洗衣店楼上

洗衣店楼上

Above the Launderette

丹尼尔没有问发生了什么事。他看了看她的包，又看了看她身后亮着灯的面包店窗户，沃尔特还低着头坐在厨房桌旁。然后，他用大拇指指了指座位。“上车吧，”他轻声说，“车里很暖和，咖啡也很难喝。你会觉得像在自己家一样。”

Daniel did not ask what had happened. He looked at her bag, then at the lit window of the bakery behind her, where Walter was still sitting at the kitchen table with his head bowed. Then he jerked his thumb towards the seats. “Get on,” he said quietly. “It’s warm in here, and the coffee’s terrible. You’ll feel right at home.”

她上了车。他关上车门，公交车驶离了Bridge Street，经过了Shah’s漆黑的窗户，以及三号和五号的空房子。安娜没有回头看。她坐在前排座位上，把包放在膝盖上，看着灰蒙蒙且半睡半醒的小镇退去，天空慢慢由黑变暗蓝。

She got on. He closed the doors, and the bus pulled away from Bridge Street, past the dark windows of Shah’s and the empty houses at numbers three and five. Ana did not look back. She sat in the front seat with her bag on her knees and watched the town go past, grey and half asleep, while the sky slowly turned from black to dark blue.

这是他当班的最后一班车。车上有三名乘客：两名去医院的清洁工，还有一个穿西装的男人，显然根本没回过家。没有人注意前排座位上的年轻女人，她正低声向司机讲述着她人生中最糟糕的一夜。

It was the last round of his shift. There were three passengers: two cleaners going to the hospital and a man in a suit who had obviously not been home at all. Nobody paid any attention to the young woman in the front seat who was telling the driver, in a low voice, the worst night of her life.

她把一切都告诉了他：那首歌、窗户、照片、杰丝在黑暗中跑过她身旁，还有桌上的钥匙。丹尼尔一边开车一边听着。他并没有说‘我早就告诉过你了’，尽管他完全有理由这么说。当她说完整件事时，他整整安静了两个车站。

She told him everything: the song, the window, the photo, Jess running past her in the dark, the keys on the table. Daniel drove and listened. He did not say I told you so, although he had every right to. When she had finished, he was quiet for two whole stops.

“好，”他最后说道，“接下来这样办。等我下班后，你跟我回家。我有一张沙发床。它不是什么好的沙发床，其实挺差的，但你想睡多久就睡多久。格蕾丝只在周末过来住。”

“Right,” he said finally. “Here’s what’s going to happen. When my shift finishes, you’re coming back to my place. I’ve got a sofa bed. It’s not a good sofa bed, it’s actually quite a bad one, but it’s yours for as long as you need it. Grace only stays at the weekend.”

“丹尼尔，我不能……”

“Daniel, I can’t…”

“你可以，而且必须这样。另一个选择是车站的长椅，我见过那张长椅。它比我的沙发更糟糕。”他在后视镜里看了她一眼，“再说，我需要有个人下棋输给我。格蕾丝已经开始赢我了。这很伤我的自信心。”

“You can, and you will. The alternative is the bench at the station, and I’ve seen that bench. It’s worse than my sofa.” He glanced at her in the mirror. “Besides, I need somebody to lose at chess to me. Grace has started winning. It’s bad for my confidence.”

丹尼尔的公寓在Mill Road的洗衣店楼上，离公交车场有两条街。房间小而温暖，散发着楼下洗衣机的洗衣粉味。冰箱上贴满了孩子的画：一辆紫色的公交车、一只六条腿的猫，还有一个留着胡子的男人，显然那是丹尼尔。窗台上摆着一副国际象棋，棋局下到了一半。

Daniel’s flat was above the launderette on Mill Road, two streets from the bus depot. It was small and warm and smelled of washing powder from the machines downstairs. There were children’s drawings all over the fridge: a purple bus, a cat with six legs, a man with a beard who was clearly Daniel. A chessboard stood on the windowsill, in the middle of a game.

他拉开沙发床，那床发出像垂死动物一般的声响，他给了她两条毯子和一个印着卡通兔子的枕头。然后他回自己的房间睡觉了，因为那天晚上他还要开车。安娜没脱衣服就躺下了。她以为自己绝睡不着。结果她睡了九个小时。

He pulled out the sofa bed, which made a noise like a dying animal, and gave her two blankets and a pillow with a cartoon rabbit on it. Then he went to sleep in his own room, because he had to drive again that night. Ana lay down in her clothes. She thought she would never sleep. She slept for nine hours.

她醒来时已是下午，手机里满是信息。没有一条是杰丝发来的。安娜在夜里给她写了六次，有长信息也有短信息，有道歉也有解释。每条信息旁边小小的双灰勾表明杰丝都读过了。但她一条也没有回复。

When she woke up, it was the middle of the afternoon and her phone was full of messages. None of them were from Jess. Ana had written to her six times in the night, long messages and short ones, apologies and explanations. Two small grey ticks next to each one showed that Jess had read them all. She had not answered a single one.

大部分信息都是普里亚发来的。普里亚不习惯发简短的信息，也不用句号。从早上六点起，她每小时都发一份关于面包店的情况汇报，读这些信息就像听她在柜台对面说话一样。

Most of the messages were from Priya. Priya did not believe in short messages, or in full stops. She had written a report on the bakery every hour since six in the morning, and reading them was like listening to her talk across the counter.

“亲爱的，沃尔特直到六点才开门，不是差十分五点，丹尼尔的公交车八年来第一次没拿到奶酪卷。到八点时，货架已经空了一半。沃德太太的女儿来拿她订的生日蛋糕，结果根本没有蛋糕。沃尔特站在店里，一句话也不说。他今天的手抖得很厉害。杰丝上学前来帮了忙，我觉得她哭了。安娜，发生什么事了？”

Walter didn’t open until six, my dear, not ten to five, and Daniel’s bus went without its cheese rolls for the first time in eight years. The shelves were half empty by eight. Mrs Ward’s daughter came for a birthday cake that she had ordered, and there was no cake. Walter stood in the shop and said nothing at all. His hands were very bad today. Jess helped before school and I think she was crying. Ana, what happened?

安娜把信息读了三遍。然后她把手机屏幕朝下放在卡通兔子枕头上，用双手捂住了双眼。她本来想保护沃尔特，现在他却独自站在店里，双手颤抖，货架空空。她本来想保护杰丝，杰丝却在柜台后面哭泣。她谁也没保护得了。

Ana read the message three times. Then she put the phone face down on the cartoon rabbit and pressed her hands over her eyes. She had wanted to protect Walter, and now he was standing alone in his shop with shaking hands and empty shelves. She had wanted to protect Jess, and Jess was crying behind the counter. She had protected nobody.