When we had dinner, I bypassed the birthday card to get to this highly touted symbol of our friendship.  With a calculatedly insensitive announcement of “It’s a book!” after deducing as much upon seeing the squared wrapping paper, I tore it off to the beat of Holly’s shaking head, revealing the old and browned hardcover.  I saw on the binding “Salinger The Catcher in the Rye Grosset & Dunlap,” and simply said, “Wow!  I love Catcher!”  All Holly did was smirk and say, “First Edition.”

She was a college kid with no job and J.D. Salinger had just died days before…

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