My Sister and Her Husband Vanished After Borrowing a Fortune — Karma Caught Up

The money from the sale wasn’t life-changing, but it was enough to breathe for the first time in a decade. I was sitting at my kitchen table, coffee in hand, dreaming about travel or school, when my sister Lisa called.

Her voice carried the weight before her words did.

“Ivy… can I come over? Please.”

Twenty minutes later, she was in my kitchen, clutching a mug of tea she never touched. Hair disheveled, nails chipped from anxious picking. No small talk.

“We’re losing the house.”

She explained: Rick’s construction business was collapsing, debts piling up, the mortgage company closing in. They’d already borrowed from his parents, but it wasn’t enough.

“How much?” I asked, because I’d always been the one to fix things.

“Twenty-five thousand,” she whispered, as if saying it too loud might shatter the number.

Nearly half my savings.

But she was my sister — the girl who crawled into my bed during storms, the woman who stood beside me at my wedding and held me through my divorce. So I said yes.

Rick came later to sign a simple loan agreement. His voice was heavy with shame. “You’re saving us. I won’t forget this.”

I believed him. Back then, I still believed words carried weight.

The money hit their account the next morning. Lisa called, sobbing with relief. For a while, I told myself I’d done the right thing.