What worries him the most about being kicked out of school is his parents" reaction, for he has already been expelled from other educational institutions. He cannot bear to remain in the dormitory after he has been beaten up by his roommate, Stradlater, and on a whim, he decides to leave the same night however, he does not want to face his parents until they recovered from the news of the expulsion. He decides to stay in a cheap hotel in New York City, going home on the only on the day he was originally expected.
The novel charts Holden's experiences over a period of about forty hours, starting from the time he leaves Pencey Prep. Holden encounters a large number of people as he traverses the city of New York and goes into nightclubs. Lonely and desperate, he accepts the offer of the hotel elevator operator to find him a prostitute, but he fails to have sex with her and fights with her pimp. The next day, he calls an old girlfriend, Sally Hayes, takes her ice-skating, and tries to convince her to run away with him.
Holden looks for some degree of understanding and acceptance from all characters he encounters, even taxi drivers, but he is denied his needs. As a result, Holden feels dislocated, as though he does not belong anywhere, and he is right. It becomes obvious through his encounters that he is in an entirely different orbit than the rest of the world. Each time Holden extends himself, he is rewarded with the rejection, until he is finally driven to almost a schizophrenic state. With his mental health deteriorating, Holden returns to his parents" home, where things are no better for him. Even his young sister, Phoebe, questions his negativism and asks him to name one thing he would like to be. Holden replies that he would like to be "the catcher in the rye" and explains that his job would be to prevent the children, who are playing nearby in a field of rye, from going over the cliff.