The summer I sang the lead for Annie it was 1999. My father was in serious preparedness mode. Not since I was five, and the Weavers were under siege, had he been so certain that the Days of Abomination were upon us.
一九九九年夏天，我在《安妮》一剧中担任主唱。父亲处于严阵以待的状态。自从我五岁时韦弗一家被围攻，他从未像现在这样肯定，世界末日马上要降临了。
Dad called it Y2K. On January 1, he said, computer systems all over the world would fail. There would be no electricity, no telephones. All would sink into chaos, and this would usher in the Second Coming of Christ.
爸爸称之为“千年虫”。到一月一日，他说，全世界的计算机系统都将崩溃。到时候没有电，没有电话，一切都会陷入混乱，而这将预示基督的第二次降临。
“How do you know the day?” I asked.
“你怎么知道是这一天？”我问。
Dad said that the Government had programmed the computers with a six-digit calendar, which meant the year had only two digits. “When nine-nine becomes oh-oh,” he said, “the computers won’t know what year it is. They’ll shut down.”
爸爸说，政府编程的电脑日历以六位数显示，这意味着年份只有两位数。“当99变成了00，”他说，“电脑就不知道是哪一年了，它们会瘫痪。”
“Nope, can’t be done,” Dad said. “Man trusted his own strength, and his strength was weak.”
“修不好，”爸爸说，“人只相信自己的力量，而人力量微弱。”
“Can’t they fix it?”
“他们不能修好它吗？”
At church, Dad warned everyone about Y2K. He advised Papa Jay to get strong locks for his gas station, and maybe some defensive weaponry. “That store will be the first thing looted in the famine,” Dad said. He told Brother Mumford that every righteous man should have, at minimum, a ten-year supply of food, fuel, guns and gold. Brother Mumford just whistled. “We can’t all be as righteous as you, Gene,” he said. “Some of us are sinners!” No one listened. They went about their lives in the summer sun.
在教堂，爸爸提醒大家提防千年虫。他建议杰伊老爹为他的加油站买些结实的锁，也许该弄些防御武器。“大饥荒来了，商店将是被洗劫的首要目标。”爸爸说。他告诉芒福德教友，每一个正直之士应该至少储备供十年使用的食物、燃料、枪支和黄金。芒福德教友只是吹了吹口哨。“我们不可能都像你一样正直，吉恩，”他说，“我们中有些人是罪人！”没有人听他的话。他们在夏日艳阳底下照常生活。
One afternoon, Dad climbed into the excavator and dug a pit next to the old barn. Then, using the loader, he lowered a thousand-gallon tank into the pit and buried it with a shovel, carefully planting nettles and sow thistle in the freshly tossed dirt so they would grow and conceal the tank. He whistled “I Feel Pretty” from West Side Story while he shoveled. His hat was tipped back on his head, and he wore a brilliant smile. “We’ll be the only ones with fuel when The End comes,” he said. “We’ll be driving when everyone else is hotfooting it. We’ll even make a run down to Utah, to fetch Tyler.”
一天下午，爸爸爬进挖掘机，在旧谷仓旁挖了一个坑。接着他用装载机把一千加仑的油罐放进坑里，用铁锹填埋好，在新鲜的泥土上精心种上荨麻，撒上蓟种子，这样它们长出来就能遮蔽油罐。拿着铁锹掩埋时，他吹着《西区故事》里《我感觉真好》的调子。他帽檐向脑后倾斜，一脸灿烂的微笑。“末日来了，我们将是唯一有燃料的人，”他说，“其他所有人靠双脚奔逃的时候，我们还能开车。我们甚至能开到犹他州去接泰勒。”
Meanwhile, my family boiled and skinned peaches, pitted apricots and churned apples into sauce. Everything was pressure-cooked, sealed, labeled, and stored away in a root cellar Dad had dug out in the field. The entrance was concealed by a hillock; Dad said I should never tell anybody where it was.
