Shawn resented my making a fuss. “It’s just Charles,” he said. “His standards aren’t that high. He’s with you, after all.”
肖恩对我的小题大做很是生气。“只不过是查尔斯而已，”他说，“他的标准没那么高，毕竟他是和你在一起。”
When I arrived at the peak, Mother was making the Thanksgiving meal. The large oak table was covered with jars of tincture and vials of essential oil, which I cleared away. Charles was coming for dinner.
我回到巴克峰时，母亲正在做感恩节大餐。大橡木餐桌上摆满了瓶瓶罐罐的酊剂和精油，我将它们收拾好。查尔斯要来吃晚饭。
Shawn was in a mood. He sat on a bench at the table, watching me gather the bottles and hide them. I’d washed Mother’s china, which had never been used, and I began laying it out, eyeing the distance between each plate and knife.
肖恩心情不错。他坐在桌旁的长椅上，看着我将瓶瓶罐罐收好。我把母亲从未用过的瓷制餐具洗净摆好，检查每个盘子和餐刀之间的距离。
Shawn turned me onto my back and sat on my stomach, pinning my arms at my sides with his knees. The shock of his weight forced the breath from my chest. He pressed his forearm into my windpipe. I sputtered, trying to gulp enough air to shout, but the airway was blocked.
肖恩将我按在地上，坐在我的肚子上，用他的膝盖夹住我的胳膊。他的体重让我透不过气来。他用前臂勒住我的气管。我气急败坏，想大口大口地喘气喊叫，但呼吸道被堵住了。
I fetched glasses. When I put one in front of him, Shawn jabbed a finger into my ribs, digging hard. “Don’t touch me!” I shrieked. Then the room turned upside down. My feet were knocked out from under me and I was swept into the living room, just out of Mother’s sight.
我拿来玻璃杯。当我把一个杯子摆在肖恩面前时，他用一根手指狠狠地戳了一下我的肋骨。“别碰我！”我尖叫道。接着房间翻了个底朝天。他将我打倒，拎着我的脚，拖到起居室，远离母亲的视线。
Shawn said this loudly, he almost shouted it. He was saying it to me, but he was not saying it for me. He was saying it for Mother, to define the moment: I was a misbehaving child; he was setting the child right. The pressure on my windpipe eased and I felt a delicious fullness in my lungs. He knew I would not call out.
肖恩说得很大声，几乎是喊出来的。他对着我说，但不是说给我听，而是说给母亲听：我是个行为不端的孩子，他是在纠正孩子的错误。气管上的压力减轻了，我感到肺部有一种美妙的充盈感。他知道我不会叫出声来。
“When you act like a child, you force me to treat you like one.”
“你的行为像个孩子，逼我把你当孩子对待。”
“Knock it off,” Mother hollered from the kitchen, though I wasn’t sure whether she meant Shawn or me.
“停下！”母亲从厨房里喊道，尽管我不确定她指的是肖恩还是我。
I folded napkins from paper towels and put one at each setting. When I placed one at Shawn’s plate, he again jabbed his finger into my ribs. I said nothing.
我从纸巾盒里拿出餐巾纸一一折好，在每一套餐具上都放上一张。当我把一张餐巾纸摆到肖恩的盘子里时，他又一次用手指戳我的肋骨。我什么也没说。
“Yelling is rude,” Shawn said, again speaking to the kitchen. “You’ll stay down until you apologize.” I said I was sorry for yelling at him. A moment later I was standing.
“大喊大叫很不礼貌，”肖恩再次朝着厨房说道，“你就这么待着，直到道歉为止。”我大叫着对他说我错了。过了一会儿，我站了起来。
Charles arrived early — Dad hadn’t even come in from the junkyard yet — and sat at the table across from Shawn, who glared at him, never blinking. I didn’t want to leave them alone together, but Mother needed help with the cooking, so I returned to the stove but devised small errands to bring me back to the table. On one of those trips I heard Shawn telling Charles about his guns, and on another, about all the ways he could kill a man. I laughed loudly at both, hoping Charles would think they were jokes. The third time I returned to the table, Shawn pulled me onto his lap. I laughed at that, too.
查尔斯到得很早——爸爸还没从废料场回来——他在餐桌前坐下，对面的肖恩眼睛一眨不眨地怒视着他。我不想让他俩单独待在一起，但母亲需要我帮忙做饭，所以我来到炉灶边，但一再找借口回到餐桌旁。一次回到餐桌时，我听见肖恩对查尔斯谈论他的枪；另一次，我听到肖恩谈论他知道的杀人的所有方法。两次我都哈哈大笑，希望查尔斯认为它们只是玩笑话。第三次回到餐桌时，肖恩把我拉到他腿上坐下。我也笑了。
“Why did you do that?” I shouted.
“你为什么这么做？”我喊道。
The charade couldn’t last, not even until supper. I passed Shawn carrying a large china plate of dinner rolls, and he stabbed my gut so hard it knocked the wind out of me. I dropped the plate. It shattered.
