Yulia was mechanically wiping the kitchen countertop when the doorbell rang. Three short, demanding rings — she immediately recognized that “signature.” Galina Petrovna never rang just once, as if she were afraid no one would hear her.
“Open up!” came the voice from behind the door. “I know you’re home!”
Yulia slowly walked to the door, paused for a second to gather herself, and opened it. Galina Petrovna stormed into the hallway without even saying hello. She was wearing the same mink coat that Yulia and Ivan had given her last New Year’s — the one that had cost them eighty thousand.
“Where is Vanya?” her mother-in-law asked, walking into the living room and looking around.
“At work,” Yulia said, closing the door. “Did you need something?”
Galina Petrovna spun around sharply, her eyes flashing with anger.
“What do you mean there’s no money? I gave you ONE HUNDRED THOUSAND!” she snapped, stepping closer and pointing a finger into the air. “I urgently need fifty thousand. Urgently, do you understand?”
Yulia was stunned. In seven years of marriage, her mother-in-law had often been harsh, but she had never expected such nerve.
“Galina Petrovna, what are you talking about? What hundred thousand?”
“Don’t play dumb!” her mother-in-law said, sitting down on the sofa without taking off her coat. “Last year, when Vanya asked for money to repair your summer house, I gave you one hundred thousand. Now I need half of it back. I have my own expenses!”
Yulia sat on the edge of the armchair. Irritation was beginning to boil inside her.
“You gave us one hundred thousand for the roof repair, that’s true. But we spent four hundred thousand on that renovation. And that was after we had paid for your trips to the health resort three years in a row — seventy thousand each time.”
“Those were gifts!” Galina Petrovna protested. “But I LENT you money!”
“You never said it was a loan,” Yulia replied, trying to keep her voice calm. “You said, ‘Take it for the repairs, I don’t mind helping the children.’”
“I meant you would return it later! You’re not going to deny that I helped you, are you?”
Yulia stood up and walked over to the window. Outside, it was an ordinary gray October day. A young mother with a stroller was walking near the playground. Just like Yulia herself had been a year ago, after giving birth to little Sasha.
“Galina Petrovna, let’s count,” she said, turning back to her mother-in-law. “In seven years, Ivan and I have paid for three of your trips to the health resort — two hundred and ten thousand. Your dental treatment — one hundred and twenty thousand. New furniture for your apartment — ninety thousand. The coat you’re sitting in right now — eighty thousand.”
“Those were GIFTS!” her mother-in-law interrupted.
“And your one hundred thousand was NOT?” Yulia’s voice took on a steely edge.
Galina Petrovna rose from the sofa, her face red with outrage.
“How dare you speak to me like that! I am your husband’s mother! I raised him alone, without a father. I gave him everything!”
“And now you want him to pay for it for the rest of his life?” Yulia asked, crossing her arms. “We transfer twenty thousand to you every month as ‘help.’ Your pension is thirty-five thousand. That makes fifty-five thousand a month. What else do you need money for?”
“That’s none of your business!” her mother-in-law snapped, stepping closer. “I need MY money! Fifty thousand, and that’s final!”
“We don’t have spare money right now,” Yulia said, still trying not to raise her voice. “We have a child, a mortgage, and our own expenses.”
“A mortgage!” Galina Petrovna scoffed. “And who gave you money for the down payment? Have you forgotten?”
Yulia exhaled sharply. Her mother-in-law brought up that “gift” for the down payment every chance she got. Three hundred thousand, five years ago. Since then, they had “thanked” her ten times over.
“You gave three hundred thousand FIVE years ago. Since then, we have spent more than a million on you. I can show you all the receipts and transfers.”
“You keep records?” her mother-in-law sneered. “So that’s what this is! Counting every penny! Greedy!”
“I’m not greedy. I’m PRACTICAL!” Yulia felt a wave of anger rising inside her. “And yes, I keep records because I’m tired of hearing how you ‘help everyone’ and ‘give us everything!’”
“Does Vanya know that you’re so… so UNGRATEFUL?”
