《渺小一生》:这个主意太蠢了

　 He knew that he was sulking, and he removed himself to the back of the building, letting the others talk without him. Above him, the sky was already completely dark, midnight dark. If he faced north, he could see directly beneath him the art-supply store where JB had been working part-time since quitting the magazine a month ago, and in the distance, the Empire State Building’s gaudy, graceless bulk, its tower aglow with a garish blue light that made him think of gas stations, and the long drive back to his parents’ house from Hemming’s hospital bed so many years ago.

他知道自己有点生气，于是独自走到建筑背面，避开其他人的谈话。天空已经完全暗了，午夜的暗。如果他面向北边，可以看到正下方那家美术用品店（杰比一个月前辞掉杂志社的工作后，就跑到这家店当计时店员），以及远方俗艳、丑陋、巨大的帝国大厦，顶端艳丽的蓝光让他想到加油站，以及多年前从亨明的医院开车回他父母家的那段漫长车程。

　 “Guys,” he called over to the others, “it’s cold.” He wasn’t wearing his coat; none of them were. “Let’s go.” But when he went to the door that opened into the building’s stairwell, the handle wouldn’t turn. He tried it again—it wouldn’t budge. They were locked out. “Fuck!” he shouted. “Fuck, fuck, fuck!”

“各位，”他朝其他人喊道，“太冷了。”他没穿大衣，其他人也没穿，“我们回去吧。”但是等他走到顶楼门边，却转不动门把。他又试了一次，门把动也不动，他们被锁在外头了。“他妈的！”他大叫，“他妈的，他妈的，他妈的！”

　 “Jesus, Willem,” said Malcolm, startled, because Willem rarely got angry. “Jude? Do you have the key?”

“老天，威廉。”马尔科姆说。他很吃惊，因为威廉很少生气。“裘德？你有钥匙吗？”

　 But Jude didn’t. “Fuck!” He couldn’t help himself. Everything felt so wrong. He couldn’t look at Jude. He blamed him, which was unfair. He blamed himself, which was more fair but which made him feel worse. “Who’s got their phone?” But idiotically, no one had his phone: they were down in the apartment, where they themselves should have been, were it not for fucking JB, and for fucking Malcolm, who so unquestioningly followed everything JB said, every stupid, half-formed idea, and for fucking Jude as well, for last night, for the past nine years, for hurting himself, for not letting himself be helped, for frightening and unnerving him, for making him feel so useless: for everything.

但裘德没有。“他妈的！”威廉忍不住又骂了一声。每件事都不对劲。他没办法看裘德。他怪他是不合理的，怪自己，倒是比较合理，但让他感觉更糟。“谁有手机？”他们真白痴，手机居然全放在楼下公寓里。他们本来也该待在公寓里的，要不是他妈的杰比，以及他妈的马尔科姆，总是毫不犹豫地对杰比言听计从，包括他说的每句话、每个不成形的愚蠢念头；还有他妈的裘德，要不是昨天晚上，要不是过去九年，要不是他伤害自己，不让别人帮他，害得他惊恐又慌张，觉得自己好没用。要不是这一切！

　 For a while they screamed; they pounded their feet on the rooftop in the hopes that someone beneath them, one of their three neighbors whom they’d still never met, might hear them. Malcolm suggested throwing something at the windows of one of the neighboring buildings, but they had nothing to throw (even their wallets were downstairs, tucked cozily into their coat pockets), and all the windows were dark besides.

他们大叫了一阵子，在屋顶上跺脚，虽然他们从没见过这栋楼的其他三户邻居，但希望住楼下的人听到他们的声音。马尔科姆建议朝邻近的大楼窗子丢个什么，但他们没有东西可丢（就连他们的皮夹都在楼下，好好地塞在大衣口袋里），何况所有的窗子都没亮。

　 “Listen,” Jude said at last, even though the last thing Willem wanted to do was listen to Jude, “I have an idea. Lower me down to the fire escape and I’ll break in through the bedroom window.”

“听我说。”裘德最后终于说了，即使威廉现在最不想做的，就是听裘德讲话。“我有个主意。你们把我放到防火梯上，我会打开卧室的窗子。”

　 The idea was so stupid that he initially couldn’t respond: it sounded like something that JB would imagine, not Jude. “No,” he said, flatly. “That’s crazy.”

这个主意太蠢了，他一开始根本无法反应，听起来像是杰比会想出的法子，而不是裘德。“不行。”他冷冷地说，“这太疯狂了。”

　 “Why?” asked JB. “I think it’s a great plan.” The fire escape was an unreliable, ill-conceived, and mostly useless object, a rusted metal skeleton affixed to the front of the building between the fifth and third floors like a particularly ugly bit of decoration—from the roof, it was a drop of about nine feet to the landing, which ran half the width of their living room; even if they could safely get Jude down to it without triggering one of his episodes or having him break his leg, he’d have to crane over its edge in order to reach the bedroom window.