这种装模作样的把戏并未持续多久，甚至没撑到晚饭时间。我端着一大瓷盘小圆面包从肖恩身边走过，他又狠狠地捅了我一下，疼得我喘不过气来。手中的盘子掉在地上，摔碎了。
It happened so quickly, I don’t know how he got me to the floor, but again I was on my back and he was on top of me. He demanded that I apologize for breaking the plate. I whispered the apology, quietly, so Charles wouldn’t hear, but this enraged Shawn. He grabbed a fistful of my hair, again near the scalp, for leverage, and yanked me upright, then dragged me toward the bathroom. The movement was so abrupt, Charles had no time to react. The last thing I saw as my head hurled down the hall was Charles leaping to his feet, eyes wide, face pale.
事情发生得太突然，我不知道他是怎么把我弄到地板上的，但我再一次仰面躺着，被他压在身下。他让我为打碎盘子道歉。为了不让查尔斯听见，我悄悄地轻声道歉，所以肖恩没听见，被激怒了。他一把抓住我的头发，又一次贴近头皮作为杠杆，将我猛拉起来，然后把我拖向卫生间。一切发生得如此突然，查尔斯都没来得及反应。当我被揪着头拖拽在走廊里时，我所见的最后一幕，便是查尔斯跳了起来，眼睛大睁，脸色苍白。
My wrist was folded, my arm twisted behind my back. My head was shoved into the toilet so that my nose hovered above the water. Shawn was yelling something but I didn’t hear what. I was listening for the sound of footsteps in the hall, and when I heard them I became deranged. Charles could not see me like this. He could not know that for all my pretenses — my makeup, my new clothes, my china place settings — this is who I was.
我的手腕交叉着，胳膊被扭在身后。我的头被塞进马桶，鼻子悬在水面上。肖恩对我喊着什么，但我什么也没听见。我在听走廊里的脚步声，一听到它们我就抓狂。不能让查尔斯看见我这个样子。不能让他看出我所有的伪装——我的化妆品，我的新衣服，我的瓷制餐具——这才是我真正的面目。
I convulsed, arching my body and ripping my wrist away from Shawn. I’d caught him off guard; I was stronger than he’d expected, or maybe just more reckless, and he lost his hold. I sprang for the door. I’d made it through the frame and had taken a step into the hallway when my head shot backward. Shawn had caught me by the hair, and he yanked me toward him with such force that we both tumbled back and into the bathtub.
我抽搐着，拱起身子，奋力将手腕从肖恩手中挣脱。我让他猝不及防；我比他想象的力气更大，或者也许只是更鲁莽，他没能抓住我。我扑向门口。我刚穿过门框，一脚踏进走廊，突然头向后一仰，又被肖恩一把抓住头发。他用力将我拽向他，于是我们又跌回浴缸里。
“Of course I am! Shawn is so, so, so — funny.” My voice strangled on the last word as I put weight on my foot and a wave of pain swept through me. Charles tried to carry me but I pushed him off and walked on the break, grinding my teeth to stop myself from crying out, while I slapped playfully at my brother.
“当然还好！肖恩是多么，多么，多么——搞笑啊。”随着我将重心挪到脚上，一阵疼痛掠过全身，我在说最后一个词时声音都哽咽了。查尔斯想把我抱走，但我推开他，一瘸一拐地走着，咬紧牙关不让自己哭出声来，还开玩笑似的拍了哥哥一下。
The next thing I remember, Charles was lifting me and I was laughing — a shrill, demented howl. I thought if I could just laugh loudly enough, the situation might still be saved, that Charles might yet be convinced it was all a joke. Tears streamed from my eyes — my big toe was broken — but I kept cackling. Shawn stood in the doorway looking awkward.
我记得的下一幕是，查尔斯抱起我，我大笑着，发出一声尖锐而疯狂的号叫。我想，如果我能大声笑出来，也许情况还有救，也许还能说服查尔斯这一切不过是个玩笑。泪水从我的眼睛里流了出来——我的大脚趾断了——但我一直咯咯地笑。肖恩站在门口，面露尴尬。
“Are you okay?” Charles kept saying.
“你还好吗？”查尔斯不停地说。
“You didn’t see what you thought you saw,” I said.
“你看到的并不是你以为的那样。”我说。
Charles didn’t stay for supper. He fled to his jeep and I didn’t hear from him for several hours, then he called and asked me to meet him at the church. He wouldn’t come to Buck’s Peak. We sat in his jeep in the dark, empty parking lot. He was crying.
查尔斯没有留下来吃晚饭。他逃进他的吉普车，我好几个小时都没听到他的消息，后来他打电话让我去教堂跟他见面。他不会再来巴克峰。在漆黑空旷的停车场，我们坐在他的吉普车里。他在哭。
If someone had asked me, I’d have said Charles was the most important thing in the world to me. But he wasn’t. And I would prove it to him. What was important to me wasn’t love or friendship, but my ability to lie convincingly to myself: to believe I was strong. I could never forgive Charles for knowing I wasn’t.
