used to be married to somebody else before he met your mother? Has he mentioned that he had a
child
with that person? Well, I am that child.

I’m writing now because I’m on a train at the moment.

That might seem a strange reason to you but it’s perfectly obvious to me.

Being on a train always makes me think about everything, like life and everything. I don’t know why that happens to me. Maybe it’s the way the train rocks? Maybe a rocking motion makes you think deep and philosophical thoughts? I wonder if that means babies are always lying in their cradles being rocked and working out the meaning of life? They probably are you know, and it’s completely wasted because they can’t talk.

Anyway, I’m with two friends, and we’ve just been to Coffs Harbour on a kind of holiday. Now we’re on our way home. Both of my friends are asleep which is why I had time to
think the deep and philosophical thoughts that the train was rocking into my head.

And what I thought was this: a stepbrother and a stepsister should really be friends. Especially when I have always been an only child and always wanted a brother or a sister, and all the time there has been the possibility of a brother.

Or maybe you think I’m being stupid.

You know how your stepdad’s in Australia at the moment? Well, that means I get to see him more often than usual (obviously), and we went out to dinner a few weeks ago, and I asked about you. I don’t want to complain about him (I guess you know him a lot better than I do), but he always acts so strange when I ask about you. He seemed to think it was a completely MAD idea to write to you.

So I am.

I’m writing to you. I don’t even know what to say. I guess I shouldn’t say very much because maybe you don’t want to hear from me anyhow? It’s just it’s been in my head, somewhere in the back of my head, ever since Dad said that it would be a mistake. I just want to find out from you if you think it’s a mistake too.

So.

I hope you don’t think this is crazy.

I hope you’ll write back but don’t worry if you don’t want to.

I don’t even know if I’ll send this. But I think I will.

Best wishes,

Elizabeth Clarry

ELIZABETH!

WELCOME BACK!

SORRY THAT I AM NOT HERE NOW TO MEET YOU. I HOPE CELIA’S MOTHER COLLECTED YOU ALL FROM THE STATION OKAY. I HOPE YOU ARE OKAY.

CALL ME AT WORK, DARLING.

I’M VERY SORRY BUT I HAVE SOMETHING BAD TO TELL YOU.

LOVE,

YOUR MUM

Elizabeth Clarry, Home Room 27

Dear Elizabeth,

Welcome back to school – I look forward to having you in the class again. Hope you kept up your reading while you were away!

I have enclosed all the letters that you received from your pen-pal at Brookfield while you were away. I labelled the envelopes too – letter 1, 2, etc, so you’d know which order they arrived in. Now they’re in nice chronological order for you. Looks like he/she was missing you!

See you in English tomorrow.

All the best,

Mr Botherit

Letter 1

Dear Elizabeth,

My God, your letter was
such a shock
. On your way to rescue Celia??? From a
circus
in
Coffs Harbour
with a cute guy named SAXON WALKER?????

You forgot to give me space in your letter to get over the shock. It’s the coolest. You must be the nicest, most generous best friend in the world. I mean, okay, fair enough, you’re getting an advantage cos you’re going north with a cute guy that you like. But even so. You’re going a far far far distance just to, kind of like,
be there
for your best friend. I really, really think you’re lovely and you should get a Best Friend Award at the next Academies.

I have to say though, I’m kind of jealous. I know, it’s
crazy
. We haven’t even met each other, but I still wish you were my best friend too. (OH GOD. I SOUND LIKE SUCH A WALRUS NOW. AND I’M EVEN STARTING TO CRY, PRACTICALLY.) It’s just that my best friend, Maddie? I mean, she’s fantastic fun to hang around with and you know, watch MTV and eat mango ice-cream and chocolatechip cookies. And she’s my cousin so we know just
everything
about each other.

But now when I need her, it’s kind of like she’s not really there. I mean, she’s
there
. I mean, she still
exists
.

She’s still breathing, last time I checked.

And she tries really hard to listen when I talk to her, and she gives advice and everything. But she’s just. I mean. I don’t know what I mean.