“Ivan knows perfectly well how much money goes to you!” Yulia went to the desk and pulled open a drawer. “Do you want me to show you our household accounts?”
She took out a thick notebook and opened it to a marked page.
“Look! January this year: transfer to Mom — twenty thousand. Medicine for Mom — eight thousand. February: transfer to Mom — twenty thousand. Mom’s utility bills — twelve thousand. March…”
“ENOUGH!” Galina Petrovna shouted. “Put that away!”
“What’s wrong? Does the TRUTH hurt?” Yulia slammed the notebook shut. “This year alone, we’ve spent three hundred and eighty thousand on you! And now you come here demanding fifty thousand from that one hundred you gave us a year ago!”
At that moment, the front door slammed. Footsteps sounded in the hallway.
“Mom?” Ivan’s voice sounded surprised. “Are you here?”
He entered the living room and looked from one furious woman to the other.
“What’s going on?”
“Your mother is demanding that we return fifty thousand from the hundred she gave us for the summer house!” Yulia blurted out.
“Your wife keeps records of my gifts!” Galina Petrovna shouted at the same time. “She counts every single penny!”
Ivan tiredly took off his jacket and hung it over the back of a chair.
“Mom, what fifty thousand?”
“I NEED the money!” Galina Petrovna turned to her son. “I have expenses. I need that exact money! I gave it to you!”
“Mom, you said it was a gift for the summer house repairs,” Ivan said, rubbing the bridge of his nose. “We spent four hundred thousand of our own money, plus your hundred.”
“I never said it was a gift! I said take it! That means you give it back later!”
Yulia stepped between them, her eyes burning with anger.
“ENOUGH! Just ENOUGH!” she raised her voice so sharply that Ivan flinched. “Galina Petrovna, you will apologize right now and leave. Or I will tell you EVERYTHING I think!”
“Yulia…” Ivan began.
“BE QUIET!” she snapped, turning to her husband. “For seven years I have endured her rudeness! For seven years I’ve listened to her tell me that I’m the wrong kind of wife, the wrong kind of mother, that I cook wrong, clean wrong! For seven years we have been supporting your mother, and now she comes here and DEMANDS more!”
“How dare you!” her mother-in-law shrieked.
“I DARE!” Yulia turned back to her. “You buy branded handbags with our money! You have savings, I know you do! Ivan, tell your mother why she urgently needs fifty thousand!”
Ivan turned pale.
“You know?”
“Of course I know! She lost it playing cards with her friends! LOST IT! Poker on Thursdays at Lidia Sergeyevna’s!”
Galina Petrovna stepped back.
“How… Who told you?”
“Lidia Sergeyevna called me yesterday herself! She said you owed fifty thousand and promised to pay today. She was worried you would get yourself into debt!”
“Mom, is that true?” Ivan asked, looking at his mother with disappointment.
“So what if it is? It’s my money! I have the right!”
“It is NOT our money!” Yulia exploded. “Every month we deny ourselves things so we can help you! I haven’t been to the hairdresser in six months! Ivan wears old shoes! We haven’t been on vacation in two years! And you GAMBLE it away!”
She stepped right up to her mother-in-law.
“You know what, Galina Petrovna? GET OUT! Get out of my house right now! And don’t you dare come here with demands again!”
“Vanya!” his mother cried, looking at her son. “Are you going to let her speak to me like this?”
Ivan was silent, staring at the floor. Then he lifted his head.
“Mom, Yulia is right. You’ve gone too far. We’ve always helped you, but you’re playing cards with the money we give you.”
“It’s MY money!”
“NO!” he barked. “It is OUR money, money that we GIVE you! And you come here demanding more to cover your card debts!”
“To hell with both of you!” Galina Petrovna shouted. “UNGRATEFUL!”
Yulia clenched her fists. Anger was boiling inside her so fiercely that she wanted to scream.
“UNGRATEFUL?!” she stepped forward. “Galina Petrovna, do you even understand what that word means?”
She yanked open a cabinet and pulled out a folder of documents.
