My apartment was a mile south of campus. It had a kitchen, living room and three small bedrooms. The other women who lived there — I knew they would be women because at BYU all housing was segregated by gender — had not yet returned from the Christmas holiday. It took only a few minutes to bring in my stuff from the car. Mother and I stood awkwardly in the kitchen for a moment, then she hugged me and drove away.
我的公寓位于校园南部一英里处，有一间厨房、一间起居室和三间小卧室。同住的女生——我知道会是女生，因为杨百翰大学的所有公寓都按性别划分——度圣诞假尚未返回。我从车里拿出全部家当仅用了几分钟。我和母亲在厨房局促地站了一会儿，然后她与我拥抱道别，开车离去。
On New Year’s Day, Mother drove me to my new life. I didn’t take much with me: a dozen jars of home-canned peaches, bedding, and a garbage bag full of clothes. As we sped down the interstate I watched the landscape splinter and barb, the rolling black summits of the Bear River Mountains giving way to the razor-edged Rockies. The university was nestled in the heart of the Wasatch Mountains, whose white massifs jutted mightily out of the earth. They were beautiful, but to me their beauty seemed aggressive, menacing.
元旦那天，母亲开车送我去往新生活。我没带多少东西：一打自制桃罐头、床上用品、一塑料袋衣服。车子沿州际高速公路疾驰而下时，我望着支离破碎的风景，贝尔河山脉连绵起伏的黑色群峰逐渐被棱角分明的落基山脉所取代。大学坐落在瓦萨奇山脉的中心地带，那里的白色山峦拔地而起。它们很美，但在我看来，它们的美丽咄咄逼人，令人生畏。
I lived alone in the quiet apartment for three days. Except it wasn’t quiet. Nowhere was quiet. I’d never spent more than a few hours in a city and found it impossible to defend myself from the strange noises that constantly invaded. The chirrup of crosswalk signals, the shrieking of sirens, the hissing of air brakes, even the hushed chatter of people strolling on the sidewalk — I heard every sound individually. My ears, accustomed to the silence of the peak, felt battered by them.
我独自一人在安静的公寓里待了三天。不过它并不安静。没有一个地方是安静的。我从未在一座城市里待过几个小时，我发现自己无力抵御不断袭来的奇怪噪音。人行道信号的吱喳声，警笛的尖叫声，气闸的嘶嘶声，甚至漫步在人行道上的行人的闲聊声——每一个声响都逃不过我的耳朵。我的耳朵，习惯了山间的寂静，被这些声音折磨得痛苦不堪。
“I’m a freshman,” I said. I didn’t want to admit I was only seventeen, and that I should be in high school, finishing my junior year.
“我是新生。”我说。我不想承认我只有十七岁，这个年纪应该上高中，刚读完高二。
“Sure,” she said. “Don’t you?”
“当然了，”她说，“你不去吗？”
Shannon surveyed me with frank disappointment, taking in my baggy flannel coat and oversized men’s jeans. “How old are you?” she said.
香农明显很失望地打量着我，看着我宽松的法兰绒外套和大号男式牛仔裤。“你多大了？”她问。
I was starved for sleep by the time my first roommate arrived. Her name was Shannon, and she studied at the cosmetology school across the street. She was wearing plush pink pajama bottoms and a tight white tank with spaghetti straps. I stared at her bare shoulders. I’d seen women dressed this way before — Dad called them gentiles — and I’d always avoided getting too near them, as if their immorality might be catching. Now there was one in my house.
第一个室友到来时，我正困得要命。她叫香农，在街对面的美容学校上学。她穿着粉色长绒睡裤和白色紧身吊带背心。我盯着她赤裸的肩膀。我见过这样穿着的女人——爸爸称之为“异教徒”——我总是远离她们，好像她们的不道德行为会传染似的。现在我的公寓里就有一个。
“You go to church?”
“你也去教堂吗？”
Shannon moved to the sink and I saw the word “Juicy” written across her rear. That was more than I could take. I backed away toward my room, mumbling that I was going to bed.
