I thought my father’s will would secure my future. Then the lawyer read a name I didn’t recognize. My grandmother’s fury was immediate. Who was Brenna, and why did my father leave her everything? And what secret was behind it?
My life used to always be governed by rules. Every morning, a strict voice echoed through the house.
“Sit up straight, Mona. Don’t slouch. A lady always keeps her composure.”
That was Loretta—my grandmother, my guardian, my shadow. After my mother died, she took over, raising me in her grand image.
For illustration purposes only | Source: Midjourney
Everything had to be perfect. My grades, my posture, and even the way I folded napkins. It was exhausting, but I tried. I always tried.
When my father passed away, Loretta quickly turned her focus to what mattered most to her. Control. But I remember the day my life changed. We were sitting in the lawyer’s office.
“You’ll invest the money wisely, Mona,” she had said that morning, already outlining how we would rebuild the family’s legacy. “Your father worked hard for this.”
For illustration purposes only | Source: Midjourney
I believed her. For years, Loretta’s confidence had been unshakable, her plans infallible. So, as we sat in that cold office with its stale coffee, I felt sure of my future.
“As per your father’s wishes,” he lawyer, glancing at the will, “his estate and money will go to Brenna.”
“Who!?” The word escaped my lips before I could stop it.
The lawyer paused. “Brenna is your father’s other daughter.”
For illustration purposes only | Source: Midjourney
“Sister? I… I have a sister?”
“Impossible!” Loretta’s sharp voice ricocheted off the walls. “This must be a mistake! My son couldn’t leave everything to some stranger!”
“It’s no mistake, ma’am,” the lawyer said. “Your son provided clear instructions. Brenna inherits the house, accounts, and stocks.”
For illustration purposes only | Source: Midjourney
“What?” Loretta’s voice rose to a shrill pitch. “You’re telling me that child, someone we don’t even know, takes it all?”
I barely heard them. A sister. A sister I never knew existed. Loretta’s hand gripped mine, pulling me back.
“We’ll fix this, Mona. We’ll find this Brenna and make sure she does what’s right.”
Her words felt suffocating, but I nodded. Defying Loretta had never been an option.
For illustration purposes only | Source: Midjourney
***
In a few days, I arrived at Brenna’s house due to Grandma’s instructions. The small house leaned slightly to one side, its peeling paint flaking like sunburned skin.
The front door creaked open before I even knocked, and Brenna stood there, smiling wide. Her arms hung loosely at her sides, her fingers twisting together in a rhythm that seemed more instinct than thought.
“Hi!” she said, her voice bright, almost musical. “I saw you coming. Did you park by the mailbox? It’s wobbly. I keep meaning to fix it, but…”
For illustration purposes only | Source: Midjourney
She trailed off, her eyes darting to the corner of the doorframe. She tapped it three times with her knuckles.
“Uh, yeah,” I replied awkwardly. “I’m Mona. Your sister.”
“Come in!” she interrupted, stepping aside but not making eye contact. “Watch the floorboard near the kitchen. It squeaks.”
Inside, the house smelled faintly of clay and earth. The narrow hallway opened into a kitchen dominated by a long workbench covered in half-finished pottery pieces, jars of paint, and tools I didn’t recognize.
For illustration purposes only | Source: Midjourney
Brenna rearranged a set of mismatched vases on the windowsill three times, muttering under her breath before nodding in satisfaction.
Then she turned back to me, her smile returning as if nothing had happened. “You’re my sister.”
“Yes,” I said slowly, unsure how to navigate her openness. “Our father… He passed away recently.”
Her smile didn’t falter. “What’s it like? Having a dad?”
“It’s… hard to say. He was kind. He cared. We were friends.”
For illustration purposes only | Source: Midjourney
She nodded, her fingers twitching against her thighs. “I never met him. But I have his hands.” She held up her palms, showing faint traces of clay. “Mom always said so. Big hands, like him.”
Her sincerity was disarming. I’d expected resentment or at least suspicion, but instead, she radiated a quiet acceptance.
“Dad left me a gift,” Brenna said.
“A gift?” I repeated. “That’s… nice.”
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“Yes. He called it that. In the letter from the lawyer. Did he leave you a gift too?”
I hesitated, Loretta’s biting words ringing in my ears. “Not really. He didn’t…”
“That’s strange. Everyone should get a gift.”
I smiled. “Maybe.”
