《渺小一生》:成年后，他有時會走火入魔

　 “Well,” said Luke, and he could feel the brother kneeling, very close to him. “Don’t cry; don’t cry.” But his voice was so gentle, and he cried harder.

“哦，”盧克說，他感覺到修士跪下來，離他很近，“別哭，別哭?！钡奘康穆曇艉軠厝?，于是他哭得更兇了。

　 Then Brother Luke stood, and when he spoke next, his voice was jollier. “Jude, listen,” he said. “I have something to show you. Come with me,” and he started walking toward the greenhouse, turning around to make sure he was following. “Jude,” he called again, “come with me,” and he, curious despite himself, began to follow him, walking toward the greenhouse he knew so well with the beginnings of an unfamiliar eagerness, as if he had never seen it before.

盧克修士站了起來，再度開口時，他的聲音比較愉快了?！棒玫拢犖艺f?！彼f，“我有個東西要給你看。跟我來吧?！毙奘块_始走向玻璃溫室，還回頭確認(rèn)他是不是跟了上來?！棒玫拢毙奘坑趾?，“跟我來吧。”他不禁好奇起來，跟了上去，走向他熟悉的玻璃溫室，帶著一種陌生的急切感，好像他從沒看過溫室一般。

　 As an adult, he became obsessed in spells with trying to identify the exact moment in which things had started going so wrong, as if he could freeze it, preserve it in agar, hold it up and teach it before a class: This is when it happened. This is where it started. He’d think: Was it when I stole the crackers? Was it when I ruined Luke’s daffodils? Was it when I had my first tantrum? And, more impossibly, was it when I did whatever I did that made her leave me behind that drugstore? And what had that been?

成年后，他有時會走火入魔，執(zhí)迷地想找出事情開始出大錯的確切時刻，仿佛他可以將那一刻凍結(jié)，保存在瓊脂里，拿起來在課堂上教導(dǎo)學(xué)生：這就是發(fā)生的時候。這就是開始的時候，他會想，是我偷餅干的時候嗎？是我毀掉盧克那些黃水仙的時候嗎？是我第一次亂發(fā)脾氣的時候嗎？或是更不可能的：會是我做了一些事、讓她把我丟在藥房后頭那個時候嗎？那會是什么事？

　 But really, he would know: it was when he walked into the greenhouse that afternoon. It was when he allowed himself to be escorted in, when he gave up everything to follow Brother Luke. That had been the moment. And after that, it had never been right again.

但其實他知道：是在他走進玻璃溫室的那個下午。是在他放棄一切，愿意跟著盧克修士之時。就是那一刻。從此以后，一切都沒再對勁過了。

　 There are five more steps and then he is at their front door, where he can’t fit the key into the lock because his hands are shaking, and he curses, nearly dropping it. And then he is in the apartment, and there are only fifteen steps from the front door to his bed, but he still has to stop halfway and bring himself down slowly to the ground, and pull himself the final feet to his room on his elbows. For a while he lies there, everything shifting around him, until he is strong enough to pull the blanket down over him. He will lie there until the sun leaves the sky and the apartment grows dark, and then, finally, he will hoist himself onto his bed with his arms, where he will fall asleep without eating or washing his face or changing, his teeth clacking against themselves from the pain. He will be alone, because Willem will go out with his girlfriend after the show, and by the time he gets home, it will be very late.

再走五步，他來到了前門，可是手抖得太厲害，鑰匙插不進鎖孔里。他詛咒著，鑰匙差點掉地。然后他進了公寓，從前門到他的床只剩十五步了，可是走到一半，他不得不停下來，緩緩坐到地上，用手肘匍匐前進，完成最后那點距離。有一會兒他躺在那里，周圍的一切旋轉(zhuǎn)著，直到他有力氣把床上的毯子拉下來蓋住自己。他會躺在那兒直到太陽離開天空，公寓內(nèi)變黑，最后他會用手臂把自己撐起來，爬到床上。然后他會睡著，沒吃飯、沒洗臉也沒換衣服，他痛得發(fā)抖，牙齒咬得格格作響。他會孤單一人，因為威廉演出結(jié)束后會跟女朋友出去，要很晚才回家。

　 When he wakes, it will be very early, and he will feel better, but his wound will have wept during the night, and pus will have soaked through the gauze he had applied on Sunday morning before he left for his walk, his disastrous walk, and his pants will be stuck to his skin with its ooze. He will send a message to Andy, and then leave another with his exchange, and then he will shower, carefully removing the bandage, which will bring scraps of rotten flesh and clots of blackened mucus-thick blood with it. He will pant and gasp to keep from shouting. He will remember the conversation he had with Andy the last time this happened, when Andy suggested he get a wheelchair to keep on reserve, and although he hates the thought of using a wheelchair again, he will wish he had one now. He will think that Andy is right, that his walks are a sign of his inexcusable hubris, that his pretending that everything is fine, that he is not in fact disabled, is selfish, for the consequences it means for other people, people who have been inexplicably, unreasonably generous and good to him for years, for almost decades now.

