Every seven-year-old deserves a superhero. That’s just how it is.
每个七岁的小孩都应该拥有一位超级英雄。这是毋庸置疑的事实。
Anyone who doesn’t agree needs their head examined.
所有不同意的人都需要去检查一下脑袋有没有毛病。
That’s what Elsa’s granny says, at least.
至少，爱莎的外婆是这么说的。
Elsa is seven, going on eight. She knows she isn’t especially good at being seven. She knows she’s different. Her headmaster says she needs to “fall into line” in order to achieve “a better fit with her peers.” Other adults describe her as “very grown-up for her age.” Elsa knows this is just another way of saying “massively annoying for her age,” because they only tend to say this when she corrects them for mispronouncing ‘déjà vu” or not being able to tell the difference between “me” and “I” at the end of a sentence. Smart-asses usually can’t, hence the “grown-up for her age” comment, generally said with a strained smile at her parents. As if she has a mental impairment, as if Elsa has shown them up by not being totally thick just because she’s seven. And that’s why she doesn’t have any friends except Granny. Because all the other seven-year-olds in her school are as idiotic as seven-year-olds tend to be, but Elsa is different.
爱莎七岁，很快就八岁了。她知道自己当七岁小孩当得不怎么称职，也清楚自己与众不同。校长说她得“正常些”才能“融入其他小朋友”。大人们总说她“太老成”。爱莎知道这不过是“小小年纪却如此烦人”的另一种说法，因为每当被爱莎纠正单词发音，或者无法为她解释主格和宾格的区别时，大人们才会这么说。越是蠢的人越爱自以为是，所以“老成”这个评价，往往伴随着对她父母的尴尬一笑。只因为爱莎这个七岁小孩没有表现得特别蠢，就好像她有什么精神问题，或是在故意卖弄。这就是为什么爱莎除了外婆没有任何朋友。因为学校里其他七岁小孩都像七岁小孩那么白痴，而爱莎不一样。
She shouldn’t take any notice of what those muppets think, says Granny. Because all the best people are different — look at superheroes. After all, if superpowers were normal, everyone would have them.
她不应该在乎那些笨蛋的想法，外婆说。因为最优秀的人总是与众不同的——看看那些超级英雄。毕竟，如果超能力人人都有，就没什么好稀奇的了。
Granny is seventy-seven years old, going on seventy-eight. She’s not very good at it either. You can tell she’s old because her face looks like newspaper stuffed into wet shoes, but no one ever accuses Granny of being grown-up for her age. “Perky,” people sometimes say to Elsa’s mum, looking either fairly worried or fairly angry as Mum sighs and asks how much she owes for the damages. Or when Granny’s smoking at the hospital sets the fire alarm off and she starts ranting and raving about how “everything has to be so bloody politically correct these days!” when the security guards make her extinguish her cigarette. Or that time she made a snowman in Britt-Marie and Kent’s garden right under their balcony and dressed it up in grown-up clothes so it looked as if a person had fallen from the roof. Or that time those prim men wearing spectacles started ringing all the doorbells and wanted to talk about God and Jesus and heaven, and Granny stood on her balcony with her dressing gown flapping open, shooting at them with her paintball gun, and Britt-Marie couldn’t quite decide if she was most annoyed about the paintball-gun thing or the not-wearing-anything-under-the-dressing-gown thing, but she reported both to the police just to be on the safe side.
外婆七十七岁，马上就七十八了。她也不是一位“称职”的七十多岁老人。她看上去的确很老，脸皱得像塞进湿鞋子里的报纸团，但从没有人说外婆太“老成”了。“活泼。”人们有时会这么对爱莎的妈妈说，表情不是很担心就是很生气。此时，妈妈会叹着气，问对方要赔多少钱。外婆曾经在医院里抽烟，触发了火灾报警器，保安强制她灭烟时，她大声咆哮道：“现在啥事都得他妈的政治正确！”有一次，她在布里特—玛丽和肯特的花园里堆了个雪人，就在他们的阳台正下方，还给它穿上大人的衣服，看着像是有人从屋顶摔了下来。还有一次，一群衣冠楚楚的人挨家挨户按门铃，宣传上帝、基督和天堂，外婆敞开睡裙站在阳台上，端着她的彩弹枪冲他们射击。布里特—玛丽说不清困扰她的是彩弹枪还是睡裙下的赤身裸体，但保险起见，她将这两件事都报告给了警察。
Those are the times, Elsa supposes, that people find Granny perky for her age.
