有一家人。都是小个。他们的胳膊很小，他们的手也小，他们的个头也不高，他们的脚非常非常小。

爷爷睡在客厅的沙发上，牙缝里漏出鼾声。他的脚又白又胖，像厚厚的玉米肉粽，他把它们扑上粉，套上白袜子，塞进棕色皮靴里。

奶奶的脚像粉红珍珠一样好看，穿着天鹅绒的高跟鞋，走起路来一歪一扭。可她还是穿着它们，因为鞋子漂亮。

宝宝的脚有十个细细的脚趾米，苍白又透明，像蝾螈的脚趾。他只要一饿就会把它们塞进嘴里。

妈妈的脚，丰盈文雅，像白色鸽子从云天，那枕头的海洋飞落，走过油麻毯上的玫瑰，走下木楼梯，走在粉笔画的跳房的格子上，5、6、7，蓝色天空。

你们想要这个吗？给你们个纸袋，里面有一双柠檬黄的鞋子、一双红色的鞋子和一双舞鞋，原先是白色的，现在是淡蓝色的。拿去吧。我们说谢谢你，等到她上楼去。

好哇！今天我们是辛德莱拉，因为我们的脚正合适。我们对着拉切尔一只套着学生灰短袜又穿着女士高跟鞋的脚大笑。你喜欢这些鞋子吗？可说实话，低头看看你的脚，却觉得有点吓人，它好像不再是你的脚了，上面的腿好长好长。

每个人都想换着穿。柠檬黄的换红的，红的换那双曾是白的现在是淡蓝色的。脱下又穿上，穿上又脱下，忙乎了好一阵，直到我们都累了。

然后露西尖声叫起来，我们把袜子脱掉吧。对呀。是真的。我们有腿呀。细瘦的腿，上面点缀着脱痂后形成的缎面疤。可这是我们自己的腿，好看，又长。

拉切尔学会了穿着这些奇妙的高跟鞋，架势十足地走来走去。她教我们把腿交叉又分开，像跳花式绳一样地走；她教我们怎么一步一响地走到街角，好像鞋子在和你对答。露西、拉切尔和我就这样踮着脚走着。走到街角，男人的眼睛没法从我们身上移开。我们像是带来了圣诞节。

街角杂货店的宾尼先生放下他的大雪茄，问，你们的妈妈知道你们这鞋子哪来的吗？谁给你们的？

没人。

这鞋不安全。他说。你们这些小女孩还太小，不适合穿这样的鞋子。趁我还没叫警察赶快脱掉吧。可我们只是跑开。

大道上一个骑着拼装自行车的男孩喊道，女士们，带我上天堂啊。

那里除了我们没别人。

你喜欢这些鞋子吗？拉切尔说是的，露西说是的，是的，我说，这些是最好的鞋子。我们再也不要穿别的鞋子了。你喜欢这样的鞋子吗？

在自助洗衣店的前面，有六个长着一样的胖脸的女孩，她们装做看不到我们。拉切尔说，他们是表姐妹，喜欢妒忌。我们有模有样地走着。

街对过的一家小酒馆的门前，一个流浪汉坐在长凳上。

你喜欢这鞋子吗？

流浪汉说，喜欢，小姑娘。你的小黄鞋好漂亮。走近点，我看不太清。再近点。来。

你是漂亮的小姑娘，那个人接着说，你叫什么名字，美女？

拉切尔说叫拉切尔。就那么答了一句。

现在你知道和醉鬼说话有多不好了吧，告诉他你的名字就更糟糕，可谁能怪她呢。她那么小，一天里听到那么多好听的话让她有点晕头了，即便那是一个流浪汉的醉话。

拉切尔，你比一辆黄色出租车还漂亮。你知道吗？

可我们不喜欢。我们得走了。露西说。

如果我给你一元钱你会吻我吗？一元钱怎么样？我给你一元钱，他低头在口袋里找起皱巴巴的票子来。

我们得马上走，露西说着拉过拉切尔的手，因为她好像在考虑那一元钱呢。

流浪汉冲着空气在叫喊着什么，可我们已经很快地跑远了，我们的高跟鞋带着我们一路跑过大街，转过街区，经过那一群难看的表姐妹，经过宾尼先生的店，跑到了芒果街上，回来了，以防万一。

我们厌倦了扮靓。露西把柠檬黄的、红色的和先是白色后来是淡蓝色的鞋子藏在后廊上一个很大的篮子里，直到星期二，她妈妈，非常爱干净的她，把它们扔了。没有人抗议。

The Family of Litt1e Feet

There was a family. All were little. Their arms were little, and their hands were little, and their height was not tall, and their feet very small.