与此同时，我们一家人将桃子煮熟去皮，给杏去核，把苹果搅成酱。一切都被高压烹熟，密封，贴上标签，储存于爸爸在牧场挖的地窖里。地窖入口很隐蔽，被一个小丘遮挡，爸爸警告我们绝不能把位置告诉任何人。
I had rehearsals most nights at the Worm Creek Opera House, a dilapidated theater near the only stoplight in town. The play was another world. Nobody talked about Y2K.
大多数晚上我都在虫溪剧场排练。那是一个破旧的剧院，靠近镇上唯一一盏红绿灯。剧场是另一个世界，那里没有人谈论千年虫。
The interactions between people at Worm Creek were not at all what I was used to in my family. Of course I’d spent time with people outside my family, but they were like us: women who’d hired Mother to midwife their babies, or who came to her for herbs because they didn’t believe in the Medical Establishment. I had a single friend, named Jessica. A few years before, Dad had convinced her parents, Rob and Diane, that public schools were little more than Government propaganda programs, and since then they had kept her at home. Before her parents had pulled Jessica from school, she was one of them, and I never tried to talk to her; but after, she was one of us. The normal kids stopped including her, and she was left with me.
虫溪剧场里人们的交流方式与我们家全然不同。当然，我也和家人以外的人来往，但那些人和我们一样：要么是雇母亲接生的女人，要么是不相信医疗机构来找她买草药的女人。我只有一个朋友，叫杰西卡。几年前，爸爸说服她的父母罗伯和黛安，说公立学校只不过是政府的宣传项目。从此以后，他们也把她留在家里。杰西卡的父母把她从学校拽走之前，她还是“他们”中的一员，我从未和她说过话；但后来她成了“我们”中的一员。正常的孩子不再要她了，她被留给了我。
I’d never learned how to talk to people who weren’t like us — people who went to school and visited the doctor. Who weren’t preparing, every day, for the End of the World. Worm Creek was full of these people, people whose words seemed ripped from another reality. That was how it felt the first time the director spoke to me, like he was speaking from another dimension. All he said was, “Go find FDR.” I didn’t move.
我从没学过如何跟与我们不一样的人，与那些去上学、去看医生，不为世界末日来临天天备战的人交谈。虫溪剧场里都是这样的人，他们的话仿佛脱胎于另一种现实。导演第一次和我说话时我就是这种感觉，就好像他来自异次元世界。他只说了一句话：“去找找FDR的资料。”我没有反应。
“Is that like a JCB?” I said. “You need a forklift?”
“你是说JCB[14]吗？”我说，“你需要叉车吗？”【注：[14]JCB，杰西博，建筑机械设备品牌。】
A week before opening night, Mother dyed my brown hair cherry red. The director said it was perfect, that all I needed now was to finish my costumes before the dress rehearsal on Saturday.
开演前一周，母亲把我棕色的头发染成了樱桃红色。导演说完美，现在我只需在周六彩排前把演出服搞定。
Everyone laughed.
大家都笑了。
He tried again. “President Roosevelt. FDR.”
他又说了一次：“罗斯福总统。FDR[13]。”【注：[13]FDR，富兰克林·德拉诺·罗斯福（Franklin Delano Roosevelt）名字的缩写。】
In our basement I found an oversized knit sweater, stained and hole-ridden, and an ugly blue dress, which Mother bleached to a faded brown. The dress was perfect for an orphan, and I was relieved at how easy finding the costumes had been, until I remembered that in act two Annie wears beautiful dresses, which Daddy Warbucks buys for her. I didn’t have anything like that.
我从家里的地下室找出一件肥大的针织毛衣，脏兮兮的，满是洞眼，还有一条很丑的蓝裙子，母亲把它漂成了浅棕色。穿这条裙子演一个孤儿再合适不过了，我为自己轻而易举找到了演出服而感到欣慰，直到我想起第二幕中，安妮穿着沃巴克斯爸爸买给她的漂亮衣裙。那样的衣服我可没有。
I’d memorized all my lines, but at rehearsals I sat alone, pretending to study my black binder. When it was my turn onstage, I would recite my lines loudly and without hesitation. That made me feel a kind of confidence. If I didn’t have anything to say, at least Annie did.