爱莎猜测，这些就是人们觉得外婆在她的年纪过于“活泼”的时刻。
They also say that Granny is mad, but in actual fact she’s a genius. It’s just that she’s a bit of a crackpot at the same time. She used to be a doctor, and she won prizes and journalists wrote articles about her and she went to all the most terrible places in the world when everyone else was getting out. She saved lives and fought evil everywhere on earth. As superheroes do.
他们还说外婆疯了，但事实上她是个天才，只不过同时有点儿古怪。她以前是位医生，得过奖，有记者报道过她奔赴世界上那些最可怕的地方，别的人只会从那些地方往外逃。她在世界各地救人性命，对抗邪恶，就像超级英雄一样。
But one day someone decided she was too old to save lives, even if Elsa quite strongly suspects what they really meant by “too old” was “too crazy.” Granny refers to this person as “Society” and says it’s only because everything has to be so bloody politically correct nowadays that she’s no longer allowed to make incisions in people. And that it was really mainly about Society getting so bleeding fussy about the smoking ban in the operating theaters, and who could work under those sorts of conditions?
但某天，某人觉得她太老，不能救人了。爱莎强烈怀疑，“太老”其实是“太疯”的意思。外婆说这个“某人”叫“社会”，只因为现在所有事都得他妈的政治正确，就不允许她在人身上切口子了。社会对手术室禁烟这件事太吹毛求疵，不来支烟还怎么工作呢？
So now she’s mainly at home driving Britt-Marie and Mum around the bend. Britt-Marie is Granny’s neighbor, Mum is Elsa’s mum. And really Britt-Marie is also Elsa’s mum’s neighbor because Elsa’s mum lives next door to Elsa’s granny. And Elsa obviously also lives next door to Granny, because Elsa lives with her mum. Except every other weekend, when she lives with Dad and Lisette. And of course George is also Granny’s neighbor, because he lives with Mum. It’s a bit all over the place.
于是，现在外婆的主要工作就是在家招惹布里特—玛丽和爱莎的妈妈。布里特—玛丽是外婆的邻居，也是爱莎妈妈的邻居。因为爱莎的妈妈就住在外婆隔壁。当然，爱莎也住在外婆隔壁，因为平时她和妈妈住在一起，但隔周的周末，爱莎会去爸爸和莉丝特的家住。当然，乔治也是外婆的邻居，因为他和爱莎的妈妈住在一起。这事挺绕的。
But anyway, to get back to the point: lifesaving and driving people nuts are Granny’s superpowers. Which perhaps makes her a bit of a dysfunctional superhero. Elsa knows this because she looked up “dysfunctional” on Wikipedia. People of Granny’s age describe Wikipedia as “an encyclopedia, but on the net!” Encyclopedias are what Elsa describes as “Wikipedia, but analog.” Elsa has checked “dysfunctional” in both places and it means that something is not quite functioning as it’s supposed to. Which is one of Elsa’s favorite things about her granny.
不过话说回来：救人性命和把人逼疯都是外婆的超能力。这让她有点儿像是个“功能失调”的超级英雄。爱莎认识这个词，她在维基百科上查过“功能失调”的意思。外婆这个年纪的人形容维基百科是“一部百科全书，但在网上”，而爱莎形容百科全书是“维基百科的仿造品”。爱莎在这两处都查过“功能失调”，它的意思是“未能如预期地发挥作用”。这就是爱莎最喜欢外婆的地方之一。
But maybe not today. Because it’s half past one in the morning and Elsa is fairly tired and would really like to go back to bed. Except that’s not going to happen, because Granny’s been throwing turds at a policeman.
但也许今天例外。现在是凌晨一点半，爱莎非常困，真的很想回床上睡觉。而那是不可能的，因为外婆正在朝一位警察扔屎球。
It’s a little complicated.
情况有点儿复杂。
Elsa looks around the little rectangular room and yawns listlessly and so widely that she looks like she’s trying to swallow her own head.
