Stolen Tongues

by Felix Blackwell

There is a brief moment at night when the brain is neither awake nor asleep, but somewhere in between. In that moment, I sometimes hear things – distant voices or odd sounds.

“You know, there’s this thing called pareidolia. See, our brains come with a kind of software application that’s pre-installed when we’re born. Facial recognition, pattern recognition, that sort of thing. It helps us recognize our mothers when we’re babies, and helps us—”

“You know when you’re a kid and you see a shadow on your wall at night, and it looks like a monster? Or when you see animals in the clouds? That’s pareidolia. And it happens

with sound, too. The wind blows through a cave or something just right, and people think they hear a voice. Your brain even makes words out of it, in the language you know best.”

something seemed to be piercing that veil and calling out to us.

I couldn’t help but feel like it was staring back.

With her eyes still closed, she looked right into my face, and said, “Tell the man in the hall…he needs to leave.”

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