The email arrives on a Monday. Because of budget pressures, the school board will vote on Thursday whether to cut the music program at the end of the year. Aurora reads it standing at her locker, and the viola on her back suddenly feels heavier than usual.
邮件是周一来的。由于预算紧张，校董会将在周四投票决定，是否在学年末取消音乐项目。奥罗拉站在储物柜前读完了邮件，背上的中提琴忽然比平时更沉了。
Her music teacher is organizing a petition, and a few parents have promised to write letters. But the board meeting has a public comment slot, three minutes per speaker, and nobody has signed up. "Someone should speak," says her teacher, looking around the room. Several students become very interested in their shoes. Aurora is one of them.
她的音乐老师正在组织联名请愿，几位家长也答应写信。可是董事会会议有一个公众发言环节，每人三分钟，却没有人报名。“应该有人去说说，”老师环视着教室说。好几个学生突然对自己的鞋子产生了浓厚的兴趣。奥罗拉就是其中之一。
She hates speaking in public. In class presentations her voice goes thin and her hands shake so much that the paper rattles. She has played in front of audiences since she was ten, but that is different. When she plays, she doesn't have to be herself. Still, that evening she writes her name on the sign-up sheet in handwriting she hardly recognizes.
她讨厌当众讲话。班上做展示的时候，她的声音会变细，手抖得纸张哗哗作响。她从十岁起就在观众面前演奏，但那不一样。演奏的时候，她不必做她自己。可那天晚上，她还是在报名表上写下了自己的名字，那笔迹她自己都几乎认不出来。
For three days she practices. She reads the speech to the bathroom mirror, to her cat and to her viola case, which listens best. The first version takes three minutes and forty seconds, mostly because it contains eleven statistics. She cuts ten of them.
整整三天，她都在练习。她对着浴室的镜子念稿，对着她的猫念，对着她的琴盒念，琴盒是最好的听众。第一稿要念三分四十秒，主要是因为里面有十一个统计数字。她删掉了十个。
On Thursday evening, the boardroom smells of coffee and carpet cleaner. Six adults sit behind a long table with name cards in front of them. A small digital timer on the lectern glows red. Aurora has been sitting in the second row for forty minutes, listening to a debate about bus routes. She can no longer feel her fingers.
周四傍晚，会议室里有咖啡和地毯清洁剂的味道。六位成年人坐在一张长桌后面，面前摆着名牌。讲台上的一个小电子计时器发着红光。奥罗拉已经在第二排坐了四十分钟，听着一场关于公交线路的辩论。她的手指已经没有知觉了。
"Next, public comment," says the chair. "Aurora, please come up. You have three minutes."
“下面是公众发言，”主席说，“奥罗拉，请上来。你有三分钟。”
Her legs carry her to the lectern, though she isn't sure how. She puts down her index cards. The first sentence on the first card is a joke. When she opens her mouth, however, her mind goes white, and the joke is gone. The timer starts. Nobody coughs.
她的双腿把她带到了讲台前，她也不清楚是怎么做到的。她放下她的索引卡。第一张卡上的第一句是个玩笑。可是她一开口，脑子里一片空白，那个玩笑不见了。计时器开始走。没有人咳嗽。
"I don't like speaking," she says, and hears her own voice shake. "So if the program didn't matter to me, I wouldn't be here."
“我不喜欢讲话，”她说，听见自己的声音在发抖，“所以，要是这个项目对我不重要，我就不会站在这里。”
Someone in the audience makes a small sound, almost a laugh. It helps.
观众席里有人发出一声轻轻的响动，几乎是一声笑。这帮了她。
She forgets the cards and tells them two things instead. The whole music budget for a year costs less than the new sign the board paid for outside the school entrance. And ninety-four students are in the program, at least a dozen of whom, she thinks, come to school mainly for it. "If the program were cut," she says, "I think some of them would simply stop coming."
她把卡片忘在了一边，转而告诉他们两件事。一整年的音乐预算，比董事会在学校门口新花钱做的那块牌子还便宜。而且有九十四名学生参加了这个项目，她想，其中至少有十几个人来上学主要就是为了它。“如果项目被取消，”她说，“我想他们中有些人会干脆不来了。”
The timer beeps. She has used two minutes and fifty-one seconds. She walks back to her seat, and her knees tremble the whole way.
计时器响了。她用了两分五十一秒。她走回座位，一路上膝盖都在发颤。
For a moment, the board members look at one another. Then the chair clears her throat. She says the board has heard the comments. The vote will be postponed until the March meeting, so the figures can be reviewed again. She does not say what will happen after that.
有那么一会儿，董事们面面相觑。然后主席清了清嗓子。她说董事会已经听取了大家的意见。投票将推迟到三月的会议，以便再次审核数字。至于那之后会怎样，她没有说。
In the corridor, her teacher squeezes her shoulder and says nothing, which is exactly right.
走廊里，老师捏了捏她的肩膀，什么也没说，这恰到好处。
On the bus home, Aurora finds the index cards in her pocket. She has not read a single one. On the last card, she had written the sentence she meant to finish with: "Please let us keep playing." She folds the card in half and tucks it into her viola case, next to the spare strings.
回家的公交车上，奥罗拉在口袋里摸到了那些索引卡。她一张也没有念。最后一张卡上，她写着本来打算用来收尾的那句话：“请让我们继续演奏。”她把卡片对折，塞进琴盒里，放在备用琴弦旁边。
She doesn't know what the board will decide in March. But Monday's rehearsal is still on, and she plans to be early.
她不知道三月董事会会做出什么决定。但周一的排练还照常进行，她打算早点到。
