Free Feeling Sorry for Celia by Jaclyn Moriarty

it looked like anyway. He was sitting there looking at this address for the circus, and breathing in big wheezing gasps of air, and I was shouting, ‘Lean forward! Breathe into a paper bag!’
    He ignored me, picked up a ventolin puffer, and sucked it into his mouth. It turned out he’s an asthmatic. I never knew that. All this time doing training with him and I never knew he had asthma.
    Anyway , so he got over his asthma attack and said, ‘My Auntie Robbie lives there! Let’s go!’
    Next thing, he was on his phone to his mother, his auntie, my mother, and the school principal, and he had the whole thing organised.
    I never saw anything like it. He was like the bit in the movie where Tom Cruise is a lawyer and he’s decided he’s really going to win this case, for the sake of justice and the American way, and that? And it’s suddenly like bang-bang-bang – grabbing files off shelves and slamming them down on the desk and punching numbers in the telephone and shaking out the phone cord dramatically, and you know,snapping out instructions to all the assistants around the desk, like: ‘get me all the phone records of the President of the United States for the last fifty years’, and ‘get me the names of every client who ever ate a banana’, and ‘Let’s get some Chinese take-away up here, on the double!’
    This kind of thing to our school principal. ‘Good afternoon? Mr Derby? Saxon Walker here. In relation to missing pupil, Celia Buckley.’
    GIVE ME A BREAK
    (But very cool . I mean, it was kind of a turn on.)
    With my mother he got me to do the talking, and then he spoke a bit himself, like a super polite private school boy, and then he asked if – get this – he asked if ‘he might have his own mother phone her and assure her of my safety!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!’
    Which put my mother in this really difficult situation, because she happens to hate his mother. (His mother’s a local councillor and my mum had a kind of full-on fight with her about rollerblading in the shopping mall.) (I know. Rollerblading.) (I know. In the shopping mall .) (I know. My mother .) Anyway, my mother was in this dilemma, because she hates Saxon’s mother, but she had to be a good parent to me and ensure my safety.
    So you know what she came up with? She gave Saxon my FATHER’S phone number and said Saxon’s mum had to call my FATHER .
    My God!
    So my father must have been confused out of his mind. With some strange woman calling and saying ‘Can your daughter go away with my son?’
    Actually I felt a bit sorry for him. He really wanted to dothe good parent thing, but he didn’t have a clue who Saxon was or who Celia was. (He probably had a bit of trouble figuring out who I was, too.) But he got a bit annoying, trying too hard, see, getting me to explain the whole story, and talking to my mum, and Saxon, and Saxon’s mother again, and even asking to call the aunt and talk to her.
    But finally, it all worked out.
    Everyone said it was fine, and Saxon phoned for train tickets.
    So now you know where I am.
    I’m on a train.
    I’m on the way to Coffs Harbour.
    And Saxon and I are going to stay with Saxon’s aunt.
    And we’re going to rescue Celia.
    But right now I’m going to stop writing because Saxon’s saying we have to eat our chocolates and Pringles, and he’s telling me I have to stop talking to you and start talking to him.
    I’ll get him to say hi to you before I stop. This is Saxon:
    Hi Tina. SORRY. Liz just told me you hate being called Tina. SORRY. Hi, Christina. Can you make Liz shut up and talk to me for a change instead of you? No offence, but I’m bored and starving. And she just wrote the longest letter I ever saw to you, so you’ve had her attention for like the entire trip, and I’ve just been sitting here neglected. I thought she was writing a novel or something. See you around. Saxon.
    PS Liz just told me I had to apologise again for the Tina thing, but I can’t really believe you’re still angry.