爱莎环顾这个长方形小房间，无精打采地打了个哈欠，嘴张得很大，像是要把自己的头给吞进去。
“I did tell you not to climb the fence,” she mutters, checking her watch.
“我告诉过你，别去爬围墙。”她边看手表边咕哝。
Granny doesn’t answer. Elsa takes off her Gryffindor scarf and puts it in her lap. She was born on Boxing Day seven years ago (almost eight). The same day some German scientists recorded the strongest-ever emission of gamma radiation from a magnetar over the earth. Admittedly Elsa doesn’t know what a magnetar is, but it’s some kind of neutron star. And it sounds a little like “Megatron,” which is the name of the evil one in Transformers, which is what simpletons who don’t read enough quality literature call “a children’s program.” In actual fact the Transformers are robots, but if you look at it academically they could also be counted as superheroes. Elsa is very keen on both Transformers and neutron stars, and she imagines that an “emission of gamma radiation” would look a bit like that time Granny spilled Fanta on Elsa’s iPhone and tried to dry it out in the toaster. And Granny says it makes Elsa special to have been born on a day like that. And being special is the best way of being different.
外婆没有回答。爱莎摘下她的格兰芬多围巾，放在膝盖上。她七年前（快八年前）出生于节礼日[1]。同一天，一些德国科学家记录下了地球上方的一颗磁星所辐射出的史上最强伽马射线。老实说，爱莎不知道什么是磁星，好像是某种中子星，而且听上去有点儿像“威震天”[2]，就是《变形金刚》里反派的名字。那些没读过什么好书的傻子说它是“小孩子的节目”。变形金刚的确是机器人，但如果你从学术角度去看，它们也可以算得上是超级英雄。爱莎对《变形金刚》和中子星都非常感兴趣，她想象中的“伽马射线辐射”看上去大概像是那一次外婆把芬达泼在了爱莎的手机上，然后试图用烤面包机把它烘干。外婆说，在那个日子出生的爱莎很特别，而“特别”是不同于他人的最好方式。【注：[1]节礼日（Boxing Day）：英联邦部分地区和一些欧洲国家庆祝的节日，一般是每年12月26日，也就是圣诞节次日。但如果26日是礼拜天，则在27日庆祝。如今这一天是每年商场打折力度最大的日子，成为人们的购物日。 [2]“磁星”的英文是magnetar，“威震天”是Megatron，两者读音略相似。】
Granny is busy distributing small heaps of tobacco all over the wooden table in front of her and rolling them into rustling cigarette papers.
外婆正坐在木桌前，忙着把烟草分成一个个小堆，然后用窸窣作响的烟纸把它们卷起来。
“I said I told you not to climb the fence!”
“我说，我叫你别去爬围墙！”
Granny makes a snorting sound and searches the pockets of her much-too-large overcoat for a lighter. She doesn’t seem to be taking any of this very seriously, mainly because she never seems to take anything seriously. Except when she wants to smoke and can’t find a lighter.
外婆不耐烦地哼了一声，在她那件大得夸张的外套的口袋中找打火机。她看上去没把这一切当回事，主要因为她似乎从来不把任何事情当回事。除了想抽烟时，找不到打火机。
“It was a tiny little fence, for God’s sake!” she says breezily. “It’s nothing to get worked up about.”
“拜托！那就是排小小的栅栏好吗！”她轻松地说，“别大惊小怪的。”
“Don’t you ‘for God’s sake’ me! You’re the one who threw shit at the police.”
“你别冲我说‘拜托’！朝警察扔屎球的是你！”
“Stop fussing. You sound like your mother. Do you have a lighter?”
“别烦了，你说话的口气和你妈一样。有打火机吗？”
“I’m seven!”
“我才七岁！”
“How long are you going to use that as an excuse?”
“你什么时候才能不用这个当借口？”
“Until I’m not seven anymore?”
“等我超过七岁？”
Granny mumbles something that sounds like “Not a crime to ask, is it?” and continues rifling through her pockets.
外婆咕哝着什么，听上去像是“问问又不算犯罪”，继续在口袋里翻找。
“I don’t think you can smoke in here, actually,” Elsa informs her, sounding calmer now and fingering the long rip in the Gryffindor scarf.
