4
Authenticity
真实
1.It is one of the ironies of love that it is easiest confidently to seduce those to whom we are least attracted. My feelings for Chloe meant I lost any belief in my own worthiness. Who could I be next to her? Was it not the greatest honour for her to have agreed to this dinner, to have dressed so elegantly ('Is this all right?' she'd asked in the car on the way to the restaurant, 'It had better be, because I'm not changing a sixth time'), let alone that she might be willing to respond kindly to some of the things that might fall (if ever I recovered my tongue) from my unworthy lips? 我们自信能不费吹灰之力，即可征服我们最不在意的人，但欲望中包含的郑重成分阻止了爱情游戏所需要的漫不经心，而且从心上人身上发现的完美所产生的吸引力，又会引发我们的自卑感，这些真是爱情中令人啼笑皆非的事情。我对克洛艾的爱恋意味着我不再能看到自身的价值。在她身边，我会是谁？她同意去吃晚饭，打扮得那么优雅（“这样穿行吗？”她在车上问，“但愿不错，因为我都换了五套衣服了”），更不用说还会愿意回答我一些毫无价值的话语（如果我的舌头还能转动的话），这些于我而言，难道不是最大的荣耀？
2.It was Friday night and Chloe and I were seated at a corner table of Les Liaisons Dangereuses, a French restaurant that had recently opened at the end of the Fulham Road. There could have been no more appropriate setting for Chloe's beauty. The chandeliers threw soft shadows across her face, the light green walls matched her light green eyes. And yet, as though struck dumb by the angel that faced me across the table, I lost all capacity either to think or speak and could only silently draw invisible patterns on the starched white tablecloth and take unnecessary sips of bubbled water from a large glass goblet.那是在星期五的晚上，克洛艾和我坐在一家名叫危险的关系的餐馆角落的一张桌子旁。这是一家新开的法国餐馆，位于富尔汉街的尽头。再没有其他地方比这儿的环境更能衬托克洛艾的美丽：枝形吊灯的柔和灯影映在她的脸上，墙壁的淡绿色正如她淡绿色的眼眸。我似乎被坐在桌子对面的天使惊呆了，发现（就在一阵热烈的交谈之后的几分钟）自己失去了一切思考或表达的能力，只能默不作声地瞧着浆过的白色台布，机械地啜饮着一只很大的高脚杯里面冒泡的水。
3.My sense of inferiority bred a need to take on a personality that was not my own, a seducing self that would respond to every demand and suggestion made by my exalted companion. Love forced me to look at myself as though through Chloe's imagined eyes. 'Who could I become to please her?' I wondered. I did not tell flagrant lies, I simply attempted to anticipate everything I believed she might want to hear.因为感知到自卑，我需要获得一种自己本身并不具有的个性：一种为了吸引对方而去迎合心上人的需求的自我。爱情是不是在谴责我失去了自我？也许不是永久地失去，但是，严格说来，至少在眼下这个阶段确实如此。意欲吸引她的想法使我不断向自己发问：什么可以吸引她？而不是：什么吸引我？我会问：她怎样看待我的领带？而不是：我认为自己的领带怎么样？爱情迫使我以心上人的眼光来观察自己。不是问：我是谁？而是问：对于她来说，我是谁？在思考这些问题时，我的自我不但束手无策，而且毫无信心，失去主见。
失去主见不一定就是可耻的欺骗或夸示。它只是在预先考虑克洛艾可能想要的每一样东西，以便我可以迎合对方的兴趣。
'Would you like some wine?' I asked her.
'I don't know, would you like wine?' she asked back.
'I really don't mind, if you feel like it,' I replied.
'It's as you please, whatever you want,' she continued.
'Either way is fine with me.'
'I agree.'
“想喝点酒吗？”我问她。
“不知道，你呢？”她反过来问我。
“如果你想喝一点，我真的不在意，”我答道。
“随便你，你要什么都行，”她继续说。
“我也随便。”
“好。”
'So should we have it or not?'
'Well, I don't think I'll have any,' ventured Chloe.
'You're right, I don't feel like any either,' I concurred.
'Let's not have wine, then,' she concluded.
'Great, so we'll just stick with the water.'