香农走到水池边，我看见她的屁股上印着“多汁”[1]。这超出了我的承受范围。我退回自己房间，嘟囔着说我要睡觉了。【注：[1]“多汁”（juicy）在俚语中指女子妖冶性感。】
“Good call,” she said. “Church is early. I’m usually late.”
“好主意，”她说，“礼拜很早。我总是迟到。”
“Of course I do. But you, you really go?”
“我当然去。但是你，你真的去吗？”
My mind was spinning as I shut my bedroom door. How could she be a Mormon?
我关上卧室房门，脑子飞快旋转。她怎么可能是摩门教徒呢？
My other roommate arrived the next day. Her name was Mary and she was a junior studying early childhood education. She dressed like I expected a Mormon to dress on Sunday, in a floral skirt that reached to the floor. Her clothes were a kind of shibboleth to me; they signaled that she was not a gentile, and for a few hours I felt less alone.
第二天我的另一个室友到了。她叫玛丽，是大三学生，主修儿童早期教育。她穿着一条碎花及地长裙，与我所期待的摩门教徒的礼拜日穿着一样。她的衣服对我来说就像某种暗号，暗示她不是一个异教徒，有几个小时我觉得不那么孤独了。
Dad said there were gentiles everywhere — that most Mormons were gentiles, they just didn’t know it. I thought about Shannon’s tank and pajamas, and suddenly realized that probably everyone at BYU was a gentile.
爸爸说到处都是异教徒——大多数摩门教徒也是异教徒，只不过他们自己不知道罢了。想到香农的背心和睡裤，我突然间意识到也许杨百翰大学的每个人都是异教徒。
She stared at me, chewing her lip, then said, “Church is at eight. Good night!”
她盯着我，咬着嘴唇，然后说：“教堂礼拜八点开始。晚安！”
Until that evening. Mary stood suddenly from the sofa and said, “Classes start tomorrow. Time to stock up on groceries.” She left and returned an hour later with two paper bags. Shopping was forbidden on the Sabbath — I’d never purchased so much as a stick of gum on a Sunday — but Mary casually unpacked eggs, milk and pasta without acknowledging that every item she was placing in our communal fridge was a violation of the Lord’s Commandments. When she withdrew a can of Diet Coke, which my father said was a violation of the Lord’s counsel for health, I again fled to my room.
直到那天晚上。玛丽突然从沙发上站起来说：“明天要上课了，该去买点东西。”她离开了，一个小时后抱着两大纸袋东西回来了。安息日禁止购物——我在礼拜日从没买过东西，连一块口香糖都没买过——但玛丽随意地拿出鸡蛋、牛奶和意大利面，拒不承认她放在我们公共冰箱里的每一件物品都是对上帝律令的公然违背。当她取出一罐健怡可乐——父亲曾说这违反了上帝的健康忠告——我又逃回自己的房间。
The next morning, I got on the bus going the wrong direction. By the time I’d corrected my mistake, the lecture was nearly finished. I stood awkwardly in the back until the professor, a thin woman with delicate features, motioned for me to take the only available seat, which was near the front. I sat down, feeling the weight of everyone’s eyes. The course was on Shakespeare, and I’d chosen it because I’d heard of Shakespeare and thought that was a good sign. But now I was here I realized I knew nothing about him. It was a word I’d heard, that was all.
第二天早上，我错上了反方向的公交车。等我换了方向到达时，课程差不多结束了。我局促不安地站在后面，直到教授——一个五官精致的瘦女人——示意我坐到前面唯一一个空座。我坐了下来，感受到每个人投来的目光所形成的压力。这是门关于莎士比亚的课，我选它是因为我听说过莎士比亚，觉得这是个好兆头。但现在我才意识到我对他一无所知。那只是我听过的一个名字，仅此而已。
When the bell rang, the professor approached my desk. “You don’t belong here,” she said.
下课铃响了，教授朝我走来。“你不属于这里。”她说。
“There are classes for seniors?” I said.
