《渺小一生》:他知道威廉正试图控制自己

　 “I promise,” Willem says, his voice low.

“我保证。”威廉说，声音很低。

　 He takes a deep breath. “Do you remember the car accident I was in?”

他深吸了一口气：“你还记得我那次出车祸？”

　 “Yes,” says Willem. He sounds uncertain, strangled. His breathing is quick. “I do.”

“记得，”威廉说，声音听起来不太确定，好像被勒住脖子，变得急促，“我记得。”

　 “It wasn’t a car accident,” he says, and as if on cue, his hands begin to shake, and he plunges them beneath the covers.

“那其实不是车祸。”他说。就在这时，他的双手开始发抖，他赶紧把手藏在被子底下。

　 “What do you mean?” Willem asks, but he remains silent, and eventually he feels, rather than sees, Willem realize what he’s saying. And then Willem is flopping onto his side, facing him, and reaching beneath the covers for his hands. “Jude,” Willem says, “did someone do that to you? Did someone”—he can’t say the words—“did someone beat you?”

“什么意思？”威廉问，但他一直没说话，最后他感觉威廉明白了。然后威廉忽然扑到他旁边，面对他，伸手到被子底下找他的手。“裘德，”威廉说，“有人对你这样吗？有人……”他说不出那些字眼，“有人打你吗？”

　 He nods, barely, thankful that he’s not crying, although he feels like he’s going to explode: he imagines bits of flesh bursting like shrapnel from his skeleton, smacking themselves against the wall, dangling from the chandelier, bloodying the sheets.

他点头，轻轻地，很庆幸自己没哭，虽然他觉得自己快要爆炸了：他想象自己的肉像炸弹碎片似的爆开来，脱离骨骼，砸到墙上，从吊灯垂下，染得床单血肉模糊。

　 “Oh god,” Willem says, and drops his hands, and he watches as Willem hurries out of bed.

“啊老天。”威廉说，手垂了下来。他看到威廉匆匆下床。

　 “Willem,” he calls after him, and then gets up and follows him into the bathroom, where Willem is bent over the sink, breathing hard, but when he tries to touch his shoulder, Willem shrugs his hand off.

“威廉。”他在后头喊着，然后起身跟到浴室。威廉弯身对着水槽，呼吸沉重，当他想碰他肩膀时，威廉甩开他的手。

　 He goes back to their room and waits on the edge of the bed, and when Willem comes out, he can tell he’s been crying.

他回到卧室，坐在床沿等待。等到威廉进来时，他看得出他刚刚哭了。

　 For several long minutes they sit next to each other, their arms touching, but not saying anything. “Was there an obituary?” Willem asks, finally, and he nods. “Show me,” Willem says, and they go to the computer in his study and he stands back and watches Willem read it. He watches as Willem reads it twice, three times. And then Willem stands and holds him, very tightly, and he holds Willem back.

那漫长的几分钟，他们并肩坐着，双臂靠在一起，什么都没说。“有讣闻吗？”威廉最后终于问了，他点点头。“给我看。”威廉说。于是他们到他书房里开了电脑查找，他后退让威廉看。他看着威廉读了两次、三次。之后威廉站直身子拥住他，抱得好紧，他也伸手回抱。

　 “Why didn’t you tell me?” Willem says into his ear.

“你为什么都不告诉我？”威廉凑在他耳边问。

　 “It wouldn’t have made a difference,” he says, and Willem steps back and looks at him, holding him by the shoulders.

“讲不讲都没区别。”他说。威廉退后看着他，两手握住他的肩膀。

　 He can see Willem trying to control himself, and he watches as he holds his long mouth firm, his jaw muscles moving against themselves. “I want you to tell me everything,” Willem says. He takes his hand and walks him to the sofa in his study and sits him down. “I’m going to make myself a drink in the kitchen, and then I’m coming back,” Willem says. He looks at him. “I’ll make you one, too.” He can do nothing but nod.

他知道威廉正试图控制自己，他看着他长长的嘴巴紧闭着，下巴的肌肉微微抽动。“我希望你告诉我一切。”威廉说，牵起他的手，带着他走向书房的沙发，让他坐下来。“我去厨房调杯酒就回来，”威廉说，他看着他，“我也会帮你调一杯。”他什么都做不了，只能点点头。

　 As he waits, he thinks of Caleb. He never heard from Caleb after that night, but every few months, he would look him up. There he was, for anyone to see: pictures of Caleb smiling at parties, at openings, at shows. An article about Rothko’s first freestanding boutique, with Caleb talking about the challenges a young label encounters when trying to break out in a crowded market. A magazine piece about the reemergence of the Flower District, with a quote from Caleb about living in a neighborhood that, despite its hotels and boutiques, still felt appealingly rough-edged. Now, he thinks: Did Caleb ever look him up as well? Did he show a picture of him to Nicholas? Did he say, “I once went out with him; he was grotesque”? Did he demonstrate to Nicholas—whom he imagines as blond and neat and confident—how he had walked, did they laugh with each other about how terrible, how lifeless, he had been in bed? Did he say, “He disgusted me”? Or did he say nothing at all? Did Caleb forget him, or at least choose never to consider him—was he a mistake, a brief sordid moment, an aberration to be wrapped in plastic and shoved to the far corner of Caleb’s mind, with broken toys from childhood and long-ago embarrassments? He wishes he too could forget, that he too could choose never to consider Caleb again. Always, he wonders why and how he has let four months—months increasingly distant from him—so affect him, so alter his life. But then, he might as well ask—as he often does—why he has let the first fifteen years of his life so dictate the past twenty-eight. He has been lucky beyond measure; he has an adulthood that people dream about: Why, then, does he insist on revisiting and replaying events that happened so long ago? Why can he not simply take pleasure in his present? Why must he so honor his past? Why does it become more vivid, not less, the further he moves from it?

