Chapter 3 03

Mick played outside late last night, but woke up early in the morning.The sun was pouring down on the earth, and the heat was unbearable, and her coffee was too hot for breakfast, so she had to add some syrup to the ice water and eat cold biscuits.She tossed about in the kitchen for a while before going out to the front porch to read the comic strip in the newspaper.She had thought Mr. Singer was reading the paper on the porch too, as he did that most Sunday mornings.But Mr. Singer was not there, and her father said later that he had come back late the night before and was in the room with another person.She waited for Mr. Singer for a long time, and the other boarders came down, but he never disappeared.At last she had to go back to the kitchen and lift Ralph out of the high chair, put him in clean clothes, and wipe his little face clean.She was getting ready now, and when the little one came back from Sunday school, she could take the children out.She put the little one in the pram with Ralph, otherwise he would be hurting barefoot on the hot pavement.She pushed the stroller about eight blocks to a big new house that was under construction.With the ladder still on the edge of the roof, she mustered up her courage and began to climb.

"Take care of Ralph," she said, turning to the little one. "Keep the mosquitoes out of his eyelids." Five minutes later, Mick stood on the roof, straightening his back.She stretched out her arms, as if spreading wings.Everyone wants to stand here, on this highest point.But not many children can do it.Most of the children are very scared. After all, if one does not stand firmly, he will roll off the edge and die.As far as the eye can see, there are roofs of other houses and the green crowns of big trees all around.On the other side of the town are church steeples and factory chimneys.The sky was blue and the weather was hot as if it was on fire.Under the scorching sun, everything on the earth is either blindingly white or tanned black.

Mick really wanted to sing.All the songs she knew were rushing to her throat, and she hadn't made a sound.Last week, a tall boy climbed to the top of this roof, yelled and then recited a line he had learned in high school: "Friends, Romans, fellow citizens, listen to me! "Standing on a high place, there will be a crazy feeling, and people can't help but want to shout, sing, and raise their arms to fly high. She felt the soles of her tennis shoes slip, and quickly squatted down, straddling the pointed roof.The house was by far the largest house on the block, and it looked almost finished.The house had two floors and the ceiling was so high that she had never seen such a steep roof.But soon the building work will be done, at which point the carpenter will leave and the children will have to find somewhere else to play.

At this moment, she is alone.There was no one else around, and the surroundings were silent, so she could take the opportunity to think for a while.She took out the pack of cigarettes she bought last night from the pocket of her shorts.She smoked slowly and felt a feeling of drunkenness.She felt a little top-heavy, but she had to finish the cigarette. She thought with all her heart that she would be famous at the age of seventeen, and when the time came, she would sign "MK" on everything.She will return home in a red and white Packard, which also has her initials spray-painted on the doors.She will also write MK in red on handkerchiefs and underwear.She might be a great inventor.She would invent a miniature radio the size of a green pea, so that people could carry it around and listen to it in their ears.She also wants to invent an aircraft. People can carry the aircraft on their backs like backpacks and travel around the world.After that, she will be the first to open a huge tunnel that runs through the world and goes straight to China, and let people ride through the tunnel in a large balloon.These were the first things she would invent.She had already planned it.

Mick smoked half of the cigarette, crushed the remaining half, and flicked the butt off the sloping roof.Then, leaning forward, resting her head on her arms, she began humming. Oddly enough, there was almost always piano or other music playing in the back of her head.No matter what she was doing, no matter what she was thinking, the music was almost always there.The lodger, Miss Brown, had a radio in her room, and she had sat on the steps listening to it on Sunday afternoons all last winter.It was probably classical music that she heard, and that is what she remembers best.Moreover, every time she hears someone's music, her heart throbs endlessly.Some days the man's music was like little colorful crystal candies, other times his tunes were soft and pathetic.

