It is dawn on Monday as Holden leaves the Antolinis’ apartment. He sleeps on a bench at the waiting room in Grand Central Station until about 9 a.m. Having second thoughts about Mr. Antolini’s intentions, he wonders if he should have returned and stayed there. Walking up on Fifth Avenue, searching for an inexpensive restaurant in which to eat breakfast, he suddenly feels very anxious. Every time he steps down off the curb to cross a street, he thinks he may just keep falling and disappear. He asks his dead brother, Allie, to help him. Holden is physically and emotionally exhausted, sweating profusely despite the cold. He is near collapse.
In a final, awkward attempt to save himself, Holden decides to go “way out West” and live as a deaf-mute so he won’t have to talk with people. Before leaving, he arranges to say good-bye to Phoebe. While he is with her, he decides to stop running and return home. In a brief final chapter, Holden concludes the story, telling us that he doesn’t know what he thinks about everything that has happened, except that he misses the people he has told us about.
