殘忍而美麗的情誼:The Kite Runner 追風箏的人(135)

He grabbed a paper bag from the backseat and plucked a half lemon out of it. I bit down on it, waited a few minutes. “You were right. I feel better,” I lied. As an Afghan, I knew it was better to be miserable than rude. I forced a weak smile.“Old watani trick, no need for fancy medicine,” he said. His tone bordered on the surly. He flicked the ash off his cigarette and gave himself a self-satisfied look in the rearview mirror. He was a Tajik, a lanky, dark man with a weather-beaten face, narrow shoulders, and a long neck punctuated by a protruding Adam’s apple that only peeked from behind his beard when he turned his head. He was dressed much as I was, though I suppose it was really the other way around: a rough-woven wool blanket wrapped over a gray pirhan-tumban and a vest. On his head, he wore a brown pakol, tilted slightly to one side, like the Tajik hero Ahmad Shah Massoud--referred to by Tajiks as “the Lion of Panjsher.”
“Checkpoint,” Farid grumbled. I slumped a little in my seat, arms folded across my chest, forgetting for a moment about the nausea. But I needn’t have worried. Two Pakistani militia approached our dilapidated Land Cruiser, took a cursory glance inside, and waved us d was first on- the list of preparations Rahim Khan and I made, a list that included exchanging dollars for Kaldar and Afghani bills, my garment and pakol--ironically, I’d never worn either when I’d actually lived in Afghanistan--the Polaroid of Hassan and Sohrab, and, finally, perhaps the most important item: an artificial beard, black and chest length, Shari’a friendly--or at least the Taliban version of Shari’a. Rahim Khan knew of a fellow in Peshawar who specialized in weaving them, sometimes for Western journalists who covered the war.
Rahim Khan had wanted me to stay with him a few more days, to plan more thoroughly. But I knew I had to leave as soon as possible. I was afraid I’d change my mind. I was afraid I’d deliberate, ruminate, agonize, rationalize, and talk myself into not going. I was afraid the appeal of my life in America would draw me back, that I would wade back into that great, big river and let myself forget, let the things I had learned these last few days sink to the bottom. I was afraid that I’d let the waters carry me away from what I had to do. From Hassan. From the past that had come calling. And from this one last chance at redemption. So I left before there was any possibility of that happening. As for Soraya, telling her I was going back to Afghanistan wasn’t an option. If I had, she would have booked herself on the next flight to Pakistan.
We had crossed the border and the signs of poverty were every where. On either side of the road, I saw chains of little villages sprouting here and there, like discarded toys among the rocks, broken mud houses and huts consisting of little more than four wooden poles and a tattered cloth as a roof. I saw children dressed in rags chasing a soccer ball outside the huts. A few miles later, I spotted a cluster of men sitting on their haunches, like a row of crows, on the carcass of an old burned-out Soviet tank, the wind fluttering the edges of the blankets thrown around them. Behind them, a woman in a brown burqa carried a large clay pot on her shoulder, down a rutted path toward a string of mud houses.
“Strange,” I said.
“What?”

他從後座抓起一個紙袋，拿出半個檸檬。我咬一口，等上幾分鐘。“你說得對，我感覺好多了。”我說謊。身爲阿富汗人，我深知寧可遭罪也不可失禮，我擠出孱弱的微笑。在白沙瓦，拉辛汗介紹我認識法裏德。他告訴我，法裏德二十九歲，不過他那機警的臉滿是皺紋，看上去要老二十歲。他生於馬紮裏沙里夫，在那兒生活，直到十歲那年，他父親舉家搬到賈拉拉巴特。十四歲，他和他父親加入了人民聖戰者組織，抗擊俄國佬。他們在潘傑希爾峽谷抗戰了兩年，直到直升機的炮火將他父親炸成碎片。法裏德娶了兩個妻子，有五個小孩。 “他過去有七個小孩。 ”拉辛汗眼露悲哀地說，但在早幾年，就在賈拉拉巴特城外，地雷爆炸奪走了他兩個最小的女兒；那次爆炸還要去了他的腳趾以及他左手的三個手指。在那之後，他帶着妻子和小孩搬到自沙瓦。
“關卡。”法裏德不滿地說。我稍稍癱在座位上，雙臂抱胸，暫時忘卻了眩暈的感覺。但我不用擔心，兩個阿富汗民兵朝我們這輛破舊的陸地巡洋艦走來，匆匆看了一眼車內，揮手讓我們走。和阿富汗尼鈔票，我的長袍和氈帽——諷刺的是，真正在阿富汗生活的那些年，這兩件東西我統統沒穿過——哈桑和索拉博的寶麗萊合影，最後，也許是最重要的是：一副黑色假鬍子，長及胸膛。表示對伊斯蘭教——至少是塔利班眼中的伊斯蘭教——的友好。拉辛汗認得白沙瓦幾個精於此道的傢伙，有時他們替那些前來報道戰爭的西方記者服務。
拉辛汗曾要求我多陪着他幾天，計劃得更詳盡些。但我知道自己得儘快啓程。我害怕自己會改變主意。我害怕自己會猶豫不決，瞻前顧後，寢食難安，尋找理由，說服自己不要前去。我害怕來自美國生活的誘惑會將我拉回去，而我再也不會趟進這條大河，讓自己遺忘，讓這幾天得知的一切沉在水底。我害怕河水將我沖走，將我衝離那些當仁不讓的責任，衝離哈桑，衝離那正在召喚我的往事，衝離最後一次贖罪的機會。所以我在這一切都還來不及發生之前就出發了。至於索拉雅，我沒有告訴她我回阿富汗並非明智之舉。如果我那麼做，她會給自己訂票，坐上下一班飛往阿富汗的客機。
我們已經越過國境，觸目皆是貧窮的跡象。在路的兩旁，我看見村落一座連一座，如同被丟棄的玩具般，散落在岩石間；而那些殘破的泥屋和茅舍，無非是四根木柱，加上屋頂的破布。我看見衣不蔽體的孩子在屋外追逐一個足球。再過幾里路，我看到有羣男人弓身蹲坐，如同一羣烏鴉，坐着的是被焚燬的破舊俄軍坦克，寒風吹起他們身邊毛毯的邊緣，獵獵作響。他們身後，有個穿着棕色長袍的女子，肩膀上扛着大陶罐，沿着車轍宛然的小徑，走向一排泥屋。
“真奇怪。”我說。
“什麼？”