殘忍而美麗的情誼:The Kite Runner 追風箏的人(78)

Fremont, California. 1980s
Baba loved the idea of America.
It was living in America that gave him an ulcer.
I Remember the two of us walking through Lake Elizabeth Park in Fremont, a few streets down from our apartment, and watching boys at batting practice, little girls giggling on the swings in the playground. Baba would enlighten me with his politics during those walks with long-winded dissertations. “There are only three real men in this world, Amir,” he’d say. He’d count them off on his fingers: America the brash savior, Britain, and Israel. “The rest of them--” he used to wave his hand and make a phht sound “--they’re like gossiping old women.”
The bit about Israel used to draw the ire of Afghans in Fremont who accused him of being pro-Jewish and, de facto, anti Islam. Baba would meet them for tea and rowt cake at the park, drive them crazy with his politics. “What they don’t understand,” he’d tell me later, “is that religion has nothing to do with it.” In Baba’s view, Israel was an island of “real men” in a sea of Arabs too busy getting fat off their oil to care for their own. “Israel does this, Israel does that,” Baba would say in a mock-Arabic accent. “Then do something about it! Take action. You’re Arabs, help the Palestinians, then!”
He loathed Jimmy Carter, whom he called a “big-toothed cretin.” In 1980, when we were still in Kabul, the U.S. announced it would be boycotting the Olympic Games in Moscow. “Wah wah!” Baba exclaimed with disgust. “Brezhnev is massacring Afghans and all that peanut eater can say is I won’t come swim in your pool.” Baba believed Carter had unwittingly done more for communism than Leonid Brezhnev. “He’s not fit to run this country. It’s like putting a boy who can’t ride a bike behind the wheel of a brand new Cadillac.” What America and the world needed was a hard man. A man to be reckoned with, someone who took action instead of wringing his hands. That someone came in the form of Ronald Reagan. And when Reagan went on TV and called the Shorawi “the Evil Empire,” Baba went out and bought a picture of the grinning president giving a thumbs up. He framed the picture and hung it in our hallway, nailing it right next to the old black-and-white of himself in his thin necktie shaking hands with King Zahir Shah. Most of our neighbors in Fremont were bus drivers, policemen, gas station attendants, and unwed mothers collecting welfare, exactly the sort of blue-collar people who would soon suffocate under the pillow Reganomics pressed to their faces. Baba was the lone Republican in our building.
But the Bay Area’s smog stung his eyes, the traffic noise gave him headaches, and the pollen made him cough. The fruit was never sweet enough, the water never clean enough, and where were all the trees and open fields? For two years, I tried to get Baba to enroll in ESL classes to improve his broken English. But he scoffed at the idea. “Maybe I’ll spell ‘cat’ and the teacher will give me a glittery little star so I can run home and show it off to you,” he’d grumble.
One Sunday in the spring of 1983, I walked into a small bookstore that sold used paperbacks, next to the Indian movie theater just west of where Amtrak crossed Fremont Boulevard. I told Baba I’d be out in five minutes and he shrugged. He had been working at a gas station in Fremont and had the day off. I watched him jaywalk across Fremont Boulevard and enter Fast & Easy, a little grocery store run by an elderly Vietnamese couple, Mr. and Mrs. Nguyen. They were gray-haired, friendly people; she had Parkinson’s, he’d had his hip replaced. “He’s like Six Million Dollar Man now,” she always said to me, laughing toothlessly. “Remember Six Million Dollar Man, Amir?” Then Mr. Nguyen would scowl like Lee Majors, pretend he was running in slow motion.
I was flipping through a worn copy of a Mike Hammer mystery when I heard screaming and glass breaking. I dropped the book and hurried across the street. I found the Nguyens behind the counter, all the way against the wall, faces ashen, Mr. Nguyen’s arms wrapped around his wife. On the floor: oranges, an overturned magazine rack, a broken jar of beef jerky, and shards of glass at Baba’s feet.
It turned out that Baba had had no cash on him for the oranges. He’d written Mr. Nguyen a check and Mr. Nguyen had asked for an ID. “He wants to see my license,” Baba bellowed in Farsi. “Almost two years we’ve bought his damn fruits and put money in his pocket and the son of a dog wants to see my license!”
“Baba, it’s not personal,” I said, smiling at the Nguyens. “They’re supposed to ask for an ID.”
“I don’t want you here,” Mr. Nguyen said, stepping in front of his wife. He was pointing at Baba with his cane. He turned to me.“You’re nice young man but your father, he’s crazy. Not welcome anymore.”

