He wore what had once been an expensive suit, now stained with mud, dust, and blood. A deep cut ran across his forehead. One arm bent at an unnatural angle. On his wrist gleamed a gold watch—far too bright, too clean for a place like this.
He looked like an angel fallen from the sky of the rich.
Emily stood perfectly still.
Her first instinct was to run.
Her second… was to help.
Her grandmother always said poverty should never steal a person’s humanity.
So, swallowing her fear, Emily knelt beside the stranger and placed her small trembling fingers against his neck.
There was a pulse.
Weak… but alive.
“Sir?” she whispered softly. “Sir, please wake up.”
She poured the last sip of water from her plastic bottle onto his lips.
The man groaned.
His eyelids fluttered open, revealing pale green eyes clouded with confusion.
“Where… am I?” he asked hoarsely.
“In the dump,” Emily replied with surprising seriousness. “And if you stay here, someone might kill you.”
The man tried to sit up but immediately collapsed back down, dizzy.
“I… I don’t remember anything,” he murmured, touching the blood on his forehead. “I don’t even know who I am.”
Emily glanced around nervously.