“I, um…” He chews the inside of his bottom lip. “I hope you don’t mind, but I asked Cindy about the whole waking up and speaking a new language thing—I didn’t say it was you,” he adds quickly, “but she might have put two and two together.”

I frown.

In some ways, him dating Cindy made everything easier. The tension abated because the possibility of something happening between us disappeared. But what I never told him is that it wasn’t possible to begin with. Not just because we were partners, but because I wanted to go on believing I was invincible. I knew that anything even resembling romantic feelings would make me vulnerable. And I would never allow that. Not again.

“She said she’d heard of cases where traumatic brain injuries led to new linguistic abilities. But it’s usually temporary and also impairs the patient’s ability to speak their native language.”

I think back to waking up here, in the hospital, the heaviness of my tongue, the nurse unable to understand me.

“There was a guy in Australia who woke up speaking Mandarin after a car crash. And an Englishman who started speaking Welsh after a stroke. They both had some experience with the language they started speaking, but neither knew it fluently. She said there’s this other rare condition called foreign accent syndrome that’s better studied, and these cases might be related.” He blinks at me expectantly. “It’s possible that you suffered damage to the part of your brain that controls the speech muscles.” He points to his mouth. “Lips, tongue, jaw, and larynx. I think that’s what she said.” He furrows his brow. “Anyway, it’s less that you’re speaking German accurately—you’re probably making grammar mistakes—it’s more that you sound fluent to non-German speakers.” He looks proud and somewhat relieved that he remembered it all. “I mean, the firefighters and nurses might have recognized that you were speaking German but wouldn’t have known if what you were saying made any sense.”

I nod slowly, feeling unbalanced by all this information. Instead of being comforted by the fact that I’m not the only one to wake up speaking a foreign language, I feel oddly shortchanged.

That was my thing, I think ridiculously.

After a stretch of silence, Teddy stirs. “What did the fire marshal say?” he asks. He leans in so close I feel his breath on my skin. “Any idea what caused the blaze?”

It’s lingering there in the cautious way he’s phrased this—the unanswered question from his last visit. The possibility this wasn’t an accident.

I heard voices.

It’s the truth, but how does it sound? What will Truman say when word gets back to him? Marlitt’s speaking in tongues and hearing things. I don’t need to add mental health to his ever-growing list of patronizing bullshit.