“And remember, nobody is obligated to support you!”
“Money?” Irina wearily lowered the heavy grocery bags onto the kitchen table. “Elizaveta Stepanovna, we gave you money just last week.”
Kitchen and dining room
Her mother-in-law, Elizaveta Stepanovna, sat at the table with the air of an offended queen, pursing her thin, always displeased lips. She was not yet an old woman, but she carefully cultivated the image of a helpless, abandoned sufferer. Her gray hair, neatly styled, and her strict blue cardigan created the deceptive impression of respectability.
“You did give it, Irochka, you did,” she rasped, as if they were talking not about five thousand rubles, but about some old forgotten candy. “Only that money is gone. Do you know how expensive medicines are these days? And the doctor prescribed me a new medicine for my heart. He said if I don’t start taking it, then…” She made a dramatic pause, pressing a hand to her chest. “Then a heart attack won’t be far off. Are you really sorry to spend money on your mother’s health?”
Irina took a deep breath, trying to count to ten. It had not been an easy day. She had been on her feet since eight in the morning, one client after another. Working as a manicurist required not only precision, but nerves of steel: listening to other people’s stories, smiling even when cats were scratching at her soul. And after work came shopping, cooking, lessons with her son. And now, the cherry on top: another visit from her mother-in-law with her hand out.
“We’re not sorry to spend money on health,” Irina replied evenly, unpacking the groceries. “But we have a mortgage, Lyosha will need everything bought for school soon, and the car is acting up again. We don’t print money. Vitalik works himself to death alone at the factory, and I’m spinning around as best I can.”
“Oh, here we go!” Elizaveta Stepanovna theatrically rolled her eyes. “You always have excuses. The mortgage, Lyosha, the car… And I’m supposed to wait, then? My only son, my own flesh and blood, works himself to the bone, and you begrudge his money to his own mother! I raised him, didn’t sleep nights, gave him my last, so he could become an engineer, a decent person! And now what? There’s no money for his mother’s medicine?”
Vitalik, drawn by the raised voices, peered into the kitchen. Tall, slightly stooped, with an eternally guilty expression on his face. He was a good engineer at the local factory, but in family battles he always turned into a confused boy torn between his mother and his wife.
“Mom, Ira, what’s going on again?” he mumbled, looking from one woman to the other.
“What do you mean, ‘what’s going on’?” Elizaveta Stepanovna immediately switched to him, and tears rang in her voice. “Son, defend your mother! Your wife reproaches me for a piece of bread! She says I’m taking the last from you! I’m not asking for fancy clothes, I’m asking for medicine! Do you want your mother to drop dead without help?”
Irina felt everything inside her begin to boil. This scene repeated itself with frightening regularity. Any attempt to talk about finances, about the fact that they could not be a bottomless barrel, ran into a wall of manipulation and accusations. She looked at her husband, who was already looking at her reproachfully. He had believed it again. Once again, she, Irina, was the cold-hearted and cruel daughter-in-law.
Her patience snapped. It did not simply run out — it exploded, shattering into thousands of tiny fragments.
“Enough!” Irina’s voice sounded unexpectedly firm and loud. She straightened up, put her hands on her hips, and looked her mother-in-law straight in the eyes. “I’m tired of these performances. We help you as much as we can. But you demand more and more, as if it’s our direct obligation. Well, I’ll tell you something. And remember this: nobody is obligated to support you!”
A ringing silence hung in the kitchen. Vitalik froze with his mouth open. Elizaveta Stepanovna slowly rose; her face changed from offended to stone-cold and impenetrable.
“What… what did you say?” she whispered.
“What you heard,” Irina said sharply, feeling a bitter but intoxicating sense of freedom spread through her body. “You are an adult, legally capable person, with a pension and your own apartment. We are a separate family with our own plans and problems. Helping — yes. Supporting — no. Nobody is obligated.”
After those words, the most interesting part began. Elizaveta Stepanovna did not scream. She did not faint. She did something much worse. She looked at Irina with a gaze full of icy hatred, then slowly turned to her son.
“Vitalik,” her voice trembled with restrained fury. “Did you hear that? Are you going to allow this… this woman to speak to your mother like that?”
Vitalik, pale as a sheet, stepped toward Irina.
“Ira, have you lost your mind? Apologize immediately!”
“I will not apologize,” she answered calmly. “I told the truth.”
“The truth?!” her mother-in-law shrieked. “My son married a boor who throws his mother out onto the street! That’s it! I will never set foot in this house again!”