他等待时，想到了凯莱布。那一夜之后，他再也没有凯莱布的消息，但每隔两三个月，他就会查一下。一查就有了，每个人都看得到：凯莱布在派对上、在开幕仪式上、在展览上微笑的照片。一篇有关罗斯科第一家独立精品店的报道，里头凯莱布谈到现在时装市场竞争激烈，指出一个年轻品牌要脱颖而出所面临的种种挑战。一篇杂志文章提到花卉区再度兴起，引用了凯莱布一段话，谈到住在这样的地带，尽管有很多饭店和精品店，依然能感觉到那种粗犷的吸引力。而这会儿他心想：凯莱布也查过他的近况吗？他会把他的照片给尼古拉斯看吗？他会说“我跟他交往过，他很怪诞”吗？他会向尼古拉斯（他想象他是个整洁的金发男子，充满自信）示范他走路的样子，两人一起大笑他在床上有多可怕、多死气沉沉吗？凯莱布会忘了他吗？至少选择永远不要想到他吗？因为他是个错误、一个短暂的污秽时刻、一个反常现象，应该被包在塑料袋里，塞在凯莱布心中远远的角落，跟童年坏掉的玩具和许久以前令人难堪的事物放在一起。他一直搞不懂，他为什么、又怎么会让那逐渐远去的四个月，影响自己这么大，改变自己的人生这么多。但接着，他可能也该自问（他的确常常问），为什么他要让自己人生的头十五年支配接下来的二十八年。他已经极其幸运了；他拥有人们梦寐以求的成年时光。那么，为什么他要坚持一再回顾、一再重温那么久以前发生的事情呢？为什么他就不能单纯地享受当下呢？为什么他要这么执着于自己的过往呢？为什么离童年越远，当年的一切就越鲜明，而不是越模糊呢？

　 Willem returns with two glasses of ice and whiskey. He has put on a shirt. For a while, they sit on the sofa, sipping at their drinks, and he feels his veins fill with warmth. “I’m going to tell you,” he says to Willem, and Willem nods, but before he does, he leans over and kisses Willem. It is the first time in his life that he has ever initiated a kiss, and he hopes that with it he is conveying to Willem everything he cannot say, not even in the dark, not even in the early-morning gray: everything he is ashamed of, everything he is grateful for. This time, he keeps his eyes closed, imagining that soon, he too will be able to go wherever people go when they kiss, when they have sex: that land he has never visited, that place he wants to see, that world he hopes is not forbidden to him forever.

威廉拿着两杯加了冰的威士忌回来，身上加了一件衬衫。他们坐在沙发上好一会儿，各自啜着酒，他觉得血管里充满暖意。“我要告诉你了。”他对威廉说，威廉点点头，但开始说之前，他先靠过去吻了威廉。这是他这辈子第一次主动吻别人，他希望借着这个吻，将他说不出来的一切传达给威廉，就连在黑暗中、在清晨的灰光中都说不出来的一切：他羞愧的一切，他感激的一切。这回，他闭上眼睛，想象着很快地，他也可以去到一般人接吻时、做爱时去的那个地方：他从来没有造访过的那片土地，他很想看看那个地方，他期盼、并且没有永远禁止他进入的那个世界。

　 When Kit was in town, they met either for lunch or dinner or at the agency’s New York offices, but when he came to the city in early December, Willem suggested they meet instead at Greene Street. “I’ll make you lunch,” he told Kit.

每回基特来纽约，他们都会碰面吃午餐或晚餐，或者在经纪公司的纽约办公室碰面，但十二月初基特来纽约时，威廉请他来格林街的公寓。“我做午餐请你吃。”他告诉基特。

　 “Why?” asked Kit, instantly wary: although the two of them were close in their own way, they weren’t friends, and Willem had never invited him over to Greene Street before.

“为什么？”基特问，立刻警觉起来。尽管两人合作密切，但并不是好友，威廉也从没请他来格林街。

　 “I need to talk to you about something,” he said, and he could hear Kit making his breaths long and slow.

“我有件事要跟你谈。”他说，听得出基特的呼吸刻意放得缓慢而悠长。

　 “Okay,” said Kit. He knew better than to ask what that something might be, and whether something was wrong; he just assumed it. “I need to talk to you about something” was not, in Kit’s universe, a prelude to good news.

“好吧。”基特说。他知道最好不要问是什么事，或是不是出了什么错；只需假设不是好事。在基特的世界里，“我有件事要跟你谈”不会是好消息的前奏。

　 He knew this, of course, and although he could have reassured Kit, the slightly diabolical part of him decided not to. “Okay!” he said, brightly. “See you next week!” On the other hand, he thought after he hung up, maybe his refusal to reassure Kit wasn’t just childishness: he thought what he had to tell Kit—that he and Jude were now together—wasn’t bad news, but he wasn’t sure Kit would see it the same way.

这点他当然知道。即使他可以跟基特保证，他心中那个有点残忍的部分却决定不要。“好吧，”他开心地说，“下星期见了！”另一方面，挂了电话后，他却想着自己不肯跟基特保证，不光是幼稚而已。他认为自己必须告诉基特的事情（现在他和裘德在一起了）并不是坏消息，但他不确定基特也这么想。