如果当时有人问我，对我来说世界上最重要的是什么，我会回答是查尔斯。但其实他不是。而我会证明给他看。对我来说重要的不是爱情或友情，而是我自欺欺人的能力：相信自己很坚强。查尔斯知道我并非如此，因此我永远不会原谅他。
I became erratic, demanding, hostile. I devised a bizarre and ever-evolving rubric by which I measured his love for me, and when he failed to meet it, I became paranoid. I surrendered to rages, venting all my savage anger, every fearful resentment I’d ever felt toward Dad or Shawn, at him, this bewildered bystander who’d only ever helped me. When we argued, I screamed that I never wanted to see him again, and I screamed it so many times that one night, when I called to change my mind, like I always did, he wouldn’t let me.
我变得反复无常，吹毛求疵，充满敌意。我设计了一个怪异而不断变化的评估标准，来衡量他对我的爱。一旦他没达到要求，我便胡思乱想。我情绪失控，将我全部的野蛮的怒火、我对父亲或肖恩的所有可怕的怨恨，都发泄到这个只是来帮助我的困惑的旁观者身上。我们吵架时，我尖叫着再也不想见到他。我这样大吵大闹了很多次，终于有一天晚上，当我像往常一样打电话告诉他我改变了主意时，他拒绝了。
We met one final time, in a field off the highway. Buck’s Peak loomed over us. He said he loved me but this was over his head. He couldn’t save me. Only I could.
我们在公路外的田野里见了最后一面。我们身后是高耸的巴克峰。他说他爱我，但这超出了他的能力范围。他不能拯救我。能拯救我的只有我自己。
Winter covered campus in thick snow. I stayed indoors, memorizing algebraic equations, trying to live as I had before — to imagine my life at the university as disconnected from my life on Buck’s Peak. The wall separating the two had been impregnable. Charles was a hole in it.
冬天的校园被厚厚的积雪覆盖。我待在室内背诵代数公式，努力像以前一样生活——想象我的大学生活与巴克峰的生活完全分开。将两者分开的那堵墙原本坚不可摧，但查尔斯是其中的一个漏洞。
The stomach ulcers returned, burning and aching through the night. Once, I awoke to Robin shaking me. She said I’d been shouting in my sleep. I touched my face and it was wet. She wrapped me in her arms so tight I felt cocooned.
胃溃疡复发了，整夜又烧又痛。有一次，罗宾将我摇醒。她说我在睡梦中一直大喊大叫。我摸了摸我的脸，是湿的。她把我紧紧搂在怀里，让我感到被包裹得严严实实。
I had no idea what he was talking about.
我不知道他在说什么。
I shrugged. She assumed my mother had, and I let her believe it. The truth was, the morning after Thanksgiving, I had asked Shawn to tell me if it was broken. He’d knelt on the kitchen floor and I’d dropped my foot into his lap. In that posture he seemed to shrink. He examined the toe for a moment, then he looked up at me and I saw something in his blue eyes. I thought he was about to say he was sorry, but just when I expected his lips to part he grasped the tip of my toe and yanked. It felt as if my foot had exploded, so intense was the shock that shot through my leg. I was still trying to swallow spasms of pain when Shawn stood, put a hand on my shoulder and said, “Sorry, Siddle Lister, but it hurts less if you don’t see it coming.”
我耸了耸肩。她以为是我母亲治的，我让她相信了。事实是，感恩节后的那天早上，我让肖恩看看我的大脚趾是否断了。他跪在厨房的地板上，我把脚放在他膝盖上。这个姿势让他看上去缩小了。他检查了一会儿脚趾，然后抬头看着我，从他的蓝眼睛里我看出了一些东西。我以为他要向我道歉，但就在我期待他开口时，他抓住我的脚趾尖，猛地一拉。我感觉脚好像炸裂一般，一阵剧痛传遍整条腿。我仍旧强忍着疼痛，这时肖恩站起身，将一只手放在我肩膀上，说：“对不起，小妹，但就是要趁你不注意，才不会那么痛。”
The next morning, Robin asked me to go with her to a doctor — for the ulcers but also for an X-ray of my foot, because my big toe had turned black. I said I didn’t need a doctor. The ulcers would heal, and someone had already treated the toe.
第二天早上，罗宾让我和她一起去看医生——去看溃疡，顺便给脚拍个X光片，因为我的大脚趾已经变黑。我说我不需要医生。溃疡自己会好，脚趾已经有人治过了。
Robin’s eyebrow rose. “Who? Who treated it?”
罗宾扬起眉毛。“谁？谁治的？”
A week after Robin asked to take me to the doctor, I again awoke to her shaking me. She gathered me up and pressed me to her, as if her body could hold me together, could keep me from flying apart.