She grabbed her bag and, without turning around, flew out of the apartment like a bullet, slamming the front door loudly behind her.
Vitalik stared at the closed door, then shifted his confused gaze to Irina.
“Well, are you satisfied now? You drove my mother to this!”
“I didn’t drive her to anything, Vitalik. I simply put an end to endless extortion.”
“Extortion?” he raised his voice. “That’s my mother! She raised me!”
“And I am your wife! And we have a son! When will you start thinking about our family first? When?” Tears rang in Irina’s voice, but she did not allow them to fall.
He said nothing. He simply turned and went into the room, leaving Irina alone in the kitchen among the half-unpacked bags. She sank onto a stool, feeling her knees tremble. She understood this was not the end. It was only the beginning of war.
The next few days turned into an icy desert. Vitalik barely spoke to Irina, answered in single words, ate in silence, and went to sleep on the sofa in the living room. Any attempts Irina made to start a conversation ran into a wall of alienation. He considered her guilty, and no arguments worked.
Then the phone calls began. The first to call was Aunt Galya, Elizaveta Stepanovna’s cousin, a loudmouthed woman who loved sticking her nose into other people’s business.
“Irochka, hello,” she began in a sugary voice that made goosebumps rise on Irina’s skin. “I’m calling to ask how our dear Lizonka is doing. She says she is very unwell. Her heart seized up after your conversation; they called an ambulance. Her blood pressure was almost two hundred. She’s lying there crying, saying her own son and daughter-in-law want to send her to the grave.”
Irina clenched her teeth. The “ambulance,” of course, was pure fiction. Elizaveta Stepanovna was a master of dramatic exaggeration.
“She’ll be all right, Aunt Galya. She is a strong woman.”
“Strong?” the voice on the phone gasped indignantly. “What are you saying! You drove a person to collapse, and now you’re mocking her too! I didn’t expect this from you, Irochka, I really didn’t. You used to be such a quiet girl, and you turned out to be a viper under a rock. Liza was right when she said you were turning Vitalik against the entire family.”
Irina could not hold back.
“You know what, Aunt Galya? Since you’re so interested, why don’t you ask Elizaveta Stepanovna herself how much money she demands from us every month? And ask what it is really spent on? Not only on ‘medicine,’ but also on a new blouse and café gatherings with her girlfriends.”
“How dare you!” Aunt Galya choked with indignation. “Counting the money in the pocket of an elderly, sick person! You have no shame!”
Irina silently hung up. Her hands were shaking. This was only the beginning. The gossip launched by her mother-in-law grew like a snowball. In the version that reached distant relatives, Irina had not merely refused to give money; she had pushed her sick mother-in-law out the door in the pouring rain and wished her a quick death.
Things were no easier at work. One of her regular clients, an old acquaintance of Elizaveta Stepanovna, suddenly said during a manicure with icy politeness:
“Irochka, have you never thought that elders should be treated with respect? Parents must be honored. It’s written in the Bible too.”
Irina almost ruined the polish. She realized her mother-in-law was waging war on all fronts, methodically turning their entire shared circle of acquaintances against her. She felt trapped, in the center of a web of lies and hypocrisy.
That evening, she tried once more to speak with her husband.
“Vitalik, do you understand that your mother is telling everyone I practically tried to kill her? Your aunt called me, a client at work lectured me. Do you think this is normal?”
Vitalik, not looking away from the television, shrugged.
“What did you expect? You offended her. So she’s complaining. Maybe if you apologized, it would all stop.”
“Apologized? For what? For telling the truth? For protecting our family budget? Vitalik, she is manipulating us! Don’t you see that?”
“I see that my mother is lying sick while my wife has dug in her heels and doesn’t want to take even one step toward her!” he exploded. “Is it so hard for you to say ‘forgive me’? Does your pride not allow it?”
“This isn’t about pride! It’s about fairness! If I apologize now, it will mean she was right and I was wrong. And everything will start again, only worse. She’ll understand she can twist us around her finger!”
“She won’t understand anything! She’ll just calm down!”
Their argument, like all the previous ones, ended nowhere. Irina bitterly realized that her husband was not an ally. He was the weak link, a puppet in his mother’s hands. And the worst part was that Elizaveta Stepanovna understood that perfectly and used it.
A week after the quarrel, Vitalik came home from work unusually agitated. He did not eat dinner, but went straight into the room where Irina was helping Lyosha with his homework.
