{"id":"01KG6FVF9GVZEQZ7163TQ07QKS","cid":"bafkreiddxzfbnr2osriqkd42kmpszbhnmzbyyryrocsimi3y5zt6nawz2e","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":5042,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T03:41:20.747Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 4","source_file":"01KG6FT59BXAZ3C5HRJ6SW8F58","start_line":4990,"text":"So 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\n\n\nprobably hitch hike out west this afternoon. Meet me at the\nMuseum of art near the door at quarter past 12 if you can and I\nwill give you your Christmas dough back. I didn't spend much.\nLove,\nHOLDEN\nHer school was practically right near the museum, and she had to pass it on her\nway home for lunch anyway, so I knew she could meet me all right.\nThen I started walking up the stairs to the principal's office so I could give the\nnote to somebody that would bring it to her in her classroom. I folded it about ten times\nso nobody'd open it. You can't trust anybody in a goddam school. But I knew they'd give\nit to her if I was her brother and all.\nWhile I was walking up the stairs, though, all of a sudden I thought I was going to\npuke again. Only, I didn't. I sat down for a second, and then I felt better. But while I was\nsitting down, I saw something that drove me crazy. Somebody'd written \"Fuck you\" on\nthe wall. It drove me damn near crazy. I thought how Phoebe and all the other little kids\nwould see it, and how they'd wonder what the hell it meant, and then finally some dirty\nkid would tell them--all cockeyed, naturally--what it meant, and how they'd all think\nabout it and maybe even worry about it for a couple of days. I kept wanting to kill\nwhoever'd written it. I figured it was some perverty bum that'd sneaked in the school late\nat night to take a leak or something and then wrote it on the wall. I kept picturing myself\ncatching him at it, and how I'd smash his head on the stone steps till he was good and\ngoddam dead and bloody. But I knew, too, I wouldn't have the guts to do it. I knew that.\nThat made me even more depressed. I hardly even had the guts to rub it off the wall with\nmy hand, if you want to know the truth. I was afraid some teacher would catch me\nrubbing it off and would think I'd written it. But I rubbed it out anyway, finally. Then I\nwent on up to the principal's office.","title":"Chunk 4"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG6FV1MXSJGSEB5SJM280689","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG6FT59BXAZ3C5HRJ6SW8F58","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KFF1K6A8V452X8SQKY55DD16","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG6FVF940DAVVTBFQ7PQZZ25","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG6FVF9GJB9ZVMD5MRDHP6HR","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T03:41:21.584Z","ts":"2026-01-30T03:41:32.559Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}