Nina walked along the sunny side of the street carrying a paper bag of strawberries, and the bottom of the bag was already beginning to soak through. The berries were early-season, expensive, and completely unreasonable—just like all the best things in her life. She had bought them simply because her sister Darya was arriving today.
After winter, the city looked as though someone had wiped it clean with a damp cloth. The linden trees were covered in tiny sticky leaves, children shouted in the courtyards, and near the bus stop a little girl of about five solemnly pushed a toy stroller. Nina caught herself smiling at strangers, and for once she wasn’t embarrassed by it.
Her phone vibrated in her pocket. She knew who it was before she even took it out.
“Nina, hi,” her mother said in her brisk, practical voice. “You haven’t forgotten, have you? Dasha is coming to stay with you today.”
“I haven’t forgotten. The strawberries are already leaking down my hand as proof of my love.”
“She’s coming by train. She’ll arrive around six. Make up a proper bed for her, not that folding cot of yours.”
“I ceremonially donated the folding cot to a museum of everyday life. Relax.”
Her mother was silent for a moment, then couldn’t resist asking.
“Has Anton called?”
“He did. Half an hour ago. Said his mother wants to talk to me.”
“And?”
“I said no and hung up. You know, I’m not taking part in that particular season anymore.”
Her mother gave an approving little snort and let her go.
Nina put the phone away, but it immediately came alive again with a short message.
Where are you?
The number wasn’t saved in her contacts, but Nina knew it by heart, the way people remember the number of an apartment they once moved out of.
Larisa Petrovna.
The woman who, three months earlier, had cheerfully told her son, “If it didn’t work out, then it wasn’t meant to be. Don’t torture each other.”
And the same woman who, just two days later, had called Nina “sweetheart” for the first time in her life—exactly when the subject of Nina’s three-room apartment came up.
Her grandfather’s apartment.
The place where six-year-old Nina had once drawn underwater horses on the wallpaper, and instead of scolding her, her grandfather had written beneath them: “A herd.”
The apartment had belonged to Nina long before Anton entered her life, and it remained hers after he left it.
She didn’t answer the message.
Replying to “Where are you?” from someone who was no longer part of your life felt like explaining to a doorbell why it was ringing.
A minute later, the phone rang.
“So where are you?” Anton asked in the tone people used with a delivery driver who was ten minutes late. “Mom’s been waiting for you.”
“Well, look at that. You suddenly remembered I exist. When you left, you practically did it with an orchestra, flags, and fireworks.”
“Don’t start.”
“I’m not starting anything. I’m summarizing the results. Different genre.”
“Nina, just tell me when you’ll be home.”
“The same time I usually am. But that concerns you about as much as the weather on Mars concerns me.”
She ended the call in the middle of his sentence and was pleased to notice that the strawberries had survived.
“Ninka!”
Someone called from behind her, and the next second she was hugged so hard the paper bag finally crinkled.
Ksyusha had jumped out of a badly parked car that violated almost every possible rule of courtesy. Igor sat behind the wheel, waving as if they hadn’t seen each other in a year.
“Why are you walking around like the heroine of a novel?” Ksyusha demanded, grabbing Nina by the arm. “Get in. We’re passing by your destiny. Café, table, twenty minutes. I’m not accepting objections.”
“No objections. I have strawberries and an hour and a half before the train arrives.”
“The strawberries are coming with us,” Ksyusha declared.
They sat by the window. Igor told some ridiculous story about a neighbor and an inflatable boat, Ksyusha laughed loudly, and Nina warmed her hands around a glass of tea.
That was when her phone vibrated again.
How much longer am I supposed to wait?
“Who is it?” Ksyusha asked, narrowing her eyes.
“My former mother-in-law.”
“What does she want?”
“No idea. But her tone sounds as if I’m late paying the entire building’s salary.”
Nina typed three words.
Don’t wait for me.
She sent it.
Fifteen seconds later, Anton’s name lit up the screen.
“Stop upsetting my mother!” he barked instead of saying hello. “She’s waiting!”
“Let her wait. It’s free and good for posture.”
