My mom died of cancer a year ago. One month we were arguing about towels. Two months later, a hospice nurse was explaining morphine while my mom stared at the ceiling, trying not to cry. She was 49.
Carol wasn’t a stranger. She was my mom’s colleague—always at our kitchen table, gossiping over coffee. When Mom was diagnosed, Carol hugged her and said, “You’re strong. You’ll beat this.”
She didn’t.
After the funeral, my dad moved like he was underwater. I cleaned, cooked, sat with him. Nothing helped. Carol did.
She brought food. Stayed late. Touched his arm. Called every night. Less than a year later, she moved in. Soon after, there was a small backyard wedding. Carol liked to say they “bonded through grief.”
From day one, she erased my mom.
“She wouldn’t want you stuck in sadness,” she’d say, boxing up photos.
“Grief has an expiration date.”
The only place she never touched was my mom’s old barn.
On the first anniversary of my mom’s death, I planned something quiet: a candle, a photo, a glass of wine.
Instead, I came home to loud music and laughter.
Carol had thrown a party.
Her friends were everywhere—drinking, dancing—using my mom’s vintage crystal glasses. Carol raised one and said, “We chose a celebration of life instead of a depressing death anniversary.”
Someone laughed. “Funerals are such a downer.”
Then two glasses shattered on the floor.
When I asked her to stop, Carol leaned in and whispered, smiling, “She’s gone. I’m here now.”
Something in me went flat.
I walked out to the barn.
Inside a locked cabinet was a metal box my mom had shown me once. Documents. Emails. Notes. Six months before she died, she’d changed her will.
The house wasn’t my dad’s.
It was mine.
And if he married Carol, she had zero rights to it.
I took photos. Went back inside. Turned off the music.
I handed my dad the papers. He read them. His face went white.
Carol laughed—until she realized it was real.
“The house isn’t yours,” I said. “And after tonight, you’re trespassing.”
Two weeks later, she was gone. No police. Just lawyers and paper.
On the second anniversary of my mom’s death, I lit a candle at the kitchen table. I poured wine into one of the crystal glasses Carol hadn’t broken.
The house was quiet.
Not a shrine.
Not a party.