Chapter Nine: Emailing Jack

Clickity clickity click. Click. Click-a-click. Click clickety clickety clickety. . . click.

It was lucky Dorothea only used three fingers and a thumb to type with. If she typed properly with both hands, the whole 'rest your arm until it's fixed itself' thing would be a real drag. Click clickety clickety click.

This whole thing was getting on her nerves. Click. The adult Fowls were being stickily nice, she didn't see the Butlers except when they brought in meals (the family ate had tea together, but other meals just happened randomly), and she hadn't seen Artemis since the whole souvenir shop fiasco. Fiasco. Not a word normal people though or said on an everyday basis, but there wasn't a thesaurus nearby and what else could you call what had happened? Clickit. Click click clickety clicky click click.

And her arm hurt. Click. Email sent.

So now she was dumping all of her troubles on the only guy whose email address she knew. jackthepumpkinking@spudemporium.spud. Come to think about it, his email address was all she knew about him.

Nuts to that. Nuts nuts nuts. Mmmm, hot salted macadamia nuts. Very droolable. Ages since she'd had any. Better not to drool on the keyboard, so Dorothea left that train of thought to crash and cast around for something else to ponder. . .

Something not food. Jack! Perfect. He was definitely not food. Food for thought perhaps, but not food for tummy.

Dorothea had met the self-titled Pumpkin King one and a half years ago when he had pointed out that she had spelt 'onomatopoeic' wrong on her website. A War of Words had ensued, with both sides suffering massive casualties by their opponents' linguistic ability. They had agreed on a truce for Christmas that year, as both parties needed to restock on dictionaries (not hard, noting the type of presents relatives are known for giving to academic kiddies).

From the evidence of his emails, Jack was a teenager from somewhere near America. He was a non-smoking, vegetarian adrenaline junkie who excelled in physical education and languages. He wanted to join the police force when he grew up, so he could drive fast cars and not get a ticket. His grip on current events was almost as nonexistent as Dorothea's own.

Best of all (from Maria-Susannah's point of view) he had sent Dorothea a picture of him looking very swish. Dorothea had her doubts- it looked a bit like a doctored photo- but ever since, Maria-Susannah had been very, like, interested! in her sister's mysterious friend. Maybe he was the one who'd messed with the phone line.

Ding. Jack had replied to her email very quickly. Then again, he had said that he'd been confined to his room for some reckless driving; he was probably sitting in front of his computer 24/7, desperate for contact from the outside world.

She opened the message. Click.

Hola, dottedline! the email began.

Your life bites almost as much as mine! We should look in for some muzzles, or pliers. You're in Ireland? That must be cool, I've never even left the country LLL. Sniff. Hey, if you send over a suitcase with airholes in, I could come visit! Or not. Mum'd probably blow her stack, and I'd have to clean up the debris, pronounced de bree.

I must say your email cheered me up a bit. You're in Ireland, millions of miles from home, and you're cooped up in the house instead of running around kissing big rocks. Least I'm not missing anything special!

Sorry about the arm. Tell more about this evil vampire chap, eh? I've heard the name somewhere, memory needs a bit of a revamp.

- Jack

Well, that was nice. Dorothea typed a few colourful phrases delightfully describing her thoughts on Jack's reaction to her crippled-ness. The reply was almost as fast.

            Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry. . . you still reading this? Moving right along from your completely ignoring my request for info on the foul Fowl fellah J I managed to remember who he is without your divine help. Apparently he's the latest in a line of rather bad eggs: arson, lawsuits, armed robbery, fraud, walking out on young ladies at the altar in favour of richer young ladies- you name it, this family's done it. One of them was a magistrate a few hundred years back, swindled half the country out of their lands. Nice friends you've got, mate.

-J

Oh, dear, thought Dorothea. I didn't know that. Well, duh, mum wouldn't have let me come if I'd known that.

Hey, I've got nothing to worry about. My life savings aren't even small potatoes to them. And they have a cool house.

Anyway, that was just their ancestors. Doesn't mean Angeline and Mr Fowl are the same.

The computer dinged again.

Forgot to say, my dotty dotted line- the son's got a criminal record longer than my arm, and none of it can be proven 'cos they don't have any hard evidence. Art forgery, bank hacking, mafia connections, blah blah blah. . .

Be careful, eh?

Well, that should have been predictable. Slimy little brat! Even more reason to write spiteful things about him in her diary. She would start right away.

December 19, 2003

THIS DIARY IS CURSED WITH A REALLY DIRE DIARY CURSE. IF YOU READ FURTHER THAN THIS, REALLY REALLY GROSS STUFF WILL HAPPEN TO YOU. WORSE THAN STUFF FROM HEALTH CLASS. REALLY DIRE STUFF.

REALLY.

WHY ARE YOU STILL READING THIS? FRACK OFF, MARIA/MUM/BETHY/DAD/MR LEVADE!

I MEAN IT. DIRE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

…

…

…

right, that should do it. thus begins the chronicles legend journal tale of Dorothea Danella Danielle Smith, as written down in my diary from Bethy which I really shouldn't be writing in before x-mas but what the hey, she can't tell because SHE SHOULDN'T BE READING THIS. anyway. 15 years old, 167cm tall, matchstick figure, dandelion hair the colour you get when you mix all the different colours of mud together and add a lot of dust. that was be, by the way. but since I'm the only one likely to be reading this, I would know that already. unless I get amnesia. so I'd better keep writing random stuff with my nifty new pen, also from Bethy. ta, Bethy. If you're still reading this, the fingerprint cannons should be kicking in about now. note to self- figure out what fingerprint cannons are. sounds cool, though. copyright! copyright! mwahahahahahahahahahaha! right. Never been kissed, never seen movie never been kissed, never skipped school 'cos p.e. doesn't count, ooh good ickle me, ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. . . like oddfellow mints and garlic hummus and chocolate, duh chocolate and everyone hates me 'cos it doesn't do anything to my lack of a figure I . honestly, big dire stuff for anyone still reading this. soooooooo. . . aargh that sounded like MS, buuuuurgh.

the official beginning of the very secret diary of me, so frack off. THIS DIARY IS RATED PG FOR MADE-UP SWEAR WORDS, EVIL VIBES ABOUT RANDOMS AND FINGERPRINT CANNONS.

I am in Ireland. I was shot by some freaky dude two days ago and just found out that I am staying with a family whose son is a renowned crim and rather hot and really freaky and pale with black hair (like his parents) and blue eyes and is taller than me. He is a burgullatingly igglestastic conpranny chrack. Hah. And anyone reading this will not know what those things mean. Kidnap Mr Sandy Claws, lala lala la. . . yeah. Feel better now. Got a bit ggggggrrrrrrrrrrrrrr-ed up thinking about Mr Artemis Fowl II.

I don't know why he has to be all mean and everything. It's really a bit of a shock. I mean, no one's ever been purposefully mean to me before. They all ignored me a bit, but they didn't talk to me for the express purpose of making themselves feel better (by being mean).

Meh. Hope he keeps ignoring me. Don't want to do something dumb like cry in front of him.

Stupid hormones. I hate crying.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Thank you, thank you, o my wonderful reviewers. Thank you, o people-who-make-school-holidays. Thank you, o thank you Tim Burton, for The Nightmare Before Christmas. And thank you, Eoin Colfer, for the Artemis Fowl books.

I'm in a very grateful mood at the moment. Could you tell?