“Ira, we need to have a serious talk,” he said in a tone that brooked no objection.
She sent her son to his room, feeling cold inside.
“Did something happen?”
“Yes,” he sat opposite her, nervously rubbing the edge of the tablecloth. “I went to see Mom today.”
“And how is she? Is her blood pressure no longer almost two hundred?” Irina could not resist the sarcasm.
“Don’t be snide. She’s unwell. But that’s not the point. She…” He hesitated, choosing his words. “She said she’s going to the notary. She wants to rewrite her will.”
Irina remained silent, waiting for him to continue.
“You see, her apartment… She wants to leave it to her cousin’s niece, Aunt Galya’s daughter. The same one who calls her every day and ‘worries about her health.’”
There it was. The trump card had been placed on the table. A three-room apartment in a good district, inherited by his mother-in-law from her parents. The apartment Vitalik had always considered his by right of inheritance. Irina and Vitalik, paying off the mortgage on their modest two-room apartment on the outskirts, had more than once talked about how, someday, after selling his mother’s apartment, they would be able to move into something bigger and close all their debts.
Kitchen and dining room
“And you believed her?” Irina asked quietly.
“Why shouldn’t I believe her?” he flared up. “It’s her right! It’s her property! She can leave it to whoever she wants! To a cat shelter if she likes! And it’s all because of you! Because of your stubbornness, we could lose everything!”
“We?” Irina smiled bitterly. “Vitalik, wake up! This is blackmail! Cheap, primitive blackmail! She is pressing on your weakest spot — money, that apartment! She wants you to crawl to her on your knees and force me to do the same!”
“And what if it isn’t blackmail? What if she really does it? What then? Will we be paying this mortgage until we’re old? What will we leave Lyosha? Have you thought about that?”
“I thought about the fact that our dignity is being taken from us!” Irina’s voice rang. “Your mother is trading her love and your future inheritance! And you are ready to buy it at the price of my humiliation! You want me to go and apologize for not wanting to be her personal cash cow, just so she doesn’t deprive you of the apartment? Is that what your idea of family looks like?”
“It looks like common sense!” he shouted. “Sometimes you have to swallow your pride for something bigger! For our son’s future!”
“Our son’s future means seeing that his parents respect each other, not bow down to manipulation! That his father is a man who can protect his wife, not run under Mommy’s skirt at her first call!”
The quarrel was terrible. They said many hurtful things to each other. Vitalik accused her of greed and selfishness; she accused him of weakness and spinelessness. At some point, Irina realized they were going in circles. He was blinded by fear of losing the apartment and did not see, did not want to see, the obvious game his mother was playing.
That night, Irina did not sleep. She lay there staring at the ceiling, one thought beating in her head: she could no longer live like this. She could not live in constant fear, waiting for the next blow, in an atmosphere of lies and betrayal from the person closest to her. She felt cornered, and she desperately needed a way out.
And then, in the silence of the night, a decision came to her. Cold, clear, and terrifyingly correct. She would no longer be a victim. She would act. If she had been dragged into a war, she had to know the rules and have her own weapon.
The next morning, Irina was unusually calm. She silently made breakfast, got her son ready for school, and, when Vitalik left for work, sat down at the laptop. She did not call her friends or look for sympathy. She typed into the search bar: “Legal consultation on inheritance matters.”
She called several firms, comparing prices and reviews. She chose the one that inspired the most trust — not the cheapest, but with a solid website and good ratings. She made an appointment for the afternoon, canceling one of her clients.
Sitting in the reception area of a small but cozy law office, Irina felt her heart pounding. She had never consulted lawyers before and felt unsure of herself. But when she was invited into the office, she pulled herself together.
She was consulted by a middle-aged man, Sergey Valeryevich, with attentive and calm eyes. He silently listened to her confused story: about her mother-in-law, about the money, about the quarrel, and most importantly, about the threat involving the will. He did not interrupt, only occasionally making notes in his notebook.
When she finished, he thought for a few seconds and then said:
“Irina Viktorovna, let’s sort everything out calmly, without emotions — only facts and the law. First. Your mother-in-law, as the owner of the apartment, really does have the full right to bequeath it to anyone. A neighbor, the state, anyone at all. This is called freedom of testament, Article 1119 of the Civil Code.”
Irina’s heart sank. So Vitalik had been right.
