{"id":"01KG6FVM5HMZMD7PW31M1QCSXW","cid":"bafkreid6h7o54jrc7h34iaccrqvf62txoymqvpkn4vdrbghrkjmbefdbs4","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":3885,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T03:41:20.744Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 8","source_file":"01KG6FT59BXAZ3C5HRJ6SW8F58","start_line":3838,"text":"they were around or not. It wasn't far over to the park, and I didn't have anyplace else\nspecial to go to--I didn't even know where I was going to sleep yet--so I went. I wasn't\ntired or anything. I just felt blue as hell.\nThen something terrible happened just as I got in the park. I dropped old Phoebe's\nrecord. It broke-into about fifty pieces. It was in a big envelope and all, but it broke\n\n\nanyway. I damn near cried, it made me feel so terrible, but all I did was, I took the pieces\nout of the envelope and put them in my coat pocket. They weren't any good for anything,\nbut I didn't feel like just throwing them away. Then I went in the park. Boy, was it dark.\nI've lived in New York all my life, and I know Central Park like the back of my\nhand, because I used to roller-skate there all the time and ride my bike when I was a kid,\nbut I had the most terrific trouble finding that lagoon that night. I knew right where it\nwas--it was right near Central Park South and all--but I still couldn't find it. I must've\nbeen drunker than I thought. I kept walking and walking, and it kept getting darker and\ndarker and spookier and spookier. I didn't see one person the whole time I was in the\npark. I'm just as glad. I probably would've jumped about a mile if I had. Then, finally, I\nfound it. What it was, it was partly frozen and partly not frozen. But I didn't see any\nducks around. I walked all around the whole damn lake--I damn near fell in once, in fact-\n-but I didn't see a single duck. I thought maybe if there were any around, they might be\nasleep or something near the edge of the water, near the grass and all. That's how I nearly\nfell in. But I couldn't find any.\nFinally I sat down on this bench, where it wasn't so goddam dark. Boy, I was still\nshivering like a bastard, and the back of my hair, even though I had my hunting hat on,\nwas sort of full of little hunks of ice. That worried me. I thought probably I'd get\npneumonia and die. I started picturing millions of jerks coming to my funeral and all. My\ngrandfather from Detroit, that keeps calling out the numbers of the streets when you ride\non a goddam bus with him, and my aunts--I have about fifty aunts--and all my lousy\ncousins. What a mob'd be there. They all came when Allie died, the whole goddam stupid\nbunch of them. I have this one stupid aunt with halitosis that kept saying how peaceful he\nlooked lying there, D.B. told me. I wasn't there. I was still in the hospital. I had to go to\nthe hospital and all after I hurt my hand. Anyway, I kept worrying that I was getting\npneumonia, with all those hunks of ice in my hair, and that I was going to die. I felt sorry\nas hell for my mother and father. Especially my mother, because she still isn't over my\nbrother Allie yet. I kept picturing her not knowing what to do with all my suits and\nathletic equipment and all. The only good thing, I knew she wouldn't let old Phoebe come\nto my goddam funeral because she was only a little kid. That was the only good part.\nThen I thought about the whole bunch of them sticking me in a goddam cemetery and all,\nwith my name on this tombstone and all. Surrounded by dead guys. Boy, when you're\ndead, they really fix you up. I hope to hell when I do die somebody has sense enough to\njust dump me in the river or something. Anything except sticking me in a goddam\ncemetery. People coming and putting a bunch of flowers on your stomach on Sunday, and\nall that crap. Who wants flowers when you're dead? Nobody.\nWhen the weather's nice, my parents go out quite frequently and stick a bunch of\nflowers on old Allie's grave. I went with them a couple of times, but I cut it out. In the\nfirst place, I certainly don't enjoy seeing him in that crazy cemetery. Surrounded by dead\nguys and tombstones and all. It wasn't too bad when the sun was out, but twice--twice--\nwe were there when it started to rain. It was awful. It rained on his lousy tombstone, and","title":"Chunk 8"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG6FV1MS094QPPD7BPA0982X","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG6FT59BXAZ3C5HRJ6SW8F58","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KFF1K6A8V452X8SQKY55DD16","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG6FVM5M8WVWB3P26PEK1A75","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG6FVM5GCZVGXX2W16BYECF1","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T03:41:26.577Z","ts":"2026-01-30T03:41:31.434Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}