Suddenly there was a cry.Mick quickly sat up straight and listened carefully.The bangs on her forehead were messed up by gusts of wind, and the sun was shining brightly, making her face pale and covered with beads of sweat.The whimpering sound was uninterrupted, and Mick lay on the steeple and moved slowly.She came to the end, leaned forward, lay on the roof, poked her head over the edge, and looked down. The children are still where they are.The little one squatted on top of something, and the black shadow around him was small.Ralph was still in the stroller, strapped into his body.He had only just learned to sit, and now he was clutching the edge of the stroller and crying, the hat on his head was askew.

"Little one!" Mick shouted down, "Go and see what Ralph wants, and hand it to him." The little one stood up and stared at the little baby's face. "He wants nothing." "Then you shake him." Mick crawled back to where she had been sitting.She wished she could think more about two or three other people, and she wanted to sing and make plans.Only Ralph cried and cried, and she never had a moment's peace. Bolding up her courage, she climbed to the ladder on the edge of the roof.The roof is really steep, and now only a few pieces of wood are nailed, and the distance is far away, which is the tripod of the craftsman.She looked dizzy, her heart was beating wildly, and she was trembling all over.She said to herself with forced composure, "Hold on tight with your hands, slide down, put your feet there, lean against the roof, and twist to the left. Be brave, Mick, you must Take courage."

Descending has always been the hardest part of climbing.It took her a long time to climb to the ladder, and she finally felt a little safe.When she was finally on the ground, she looked much smaller, and for a moment it felt like her legs were going to collapse with her.She jerked the shorts and fastened the belt one buttonhole.Ralph was still crying, but she ignored it and went into the empty new house. Last month, they put up a sign in front of the house that read "Children not allowed on construction site".One night a group of children sneaked into the house to play, and it was too dark to see, and a girl ran into a room that hadn't been floored, and fell and broke her leg.She has not been discharged from the hospital until now, and she also has a cast on her leg.Another time, a bunch of bad boys pissed on a wall and wrote obscenities.Unless the house is painted, construction is complete, and someone moves in, no amount of "No Entry" signs put up will stop the little ones from coming to play.

The room smelled of new wood, and the soles of her tennis shoes would squeak as she walked, echoing throughout the house.The room was stuffy and quiet.She stood motionless in the middle of the front hall for a while, and then suddenly thought of something.She rummaged in her pocket and took out two chalks.One is green and the other is red. Mick slowly drew large capital letters—she wrote “Edison” on top, and “Dick Tracy” and “Mussolini” below.Then, in each corner, she wrote her initials MK in the largest letters, first in green and then outlined in red.After writing this, she went to the opposite wall and wrote the dirty word "slut", and wrote her initials under the word.

She stood in the middle of the empty room, looking at her masterpiece.The chalk was still in her hand, but she was not satisfied.She tried to recall the composer's name she had heard on the radio last winter.She inquired about it with a girl in the school. That girl had a piano at home and she was learning to play his music, so she inquired about it with her teacher.It is as if the composer was a child who lived in a certain country in Europe many years ago.Even if he was a child, he still wrote so many moving piano pieces, violin pieces and symphonies.She also remembers about half a dozen different tunes she's heard.Some of them have bright and crisp rhythms, and some of them seem to be filled with the breath of spring rain.But these songs made her feel sad and excited at the same time.

