《渺小一生》:“我不能讓你這樣對自己?！?/h1>

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2020年06月18日

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　 “It’s over, Willem,” he said at last. “It was a long time ago. I don’t need help.”

“那些都過去了，威廉，”他最后終于說，“那是很久以前的事了。我不需要幫助?！?

　 There was another silence. “Was Brother Luke the person who hurt you?” Willem asked, and then, when he was quiet, the seconds ticking past, “Do you like having sex, Jude?”

兩人又沉默了一會兒?！氨R克修士就是傷害你的人嗎？”威廉問。他沒吭聲，幾秒鐘過去?！棒玫?，你喜歡做愛嗎？”

　 If he spoke, he would cry, and so he didn’t speak. The word no, so short, so easy to say, a child’s sound, a noise more than a word, a sharp exhalation of air: all he had to do was part his lips, and the word would come out, and—and what? Willem would leave, and take everything with him. I can endure this, he would think when they had sex, I can endure this. He could endure it for every morning he woke next to Willem, for every affection Willem gave him, for the comfort of his company. When Willem was watching television in the living room and he was walking by, Willem would reach out his hand and he would take it, and they would remain there, Willem watching the screen and sitting, he standing, their hands in each other’s, and finally he would let go and continue moving. He needed Willem’s presence; every day since Willem had moved back in with him, he had experienced that same feeling of calm he had when Willem had stayed with him before he left to shoot The Prince of Cinnamon. Willem was his ballast, and he clung to him, even though he was always aware of how selfish he was being. If he truly loved Willem, he knew, he would leave him. He would allow Willem—he would force him, if he had to—to find someone better to love, someone who would enjoy having sex with him, someone who actually desired him, someone with fewer problems, someone with greater charms. Willem was good for him, but he was bad for Willem.

如果他開口，就會哭出來，因此他無法回答。“不”這個字這么短、這么容易說出口，連小孩都可以，比較像個聲音而非文字，只是用力吐出一口氣。他唯一要做的就是張開嘴唇，那個字就能吐出來。然后——然后怎樣？威廉會離開，帶走一切。我可以忍受這個，他們做愛時他會想，我可以忍受這個。他可以忍受這個，以換取每天早晨在威廉旁邊醒來，換取威廉給他的種種關(guān)愛，換取有他做伴的舒適。威廉在起居室看電視而他經(jīng)過時，威廉會伸出一只手，他會握住，兩個人就保持那樣的姿勢，威廉坐著看電視，他站著，兩個人握著手，最后他會放開，繼續(xù)往前走。他需要威廉在場；自從威廉搬進來跟他住以后，每一天他都體驗到威廉去拍《肉桂王子》之前跟他同住的那種平靜感。威廉是他的穩(wěn)定力量，他想抓緊不放，即使他知道自己有多么自私。如果他真的愛威廉，他就該離開他，讓威廉找一個更好的人去愛（必要的話，還會逼他），一個可以享受跟他做愛、真正對他有欲望、毛病比較少、更有魅力的人。威廉對他有好處，他對威廉卻有壞處。

　 “Do you like having sex with me?” he asked when he could finally speak.

“你喜歡跟我做愛嗎？”他最后終于開口問。

　 “Yes,” said Willem, immediately. “I love it. But do you like it?”

“喜歡，”威廉立刻說，“我很愛，但是你喜歡嗎？”

　 He swallowed, counted to three. “Yes,” he said, quietly, furious at himself and relieved as well. He had won himself more time: of Willem’s presence, but also of sex. What, he wonders, if he had said no?

他咽下口水，數(shù)到三?！跋矚g?！彼吐曊f，很生自己的氣，但同時也放心了。他又為自己爭取到更多時間：讓威廉留在身邊的時間，但也是做愛的時間。他很好奇，如果他說不，那會怎樣呢？

　 And so on they went. But in compensation for the sex, there is the cutting, which he has been doing more and more: to help ease the feelings of shame, and to rebuke himself for his feelings of resentment. For so long, he had been so disciplined: once a week, two cuts each time, no more. But in the past six months, he has broken his rules again and again, and now he is cutting himself as much as he had when he was with Caleb, as much as he had in the weeks before the adoption.