“那我们是要还是不要？”
“嗯，我想我不要，”克洛艾大胆地说。
“听你的，我也不想要什么，”我赞同说。
“那我们就不要酒吧，”她作出决定。
“完全可以，我们就喝水。”
尽管保持真实的自我需要一个先决条件，即，能够不受他人的影响而获得稳定的个性，但那个夜晚还是让自我不再真实，而是根据克洛艾的喜好来自我定位、自我调整。她对男人的期待是什么？我应该根据什么品味和取向来调整自己的表现？如果认为保持真实的自我是个人道德的基本标准，那么爱的诱惑让我在道德考验中一败涂地。克洛艾头顶上方的广告招牌上陈列着一排排的酒，看上去味道不错。我为什么要掩饰自己想要喝的真实想法？因为与克洛艾只想喝矿泉水的要求相比，如果我选择酒，那么我的选择似乎会显得很不恰当，而且粗俗。为了迎合她，我分裂成两半，一半是真实的（想要喝酒）自我，一半是虚假的（想要喝水）自我。
4.The first course arrived, arranged on plates with the symmetry of a formal French garden.第一道菜来了。菜肴摆放得极其精致，就像地道的法国花园那样一丝不苟。
'It looks too beautiful to touch,' said Chloe (how I knew the feeling), 'I've never eaten grilled scallops like this before.' We began to eat. The only sound was that of cutlery against china. There seemed to be nothing to say. Chloe had been my only thought for too long, but the one thought that at this moment I could not share with her.“太美了，简直不忍心吃它，”克洛艾说（我亦有同感），“我从来没吃过这么好的煎金枪鱼。”
我们开始用餐，惟一的响声是刀叉碰到瓷餐具的声音。似乎没什么要说的：这么久以来，克洛艾是我唯一的念想，但此刻，这念想又如何能与她分享？
Silence was damning. A silence with an unattractive person implies they are the boring one. A silence with an attractive one immediately renders it certain you are the tedious party.沉默是致命的指责。与毫无魅力的人共处时，沉默暗示对方令人厌烦；面对仰慕不已的对象时，沉默不语会让你相信，正是你自己了无意趣。
5. Silence and clumsiness could of course be taken as rather pitiful proof of desire. It being easy enough to seduce someone towards whom one feels indifferent, the clumsiest seducers could generously be deemed the most genuine. Not to find the right words is paradoxically often the best proof that the right words are meant. In that other Liaisons Dangereuses, the Marquise de Merteuil faults the Vicomte de Valmont for writing love letters that are too perfect, too logical to be the words of a true lover, whose thoughts will be disjointed and for whom the fine phrase will always elude. Real desire lacks articulacy ?but how willingly I would at that moment have swapped my constipation for the Vicomte's loquacity.沉默和笨拙也许可以得到谅解，可当作心怀仰慕的证据。一个人完全可以收放自如地吸引自己毫不在意的人，而最笨拙的人则可被认为是最真诚的，拙于言辞反而可以证明其真情实意（如果能用语言表达出来的话）。在小说《危险的关系》里，梅特伊侯爵夫人写信给瓦尔蒙子爵，指出子爵的失误：他的情书过于完美无缺，过于逻辑严谨，不像真爱之士的心声。胸怀真爱的人，思绪凌乱，无法雕饰华丽的辞藻。语言在爱情面前无法自制，错误百出，因而欲望往往言辞朴拙（但那一刻我多么情愿把我的语塞换作瓦尔蒙子爵的辞采）。
6. I had to find out more about Chloe, for how could I abandon my true self unless I knew what false self to adopt? But the patience and intelligence required to fathom someone else went far beyond the capacities of my anxious, infatuated mind. I behaved like a reductive social psychologist, eager to press my companion into simple categories, unwilling to apply the care of a novelist to capturing the subtleties of human nature. Over the first course, I blundered with heavy-handed, interview-like questions: What do you like to read? ('Joyce, Henry James, Cosmo if there's time'), Do you like your job? ('All jobs are pretty crap, don't you think?'), What country would you live in if you could live anywhere? ('I'm fine here, anywhere where I don't have to change the plug for my hairdryer'), What do you like to do on weekends? ('Go to the movies on Saturday, on Sunday, stock up on chocolate for getting depressed with in the evening').