“You should stay for a week,” Brenna said smiling. “You can tell me about him. What he was like. What he liked to eat. What his voice sounded like.”
For illustration purposes only | Source: Midjourney
“A week?” I asked, startled. “I don’t know if…”
“In return,” she interrupted, “I’ll share the gift. It’s only fair.” Her hands were twisting together as she waited for my response.
“I don’t know if I have much to say about him,” I said, though even as the words left my mouth, I felt the pang of their untruth. “But… okay. A week.”
Her face lit up. “Good. We can have pancakes. Only if you like them, though.”
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She turned back to her workbench, humming softly. I knew what her so-called “gift” was. At that moment, Loretta’s plan seemed simple. Too simple. But Brenna’s kindness was already complicating everything.
***
That week at Brenna’s house, I felt like stepping into a parallel universe, one where the world spun slower and expectations melted away. Everything about her life was so unlike mine.
Breakfast was no longer a croissant from the corner bakery paired with a sleek latte. Instead, it was simple—bacon, eggs, and a mug of tea served on paper plates.
“Easier this way,” Brenna said one morning. “No big cleanup. Time saved is time for pottery.”
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She had a way of saying things so directly, without the filters most people wore. It was disarming.
But her habit of setting and resetting the plates on the porch rail, always ensuring they were aligned right, made me watch her closely. Each ritual told a story.
“Let’s walk to the lake,” she suggested after breakfast on my second morning.
She slipped out of her sandals, leaving them neatly by the porch steps, and stepped into the grass barefoot.
“It’s better like this.”
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Dew clung to the grass, cold and sharp against my feet, as I followed her. She led the way, occasionally pausing to touch the leaves or to rearrange a small pile of stones along the path.
Those small, deliberate actions seemed to calm her like they were as necessary as breathing.
At the lake, she crouched by the edge, dipping her fingers into the water. “You ever just sit and listen?”
“To what?” I asked, standing stiffly behind her.
“Everything.”
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Brenna’s studio became the heart of our days. The air inside smelled earthy and damp, the scent of clay and creativity.
She handed me a lump of clay on the third day. “Here. Try making something.”
My first attempt was a disaster. The clay slid through my fingers, collapsing into a shapeless blob.
“It’s terrible,” I groaned, ready to throw it aside.
“It’s not terrible,” Brenna’s hands moved gently as she began reshaping the clay, showing me the motions. “It’s just new. New things take time.”
For illustration purposes only | Source: Midjourney
Her patience amazed me. Even when I spilled water on her workbench, smearing one of her finished pieces, she didn’t scold me. Instead, she carefully cleaned the mess.
Just as I started to relax, finally free from Loretta’s constant control, her calls became more frequent. It was as if she could sense the shift in me, the way I was beginning to breathe a little easier and live a little differently.
That night, her voice came through the line sharp. “Mona, what are you waiting for? This isn’t a vacation! You need to take action. She doesn’t know what to do with that kind of money.”
For illustration purposes only | Source: Midjourney
I stayed silent, but my grip on the phone tightened. I could feel her impatience boiling over.
“She’s naïve, Mona. You need to convince her to sign it over. If persuasion doesn’t work, then… Well, figure something out. Use her trust if you have to.”
Her words stung because they felt so wrong in Brenna’s world.
“I don’t know, Grandma. It’s not as simple as you think.”
“It’s exactly that simple,” she barked back. “Don’t get distracted by her little quirks. Focus, Mona.”
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I wanted to argue, to tell her that maybe Brenna deserved more than she realized, but the words wouldn’t come. Instead, I mumbled something vague and ended the call. For the first time in my life, I started questioning my own motives.
***
The following day, Loretta arrived unannounced, her sharp presence tearing through the peace like a storm. Her heels clicked on the uneven floor as she stepped into the house.
For illustration purposes only | Source: Midjourney
“This is where you’ve been hiding?” she snapped, her eyes darting over Brenna’s neatly cluttered pottery studio. “How can you stand this mess, Mona? And you,” she turned to Brenna, “you have no right to what’s been given to you.”
Brenna froze, her hands trembling as she rearranged vases on the workbench, muttering, “Gift, gift,” under her breath.
For illustration purposes only | Source: Midjourney
Loretta ignored her, turning to me. “Mona, end this nonsense. She doesn’t deserve your father’s legacy. She’s…” Loretta’s voice grew venomous, “not like us.”
“Gift,” Brenna said louder, pointing toward a small cabinet in the corner. Her rocking grew more pronounced, her fingers twisting at her apron.