She hummed one of the tunes and felt tears fill her eyes as she was alone in the empty, stuffy house for a while.Her throat constricted, her voice was hoarse, and she could no longer sing.Soon, she wrote the composer's name - Mozart - on top of the names. Ralph was still strapped into the pram.He was sitting quietly at this moment, motionless, with two chubby little hands hanging by his sides.Ralph, with his black bangs and big black eyes, looked like a Chinese doll.The sun was shining on his face, and that's why he was crying.Tiny is gone.Ralph grinned again when he saw her.She pulled the pram into the shade on the side of the new house and pulled a blue jelly bean from her shirt pocket.She stuffed the candy into the warm soft mouth of the little baby. "Taste slowly," she told him.In a sense it was wasteful, since Ralph was too young to taste sweets.Even if you give him a clean stone, he will taste the same, but it will be miserable if the little fool swallows the stone.He couldn't taste it, and he couldn't understand what others said.It doesn't matter if you're saying you've had enough and can't be bothered to push him around and want to throw him in the river, or that you love him.From his point of view, everything really wasn't that different.Because of this, pushing him around would be extremely boring. Mick cupped his hands, squeezed them together, and blew into the space between his thumbs.Her cheeks bulged, and at first there was only the sound of air blowing through her fists.Next, there was a sharp and high-pitched whistle.After a while, Xiao BuDian circled around the corner of the house. She flicked the sawdust out of the little one's hair and straightened Ralph's hat.In Ralph's clothing, this hat can be said to be the most exquisite.The hat is inlaid with lace and embroidered.The ribbon tied under his chin was blue on one side and white on the other, and each ear was covered with large rosettes.His head was too big for the hat to fit on his head and the embroidery was frayed, but she always put it on him whenever she took him out.Ralph didn't have a decent pram, like most people's kids did, and he didn't have summer socks.He could only sit in this dilapidated stroller she bought for Christmas three years ago, being pushed around.But that exquisite hat more or less earned him a little face. Today is Sunday, and it is almost noon, and the weather is hot, and the streets are empty.The stroller creaked.The little one was barefoot, and the sidewalk was hot, making his feet sting.The lush oaks cast shadows on the ground that looked cool, but not cool enough. "Get in the pram," she told the little one. "Just put Ralph on your lap." "I have no problem walking." The long summer days always make the little one suffer from colic.He was shirtless and his ribs were prominent and white.The sun was hot and he was pale instead of tanned, with nipples like blue raisins on his chest. "I'll push you, no problem," Mick said. "Come on." "Ok." Mick was not in a hurry to go home, so he slowly pushed the stroller forward.She started talking to the children, but it was more like talking to herself. "It's kind of weird to say--I've been having weird dreams lately. I seem to be swimming. But not in the water. I stretch out my arms and swim in countless streams of people. The sea of ​​people is going to A hundred times more people than there was in Cressers' grocery store on a Saturday afternoon. It was the largest crowd in the world. Sometimes I shouted and swam among the crowd, where I swam, Knocks people down somewhere. There are times when I'm on the ground and people step on me and my guts and stuff spray out onto the sidewalk. Look, it's not just a normal dream, it's a nightmare That's right." The tenants were visited on Sundays, so that the house would be full of people.Newspapers could be heard rattling, the room was filled with cigarette smoke, and footsteps were heard on the stairs. "There are always things you don't want to say to outsiders. Not because it's a bad thing, but because you just don't want to say it to others. Some things, I don't even want to tell you." At the corner, Tiny got out of