“为什么？”杰比问，“我觉得这个计划很棒。”这栋建筑的防火梯很不牢靠，设计欠佳，一点用处都没有，生锈的金属骨架固定在建筑正面的五楼到三楼间，像个特别丑的装饰品。从屋顶往下大概要九英尺，才会到达防火梯顶端的平台，平台在他们公寓外头，约有半个客厅那么宽。就算他们可以安全地把裘德放下去，不会引起他的疼痛发作或害他摔断腿，他还得把身体探出平台，才够得到卧室的窗子。

　 “Absolutely not,” he told JB, and the two of them argued for a bit until Willem realized, with a growing sense of dismay, that it was the only possible solution. “But not Jude,” he said. “I will.”

“绝对不行。”他告诉杰比，他们两个吵了一会儿，直到威廉愈发丧气地发现，这是唯一可能的办法。“可是不能让裘德去。”他说，“我来吧。”

　 “You can’t.”

“不行。”裘德说。

　 “Why? We won’t need to break in through the bedroom, anyway; I’ll just go in through one of the living-room windows.” The living-room windows were barred, but one of them was missing, and Willem thought he might be able to squeeze between the remaining two bars, just. Anyway, he’d have to.

“为什么？反正我们不一定要敲破卧室的窗子，我只要从客厅的一扇窗子进去就行了。”客厅的窗子装了铁栅，但其中一根不见了。威廉觉得自己或许可以勉强挤进去。总之，他非得挤挤看不可。

　 “I closed the windows before we came up here,” Jude admitted in a small voice, and Willem knew that meant he’d also locked them, because he locked anything that could be: doors, windows, closets. It was reflexive for him. The bedroom window’s lock was broken, however, so Jude had fashioned a mechanism—a complex, blocky thing made from bolts and wire—that he claimed secured it completely.

“我们上来之前，我把窗子关上了。”裘德小声承认。威廉知道这表示他也顺手锁上了窗子，因为他向来会把能锁的全锁上，门、窗子、柜子。那是他的本能。不过卧室窗子的锁坏了，所以之前裘德用螺栓和铁丝做了一个复杂、结实的小机关，宣称可以把窗子锁好。

　 He had always been mystified by Jude’s hyper-preparedness, his dedication to finding disaster everywhere—he had long ago noticed Jude’s habit of, upon entering any new room or space, searching for the nearest exit and then standing close to it, which had initially been funny and then, somehow, became less so—and his equal dedication to implementing preventative measures whenever he could. One night, the two of them had been awake late in their bedroom, talking, and Jude had told him (quietly, as if he was confessing something precious) that the bedroom window’s mechanism could in fact be opened from the outside, but that he was the only one who knew how to unjam it.

他总是搞不懂裘德那种随时随地过度准备、努力寻找各种灾难的习性，而且同样努力做好各种预防性措施——他很早就注意到，裘德只要进入一个陌生的房间或空间，就会习惯性地找出最接近的出口，然后站在那附近。一开始他觉得很滑稽，后来不知怎的，就没那么好笑了。有天晚上，他们两个在卧室聊到很晚。裘德告诉他（很小声，仿佛在透露某种宝贵信息），卧室的那个机关其实可以从外头打开，但他是唯一能破解的人。

　 “Why are you telling me this?” he’d asked.

“你为什么要告诉我？”当时他问。

　 “Because,” Jude had said, “I think we should get it fixed, properly.”

“因为，”裘德说，“我觉得我们应该找人来把窗子修好。”

　 “But if you’re the only one who knows how to open it, why does it matter?” They didn’t have extra money for a locksmith, not to come fix a problem that wasn’t a problem. They couldn’t ask the superintendent: After they had moved in, Annika had admitted that she technically wasn’t allowed to sublet the apartment, but as long as they didn’t cause any problems, she thought the landlord wouldn’t bother them. And so they tried not to cause problems: they made their own repairs, they patched their own walls, they fixed the plumbing themselves.

“但如果你是唯一有办法破解的人，修不修也没区别吧？”他们没多余的钱请锁匠，何况这个问题不再是问题了。他们不能找公寓管理员：他们搬进来之后，安妮卡承认，严格来说，她不能把公寓转租给他们，但只要他们不惹麻烦，她想房东应该不会来烦他们。所以他们设法不要惹麻烦：有什么坏掉了就自己想办法修理，墙壁也自己补贴了壁纸，还修好了水管。

　 “Just in case,” Jude had said. “I just want to know we’re safe.”

“只是以防万一，”裘德说，“我只是想确保我们的安全。”

　 “Jude,” he’d said. “We’re going to be safe. Nothing’s going to happen. No one’s going to break in.” And then, when Jude was silent, he sighed, gave up. “I’ll call the locksmith tomorrow,” he’d said.

“裘德，”他说，“我们很安全。不会出什么事的。不会有人闯进来的。”裘德沉默不语，于是他叹了口气，投降了。“我明天会打电话找锁匠。”他说。

　 “Thank you, Willem,” Jude had said.

“谢了，威廉。”裘德说。

　 But in the end, he’d never called.

但是后来，他始终没打那通电话。