I offered him a small smile and ordered another sandwich. “Do you remember anything? Where you’re from?”
He hesitated, staring at his tea. “No. Not beyond the last year. I woke up one day, filthy, starving, and alone. No ID, no memory. Just… this.” He gestured at himself… his ragged clothes and the deep lines of street life on his face.
He nodded. “Tried shelters. Some nights, I found work… small jobs, no questions asked. But mostly, I roamed the streets. And I ended up here.”
That’s when I noticed his hands. They were raw, fingers stiff with what looked like the beginning of frostbite. My stomach twisted.
“You need a doctor,” I said.
He flinched. “I can’t pay —”
“I know someone… a friend. He’ll help.”
“Do you ever wonder,” he asked suddenly, setting down his cup with trembling hands, “if there’s someone out there looking for you? Someone who misses you?”
I could see the pain behind his eyes.
“I dream sometimes,” he continued. “Faces I almost recognize. Voices calling a name I can’t quite hear. Then I wake up and it’s gone… all gone.”
“Or just the desperate wishes of a broken old man,” he laughed.
“Either way, you deserve answers. You deserve to know who you are, Sir.”
He looked at me with such raw hope that it made my heart ache.
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