既然想要吸引克洛艾，那么关键在于对她要有更多的了解。如果尚不知该采纳哪种虚假的自我，我又怎能抛弃真正的自我？但这实非易事，了解一个人需要长久的体察和破译，从万千言语和动作中梳理出完整的性格。不幸的是，其所必需的耐心和睿智却不为我这焦虑不安、情迷昏沉的头脑所有。我如同一个持简化论的社会心理学家一样行事，急于将人置于简单的定义之中，却不愿像小说家一样，用细腻的手法去捕捉人类天性中的多种质素。用完第一道菜，我慌乱地问了几个笨拙的、 采访式的问题： 你喜欢读什么书？（“乔伊斯、亨利·詹姆斯，如果有时间，还看一看《时尚》杂志。”）你喜欢你的工作吗？（“你不认为世上所有的工作都令人讨厌？”）如果随便你挑，你会住到哪个国家去？（“这儿就挺好，只要不用换电吹风的插头，住哪儿我都行。”）周末你喜欢做什么？（“周六看电影，周日买点巧克力，对付晚上情绪低落。”）
7. Behind such clumsy questions (with every one I asked, I seemed to get further from knowing her) rested an impatient attempt to get to the most direct question of all, 'Who are you?' ?and hence 'Who should I be?' But my directness was doomed, and the more I practised it, the more my subject escaped through the net, letting me know what newspaper she read and music she liked, but not thereby enlightening me as to who she might really be.在这些笨拙的问题后面（每问一个，我就似乎更不了解她一些），我迫不及待地想提出一个最直接的问题：“你是一个怎样的人？”（从而“我应该做一个怎样的人？”）但是这样直接的提问注定会一败涂地，我越是直截了当地追问，就越偏离我的目标；我只能知道她喜欢看什么报纸、听什么音乐，却不能明白她会是“一个怎样的人”——一个使“我”消除自我的提示者，如果有人需要它的话。
8. Chloe hated talking about herself. Perhaps her most obvious feature was a certain modesty and self-deprecation. When the conversation led her to refer to herself, it would not simply be 'I' or 'Chloe', but 'a basket-case like me'. Her self-deprecation was all the more attractive for it seemed to be free of the veiled appeals of self-pitying people, the false self-deprecation of the _I'm so stupid/No, you're not_ school.克洛艾不愿谈及自己。也许她最明显的特征就是有些谦逊羞怯，惯于自我贬低。每当谈话涉及这个主题时，克洛艾总是用最严厉的词贬抑自己。她不再称自己为“我”或“克洛艾”，而是“像我这样的废人”或“极度神经质的奥菲莉亚奖得主”。她这样做反而增添了吸引力，因为这种称呼似乎不是自哀自怜之人遮遮掩掩地诉求，也不属于“我太蠢了/不，你一点也不蠢”之类让人恍然大悟的自我贬低。
Her childhood had been awkward, but she was stoic about the matter ('I hate childhood dramatizations that make Job look like he got off lightly'). She had grown up in a financially comfortable home. Her father ('All his problems started when his parents called him Barry') had been an academic, a law professor, her mother, Claire, had for a time run a flower shop. Chloe was the middle child, a girl sandwiched between two favoured and faultless boys. When her older brother died of leukaemia shortly after her eighth birthday, her parents' grief expressed itself as anger at their daughter who, slow at school and sulky around the house, had obstinately clung to life instead of their son. She grew up guilty, filled with a sense of blame for what had happened, feelings that her mother did little to alleviate. The mother liked to pick on a person's weakest characteristics and not let go. Chloe was forever reminded of how badly she performed at school compared to her dead brother, of how gauche she was, and of how