“Did one week somehow turn into two years?” Andrei lowered himself onto a stool that wobbled suspiciously beneath him. “And exactly how many of you are living here?”
“Six,” Alina replied.
At that moment, a man wearing a wrinkled undershirt and sweatpants came out of the room. He scratched the back of his head and nodded casually at Andrei.
“Hey. So you’re the owner?”
“What are you doing here?” Alina demanded, blocking the entrance while clutching a baby wrapped in a flannel blanket against her chest.
“What do you mean, what am I doing here?” Andrei froze in the doorway, still holding his heavy travel backpack. “I came home, Alina. My work assignment is over.”
He stared at her in disbelief.
“I’ve been away for two years. The real question is what you are doing here. And why doesn’t my key fit the lock?”
“Oh, don’t make so much noise,” his sister said with an annoyed grimace as she backed into the hallway. “You’ll wake the children. The older ones have only just gone down for their nap.”
Then she added casually:
“We changed the lock because the old one kept sticking. Didn’t Mom tell you?”
“Mom told me everything was fine with the apartment,” Andrei said, stepping inside.
He immediately stumbled over a mountain of mismatched shoes.
“She said she came by once a week to water the plants. Where did all these children come from, Alina? Whose are they?”
“Well, come in since you’re already here,” she sighed dramatically. “But take off your boots. I washed the floor this morning. Although with this many children, cleaning is practically pointless.”
Andrei walked farther down the hallway and stopped dead.
Before leaving, he had painted the walls an expensive pearl shade. Now they were covered halfway up with colorful marker drawings.
A bunk bed stood in the corner where his favorite floor lamp had once been. The muffled sound of a television came from the kitchen.
“Mom let me stay here for one week,” Alina began as she entered the kitchen and sat down in an old armchair. “It happened after I got thrown out of that rental apartment. Remember? I told you about it. The landlord turned out to be completely unreasonable.”
“So we moved in here. After that, one thing led to another.”
“One week became two years?” Andrei asked as he sat on the unstable stool. “How many people are living here?”
“Six,” she repeated.
The man in the rumpled undershirt appeared again.
“Hey,” he said. “You must be the owner.”
“I’m Andrei,” he replied coldly. “And you are?”
“This is Stas,” Alina answered quickly. “My husband. Well, almost my husband. We haven’t officially registered the marriage yet. Stas, this is my brother. The one who was working in Yakutia.”
“Right,” Stas said.
He walked to the refrigerator as though it belonged to him and took out a bottle of kefir.
“Want some? Oh, right, you just got back from a long trip. There’s some soup left in the pot. Alina, heat some for your brother.”
“I don’t want soup,” Andrei said, rubbing his temples. “Alina, please explain how all of you have been living here. This is a two-room apartment. Where are my belongings? Where is the sofa I spent years paying off?”
“We had to sell the sofa,” Alina said calmly while stirring something in a saucepan. “It was too big. There wasn’t enough space for the children’s beds.”
“We packed your things into boxes and moved them onto the balcony. At least the better things. I took the old junk to Mom’s place. She brought it to the country house.”
She turned toward him.
“Andrei, try to understand. I have four children. Where was I supposed to take them? Into the middle of a field?”
“Four?” His eyes widened. “When I left, you had two children from your first marriage.”
“Well, life doesn’t stand still,” Stas said with a grin as he drank from a mug. “We had two more together. The youngest is only three months old.”
“We even renovated the room for ourselves. We put up new wallpaper in the children’s room. You’ll like it. It has cute little bears on it.”
“Bears over my Italian wallpaper?” Andrei stared at them. “Do either of you understand that you have taken over someone else’s private property?”
“Stop shouting!” Alina snapped, spinning around. “It’s easy for you to judge. You were up north earning millions and enjoying your freedom. I was here with children, debts and no money.”
“Mom said it herself: ‘Let Alina stay there. Andrei’s apartment is empty anyway. He won’t lose anything.’”
“I’m calling Mom right now,” Andrei said, pulling out his phone.
“Go ahead,” his sister replied with a shrug. “You’ll only upset her. Her blood pressure was high yesterday, so why not finish her off with your selfishness?”
Andrei stepped onto the balcony, trying not to look at the piles of clutter among which he recognized his own possessions.
He called his mother.
“Hello, Mom? Yes, I’m home. Or at least in what used to be my home. Why didn’t you tell me Alina was living here with her entire circus?”
His mother’s voice instantly became tearful.
“Andryusha, sweetheart, you’re already back? Thank God. Please don’t be angry.”
“Alina was in such a difficult situation. Where could she go with the children? Stas promised to find work, and they planned to move out, but things didn’t work out.”
“Mom, they changed the lock! They sold my sofa! The apartment is destroyed. There are children everywhere, and some man named Stas is walking around in my slippers!”
“Son, you’re strong. You can earn enough to replace everything. You’re a man. But she’s a helpless woman with little angels in her arms. Where was I supposed to send them? To my one-room apartment?”
“You know I don’t have enough space.”
“Be patient for a while. You’re family. You can live together at first. The apartment is big.”
“Together? Mom, there are six of them!” Andrei gasped. “Where am I supposed to sleep? On the doormat in the hallway?”
“Why are you talking like that?” she complained. “Alina said you could put a folding chair in the kitchen. You’re a kind person, Andryusha. You wouldn’t throw your sister and four children into the street, would you? Winter is coming. Have some pity.”
“I understand,” Andrei said quietly.
He ended the call.
When he returned to the room, Alina was sitting on an old sagging sofa, feeding the baby. Stas had turned up the volume on the football match.