The grandpa slept on the living room couch and snored through his teeth. His feet were fat and doughy like thick tamales, and these he powdered and stuffed into white socks and brown leather shoes.

The grandma's feet were lovely as pink pearls and dressed in velvety high heels that made her walk with a wobble, but she wore them anyway because they were pretty.

The baby's feet had ten tiny toes, pale and see-through like a salamander's, and these he popped into his mouth whenever he was hungry.

The mother's feet, plump and polite, descended like white pigeons from the sea of pillow, across the linoleum roses, down down the wooden stairs, over the chalk hopscotch squares，5，6，7，blue sky.

Do you want this? And gave us a paper bag with one pair of lemon shoes and one red and one pair of dancing shoes that used to be white but were now pale blue. Here, and we said thank you and waited until she went upstairs.

Hurray！Today we are Cinderella because our feet fit exactly, and we laugh at Rachel's one foot with a girl's grey sock and a lady's high heel. Do you like these shoes? But the truth is it is scary to look down at your foot that is no longer yours and see attached a long long leg.

Everybody wants to trade. The lemon shoes for the red shoes, the red for the pair that were once white but are now pale blue, the pale blue for the lemon, and take them off and put them back on and keep on like this a long time until we are tired.

Then Lucy screams to take our socks off and yes, it's true. We have legs. Skinny and spotted with satin scars where scabs were picked, but legs, all our own, good to look at, and long.

It's Rachel who learns to walk the best all strutted in those magic high heels. She teaches us to cross and uncross our legs, and to run like a double-dutch rope, and how to walk down to the corner so that the shoes talk back to you with every step. Lucy, Rachel, me tee-tottering like so. Down to the corner where the men can't take their eyes off us. We must be Christmas.

Mr. Benny at the corner grocery puts down his important cigar：Your mother know you got shoes like that? Who give you those?

Nobody.

Them are dangerous, he says. You girls too young to be wearing shoes like that. Take them shoes off before I call the cops, but we just run.

On the avenue a boy on a homemade bicycle calls out：Ladies, lead me to heaven.

But there is nobody around but us.

Do you like these shoes? Rachel says yes, and Lucy says yes, and yes I say, these are the best shoes. We will never go back to wearing the other kind again. Do you like these shoes?

In front of the laundromat six girls with the same fat face pretend we are invisible. They are the cousins, Lucy says, and always jealous. We just keep strutting.

Across the street in front of the tavern a bum man on the stoop.

Do you like these shoes?

Bum man says, Yes, little girl. Your little lemon shoes are so beautiful. But come closer. I can't see very well. Come closer. Please.

You are a pretty girl, bum man continues. What's your name, pretty girl?

And Rachel says Rachel, just like that.

Now you know to talk to drunks is crazy and to tell them your name is worse, but who can blame her. She is young and dizzy to hear so many sweet things in one day, even if it is a bum man's whiskey words saying them.

Rachel, you are prettier than a yellow taxicab. You know that?

But we don't like it. We got to go, Lucy says.

If I give you a dollar will you kiss me? How about a dollar. I give you a dollar, and he looks in his pocket for wrinkled money.

We have to go right now, Lucy says taking Rachel's hand because she looks like she's thinking about that dollar.

Bum man is yelling something to the air but by now we are running fast and far away, our high heel shoes taking us all the way down the avenue and around the block, past the ugly cousins, past Mr. Benny's, up Mango Street, the back way, just in case.

We are tired of being beautiful. Lucy hides the lemon shoes and the red shoes and the shoes that used to be white but are now pale blue under a powerful bushel basket on the back porh,until one Tuesday her mother,who is very clean,throws them away. But no one complains.