“Sometimes you'd just forget the truth like a language you haven't spoken in for years: when you would try again in a quiet hour, you'd only stutter and falter. You would make a fool of yourself and promise you wouldn't ever try again. But over one too many drinks you would be trying, anyway, which would be when fluently you’d speak languages you wouldn’t even know when sober. The truth that sober Tom had unlearned was turning him into an alcoholic. Constantly it kept coaxing him to drink, because he couldn't get it out any other way .”