disreputable her friends were (criticisms that were not particularly true, but that grew more so with every mention). Chloe had turned to her father for affection, but the man was as closed with his emotions as he was open with his legal knowledge, which he would pedantically share with her as a substitute for warmth, until her adolescence when Chloe's frustration with him turned to anger and she openly defied him and everything he stood for (it was fortunate that I had not chosen the legal profession).她的童年缺少欢乐，但她淡然处之（“我痛恨童年的戏剧表演，因为那里面的约伯[注释]看起来总像是有点昏昏欲睡”）。她出生于一个经济条件良好的家庭，父亲（“自他出生之日起就麻烦不断”）是大学老师，一位法律教授，母亲（克莱尔）曾一度经营过花店。克洛艾在家里排行居中，上下各有一个备受宠爱、完美无缺的男孩。她八岁生日刚过，她哥哥就患白血病死了，父母的悲痛转化为对女儿的恼怒：她在学校成绩很差，在家脾气又不好，居然能顽固地活下来，而他们的宝贝儿子却不能。她在负罪感中长大，为所发生的不幸自责，但她母亲却并未设法来缓解她的痛苦。母亲喜欢挑剔别人的致命弱点，并且紧追不放——所以克洛艾永远被拿来跟死去的哥哥比较，指责她在学校里成绩是如何不好，她是多么不善交际，她的朋友是多么不体面（都不是与事实特别相符的批评，然而每批评一次，就似乎真实了几分）。克洛艾转而向父亲寻求亲情，但父亲感情封闭的程度，就如他对自己的法律知识的毫不保留一样。所以他非但不能给予她所需要的父爱，相反，他会迂腐地向她卖弄法律知识，直到克洛艾长大，由失望转为愤怒。克洛艾公开反对他以及他主张的一切（幸亏我当初没选择法律行业）。
9. Of past boyfriends, only hints emerged over the meal: one had worked as a motorcycle mechanic in Italy and had treated her badly, another, who she had mothered, had ended up in jail for possession of drugs. A third had been an analytical philosopher at London University ('You don't have to be Freud to see he was the daddy I never went to bed with'), a fourth a test-car driver for Rover ('To this day I can't explain that one. I think I liked his Birmingham accent'). But no clear picture was emerging, and therefore the shape of her ideal man forming in my head needed constant readjustment. There were things she praised and condemned within sentences, forcing me into frantic rewriting. At one moment she seemed to be praising emotional vulnerability, and at the next, damning it in favour of independence. Whereas honesty was at one point extolled as the supreme value, adultery was at another justified on account of the greater hypocrisy of marriage.在用餐的过程中，克洛艾只是略微提及了过去的男友：一个在意大利干摩托车修理，曾经对她很不好；另一个因为携带毒品被关进监狱，他们也就此结束，她曾为他怀孕；还有一个是伦敦大学的精神分析学家（“你不要像弗洛伊德那样认为他代表着我的恋父情结，不要以为我不会与他上床”）；再一个是兰德罗弗汽车公司的试车员（“直到现在我都说不清为什么会看上他，我想是我喜欢听他的伯明翰口音”）。但是她没有详细地描述这些人，因此我需要在脑海里不断地调整她理想男人的模样。在谈论中她既有赞扬又有批评，从而使我手忙脚乱地不断修改我理应表现的自我。她似乎一会儿称许感情脆弱，转而又会诅咒它，赞同精神独立；她上一分钟把忠诚誉为最高贵的品质，在下一秒又会认为外遇合理，因为婚姻更虚伪。
10. The complexity of her views led to a schizophrenia in mine. The main course (duck for me, salmon for her) was a marshland sowed with mines. Did I think two people should live solely for one another? Had my childhood been difficult? Had I ever been truly in love? Was I an emotional or a cerebral person? Who had I voted for in the last election? What was my favourite colour? Did I think women were more unstable than men? Because it involves the risk of alienating those who don't agree with what one is saying, originality proved wholly beyond me.她的观点是那么纷繁复杂，以至我有点患上了精神分裂症。我应该释放自己的哪些个性？我怎样才能不与她生分，同时不显出令人讨厌的枯燥乏味？我们吃着一道道菜（年轻的瓦尔蒙感到一道道的障碍）。我发现自己试着提出一点想法，过后不久就会微妙地加以修正，使之与她的想法一致。克洛艾的每个问题都让人心惊胆战，因为答案不知不觉会包含有触怒她的内容。主菜（我点的是鸭，她点的是鳟鱼）是一块布满地雷的沼泽地——我认为两个人应该互相保持独立吗？我的童年时代苦涩吗？我曾经真爱过吗？感觉怎样？我是比较感性的还是理性的？上次选举我投了谁的票？我最喜欢的颜色是什么？我认为女人没男人情绪稳定吗？