罗宾要带我去看医生的一个星期后，我又被她摇醒了。她把我抱起来，紧紧搂着我，仿佛她的身体能将我揽住，以防我散架。
“I think you need to see the bishop,” she said the next morning.
“我觉得你需要去见见主教。”第二天早上她说。
“I’m fine,” I said, making a cliché of myself the way not-fine people do. “I just need sleep.”
“我没事。”我说，重复着明明不太好的人的那套陈词滥调，“睡上一觉就好了。”
My algebra final was swept up in this superstition. In my mind, it acquired a kind of mystical power. I studied with the intensity of the insane, believing that if I could best this exam, win that impossible perfect score, even with my broken toe and without Charles to help me, it would prove that I was above it all. Untouchable.
我的代数期末考试也被卷入这种迷信中。在我脑海里，它获得了一种神秘的力量。我疯狂地高强度学习，相信如果我能在这次考试中取得最佳成绩，考出不太可能的满分，即便我的脚趾断了，即便没有查尔斯的帮助，也能证明我是最优秀的。不可战胜。
Soon after, I found a pamphlet for the university counseling service on my desk. I barely looked at it, just knocked it into the trash. I could not see a counselor. To see one would be to ask for help, and I believed myself invincible. It was an elegant deception, a mental pirouette. The toe was not broken because it was not breakable. Only an X-ray could prove otherwise. Thus, the X-ray would break my toe.
不久，我在书桌上发现一本大学心理咨询服务的小册子。我几乎看也没看，就把它扔进了垃圾箱。我是不会去见咨询师的。去见咨询师就意味着寻求帮助，而我相信自己战无不胜。这是一种优雅的骗局，一种精神战术。脚趾没有断，因为它不那么容易折断。只有X光可以证明它是不是断了，所以让我的脚趾断掉的是X光。
The morning of the exam I limped to the testing center and sat in the drafty hall. The test was in front of me. The problems were compliant, pliable; they yielded to my manipulations, forming into solutions, one after the other. I handed in my answer sheet, then stood in the frigid hallway, staring up at the screen that would display my score. When it appeared, I blinked, and blinked again. One hundred. A perfect score.
考试那天早上，我一瘸一拐地来到考试中心，坐在通风的大厅里。试卷就摆在我面前。问题顺从而柔软，轻易被我掌控，我将它们一一解答出来。我交上答卷，然后站在冰冷的走廊上，盯着大屏幕，屏幕上会显示我的分数。分数出现时，我的眼睛眨了又眨。一百分。完美的满分。
Richard was in the forklift as I drove up the hill, moving a stack of purlins for the shop Dad was building in Franklin, near town. Richard was twenty-two, and one of the smartest people I knew, but he lacked a high school diploma. As I passed him in the drive, it occurred to me that he’d probably be driving that forklift for the rest of his life.
我开车进山时，理查德正开叉车搬运檩条，供爸爸在附近的富兰克林镇盖商店使用。理查德二十二岁，是我认识的最聪明的人之一，但是他没有高中文凭。开车从他身边经过时，我突然意识到，他可能要开一辈子的叉车。
I was filled with an exquisite numbness. I felt drunk with it and wanted to shout at the world: Here’s the proof: nothing touches me.
我感到一阵陶醉和麻木，犹如喝醉了一般。我想对着世界大喊：这就是证据，没有什么东西能影响到我。
Buck’s peak looked the way it always did at Christmas — a snowy spire, adorned with evergreens — and my eyes, increasingly accustomed to brick and concrete, were nearly blinded by the scale and clarity of it.
圣诞节，巴克峰看上去一如往常——山顶白雪皑皑，点缀着常青树——而我的眼睛，越来越习惯于砖和混凝土，被其磅礴和明净晃得几乎睁不开。
Tyler laughed. “Yeah, Dad. He wants Richard to go to college.”
泰勒笑了。“是的，爸爸想让理查德去上大学。”
“I don’t know,” Tyler said. “Maybe. Dad and I have been working on him.”
“我不知道，”泰勒说，“也许吧。我和爸爸一直在做他的工作。”
“He’s gonna take it?”
“他要参加考试？”
I’d been home for only a few minutes when Tyler called. “I’m just checking in,” he said. “To see if Richard is studying for the ACT.”
回家刚几分钟，泰勒就打来电话。“我只想问问，”他说，“理查德是否在准备参加大学入学考试。”
I waited for an explanation. It was not long in coming. “Richard is a genius,” Dad told me a moment later, winking. “He’s five times smarter than that Einstein was. He can disprove all them socialist theories and godless speculations. He’s gonna get down there and blow up the whole damn system.”
我等着一个解释。解释很快就来了。“理查德是个天才，”过了一会儿，爸爸眨眨眼对我说，“他比爱因斯坦聪明五倍。他能驳斥所有无神论。他要去把整个该死的体系推翻。”
“Dad?”