他會很早醒來，覺得好過一些，但傷口會在黑夜?jié)B出液體。他星期天上午出門走路（災(zāi)難性的散步行程）前換上的紗布會被膿汁浸透，而他的長褲會因為分泌物黏在皮膚上。他會傳短信給安迪，得到回復(fù)后會再傳一則。然后他會沖澡，小心翼翼地拆掉繃帶，上頭黏著零碎的爛肉和發(fā)黑、黏濕的血塊。他會喘著猛吸氣，免得叫出聲來。他會記得上回這種情況發(fā)生時他和安迪的對話，當(dāng)時安迪建議他弄個輪椅以備不時之需。盡管他很不想再用輪椅，可是他但愿現(xiàn)在有一臺。他想安迪說得沒錯，他的市區(qū)長途漫步的確代表著他不可饒恕的傲慢，他想假裝一切沒問題、不肯面對自己的殘疾，實在太自私了，因為后果就是會影響到其他人。這些人多年來一直對他慷慨又和善，莫名又沒有道理，到現(xiàn)在都快二十年了。

　 He will turn off the shower and lower himself into the tub and lean his cheek against the tile and wait to feel better. He will be reminded of how trapped he is, trapped in a body he hates, with a past he hates, and how he will never be able to change either. He will want to cry, from frustration and hatred and pain, but he hasn’t cried since what happened with Brother Luke, after which he told himself he would never cry again. He will be reminded that he is a nothing, a scooped-out husk in which the fruit has long since mummified and shrunk, and now rattles uselessly. He will experience that prickle, that shiver of disgust that afflicts him in both his happiest and his most wretched moments, the one that asks him who he thinks he is to inconvenience so many people, to think he has the right to keep going when even his own body tells him he should stop.

他會關(guān)掉花灑的水，放低身子躺在浴缸里，臉頰貼著瓷磚，等自己感覺好一點。他會想起自己受困了，困在這具他痛恨的身體里，懷著他所痛恨的過去，兩者他都永遠(yuǎn)無法改變。他會想哭，因為挫折、憎恨和疼痛，但自從發(fā)生了盧克修士的事情以后，他告訴自己再也不可以哭了，從此他真的沒再哭過。他會想起自己無足輕重，只是一個空殼，里面的果實早就干癟，只能發(fā)出空洞無用的喀啦聲。他會感受到在他最快樂和最難受的時刻都會出現(xiàn)的那種刺痛、打著冷戰(zhàn)的厭惡，問他自以為是誰，竟然給這么多人造成麻煩，以為他有權(quán)利繼續(xù)活下去。其實他自己的身體都跟他說該停下來了。

　 He will sit and wait and breathe and he will be grateful that it is so early, that there is no chance of Willem discovering him and having to save him once again. He will (though he won’t be able to remember how later) somehow work himself into a standing position, get himself out of the tub, take some aspirin, go to work. At work, the words will blur and dance on the page, and by the time Andy calls, it will only be seven a.m., and he will tell Marshall he’s sick, refuse Marshall’s offer of a car, but let him—this is how bad he feels—help him into a cab. He will make the ride uptown that he had stupidly walked just the previous day. And when Andy opens the door, he will try to remain composed.

他會坐在那里等待，繼續(xù)呼吸，然后他會慶幸現(xiàn)在時間還很早，威廉不可能發(fā)現(xiàn)他，也就不必再次救他。他會設(shè)法拖著身子站起來（雖然事后他不會記得是怎么做到的），爬出浴缸，吃幾顆阿司匹林，再去上班。上班時，他會覺得紙上的字模糊地舞動。等到安迪來電時，應(yīng)該才早上7點，他會告訴上司馬歇爾他病了，拒絕馬歇爾開車送他，但是如果感覺太難受了，就讓他協(xié)助他上出租車。去上城的路上，他會經(jīng)過他前一天才愚蠢地走過的那段路。等到安迪開門時，他會設(shè)法保持鎮(zhèn)定。

　 “Judy,” Andy will say, and he will be in his gentle mode, there will be no lectures from him today, and he will allow Andy to lead him past his empty waiting room, his office not yet open for the day, and help him onto the table where he has spent hours, days of hours, will let Andy help undress him even, as he closes his eyes and waits for the small bright hurt of Andy easing the tape off his leg, and pulling away from the raw skin the sodden gauze beneath.