弗裏蒙特，加利福尼亞，1980年代
爸爸愛美國的理想。
正是在美國生活，讓他得了潰瘍。
我記得我們兩個走過幾條街道，在弗裏蒙特的伊麗莎白湖公園散步，看着男孩練習揮棒，女孩在遊戲場的鞦韆上咯咯嬌笑。爸爸會利用步行的機會，長篇大論對我灌輸他的政治觀點。“這個世界上只有三個真正的男人，阿米爾，”他說，他伸出手指數着，“美國這個魯莽的救世主，英國，還有以色列。剩下那些……”通常他會揮揮手，發出不屑的聲音，“他們都像是饒舌的老太婆。”
他關於以色列的說法惹惱了弗裏蒙特的阿富汗人，他們指責他親近猶太人，而這實際上就是反對伊斯蘭。爸爸跟他們聚會，喝茶，吃點心，用他的政治觀念將他們氣瘋。“他們所不明白的是，”後來他告訴我，“那跟宗教毫無關係。”在爸爸眼裏，以色列是“真正的男人”居住的島嶼，雖然處在阿拉伯海洋的包圍之下，可是阿拉伯人只顧着出賣石油賺錢，毫不關心自家人的事情。“以色列幹這個，以色列幹那個，”爸爸會模仿阿拉伯人的語氣說，“那做些事情啊!行動啊!你們這些阿拉伯人，那麼去幫巴勒斯坦啊!”
他討厭吉米?卡特，管他叫“大牙齒的蠢貨”。早在1980年，我們還在喀布爾，美國宣佈抵制在莫斯科舉辦的奧運會。“哇!哇!”爸爸充滿厭惡地說，“勃列日涅夫入侵阿富汗，那個捏軟柿子的傢伙居然只說我不去你家的泳池游泳。”爸爸認爲卡特愚蠢的做法助長了勃列日涅夫的氣焰。“他不配掌管這個國家。這好像讓一個連自行車都不會騎的小孩去駕駛一輛嶄新的卡迪拉克。”美國，乃至世界需要的是一個強硬的漢子，一個會被看得起、會採取行動而非一籌莫展的人。羅納德?里根就是這樣的硬漢。當里根在電視現身，將俄國稱爲“邪惡帝國”，爸爸跑出去，買回一張照片：總統微笑着豎起拇指。他把照片裱起來，掛在入門的牆上，將它釘在一張黑白的老照片右邊，在那張照片裏面，他繫着領帶，跟查希爾國王握手。我們在弗裏蒙特的鄰居多數是巴士司機、警察、加油站工人、靠救濟金生活的未婚媽媽，確切地說，全都是被裏根的經濟政策壓得喘不過氣來的藍領工人。爸爸是我們那棟樓惟一的共和黨員。
但交通的濃霧刺痛他的眼睛，汽車的聲響害他頭痛，還有，花粉也讓他咳嗽。水果永遠不夠甜，水永遠不夠乾淨，所有的樹林和原野到哪裏去了?開頭兩年，我試着讓爸爸參加英語培訓班的課程，提高他那口破英語，但他對此不屑一顧。“也許我會把‘cat’拼出來，然後老師會獎給我一顆閃閃發光的星星，那麼我就可以跑回家，拿着它向你炫耀了。”他會這麼咕噥。
1983年春季的某個星期天，我走進一家出售平裝舊書的小店，旁邊是家印度電影院，往東是美國國家鐵路和弗裏蒙特大道交界的地方。我跟爸爸說等我五分鐘，他聳聳肩。他當時在弗裏蒙特某個加油站上班，那天休假。我看到他橫跨弗裏蒙特大道，走進一家雜貨便利店，店主是一對年老的越南夫妻，阮先生和他的太太。他們白髮蒼蒼，待人友善，太太得了帕金森症，先生則換過髖骨。“他現在看起來像《無敵金剛》了，”她總是這麼笑着對我說，張開沒有牙齒的嘴巴。“記得《無敵金剛》嗎，阿米爾?”接着阮先生會學着李?梅傑斯，怒眉倒豎，以緩慢的動作假裝正在跑步。
我正在翻閱一本破舊的麥克?漢默［1］MikeHammer，美國作家邁克?斯畢蘭（MikeSpillane1918～）創作的系列恐怖小說主角。［1］懸疑小說，這當頭傳來一聲尖叫，還有玻璃碎裂的聲音。我放下書，匆匆穿過馬路。我發現阮先生夫婦在櫃檯後面，臉如死灰，緊貼牆壁，阮先生雙手抱着他的太太。地板上散落着橙子，翻倒的雜誌架，一個裝牛肉乾的破罐子，爸爸腳下還有玻璃的碎片。
原來爸爸買了橙子，身上卻沒有現金。他給阮先生開了支票，阮先生想看看他的身份證。“他想看我的證件，”爸爸用法爾西語咆哮，“快兩年了，我在這裏買這些該死的水果，把錢放進他的口袋，而這個狗雜碎居然要看我的證件!”
“爸爸，這又不是針對你。”我說，朝阮氏夫婦擠出微笑，“他們理應查看證件的。”
“我不歡迎你在這裏，”阮先生說，站在他妻子身前，他用柺杖指着爸爸，然後轉向我，“你是個很好的年輕人，但是你爸爸，他是個瘋子。這裏再也不歡迎他。”