分节阅读_91

  e ice cream, others prefer strawberry?”
  i nodded.
  ”sorry about the food analogy — i 't think of ao
  explain.”
  i smiled. he smiled ruefully back.
  ”you see, every person smells different, has a different essence. if you
  lo al a room full of stale beer, he'd gladly drink it.
  but he could resist, if he wished to, if he were a reg alcoholic.
  's say you pla that room a glass of hundred-year-old brandy,
  the rarest, fi ad filled the room with its warm aroma — how
  do you think he would fare then?”
  we sat silently, lookiher's eyes — trying to read each
  other's thoughts.
  he broke the sile.
  ”maybe that's aybe it would be too easy to
  turn doerhaps i should have made our alcoholi
  addistead.”
  ”so what y is, i'm your brand of heroirying to
  lighten the mood.
  he smiled swiftly, seeming to appreciate my effort. ”yes, you are exactly
  my brand of heroin.”
  ”does that happen often?” i asked.
  he looked across the treetops, thinking through his response.
  ”i spoke to my brothers about it.” he still stared iao
  jasper, every one of you is much the same. he's the most ret to join
  our family. it's a struggle for him to abstain at all. he hasn't had time
  to grow sehe differen smell, in flavlanced
  swiftly at me, his expressioic.
  ”sorry,” he said.
  ”i don't mind. please don't worry about offending me, me,
  or whichever. that's the way you think. i derstand, or i try to
  at least. just explain however you .”
  he took a deep breath ahe sky again.
  ”so jasper wasn't sure if he'd ever eone who was as” — he
  hesitated, lht ealing as you are to me.
  which makes me thi has been on the wagoo
  speak, aood what i meawi, once
  strohe other.”
  ”and for you?”
  ”never.”
  the w there for a moment in the warm breeze.
  ”what did emmett do?” i asked to break the silence.
  it was the wroo ask. his face grew dark, his hand ched
  into a fist inside mine. he looked away. i waited, but he wasn't going to
  answer.
  ”i guess i know,” i finally said.
  he lifted his eyes; his expression was wistful, pleading.
  ”evero of us fall off the wagon, don't we?”
  ”what are you asking? my permission?” my voice er than i'd
  iried to make my tone kinder — i could guess what his hoy
  must . ”i mean, is there hen?” how calmly i could
  discuss my owh!
  ”no, antly trite. ”of course there's hope! i mean, of
  course i won't…” he left the senteng. his eyes buro mine.
  ”it's different for us. emmett… these were strangers he happened across.
  it was a long time ago, and he wasn't as… practiced, as careful, as he is
  now.”
  he fell silent aently as i thought it through.
  ”so if we'd met… oh, in a dark alley or something…” i trailed off.
  ”it t i had not to jump up in the middle of that class full
  of aopped abruptly, looking aalked
  past me, i could have ruihing carlisle has built fht
  then and there. if i hadn't been denying my thirst for the last, well,
  too many years, i wouldn't have beeop myself.” he paused,
  sg at the trees.
  he gla me grimly, both of us remembering. ”you must have thought i
  ossessed.”
  ”i 't uand why. how you could hate me so quickly…”
  ”to me, it was like you were some kind of demoraight from
  my own persoo ruihe fragraning off your skin… i
  thought it would make me dera first day. in that one hour, i
  thought of a hundred different wa