Chapter 9

Chapter 9 Negotiation (negotiation) n. A method of bargaining so that you can reach an agreement. Evan looked up from the marble track he was building when Jessie walked in the front door. She looked hot. She looked sweaty. She looked... happy. Really happy. Like she'd just gotten an A+. Or like... like she'd just won a war. "What are you smiling for?" asked Evan, holding a marble at the top of the track. "No reason." Jessie put her hands on her hips and stared at Evan. She looked like one of those goofy yellow smiley faces—all mouth. "Well, quit looking at me, would ya? It's

第九章谈判（Negotiation） 一种讨价还价的方法，使你能达成协议。 当杰西走进前门时，埃文从他正在铺设的大理石轨道上抬起头来。 她看起来很性感。她看起来汗流浃背。 她看起来……快乐。真的快乐。 就像她得了A+一样。 或者像……就像她刚刚打赢了一场战争。 “你笑什么？”埃文问道，手里拿着一颗弹珠。 “没有理由”。杰西双手叉腰，盯着埃文。 她看起来就像那些傻乎乎的黄色笑脸，满嘴都是。 “好了，别看我了，好吗？” 这是

creepifying. You look like you're going to explode or something." Evan dropped the marble into the funnel. It raced through the track, picking up speed around the curves. It passed the flywheel, sending the flags spinning, then fell into the final drop. When it reached the end of the track it went sailing through the air like a beautiful silver bird. And fell short. The marble landed on the ground, instead of in the bull's-eye cup. Evan muttered under his breath and adjusted the position of the cup. "Raise the end of the track," said Jessie. "You'll get more loft." Evan looked at her angrily. The marble had fallen into the cup the last ten times he'd done it. Why did it have to fall short the one time she was watching? "Don't tell me what to do," he said. Why was she smiling like that? "I didn't tell you what to do," she said. "I just made a suggestion. Take it or leave it." She turned to

creepifying。你看起来好像要爆炸了。” 埃文把弹珠扔进了漏斗。 它在赛道上疾驰，在拐弯处加速。 它经过飞轮，让旗子旋转起来，然后落入最后一滴水。 当它到达跑道的尽头时，它像一只美丽的银色小鸟一样在空中飞翔。 但没能成功。弹珠落在了地上，而不是射中了靶心。 埃文低声咕哝着，调整了一下杯子的位置。 “把轨道的末端抬起，”杰西说。 “你会得到更多的阁楼。”埃文生气地看着她。 前十次弹珠都掉到杯子里了。 为什么她只看了一次，结果就失败了呢？ “别告诉我该怎么做，”他说。 她为什么那样笑？ “我没告诉你该怎么做，”她说。 “我只是提了个建议。 要么接受，要么放弃。”她转向

walk up the stairs. "Grumpminster Fink," she tossed over her shoulder. Evan threw a marble at her disappearing back but missed by a mile. Well, he hadn't really been aiming anyway; he just wanted that feeling of throwing something. He'd been feeling the need to throw something these past four days. Grumpminster Fink. That was the name of a character he'd made up when he was six and Jessie was five. That was back when Mom and Dad were fighting a lot and Evan and Jessie just had to get out of the house. They'd scramble up the Climbing Tree —Evan had his branch, Jessie had hers—and wait it out. Sometimes they had to wait a long time. And once, when Jessie was thirsty and impatient and cranky, Evan had said, "Be quiet and I'll tell you a story about Grumpminster Fink." Grumpminster Fink was a man who was cranky and mean and made everybody miserable. But deep down, he wanted people to love him. It's just that every time he tried to do something nice, it turned

走上楼梯。“脾气暴躁的芬克部长。”她回过头说。 埃文朝她的背影扔了一颗弹珠，但没打中。 好吧，反正他也没有真正瞄准；他只是想要那种扔东西的感觉。 在过去的四天里，他一直觉得有必要扔点什么。 Grumpminster芬克。这是他六岁和杰西五岁时编的一个角色的名字。 那是在爸爸妈妈经常吵架的时候，埃文和杰西不得不离开家。 他们会爬上爬树——埃文有他的树枝，杰西有她的——等着它出来。 有时他们不得不等很长时间。 有一次，杰西又渴又不耐烦又暴躁，埃文说：“安静点，我给你讲个关于臭脾气的芬克的故事。” 脾气暴躁的芬克是一个脾气暴躁、刻薄的人，让每个人都很痛苦。 但在内心深处，他希望人们爱他。 只是每次他想做点好事的时候，情况就变了

out all wrong. Evan had made up a lot of stories about Mr. Fink in that tree. But after Dad left, there just weren't any more stories to tell. No one in the whole world, besides Jessie and Evan, knew about Grumpminster Fink. And Evan hadn't thought about him in years. "Hey!" he said sharply. He heard Jessie stop at the top of the stairs, but she didn't come down. "Do you want to call this whole thing off?" he asked. "What?" she shouted. "This... this... Lemonade War," he said. "Call it off?" "Yeah," he said. "Just say nobody wins and nobody loses." Jessie walked down the stairs and stood with her arms crossed. Evan looked at her. He missed her. He had spent the whole day—the third to last day before school started—by himself. It stunk. It totally