“可是，我觉得这儿不能抽烟。”爱莎用稍微平静些的语气提醒她，手里把玩着格兰芬多围巾上长长的破口子。
“Course you can smoke. We’ll just open a window.”
“当然能抽，只要开扇窗。”
Elsa looks skeptically at the windows. “I don’t think they’re the sort of windows that open.”
爱莎怀疑地看着窗户。“我觉得这种窗户打不开。”
“Why not?”
“为什么？”
“They’ve got bars on them.”
“上面有铁条。”
Granny glares with dissatisfaction at the windows. And then at Elsa. “So now you can’t even smoke at the police station. Jesus. It’s like being in 1984.”
外婆一脸不满地瞪着窗户，然后看向爱莎。“所以，现在都不能在警察局抽烟了。天啊，简直就像《一九八四》。”
Elsa yawns again. “Can I borrow your phone?”
爱莎又打了个哈欠。“能借我你的电话吗？”
“What for?”
“干吗？”
“To check something.”
“查些东西。”
“Where?”
“哪儿？”
“Online.”
“网上。”
“You invest too much time on that Internet stuff.”
“你在那个叫英特网的玩意儿上投了太多时间。”
“You mean, ‘spend.’ ”
“你的意思是‘花’。”
“I beg your pardon?”
“啥？”
“What I mean is, you don’t use ‘invest’ in that way. You wouldn’t go round saying, ‘I invested two hours in reading Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone,’ would you?”
“我是说，‘投’不是那么用的。你不会到处跟人说，我在读《哈利·波特与魔法石》上投了两小时，对吧？”
Granny just rolls her eyes and hands her the phone. “Did you ever hear about the girl who blew up because she did too much thinking?”
外婆翻了个白眼，把手机递过来。“你没听过那个故事吗？有个女孩想太多，然后就爆炸了。”
The policeman who shuffles into the room looks very, very tired.
一个警察拖着步子走进房间，看上去疲惫不堪。
“I want to call my lawyer,” Granny demands at once.
“我要打电话给我的律师。”外婆立即要求道。
“I want to call my mum!” Elsa demands at once.
“我要打电话给我妈妈！”爱莎立即要求道。
“In that case I want to call my lawyer first!” Granny insists.
“如果是这样的话，我要先打给我的律师！”外婆坚持。
The policeman sits down opposite them and fidgets with a little pile of papers.
警察在她们对面坐下来，摆弄着一叠纸。
“Your mother is on her way,” he says to Elsa with a sigh.
“你妈妈正在赶来。”他叹了口气，对爱莎说。
Granny makes the sort of dramatic gasp that only Granny knows how to do.
外婆夸张地吸了口气，只有她做得出那样的动作。
“Why did you call her? Are you mad?” she protests, as if the policeman just told her he was going to leave Elsa in the forest to be raised by a pack of wolves. “She’ll be bloody livid!”
“你干吗叫她，疯了吗？”她抗议道，就好像警察刚刚告诉她，要把爱莎扔在森林里让一群狼养大。“她会气炸的！”
“We have to call the child’s legal guardian,” the policeman explains calmly.
“我们必须打电话给孩子的法定监护人。”警察沉着地解释。
“I am also the child’s legal guardian! I am the child’s grandmother!” Granny fumes, rising slightly out of her chair and shaking her unlit cigarette menacingly.
“我也是孩子的法定监护人！我是孩子的外祖母！”外婆怒气冲冲，从椅子上微微抬起身，威胁地晃着她没有点燃的香烟。
“It’s half past one in the morning. Someone has to take care of the child.”
“现在是凌晨一点半，必须有人来照顾这个孩子。”
“Yes, me! I’m taking care of the child!” she splutters.
“是啊，我啊！我正在照顾这孩子！”她气急败坏地说。
The policeman makes a fairly strained attempt to gesture amicably across the interrogation room.
警察试着友善地朝审讯室比画了一下，但动作不太自然。
“And how do you feel it’s going so far?”
“那你觉得你现在照顾得怎么样呢？”
Granny looks slightly offended.
外婆看上去有点儿被冒犯的样子。
“Well… everything was going just fine until you started chasing me.”