为了避免自己的观点会疏远持异见之人，我的回答没有一点独创性。我只是根据自己对克洛艾的判断来调整自己的答案。如果她喜欢坚强的男人，我就装得坚强；如果她喜欢风帆冲浪，我就是一个风帆冲浪运动员；如果她讨厌下棋，我也就与象棋势不两立。在我看来，她对情人的看法可比作是紧身的套装，而我认为真实的自我却很肥胖，所以，那整个晚上似乎都是一个胖男人在努力想让一套太小的衣服显得合身。我得拼命把多余的赘肉塞进不合身的衣服里，紧缩腰身，屏住呼吸，防止衣料撕裂。如果我的动作不如往常反应自如，那么一点都不奇怪，一个被过瘦衣服缠身的胖男人如何能反应自如？他太害怕衣服裂开，不得不一动不动地坐在那儿，屏住呼吸，祷告上天保佑这个夜晚不出大祸，平安度过。爱情已让我瘫痪。
11. Chloe was facing a different dilemma, for it was time for dessert, and though she had only one choice, she had more than one desire.
'What do you think, the chocolate or the caramel?' she asked, traces of guilt appearing on her forehead. 'Maybe you can get one and I'll get the other and then we can share.'
I felt like neither, I was not digesting properly, but that wasn't the point.
克洛艾面对的却是一个不同的难题。到吃甜点的时候了，尽管只能挑选一种，她却期望有更多的选择。
“你要哪种，巧克力的还是卡拉梅尔糖的？”她问我（额头上出现不安的痕迹），“或者你要一种，我要一种，然后我们一起分。”
我对这两种都不感兴趣，因为当时消化不良，不过真正的问题不在于此。
'I just love chocolate, don't you?' asked Chloe. 'I can't understand people who don't like chocolate. I was once going out with a guy, this guy Robert I was telling you about, and I was never really comfortable with him, but I couldn't work out why. Then one day it all became clear: he didn't like chocolate. I mean he didn't just not love it, this guy actually hated it. You could have put a bar in front of him and he wouldn't have touched it. That kind of thinking is so far removed from anything I can relate to, you know. Well, after that, you can imagine, it was clear we had to break up.'“我喜欢吃巧克力，你不喜欢吗？”克洛艾问我，“我不能理解那些不喜欢巧克力的人。有一次我和一个男的出去玩，就是我跟你说过的那个罗伯特，我一直感觉跟他在一起不舒服，但不明白其中的缘由。后来我知道了，是因为他不喜欢吃巧克力。我是说，他不只是不爱吃，简直是厌恶它。你用棒子逼着他，他都不会碰一下。这种想法实在与我的习惯大相径庭，你说是吧。很显然，自那以后，我们只能分手。”
'In that case we should get both desserts and taste each other's. But which one do you prefer?'
'I don't mind,' lied Chloe.
'Really? Well if you don't mind, then I'll take the chocolate, I just can't resist it. In fact, you see the double chocolate cake at the bottom there? I think I'll order that. It looks far more chocolaty.'
'You're being seriously sinful,' said Chloe, biting her lower lip in a mixture of anticipation and shame, 'but why not? You're absolutely right. Life is short and all that.'
“既然这样，我们两种甜点都要，互相分着吃。不过，你更喜欢吃哪种？”
“我无所谓，”克洛艾在说谎。
“真的？如果你真的无所谓，我就要巧克力，我简直太想吃了。你看见摆在那下边的双层巧克力蛋糕了吗？我就点那个，看上去好像含有很多巧克力。”
“你这样就不对了，”克洛艾咬着下嘴唇，表情半是期待，半是羞愧，“不过，为什么不这样呢？这样好。生命太短暂了。”
12. Yet again I had lied (I was beginning to hear the sounds of cocks crowing in the kitchen). I had been more or less allergic to chocolate all my life, but how could I have been honest when the love of chocolate had been so conclusively identified as a criterion of Chloe-compatibility?
