Mom called at seven in the morning. On a Saturday. I was lying in bed beside my quietly breathing husband, looking at the rain outside the window and thinking that today I would finally choose new curtains for the children’s room. The phone rang so unexpectedly that I jumped. “Katyenka, darling, hello! I know you’re … Read more
Victoria returned home around eight in the evening, when the apartment was already dark. Sergei usually came home later — after his workout at the gym, sometimes stopping by the store on the way. Vika had an hour, maybe an hour and a half, that belonged only to her, and she treasured those minutes. … Read more
Alice had bought this apartment six years ago. Thirty square meters in an old brick building not far from the city center. Back then, she had just started a new job with a good salary and had taken out a mortgage for twenty long years. She signed a thick stack of papers with hands trembling … Read more
“Galya, you’re rich now!” her cousin’s aunt shouted into the phone. “Aunt Raya left you her three-room apartment in the city center!” Galya lowered the phone, stunned. An apartment. Her own apartment. A three-room apartment. She looked at her husband. Zhenya, who until that moment had been lazily picking his teeth, suddenly straightened up. His … Read more
Don’t bother rummaging around on the mezzanine shelves, Anya. I took the envelope,” Zinaida Pavlovna said, noisily sipping hot tea from her saucer and smugly adjusting the collar of her washed-out housecoat. “My Vitenka has a debt to pay. The boy’s in trouble. And your Lenka will manage somehow. No need for a girl to … Read more
Nika stood in the hallway, looking sadly at her favorite Italian sneakers. They had not merely been moved out of place. They had been shoved into the farthest, dustiest corner of the shoe rack, while in their rightful, “front-row” spot, right on the mat that said “Welcome,” stood a pair of patent leather stiletto ankle … Read more
— Are you with your mother again? — Polina slammed the cabinet door so hard the glasses inside trembled. — Every single day it’s the same thing: “Mom needs this, Mom needs that.” What am I, some kind of ATM? — Don’t start, — Alexey muttered, sitting at the table with a cup of cold … Read more
Stop messing with my head! I said my mother is coming, so she’s coming!” Nina sat on the sofa, pressed into the corner, watching Sergei pace back and forth across their one-room apartment. Back and forth, back and forth — like a trapped animal in a cage. Outside the window, a blizzard drove the snow … Read more
The morning began with a lie. It slipped into the house with the first rays of sunlight, which played carelessly across the perfectly polished floor. Mikhail, my husband, kissed my temple with that practiced tenderness he had refined over the years. That gesture, which had once made my heart race and lifted it with happiness, … Read more
“I didn’t come here to live with you. I came to live with my son, so keep quiet,” the mother-in-law declared to her daughter-in-law, dragging her suitcase into the hallway. The enormous, swollen bag made of cheap faux leather flopped onto the Italian tile like a seal onto an ice floe. The sound was dull, … Read more