“嗯…一切都很好，直到你开始追捕我。”
“You broke into a zoo.”
“你闯进了一家动物园。”
“It was a tiny little fence –“
“那就是排小小的栅栏…”
“There’s no such thing as a ‘tiny’ burglary.”
“入室盗窃罪可没有‘小小’这一说。”
Granny shrugs and makes a brushing movement over the table, as if she thinks they’ve stretched this out long enough. The policeman notices the cigarette and eyes it dubiously.
外婆耸了耸肩，在桌子上方一摆手，似乎是觉得他们为这个争执太久了。警察注意到了香烟，怀疑地盯着它。
“Oh, come on! I can smoke in here, can’t I?”
“哦，拜托！我能在这儿抽烟吧？”
He shakes his head sternly. Granny leans forward, looks him deep in the eyes, and smiles. “Can’t you make an exception? Not even for little old me?”
警察坚决地摇摇头。外婆探出身，死死地盯着他的眼睛，微微一笑。“你不能为我破一次例吗？我都这么大年纪了。”
Elsa gives Granny a little shove in the side and switches to their secret language. Because Granny and Elsa have a secret language, as all grannies must have with their grandchildren, because by law that’s a requirement, says Granny. Or at least it should be.
爱莎在旁边推了外婆一下，开始用她们的秘密语言说话。外婆和爱莎有一种秘密的语言，就像所有外婆和她们的外孙外孙女一样。外婆说，这是法律规定的。或者说，法律应该这么规定。
“Drop it, Granny. It’s, like, illegal to flirt with policemen.”
“别这样，外婆，跟警察调情，应该…是违法的。”
“Says who?”
“谁说的？”
“Well, the police for starters!” Elsa replies.
“首先，警察！”爱莎回答。
“The police are supposed to be there for the sake of the citizens,” Granny hisses. “I pay my taxes, you know.”
“警察是为了市民们的利益而存在的，”外婆小声地说，“我纳了税的。”
The policeman looks at them as you do when a seven-year-old and a seventy-seven-year-old start arguing in a secret language in a police station in the middle of the night. Then Granny’s eyelashes tremble alluringly at him as she once again points pleadingly at her cigarette, but when he shakes his head, Granny leans back in the chair and exclaims in normal language: “I mean, this political correctness! It’s worse than apartheid for smokers in this bloody country nowadays!”
警察看着她们，做出任何一个人面对七岁小孩和七十七岁老太太大半夜在警察局里用秘密语言吵架时会做出的反应。外婆的睫毛妩媚地朝他忽闪忽闪，目光再一次恳求般指向她的香烟，然而警察依旧摇头。她靠回椅背，用正常的语言大声说：“多么政治正确！如今这个见鬼的国家，烟民的待遇比种族隔离还糟糕！”
“How do you spell that?” asks Elsa.
“那个词怎么拼？”爱莎问。
“What?” Granny sighs as you do when precisely the whole world is against you, even though you pay taxes.
“什么？”外婆叹了口气，就好像全世界都在和她作对，即使她付了税金。
“That apartight thing,” says Elsa.
“那个什么‘种族隔离’。”爱莎说。
“A-p-p-a-r-t-e-i-d,” Granny spells.
“a—p—p—a—r—t—e—i—d。” [3]外婆说。【注：[3]种族隔离的英文应为apartheid。】
Elsa immediately Googles it on Granny’s phone. It takes her a few attempts — Granny’s always been a terrible speller. Meanwhile the policeman explains that they’ve decided to let them go, but Granny will be called in at a later date to explain the burglary and “other aggravations.”
爱莎立刻用外婆的手机查了谷歌。她试了好几次——外婆一向不擅长拼写。与此同时，警察说已经决定放她们走，但过几天，外婆还会被请回来调查入室盗窃和“其他更严重的罪行”。
“What aggravations?”
“什么罪行？”
“Driving illegally, to begin with.”
“第一项是非法驾驶。”
“What do you mean, illegally? That’s my car! I don’t need permission to drive my own car, do I?”
“你什么意思，非法？那是我的车！我开自己的车不需要什么许可吧？”
“No,” replies the policeman patiently, “but you need a driver’s license.”
