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September 2003

Hey Forrester,

What are you really hanging around for? I’ll tell you this, Forrester—you’ve got to find some sort of closure. Take that day I stood on the hill at Pencey freezing my ass off just to say good-bye. When you leave a place, you need to know you’re leaving it. Understanding requires some distance, you know that better than anyone. In the fifteen years you’ve been away you’ve managed to get it together. So why the hell are you back? Give Devon School one final farewell and get out of there. That’s the difference between you and me, kid. You could get out if you would just put the past behind you. I’m still taking it easy, you know, trying to figure things out. People have this crazy idea that prep school boys are all the same. But Forrester, I think we could stand to teach each other a few things.

We are both stuck in this misery, and the faster we move on the better. It’s obvious your memory has a hold on you. Everything you remember in its WWII splendor is larger, more important than it looks now. Let me tell you something, the nostalgia for your days at Devon is sickening. That tree by the river you were intent on seeing, the one that was as “forbidding as an artillery piece, high as a beanstalk”, turned out to be nothing like the great giant you remembered, did it? I guess fifteen years will do that do you. Memory has a way of making things more beautiful, more easily admired and eloquently told. You certainly didn’t fall into any smart-ass idiom as you told your story, but you didn’t fall into reality either. But don’t let it kill you, Forrester. It’s been fifteen years. Who knows, maybe the tree did actually shrink.

For awhile at Devon you were children of endless peace. You knew nothing about the war, and even questioned if it really existed at all. Innocence protected you, but age made you prisoner when you weren’t paying attention. The world is so damn corrupt that once you opened yourselves to it there was no going back. It got to you, and I wish someone would have been there to catch you before it did. I’m going to be that catcher someday. I keep picturing all these little kids playing some game in this big field of rye and all. Thousands of little kids, and nobody’s around—nobody big, I mean—except me. And I’m standing on the edge of some crazy cliff. What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff. You’ve said it yourself that kids will change for the worst as they get older and realize how sick the world is. Why let it get to them like it got to us?

I came close once, but I’ve never had a best friend. You were damn lucky to have Finny. At first I didn’t understand how someone so smart could be a sports fanatic. I hate sports—games aren’t much fun when you’re always on the other side. I remember when Pencey played Saxon Hall a few seasons ago. It was supposed to be a very big deal. It was the last game of the year, and you were supposed to commit suicide or something if old Pencey didn’t win—just ridiculous. But Finny had this complexity that no pathetic athlete could match. He didn’t use sports as a distraction for life, but a way to practice for it. I bet he saw that tree as life itself, all goddam twisted and dangerous. If you could jump from that tree, you could handle anything.

The world is full of phonies, and I’ll tell you that Finny wasn’t one of them. Don’t listen to people who tell you to play by the rules. Finny never did, but was able to fit in well enough everywhere he went. He knew that if he was late for dinner, breaking into a West Point stride was the dumbest thing a self-respecting person could do. Finny had true talent without being stuck up like the rest of those little Devon prep school jerks and was able to win over every one of those sour house masters. The world could use more guys like him. He was different, and didn’t give a damn what people thought. That pink shirt he always wore reminded me of my old hunting hat. You were embarrassed for him when he put it on. Just like old Ackley—the jerk tried to get me to take it off, telling me that my hat was only for shooting deer.

Forrester, presenting yourself as a rule-abiding, nice kind of person just wasn’t convincing enough. I’ve never tried to sell myself like that—I’ve thrown too many punches for it to hold up. I’m one terrific liar, but I’m damn near positive that someone who intentionally injures his best friend and then tries to cover up the truth can’t be the good guy for very long. You wanted to be envied, but Finny seemed pretty content being himself. Sure you were the better scholar, but life is about more than grades, and Finny knew that. He saw himself, though, as your equal, but being so goddam stubborn you just couldn’t believe it. So you shook that tree with him standing between the branches, and Finny fell, crippled and below you forever.

You were at war with the hatred you felt towards him, and things appeared to sort themselves out right there. The boys figured it out and brought you to trial, but I bet that fifteen years later you still stay awake at night, hearing that dirty Leper tell you you’re a “savage underneath” over and over again. So what. You know damn well now that we all are. It’s time to stop denying it, Forrester, and let go of your guilt. Sometime during their lives, most people get scared and try to fight an enemy that they believe comes from the outside, and you aren’t any different. It’s ironic really, but from the outside it’s obvious that your enemy came from within. It’s so damn complicated. I know I don’t blame you for not speaking directly about the accident. There are so many things you still don’t know.

I guess I was a fool to think you had everything figured out, that fifteen years is the magic solution that turns all the misery to peace. Coming back to Devon was something you had to do. In saying to hell with it all, you’ve created more distance than you can take. I feel it too. About all I know is, I sort of miss everything. It’s funny. A separate peace really isn’t peace at all. Hang in there, Forrester.

- Holden