My Daughter Smokes
我女儿抽烟
Alice Walker
艾丽斯•沃克
My daughter smokes. While she is doing her homework, her feet on the bench in front of her and her calculator clicking out answers to her algebra problems, I am looking at the half-empty package of Camels tossed carelessly close at hand. Camels. I pick them up, take them into the kitchen, where the light is better, and study them—they're filtered, for which I am grateful. My heart feels terrible. I want to weep. In fact, I do weep a little, standing there by the stove holding one of the instruments, so white, so precisely rolled, that could cause my daughter's death. When she smoked Marlboros and Players, I hardened myself against feeling so bad; nobody I knew ever smoked these brands.
我女儿抽烟。她在做作业时.两只脚放在前面的长凳上,计算器嗒嗒地跳出代数题的答案,而我却在看着那包她已抽了一半、被她随意扔在手边的“骆驼”牌香烟。“骆驼”牌。我拿起香烟,走到厨房去仔细察看,那里的光线更好一些——这种香烟是带有过滤嘴的,谢天谢地。我心里感到十分难过。我想哭。事实上,我站在炉子旁,手里拿着一支雪白的、制作得如此精致的香烟,我确实哭了,这东西可以置我女儿于死地。当她抽“万宝路”和“普雷厄尔”牌香烟时,我硬起心肠,不让自己难过,我认识的人中没有人抽过这两种牌子的香烟。