the stroller and helped her lift it off the curb and onto the sidewalk ahead. "However, I am willing to exchange everything I have for one thing. That is a piano. If I can have a piano, I will practice every night and learn all the tunes in the world. This is what I want most." By this time, they had walked to the block where their house was located, and they were only a few houses away.Their three-story house was one of the largest in the northern part of town.There are fourteen people in the family. There are not many Kellys. The rest are tenants. They pay five yuan each for food and lodging, so they have to be counted.Mr. Singer could not be counted because he rented only one room and kept it clean and tidy himself. The house was narrow and hadn't been painted in years.The house seemed too weak to support the weight of three stories, and one side had sagged. Mick unbuckled Ralph and lifted him out of the stroller.She walked quickly down the corridor, and out of the corner of her eye she saw that the living room was full of tenants.Her father was there too.Mother must be in the kitchen.Those people are waiting for dinner. There were three rooms occupied by their own family, and now she went into the first room, put Ralph in the bed where her parents slept, and gave him a string of beads to play with.The door of the next room was closed, and she heard voices coming from inside, so she decided to go and have a look. Hazel and Etta fell silent when they saw her.Etta was sitting in a chair by the window, painting her toenails with red nail polish.Her hair was wrapped in stainless-steel curls, and the pimples under her chin were covered in white cream.Hazel was still lying lazily on the bed as usual. "What are you talking about?" "None of your business." Etta said, "Shut your mouth and stay away from us." "This is your room, and it's also mine. You have the right to stay here, and so do I." Mick walked from one corner of the room to the other arrogantly, walking through the entire room, "I don't want to Finding faults and quarreling, I just want my own rights." Mick brushed back her shaggy bangs with the palm of her hand, as she often did because there was always a lock of unruly hair on her forehead.She wrinkled her nose, made a face at herself in the mirror, and started walking up and down the room again. Hazel and Etta are still qualified sisters.But Etta is out of tune all day long, and all she thinks about is being a movie star and making movies.Once, she wrote to Janet MacDonald and received a typewritten letter saying that if she went to Hollywood, she could go to Macdonald's house and swim in her swimming pool.Since then, the swimming pool has become Etta's dream goal.All she thought about was saving up enough money to go to Hollywood, find a job as a secretary, become close friends with Janet Macdonald, and then make movies herself. She only knows how to dress up all day long.This is really bad.Etta is not a born beauty like Hazel.What matters is that she has a very short chin.She often pulls her jaw and does chin exercises as taught in the movie pictorial.She often looks at her side face in the mirror and puts her mouth at the right angle.It's a pity that it doesn't help at all.Sometimes, because of this, Etta would put her face in her hands and cry at night. Hazel is a slacker.She has a beautiful appearance, but she is an idiot.She was eighteen years old, the second oldest in the family after Bill.Maybe that's the problem.No matter what it is, she is the first to pick and get the most. With new clothes, she is the first to wear them. With special delicacies, she can get the biggest portion.Hazel never had to fight over anything, she was a gentle person. "Are you going to walk around the house all day? I've seen enough of you in those boy's clothes. You're so silly. Somebody ought to keep an eye on you, Mick Kelly, so you can behave yourself." Etta said. "Shut up," Mick said. "I'm wearing shorts because I don't want to wear your leftovers. I don't want to be like you, and I don't want to dress like you. Absolutely not. That's why I wear shorts. I'd rather be a boy. I wish I could share a