所有台词我都烂熟于心，但排练时，我一个人坐在那里，假装研究我的黑色活页夹。轮到我上台时，我会毫不犹豫地大声背诵台词。这给了我自信。如果我无话可说，至少安妮有的说。
I told Mother and her face sank. We drove a hundred miles round-trip, searching every secondhand shop along the way, but found nothing. Sitting in the parking lot of the last shop, Mother pursed her lips, then said, “There’s one more place we can try.”
我告诉了母亲，她脸色一沉。我们驱车一百英里，沿途到每一家二手商店苦苦寻找，但一无所获。在最后一家店的停车场里，母亲噘起嘴唇说：“还有一个地方我们可以去试试。”
We drove to my aunt Angie’s and parked in front of the white picket fence she shared with Grandma. Mother knocked, then stood back from the door and smoothed her hair. Angie looked surprised to see us — Mother rarely visited her sister — but she smiled warmly and invited us in. Her front room reminded me of fancy hotel lobbies from the movies, there was so much silk and lace. Mother and I sat on a pleated sofa of pale pink while Mother explained why we’d come. Angie said her daughter had a few dresses that might do.
我们开车去了安琪姨妈家，把车停在她和外婆共用的白色尖桩栅栏前。母亲敲了敲门，然后站在门外，理顺头发。安琪见到我们很惊讶——母亲很少看望这个妹妹——但她热情地微笑着请我们进屋。她家前厅有许多丝绸和蕾丝，让我想起了电影里豪华酒店的大堂。我和母亲坐在淡粉色的褶皱沙发上，母亲解释了我们为何而来。安琪说她女儿有几条裙子，可能用得上。
Mother waited on the pink sofa while Angie led me upstairs to her daughter’s room and laid out an armful of dresses, each so fine, with such intricate lace patterns and delicately tied bows, that at first I was afraid to touch them. Angie helped me into each one, knotting the sashes, fastening the buttons, plumping the bows. “You should take this one,” she said, passing me a navy dress with white braided cords arranged across the bodice. “Grandma sewed this detailing.” I took the dress, along with another made of red velvet collared with white lace, and Mother and I drove home.
母亲坐在粉红色的沙发上等着，安琪领我来到楼上她女儿的房间，摆出一大堆裙子，每一件都很精美，有着繁复的蕾丝花边和雅致的蝴蝶结。起初我不敢去碰它们。安琪帮我一一试穿，系上腰带，扣上扣子，整理好蝴蝶结。“你应该穿这件。”说着，她递给我一件深蓝色的裙子，裙子上身镶有白色编织坠饰。“上面的小装饰都是你外婆缝的。”我拿了那件裙子，还有另一件带白蕾丝花边的红色天鹅绒裙，和母亲开车回了家。
When the director of the next play got divorced, it confirmed Dad’s suspicions. He said he hadn’t kept me out of the public school for all these years just to see me corrupted on a stage. Then he drove me to the rehearsal. Nearly every night he said he was going to put a stop to my going, that one evening he’d just show up at Worm Creek and haul me home. But each time a play opened he was there, in the front row.
下一部剧的导演离婚的时候，爸爸的怀疑得到了证实。他说这些年来他没送我去公立学校读书，可不是为了看我在舞台上堕落。之后排练都是他亲自开车送我去。几乎每晚他都说以后不会再让我去了，说他迟早会在哪天晚上去虫溪剧场把我拖回家。但每次演出一开始他就来了，坐在第一排。
The play opened a week later. Dad was in the front row. When the performance ended, he marched right to the box office and bought tickets for the next night. It was all he talked about that Sunday in church. Not doctors, or the Illuminati, or Y2K. Just the play over in town, where his youngest daughter was singing the lead.
