An Old Student of Mine Again

I decided to embark my daily walk around two. It was a serene stroll down all that hustle and bustle by the train station. It was pretty gloomy outside and I always had an inkling that it would rain, but I went out anyway. Soon enough it did, then it started to rain profusely, throwing down buckets at a time. I rushed over to the nearest place I could see—the train station café. I waited just inside the door for a few long minutes by then decided to sit down because the rain wasn’t going to stop any time soon. So, I lackadaisically stalked over to an empty table near the back and ordered some water, I felt quite dehydrated for some reason. I sat back and a look around and saw not many people: a dark woman in a beige coat, two nuns clad in their uniforms, and… oh, it was Holden Caulfield—wearing a funny read hat of some sort with a grimace on his face. I hadn’t seen him since he was in my class a few years ago; I could remember him from anywhere, always doing the most unusual things. I gingerly walked over to him and said in a very nervous yet affable voice,”Hey, Holden, is that you boy?” he spun around and said, “Oh…uhh yea it’s me, nice to see you again miss…” I quickly interrupted him—though I’m sure he still didn’t remember my name anyway—and said, “Yes, it’s nice to see you again, how have you been?” He replied as I endeavoured to shake his hand, “quite well actually, been moving around a lot to lots of places, one where there was quite a few ducks. Oh well, I best be of then, I wouldn’t want to be late.“ He smiled and nodded and quietly walked away. Now that evoked memories from when he was always making excuses in my class, they pervaded my mind for a few seconds. I thought that was quite a cursory encounter but it didn’t really matter, he wasn’t my best student anyway. Then I shook those thoughts away and went to sit down.