“小裘。”安迪會這般喊他，并且處于溫柔模式，他今天不會說教。接著他會讓安迪帶著他穿過空蕩蕩的等候室，此時他的診所還沒開門。然后安迪會幫他坐上那張他度過好多個小時、好多天的檢查臺。他甚至?xí)尠驳蠀f(xié)助他脫掉衣服，再閉上眼睛，等著安迪拆開他腿上的膠帶，揭開濕透的紗布，露出破皮的傷口，等著那令人暈眩的劇痛襲來。

　 My life, he will think, my life. But he won’t be able to think beyond this, and he will keep repeating the words to himself—part chant, part curse, part reassurance—as he slips into that other world that he visits when he is in such pain, that world he knows is never far from his own but that he can never remember after: My life.

我的人生，他會想著，我的人生。除此之外沒法再想別的，他會一直重復(fù)默念這幾個字——一部分像念經(jīng)，一部分像詛咒，一部分像寬慰——同時滑入他經(jīng)歷這類劇痛時會造訪的另一個世界。他知道那世界離自己的世界從來不遠(yuǎn)，但他事后總是想不起來：我的人生。

　 2

2

　 YOU ASKED ME once when I knew that he was for me, and I told you that I had always known. But that wasn’t true, and I knew it even as I said it—I said it because it sounded pretty, like something someone might say in a book or a movie, and because we were both feeling so wretched, and helpless, and because I thought if I said it, we both might feel better about the situation before us, the situation that we perhaps had been capable of preventing—perhaps not—but at any rate hadn’t. This was in the hospital: the first time, I should say. I know you remember: you had flown in from Colombo that morning, hopscotching across cities and countries and hours, so that you landed a full day before you left.

有一回，你問我是什么時候開始認(rèn)定他的，當(dāng)時我告訴你我一直都知道。但是一說出口，我就知道那并非實情。我會這么說，是因為這話聽起來很美，像是書中或電影里的角色會說的話。當(dāng)時你我都覺得很痛苦、很無助，我覺得這樣說，眼前的狀況可能就不會讓我們那么難受。那個狀況，我們一直覺得有辦法阻止，但還是發(fā)生了。那是在醫(yī)院里，第一次發(fā)生的時候。我知道你記得：你那天早上從斯里蘭卡的科倫坡搭上飛機，跳房子似的經(jīng)過好幾個城市和國家，花了好多時間，降落后停留一整天，然后又離開了。

　 But I want to be accurate now. I want to be accurate both because there is no reason not to be, and because I should be—I have always tried to be, I always try to be.

但現(xiàn)在我想講得精確一點。因為沒有理由不精確，而且我應(yīng)該力求精確。我一直想要這樣，一直試著這樣。

　 I’m not sure where to begin.

我不確定該從哪里講起。

　 Maybe with some nice words, although they are also true words: I liked you right away. You were twenty-four when we met, which would have made me forty-seven. (Jesus.) I thought you were unusual: later, he’d speak of your goodness, but he never needed to explain it to me, for I already knew you were. It was the first summer the group of you came up to the house, and it was such a strange weekend for me, and for him as well—for me because in you four I saw who and what Jacob might have been, and for him because he had only known me as his teacher, and he was suddenly seeing me in my shorts and wearing my apron as I scooped clams off the grill, and arguing with you three about everything. Once I stopped seeing Jacob’s face in all of yours, though, I was able to enjoy the weekend, in large part because you three seemed to enjoy it so much. You saw nothing strange in the situation: you were boys who assumed that people would like you, not from arrogance but because people always had, and you had no reason to think that, if you were polite and friendly, then that politeness and friendliness might not be reciprocated.

或許講些好聽的話吧，也的確是事實：第一次見面時，我立刻就喜歡你了。當(dāng)時你24歲，我47歲（天啊），我當(dāng)時覺得你很特別。后來，他談到你的善良，但他從來不必跟我解釋，因為我知道你很善良。那個夏天你們四個第一次來我的房子，對我來說，那是個非常奇特的周末，對他也是。對我，是因為我在你們四個身上看到雅各布可能變成什么樣子；對他，則是因為他原先只把我當(dāng)老師，但那回他突然看到我穿短褲和圍裙，在烤架上烤蛤蜊，還跟你們?nèi)齻€爭辯各式各樣的話題。一旦我停止在你們臉上尋找雅各布的影子，我就開始享受那個周末了，很大一部分原因是你們?nèi)齻€是那么樂在其中。你們不覺得整個狀況有什么奇怪：你們?nèi)齻€假設(shè)人們會喜歡你們，不是出于傲慢，而是因為人們總是喜歡你們。而且你們覺得，如果自己禮貌又友善，就沒有理由認(rèn)為對方不會回報。

　 He, of course, had every reason to not think that, although I wouldn’t discover that until later. Then, I watched him at mealtimes, noticing how, during particularly raucous debates, he would sit back in his seat, as if physically leaning out of the ring, and observe all of you, how easily you challenged me without fear of provoking me, how thoughtlessly you reached across the table to serve yourselves more potatoes, more zucchini, more steak, how you asked for what you wanted and received it.

