The Stranger at the Wake – Part 2…

The Stranger at the Wake…

Three hours that changed everything.

If you’ve been following this story, you’ll know I left my dad’s wake confused as hell, with a son nobody in my family knew about and a million questions swirling in my head.

On the drive home, I finally started asking them.

‘How did you even know my dad died‘?
‘Who dropped you off at my door‘?
‘Why are you here now‘?

And that’s when the first bomb dropped.

Turns out, my son had been talking to Bully behind my back for almost three years.
I nearly drove off the road.

Three years.
And I knew nothing about it.

It gets better – Bully arranged everything.
Paid for him to get to the wake.
Made sure he was there.
Even went as far as setting it up, so Bully’s best buddy would deliver him to my house for me to deal with!

I asked my son how they met.
He told me it was at a football match.
Two hours away.
A match Bully would never be caught dead at.

The lies were unraveling faster than I could keep up.

And then it hit me – that’s why Bully had pushed so hard to have my son’s name read at the mass.
I thought it was a last-minute gesture. A bit of decency.
But no, it was all part of his plan.

By the time I got home, my head was spinning and my heart was in pieces.

But I wasn’t done.

I asked good old Fanny what was going on? Her reply:

‘WE only did what you should’ve done‘.

That one sentence nearly finished me off.

I couldn’t believe the audacity.
This wasn’t about helping.
This was about control. About making sure they got to play puppet master one more time. About deciding what parts of my life I got to have a say in.

I was gobsmacked.

And then I looked at my son, sitting there in my kitchen and realized neither of us really knew who the other was anymore or maybe we never did.

Three hours.
That’s all it took to tear open old wounds, make new ones and set a storm in motion that hasn’t stopped since.

This story’s far from over….

Lesson from the Wake: Trust Isn’t a Given, It’s a Currency…

Life will hand you moments where the people you thought you knew will show you sides you never saw coming. And it won’t be in the big, obvious betrayals – it’ll be in quiet arrangements, backdoor conversations and faces you are supposed to love being led by people you don’t.

The lesson here isn’t to stop trusting.
It’s to realize trust is a currency.
You spend it carefully. You earn it slowly. And once it’s stolen, it takes a long damn time to build back.

Family will make you believe you owe them blind loyalty.
But you don’t.
You owe yourself peace.
You owe yourself honesty.
You owe yourself people in your life who move with your best interests at heart – not their own agenda dressed up as a favor.

And when you find out someone’s been writing chapters in your story without your permission, you get to decide if they’re in the next one.

Lesson:
Not every bond is sacred just because you share blood. And sometimes the strongest thing you can do is quietly reclaim your pen and write the next page yourself.

The Stranger At The Wake – Part 2 …

The Stranger At The Wake – Part 3 …

The Stranger at The Funeral – Part 1…

The Stranger At The Funeral – Part 2 …