A friend of mine befriended a housewife – a not-so-well-to-do housewife – and they became close friends almost immediately. One day the woman asked my friend if she could borrow a hundred plus or so dollars to buy some regular medication for her mother as she didn’t have enough. My friend generously agreed. She picked both the woman and her mother from their house in her car and off they went to the pharmacy.
After getting the required prescription, my friend invited both of them to her house – for some afternoon tea and snacks. They stayed for a few hours and then decided to take leave. My friend asked them to wait while she went in her room to take something. After she came out and while they were walking towards the door, she noticed her box of tissues (which was on the coffee table) inside the mother’s plastic bag (which was holding the bottles of prescriptions). She was surprised, shocked and puzzled. She pretended not to know it and asked the woman’s mother what was that box inside her plastic bag. The mother said that it was ‘nothing’ and then gave a sheepish smile. My friend looked at the daughter to see her reaction and was surprised to see her smiling and repeating the same words her mother had said.
Outraged, she told both of them to get out of her house and promised never to see them again. My friend felt so hurt at the betrayal. After driving them to the pharmacy, paying for the prescription and then extending her courtesy to bring them to her home and even offered to send them home, the two of them betrayed her trust and confidence and stole from her own house. It is not so much of the value of the tissue box but it is the value of trust that has been violated.
Weeks later, she heard from another friend of ours that that woman had been spreading rumours that my friend had accused them of stealing the tissue box and then screaming and shouting at them to get out of their house.
You never know the true identity of a person until you really get to know him/her. Take care. Be careful of whom you trust. Never be deceived by a person’s outer appearance or smooth talk. Looks can be deceiving.