但他當(dāng)然有充分的理由不這么想，我是到后來才發(fā)現(xiàn)的。然后，我在用餐時觀察他，發(fā)現(xiàn)爭辯特別激烈時，他會往后坐，似乎完全退出戰(zhàn)場，然后持續(xù)觀察你們。你們?nèi)齻€是那么輕松地提出挑戰(zhàn)，完全不怕激怒我，也毫無顧忌地動手去拿桌上的馬鈴薯、節(jié)瓜、牛排，還會開口要求自己想要的，并大方接受。

　 The thing I remember most vividly from that weekend is a small thing. We were walking, you and he and Julia and I, down that little path lined with birches that led to the lookout. (Back then it was a narrow throughway, do you remember that? It was only later that it became dense with trees.) I was with him, and you and Julia were behind us. You were talking about, oh, I don’t know—insects? Wildflowers? You two always found something to discuss, you both loved being outdoors, both loved animals: I loved this about both of you, even though I couldn’t understand it. And then you touched his shoulder and moved in front of him and knelt and retied one of his shoelaces that had come undone, and then fell back in step with Julia. It was so fluid, a little gesture: a step forward, a fold onto bended knee, a retreat back toward her side. It was nothing to you, you didn’t even think about it; you never even paused in your conversation. You were always watching him (but you all were), you took care of him in a dozen small ways, I saw all of this over those few days—but I doubt you would remember this particular incident.

那個周末，我記得最清楚的是一件小事。那天，你跟他、朱麗婭和我，正走在通往瞭望臺、兩旁種了樺樹的小徑上（你還記得嗎？當(dāng)時那里只有一條窄窄的小路，茂密的樹林是很久以后的事了）。我跟他并肩而行，你和朱麗婭在后頭。你們不知正在聊什么，昆蟲？野花？你們兩個總是聊得來，你們都喜歡野外，也喜歡動物。我不明白樂趣何在，但我很喜歡你們兩人這一點。你碰觸他一邊的肩膀，走到他面前，跪下來幫他把松開的鞋帶重新綁好，然后回到后頭跟朱麗婭邊走邊聊。整個過程很流暢，只是一個小動作：往前一步，彎下膝蓋，又往后退到她旁邊。對你來說這沒什么，連想都沒想，甚至沒有中斷談話。你總是留心著他（不過你們?nèi)齻€都是），以十幾種小小的方式照看著他，在那短短的幾天，我都看到了，但我懷疑你不會記得這起小事件。

　 But while you were doing it, he looked at me, and the look on his face—I still cannot describe it, other than in that moment, I felt something crumble inside me, like a tower of damp sand built too high: for him, and for you, and for me as well. And in his face, I knew my own would be echoed. The impossibility of finding someone to do such a thing for another person, so unthinkingly, so gracefully! When I looked at him, I understood, for the first time since Jacob died, what people meant when they said someone was heartbreaking, that something could break your heart. I had always thought it mawkish, but in that moment I realized that it might have been mawkish, but it was also true.

當(dāng)你這么做的時候，他看著我，他臉上的表情——我至今無法形容，只知道在那一刻，我感覺心中有個什么崩塌了，就像一座蓋得太高的沙塔：為了他，為了你，也為我自己。在他臉上，我看到了呼應(yīng)我的表情。真不敢相信有人會去幫另一個人做這樣的事情，這么不假思索，這么有風(fēng)度！我看著他，打從雅各布死后，我第一次明白，所謂有個人或有個東西會讓你心碎是什么意思。我以前一直以為這種說法太強說愁了，但在那一刻，我明白那可能是強說愁，但也是真實的。

　 And that, I suppose, was when I knew.

而我想，我就是從那一刻開始認(rèn)定他的。

　 I had never thought I would become a parent, and not because I’d had bad parents myself. Actually, I had wonderful parents: my mother died when I was very young, of breast cancer, and for the next five years it was just me and my father. He was a doctor, a general practitioner who liked to hope he might grow old with his patients.

我從沒想過自己會為人父母，不是因為我有差勁的父母。事實上，我的父母很棒：我母親在我很小的時候就死于乳癌，接下來五年只有我和父親。他是自己開業(yè)的家庭醫(yī)生，總是希望自己可以跟病人一起變老。