“Are you even human?”
“I am. I’m just not yours anymore. Anton, listen carefully because I’m not repeating myself: you’re a stranger to me, she’s a stranger to me, we have no children, no shared property, and the matter is closed. The only thing connecting us now is a memory, and frankly, it doesn’t rank very high.”
“You—”
She hung up.
Ksyusha silently lifted her glass and tapped it against Nina’s.
“To strangers,” she said.
“To closed chapters,” Nina corrected.
Nina reached her building shortly after five and immediately understood that the day had decided not to end as peacefully as it had begun.
Larisa Petrovna was sitting on a bench beside the entrance.
Next to her stood an enormous plaid travel bag and an old wheeled suitcase with a faded sticker from some Soviet-era health resort.
She sat straight-backed and proud, like a monument erected in her own honor.
The moment she saw Nina, she jumped up with surprising speed, grabbed the suitcase handle, and started dragging it toward the door.
“Stop,” Nina said calmly. “Where exactly are you going?”
“What do you mean, where?” Larisa Petrovna looked genuinely surprised. “To your place. I’ll stay with you for a while.”
“‘I’ll stay with you for a while’ is usually a sentence that begins with ‘May I?’ Preferably with a question mark.”
“Oh, don’t start with me!” the woman snapped, tugging the suitcase. “Open the door. I’ve been on my feet since lunchtime.”
“Larisa Petrovna, I have some news for you. It’s three months old. I divorced your son. That makes you about as close to me as any random person on the street. And I don’t invite random people into my home. Bad luck.”
“Divorce is no reason to shut the door in my face!” Her voice rose two octaves. “It’s your home, and you have space! Three rooms, for heaven’s sake! One of them is empty!”
“I also have a balcony and a storage cupboard. That doesn’t mean I move everyone who asks into them.”
“How dare you speak to me like that?”
“Exactly the way you speak to me. I just use a slightly larger vocabulary.”
Nina took out her phone, looked Larisa Petrovna directly in the eyes, and called Anton.
He answered immediately. He had clearly been waiting.
“Anton, what kind of circus is your mother staging outside my building? She’s here with a suitcase, a giant bag, and the face of an insulted queen. Let me make this clear: I am not letting her into my apartment.”
“Stop being difficult,” he hissed. “Just let her stay. What do you care? You’ve got three rooms—”
Nina hung up.
She had no interest in hearing the rest.
“Well?” Larisa Petrovna lifted her chin.
“Well what? What actually happened? You lived in your own two-room apartment, and as far as I remember, you were very proud of it.”
Something in the woman suddenly deflated.
Her shoulders dropped. So did her chin.
“I can’t live with her,” she finally said with difficulty. “That Violetta. She’s unbearable. Fighting in the morning, fighting at night. She told Anton, ‘Either your mother goes or I go.’ And Anton just sits there in silence. He says nothing, do you understand?”
“I understand. He has a remarkable talent for staying silent while other people make decisions for him. You trained him well, remember? ‘If it didn’t work out, don’t hold on.’ So I didn’t hold on. I even held the door for him so it wouldn’t hit him on the way out.”
“It’s easy for you to say…”
“It wasn’t easy for me.”
Nina stepped forward to walk past her—and stopped.
For a moment, she really looked at the woman.
Larisa Petrovna stood outside someone else’s building in an old coat, next to a suitcase that looked as though it had survived the seventies, with the expression of a person who had just been carried out of her own life along with the furniture.
“All right,” Nina said. “One night. Do you hear me? One night. It’s already late, the buses are crowded, and I’m not a monster. Tomorrow morning you deal with your son yourself. Your situation is not my responsibility.”
“Thank you, Ninochka!” Larisa Petrovna brightened instantly and shoved the plaid bag into Nina’s arms.
Naturally, it was the heaviest one.
“Take this. There are jars inside.”
“Of course there are,” Nina said. “What would life be without jars?”
At home, Nina pointed toward the sofa in the back room.
“There. Blanket in the cabinet, pillow on top.”