“爸爸？”
I thought Tyler was joking until an hour later when we sat down to dinner. We’d only just started eating when Dad, his mouth full of potatoes, said, “Richard, I’ll give you next week off, paid, if you’ll use it to study them books.”
我以为泰勒在开玩笑，直到一个小时后我们坐下来吃饭。我们刚开始吃，嘴里塞满了土豆的爸爸就说：“理查德，我下星期给你放带薪假，如果你把这段时间用来学习的话。”
Dad continued with his raptures, oblivious to the effect he was having on his listeners. Shawn slumped on a bench, his back against the wall, his face tilted toward the floor. To look at him was to imagine a man cut from stone, so heavy did he seem, so void of motion. Richard was the miracle son, the gift from God, the Einstein to disprove Einstein. Richard would move the world. Shawn would not. He’d lost too much of his mind when he’d fallen off that pallet. One of my father’s sons would be driving the forklift for the rest of his life, but it wouldn’t be Richard.
爸爸继续欣喜若狂地说着，没有注意到他对听众的影响。肖恩瘫在长凳上，背靠着墙，脸歪向地板。他的样子让人想起一尊石像，看上去那么沉重，那么缺乏行动能力。理查德是奇迹之子，是上帝赐予的礼物，是能驳倒爱因斯坦的天才。理查德会改变世界。肖恩不会。从托盘上摔下来让他失去了太多理智。爸爸的一个儿子会开一辈子叉车，但这个人不会是理查德。
“Apparently I’m Einstein,” Richard said, his head in his hands. “What do I do? Dad is saying I’m going to blow this thing out of the water, and I’m not even sure I can pass.”
“表面上我好像是爱因斯坦，”理查德双手抱头说，“我该怎么办？爸爸说我将摧毁那个玩意儿，我甚至不确定能不能通过考试。”
The shop in Franklin was ready to roof, so two days after Christmas I forced my toe, still crooked and black, into a steel-toed boot, then spent the morning on a roof driving threading screws into galvanized tin. It was late afternoon when Shawn dropped his screw gun and shimmied down the loader’s extended boom. “Time for a break, Siddle Liss,” he shouted up from the ground. “Let’s go into town.”
富兰克林镇的商店准备盖屋顶了，所以圣诞节两天后，我将仍然又弯又黑的脚趾勉强塞进钢头靴，然后花了一个上午在屋顶给镀锌铁皮拧螺丝。傍晚时分，肖恩扔下螺丝枪，降下装载机的加长吊杆。“休息一下吧，小妹。”他从地上喊道，“我们进城去吧。”
Richard looked even more miserable than Shawn. His shoulders hunched and his neck sank into them, as if he were compressing under the weight of Dad’s praise. After Dad went to bed, Richard told me that he’d taken a practice test for the ACT. He’d scored so low, he wouldn’t tell me the number.
理查德看起来比肖恩更可怜。他耷拉着肩膀，缩着脖子，仿佛爸爸的赞扬压得他喘不过气来。爸爸上床睡觉后，理查德告诉我他参加了ACT模拟考试。得分很低，他不想告诉我分数。
Every night was the same. Through dinner, Dad would list all the false theories of science that his genius son would disprove; then after dinner, I would tell Richard about college, about classes, books, professors, things I knew would appeal to his innate need to learn. I was worried: Dad’s expectations were so high, and Richard’s fear of disappointing him so intense, it seemed possible that Richard might not take the ACT at all.
每晚都是如此。晚饭时，爸爸会一一罗列他的天才儿子将驳倒的错误科学理论；晚饭后，我会和理查德谈论大学、课程、书籍、教授，我所知道的会激发他内心对学习的渴望的话题。我很担心，爸爸的期望如此之高，理查德又那么害怕让他失望，很可能根本连大学入学考试都不去参加。
“I’ll wait in the car.”
“我在车里等着。”
I hopped onto the pallet and Shawn dropped the boom to the ground. “You drive,” he said, then he leaned his seat back and closed his eyes. I headed for Stokes.
我跳上托盘，肖恩降下吊杆至地面。“你来开车。”说完，他把椅子往后一拉，闭上了眼睛。我开车前往斯托克斯。
I remember strange details about the moment we pulled into the parking lot — the smell of oil floating up from our leather gloves, the sandpaper feel of dust on my fingertips. And Shawn, grinning at me from the passenger seat. Through the city of cars I spy one, a red jeep. Charles. I pass through the main lot and turn into the open asphalt on the north side of the store, where employees park. I pull down the visor to evaluate myself, noting the tangle the windy roof has made of my hair, and the grease from the tin that has lodged in my pores, making them fat and brown. My clothes are heavy with dirt.