“Here! Look! Receipts for your eye surgery — two hundred thousand! Here’s the contract for the health resort — seventy thousand! Here’s the purchase of your favorite phone — sixty thousand! Here…”
“Stop it!” her mother-in-law tried to snatch the folder.
“DON’T TOUCH IT!” Yulia pulled her hand back. “Ivan, tell your mother how much you earn!”
“Yul, don’t…”
“SAY IT!” she turned to her husband. “Or should I? One hundred and twenty thousand! And I earn sixty! That’s one hundred and eighty total! And FORTY of that goes to your mother! FORTY THOUSAND every month!”
“I raised him!” Galina Petrovna shouted. “I have the right!”
“You do NOT have the right to come into MY home and insult me!” Yulia threw the folder onto the table. “You do NOT have the right to demand money you lost gambling! You do NOT have the right to humiliate me every time we meet!”
She walked to the door and flung it open.
“GET OUT! Right now! And I don’t want to see you here again!”
“Vanya, do you hear this?” his mother threw up her hands. “She’s throwing your mother out!”
Ivan stood up and walked over to her.
“Mom, leave. Really, leave. We all need to calm down.”
“You’re choosing HER?”
“I’m choosing my FAMILY. My wife and daughter. And you… you crossed the line, Mom.”
Galina Petrovna grabbed her handbag.
“You’ll REGRET this! Both of you! When I get sick and die, you’ll be sorry!”
“Just go already!” Yulia waved her hand tiredly. “Go to your friends and play poker! But you won’t get any more money! NOT A SINGLE PENNY!”
Her mother-in-law flew out the door. A second later, she came back.
“And the monthly payments? You wouldn’t dare…”
“WE WOULD!” Yulia cut her off. “You’ll get ten thousand, and that’s enough! We’ll spend the rest on OUR family!”
“Ivan!” Galina Petrovna pleaded. “Son!”
“Mom, go home,” he said, turning away. “Just go.”
The door slammed. The sound of heels and loud sobbing echoed down the staircase.
Yulia leaned against the wall and closed her eyes. Her whole body was shaking from the anger she had just released.
“I’m sorry,” Ivan said quietly. “I should have done this myself long ago. I should have put her in her place.”
“She’s your mother…”
“But you are my wife. And she had no right to treat you like that all these years. I’m sorry I allowed it.”
Yulia opened her eyes and looked at him.
“Does she really play cards?”
“Yes. I found out a month ago from Lidia Sergeyevna’s husband. I hoped Mom would stop on her own.”
Three weeks passed. During the first week, Galina Petrovna called her son every day. Then every other day. Then she went silent. Ivan transferred the promised ten thousand to her and nothing more.
One Saturday morning, the doorbell rang. Yulia went to open it, expecting the grocery delivery courier. But behind the door stood an unfamiliar woman of about sixty.
“Are you Yulia? Galina Petrovna’s daughter-in-law?”
“Yes. And you are?”
“Lidia Sergeyevna. May I come in? There’s something important we need to discuss.”
Yulia invited the guest inside and offered tea. The woman sat down in the kitchen and placed an envelope on the table.
“I came to apologize and return this.”
“What is it?”
“Fifty thousand. The very money Galina supposedly lost to me. I can’t take it.”
Yulia raised her eyebrows in surprise.
“But she lost it fairly, didn’t she?”
“Not exactly,” Lidia Sergeyevna said, shaking her head. “You see, we’ve been playing for five years. Small stakes, just for fun. But over the last six months, Galina started playing big. And constantly losing.”
“So?”
“So she was losing ON PURPOSE. My friends and I began suspecting it about a month ago. And yesterday her neighbor, Nina Vasilyevna, accidentally let something slip.”
Lidia Sergeyevna took out her phone and played a voice recording. Galina Petrovna’s voice came from the speaker:
“…those fools keep paying and paying! I said I lost money, and my son immediately gave it to me! Next time I’ll say I owe a hundred thousand! That Yulia will go mad, but Vanka won’t let his mother suffer! And I put the money in the bank, on deposit. I’ve already saved four hundred thousand in six months! By New Year, I’ll go to Turkey, to a five-star hotel!”
