Georgi's phone has been dying for weeks. The battery is empty by lunch, and the screen sometimes goes black for no reason. Last night, a warning appeared: "Storage almost full. Your phone may stop working." He decides it is finally time to buy a new one.
格奥尔基的手机已经快不行好几个星期了。电池到中午就没电，屏幕有时无缘无故变黑。昨晚，弹出了一条警告：“存储空间几乎已满。您的手机可能会停止工作。”他决定，终于到了买新手机的时候。
Then he remembers the voice messages. His grandmother lives eight hundred kilometers away, in a village near the mountains. She does not like typing, so for two years she has sent him voice messages instead. Some are only ten seconds long. Others are five minutes of weather, neighbors and advice about his cough.
接着，他想起了那些语音消息。他的奶奶住在八百公里外，在靠近山区的一个村子里。她不喜欢打字，所以两年来，她一直给他发语音消息。有些只有十秒钟长。有些则是五分钟，讲天气、邻居，还有关于他咳嗽的建议。
Georgi has never saved any of them. They all live inside the old phone, and he has no idea what will happen when it dies. "If I lose them, I will never get them back," he thinks.
格奥尔基从来没有保存过其中任何一条。它们全都存在旧手机里，而手机坏掉时会发生什么，他毫无头绪。“要是丢了，我就再也找不回来了。”他想。
That evening, he sits at the kitchen table with a cup of tea. The phone is plugged into the wall. He searches for "how to save voice messages". The first answer is far too complicated. The second one works, but only for one message at a time. He tries it anyway. Each message takes about a minute to export to his laptop.
那天晚上，他端着一杯茶坐在厨房的桌前。手机插在墙上充电。他搜索“如何保存语音消息”。第一个答案复杂得过分。第二个行得通，但一次只能导出一条。他还是试了。每条消息导出到笔记本电脑上大约要一分钟。
By ten o'clock, he has saved forty messages. He listens to some while he works. In one, his grandmother is complaining about a neighbor's very loud rooster. In another, she says, "Eat something green, Georgi. I can hear that you are tired." He laughs out loud in the empty kitchen.
到十点钟，他已经保存了四十条。他一边干活一边听其中一些。有一条里，他奶奶在抱怨邻居家那只吵得要命的公鸡。另一条里，她说：“吃点绿色的东西，格奥尔基。我听得出你累了。”他在空荡荡的厨房里哈哈大笑。
By midnight, all one hundred and twelve messages are safe in a folder on his laptop. He copies the folder twice, just to be sure. The old phone still has twelve percent of its battery, and it seems almost proud of itself.
到午夜，全部一百一十二条消息都安全地存进了他笔记本电脑里的一个文件夹。他把文件夹复制了两份，只为保险。旧手机还剩百分之十二的电量，看上去几乎有点得意。
The next morning, before work, he calls her. She picks up on the fourth ring. "Why are you calling so early? Is something wrong?"
第二天早上，上班前，他给她打了电话。响到第四声，她接了。“你这么早打电话干什么？出什么事了吗？”
"Nothing is wrong," Georgi says. "I just saved all your voice messages."
“什么事也没有，”格奥尔基说，“我只是把你所有的语音消息都存下来了。”
"Why would you save them? It is only me talking."
“为什么要存？只是我在说话而已。”
"That is exactly why."
“就是因为这个。”
She is quiet for a moment. Then she laughs, the same short laugh he has heard a hundred times in the recordings. "You are a strange boy," she says. "Fine. If you want my voice, I will give you something new."
她静了一会儿。然后她笑了，还是那种他在录音里听过上百遍的短促的笑。“你这孩子真怪，”她说，“好吧。你要是想要我的声音，我就给你点新的。”
"Can we record one together?" he asks. "You and me, right now?"
“我们能一起录一条吗？”他问，“你和我，就现在？”
"Of course. Wait, let me sit down. And tell me where I should speak."
“当然。等等，让我先坐下。还有，告诉我该对着哪儿说话。”
Georgi opens the app on his new phone and holds it close to the speaker. He presses the red button, and his grandmother clears her throat and begins to talk.
格奥尔基打开新手机上的应用，把手机凑近扬声器。他按下红色的按钮，他的奶奶清了清嗓子，开始说话。