room with Bill." Mick got under the bed and took out a big hat box.Just as she was walking towards the door with her hat box, the two sisters shouted behind her: "At last we can be quiet for a while!" Of all the family, Bill's room was the nicest.His room is like a cave, except for the little one, which is only for him.Bill tacked pictures cut out of magazines to the wall, most of them heads of beautiful women, and in the other corner was a picture that Mick had drawn in free art class last year.There is only a bed and a desk in his room. Bill was hunched over his desk, watching Popular Mechanics.She came up behind him and put her arms around his shoulders. "Hey, bro." He didn't wrestle with her like he used to. "Hey." He said shaking his shoulders slightly. "I want to stay here for a while, won't it affect you?" "Whatever, I don't mind." Mick knelt on the floor and untied the tie of the big hat box.Her hand was hanging just above the edge of the lid, but somehow she hadn't made up her mind whether to open it or not. "I've been thinking about it, and I don't know how I'm doing," she said. "Maybe I can play, maybe I can't." Bill is still reading magazines.She still knelt by the box, but never opened it.Her eyes flicked to Bill, who was now turning his back on her.While he was reading, one big foot was pressed on top of the other.His shoes are all worn out.Once, their father said, all Bill's lunch went up his feet, and his breakfast went up one ear, and the other in the evening.That's too mean to say, and it ended up making Bill miserable for a whole month, but it's kind of an interesting way to say it.He has a pair of protruding ears, bright red, and he wears a size thirteen shoe when he just graduated from high school.When he stood, he shuffled one foot behind the other, thinking that it would be invisible to others, but it was just the opposite. Mick opened the lid a crack, then snapped it back.She was inexplicably excited and didn't dare to look inside.She got up, walked around the room, and finally calmed down a little.After a few minutes, she stopped in front of a painting.That was last winter, when she drew it in a free art class provided by the government for students.She painted a storm at sea with a seagull flying against the wind.This painting is called "Seagull in the Rainstorm".The art teacher described the sea in the first two or three classes, and almost every student drew according to the teacher's description.Most of the students, like her, have never seen the sea with their own eyes. It was the first picture she drew, and Bill tacked it to the wall.Her other paintings are filled with people.She began by painting other images of storms at sea, in which a plane crashes and people jump to save themselves, and in another, where a transatlantic liner sinks and people push each other , flocked to a small lifeboat. Mick went to the closet in Bill's room and brought out several other drawings she had made in art class, some in pencil, some in watercolour, and one in oil.These paintings are full of people.She imagined a fire on Broad Street and drew what she imagined.Mr. Brannon's restaurant and the First National Bank are the only two remaining buildings as the fire bursts into bright green and orange flames.The streets were full of dead people, while others ran for their lives.A man in pajamas and a woman escaped with a handful of bananas.There was another painting called "Factory Boiler Explosion," with people jumping out of windows and running for their lives, and a bunch of kids in jumpsuits huddled together, holding in their arms lunch boxes delivered to their fathers.The oil painting showed the whole town ganging up on Broad Street.She never knew why she drew the painting, nor could she think of a suitable name.There is no fire in the painting, no storm, and no reason for the fight can be seen.But there are more people in this painting than in the others.This oil painting is the best work she has ever painted, but it's a pity that she doesn't know what to call it.But in fact, that name has been buried deep in her heart. Mick put the painting back on the shelf in the cupboard.In