I hesitated but opened the cabinet. Inside was a stack of old letters, their edges worn and faded. Each one was addressed to my father. My breath caught.
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“What are those?” Loretta demanded.
“These are from Brenna’s mother,” I said, flipping through them. “Did you know?”
Loretta paled, but then her face hardened. “I did what I had to! Do you think I’d let some woman trap my son with a broken child? When she came looking for him, I told her to stay away. I refused to let her and her daughter become part of this family.”
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Her words were cruel, and Brenna clung to the table, her wide eyes fixed on Loretta.
“You destroyed this family,” I said, my voice trembling. “You never even told him he had another daughter.”
Loretta’s bitter laugh filled the room. “He found out! That’s why he changed his will. And now you’re letting her take everything!”
“Dad left a gift,” Brenna said softly. “He wanted me to have it.”
“This isn’t about money, Grandma. And I won’t let you take anything else from her.”
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Loretta stormed out, slamming the door behind her.
I turned to Brenna. “I’m so sorry. I love you, sis.”
“Do you want pancakes?” she suddenly asked as if nothing happened.
“Oh, I really do!”
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We ate on the porch as the sun dipped low, painting the sky in soft hues. From that day, we started building a life together.
I helped Brenna grow her pottery studio. We repaired the house, filled it with flowers, and I rediscovered my love for painting by decorating her creations.
Word spread, and soon people came from other towns to buy our work. Life wasn’t perfect, but it was ours. For the first time, I wasn’t living to meet someone else’s expectations. I was living for us—Brenna and me.
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Woman Goes on Labor Mid-flight, Pilot Reroutes but Not to the Airport — Story of the Day
A pregnant woman went into labor while aboard a commercial airplane which forced the pilot to reroute the plane, but not to the airport.
Rose hated flying. She was a young woman who never had the opportunity to be on a plane for most of her life. Indeed she only started riding one when she started making visits from her town in Omaha to the city of Texas where her husband, Bill, worked as a miner.
The job brought in decent pay which was why he did it, but it separated them for a long long time. Bill was always gone all year long and he only got a break between Christmas and the New Year.
Rose went into labor on a plane during a flight back from visiting her husband | Source: Shutterstock
When she got tired of having to live without seeing her husband for long periods, she got Bill to agree to her making a monthly trip to see him.
Bill was initially not enthused about the idea, but in the end, the weekends he spent with her at the small apartment he stayed in were some of the best in their marriage.
It was one of those long romantic nights that brought about the pregnancy Rose now carried in her belly. Bill was aware of the child and could not wait to meet his youngster.
He had even promised to retire from mining and start a farm where they could grow crops to sell. Everyone knew farmers made a lot of profit in Omaha if they had the know-how, and Bill descended from a long line of farmers.
One day, Rose, heavy with child, was flying to Texas to see Bill even though he had asked her to remain in their Omaha home. Flying to him for their weekend getaways had become a habit and she could not stand not seeing him that weekend.
Rose got pregnant after several visits to Bill | Source: Pexels
“You are nine months pregnant Rose,” he told her the last time they spoke.
“Oh, thank you for pointing that out, I had no idea my stomach started swelling nine months ago,” Rose replied drily.
“You shouldn’t be moving around so much now that you’re this close to giving birth but you want to make a whole journey? That’s absurd my dear.”
“I need to see you, be with you, I’ve missed you,” Rose cooed. She had let him convince her to remain at home for two months before she put her foot down.
“I know baby,” he said. “Hey, it’s September and I get to come home in December and never leave again, just be patient hon.”
Rose let him believe he had gotten through to her again but as soon as it was Friday, she got on a flight headed to Texas. She surprised him, and even though he claimed to be angered by it, they enjoyed their time together.
As soon as it was Friday, Rose got on a flight headed to Texas | Source: Pexels
By Sunday evening, when Rose got on a plane bound for Omaha, she was glowing — she really did enjoy her husband’s refreshing company.
It wasn’t until the plane hit turbulence as it gained altitude that she was reminded how much she did not enjoy flying — it was nothing personal, she just preferred to have feet on solid ground where her fall to the ground, if it ever happened, would be a short distance.
Another rattle shook the plane and sent her overactive imagination into overdrive. She thought of everything from a hijacking to a plane crash and it got her stressed out. And it was as she mentally listed things that could go wrong that her water broke.
