The Fight

The Fight
I came in that night early because Jane only signed out for nine thirty. Who the hell signs out only for nine thirty on a Saturday? Anyway, I came in the dorm and thanked Holden for letting me borrow his hound’s-tooth jacket. I asked him if he had written that paper and he said yes and handed it to me.
“For Chrissake, Holden. This is about a goddam baseball glove.” I said to him
“So what” he replied.
“Wuddaya mean so what?   I told you it had to be about a goddam room or a house or something,” I told him.
He just told me it had to be vivid and that’s what it was.   I told him that he doesn’t follow directions and that is why he is flunking out of Pency. This got him all riled up so he came over to me grabbed the paper and ripped it in half. Now I was really angry but laid on my bed rather than making things worse. Holden started to smoke and I knew he was doing this just to get me angry. He then began to ask me questions about my date, like it is goddam business.   He asked me if I asked Jane is she still kept he kings in the back row. What am I a 12 year old? There was no way I asked her that.
Holden then said “What’d you do? Give her the time in Ed Banky’s goddam car?”
I said, “That’s a professional secret.”
Like I would tell him what I did tonight. All of the sudden he got up and took a swing at me. He just barely nicked me; it was kind of pathetic. I took him to the ground and sat on top of him.   He kept calling me a moron but, I didn’t want to fight him so I kept warning. He wouldn’t stop so I socked him. He got up and continued to call me a moron. At this point I had enough so punched him right in the face. He fell to the ground and he started to bleed everywhere.
“Go wash your face,” I told him.
“Go wash your own moron face,” he replied.
His comment was something a 12 year-old would make but I didn’t say anything because it would only make things worse. I didn’t Holden for the rest of the night and when I woke up in the mourning...