A Date with Sally

STLR.Finally, old Sally started coming up the stairs. She looked terrific. She really did. The funny part is, I felt like marrying her the minute I saw her. I’m crazy. I didn’t even like her much, and yet all of a sudden I felt like I was in love with her and wanted to marry her. I swear to God I’m crazy. I admit it.

SALLY.Holden! It’s marvelous to see you! It’s been ages.

STORYTELLER.She had one of these very loud, embarrassing voices when you met her somewhere. She got away with it because she was so damn good-looking, but it always gave me a pain in the ass.

HOLDEN.Swell to see you. How are ya, anyway?

SALLY.Absolutely marvelous. Am I late?

HOLDEN.No

STORYTELLER.She was around ten minutes late, as a matter of fact. I didn’t give a damn, though. If a girl looks swell when she meets you, who gives a damn if she’s late? Nobody. We horsed around a little bit in the cab on the way over to the theater. At first she didn’t want to, because she had her lipstick on and all, but I was being seductive as hell and she didn’t have any alternative. Then, just to show you how crazy I am, when we were coming out of this big clinch, I told her I loved her and all. It was a lie, of course, but the thing is, I meant it when I said it. I’m crazy. I swear to God I am.

SALLY.Oh, darling, I love you too. Promise me you’ll let your hair grow. Crew cuts are getting corny. And your hair’s so lovely.

STORYTELLER.Lovely my ass.

HOLDEN.Hey, Sally.

SALLY.What?

HOLDEN.Did you ever get fed up? I mean did you ever get scared that everything was going to go lousy unless you did something? I mean do you like school, and all that stuff?

SALLY.It’s a terrific bore.

HOLDEN.I mean do you hate it? I know it’s a terrific bore, but do you hate it, is what I mean.

SALLY.Well, I don’t exactly hate it. You always have to—

HLDN.Well, I hate it. Boy, do I hate it. But it isn’t just that. It’s everything. I hate living in New York and all. Taxicabs, and buses, with the drivers and all always yelling at you, and going up and down in elevators when you just want to go outside, and guys fitting your pants all the time at Brooks, and people always—

SALLY.Don’t shout, please.

STORYTELLER.Which was very funny, because I wasn’t even shouting.

HOLDEN.Take cars. Take most people, they’re crazy about cars. They worry if they get a little scratch on them, and they’re always talking about how many miles they get to a gallon, and if they get a brand-new car already they start thinking about trading it in for one that’s even newer. I don’t even like old cars. I mean they don’t even interest me. I’d rather have a goddam horse. A horse is at least human, for God’s sake. A horse you can at least—

SALLY.I don’t know what you’re even talking about. You jump from one—

HOLDEN.You know something? You’re probably the only reason I’m in New York right now, or anywhere. If you weren’t around, I’d probably be someplace way the hell off. In the woods or some goddam place. You’re the only reason I’m around, practically.

SALLY.You’re sweet.

STORYTELLER.But you could tell she wanted me to change the damn subject.

HOLDEN.You ought to go to a boys’ school sometime. Try it sometime. It’s full of phonies, and all you do is study so that you can learn enough to be smart enough to be able to buy a goddam Cadillac some day, and you have to keep making believe you give a damn if the football team loses, and all you do is talk about girls and liquor and sex all day, and everybody sticks together in these dirty little goddam cliques. If you try to have a little intelligent—

SALLY.Now, listen. Lots of boys get more out of school than that.

HOLDEN.I agree! I agree they do, some of them! But that’s all I get out of it. See? That’s my point. That’s exactly my goddam point. I don’t get hardly anything out of anything.I’m in bad shape. I’m in lousy shape.

SALLY.You certainly are.

STORYTELLER.Then, all of a sudden, I got this idea.

HOLDEN.Look. Here’s my idea. How would you like to get the hell out of here? Here’s my idea. I know this guy that we can borrow his car for a couple of weeks. He used to go to the same school I did and he still owes me ten bucks. What we could do is, tomorrow morning we could drive up to Massachusetts and Vermont, and all around there, see. It’s beautiful as hell up there, It really is.

STORYTELLER.I was getting excited as hell, the more I thought of it, and I sort of reached over and took old Sally’s goddam hand. What a goddam fool I was.

