Future sentence

The old man was about to die.

Oddly, nobody else was in the room.

The door opened, and a man walked in.

The old man couldn’t speak; he looked at the stranger.

The stranger approached, pulled a chair, sat close to the man and leaned in, his elbows on the bed and his chin on top of his wrists, clenched on top of another.

The old man was having trouble breathing, but none hearing.

- I am not from the future, but the information I hold is, and I’ve been sent here to deliver a message. In the future, everyone knows what you’ve done. Your name is a disgrace. There are no more statues of you or streets named after you. Your mischief will be proven a few years from now, and your reputation will vanish shortly after.

The old man smiled.

- You think I’m joking, but you did leave a lot of traces, they just haven’t been found yet. The bodies will show up, your passwords will be cracked, photographs will arise.

The old man questioned himself for a moment.

- I guess you shouldn’t have taken the pictures. Technology is always improving, you know?

The old man got a bit nervous; the stranger could be telling the truth.

So what? Even if he were, he had led the life he wanted, and no one could take that away from him.

The stranger leaned closer.

- There’s something else. I’m not here just to let you know this. I’m here because you’ve been sentenced, and your punishment is learning what happens to your family.

The old man’s eyes widened.

- Your son dies in a car crash, just two months from now. Your daughter disappears shortly after. No one knows what happens to her, but you can take a guess. Your wife is killed in what seems to be a robbery… But we both know it isn’t.

The stranger was clearly taking pleasure from letting the old man learn all of this.

- There will be no one left to carry on your name. I kind of hope this makes up for all that you’ve done. Your name will be cleansed of this earth.

As the stranger got up and left, the old man pondered on whether to tell someone about this. Could he save anyone? Could he make himself understood?

He lingered so much on these thoughts before he died that he didn’t even consider the possibility of the man having lied.