fact, none of these paintings are good enough.The people in the paintings either had no fingers or had arms longer than their legs.But it's fun to take a drawing class.But she only paints the pictures that pop into her mind inexplicably—in her heart, painting can't give her the feeling that music brings her.In this world, only music is the most beautiful. Mick knelt on the floor and quickly opened the lid of the big hat box.Inside was a damaged ukulele with two violin strings, a guitar string and a banjo string.There is a slit in the back of the ukulele, but it has been taped neatly, and the round hole in the middle is covered by a board.A violin bridge is used to support the strings at the end, and some sound holes are cut out on the sides of the body.This is the violin that Mick made for himself.She raised the violin to her lap.She feels like she's never really seen the violin.Not long ago, she was inspired to make a toy mandolin for the little one out of a cigarette case and rubber bands.Since then, she's been looking around for different accessories, making her piano a little more complete every day.It seemed to her that she had used everything she could. "Bill, that's the worst violin I've ever seen." He is still reading magazines. "what--?" "Looks weird. Not at all—" She would have tightened the pegs and tuned the violin today.However, she suddenly realized that her work was a pile of rags, so she didn't want to take a second look.She slowly tore off the strings one by one.Each string produces a subtle hollow sound. "How can I get a bow? Are you sure you can only make a bow out of horse mane?" "That's right," Bill said impatiently. "Isn't it possible to tie it with thin wire or hair to a flexible branch?" Bill rubbed his feet together and didn't answer. She was so angry that big beads of sweat came out of her forehead.Her voice was hoarse. "It's not a bad violin, it's just a bit of a mandolin and a bit of a ukulele. I hate them. I hate them—" Bill turned his head. "What kind of violin is that? It's useless. It's all trash." "Forget it," Bill said. "Are you going to go on tinkering with that old ukulele? I should have told you from the start that making your own violin is a whimsy. You have to buy things that can be made. Everyone knows about this kind of thing. I also have good intentions, thinking that if you realize it yourself, you won’t be sad.” Sometimes she hated Bill the most in the world.He is a completely different person now.She really wanted to smash the violin to the ground and stomp on it, but she just put it back in the box roughly.Tears welled up in her eyes, hot as fire.She kicked the box and ran out of the room without looking at Bill. She dodged across the corridor and ran toward the backyard, only to run into her mother. "What's wrong with you? What did you do just now?" Mick struggled twice, but her mother held her arm tightly.Sullenly, she wiped the tears from her face with the back of her hand.Her mother had been in the kitchen, still wearing an apron and slippers.She was still as usual, preoccupied and had no time to care about her. "Mr. Jackson brought his two younger sisters to lunch. There are not enough chairs. You can eat in the kitchen with the little one today." "Excellent," Mick said. Her mother let her go, taking off her apron as she walked.The dining bell in the dining room rang, and the sound of pleasant conversation suddenly resounded.She could hear her father say that he broke his hip and lost a lot of money because he didn't stick to his accident insurance.Her father would never forget it as long as he lived—he always said that he could have made money, but he didn't get any money.Then there was the clatter of dishes, and after a while the talking stopped. Mick leaned against the banister.When she cried so suddenly, she hiccupped.Thinking back to last month, it occurred to her that she never really believed that the violin she made could play music.But she kept forcing herself to believe in her heart.Even now, it was hard for her not to believe it.She is exhausted.Right now, Bill couldn't do anything to help.She used to think Bill was the greatest man in