“还有老年人[2]的课？”我说。【注：[2]原文中的“seniors”兼有“大学四年级学生”和“老年人”之意。】
She rolled her eyes as if I were trying to be funny. “This is 382. You should be in 110.”
她翻翻眼珠，好像我在逗她似的。“这里是382教室。你应该去110。”
I stared at her, confused. Of course I didn’t belong, but how did she know? I was on the verge of confessing the whole thing — that I’d never gone to school, that I hadn’t really met the requirements to graduate — when she added, “This class is for seniors.”
我困惑地盯着她。我当然不属于这里，但她是怎么知道的？我差一点就将整件事坦白交代——我从没上过学，并未达到高中毕业要求——这时她补充了一句：“这门课是为大四学生开的。”
Freshman English was taught by a cheerful woman in her late twenties who kept talking about something called the “essay form,” which, she assured us, we had learned in high school.
新生英语课由一位不到三十岁的活泼开朗的女老师讲授，她一直在讲一种叫“论文形式”的东西，并向我们保证，这是我们在高中就已经学过的。
It took most of the walk across campus before I understood what she’d said, then I checked my course schedule and, for the first time, noticed the numbers next to the course names.
我走了大半个校园才明白过来她的意思，然后查了查我的课程表，第一次注意到课程名称旁边还有一组数字。
I went to the registrar’s office, where I was told that every freshman-level course was full. What I should do, they said, was check online every few hours and join if someone dropped. By the end of the week I’d managed to squeeze into introductory courses in English, American history, music and religion, but I was stuck in a junior-level course on art in Western civilization.
我去了注册处，被告知新生课程全部满员。他们让我每隔几小时上网查看一下，如果有人退课，我就可以选。第一周快结束时，我勉强挤进几门课程，有基础英语入门、美国历史、音乐和宗教，但还被困在一门面向大三学生的西方文明艺术课中。
My next class, American history, was held in an auditorium named for the prophet Joseph Smith. I’d thought American history would be easy because Dad had taught us about the Founding Fathers — I knew all about Washington, Jefferson, Madison. But the professor barely mentioned them at all, and instead talked about “philosophical underpinnings” and the writings of Cicero and Hume, names I’d never heard.
我的下一门课——美国历史——在一个以先知约瑟夫·史密斯命名的大教室上课。我原以为美国历史这门课会很容易，因为爸爸给我们讲过那些开国元勋——我知道所有关于华盛顿、杰斐逊和麦迪逊的事迹。但是教授对这些人几乎只字未提，而是谈论“哲学基础”，以及西塞罗和休谟的作品，这些名字我从未耳闻。
Failing a quiz did nothing to undermine my new devotion to an old creed, but a lecture on Western art did.
测验不及格并未削弱我对旧信条的新忠诚，但一堂关于西方艺术的课做到了。
In the first lecture, we were told that the next class would begin with a quiz on the readings. For two days I tried to wrestle meaning from the textbook’s dense passages, but terms like “civic humanism” and “the Scottish Enlightenment” dotted the page like black holes, sucking all the other words into them. I took the quiz and missed every question.
第一堂课上，我们便被告知下节课将进行阅读测验。两天来，我努力从课本密密密麻麻的段落中找寻意义，但“公民人文主义”和“苏格兰启蒙运动”之类的词汇遍布全书，像黑洞一样将其他词汇都吞噬了。我参加了测验，一个问题都没答对。
That failure sat uneasily in my mind. It was the first indication of whether I would be okay, whether whatever I had in my head by way of education was enough. After the quiz, the answer seemed clear: it was not enough. On realizing this, I might have resented my upbringing but I didn’t. My loyalty to my father had increased in proportion to the miles between us. On the mountain, I could rebel. But here, in this loud, bright place, surrounded by gentiles disguised as saints, I clung to every truth, every doctrine he had given me. Doctors were Sons of Perdition. Homeschooling was a commandment from the Lord.