我还记得我们把车开进停车场的那一刻所有的奇怪细节——我们的皮手套飘散汽油的味道；我指尖的污垢摸上去质感如砂纸一般。而肖恩，坐在副驾驶座上对我咧嘴笑。在城市的车流中穿梭时，我发现一辆红色吉普车。是查尔斯的。我们穿过主停车场，转入商店北侧的露天柏油路，那里是员工停车处。我拉下遮阳板审视自己的模样，注意到我的头发被屋顶的风吹得乱糟糟的，毛孔里塞满了铁皮上的油脂，变得粗大发黄。我的衣服上也布满灰尘。
Shawn sees the red jeep. He watches me lick my thumb and scrub dirt from my face, and he becomes excited. “Let’s go!” he says.
肖恩看见了红色吉普车。他看着我舔拇指、擦洗脸上的污垢，变得兴奋起来。“我们走吧！”他说。
Shawn can smell shame. He knows that Charles has never seen me like this — that every day all last summer, I rushed home and removed every stain, every smudge, hiding cuts and calluses beneath new clothes and makeup. A hundred times Shawn has seen me emerge from the bathroom unrecognizable, having washed the junkyard down the shower drain.
肖恩能嗅到羞耻的味道。他知道查尔斯从未见过我这番模样——去年夏天，我每天都跑回家，洗掉身上每一处瑕疵、每一块污垢，用新衣服和化妆品遮住伤口和老茧。肖恩见过我无数次从卫生间出来，焕然一新，已将废料场的垃圾冲进了地漏。
“You’re coming in,” Shawn says.
“你给我进去。”肖恩说。
He begins to laugh, loudly, wildly, as if something funny has happened but nothing has. Still laughing, he grabs my arm and draws it upward, as if he’s going to throw me over his back and carry me in fireman-style. I don’t want Charles to see that so I end the game. I say, flatly, “Don’t touch me.”
他开始大声狂笑，好像发生了什么有趣的事，但什么也没有发生。他仍然大笑着，抓住我的胳膊向上提，似乎要把我驮在背上。我不想被查尔斯看到，于是结束了游戏。我直截了当地说：“别碰我。”
“You’re coming in,” Shawn says again. He walks around the car and opens my door. The movement is old-fashioned, vaguely chivalrous.
“你进去。”肖恩又说了一遍。他绕车走了一圈，为我打开车门。他的行为十分老派，有绅士风度。
“I don’t want to,” I say.
“我不想进去。”我说。
“Don’t want your boyfriend to see you looking so glamorous?” He smiles and jabs me with his finger. He is looking at me strangely, as if to say, This is who you are. You’ve been pretending that you’re someone else. Someone better. But you are just this.
“不想让你的男朋友看到你这么光彩照人吗？”他笑着用手指戳我。他奇怪地看着我，好像在说，这就是你。你一直假装自己是别人，是比你更好的人。但这才是你本来的样子。
What happens next is a blur in my memory. I see only snapshots — of the sky flipping absurdly, of fists coming at me, of a strange, savage look in the eyes of a man I don’t recognize. I see my hands grasping the wheel, and I feel strong arms wrenching my legs. Something shifts in my ankle, a crack or a pop. I lose my grip. I’m pulled from the car.
接下来发生了什么，我的记忆一片模糊。我只记得一些片段——天旋地转，拳头向我砸来，还有一个我认不出的男人陌生、凶狠的目光。我双手紧握方向盘，感觉到强有力的胳膊扭着我的腿。我的脚踝处有什么东西移位了，发出咔嚓或者啪的一声。我失去控制，从车上被拉了下来。
I am dragged upward and set on my feet. I claw at my clothing. Then I’m doubled over and my wrist is being folded back, bending, bent as far as it will go and bending still. My nose is near the pavement when the bone begins to bow. I try to regain my balance, to use the strength in my legs to push back, but when my ankle takes weight, it buckles. I scream. Heads turn in our direction. People crane to see what the commotion is. Immediately I begin to laugh — a wild, hysterical cackle that despite all my efforts still sounds a little like a scream.
我被拉起，站了起来。我抓住衣服，接着我的腰弯了下去，手腕被向后折叠弯曲，直到极限。骨头开始弯曲时，我的鼻子紧贴路面。我努力恢复平衡，腿使劲向后蹬，但脚踝受力时也弯曲了。我尖叫起来。有人转头朝我们这边看。人们伸长脖子，想看看发生了什么骚动。我开始大笑——疯狂地、歇斯底里地咯咯笑个不停。尽管我努力假装，我的声音听上去仍然有些像尖叫。
I feel icy pavement on my back; pebbles are grinding into my skin. My jeans have slid down past my hips. I’d felt them peeling off me, inch by inch, as Shawn yanked my legs. My shirt has risen up and I look at myself, at my body spread flat on the asphalt, at my bra and faded underwear. I want to cover myself but Shawn has pinned my hands above my head. I lie still, feeling the cold seep into me. I hear my voice begging him to let me go, but I don’t sound like myself. I’m listening to the sobs of another girl.
