A bump on the head, they told him. A concussion. That’s all it was. Not the worst they had seen, but still serious. No one could figure out why he was there the night it happened, but he was. He couldn’t remember anything.
Those nice people at the church across the street had seen him fall and ran to help. They kept him company until the ambulance came, then the priest rode with him on the ambulance. It was nice to have someone with him, someone who cared. His memory had been affected by the concussion, but to the best of his knowledge, he had no family around. He didn’t remember being married.
He had no idea how much memory he had lost. It could have been a few months or years. But he distinctly remembered spending the day alone in his apartment on the past Christmas, and not much after that. It was January 29: so he hadn’t lost more than a month’s worth of memories. It was kind of freaky, not knowing what he had done for the past month, who he had been. But at least he hadn’t lost more memory. He hadn’t completely forgotten who he was.
Memories are a weird thing. Memories aren’t who we are, they don’t define us. But they tell us who we are. They remind us who we are. I am not defined by what I’ve done, but what I’ve done tells what kind of person I am.
Why had he been at the bank that night? More importantly, why had he fallen off the ledge over the main entrance? Why had he climbed up the side of the building dressed all in black?
The priest was still sitting beside the hospital bed, Bible spread across his lap. He looked up, into the patient’s eyes and could tell the man was starving for intelligent conversation. He was aware of his fragile state, but they talked for hours, until the nurse said he had to leave. But he vowed to return the next morning.
How can someone spend so much time with me when he has other stuff to do?, the man asked himself. It’s like he actually cares about me.
The next morning, the priest returned as promised. Eventually their conversation came around to Christianity. The man had been broken by his fall. God had saved him from a near-brush with death. He realized who he truly was, a sinner, and asked the holy man how he could be saved.
After that day, he was truly a changed man. He had a renewed passion for life, and soaked himself in the Word. Whenever the priest came to visit, he asked all sorts of questions, and he was determined to live for others. He couldn’t wait until he was released from the hospital.
A week after his fall, the doctors told him that he had only a few more days in the hospital. The next day, there was a knock on the door.
In walked two men in suits. They flashed their badges and told him they were liaisons for the bank’s security firm. They asked him if it was a good time to talk, but he didn’t have much of a choice. Instead of taking the offered chairs, they chose to stay standing. They told him they had reviewed the security footage from the night he had fallen from the bank and concluded that he had been trying to rob the bank.
He had played with that possibility in the back of his mind, but he wasn’t ready to face it. He didn’t remember trying to rob the bank, and he told the men that. To the best of his memory, he hadn’t done it. Maybe the amnesia had blocked memories. They understood, but had to do a lie-detector test. He felt helpless, like he hadn’t been in control of his own body.
Yet he had been in control. He chose to do that then. But He couldn’t remember it now. He was willing to do anything they asked to show them he was innocent.
They took a polygraph machine out of a briefcase and hooked him up. They asked him questions, and he answered truthfully. As the beginning questions gave way to the real questions, he saw them huddle together and stare at the results on the screen. They continued the examination.
When it was over, they told him the results were unlike anything they’d ever seen. From what they could tell, he was telling the truth. He hadn’t tried to break into the bank. Yet, somehow, the machine had detected that he had lied. Yet they knew he didn’t know he was lying. The best explanation they could give was that his subconscious knew the truth that his conscious didn’t. Maybe the amnesia explained it. Either way, they still had to press charges.
Just then, one of the black suits whipped a phone out of his pocket and had a confidential conversation. He hung up and turned back to the other. The video tape from a nearby security cam had been acquired and confirmed that they, indeed, had the culprit.
As soon as the two men had left, the criminal called the priest, and the priest rushed over. The priest took his usual seat at the side of the hospital bed.
The man was frightened and asked, Am I responsible for something I didn’t chose to do?
You did chose to do it, the priest replied.
How can I be held responsible for something I don’t remember doing?
Just because you don’t remember it doesn’t mean you didn’t do it. You still chose to do it.
But I’m a new man, he argued. I’m not the same man who did that!
We are redeemed, yet we still have to deal with the consequences of our past choices. You are not that man anymore, yet you are.
World is so broken
Yet I'm a redeemed person
Yet sin wreaks havoc
I like how your subjects are so vague: the priest, the man, etc. And you don't describe their looks, their story, or much of their emotions. I think the vagueness with which you tell it helps people to concentrate on the facts, and how any of us could be any of the characters in the story. In fact, we all are at least one character: the man in the hospital. I also like how, as soon as he was determined to be guilty, you call him a criminal. It kind of de-humanizes the character. He's no longer a man. He's a "bad guy". It makes it easier for us to look on his story and cluck our tongues and shake our heads disapprovingly. We forget about how sorry we felt for him before when he had no memory. We forget how we rejoiced when he accepted the Lord. He is only a thing. He has no chance of redemption. He cannot change. But then, when the priest comes to talk to him, he turns back into a man again. This time, he is not being seen through the eyes of the world, but through the eyes of forgiveness.He IS a man. That doesn't mean he's perfect (far from it!), but that does mean he has a soul.
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