the world.She followed him wherever he went-fishing in the woods, to the club he and the other boys had built, to play the slot machines behind Mr. Brannon's restaurant, and she was Bill's henchman anyway.Maybe he didn't mean to disappoint her.However, they are no longer good friends. The corridors smelled of cigarettes and Sunday lunches.Mick took a deep breath and walked to the kitchen.Lunch smells delicious and she's hungry too.She could hear Portia talking to the little one, and it sounded like she was singing and telling him a story. "That's why I'm luckier than most black girls," Portia said as she opened the door. "What?" Mick asked. Portia and Tiny were sitting at the table having lunch.Portia looked cool in a green printed dress against her dark skin.She wore green earrings and her hair was combed tightly and neatly. "You just listen to the end of the line at a time, and then pester people to repeat the whole conversation to you," Portia said.She got up, stood by the blazing fire, and put some food on Mick's plate. "Me and the little one were talking about my grandpa's home on the Old Sardis Road. I was telling the little one how he and my uncles bought all that land. Fifteen and a half acres. Four acres of it had been It is used to grow cotton, and in some years, peas are used to ensure the land is fertile. One acre of land on the mountain only grows peaches. They have a mule, a breeding sow, and twenty to twenty-five egg-laying hens Chickens and chicks. They have a vegetable patch, two hickory trees, lots of fig trees, plum trees, and berry trees. I'm not bragging, no white man's farm can compare to my grandpa's farm." Mick put his elbows on the table and leaned over to her plate.There are three topics that Portia likes to talk about most, one is her husband, the other is her brother, and the third is her grandfather's farm.After listening to her talk, you will feel that the farm run by black people is no different from the White House. "The family started out with one small room. Over the years, the house grew to accommodate my grandfather, his four sons, daughter-in-law and grandchildren, as did my brother Hamilton. In the living room was a A real pipe organ and gramophone. There is a huge picture on the wall of my grandfather in his local chapter uniform. They store their fruit and vegetables in big pots, no matter how cold the winter or how much rain it rains. There's always enough food for them." "Then why don't you live with them?" Mick asked. Portia stopped peeling the potatoes and tapped her long brown fingers on the table, keeping pace with her words. "That's the way it is. Everyone has to add to their home and they've worked hard over the years. Of course, it's tough for everyone right now. I lived with my grandpa when I was a kid .But I didn't contribute anything. But if me, Willie and Highboy get into trouble, you can always go back." "Did your father add anything?" Portia suddenly stopped chewing. "Whose father? Do you mean my father?" "Of course," Mick said. "You know my dad works as a doctor in town." Mick had heard Portia say this before, but he always thought she was talking nonsense.After all, how could a black man be a doctor? "That's the way it is. Before my mother married my father, she was a kind-hearted and good person. My grandfather was also a very kind person. But my father and him are completely different." "So your father was a scumbag?" Mick asked. "No, he's not a scumbag," said Portia slowly. "Here's the thing. My dad isn't like any other black person. It's hard to tell. My dad taught himself. A long time ago , he understands what a family should be like. He will ask about every little thing in the family, and at night, he will teach us children to read." "I don't think that's too bad," Mick said. "Look what I'm telling you. Most of the time, he's silent. But some nights, he explodes and becomes crazier than anyone I've ever met. But anyone who knew my dad said He must be crazy. He did all the crazy things and our mother left him. I was ten years old. My mother took us kids to my grandfather's farm where we grew up. Our father always wanted us to go