那次失败让我忐忑不安。这是第一个可以衡量我是否够格、我大脑中经由教育得到的知识储备是否足够的指标。这次测验之后，答案似乎很明确：还不够。意识到这一点，我本该憎恨我的成长环境，但我没有。我对父亲的忠诚与我们之间的距离成正比。在山上，我可以反抗。但在这里，在这个明亮喧嚣的地方，被伪装成圣人的异教徒包围着，我坚守着他教导我的每一条真理、每一条教义。医生是堕落之子。家庭教育是上帝的旨意。
The lecture began when an old man with small eyes and a sharp nose shuttered the windows. He flipped a switch and a slide projector filled the room with white light. The image was of a painting. The professor discussed the composition, the brushstrokes, the history. Then he moved to the next painting, and the next and the next.
开始上课了，一个小眼睛、尖鼻子的老人关上了百叶窗。他轻按开关，幻灯机的白光照亮了整个房间。照出的图像是一幅油画。教授讨论了它的构图、笔触和历史。接下来他切换到下一幅画，一幅又一幅。
The classroom was bright when I arrived, the morning sun pouring in warmly through a high wall of windows. I chose a seat next to a girl in a high-necked blouse. Her name was Vanessa. “We should stick together,” she said. “I think we’re the only freshmen in the whole class.”
我到达的时候，教室里很明亮，晨间的阳光透过高高的窗户暖暖地照射进来。我在一个身穿高领衫的女孩旁边坐下来。她叫凡妮莎。“我们应该坐一起，”她说，“我想全班就咱俩是新生。”
I opened the picture book I’d purchased for the class so I could take a closer look. Something was written under the image in italics but I couldn’t understand it. It had one of those black-hole words, right in the middle, devouring the rest. I’d seen other students ask questions, so I raised my hand.
我打开专门为这门课买的图册，以便看得更仔细些。这幅图下面写着一些斜体字，但我看不懂。有个黑洞般的单词，就在正中，吞噬了其他的词汇。我见过别的学生问问题，于是举起了手。
Then the projector showed a peculiar image, of a man in a faded hat and overcoat. Behind him loomed a concrete wall. He held a small paper near his face but he wasn’t looking at it. He was looking at us.
然后投影仪展示了一幅奇特的画面：一个身穿大衣、头戴褪色帽子的人。他的身后是一堵水泥墙。他手拿一张小纸片举在面前，但并没有看着纸片。他在看着我们。
There was silence. Not a hush, not a muting of the noise, but utter, almost violent silence. No papers shuffled, no pencils scratched.
一片寂静。不是突然安静下来，也不是没有了噪音，而是彻底的死寂。没有书页翻动，也没有铅笔划擦。
The professor called on me, and I read the sentence aloud. When I came to the word, I paused. “I don’t know this word,” I said. “What does it mean?”
教授叫了我，我大声朗读了那个句子。读到那个词时，我停了下来。“我不认识这个单词，”我说，“请问它是什么意思？”
The professor’s lips tightened. “Thanks for that,” he said, then returned to his notes.
教授抿紧了嘴唇。“谢谢你提了那样一个问题。”说完，他接着讲课。
I scarcely moved for the rest of the lecture. I stared at my shoes, wondering what had happened, and why, whenever I looked up, there was always someone staring at me as if I was a freak. Of course I was a freak, and I knew it, but I didn’t understand how they knew it.
这节课剩下的时间我几乎一动不敢动。我盯着鞋子，想知道发生了什么，为什么每当我抬起头，总会有人盯着我，好像我是个怪胎。我当然是个怪胎，我清楚这一点，但我不明白他们是怎么知道的。
When the bell rang, Vanessa shoved her notebook into her pack. Then she paused and said, “You shouldn’t make fun of that. It’s not a joke.” She walked away before I could reply.
下课铃响起时，凡妮莎将她的笔记本塞进背包。接着她停顿了一下，说：“你不应该拿那个词开玩笑。它可不是个笑话。”我还没来得及回答，她就走了。
I stayed in my seat until everyone had gone, pretending the zipper on my coat was stuck so I could avoid looking anyone in the eye. Then I went straight to the computer lab to look up the word “Holocaust.”