I have to explain. Remember I told you about that new guy at Maddie’s school who she liked? Well, she decided to
go out with his best friend to get him jealous, which my mum said was
morally reprehensible
and I thought so too, so I told her so, but she just said, ‘A girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do’ and then did what she had to do.

So she asks out the guy’s friend, and they go out a few times, and TYPICAL MADDIE, she falls for the friend. It’s cos she’s so obsessed by love. It means she’s always kind of catching it, like a flu or something.

So she falls for the friend, who is a fucking lunatic, and get this? He talks her into sneaking out with him in the middle of this full moon night and helping him to steal his older brother’s hang-glider. They take it up to the Gap, you know the place where
normal
people go to do themselves in, but where Maddie and this guy go to have a good time.

So they get to the top of the cliff and drink like half a bottle of bourbon each to get themselves brave enough to do it. But Maddie starts chickening out and saying, ‘You know, maybe we should just get a pizza and look at the stars’ and this guy’s saying to her in a kind of dopey voice, ‘If you really love me, you will
fly
into the night sky with me and
touch
the stars.’

I don’t know if he was being romantic or if he’s so stupid he actually thought he could touch the stars. You never can tell.

Anyway, so Maddie keeps saying no, and suggesting pizza toppings they could choose instead of flying to the stars, until this guy gets mad and says that if
she
won’t come with him, he’ll go and
fetch
her a star himself, and
that’s how much he loves her
and it’s
such a sad tiling that she doesn’t love him as much as he loves her
.

And he gets on the hang-glider all dramatic and sobbing,
and goes flying off the edge of the cliff and of
course
he crashes. It’s incredible he didn’t the, actually. Maddie had to run all the way down to the pizza shop, and get them to call an ambulance, and helicopters had to come and rescue this stupid guy, and Maddie got to fly in the helicopter, and now the guy’s in hospital in a coma, although they reckon he’s going to wake up soon and he’ll be fine.

ANYWAY, so Maddie is spending all her time at the hospital now trying to wake this guy up from his coma by singing lullabies to him (I tried to explain to her that
lullabies
are actually meant to put people to
sleep
, but she was too hysterical to get the point) – and when I do get to talk to her, she’s just full of stories about hang-gliders and ambulances and helicopters and free ham and pineapple pizzas. The guy in the shop gave her the pizzas because he felt sorry for her.

She’s not interested in my stupid complicated problem.

I just kind of wish you weren’t away right now. I don’t know when you’re coming back, or when you’ll get my letter. It’s not even a problem really. It’s not such a big deal. It’s nothing. I’m being stupid. It’s just Derek.

You know, Derek, my BOYFRIEND. And you know how he was trying to talk me into having sex and that? So I did it, just the other day. It was fine, but kind of stupid and embarrassing. Different to what I expected.

And the thing is now? For some reason I want to break up with Derek. I have all these confused thoughts in my head, like I’m angry with him. But that’s stupid cos it’s not his fault. I mean I said
yes
. And I only did it because I really really wanted to. I keep getting in these stupid moods where I think everything’s horrible now, and ruined. Like something
really important happened to me, and Derek’s not taking it seriously enough. Then the next moment I think don’t be stupid, it only seems like it’s a big deal because people
talk
about it like it is.

Then the next moment I want to try and have sex again.

I’m just going blah blah blah and you won’t even get this until you get back and I’ll probably be perfectly happy by then and just about to get married to Derek or something. Good luck with Celia. I hope the rescue works well.

Love from Christina

Letter 2

Dear Elizabeth,

HELP.

What should I do?

You know in my last letter I was going on and on about how maybe I should break up with Derek and that? Well now I’ve got a much bigger problem. We did it again, sex I mean, yesterday afternoon while his parents weren’t home, and this time the condom broke. How come condoms break? What’s the point in them if they do that?

What I want to know is: how come there’s this big anti-AIDS campaign all based on condoms, when condoms BREAK.