“However,” the lawyer continued, and she looked up at him, “there is such a concept as a mandatory share in inheritance. Article 1149. If, at the time of your mother-in-law’s death, your husband, Vitaly, is incapacitated for work — meaning retired by age or disabled — he will have the right to a share of the inheritance regardless of the contents of the will. Not less than half of the share he would have received by law if there had been no will.”
“But he isn’t retired and, thank God, he isn’t disabled,” Irina said quietly.
“At the moment, yes. Therefore, right now your mother-in-law’s threat is quite real. If she makes a will not in his favor, and at the time of her death he is still able-bodied, he will receive nothing.”
Irina drooped.
“But that is not all,” Sergey Valeryevich continued. “Let’s talk about something else. About her demands for money. You said she constantly refers to illness and lack of funds. According to the law, specifically the Family Code, able-bodied adult children are obliged to support their disabled parents who are in need of assistance.”
“So that means we are obligated?” Irina gasped.
“The key words here are ‘disabled’ and ‘in need,’” the lawyer emphasized. “Disability for work means either disability status or reaching retirement age. Your mother-in-law is a pensioner, so the first condition is met. But ‘need’ is an evaluative concept. If her pension is below the subsistence minimum in your region, and she has no other sources of income or property that could generate income, then a court may recognize her as being in need. And then she really could recover support payments from your husband in a fixed monetary amount.”
“But her pension is not minimal! Plus she has an apartment!” Irina exclaimed.
“Exactly! The apartment is her asset. She is not ‘in need’ in the sense the law gives that concept. She is not homeless; she has somewhere to live. To recover support payments, she would have to prove in court that her income is catastrophically insufficient for basic needs — food and medicine. And you, in turn, would have to prove that you already help her and that her demands are excessive. The court would examine the income of all parties. It is a complicated and unpleasant process. And judging by your story, your mother-in-law is unlikely to go that route. It is much easier and more effective for her to use emotional blackmail.”
Irina listened, and the fog in her head gradually cleared. She began to see the situation not as a knot of family grievances, but as a clear scheme with legal boundaries.
“So,” she said slowly, “her threat about the apartment is real, but her demands for money are pure manipulation, unsupported by law?”
“Exactly,” the lawyer nodded. “She is using a real lever — the apartment — to push through her unfounded financial demands. She is playing on your husband’s fear. You need to understand that and communicate it to him.”
Irina felt as if wings were growing behind her back. Knowledge was power. Real, tangible power. She paid for the consultation, and that money was the best investment she had made in the last several years. She left the office as a different person. Not a frightened victim, but a woman who knew her rights.
That evening, she waited for her husband. She was not going to shout or prove anything. She was going to talk.
Vitalik came home late, gloomy and tired. He silently went into the kitchen and poured himself a glass of water.
Kitchen and dining room
“Vitalik, please sit down. We need to talk,” Irina said in a calm, even tone.
He measured her with a wary look, but sat down.
“If this is again about how I should…”
“No,” she interrupted. “I’m not going to demand anything. I simply want to tell you something. Today I went to a lawyer.”
Vitalik choked on his water.
“Where? Why? Are you planning to file for divorce?”
“Calm down. I went for a consultation on inheritance matters. And about our ‘obligations’ to your mother.”
She methodically, word for word, repeated everything she had heard from Sergey Valeryevich. About freedom of testament. About the mandatory share. About the conditions under which children are required to pay support to parents. She spoke without emotion, operating with facts and article numbers.
Vitalik listened, and the expression on his face changed. From disbelief and anger to confusion and thoughtfulness. His mother’s threat, so absolute and terrifying in her mouth, looked entirely different in legal interpretation. It remained real, but it lost its halo of sacred parental punishment, turning into one possible but entirely earthly scenario.
“So… she really can leave the apartment to Galya?” he asked when Irina finished.
“Yes. She can. If she wants to. But her screams that we are obligated to support her because she is ‘Mother’ are just words. The law is on her side regarding the apartment, but not regarding us supporting her in the way she demands. Do you understand the difference?”
He was silent, staring at one spot.
“Vitalik, I want you to understand,” Irina continued, now quieter and softer. “I am not against helping her. Buying groceries, paying utilities if she doesn’t have enough, buying truly necessary prescription medicine. I am against being an ATM for her whims. I am against her controlling our life through blackmail. The apartment is just walls. But our family, our respect for each other, our peace — that is much more important. Are you really ready to trade that for her apartment? Are you really ready to let her destroy what we have built for years?”
Family
He raised his eyes to her. There was no anger in them anymore. Only fatigue and confusion.