然而我又一次撒谎了（我开始听见厨房里公鸡的叫声）。我一直都对巧克力有些过敏，但是在这种情形中，爱吃巧克力如此确凿地被认定是与克洛艾和谐相处的首要标准，我怎么还能诚实地表达自己的愿望？
然而，我的谎言却适得其反，因为这对我的口味和习惯的假设必然比克洛艾的口味和习惯缺少存在的合理性，而克洛艾肯定会被任何有悖于她的分歧所冒犯。我也许应该为自己和巧克力编造一个动人的故事（“我最喜欢巧克力，但是医生会诊小组警告我说，如果我还吃，就会把命都丢掉。自此我已经戒了三年了”），藉此我也许能得到克洛艾的许多同情——但太冒险了。
我的谎言尽管无可避免，也令我羞愧难当，但它倒给了我启示，让我分清两种不同类型的谎言，为了逃避而说谎和为了被爱而说谎。出于吸引他人的谎言与其他谎言有很大区别。如果我向警察谎报我的车速，这谎言的动机非常直接：为了逃避罚款或逮捕。但是为了被爱而说谎，则包含了更有违常情的假设：如果我不说谎，我就不会被爱。
I had decided that attraction was synonymous with the removal of all personal characteristics, my true self being necessarily in conflict with, and unworthy of the perfections found in the beloved.这是一种态度，认为要富有魅力就要消除个性（因此口服心服怀会事与愿违），认为真正的自我不可避免地会与心上人的完美发生冲突（因而配不上心上人的完美）。
13. I had lied, but did Chloe like me any the more for it? Curiously, she merely expressed a certain disappointment, in view of the inferior taste of caramel, that I should have insisted so strongly on taking the chocolate ?adding in an off-hand way that a chocophile was in the end perhaps as much of a problem as a chocophobe.我说谎了，但是克洛艾就会因此更喜欢我吗了？她会伸过手来握住我的手，或建议说我们回家，不吃甜点了吗？肯定不会，由于卡拉梅尔糖味道不好，她对我坚持要巧克力表示了一定的失望，并且不假思索地加了一句：嗜好巧克力的人最终会与厌食巧克力的人一样有麻烦。
吸引是一种表演行为，是从自发的行为向符合观众要求的行为的转变。但是就如演员必须知道观众的期望是什么一样，吸引者必须知道心上人想要听的是什么——因此如果有确凿的理由反对为了被爱而撒谎，那么演员将不知道什么才能打动和或她的观众。表演行为唯一正当的理由是具有实效性，而不出于本能。但是考虑到克洛艾性格的复杂，以及模仿行为的引诱力效果难测，所以不论我是诚实还是本能地行事，
14. We charm by coincidence rather than design. What had Chloe done to make me fall in love with her? My feelings had as much to do with the adorable way she had asked the waiter for extra butter as they had to do with her views on politics or the dress she had carefully chosen.
我们经常在偶尔发生而非设计好的情形之中达到目的。我们经常在偶然发生而非设计好的情形中达到目的。这是一个令充满实证主义和理性主义精神的吸引者沮丧的消息。因为他相信，通过足够的细心观察和完全科学的研究，就能够发现相爱的法则。吸引者开始行动，希望找到爱情之钩，把心上人钩入谷中——一个微笑、一个观点、或拿餐叉的一类方式……不幸的是，尽管人人都有爱情之钩，但如果在吸引对方时碰巧奏效，更多的也是出于偶然，而非通过算计。克洛艾究竟做了什么使我爱上她？我爱她向侍者要黄油时令人赞美的姿态，我爱她认可我对海德格尔《存在与时间》一书价值的看法。
The steps I had on occasion seen women take to seduce me were rarely the ones I had responded to. I was more likely to be attracted by tangential details that the seducer had not even been sufficiently aware of to push to the fore. I had once taken to a woman who had a trace of down on her upper lip. Normally squeamish about this, I had mysteriously been charmed by it in her case, my desire stubbornly deciding to collect there rather than around her warm smile or intelligent conversation. When I discussed my attraction with friends, I struggled to suggest that it had to do with an indefinable 'aura' - but I could not disguise to myself that I had fallen in love with a hairy upper lip. When I saw the woman again, someone must have suggested electrolysis, for the down was gone, and (despite her many qualities) my desire soon followed suit.爱情之钩显然不符合一切逻辑的因果法则，而具有一种极其独特的品性。我有时会碰到一些女性有意吸引我，但她们的伎俩最终并不能生效。我容易因一些全不相干或完全偶然的因素萌生爱意，但那个吸引我的人却全然不知，不加以利用这富有价值的资本。曾经有一次，我爱上一个上唇微微有些绒毛的女人。平常对这一贯很厌恶，而这次我却奇迹般被迷倒。她亲切的微笑、金色的头发或是聪慧的谈吐都不及这个特征更能激发我强烈的情感。当我与朋友谈起自己对她的迷恋时，我努力表明是由于她身上拥有一种不可言传的“气质”——但是我掩盖不住事实上我只是爱上她毛茸茸的上唇。当我再一次看见她时，肯定是谁建议她用了电烫除毛，她上唇的绒毛不见了，（尽管她有许多好的品质）我的热情也很快随之消退。