“是的。”警察耐心地回答，“但你需要驾驶执照。”
Granny throws out her arms in exasperation. She’s just launched into another rant about this being a Big Brother society when Elsa whacks the phone sharply against the table.
外婆愤怒地挥舞着手臂，正准备大声控诉“独裁社会”时，爱莎突然将手机重重砸向桌子。
“It’s got NOTHING to do with that apartheid thing!!! You compared not being able to smoke with apartheid and it’s not the same thing at all. It’s not even CLOSE!”
“这跟种族隔离的问题一毛钱关系都没有！你把禁止吸烟和种族隔离相比，但这压根就不是一回事，根本连边都沾不上！”
Granny waves her hand resignedly. “I meant it was… you know, more or less like that –“
外婆无奈地挥挥手。“我的意思是…或多或少像是…”
“It isn’t at all!”
“压根不像！”
“It was a metaphor, for God’s sake –“
“这只是个比喻，天啊…”
“A bloody crap metaphor!”
“这比喻烂透了！”
“How would you know?”
“你又是怎么知道的？”
“WIKIPEDIA!”
“维！基！百！科！”
Granny turns in defeat to the policeman. “Do your children carry on like this?”
外婆沮丧地转向警察。“你家孩子也这样？”
The policeman looks uncomfortable. “We… don’t let the children surf the Net unsupervised…”
那警察看上去很不自在。“我们…不让孩子在没有监管的情况下上网…”
Granny stretches out her arms towards Elsa, a gesture that seems to say “You see!” Elsa just shakes her head and crosses her arms very hard.
外婆向爱莎摊开双手，做了个“你看吧”的手势。爱莎只是摇头，在胸前紧紧地交叉着双臂。
“Granny, just say sorry for throwing turds at the police, and we can go home,” she snorts in the secret language, though still very expressly upset about that whole apartheid thing.
“外婆，快跟警察说对不起，不该朝他扔屎球，然后我们就能回家了。”她用秘密语言轻声地说，仍然因为之前种族隔离的说辞很不开心。
“Sorry,” says Granny in the secret language.
“对不起。”外婆用秘密语言说。
“To the police, not me, you muppet.”
“对警察说，别对我说，傻瓜。”
“There’ll be no apologizing to fascists here. I pay my taxes. And you’re the muppet.” Granny sulks.
“我才不会对法西斯分子道歉。我纳了税的。你才是傻瓜。”外婆面带愠色。
“Takes one to know one.”
“彼此彼此。”
Then they both sit with their arms crossed, demonstratively looking away from each other, until Granny nods at the policeman and says in normal language: “Would you be kind enough to let my spoilt granddaughter know that if she takes this attitude she’s quite welcome to walk home?”
接着，她们俩都交叉手臂坐着，赌气不看彼此，直到外婆朝警察点了点头，用正常的语言说：“能不能帮忙跟我这个被宠坏的外孙女说，如果她还是这种态度，那她就自己走路回家吧。”
“Tell her I’m going home with Mum and she’s the one who can walk!” Elsa replies at once.
“告诉她，我和妈妈一起回家，她才是要走回家的那个人！”爱莎立刻反击。
“Tell HER she can –“
“告诉她，她可以…”
The policeman stands up without a word, walks out of the room and closes the door behind him, as if intending to go into another room and bury his head in a large, soft cushion and yell as loud as he can.
警察不发一言站起身，走出房间，关上了身后的门，好像是打算去另一个房间，把头埋进大大的软垫里，用最大的音量尖叫一番。
“Now look what you did,” says Granny.
“这下好了，看看你干的事。”外婆说。
“Look what YOU did!”
“看看你干的事！”
Eventually a heavyset policewoman with piercing green eyes comes in instead. It doesn’t seem to be the first time she’s run into Granny, because she smiles in that tired way so typical of people who know Granny, and says: “You have to stop doing this, we also have real criminals to worry about.” Granny just mumbles, “Why don’t you stop, yourselves?” And then they’re allowed to go home.