这出剧一星期后开演。爸爸坐在前排。演出结束后，他径直走到售票处，又买了第二天晚上的票。那个星期天他在教堂没有谈论别的。不再谈论医生或光明会，也不再提什么千年虫，只谈论镇上上演的那出戏剧，他的小女儿在里面担任主唱。
Dad didn’t stop me from auditioning for the next play, or the one after that, even though he worried about me spending so much time away from home. “There’s no telling what kind of cavorting takes place in that theater,” he said. “It’s probably a den of adulterers and fornicators.”
尽管爸爸担心我离家在外的时间太久，但他并没有阻止我去为下一出剧以及再下一出剧试唱。“谁知道剧院里在进行什么勾当，”他说，“很可能是通奸者的巢穴呢。”
I did it for a month.
我这样坚持了一个月。
Sometimes he played the part of an agent or manager, correcting my technique or suggesting songs for my repertoire, even advising me about my health. That winter I caught a procession of sore throats and couldn’t sing, and one night Dad called me to him and pried my mouth open to look at my tonsils.
有时他扮演经纪人或经理的角色，纠正我的演唱技巧，为我推荐曲目，甚至为我的健康出谋划策。那年冬天，我的嗓子持续疼痛，无法唱歌。一天晚上，爸爸把我叫到跟前，撬开我的嘴，查看我的扁桃体。
“They’re swollen, all right,” he said. “Big as apricots.” When Mother couldn’t get the swelling down with echinacea and calendula, Dad suggested his own remedy. “People don’t know it, but the sun is the most powerful medicine we have. That’s why people don’t get sore throats in summer.” He nodded, as if approving of his own logic, then said, “If I had tonsils like yours, I’d go outside every morning and stand in the sun with my mouth open — let those rays seep in for a half hour or so. They’ll shrink in no time.” He called it a treatment.
“它们都肿了，好吧，”他说，“肿得跟杏子似的。”母亲用紫锥菊和金盏花也没能让它们消肿，爸爸便提出了自己的疗法：“人们不知道，其实太阳才是最强大的药物。夏天人们不会喉咙痛就是这个原因。”他点了点头，仿佛对自己的逻辑深表赞同，然后说，“如果我的扁桃体像你这样，我就会每天早上出门站在太阳底下，张开嘴巴，晒上半小时左右。它们很快就会消肿。”他称之为“治疗”。
It was uncomfortable, standing with my jaw dropped and my head tilted back so the sun could shine into my throat. I never lasted a whole half hour. My jaw would ache after ten minutes, and I’d half-freeze standing motionless in the Idaho winter. I kept catching more sore throats, and anytime Dad noticed I was a bit croaky, he’d say, “Well, what do you expect? I ain’t seen you getting treatment all week!”
站在那里，抬起下巴，头向后仰着，让阳光照进喉咙，这个姿势极不舒服，我连半小时都坚持不了。十分钟后我的下巴就开始疼痛，且一动不动地站在爱达荷州冬日的严寒中，人很快就冻僵了。我的喉咙越来越疼。每当爸爸发现我嗓音沙哑，他就会说：“嗯，你还能指望怎样？我都整个星期没见你好好治疗了！”
“I’m Charles,” he said. There was a pause while he waited for me to give my name, but I didn’t. “I saw you in the last play,” he said after a moment. “I wanted to tell you something.” I braced myself, for what I wasn’t sure, then he said, “I wanted to tell you that your singing is about the best I ever heard.”
“我叫查尔斯。”他说。他停顿了一下，等着我说我的名字，但我没吭声。“我在上一出剧里见过你。”过了一小会儿，他又说：“我想告诉你一件事。”我做好准备，不知道他要说什么，然后他说：“我想告诉你，你的歌声是我听过的最好听的。”
He shifted to the right, making room for me. I sat slowly, tensely, as if the seat were made of needles.
他向右挪了挪，为我腾了个地方。我如坐针毡般慢慢地、紧张地坐下。
It was at the Worm Creek Opera House that I first saw him: a boy I didn’t know, laughing with a group of public school kids, wearing big white shoes, khaki shorts and a wide grin. He wasn’t in the play, but there wasn’t much to do in town, and I saw him several more times that week when he turned up to visit his friends. Then one night, when I was wandering alone in the dark wings backstage, I turned a corner and found him sitting on the wooden crate that was a favorite haunt of mine. The crate was isolated — that was why I liked it.
