A man knelt before a grave, rain-soaked and unmoving, as if he were just another weathered statue marking the graveyard. His clothes clung to him, waterlogged and heavy, but he didn’t stir. On the tombstone in front of him, words were faintly visible through the rain: a woman’s name, followed by the inscription “A Loving Mother.” A passerby moved toward him, splashing through the mud, reaching out to help him out, but the man was unresponsive, his hollow eyes fixed on the tombstone.

Why does my head hurt? he thought, as a dull ache throbbed in his temples. Slowly, he opened his eyes, finding himself lying on his back, staring up at a ceiling he didn’t recognize. He blinked, trying to clear his vision and make sense of the dim, smoky light that barely illuminated the room. Around him, strangers lay sprawled on rough beds, bodies swathed in blankets that barely covered them.

A nurse approached, her expression worn but kind. “You’re awake, sir. Can you hear me?” she asked, her voice gentle yet strained.

He didn’t answer, only stared back, his eyes hollow. His hands went to his head, pressing hard against his temples to silence the relentless pounding. When that didn’t help, he began tapping his fingers against his skull, as if the rhythm might dull the pain. The nurse reached out and gently stopped him, placing her hand over his and pressing it down to his chest.

“Please, don’t,” she said softly. “Can you tell me your name?”

“My name?” he muttered, as though the question were unfamiliar, a foreign concept that he couldn’t quite grasp. “What… is my name?” He groaned, the pain making it nearly impossible to think. “My head…”

“Rest,” she said quietly, a softness in her voice that cut through his haze. “Just close your eyes and sleep. You’ve been through quite a lot.” He let his head sink back, her words lulling him back into the darkness.

A week later, he opened his eyes again, the headache now reduced to a dull throb. The nurse was beside him, her face lined with exhaustion but still attentive. “Are you feeling better? Any headaches?” she asked, her gaze intent.

He glanced around the dim, crowded room. “Am I… in a hospital?” he murmured, his voice barely more than a whisper. The worn cots, the peeling walls, and the faint odor of dampness and wood smoke did not fit his idea of a hospital.

The nurse offered a faint, nervous smile. “Yes… of sorts.”

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“What’s the name of this place?” he asked, the words coming slowly, as if his thoughts were suspended in fog.

She hesitated, her eyes shifting away briefly. “I’ve been taking care of people here for as long as I can remember,” she said softly, as though uncertain herself. “Don’t you remember me?”

He frowned, her question only adding to the confusion clouding his mind. “No… I’m certain I’ve never seen you before,” he thought, though he kept silent.

With a sigh, she explained that he’d been found lying outside in the rain, his body dangerously cold. Someone had brought him here, she said, and without that act of kindness, he wouldn’t have survived. “It’s a miracle you’re alive,” she murmured.

He looked down at his hands—hands that felt wrong, unfamiliar. They were rough, hardened in ways he didn’t remember. Who am I? The question formed slowly, its weight pressing down on him. Did I… die? Why can’t I remember?

Memories stirred, hazy and fragmented, drifting through his mind in pieces he couldn’t place. Faces blurred together, memories from a different life, and a strange realization crept over him: he wasn’t who he’d been. He’d become… someone else. And as the fragments pieced together, he felt only a dull ache, not quite fear but something hollow and consuming.

When he awoke again, his mind was clearer, though a sense of emptiness gnawed at him. Some details surfaced—names, faint memories. He remembered this nurse and the place, though it brought him no comfort. His eyes scanned the room, and a faint, creeping despair settled over him. Somehow, he’d ended up as this person, a man in his twenties, working as a guard on a poor farmer’s land, tasked with watching over livestock through the cold night hours to keep away thieves.

He sifted through fragments of his new life, his gaze blank as details floated to the surface, each one leaving a bitter taste in his mouth. This man was uneducated, hardly more than a stranger in his own world. His knowledge was basic at best, and his life was confined to the most ordinary of tasks, watching sheep in the night and retreating each dawn to a cold shack at the edge of a village that barely tolerated him. He was a man who had drifted through life, scarcely noticed and rarely needed.

The frustration he felt was dull, his thoughts sluggish, as though even his emotions had grown weary. Is this my life now? he wondered, though there was no spark of resolve behind the question. Just a deep sense of loss, an ache that settled in his chest and refused to leave.

As days passed, he watched the nurse shuffle between patients, her face etched with a constant strain as she moved from one bed to the next. The makeshift hospital overflowed with people in need, the air thick with quiet despair. She always returned to his bedside, bringing him a small meal, offering what little she could. But her words barely registered, her face a distant blur. His mind felt like it was slipping further from clarity, as though every new detail he discovered about this life only pushed him further away from himself.

When he was well enough to walk, he left. No words of thanks, no lingering look back. He took the bundle of clothes she handed him without comment, his face blank as he stepped out into the cold air.