Holden Caulfield

If you really want to know, I just got back from a walk down in old Central Park South. Near the bench that only has half its paint. I mean it can barely even stand up when a fat man sits on it. I’m not kidding. Anyway, on the way back I found this dopey coin just laying on the street corner. It had this old lady in a gold dress on the front. Probably something from the European dumps. That’s what my dad used to call them. And just as I picked it up, some gray dog came running at me. I thought I wasn’t gonna make it outta there. Luckily, some random creep came and caught the dog and took it in this truck. So I ran the heck out of there, and came here.

But now I’m here listening to Ackley drone on and on about some girl he went on a date with. In my room. He was even touching all my clothes that I was going to wear tomorrow. He really was. If you really want to know, this is what he was talking about:

“And so I was telling her that if I were to go to Massachusetts then wedn’t be t’gether anymore.”
I don’t know why, but for some reason I didn’t shoot myself. It was really that boring.

“But all she’d say was ‘But we can still communicate if we just-‘ Hey! I told you you’d better be listn’n! Why can’t you just do something right?”

I thought about giving him some stupid reply, but I figured that I liked that way my face looked right now. So I just walked into the can to pretend that I was combing my hair. I never comb my hair. At least Ackley didn’t know that. I mean if it was Stradlater I was talking to, man! He would beat the lights outta me! I really mean it. It’s not that I’m a wimp. Well, I’m definitely not the strongest guy out there, but I’m not too bad. I could lift a couple hundred pounds when I was fifteen. But anyways, I probably shouldn’t tell you all what Stradlater’s done to me before.

“If you’ren’t gonna come out here on my count of three, then I’m gonna leave‼”

Wow. That was the most perfect thing that he could possibly say. So I just shut the door and didn’t say a word to him. It worked. It really did!

Later I thought about giving Jane a buzz. It wouldn’t leave my mind. It just wouldn’t. But when I got into the phone booth, I wasn’t in the mood to do it. So what I did, I called Stradlater just for the heck of it. I don't know why, but when he answered I told d him I was in a rush. He wasn't too thrilled that I even called him in the first place.

"Yeah, Stradlater." he said.

"Hey it's me, Holden." I said back,

"Don't you have some sort of a session goin' on now?"
Of all things to say, why couldn't he just have said something like 'Hey, it's good to hear from you!' or 'You're still at Pencey, right?'? But he just had to ridicule me.

"Uh... I just got back from Oral Expression." Stradlater is so dumb. You could tell him that you just arrived from a UFO and are going on a date with a space alien. He couldn't tell if you are lying or not.

"Well, don't keep bothering the heck out of everyone in the state. There's not enough people in Pennsylvania to die from your boring lies."

Crap, so he did know I was lying. But there was nothing that he could do to me now. I was well over a hundred miles away from his filthy body. But right then I hung up on Stradlater. Not because I was afraid of him, but because I was supposed to meet Carl Luce. Old Luce. If there's one guy in the world who could tell you if everyone in a bar was a flit or not, it was him. Just something about him makes himself so arrogant. It's probably because he hangs around with everyone who goes to the preppy schools with him. that bothers heck out of me.

Anyway, when I entered the Wicker Bar, old Luce wasn't even there. And I was fifteen minutes late! I guess he probably got impatient and left after a minute passed. Oh well. It's not like I was dying to see him. He can really get on your nerves.

So when I left the bar, I quickly ran to catch a cab. I didn't realize it at the time, but I was very low on dough. I really was. Luckily, I only went to Central Park instead of my dorm room. Central Park is only about five miles away from the Wicker Bar. My room is closer to an hour away.

Lately when I've been going to the park, I just sit down on the bench that faces right at the pond with all the ducks. It's really peaceful there. I still wonder where all the ducks go when winter comes. Do they fly south where it's really warm? Or do they all hide in some cave that's underground? and the fish. What do they do? The guy in my cab said they just freeze in the water. They make their own food inside the ice and just stay there comfortably. That cab driver is definitely phony. He doesn't even know a thing what he's talking about.

I just remembered now that I have an appointment with Phoebe at the zoo. I'm so excited! I haven't talked to Phoebe in almost a whole year! I need to start giving her more buzzes. I'm bored all the time. It's really annoying sometimes. I feel very depressed. I need to start talking to more people. Maybe I just hang out with the most depressing people in the world. I really don't know right now. I'll have to see how the zoo goes.