我一直坐在座位上，假装外套上的拉链卡住了，以避免直视别人的眼睛，直到所有人都离开。然后我径直去了机房，去查“Holocaust”[3]这个词的意思。【注：[3]“Holocaust”专指二战期间纳粹对犹太人展开的大屠杀。】
I searched my memories. In some ways the word “Holocaust” wasn’t wholly unfamiliar. Perhaps Mother had taught me about it, when we were picking rosehips or tincturing hawthorn. I did seem to have a vague knowledge that Jews had been killed somewhere, long ago. But I’d thought it was a small conflict, like the Boston Massacre, which Dad talked about a lot, in which half a dozen people had been martyred by a tyrannical government. To have misunderstood it on this scale — five versus six million — seemed impossible.
我在记忆中搜索。从某种程度上来说，“大屠杀”这个词并不完全陌生。也许在我们采摘蔷薇果或者制作山楂酊剂时，母亲曾教过我。我的确有种模糊的概念，知道犹太人很久以前在什么地方被杀害。但我以为那只是一场小规模的冲突，就像父亲经常提到的波士顿惨案。在那次事件中，有六人被残暴的政府杀害。六百万犹太人惨遭屠杀，我却误以为只有五六个人的规模，这让人无法接受。
I don’t know how long I sat there reading about it, but at some point I’d read enough. I leaned back and stared at the ceiling. I suppose I was in shock, but whether it was the shock of learning about something horrific, or the shock of learning about my own ignorance, I’m not sure. I do remember imagining for a moment, not the camps, not the pits or chambers of gas, but my mother’s face. A wave of emotion took me, a feeling so intense, so unfamiliar, I wasn’t sure what it was. It made me want to shout at her, at my own mother, and that frightened me.
我不知道自己坐在那里读了多长时间，直到某一刻，我读了足够多的内容。我往后一靠，盯着天花板。我想我当时震惊不已，但究竟是为得知可怕的事实而震惊，还是为自己的无知而震惊，我并不确定。我清楚地记得有那么一刻，我脑海中闪现的不是集中营，不是毒气坑或毒气室，而是我母亲的脸。一股情绪的波动带走了我，一种如此强烈、如此陌生的感觉，我不确定那是什么。它令我想对她大喊，对自己的母亲大喊，而那让我感到害怕。
That saturday, I SAT at my desk with a stack of homework. Everything had to be finished that day because I could not violate the Sabbath.
那个星期六，我坐在书桌前，有一堆作业要做。我必须在当天做完所有作业，因为我不能违反安息日的规定。
I found Vanessa before the next lecture and apologized for the joke. I didn’t explain, because I couldn’t explain. I just said I was sorry and that I wouldn’t do it again. To keep that promise, I didn’t raise my hand for the rest of the semester.
下节课之前我去找凡妮莎，为这个笑话道歉。我没有解释，因为我无法解释。我只是说我很抱歉，以后再也不会这么做了。为了信守承诺，这个学期剩下的时间里我再也没有举过手。
I knew I should stop — this was the Lord’s time — but I hadn’t even started the assignment for music theory, which was due at seven A. M. on Monday. The Sabbath begins when I wake up, I reasoned, and kept working.
我知道应该停下来——这是上帝的时间——但我还没开始写音乐理论作业，周一上午七点就该交了。安息日从我醒来开始算起，我找了个理由，继续写。
I spent the morning and afternoon trying to decipher the history textbook, without much success. In the evening, I tried to write a personal essay for English, but I’d never written an essay before — except for the ones on sin and repentance, which no one had ever read — and I didn’t know how. I had no idea what the teacher meant by the “essay form.” I scribbled a few sentences, crossed them out, then began again. I repeated this until it was past midnight.
上午和下午我都在试图限免历史课本，但收效甚微。晚上我试着写一篇英语课的论文，但我从未写过论文——除了关于罪恶和忏悔的文章，那些从来没有人读过——我不知道怎么写。我不知道老师说的“论文形式”是什么意思。我草草写了几个句子，划掉，又重写。就这样反反复复，直到过了午夜。
Shannon rolled her eyes. “She’s very devout,” she whispered.
