{"id":"01KG6FJ3D3248ACZC5ZRNYJG2Z","cid":"bafkreifi5xe225jpcwuenlu2w4ahoxjt6jamuklv5pscx2uhkehsuen6hu","type":"file","properties":{"cid":"bafkreifmlubjqb342rgwtlzsj6ihh7yz5ilh6rx445gdsm5awe2kwc3bdu","content_type":"image/jpeg","filename":"Rye_page_0107.jpg","height":2400,"key":"pdf-page-1769744174309-75w06cy8k0b","label":"Rye_page_0107.jpg","page_number":107,"pdf_type":"born_digital","size":758243,"text":"and oil in people's cars. I didn't care what kind of job it was, though. Just so people didn't\nknow me and I didn't know anybody. I thought what I'd do was, I'd pretend I was one of\nthose deaf-mutes. That way I wouldn't have to have any goddam stupid useless\nconversations with anybody. If anybody wanted to tell me something, they'd have to\nwrite it on a piece of paper and shove it over to me. They'd get bored as hell doing that\nafter a while, and then I'd be through with having conversations for the rest of my life.\nEverybody'd think I was just a poor deaf-mute bastard and they'd leave me alone. They'd\nlet me put gas and oil in their stupid cars, and they'd pay me a salary and all for it, and I'd\nbuild me a little cabin somewhere with the dough I made and live there for the rest of my\nlife. I'd build it right near the woods, but not right in them, because I'd want it to be sunny\nas hell all the time. I'd cook all my own food, and later on, if I wanted to get married or\nsomething, I'd meet this beautiful girl that was also a deaf-mute and we'd get married.\nShe'd come and live in my cabin with me, and if she wanted to say anything to me, she'd\nhave to write it on a goddam piece of paper, like everybody else. If we had any children,\nwe'd hide them somewhere. We could buy them a lot of books and teach them how to\nread and write by ourselves.\nI got excited as hell thinking about it. I really did. I knew the part about\npretending I was a deaf-mute was crazy, but I liked thinking about it anyway. But I really\ndecided to go out West and all. All I wanted to do first was say good-by to old Phoebe.\nSo all of a sudden, I ran like a madman across the street--I damn near got killed doing it,\nif you want to know the truth--and went in this stationery store and bought a pad and\npencil. I figured I'd write her a note telling her where to meet me so I could say good-by\nto her and give her back her Christmas dough, and then I'd take the note up to her school\nand get somebody in the principal's office to give it to her. But I just put the pad and\npencil in my pocket and started walking fast as hell up to her school--I was too excited to\nwrite the note right in the stationery store. I walked fast because I wanted her to get the\nnote before she went home for lunch, and I didn't have any too much time.\nI knew where her school was, naturally, because I went there myself when I was a\nkid. When I got there, it felt funny. I wasn't sure I'd remember what it was like inside, but\nI did. It was exactly the same as it was when I went there. They had that same big yard\ninside, that was always sort of dark, with those cages around the light bulbs so they\nwouldn't break if they got hit with a ball. They had those same white circles painted all\nover the floor, for games and stuff. And those same old basketball rings without any nets-\n-just the backboards and the rings.\nNobody was around at all, probably because it wasn't recess period, and it wasn't\nlunchtime yet. All I saw was one little kid, a colored kid, on his way to the bathroom. He\nhad one of those wooden passes sticking out of his hip pocket, the same way we used to\nhave, to show he had permission and all to go to the bathroom.\nI was still sweating, but not so bad any more. I went over to the stairs and sat\ndown on the first step and took out the pad and pencil I'd bought. The stairs had the same\nsmell they used to have when I went there. Like somebody'd just taken a leak on them.\nSchool stairs always smell like that. Anyway, I sat there and wrote this note:\nDEAR PHOEBE,\nI can't wait around till Wednesday any more so I will","text_extracted_at":"2026-01-30T03:36:14.309Z","text_extracted_by":"pdf-processor","text_has_content":true,"text_source":"born_digital","uploaded":true,"width":1855},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KFHMJM2J9JHQAQM1Q9SKBJWF","predicate":"derived_from"},{"peer":"01KFF1K6A8V452X8SQKY55DD16","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG6FJ3CTHMH8NT7E4ZRT8RPR","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG6FJ3CN3P1SH5ZQNF8WJ38X","predicate":"next"},{"peer":"01KG6FNR3WN2Z03Y70JRE9EB18","peer_label":"Rye_page_0107_medium.jpg","peer_type":"file","predicate":"has_derivative"},{"peer":"01KG6FNVP62FWP3VPB8EZC73QW","peer_label":"Rye_page_0107_thumb.jpg","peer_type":"file","predicate":"has_derivative"},{"peer":"01KG6FT59BXAZ3C5HRJ6SW8F58","predicate":"has_assembly"}],"ver":6,"created_at":"2026-01-30T03:36:14.499Z","ts":"2026-01-30T03:40:42.705Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFFC4A8W8939TXGEXCK439ZK"}}