I watch him step through the prison gate, a free man for the first time. At least in his mind anyway.
It’s been nearly ten years since I’ve seen him last. Ten years since he woke in a cell and told he was a name that wasn’t his. Ten years I bet he spent picking at the tattered fragments of his memory. They told him he was a killer. Hell, if they only knew half the truth.
Ten years since he woke and we both know he’s still sleeping.
“Word is you go by Jailbird now,” I say. “I take it Thomas didn’t stick?” I light a cigarette as I watch him study my face. I may be older, grayer, but he wouldn’t be able to recognize me even if he tried. “Wherever it is you’re going – don’t. There’s nothing for you there, there never was.” He eyes me, an old man in a fading charcoal suit.
“What do you want?”
“I’ve been looking for you for a long time. Here,” I say, as I toss him the key.
“What this?”
“Your real name.”
“Fuck you,” he says, walking away into the rain, placing his past in a back pocket.