大象传媒

鈥淲hat were you praying for, Ma鈥檃m?鈥�

听鈥淣辞迟 for anything.聽 I don鈥檛 pray anymore.聽 I just talk.鈥�

聽鈥淲hat were you talking about?鈥�

聽鈥淵ou won鈥檛 understand, baby.鈥�

聽鈥淵es, I will.鈥�

聽鈥淚 was talking about time.聽 It鈥檚 so hard for me to believe in it.聽 Some things go.聽 Pass on.聽 Some things just stay.聽 I used to think it was my rememory.聽 You know.聽 Some things you forget.聽 Other things you never do.聽 But it鈥檚 not.聽 Places, places are still there.聽 If a house burns down, it鈥檚 gone, but the place - the picture of it - stays, and not just in my rememory, but out there, in the world.聽 What I remember is a picture floating around out there outside my head.聽 I mean, even if I don鈥檛 think it, even if I die, the picture of what I did, or knew, or saw is still out there.聽 Right in the place where it happened.鈥�

聽鈥淐an other people see it?鈥� asked Denver.

聽鈥淥h yes.聽 Oh, yes, yes, yes.聽 Someday you be walking down the road and you hear something or see something going on.聽 So clear.聽 And you think it鈥檚 you thinking it up.聽 A thought picture. 聽But no.聽 It鈥檚 when you bump into a rememory that belongs to somebody else.聽 Where I was before I came here, that place is real.聽 It鈥檚 never going away... 聽So, Denver, you can鈥檛 never go there.聽 Never.聽 Because even though it鈥檚 all over - over and done with - it鈥檚 going to always be there waiting for you.聽 That鈥檚 how come I had to get all my children out.聽 No matter what.鈥�

聽Denver picked at her fingernails.聽 鈥淚f it鈥檚 still there, waiting, that must mean that nothing ever dies.鈥�

聽Sethe looked right in Denver鈥檚 face.聽 鈥淣othing ever does,鈥� she said.