我躺在冰冷的路面上，鹅卵石磨着我的肌肤。我的牛仔裤已滑下臀部。肖恩拽着我的腿时，我感觉裤子一寸一寸地往下掉。我的衬衫已上蹿，我看着自己，看着自己平躺在柏油路上的身体，看着我的胸罩和褪色的内衣。我想遮住自己，但肖恩把我的手按在头顶上。我一动不动地躺着，感觉寒冷渗入身体。我听到自己恳求他放开我，但声音听上去不像我自己的，像是另一个女孩在啜泣。
We do not see Charles.
我们没有看见查尔斯。
I go with him into the bright lights. I laugh as we pass through aisle after aisle, gathering the things he wants to buy. I laugh at every word he says, trying to convince anyone who might have been in the parking lot that it was all a joke. I’m walking on a sprained ankle, but the pain barely registers.
我和他一起走在明亮的灯光下。我笑着穿过一个又一个过道，把他要买的东西一一拿好。他每说一个字我都笑，试图让任何可能在停车场里的人相信，刚才那只是一个玩笑。我拖着扭伤的脚踝走路，但几乎感觉不到痛。
“You’re going in,” Shawn says, and I feel the bone in my wrist crack.
“你给我进去。”肖恩说。我感觉手腕上的骨头裂开了。
The drive back to the site is silent. It’s only five miles but it feels like fifty. We arrive and I limp toward the shop. Dad and Richard are inside. I’d been limping before because of my toe, so my new hobble isn’t so noticeable. Still, Richard takes one look at my face, streaked with grease and tears, and knows something is wrong; Dad sees nothing.
开车返回工地的路上一片沉默。只是五英里的车程，但感觉像五十英里。到了工地，我一瘸一拐地走向工作间。爸爸和理查德在里面。因为脚趾没好，之前我走路就一瘸一拐，所以现在跛行并没有那么引人注意。尽管如此，理查德还是看见我脸上满是油污和泪水，他知道有点儿不对劲；爸爸什么都没看出来。
I pick up my screw gun and drive screws with my left hand, but the pressure is uneven, and with my weight gathered on one foot, my balance is poor. The screws bounce off the painted tin, leaving long, twisting marks like curled ribbons. Dad sends me home after I ruin two sheets.
我拿起螺丝枪，用左手拧螺丝，但无法均匀用力，仅用一只脚支撑身体也无法保持平衡。螺丝从漆过的铁皮上弹跳下来，留下一道长长的弯曲的痕迹，像卷曲的丝带一般。在我弄坏两张铁皮后，爸爸打发我回家了。
Shawn knocks. I slide my journal under the pillow. His shoulders are rounded when he enters. He speaks quietly. It was a game, he says. He had no idea he’d hurt me until he saw me cradling my arm at the site. He checks the bones in my wrist, examines my ankle. He brings me ice wrapped in a dish towel and says that next time we’re having fun, I should tell him if something is wrong. He leaves. I return to my journal. Was it really fun and games? I write. Could he not tell he was hurting me? I don’t know. I just don’t know.
肖恩来敲门。我把日记本放在枕头下面。他耷拉着肩膀进来，说话声音很轻。那只是闹着玩的，他说。他不知道会伤害到我，直到看见我在工地扶着胳膊干活。他查看了我的手腕，又检查了我的脚踝。他为我拿来用洗碗巾包好的冰块，说下次两人再闹，要是有什么不对劲，我一定要告诉他。他离开后，我继续写日记。真的是在闹，在开玩笑吗？我写道。难道他不知道他在伤害我吗？我不知道。我真的不知道。
I begin to reason with myself, to doubt whether I had spoken clearly: what had I whispered and what had I screamed? I decide that if I had asked differently, been more calm, he would have stopped. I write this until I believe it, which doesn’t take long because I want to believe it. It’s comforting to think the defect is mine, because that means it is under my power.
我开始自我反思，思考自己是否表达清楚：我低声说了些什么，尖叫了些什么？我决定相信，如果换一种方式请求他，让他冷静下来，他就会停下。我写下这些，直到让自己相信。这并没花很长时间，因为我想相信就是这样。想到过错在我，我感到很欣慰，因为这意味着事情还在我掌控之下。
That night, with a heavily wrapped wrist, I scratch out a journal entry. I ask myself questions. Why didn’t he stop when I begged him? It was like getting beaten by a zombie, I write. Like he couldn’t hear me.
那天晚上，我手腕上裹着厚厚的纱布，草草写下一则日记。我问自己，为什么我恳求他的时候，他不停下？我写道：就像被一个僵尸殴打。仿佛他听不见我说话一样。
This half-knowledge works in me like a kind of possession, and for a few minutes I’m taken over by it. I rise from my bed, retrieve my journal, and do something I have never done before: I write what happened. I do not use vague, shadowy language, as I have done in other entries; I do not hide behind hints and suggestion. I write what I remember: There was one point when he was forcing me from the car, that he had both hands pinned above my head and my shirt rose up. I asked him to let me fix it but it was like he couldn’t hear me. He just stared at it like a great big jerk. It’s a good thing I’m as small as I am. If I was larger, at that moment, I would have torn him apart.