香农翻了翻白眼，小声说：“她可是非常虔诚。”
I’d always known that my father believed in a different God. As a child, I’d been aware that although my family attended the same church as everyone in our town, our religion was not the same. They believed in modesty; we practiced it. They believed in God’s power to heal; we left our injuries in God’s hands. They believed in preparing for the Second Coming; we were actually prepared. For as long as I could remember, I’d known that the members of my own family were the only true Mormons I had ever known, and yet for some reason, here at this university, in this chapel, for the first time I felt the immensity of the gap. I understood now: I could stand with my family, or with the gentiles, on the one side or the other, but there was no foothold in between.
我一直知道父亲信仰的是另一个神。孩提时我就意识到，虽然我的家人和我们镇上的每个人都去同一座教堂，但我们的宗教信仰不一样。他们信仰谦逊；我们身体力行。他们信仰上帝有治愈之力；我们将伤病交由上帝处理。他们信仰要为基督复临做准备；我们采取实际行动。从我记事起，我就知道我的家人是我认识的人里仅有的真正的摩门教徒，然而出于某种原因，在这所大学，在这座礼拜堂里，我第一次感受到巨大的鸿沟。现在我明白了：我可以选择站在我家人的一边，或者站在异教徒的一边，非此即彼，此外别无选择。
I awoke with my face pressed to the desk. The room was bright. I could hear Shannon and Mary in the kitchen. I put on my Sunday dress and the three of us walked to church. Because it was a congregation of students, everyone was sitting with their roommates, so I settled into a pew with mine. Shannon immediately began chatting with the girl behind us. I looked around the chapel and was again struck by how many women were wearing skirts cut above the knee.
醒来时我发现自己的脸贴在桌子上。房间明亮。我能听见香农和玛丽在厨房里说话。我穿上礼拜日的衣服，我们三人步行去教堂。教堂会众都是学生，大家都与室友坐在一起，于是我也和室友们坐在同一张长凳上。香农立刻与后面的一个女生聊了起来。我环顾教堂，又一次被那么多女孩穿着露膝短裙而震惊。
The girl talking to Shannon said we should come over that afternoon to see a movie. Mary and Shannon agreed but I shook my head. I didn’t watch movies on Sunday.
和香农聊天的女孩提议我们那天下午一起去看电影。玛丽和香农同意了，但我摇了摇头。星期天我从不看电影。
The service ended and we filed into Sunday school. Shannon and Mary chose seats near the front. They saved me one but I hesitated, thinking of how I’d broken the Sabbath. I’d been here less than a week, and already I had robbed the Lord of an hour. Perhaps that was why Dad hadn’t wanted me to come: because he knew that by living with them, with people whose faith was less, I risked becoming like them.
礼拜结束了，我们列队走进主日学校。香农和玛丽选了前排的座位。她们给我留了一个，但我犹豫了，想到我已破了安息日的规矩。我来这里还不到一星期，就已经剥夺了上帝的一小时。也许那就是爸爸不让我来的原因：因为他知道，和他们一起生活，和信仰不那么坚定的人一起生活，我极有可能会变得和他们一样。
Shannon waved to me and her V-neck plunged. I walked past her and folded myself into a corner, as far from Shannon and Mary as I could get. I was pleased by the familiarity of the arrangement: me, pressed into the corner, away from the other children, a precise reproduction of every Sunday school lesson from my childhood. It was the only sensation of familiarity I’d felt since coming to this place, and I relished it.
香农向我招手，她的V领开得很低。我从她身边走过，把自己缩到一个角落里，尽可能远离香农和玛丽。我对这种熟悉的安排感到高兴：我，缩进角落，远离其他孩子，准确地再现了童年时期我每次在主日学校上课时的情景。这是我来到这个地方以后唯一熟悉的感觉，我喜欢这种感觉。
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