“I don’t know, Ira… I’m lost. She is my mother…”
“I know. And I am not asking you to renounce her. I am asking you to be my husband. Mine and Lyosha’s protector. I am asking you to stand on our side. We are your family. Here. Not there.”
That evening, for the first time in a long while, he did not go to sleep on the sofa. He lay down beside her, but turned toward the wall. Irina did not know what he was thinking about. She had given him information, food for thought. Now the choice was his.
Two more days passed in tense silence. And on Saturday morning, Vitalik said:
“Get dressed. We’re going to Mom’s. Together.”
Irina’s heart skipped a beat.
“Why?”
“We’re just going. It’s time to end this circus.”
They were silent the entire way. Irina did not know what to expect. What had he decided? Would he force her to apologize? Or support her? She prepared for the worst.
Elizaveta Stepanovna met them at the threshold of her spacious apartment, which smelled of mothballs and Valocordin. Seeing Irina, she twisted her lips but let them both into the room.
“Well, finally,” she hissed, sitting down in her favorite armchair. “My son has brought the lost sheep to repent. I thought I would never live to see it.”
Vitalik did not sit. He remained standing in the middle of the room, tall and tense.
“Mom, we came to talk.”
“What is there to talk about?” she snorted. “Let your wife ask forgiveness for her words, and we’ll consider the incident closed. Though of course, a bitter aftertaste will remain.”
Irina said nothing, clutching her bag. All her attention was fixed on her husband.
“Mom,” Vitalik began, and his voice was unusually firm. “Ira will not apologize.”
Elizaveta Stepanovna froze.
“What?”
“She will not apologize because, in many ways, she was right. We helped you and we will keep helping you. But we are a separate family. We have our own expenses and our own plans. We cannot and will not give you money on demand for who knows what. If you need specific medicine — show the prescription, show the receipt, and we’ll pay. If you need groceries — give us a list, and we’ll buy them. But we will no longer simply hand over cash so that afterward you can tell everyone how little we value you.”
Elizaveta Stepanovna slowly turned red.
“You… have you lost your mind, son? Did she teach you this? That…”
“This is my decision,” Vitalik cut her off. “And about the apartment. It is your apartment, and you have the right to dispose of it however you want. If you want to leave it to your niece, that is your right. But you will no longer blackmail us with it. I will not allow it. My family is Ira and Lyosha. And I will not let you destroy it.”
Dead silence fell. Irina stared at her husband with wide eyes. She could not believe her ears. This was not the mumbling, eternally doubting Vitalik. This was a man. Her man.
Elizaveta Stepanovna opened and closed her mouth like a fish thrown onto the shore. She had not been ready for such resistance. Especially not from her son.
“So that’s how it is!” she finally exhaled, her face distorted with rage. “So you conspired against your mother! Out! Out of my house, both of you! And never set foot here again! Traitor! I raised you only to suffer this!”
They went out onto the landing, and behind them the door slammed shut with a crash. Vitalik breathed heavily, leaning against the wall. Irina came closer and carefully took his hand.
He looked at her, and in his eyes she saw relief.
“Let’s go home,” he said quietly.
They drove home, and for the first time in a long while, Irina felt happy. They had won. Not against her mother-in-law, but against their own fear and uncertainty. They had defended their family.
But when they were already approaching their apartment, Vitalik’s phone rang. “Mom” lit up on the screen. He declined the call. The phone rang again. And again. He turned off the sound.
That evening, while Irina was putting Lyosha to bed, she heard Vitalik speaking quietly with someone in the hallway. She thought it was work. But when she came out, he had already finished the conversation and was standing by the window with a strange expression on his face.
Later, when the house had gone quiet, Irina could not fall asleep. Some inexplicable anxiety gnawed at her from within. She quietly got up and went to the kitchen to drink some water. The door to the hallway was not fully closed, and from there came her husband’s muffled voice. He was talking on the phone again.
Kitchen and dining room
Irina froze, listening. Her heart plunged somewhere downward. She recognized that ingratiating, guilty tone. He was speaking to his mother.
She came closer, barely breathing, and pressed her ear to the crack.
“…yes, Mom, I understand everything… Don’t shout, please… Yes, I heard how she…” He lowered his voice to a whisper, and Irina had to strain all her hearing to make out the words. “Mom, I heard… Yes… Ira declared that she isn’t obligated to support you! Don’t worry. I’ll talk to her. I’ll make her apologize…”