“Anything.”
“There’s a rosebush in the backyard,” she said. “My favorite one. One year after I’m gone, dig it up and move it somewhere safe.”
The request surprised me, but the seriousness in her voice made me nod immediately.
“I promise.”
Then she added something else.
“And the house… it belongs to you and your mother. The lawyer has my will.”
Those words comforted me at the time.
But after she passed away, everything changed.
Karen returned for the funeral looking like she had stepped out of a luxury magazine. Her clothes were elegant, her attitude confident.
Three days later, she walked into the house holding a folder.
“The house is mine,” she announced.
Inside the folder was a will none of us had ever seen.
My mom stared at it in disbelief.
“That can’t be right,” she whispered. “Your mother told us something completely different.”
Karen only smiled.
“Looks like she changed her mind.”
Mom and I searched the house from top to bottom for the will Grandma had mentioned.
It was nowhere.
We considered fighting the claim in court, but Karen had something we didn’t — money and powerful lawyers.
Eventually, we had to accept defeat.
We packed our belongings into boxes and left the home where we had lived for decades.
Within weeks, Karen rented the house out to strangers.
Life moved on, but one thing never left my mind.
Grandma’s rosebush.
Nearly a year later, I finally called Karen.
“Can I take Grandma’s rosebush from the yard?” I asked. “I want to replant it near our cottage.”
Karen sounded annoyed.
“If it’s just a plant, take it,” she said. “I don’t care.”
The tenants living there were kind enough to let me come by.