HOLDEN.No kidding. I have about a hundred and eighty bucks in the bank. I can take it out when it opens in the morning, and then I could go down and get this guy’s car. No kidding. We’ll stay in these cabin camps and stuff like that till the dough runs out. Then I could get a job somewhere and we could live somewhere with a brook and all and, later on, we could get married or something. I could chop all our own wood in the wintertime and all. Honest to God, we could have a terrific time! Wuddaya say? C’mon! Wuddaya say? Will you do it with me? Please!

SALLY.You can’t just do something like that.

HOLDEN.Why not? Why the hell not?

SALLY.Stop screaming at me, please.

STORYTELLER.Which was crap, because I wasn’t even screaming at her.

HOLDEN.Why can’tcha? Why not?

SALLY.Because you can’t, that’s all. In the first place, we’re both practically children. And did you ever stop to think what you’d do if you didn’t get a job when your money ran out? We’d starve to death. The whole thing’s so fantastic, it isn’t even—

HOLDEN.It isn’t fantastic. I’d get a job. Don’t worry about that. You don’t have to worry about that. What’s the matter? Don’t you want to go with me? Say so, if you don’t.

SALLY.It isn’t that. It isn’t that at all.

STORYTELLER.I was beginning to hate her, in a way.

SALLY.We’ll have oodles of time to do those things—all those things. I mean after you go to college and all, and if we should get married and all. There’ll be oodles of marvelous places to go to. You’re just—

HOLDEN.No, there won’t be. There won’t be oodles of places to go to at all. It’ll be entirely different.

STORYTELLER.I was getting depressed as hell again.

SALLY.What? I can’t hear you. One minute you scream at me, and the next you—

HOLDEN.No! there won’t be marvelous places to go to after I go to college and all. Open your ears. It’ll be entirely different. We’d have to go downstairs in elevators with suitcases and stuff. We’d have to phone up everybody and tell ’em good-by and send ’em postcards from hotels and all. And I’d be working in some office, making a lot of dough, and riding to work in cabs and Madison Avenue buses, and reading newspapers, and playing bridge all the time, and going to the movies and seeing a lot of stupid shorts and coming attractions and newsreels. Newsreels. Christ almighty. There’s always a dumb horse race, and some dame breaking a bottle over a ship, and some chimpanzee riding a goddam bicycle with pants on. It wouldn’t be the same at all. You don’t see what I mean at all.

SALLY.Maybe I don’t! Maybe you don’t, either.

STORYTELLER.We both hated each other’s guts by that time. You could see there wasn’t any sense trying to have an intelligent conversation. I was sorry as hell I’d started it.

HOLDEN.C’mon, let’s get outa here. You give me a royal pain in the ass, if you want to know the truth.

STORYTELLER.Boy, did she hit the ceiling when I said that. I know I shouldn’t’ve said it, and I probably wouldn’t’ve ordinarily, but she was depressing the hell out of me. Usually I never say crude things like that to girls. Boy, did she hit the ceiling. I apologized like a madman, but she wouldn’t accept my apology. She was even crying. Which scared me a little bit, because I was a little afraid she’d go home and tell her father I called her a pain in the ass. Her father was one of those big silent bastards, and he wasn’t too crazy about me anyhow. He once told old Sally I was too goddam noisy.

HOLDEN.No kidding. I’m sorry.

SALLY.You’re sorry. You’re sorry. That’s very funny.

STORYTELLER.And all of a sudden I did feel sort of sorry I’d said it.

HOLDEN.C’mon, I’ll take ya home. No kidding.

SALLY.I can go home by myself, thank you. If you think I’d let you take me home, you’re mad. No boy ever said that to me in my entire life.

STORYTELLER.The whole thing was sort of funny, in a way, if you thought about it, and all of a sudden I did something I shouldn’t have. I laughed. And I have one of these very loud, stupid laughs. I mean if I ever sat behind myself in a movie or something, I’d probably lean over and tell myself to please shut up. It made old Sally madder than ever. I stuck around for a while, apologizing and trying to get her to excuse me, but she wouldn’t. She kept telling me to go away and leave her alone. So finally I did it. I shouldn’t’ve, but I was pretty goddam fed up by that time. If you want to know the truth, I don’t even know why I started all that stuff with her. I mean about going away somewhere and all. I probably wouldn’t’ve taken her even if she’d wanted to go with me. She wouldn’t have been anybody to go with. The terrible part, though, is that I meant it when I asked her. That’s the terrible part. I swear to God I’m a madman.