完全错了。埃文编造了很多关于芬克先生在树上的故事。 但爸爸走后，就没有什么故事可讲了。 除了杰西和埃文，这个世界上没有人知道芬克脾气的事。 埃文已经很多年没想过他了。 “嘿！”他厉声说。他听见杰西停在楼梯顶上，但她没有下来。 “你想取消整个计划吗？”他问。 “什么？”她喊道。“这…… 这个…柠檬水战争，”他说。 “取消？”“是的，”他说。 “就说没人赢也没人输。” 杰西走下楼梯，双臂交叉站着。 埃文看着她。他想念她。 他独自度过了整整一天——开学前的第三天到最后一天。 它发臭。它完全

stunk. If Jessie had been around—and they hadn't been fighting with each other—they could have played air hockey or made pretzels or built a marble track with twice as many gizmos that launched the marble into the bull's-eye cup every time. Jessie was very precise. She was good at getting the marble to go into the cup. "Whaddya say?" he asked. Jessie looked puzzled. "I don't know..." she said, frowning. "You see, Megan kinda, well, she..." Evan felt his face go hot. Megan Moriarty. Every time he thought of her his throat got all squeezed and scratchy. It was like the allergic reaction he had if he accidentally ate a shrimp. "You told Megan Moriarty about—everything?" he asked, feeling itchy all over. "No. Well... what 'everything'?" asked Jessie. Evan thought she looked like a fish caught in a net. "You did." And suddenly Evan knew exactly why Jessie had been smiling when she walked in the door. And why she didn't want to call off the war.

发臭。如果杰西在身边——而且他们没有互相打架——他们就可以玩空中曲棍球，或者做椒盐脆饼，或者用两倍的小装置建造一条大理石轨道，每次都把大理石发射到靶心杯里。 杰西说得很精确。她很擅长把弹珠放进杯子里。 “你说什么？”他问。杰西看起来很困惑。 “我不知道……”她皱着眉头说。 “你看，梅根有点，嗯，她……” 埃文感到脸发烫。 梅根·莫里亚蒂。每当他想到她，他的喉咙就会发痒。 就像他不小心吃了虾后的过敏反应一样。 “你把一切都告诉梅根·莫里亚蒂了？”他问，觉得浑身发痒。 “没有。嗯…什么‘一切’？”杰西问。 埃文觉得她看起来像一条被网住的鱼。 “你做的。”突然间，埃文明白了为什么杰西在进门时一直在微笑。 以及为什么她不想停止战争。

She had done it. Again. She had figured out some way to show the world just how stupid he was. Like the time he'd come home with 100 percent on his weekly spelling quiz—the only time he'd ever gotten every word right—to find that Jessie had won a statewide poetry-writing contest. He'd thrown his paper into the trash without even telling his mom. What was the point? Evan didn't know how, but somehow Jessie'd found a way to earn more than one hundred and three dollars. She was going to beat him. And Megan Moriarty knew all about it. And she would tell everyone else. All the girls would know. Paul would know. And Ryan. And Adam and Jack. Scott Spencer would know. Can you believe it? He lost to his little sister. The one who's going to be in our class. What a loser! "You know what?" he said, pushing past her. "Forget it! Just forget I said anything. The war is on. O-N. Prepare to die."

她做到了。再一次。她想出了一个办法，让世人知道他有多蠢。 就像有一次，他每周的拼写测验满分回家——这是他唯一一次把每个单词都拼对——却发现杰西赢得了全州的诗歌写作比赛。 他甚至没有告诉他妈妈就把报纸扔进了垃圾桶。 有什么意义呢？埃文不知道是怎么回事，但不知怎么的，杰西找到了挣103多美元的方法。 她要打败他。 梅根·莫里亚蒂知道这一切。 她会告诉其他人。 所有的女孩都会知道。保罗会知道的。 和瑞安。还有亚当和杰克。 斯科特·斯宾塞会知道的。你能相信吗？ 他输给了他的小妹妹。 就是要来我们班的那个。 真是个失败者！“你知道吗？”他说着从她身边挤过去。 “算了吧!就当我没说什么。 战争开始了。设计。准备去死吧。”