最终，另一名眼神犀利、体格魁梧的绿眼睛女警官走进房间，看上去不像是第一次遇见外婆，因为她的笑容苍白无力，就像那些认识外婆的人的典型反应。“你必须停止这种行为，我们还有真正的罪犯要操心呢。”外婆只是含糊不清地念叨了一句：“你自己干吗不停止呢？”然后，她们就被允许回家了。
Standing on the pavement waiting for her mother, Elsa fingers the rip in her scarf. It goes right through the Gryffindor emblem. She tries as hard as she can not to cry, but doesn’t make much of a success of it.
在人行道边等妈妈时，爱莎用手指拨弄着围巾上的破口子。它正好穿过格兰芬多院徽。她努力不让自己哭出来，但没有成功。
“Ah, come on, your mum can mend that,” says Granny, trying to be cheerful, giving her a little punch on the shoulder.
“哦，行了，你妈妈能补好的。”外婆努力表现出欢快的样子，用拳头轻轻地击打了一下爱莎的肩膀。
Elsa looks up anxiously.
爱莎不安地抬起头。
“And, you know… we can tell your mum the scarf got torn when you were trying to stop me climbing the fence to get to the monkeys.”
“嗯，我想想啊…我们可以跟你妈妈说，你试图阻止我爬围墙去看猴子的时候，把围巾扯坏了。”
Elsa nods and runs her fingers over the scarf again. It didn’t get torn when Granny was climbing the fence. It got torn at school when three older girls who hate Elsa without Elsa really understanding why got hold of her outside the cafeteria and hit her and tore her scarf and threw it down the toilet. Their jeers are still echoing in Elsa’s head. Granny notices the look in her eyes and leans forward before whispering in their secret language: “One day we’ll take those losers at your school to Miamas and throw them to the lions!”
爱莎点点头，手指再次划过围巾。它不是在外婆爬围墙时被扯坏的。学校里三个高年级的女孩在餐厅外抓住爱莎，打她，扯坏了她的围巾，还把围巾扔进马桶。这三个女孩讨厌爱莎，但爱莎也不知道为什么。她们的嘲笑声还回荡在爱莎的脑海里。外婆注意到她眼中的情绪，靠近身来，用秘密语言轻声说：“总有一天，我们要把你学校的那些废物带去密阿玛斯，把她们扔去喂狮子。”
Elsa dries her eyes with the back of her hand and smiles faintly.
爱莎用手背擦去眼泪，微微地笑了笑。
“I’m not stupid, Granny,” she whispers. “I know you did all that stuff tonight to make me forget about what happened at school.”
“我不傻，外婆，”她小声说，“我知道你今晚做的一切，都是为了让我忘记白天在学校发生的事。”
Granny kicks at some gravel and clears her throat. “I didn’t want you to remember this day because of the scarf. So I thought instead you could remember it as the day your Granny broke into a zoo –“
外婆踢着路面上的碎石，清了清喉咙。“我不希望你因为围巾的事记住今天，所以，我想与其那样，倒不如因为外婆闯进一家动物园而记住今天这个日子…”
“And escaped from a hospital,” Elsa says with a grin.
“然后从医院逃了出来，”艾尔莎笑着说。
“And escaped from a hospital,” says Granny with a grin.
“然后从医院逃了出来，”奶奶笑着说。
“And threw turds at the police.”
“还朝警察扔了屎球。”
“Actually, it was soil! Or mainly soil, anyway.”
“其实，那是土疙瘩而已！不管怎样，大部分是土啦。”
“Changing memories is a good superpower, I suppose.”
“改写记忆是一种很不错的超能力，我觉得。”
Granny shrugs. “If you can’t get rid of the bad, you have to top it up with more goody stuff.”
外婆耸了耸肩。“如果你摆脱不了坏事，就必须用更多‘好料’去盖过它。”
“That’s not a word.”
“用词不当啦。”
“I know.”
“我知道。”
“Thanks, Granny,” says Elsa and leans her head against her arm.
“谢谢，外婆。”爱莎将头靠在她的手臂上。
And then Granny just nods and whispers: “We’re knights of the kingdom of Miamas, we have to do our duty.”
外婆只是点点头，轻声说：“我们是密阿玛斯的骑士，我们必须尽到自己的责任。”
Because all seven-year-olds deserve superheroes.
每个七岁的小孩都应该拥有一位超级英雄。
And anyone who doesn’t agree needs their head examined.
所有不同意的人都需要去检查一下脑袋有没有毛病。
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