back. However, even after my mother passed away, we children did not go home. Now my father lives alone." Mick went to the fire and filled another plate.At this moment, Portia's voice was up and down, as if she was singing, and she would not stop until she had a good time. "I don't see my dad very often, maybe once a week, but I miss him all the time. He's the one I feel the most about. I know, he read a lot, and the white people in this town are better than Not him. The more books he reads, the more things he worries about. He's full of books, worrying about this and that. He doesn't believe in God, he's turned his back on religion. In the end, that's what's wrong with him The crux." Portia became more and more excited as she spoke.Whenever God was mentioned--or her brother Willie, or her husband High Boy--she became especially agitated. "Well, I'm the worst braggart ever. I'm a Presbyterian, and we don't approve of rolling around and chattering. We don't consecrate every week, or go everywhere together. In our We sang together and let the pastor preach. Honestly, I don't think singing and listening to the sermons would do you any harm, Mick. You should take your brother to Sunday school, and besides, you're too old It’s not too late, it’s time to go to church. Look at you, you’ve always been arrogant lately, let me tell you, you’ve already stepped into hell with one foot.” "Nonsense," said Mick. "Before we got married, Highboy was a perfectionist. He used to like to pursue spiritual enjoyment every Sunday, yell, yell, and purify his soul. But after we got married, I wanted him to join my sect, although there were It was hard to get him to quiet down sometimes, but I think he did a good job." "I don't believe in God or Santa Claus," Mick said. "Wait! That's why I sometimes think you're more like my father than anyone else." "Me? You say I look like him?" "I don't mean you look alike. I mean you have similar souls and minds." Little Dot sat there, looking at the two of them.He has a napkin tied around his neck and still holds an empty spoon in his hand. "What does God eat?" he asked. Mick stood up from the table, came to the door and stood still, she was about to leave.Sometimes Naportia was a lot of fun to joke around with.She used the same tone every time she spoke, and said the same things over and over again—as if that was all she knew. “像你和我爸爸这样从来都不去教堂的人，永远都不可能得到平静。就拿我来说吧，我笃信上帝，因此享受宁静。再说小不点，他也拥有平静。我的海伯伊和我的威利也是一样。而且，只要看一眼辛格先生，就知道他也享受着平静。我第一次见到他的时候，就有这种感觉。” “你爱怎么样就怎样吧。”米克说，“你父亲疯，你比他更疯。” “但是，你既不爱上帝，也不爱任何人。你就跟牛皮一样坚硬，你就是铁石心肠。但我照样知道你是个什么样的人。今天下午，你会到处闲逛，心里却从不满足。你从一个地方游荡到另一个地方，像是在寻找丢失了的东西。你让自己兴奋，心脏扑通扑通狂跳，足以要了你的命，因为你没有爱，也享受不到安宁。然后，有一天，你就崩溃了，彻底毁了。到那个时候，你就没得救了。” “什么，波西娅？”小不点问，“上帝到底吃什么呀？” 米勒哈哈大笑起来，咚咚咚走出了房间。 那天下午，她确实在房子里闲逛来着，因为她总也无法平静下来。有些日子里，她就是这么过的。首先，一想到小提琴，她就情不自禁地心绪难安。她永远都做不出一把真正的小提琴了——而且，她一连策划了好几个星期，现在一想到她费了这么大的力气，就觉得恶心。可她怎么就那么确定她能做出小提琴？她怎么会这么傻？或许当一个人极渴望一样东西，那只要能得到那个东西，任何事情都会相信。 有家里人在，米克不愿意回房间。她也不愿意和那些房客说话。除了街上，她无处可去——可街上太热了。她漫无目的地在走廊里走来走去，不停地用手心把凌乱的刘海拨开。“见鬼。”她大声地自言自语道，“除了一架真正的钢琴，我最想要的就是一个属于我自己的地方了。” 波西娅是有那么点黑人式的疯狂，但她这个人其实还不错。她跟有些黑人姑娘不一样，从不会偷偷虐待小不点或拉尔夫。但波西娅竟然说她不爱任何人。米克不再走路，而是定定地站着不动，用拳头揉搓着头顶。如果波西娅知道了真相，会怎么想？她会有什么看法呢？ 她一向都将秘密深埋在心底。这一点是不争的事实。 米克慢慢地走上楼梯。她走过第一个楼梯平台，来到第二个楼梯平台。有些房门开着通风，整栋房子里充斥着很多声音。米克停在最后一段楼梯上，坐了下来。要是布朗小姐开了收音机，她就能听音乐了。说不定还能听到很棒的节目。 她把头搭在膝盖上，把网球鞋的鞋带系好。波西娅若是知道，她爱上过很多人，会怎么说？每次她爱上别人，都好像一颗心碎成了无数片。 只是她一向都不会把心事宣之于口，所以没人知道。 米克在楼梯上坐了很久。布朗小姐压根儿就没开收音机，四下里只有人们制造出的各种声音。她思考了很久，还一直用拳头敲打着大腿。她觉得自己的脸破碎成了无数碎片，她无法让她的脸保持完整。她此刻心里的感觉与饥饿差不多，却更为糟糕。我想要——我想要——我想要。此时此刻，她心心念念想的就是这个，只是并不清楚她真正想要的是什么。 大约一个小时后，上面的楼梯平台处传来了门把手转动的声音。米克立即抬起头来，只见是辛格先生。他在走廊里站了一会儿，脸上带着忧伤沉静的神情。然后，他向厕所走去。他的同伴并没有和他一起出来。从她所坐的地方，她能看到他的一部分房间，只见那个同伴盖着被单，正在床上睡觉。她等着辛格先生从厕所出来。她的脸颊滚烫，不由得伸手抚摸她的脸。有时候，她跑到这么高的楼梯上，的确是为了听楼下布朗小姐的收音机，但主要则是为了见辛格先生。她很好奇，虽然他的耳朵听不到，但他在心里能听到什么样的音乐呢。no one knows.如果他能说话，他都会说些什么呢。也没人知道。 米克等待着。过了一会儿，他又走到走廊里。她盼着他能低头看到她，对她笑笑。跟着，在他走到房门口的时候，确实向下扫了一眼，还点了点头。米克马上露出灿烂的笑容，只是笑得有些颤抖。他走进房间，关上了门。说不定他这是在邀请她到他的房间去呢。米克突然很渴望去他的房间。等他的同伴走了，她一定会去辛格先生的房间见他。她一定会这么做的。 炎热的下午是那么漫长，米克独自坐在楼梯上，动也不动。莫扎特的音乐再一次出现在她的脑海里。说来也怪，一看到辛格先生，她就能想到莫扎特的音乐。她真希望找个地方，大声哼出他的音乐。有些乐曲很私人，没办法在满是人的房子里唱。还有一点很奇怪，在拥挤的屋子里，一个人会感觉如此孤独。米克努力琢磨着有哪些私密的地方可以让她去，让她可以独自学习莫扎特的音乐。她想了很久，不过她从一开始就知道，根本就没有这样的地方。