When my grandmother, Nana, passed away, it was a bittersweet moment. She had been like a second mother to me. The love she gave was unconditional, and her home was always a refuge when I needed it most. Before her death, she had told me, in a quiet moment, that she was leaving me a sum of money—$20,000—to help with my future. I never expected much, but Nana was a woman of integrity, and I knew her word was solid.
After her funeral, the family gathered to read the will. When the lawyer read my name and the $20,000, I felt a lump in my throat. It was the last piece of her, a small but meaningful gesture of her belief in me. But when it came time to collect, the check wasn’t there.
I thought it was a mistake. Maybe the paperwork hadn’t been sorted yet. But weeks passed, and there was no mention of the money. I reached out to the lawyer, who assured me everything was in order. That’s when I began to suspect something wasn’t right.
My brother, Evan, and I were close growing up, but over the years, we’d grown distant. I never thought much about it—life had taken us in different directions. Still, something about the way he had been acting after Nana’s passing raised an eyebrow. He seemed overly concerned with my inheritance, offering strange, unsolicited advice about how I should use the money. It wasn’t like him.
I did some digging, quietly, checking the details with the lawyer. To my horror, I found that Evan had somehow managed to access Nana’s estate account. The $20,000 was gone—transferred into his account just a few days after her death. My heart sank. I felt betrayed, shocked. How could he do this?
But I didn’t confront him right away. Something inside me told me to wait.
It wasn’t long before karma stepped in, as it often does. One night, as I sat at home, my phone rang. It was Evan.
“Hey, can we talk?” he asked, his voice unusually strained.
I didn’t even need to ask what was on his mind. I knew what was coming. I was calm, surprisingly so. “About the $20,000?”
There was silence on the other end. “Yeah,” he finally admitted. “I—I wasn’t sure how to tell you. But… I’ve been struggling, and… I needed it.”
I let his words hang in the air. There was nothing he could say that would make what he’d done right. The betrayal was crushing, but as he stumbled over his words, I realized I didn’t need to confront him. Life was already doing it for me.
Two days later, I got a call from Evan. His voice was panicked. “I—I lost everything. The business… it’s all gone. I’ve got nothing left.”
I sat there, stunned for a moment, before the words came: “Karma has a way of balancing things out, doesn’t it?”
Evan didn’t respond, but I could hear the despair in his silence.
That night, I sat with the memory of Nana’s love and the lessons she had taught me. I’d been angry at first, furious even, but now I understood. My brother didn’t need my confrontation. He was already paying the price for his actions. I didn’t need to take the money back, because life had already shown him what happens when you betray family.