Yulia stared at the phone in shock.
“She… she was lying to us?”
“Exactly. She deliberately lost small amounts and told you they were large. She put the difference in the bank. Yesterday, the girls and I were outraged. We told her we wouldn’t play with her anymore. Or even speak to her.”
“But why did she come specifically for fifty thousand this time?”
“She got a call from the travel agency the day before yesterday. They told her that if she paid the deposit by the end of the week, she would get a thirty percent discount. So she needed exactly fifty thousand to finish paying for the trip.”
Yulia stood up and walked around the kitchen.
“Four hundred thousand… She was saving our money while lying to us…”
“Take it,” Lidia Sergeyevna said, pushing the envelope toward her. “This is honestly your money. Galina didn’t win it from me. And we are no longer dealing with her. A person who can deceive her own son like that…”
The front door slammed in the hallway. Ivan entered with grocery bags.
“Oh, we have guests? Hello!”
“Ivan, this is Lidia Sergeyevna. Sit down. You need to hear this.”
For the next fifteen minutes, Lidia Sergeyevna explained everything and showed the evidence. Ivan’s face changed from surprise to disappointment, then to anger.
“Damn it,” he exhaled when the guest had finished. “I’m sorry. I just… She’s my MOTHER! How could she?”
“Unfortunately, she could,” Lidia Sergeyevna sighed. “And you know what else? Yesterday she also lied to Marina Pavlovna, a mutual acquaintance of ours, saying that you had abandoned her, that you weren’t helping her, that she was starving. Marina almost gave her twenty thousand out of pity. Luckily, I warned her in time.”
Ivan stood up and walked to the window.
“Yul, forgive me. Forgive me for all these years. You were right from the very beginning.”
“Well, I’ll be going,” Lidia Sergeyevna said, standing up. “The money is yours, and we’ll deal with Galina ourselves. Everyone in our circle now knows the truth.”
When the door closed behind the guest, Ivan embraced his wife.
“You know what we’re going to do now? We’re going to buy you that dress you were looking at a month ago. And we’ll go to a restaurant. And book you an appointment at the hairdresser. Enough saving on ourselves for the sake of someone who lies to us.”
Yulia leaned into him.
“And what about your mother?”
“Let her go to Turkey. With the money she saved from OUR pockets. And when she comes back… I’ll have a VERY serious talk with her. And if she doesn’t apologize to you, to us… she’ll lose her son.”
That same evening, Galina Petrovna received a call from the travel agency informing her that her reservation had been canceled due to non-payment. She rushed to the bank — the account had been frozen at her son’s request because it had been opened using his passport details. She had used a copy of his passport that had been given to her for another purpose.
The next day, Ivan called her.
“Mom, we took the money from the account. All four hundred thousand. That is our money, which you stole through deception. You will continue receiving ten thousand a month. If you want your son back, come and apologize to Yulia. Apologize SINCERELY. Otherwise, this will be our last conversation.”
Galina Petrovna hung up. She was certain her son would come to his senses and come to her himself, as he always had.
A month passed. Then another. The money kept arriving on her card, but neither Ivan nor Yulia called or visited. For New Year, they sent only a formal greeting card.
In February, Galina Petrovna finally broke down. Pride lost to loneliness. She came to her son’s home with a cake and a bottle of wine.
“Yulenka, forgive me,” she said from the doorway. “I was wrong. Very wrong. Please forgive me.”
Yulia looked at her mother-in-law for a long time. Then she nodded.
“Come in, Galina Petrovna. But remember this — not one more rude word, not one more lie. Otherwise, the door to our home will close forever.”
And Galina Petrovna understood that her daughter-in-law was not joking. She had to learn to live differently. Honestly. Without manipulation or deception. As it turned out, it wasn’t so bad after all — being accepted as you are, while being expected to offer one simple thing in return: basic human decency.