“All right,” Andrei announced, standing in the middle of the room. “You have three days. Find another place, move in with Mom or do whatever you have to do.”
“In three days, I’ll call a locksmith, open the apartment and put every one of these beds out in the stairwell.”
Alina slowly looked up at him.
“We’re not leaving, Andrei. You obviously don’t know the law. All four of my underage children are officially registered at this address.”
“What?” His knees nearly gave way. “Who registered them?”
“Mom,” Alina answered calmly. “Did you forget that she owns a share of the apartment?”
“She had the legal right to register relatives here. So relax, dear brother. You won’t get rid of us in three days or three years. You’ll be fighting in court for decades.”
“Mom couldn’t have done that,” he whispered.
“She absolutely could,” Stas said without looking away from the television. “She understands what family means. You only care about your precious square meters.”
“That isn’t how decent people behave. We are here legally. You can live with us. We’ll give you a little corner.”
“And if you cause trouble, we’ll call the police and say you threatened the children and wouldn’t let them sleep.”
“Alina, I worked on construction sites for five years to buy this place,” Andrei said quietly. “I didn’t take vacations because I wanted to renovate it. Do you understand that you are robbing me?”
“I’m raising children!” Alina shouted, jumping to her feet. “While you were counting your money, I was creating life!”
“If you can’t spare one room for your own nieces and nephews, then you are worthless as a human being.”
“Go complain wherever you like. Take us to court or write to the United Nations. We’re not leaving because we have nowhere else to go.”
“Stas has parents, doesn’t he? Why don’t you live with them?”
“The conditions there are unsuitable,” Stas replied. “The school is close to this apartment. So are the kindergarten and the clinic. We’ve already settled in.”
“Don’t worry, Andrei. We aren’t demanding people. There’s enough room for everyone. You can also help us buy groceries because money is tight at the moment.”
“I’m supposed to help you?” Andrei gave a nervous laugh. “You broke into my home, ruined my belongings, registered yourselves behind my back, and now I’m expected to feed you?”
“What else would you do?” Alina had already calmed down and was rocking the baby again. “Relatives are supposed to support one another.”
“You’re rich and we’re poor. Helping us is only fair. Mom said, ‘When Andrei returns, he’ll become your provider.’”
“Mom said many things,” Andrei replied, picking up his backpack. “But she forgot one important detail. Even I have a limit.”
He walked into the hallway.
Greasy handprints covered the walls. A bag of garbage stood in the corner, and judging by the smell, no one had taken it out for several days.
Andrei sat on his suitcase because he no longer had the strength to remain standing.
A boy of about five ran out of the room. He stopped in front of Andrei and examined him carefully.
“Who are you?” the child asked.
“I live here, little man,” Andrei replied, looking into his nephew’s eyes.
“Mom says we live here. You’re the rich uncle. She said you’re going to buy us a game console.”
The boy sniffed and ran away.
Andrei closed his eyes.
He desperately wanted to believe it was all a nightmare. He imagined waking up in his bunk at the work camp, with another month of hard labor ahead of him, followed by his clean, peaceful and empty apartment.
“Alina!” he called.
His sister appeared in the doorway.
“What now? Have you decided to discuss things peacefully?”
“I want to take my documents from the safe. Where is it?”
Alina hesitated and looked away.
“The safe… well, Stas needed some tools. He opened it because the lock was jammed. We put your documents in a folder. It’s on top of the cabinet in the hallway.”
“We sold the safe for scrap metal. It was damaged anyway.”
“My awards were inside,” he whispered. “And the letters from our father.”
“Oh, who needs those old papers?” Alina said dismissively. “This is hardly the time to become sentimental.”
Andrei stood and picked up his suitcase.
“Where are you going?” she asked in surprise. “It’s already nighttime. Mom said you could sleep in the kitchen.”
“I’d rather stay in a hostel,” he replied as he opened the door. “Or at the train station. Anywhere is better than watching what you’ve done to my home.”
“Then get out!” Alina shouted after him. “You think you’re too good for us! We’ll see how proud you are when the utility bills arrive.”
“We haven’t paid them for almost a year, so you came back at exactly the right time. You can settle the debt!”
The next several months became a nightmare.
Andrei hired a lawyer, but Alina had been right about one thing: evicting a family with four children, two of them infants, was nearly impossible under the circumstances.
Their mother fully supported her daughter and accused Andrei of being cruel and heartless.
Every conversation ended with her sobbing and claiming that he wanted his nieces and nephews to freeze to death in the street.
Andrei repeatedly tried to enter the apartment to retrieve the rest of his belongings, but Stas refused to open the door.
On one occasion, Stas even called the police and reported that an intoxicated relative was trying to break into a home full of children.
When the local officer saw the frightened children and their crying mother, he merely spread his hands and advised Andrei to resolve the matter through civil court.
Six months later, Andrei made a difficult decision.
He put his share of the apartment up for sale.
The buyers belonged to a particular group specializing in disputed and problematic real estate. They offered only one-third of the market value, but by then Andrei no longer cared.
On the day the deal was completed, he called his mother for the last time.
“Mom, I sold my share of the apartment. The new owners will move in next week. There will be ten of them.”
“You couldn’t do that!” his mother screamed. “There are children there! You’ve destroyed your sister’s life!”
Andrei ended the call and blocked her number.
A ticket back north was already in his pocket.
Alina and her large family fled the apartment less than two weeks after the new co-owners arrived. The newcomers made life so unbearable that even Stas could not tolerate staying there.
The apartment was eventually sold for almost nothing.
Andrei never returned to his hometown again.