第一次见到他是在虫溪剧场：一个我不认识的男孩，和一群公立学校的孩子一起笑着，穿一双白色大鞋，卡其短裤，笑容灿烂。他没参演戏剧，但城里又没什么地方可以消遣。那个星期，他来看望他的朋友，我又见过他几次。一天晚上，我一个人在后台黑暗的角落闲逛时，一转弯，发现他坐在我最喜欢坐的木箱上。箱子孤零零的——这正是我喜欢它的原因。
I came home one afternoon from packing macadamias to find Dad and Richard gathered around a large metal box, which they’d hefted onto the kitchen table. While Mother and I cooked meatloaf, they assembled the contents. It took more than an hour, and when they’d finished they stood back, revealing what looked like an enormous military-green telescope, with its long barrel set firmly atop a short, broad tripod. Richard was so excited he was hopping from one foot to the other, reciting what it could do. “Got a range more than a mile! Can bring down a helicopter!”
一天下午，我把夏威夷果打包完毕后回到家，发现爸爸和理查德围坐在一个大金属盒子旁。他们把大盒子抬到了餐桌上。我和母亲做肉卷的时候，他们就组装起里面的东西来。他们花了一个多小时才完成，然后退后一步，给我们展示一个貌似巨大的绿色军用望远镜的东西，长长的管筒稳稳地支在一个短而宽的三脚架上。理查德兴奋地跳来跳去，一一罗列它能做什么。“射程超过一英里！能把一架直升机打下来呢！”
Dad stood quietly, his eyes shining.
爸爸静静地站着，眼睛闪闪发光。
I peered through the scope, searching the mountainside, fixing distant stalks of wheat between its crosshairs.
我透过瞄准镜观察，在山坡上搜寻，在十字线之间瞄准远处的麦田。
“What is it?” I asked.
“这是什么？”我问。
“It’s a fifty-caliber rifle,” he said. “Wanna try it?”
“这是一支五十口径步枪，”他说，“想不想试一试？”
“Defense,” he said.
“防御。”他说。
The meatloaf was forgotten. We charged outside. It was past sunset; the horizon was dark. I watched as Dad lowered himself to the frozen ground, positioned his eye at the scope and, after what felt like an hour, pulled the trigger. The blast was thunderous. I had both palms pressed to my ears, but after the initial boom I dropped them, listening as the shot echoed through the ravines. He fired again and again, so that by the time we went inside my ears were ringing. I could barely hear Dad’s reply when I asked what the gun was for.
肉卷被忘得一干二净，大家跑到外面。日落时分已过，地平线一片黑暗。我看着爸爸趴在冻僵的地面上，眼睛盯着瞄准镜，感觉过了一小时之久，他才扣动扳机。冲击波震耳欲聋。我双手捂住耳朵，等砰的头一声枪响过后，才放下双手，听着枪声在山谷中回荡。他一次又一次地开火，等我们进了屋，我的耳朵还在嗡嗡作响。当我问那支枪是干什么用的，爸爸的回答我几乎没听清。
It wasn’t a question.
这不是一个问句。
“You don’t go to school,” he said.
“你不上学啊。”他说。
The next night I had a rehearsal at Worm Creek. I was perched on my crate, listening to the monologue being performed onstage, when Charles appeared and sat next to me.
第二天晚上，我在虫溪剧场排练。我坐在板条箱上，听着台上的独白，这时查尔斯出现了，坐到我旁边。
“You should come to choir. You’d like choir.”