15.The Euston Road was still blocked with traffic when we made our way back towards Islington. Long before such issues could have become meaningful, we'd arranged that I would drop Chloe home, but nevertheless the dilemmas of seduction remained a weighty presence in the car. At some point in the game, the actor must risk losing his audience. However, reaching the door of 23a Liverpool Road, awed by the dangers of misreading the signs, I concluded that the moment to propose metaphorical coffee had not yet arisen.我们回伊斯灵顿时，尤思顿路的交通依然拥挤。我早就想好要送克洛艾回家，但是一个两难的问题（吻别，还是不吻别）沉重地压在心头。从某些方面来说，演员要冒着失去观众的危险。可以通过模仿行为来迎合，但是这个游戏最终需要对方决定范围，甚至在进行中得冒着心上人征收我们的危险。一个吻将会改变一切，两个人皮肤的接触必然会不可逆转地改变我们交往的进程，结束谈话语义迷离的阶段，承认潜台词。然而，当我们到达利物浦街23A门前时，因为害怕错误地解读了她的意图，我认为提议去喝一杯富有寓意的咖啡的时机还没有到来。
But after such a tense and chocolate-rich meal, my stomach suddenly developed different priorities, and I was forced to ask to be allowed up to the flat. I followed Chloe up the stairs, into the living room and was directed to the bathroom. Emerging a few minutes later with my intentions unaltered, I reached for my coat and announced, with all the thoughtful authority of a man who has decided restraint would be best and fantasies entertained in weeks previous should remain just that, that I had spent a lovely evening, hoped to see her again soon and would call her after the Christmas holidays. Pleased with such maturity, I kissed her on both cheeks, wished her goodnight and turned to leave the flat.但是在吃完这样一顿紧张而富含巧克力的晚餐之后，我的肚子突然有了一种截然相反的需求，我不得不请求进到房间里去。我跟着克洛艾上楼，进入起居室，直奔卫生间。几分钟后，我出来了，想法没有改变。一个男人经过深思熟虑，找到所有理由，决定最好还是克制自己，让几个星期以来的狂热幻想埋在心底。我拿起外套，对心爱的人说，今晚我过得非常愉快，希望很快见到她，圣诞假期后就给她打电话。满意于如此慎重的告别，我吻了她的两颊，祝她晚安，随即转身欲离开她的住所。
16.It was therefore fortunate that Chloe was not so easily persuaded, arresting my flight by the ends of my scarf. She drew me back into the apartment, placed both arms around me and, looking me firmly in the eye with a grin she had previously reserved for the idea of chocolate, whispered, 'We're not children, you know.' And with these words, she placed her lips on mine and we embarked on one of the longer and more beautiful kisses mankind has ever known.处于这种情形中，幸运的是克洛艾不是那么容易被说服，她抓住我领带的末梢，阻止了我的离去。她把我拉回房间，双手环拥着我，定定地看着我的眼睛，先前说起巧克力时忍住的笑这时方才露出。她咧开嘴笑着，轻声呢喃：“你知道，我们都不是小孩。”
随着这句话，她的唇落在我的唇上，我们开始了人类历史上最长久最美好的亲吻。