Larisa Petrovna immediately laid her suitcase flat, unzipped it, and looked around with businesslike interest.
“Where should I put my things? Is this wardrobe empty? I’ll hang my robes here and put my underwear in the dresser.”
Nina walked over, carefully closed the suitcase, and zipped it shut again.
“One night,” she repeated. “Tomorrow morning, out the door. Your clothes can survive one night in a suitcase. They’re experienced travelers.”
“You’re heartless,” Larisa Petrovna said, offended.
Nina went to make salad.
Behind her, Larisa Petrovna rustled around triumphantly and hummed to herself. It was obvious that, in her mind, everything was going according to plan.
By half past six, dinner was ready: baked fish, vegetables, warm bread, strawberries in a glass bowl, and a bottle of wine.
Larisa Petrovna came out, inspected the table, and immediately sat at the head of it.
“Serve me,” she said.
“This isn’t for you,” Nina replied evenly. “It’s for my guests.”
“And what am I?”
“You are overnight accommodation. Temporary arrangement.”
The doorbell rang.
Nina rushed to open it, and the hallway immediately erupted into what the neighbors probably mistook for a fire alarm.
The two sisters squealed, hugged, shook each other by the shoulders, and spoke at the same time.
“You cut your hair!” Darya shouted.
“And you’re tanned! Give me that bag! God, what’s in here, bricks?”
“Gifts! My husband packed an entire box for me. I gave half of it to the train attendant.”
At the table, Larisa Petrovna pursed her lips.
“Hello,” Darya said politely when she noticed her. “And you are…?”
“A guest for one night,” Nina introduced her. “This is Larisa Petrovna.”
Darya needed exactly one second to understand everything.
She simply nodded and sat down.
Nina gave her sister the best piece of fish, poured her wine, and pushed the strawberries closer.
Then she took a plate for her former mother-in-law, added enough fish and salad to remain a decent human being, and handed it over.
She did not pour wine.
“And me?” Larisa Petrovna nodded toward the bottle.
“Water for you. You always said you have high blood pressure. I’m protecting your health.”
The woman ate quickly, stood up, and went back to the sofa.
Ten minutes later, steady snoring came from the room.
“You seriously let her stay?” Darya whispered.
“For one night. She looked like someone who had been thrown out of her own home. I can’t walk past that. But I’m not turning into a charity foundation either.”
“Ninochka, by tomorrow she’ll have roots growing through the floorboards.”
“She won’t have time. I’m faster.”
Darya narrowed her eyes mischievously.
“Speaking of tomorrow—we’re going to the lake. I already called Ksyusha. We’ll have a car at ten, Igor’s driving. Swimsuit, blanket, thermos. We’re staying all day.”
“At ten,” Nina repeated with a smile. “Perfect.”
The next morning, the apartment looked as though not one woman but an entire delegation had spent the night there.
Robes hung over the back of an armchair. Slippers sat beside the radiator. Sweaters were stacked neatly on the windowsill. Jars lined the wall in military formation.
The suitcase stood open and empty like a gaping mouth.
Nina looked at everything in silence.
Then she went to the kitchen and made breakfast: omelets, sandwiches, coffee.
“Larisa Petrovna! Breakfast!”
The woman came out looking pleased, sat down, ate without hurry, and even commented that the sofa was too soft and really ought to be replaced.
Nina listened, nodded, and checked the time.
When Larisa Petrovna returned to the room, she froze in the doorway and made a sound like a rusty hinge.
“Where?! Where are my things?!”
“In the car,” Nina called from the hallway. “Igor, my friend’s husband, kindly agreed to drive you home. Everything is packed. Nothing is wrinkled. The jars are in a box. I checked personally.”
“What car?! You… what do you think you’re doing?!”
“I’m allowing myself to live in my own apartment according to my own rules. Revolutionary idea, I know.”
“I don’t have a home!” the woman shouted, her voice cracking. “I don’t! Do you hear me?”
“Then you need to solve that problem even more urgently. Get dressed and head out.”
“How dare you—”
The doorbell rang.
Nina opened it.