Caught up in her head, Rose wasn’t even aware that her water already broke. When she noticed the wetness, she turned red in the face, embarrassed thinking she could not control her bladder. It never occurred to her that her water had broken because it was not supposed to for another three weeks. Then the contractions began.
Rose got on a plane bound for Omaha by Sunday | Source: Pexels
Rose started to scream, catching the attention of the flight attendant who rushed over to find out what was wrong. “I’m having a baby!!” Rose yelled.
The attendant quickly let the pilot know and he immediately connected with the nearest airport to request permission to land. Meanwhile, the flight attendant tried to calm Rose down by talking to her in between each contraction.
“Why are you traveling alone pregnant?” the kind-looking woman asked Rose.
“I was with my husband and I’m returning home,” Rose answered.
“He let you travel like this, how irresponsible!” the flight attendant exclaimed. “Okay, do you have family we can call? Besides your husband?”
“No, I’m an orphan,” Rose said. The flight attendant noticed that she had a temperature and was getting spent from enduring the contractions so she informed the pilot that the labor could get dangerous for Rose without a professional doctor to help.
The attendant informed the pilot and he immediately connected with the nearest airport to request permission to land | Source: Pexels
A dispatcher informed the pilot, a man named Drew, that the nearest airport was not ready to receive their plane due to weather conditions.
Time was running out and in her feverish state, all Rose could manage was call out her husband’s name. That’s when Drew decided to turn the plane around to return to Texas.
“Keep her stable for thirty more minutes,” he told the attendant. Unfortunately, the weather in Texas was also terrible so their plane was denied access to land at the airport.
Luckily, Drew knew the area so he was aware of an abandoned airfield not far from the airport. The only problem was the runway was too short to land their large plane. Still, it was the closest town to where Rose could get medical help.
“Let’s land at the abandoned airstrip,” Drew told his co-pilot, a rookie who went by the name Stan.
“Sir with all due respect, landing there is against the rules,” Stan said.
“Sometimes to save a human being, you need to act according to your conscience, not the rules!” Drew replied.
Rose caught the attention of the flight attendant telling her she was having a baby.| Source: Pexels
He got the attendant to call Rose’s husband as they circled the abandoned airstrip getting ready to land. Drew knew every move had to be planned down to the last degree.
They circled once, twice, each time steadily getting closer to the ground. Meanwhile Rose was starting to lose consciousness because of her contractions.
The plane got closer to the ground and with a leap of faith, because there was no control tower to navigate their path, Drew took the plane down.
His co-pilot who was still a rookie was just one step away from panicking but he followed Drew’s lead and several tense minutes later, the aircraft touched the ground.
As they opened the hatch to get Rose out, an ambulance carrying EMTs and Rose’s husband sped through the clearing. It was followed by media vans and some civilians who feared there would be a crash and had come to help.
When the plane finally landed in the airfield, Bill and the ambulance crew were waiting | Source: Pexels
Bill carried his wife, pregnant as she was to the ambulance and they raced to the hospital. All the shocked man could do was pray that his wife, who did not look very good, would be alright.
At the hospital, the doctors got her a private room and a quick check of her vitals revealed that she was already too weak to push her baby out. It would have to be done via a C–section.
Bill was not allowed to remain in the room but after long moments of waiting, he was ushered in to see his new child and his recuperating wife. He could not believe how close he had gotten to losing them.
He quit his job that day so that when they returned to Omaha, it was to stay. Bill found out the name of the thoughtful pilot who took the risks to get his wife help and named their child after him. Rose was all in favour.
Still, she did not get on another airplane for years.
Rose was too weak to push in the hospital, so they did a C-section on her and their child was born | Source: Pexels
What did we learn from this story?
- Human life is very precious. Drew was right when he decided to land the plane at the abandoned airstrip so as to save not just Rose’s life but the baby’s as well. That’s because human life is very precious and should be guarded well.
- Overthinking is not your friend. Rose may have made the flight back to Omaha easily had she not started to overthink things because the plane shook from turbulence. However, once she got herself worked up enough, her body went into hyperdrive, and her water broke. It only goes to show that most times, overthinking does not help.
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If you enjoyed this story, you might like this one about a pregnant woman who went into labor in a traffic jam and couldn’t get access to an ambulance.
This account is inspired by our reader’s story but written by a professional writer. All names have been changed to protect identities and ensure privacy. Share your story with us; maybe it will change someone’s life. If you would like to share your story, please send it to
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