“你应该参加唱诗班。你会喜欢的。”
“Maybe,” I said, and he smiled. A few of his friends stepped into the wing and called to him. He stood and said goodbye, and I watched him join them, taking in the easy way they joked together and imagining an alternate reality in which I was one of them. I imagined Charles inviting me to his house, to play a game or watch a movie, and felt a rush of pleasure. But when I pictured Charles visiting Buck’s Peak, I felt something else, something like panic. What if he found the root cellar? What if he discovered the fuel tank? Then I understood, finally, what the rifle was for. That mighty barrel, with its special range that could reach from the mountain to the valley, was a defensive perimeter for the house, for our supplies, because Dad said we would be driving when everyone else was hotfooting it. We would have food, too, when everyone else was starving, looting. Again I imagined Charles climbing the hill to our house. But in my imagination I was on the ridge, and I was watching his approach through crosshairs.
“也许吧。”我说，他笑了。他的几个朋友走到舞台这一侧喊他。他站起来跟我道别，我看着他加入他们，与他们一起轻松地说笑，想象着在另一个平行现实中我成了他们中的一员。我想象查尔斯邀请我去他家，邀请我去玩游戏或看电影，感到一阵心驰神往。但当我想象查尔斯来巴克峰做客的时候，我感到了另一种东西，类似于恐慌。如果他发现了地窖怎么办？如果他发现了油箱怎么办？接着我终于明白了那支步枪的用途。那支特殊的、射程覆盖山到山谷的巨大枪管，是保卫我们的房子和补给品的防御工事，因为爸爸说过在其他人只能靠双脚奔逃的时候，我们将能开车。其他人都在挨饿、抢劫的时候，我们还会有食物。我又一次想象查尔斯爬上山来到我们家。但在我的想象中，我在山脊上，正通过十字瞄准镜，望着他一步步走过来。
After dinner, Dad studied Isaiah for hours. At around ten he closed his Bible and turned on the TV. The television was new. Aunt Angie’s husband worked for a satellite-TV company, and he’d offered Dad a deal on a subscription. No one had believed it when Dad said yes, but in retrospect it was entirely characteristic for my father to move, in the space of a day, from no TV or radio to full-blown cable. I sometimes wondered if Dad allowed the television that year, specifically, because he knew it would all disappear on January 1. Perhaps he did it to give us a little taste of the world, before it was swept away.
晚饭后，爸爸研读了几个小时的《以赛亚书》。十点左右，他合上《圣经》，打开电视。电视是新的。安琪姨妈的丈夫在一家卫星电视公司工作，他让爸爸订阅他们的节目。不敢相信爸爸竟然答应了。回想起来，这完全是爸爸的风格。在一天之内，原本没有电视和收音机的家里一下子装上了全套的有线电视。我有时会想，爸爸破例同意在那一年安装电视，是否因为他知道在一月一日，一切都将消失。也许他这么做是为了在一切被吞没之前，让我们领略一番这个世界。
Before Christmas, we continued our preparations as if every action, every minor addition to our stores might make the difference between surviving, and not; after Christmas, we waited. “When the hour of need arises,” Dad said, “the time of preparation has passed.”
圣诞节前，我们继续做准备工作，好像每一步行动、每一点储备物资的增添，都可能攸关生死。圣诞节后，我们等待着。“当需要的时刻到来，”爸爸说，“准备的时刻就过去了。”
Christmas was sparse that year. We weren’t poor — Mother’s business was doing well and Dad was still scrapping — but we’d spent everything on supplies.
那年的圣诞节我们没怎么过。我们并不贫穷——母亲的生意做得很好，爸爸还在捡收废品——但我们把所有钱都花在了补给品上。
The days dragged on, and then it was December 31. Dad was calm at breakfast but under his tranquillity I sensed excitement, and something like longing. He’d been waiting for so many years, burying guns and stockpiling food and warning others to do the same. Everyone at church had read the prophecies; they knew the Days of Abomination were coming. But still they’d teased Dad, they’d laughed at him. Tonight he would be vindicated.
日子一天天过去，转眼到了十二月三十一日。早餐时爸爸很平静，但在他的宁静中我感受到兴奋与类似渴望的东西。他等了这么多年，埋藏枪支，囤积食物，还告诫别人也这么做。教堂里的每个人都读过预言书，他们知道世界末日将要到来。尽管如此，他们还是对爸爸冷嘲热讽。今晚将证明他是正确的。
Dad’s favorite program was The Honeymooners, and that night there was a special, with episodes playing back to back. We watched, waiting for The End. I checked the clock every few minutes from ten until eleven, then every few seconds until midnight. Even Dad, who was rarely stirred by anything outside himself, glanced often at the clock.
