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25th October 2023
10:20am BST
A man has spoken of the moment he told his parents he was alive - six months after they thought he had been killed.
The unlikely story played out on New Zealand's ZM Radio station after hosts Carl Fletcher, Vaughan Smith and Megan Papas put a call out for listeners who had been presumed dead.
But they weren't quite expecting the story they were about to be told from a man - only identified as Callum - whose cruel sisters had broken the news to his parents out of spite.
"Yes, I definitely have been presumed dead, mate," Callum began.
He said his sisters were "in a bit of a tiff" with their parents, and weren't "really getting along".
At the time, Callum was living in Wellington, in New Zealand's north island, and the rest of his family were in Christchurch, in the south island.
"My older sister actually called my parents up and told them that I had died," Callum went on.
The vengeful sisters added that Callum's ex-girlfriend's parents didn't want his mum and dad there.
Vaughan chipped in at that point with an observation: "What! I'm going to say this in the nicest possible way Callum… your sister sounds like a crazy b****.
"No offence. Your sister sounds like a top level, red flag, crazy b****!"
Callum was then asked why he hadn't been in contact with his parents for half a year and responded simply that he was "just busy with life and work".
He went on to say that when the absence of contact occurred to him, he got in touch: "And then I was like wait - I haven't heard from my parents in a while, I wonder what's going on?
"And I gave them a call-up and my mum and dad are like 'you're alive?'
"My mum was absolutely in tears and my dad was just kind of gobsmacked - he was just like 'what the f*** is going on?'"
The hosts then erupted in laughter, before quizzing Callum on whether his parents had just accepted the news of his death without questioning it.
"They were kinda like running around calling our other family seeing if they had heard anything, from what I was told," he explained.
"Then they didn't really know anything to go off so my parents just kind of presumed 'yeah he died'."
But it didn't end there. Callum later revealed his sisters told his parents that he had been stabbed to death.
Vaughan: "Wait wait wait, you were murdered?
"You're not dead in an accident by your own hand, someone murdered you! This is the wildest phone call we've ever had.
"Were you the sort of person who would have been stabbed?"
Callum then comically responded: "I was not in some gangs but I will say, at the point in time, it wouldn't have been un-peculiar for me to get stabbed."
He added that his mum and dad were "over the moon" to learn he was still alive and that he had rushed back to see them that weekend to "reassure them it's really me".
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