于是他們繼續(xù)過下去。但為了彌補性交，他就割自己，割得越來越兇，好幫自己減輕羞愧的感覺，也懲罰自己產(chǎn)生怨恨之感。好長一段時間以來，他一直嚴(yán)格遵守紀(jì)律：每周只割一次，每次只割兩道，絕不超過。但過去六個月，他一再打破規(guī)則，現(xiàn)在他割得跟當(dāng)初和凱萊布在一起時一樣多，跟他被收養(yǎng)前那幾個星期一樣多。

　 His accelerated cutting was the topic of their first truly awful fight, not only as a couple but ever, in their entire twenty-nine years of friendship. Sometimes the cutting has no place in their relationship. And sometimes it is their relationship, their every conversation, the thing they are discussing even when they’re not saying anything. He never knows when he’ll come to bed in his long-sleeved T-shirt and Willem will say nothing, or when Willem will begin interrogating him. He has explained to Willem so many times that he needs it, that it helps him, that he is unable to stop, but Willem cannot or will not comprehend him.

他這樣加速割自己，也成了他們第一次真正大吵的主題，不光是兩人談戀愛以來，也是他們認識二十九年來僅有的一次。有時，他的割傷在兩人的伴侶關(guān)系中根本不存在。但有時，這些割傷好像是他們關(guān)系的全部，所有的對話都離不開，即使不說話也在無言地討論。他穿長袖T恤上床時，從來不知道威廉什么時候不會吭聲，什么時候又會開始質(zhì)問他。他跟威廉解釋過很多次了，說他需要割自己，說這樣能幫助他，說他沒辦法停止，但威廉就是不能了解，或者不肯了解。

　 “Don’t you understand why this upsets me so much?” Willem asks him.

“你難道不明白，這為什么會讓我如此心煩嗎？”威廉問他。

　 “No, Willem,” he says. “I know what I’m doing. You have to trust me.”

“不，威廉，”他說，“我知道自己在做什么。你必須信任我?！?

　 “I do trust you, Jude,” Willem says. “But trust is not the issue here. The issue is you hurting yourself.” And then the conversation deadends itself.

“我是信任你啊，裘德，”威廉說，“但現(xiàn)在的問題不是信任，而是你在傷害自己?！比缓髮υ捑妥孕薪Y(jié)束。

　 Or there is the conversation that leads to Willem saying, “Jude, how would you feel if I did this to myself?” and him saying, “It’s not the same thing, Willem,” and Willem saying, “Why?” and him saying, “Because, Willem—it’s you. You don’t deserve it,” and Willem saying, “And you do?” and him being unable to answer, or at least not able to provide an answer that Willem would find adequate.

或者有的對話會讓威廉說：“裘德，如果我對自己這樣，你會有什么感覺？”他說：“不一樣的，威廉。”威廉就說：“為什么？”而他說：“因為，威廉——因為是你，你不應(yīng)該遭受這些?！蓖畡t說：“那你就應(yīng)該？”他沒辦法回答，至少想不出一個能讓威廉接受的答案。

　 About a month before the fight, they’d had a different fight. Willem had, of course, noticed that he was cutting himself more, but he hadn’t known why, only that he was, and one night, after he was certain Willem was asleep, he was creeping toward the bathroom, when suddenly, Willem had grabbed him hard around the wrist, and he had gasped from fright. “Jesus, Willem,” he’d said. “You scared me.”

他們大吵前一個月左右，曾經(jīng)吵過一架。威廉當(dāng)然注意到他割自己割得更兇了，但不知道為什么。有一晚，他確定威廉睡著后，躡手躡腳要去浴室。忽然間，威廉用力握住他的手腕，他嚇得倒抽一口氣。“天啊，威廉，”他說，“你嚇了我一跳?！?

