On her first day at the port school, Imane wrote her name on the register in careful letters. The teacher, Mr. Doyle, read it aloud as “Imma” and said it was easier for everyone. By the end of the week, even Imane had stopped correcting him. Her name had become a coat that did not fit, and she wore it to avoid the trouble of taking it back.
在港口学校的第一天，伊曼用认真的字迹把名字写在点名册上。老师多伊尔先生把它读成“伊玛”，说这样对大家都方便。到周末，连伊曼也不再纠正他。她的名字变成了一件不合身的外套，她穿着它，以免取回来时惹麻烦。
The trouble came anyway. In the school play, she was cast as a narrator and asked to introduce herself. She stood on the stage during rehearsal and said her name correctly, slowly, with the small sound at the end that Mr. Doyle had been dropping. The class went quiet. Someone laughed, not cruelly, and then someone else tried to say it.
麻烦还是来了。学校戏剧里，她被选为旁白，要介绍自己。排练时她站在台上，正确地、缓慢地说出自己的名字，带上多伊尔先生一直省略的那个尾音。全班安静了。有人笑了，不是恶意的，然后另一个人试着念。
Mr. Doyle apologized in front of everyone, which was awkward and useful. He asked Imane to teach the class the sound, and for ten minutes the room practiced a name as if it were a piece of music. Her mother came to the performance and heard thirty children say it properly. Imane kept the register page from that first day. She had not changed her name. She had made room for it.
多伊尔先生当着所有人的面道了歉，场面尴尬却有用。他请伊曼教全班那个音，接下来的十分钟，教室里像练一段音乐一样练一个名字。她母亲来看了演出，听见三十个孩子正确地念出它。伊曼留着第一天的点名册那一页。她没有改名字。她只是为它腾出了位置。
Elias had painted the name on the boat himself, in white letters with a brush that was older than his daughter. Marisol. Every morning for thirty years he had stepped onto a boat that carried her name, and every winter he had repainted it. His daughter now lived in a city with no harbor and called on Sundays. The boat had become the largest thing he had left of her childhood.
埃利亚斯亲手把名字刷在船上，用的是比女儿还老的刷子。玛丽索尔。三十年来，他每天早晨踏上一艘载着她名字的船，每年冬天重新刷一遍。女儿如今住在一座没有港口的城市，周日打电话回来。这条船成了他手中有关她童年的最大一件东西。
When his knees began to fail, a young fisherman named Bo offered to buy it. Bo was respectful and strong and wanted to rename the boat Second Wind. Elias said no. He said it twice, then stopped answering the phone.
膝盖开始不听使唤时，一个叫博的年轻渔民提出买船。博恭敬、强壮，想把船改名“第二阵风”。埃利亚斯说不。他说了两遍，然后不再接电话。
In March, Marisol came home for a week. She walked down to the dock with her father and looked at the letters. “It's a boat, Papa,” she said, kindly. “It won't forget me.” Elias sold it to Bo the next day, on one condition: Bo would let him paint over the old name. It took an hour. Under the new letters, Elias wrote Marisol's name once more, small, where no one would see it. Then he handed Bo the brush.
三月，玛丽索尔回家住了一周。她和父亲走到码头，看着那些字母。“这是一条船，爸爸，”她温和地说，“它不会忘记我。”第二天，埃利亚斯把船卖给了博，只有一个条件：让博允许他刷掉旧名字。花了一个小时。在新字母下面，埃利亚斯又写了一次玛丽索尔的名字，很小，没人会看见。然后他把刷子递给博。
Hana had published three novels under the name L. Voss, a name she had chosen because it sounded like someone who did not apologize. In real life she worked in an office, avoided parties, and let her mother believe the books were a hobby. L. Voss wrote letters to readers. Hana read them in the kitchen and did not answer.
花奈以“L. 沃斯”之名出版了三部小说。她选这个名字，是因为它听起来像一个不会道歉的人。现实生活中，她在办公室工作，回避聚会，让母亲以为写书只是爱好。L. 沃斯给读者回信。花奈在厨房读那些信，从不回复。
Then the fourth novel was nominated for a prize, and the organizers invited L. Voss to read at the ceremony. Hana wrote three drafts of a refusal. Each one was polite and each one was a lie.
后来第四部小说获得一个奖项提名，主办方邀请L. 沃斯在典礼上朗读。花奈写了三稿拒绝信。每一封都礼貌，每一封都是谎言。
She went. She stood at the podium in a borrowed jacket and said, “My name is Hana, and I also answer to L. Voss.” The room was silent for a moment, then applauded, and she read the first page in the voice she had been practicing alone for years. Afterward, a woman in the audience asked which name was real. Hana thought about the office, the kitchen, the letters. “They are both the name I use when I am being honest,” she said. “Only one of them is easier to hide behind.”
她去了。她穿着借来的外套站在讲台上，说：“我叫花奈，我也回应L. 沃斯这个名字。”房间里静了一瞬，然后响起掌声，她用独自练习多年的声音读了第一页。事后，一位观众问哪个名字才是真的。花奈想到办公室、厨房、那些信。“它们都是我诚实时会用的名字，”她说，“只是其中一个更容易躲藏。”