爸爸最喜欢看《蜜月期》[15]。那天晚上播出特别节目，一再回放过去的剧集。我们看电视，等着“完结”。从十点到十一点，我隔几分钟便查看一次时钟，之后每隔几秒就看一眼，直到午夜。即便很少为外界事物所动的爸爸，也频频瞥向时钟。【注：[15]The Honeymooners，2005年播出的美国喜剧，下文中的拉尔夫和爱丽丝·卡拉门登是剧中一对夫妇。】
11:59.
11：59。
Then it was 12:00. The TV was still buzzing, its lights dancing across the carpet. I wondered if our clock was fast. I went to the kitchen and turned on the tap. We had water. Dad stayed still, his eyes on the screen. I returned to the couch.
接着到了十二点。电视仍在嗡嗡作响，发出的光在地毯上舞动。我在想我们的时钟是不是走快了。我来到厨房，打开水龙头。还有水。爸爸一动不动，眼睛盯着屏幕。我又回到沙发上。
12:05.
12：05。
I held my breath. One more minute, I thought, before everything is gone.
我屏住呼吸，心想：再过一分钟，一切就都烟消云散了。
How long would it take for the electricity to fail? Was there a reserve somewhere that was keeping it going these few extra minutes?
还有多长时间电力才会中断？是不是哪个地方有额外储备用电，还能多持续几分钟？
The black-and-white specters of Ralph and Alice Kramden argued over a meatloaf.
电视上拉尔夫和爱丽丝·卡拉门登的黑白影像如幽灵一般，正为一个烘肉卷争吵。
12:10.
12：10。
I waited for the screen to flicker and die. I was trying to take it all in, this last, luxurious moment — of sharp yellow light, of warm air flowing from the heater. I was experiencing nostalgia for the life I’d had before, which I would lose at any second, when the world turned and began to devour itself.
我等待电视屏幕突然一闪后熄灭。我努力记住这一切，记住这最后的奢侈的时刻——记住强烈的黄色光线，记住流动在电热器周围的温暖空气。世界将化为乌有，我的人生随时会终结，我正体验着对过往生活的怀旧之情。
But God withheld the flood.
但上帝并未让洪水泛滥。
He seemed smaller to me than he had that morning. The disappointment in his features was so childlike, for a moment I wondered how God could deny him this. He, a faithful servant, who suffered willingly just as Noah had willingly suffered to build the ark.
在我看来，与那天早上相比，他更矮小了。他脸上的失望是如此孩子气，一时间我疑惑上帝怎么能不遂他的心愿。他是那样虔诚的信徒，心甘情愿地受苦，就像挪亚心甘情愿去建造方舟一样。
Sometime after 1:30 I went to bed. I glimpsed Dad as I left, his face frozen in the dark, the light from the TV leaping across his square glasses. He sat as if posed, with no agitation, no embarrassment, as if there were a perfectly mundane explanation for why he was sitting up, alone, at near two in the morning, watching Ralph and Alice Kramden prepare for a Christmas party.
一点半过后，我上床睡觉了。离开时我瞥了一眼父亲，他的脸在黑暗中凝固，电视光线在他的方框眼镜上闪烁。他摆姿势一般坐着，既不激动，也不尴尬。至于为什么在接近凌晨两点时还独自坐在那里，看着电视上的拉尔夫和爱丽丝·卡拉门登为圣诞晚会做准备，他仿佛有再平常不过的理由。
The longer I sat motionless, breathing deeply, trying to inhale the last scent of the fallen world, the more I resented its continuing solidity. Nostalgia turned to fatigue.
我一动不动地坐了许久，深呼吸，试图吸进这个沉沦的世界的最后一丝气息。越这么做，我就越讨厌一切原封不动。怀旧变成了厌倦。
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