这种不完全的认识攫住了我，有几分钟我的脑海被它占据了。我从床上坐起来，重新拿出日记，做了之前从未做过的事：我把发生的经过写了下来。我不再像以前那样在日记中使用模糊隐晦的语言，不再隐藏自我暗示和提议。我写下了记忆中的内容：有一次，他强迫我下车，将我的双手举到头顶按住，我的衬衫也蹿了上去。我恳求他让我整理一下衣服，但他好像听不见我的话。他只是像个大浑蛋一样盯着它看。幸亏我个头还小。如果个头再大一些，当时我就会把他撕成碎片。
I put away my journal and lie in bed, reciting this narrative as if it is a poem I’ve decided to learn by heart. I’ve nearly committed it to memory when the recitation is interrupted. Images invade my mind — of me on my back, arms pressed above my head. Then I’m in the parking lot. I look down at my white stomach, then up at my brother. His expression is unforgettable: not anger or rage. There is no fury in it. Only pleasure, unperturbed. Then a part of me understands, even as I begin to argue against it, that my humiliation was the cause of that pleasure. It was not an accident or side effect. It was the objective.
我收起日记，躺在床上，背诵着这段话，仿佛这是一首我决定要用心记住的诗。我几乎就要将它牢记在心，突然被一个念头打断了背诵。一幅画面侵入我的脑海——我躺在地上，胳膊被按在头顶上。我重回停车场，低头看看自己露出的白花花的肚皮，然后抬头看看哥哥。他的表情令人难忘：不是愤怒或狂暴。其中没有怒火，只有平静的快乐。然后我有点儿明白了——尽管内心不愿承认——他的快乐正源于对我的羞辱。羞辱我并非事出偶然或副作用。那是他的目的。
They were brought into focus when I checked my email. There was a message from Shawn. An apology. But he’d apologized already, in my room. I had never known Shawn to apologize twice.
查看电子邮件时，一切回忆重又浮现。有一封肖恩写来的道歉信。但他已经来我房间道过歉了。我从没见过肖恩道歉两次。
“I don’t know what you’ve done to your wrist,” Dad told me the next morning, “but you’re no good on the crew like that. You might as well head back to Utah.”
“不知道你到底用手腕干了什么，”第二天早上爸爸对我说，“但你这个样子在队里派不上一点用场。你还不如回犹他州。”
The words of the second entry would not obscure the words of the first. Both would remain, my memories set down alongside his. There was a boldness in not editing for consistency, in not ripping out either the one page or the other. To admit uncertainty is to admit to weakness, to powerlessness, and to believe in yourself despite both. It is a frailty, but in this frailty there is a strength: the conviction to live in your own mind, and not in someone else’s. I have often wondered if the most powerful words I wrote that night came not from anger or rage, but from doubt: I don’t know. I just don’t know.
第二则日记不会掩盖第一则的文字。两则日记都会保留下来，将我的记忆和他的记忆并置一处。我没有为了保持前后一致而进行修改，没有将某一页撕下来，这是一种大胆的做法。承认不确定性，就是被迫承认自己的软弱和无能，但也意味着你相信你自己。这是一个弱点，但这个弱点中透出一股力量：坚信活在自己的思想中，而不是别人的思想中。我常常在想，那天晚上我写下的最有力的话，是否并非源自愤怒，而是出于怀疑：我不知道。我只是不知道。
The drive to BYU was hypnotic; by the time I arrived, my memories of the previous day had blurred and faded.
开车返回杨百翰大学就像一次催眠；一到那里，我关于前一天的记忆就已经模糊褪色。
I retrieved my journal and I wrote another entry, opposite the first, in which I revised the memory. It was a misunderstanding, I wrote. If I’d asked him to stop, he would have.
我拿出日记本，写了另一则日记。与上一篇相反，在这一篇里，我对回忆做了修正。这是一个误会，我写道。如果我叫他停，他会停下来的。
But however I chose to remember it, that event would change everything. Reflecting on it now I’m amazed by it, not by what happened, but that I wrote what happened. That from somewhere inside that brittle shell — in that girl made vacant by the fiction of invincibility — there was a spark left.
但无论我选择如何记忆，这个事件都会改变一切。现在回想起来，我为此感到惊讶，不是为事实上发生了什么而惊讶，而是为我笔下发生了什么而惊讶。在那个女孩脆弱的躯壳中，在她为自己虚构的不可战胜的空虚中，还留下了一个火花。
Not knowing for certain, but refusing to give way to those who claim certainty, was a privilege I had never allowed myself. My life was narrated for me by others. Their voices were forceful, emphatic, absolute. It had never occurred to me that my voice might be as strong as theirs.
我从未允许自己拥有这样的特权：不确定，但拒绝让位于那些声称确定的人。我的一生都活在别人的讲述中。他们的声音铿锵有力，专制而绝对。之前我从未意识到，我的声音也可以与他们的一样有力。
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