Page 5 of All for her Forgiveness

During the final months I spent in the cabin, although I didn't force myself to remember, Ernest gave me newspapers containing everything that was said about the crime.

It was like reading about someone else's life.

According to the reports, I’d lived with the deceased woman, Pam Marcotte, and her grandmother, Vina.

I'm an orphan, and I was initially raised by this lady's daughter in Louisiana, but about two months before the crime that resulted in Pam's death, I moved to Manhattan to be with them.

I push that memory away and focus on the present.

"Because there's not enough evidence against you," he finally answers. "Your memory hasn't shown any signs of returning, has it? It would be crucial for your defense."

"No. It's as if my brain deleted the past. I only remember finding Pam dead, and my first instinct was to help her, but when I realized there was nothing I could do, I ran away, scared."

Amnesia is a scary thing. I remember what people do to lead a normal life. I know there are laws, courts, prisons, banks, schools, and universities.

I know there are poor and rich people and how the world is governed by politicians, but I can't say a word about my childhood, for example.

"We will get you to answer the charges while out on bail, Kennedy. The lawyers defending you now are excellent."

"Do you think it's really possible?"

"I have faith that it is."

"Who is paying them, Ernest?"

"That's not important right now. One day, when you remember the past, I'll tell you. What you need to believe is that I will never leave your side. I am your protector and friend. Someone who will never give up on you, Kennedy. We will get you out of here."

Kennedy

CHAPTER TWO

"It soundslike something out of a mystery movie," Delores, my new friend and perhaps the only one besides Mr. Ernest, says the next day when I tell her about the conversation I just had with my new lawyers.

Yesterday, I told her about Mr. Ernest's visit and also that the psychiatrist had admitted someone was paying his fees, though he refused to say who.

When I asked her if I should be worried about that, Delores said no, as the doctor has quite a reputation worldwide, and she doubts he'd tarnish his own name with dishonesty.

I sighed in relief. Delores has been in prison for almost two decades and seems to be an expert in laws and legal procedures.

She killed her husband to protect her own daughter from his abuse.

Delores has been like a mother to me since I woke up from the coma. She talks to me when I can't sleep because I'm anxious, trying to remember the past, understand the present, and imagine the future.

"Honest or not, I won't have any more sessions with that psychiatrist. My new lawyers have dismissed him. They said they'll bring in a new expert because Dr. Roberts wasn't part of the defense team, which I already suspected."

Unlike the psychiatrist or Ernest, they're not concerned about helping my memory recovery; they want to get me out of here. To do that, they've given me more facts than I had discovered by myself, both during the months I spent in the cabin and since waking up from the coma.

"Now I'm absolutely sure I have no family," I say sadly.

Trying to jog my memory, they recounted the stories I read in the newspaper headlines.

I was indeed raised by a friend of my mother's. She had appointed this person, Riny Marcotte, as a legal guardian in case anything happened to her, and when my mother and father died in an accident, I went to live with the woman, who has since passed away too.

It's a shame I don't remember anything about her. She must have been a good person to take in a child she wasn't related to.

"You also know you're of Irish descent on your mother's side, or you wouldn't have 'O'Neal' as a surname."

"Why didn't my father give me his surname?"

---