　 “Where are you going, Jude?” Willem had asked, his voice tense.

“裘德，你要去哪里？”威廉問，聲音很緊張。

　 He’d tried to pull his arm free, but Willem’s grip was too strong. “I have to go to the bathroom,” he said. “Let go, Willem, I’m serious.” They had stared at each other in the dark until finally Willem had released him, and then had gotten out of bed as well.

他試著抽出手臂，但威廉抓太牢了。“我得去浴室，”他說，“放開我，威廉。我說真的。”他們在黑暗中凝視彼此，最后威廉總算放開他，自己也下了床。

　 “Let’s go, then,” he’d said. “I’m going to watch you.”

“那走吧，”他說，“我跟你去?！?

　 They had quarreled, then, hissing at each other, each of them furious at the other, each of them feeling betrayed, he accusing Willem of treating him like a child, Willem accusing him of keeping secrets from him, each as close as they had ever been to yelling at the other. It had ended with him wrenching out of Willem’s grasp and trying to run toward his study so he could lock himself in and cut himself with a pair of scissors, but in his panic he had stumbled and fallen and split his lip, and Willem had hurried over with a bag of ice and they had sat there on the living-room floor, halfway between their bedroom and his study, their arms around each other, apologizing.

于是他們開始拌嘴，對彼此惡聲惡氣，生對方的氣，覺得自己被背叛。他指控威廉拿他當(dāng)小孩，威廉指控他有秘密瞞著不讓他知道，幾乎就要吼起來了。最后是他掙脫威廉的手，想跑向書房，把自己關(guān)在里面，用一把剪刀割自己，但恐慌中，他絆倒了，跌在地上，嘴唇碰破了。威廉趕緊拿一袋冰塊過來，兩個人坐在起居室的地板上，在臥室和書房之間，彼此相擁著道歉。

　 “I can’t have you doing this to yourself,” Willem had said the next day.

“我不能讓你這樣對自己?！蓖稳者@么說。

　 “I can’t not,” he said, after a long silence. You don’t want to see me without it, he wanted to tell Willem, as well as: I don’t know how I’d make my way through life without it. But he didn’t. He was never able to explain to Willem what the cutting did for him in a way he’d understand: how it was a form of punishment and also of cleansing, how it allowed him to drain everything toxic and spoiled from himself, how it kept him from being irrationally angry at others, at everyone, how it kept him from shouting, from violence, how it made him feel like his body, his life, was truly his and no one else’s. Certainly he could never have sex without it. Sometimes he wondered: If Brother Luke hadn’t given it to him as a solution, who would he have become? Someone who hurt other people, he thought; someone who tried to make everyone feel as terrible as he did; someone even worse than the person he was.

“我不能不做?！彼聊S久后說。你不會想看到我不割自己的，他想告訴威廉，還有：我不知道沒了這個，我要怎么活下去。但他什么都沒說。他從來沒辦法用威廉可以理解的方式，去解釋割自己對他的效果：它是一種懲罰，也是一種凈化的形式，它讓他得以排掉身上各種有毒或腐壞的東西，讓他不會對其他每個人產(chǎn)生無理的憤怒，讓他不會大叫、使用暴力，讓他覺得自己的身體、自己的人生都真正屬于他，而不是別人的。如果不割自己，他當(dāng)然也絕對沒有辦法性交。有時他很納悶，如果盧克修士沒有給他這個藥方，他會變成什么樣的人？一個總是傷害別人的人，他心想；一個設(shè)法讓每個人感覺跟他一樣糟糕的人；那樣的人，甚至比現(xiàn)在的他還差勁。

　 Willem had been silent for even longer. “Try,” he said. “For me, Judy. Try.”

威廉沉默了更久?！霸囋嚳窗?，”他說，“為了我，小裘。試試看吧。”