Grief changes you, sometimes settling as a dull ache, sometimes hitting like a punch to the heart. One summer morning, as I read the anonymous note in my kitchen, I felt something different—hope mixed with terror. “They’re not really gone,” it read. This claim, and a mysterious charge on my daughter Monica’s card, stirred memories and questions. My daughter and her husband had supposedly died in an accident two years ago, leaving me to raise their boys. But on a beach outing,
my grandson pointed to a couple who looked just like Monica and Stephan. Following them, I discovered they had staged their deaths to escape debt, hoping to spare the children from their troubles. I called the police, knowing it would break the illusion for my grandkids but believing the truth needed to be faced. Now, though, I wonder if I did the right thing. Would you have made the same call?