Anton stood on the landing, looking pleased and slightly out of breath.
Two enormous travel bags sat at his feet.
He still had no idea that his mother was being told to put her shoes on.
“Here,” he said cheerfully, dragging one bag toward the doorway. “This is the rest of her stuff. Don’t worry, I’ll bring some more later—”
Nina was not worried.
She drove her knee sharply between his legs.
Anton folded in half, dropped to the floor, and made a sound Nina had never heard from him in nine years of marriage.
She calmly stepped back into the apartment.
“Larisa Petrovna, your son is out there. Rolling around on the floor.”
The woman rushed into the hallway and out onto the landing.
The door closed softly behind her.
Click.
The lock turned.
Silence.
Then fists pounded against the door.
“Open up! Open this door right now! You tricked me out here! You—”
“Mom…” Anton groaned from the floor.
“Be quiet! And you, open the door! My things! My suitcase!”
Five minutes later, the door opened.
Nina stepped out with a backpack over one shoulder. Darya followed carrying a blanket.
Nina locked the door and turned toward Anton, who was now sitting on the stairs.
“Listen carefully, ex-husband. If you so much as touch my lock, I’ll report you for attempted unlawful entry. That happens to be a criminal matter, and you might celebrate your birthday in very interesting surroundings.”
“You’ve completely lost your mind.”
“No. I simply stopped being convenient. Some people find that more shocking than divorce.”
“And what am I supposed to do?!” Larisa Petrovna wailed. “Where am I supposed to go?”
Nina stopped on the landing and looked at her almost kindly.
“There’s your son. Alive, healthy, slightly bruised. Make a decision. Either you finally stand up for yourself and throw his woman out of your apartment, or you throw both of them out. The third option called ‘I’ll stay with Nina’ no longer exists. It’s been discontinued.”
Then she walked downstairs without waiting for an answer.
Larisa Petrovna slowly turned toward her son and stared down at him for a long, heavy moment.
“Mom, what are you—”
The slap rang through the stairwell so loudly that a dog started barking somewhere on the floor above.
“Get out,” she said. “Take your woman and get out of my apartment. Today. Do you hear me? Today.”
Anton sat on the steps touching his split lip. Blood had started running from his nose, so he tilted his head back and pressed his sleeve against his face.
“This is all her fault,” he muttered toward the ceiling. “She couldn’t even let my mother stay. She has three rooms! Three! You only have two! What would it cost her?”
Larisa Petrovna didn’t answer.
She was already heading down the stairs with the determination of a woman marching off to reclaim what was hers.
Under her breath, she muttered to herself.
“Why on earth should I leave my own apartment? It’s mine. Mine. She can go back wherever she came from.”
At that moment, she wasn’t thinking about her son at all.
She was thinking a great deal about her former daughter-in-law, and none of those thoughts were kind.
But Nina couldn’t have cared less.
By then, she was already loading the blanket into the trunk while Ksyusha argued with Igor about the best place to sit by the water.
By evening, Anton and Violetta had rented a one-room apartment.
The building was new, the neighbors were noisy, and the sofa fought back every time they tried to unfold it.
“Spineless!” Violetta shouted, throwing her bag onto the floor. “You’re pathetic! You couldn’t deal with your own mother? You couldn’t make your ex-wife listen to you? Her three-room apartment is practically empty while we’re crammed in here!”
“She doesn’t owe us anything…”
“She does! She took everything from you! Everything! And now you’re sitting there with a split lip, blinking like an idiot! Are you a man or a piece of furniture?”
“Violetta…”
“Shut up! I hate when you use that voice.”
She went into the bathroom and turned on the water.
Anton sat still for exactly four seconds.
Then he stood, grabbed both his bags, quietly walked out, and closed the door behind him.
Outside, his phone vibrated.
Her name.
He blocked Violetta’s number while he was still walking.
A year ago, she had been completely different. She had laughed, called him “my darling,” and brought him pastries.
Now she was like a wasp trapped in a jar.
And then an idea crept into his mind.
What if he tried Nina?
She was forgiving.
She was always forgiving.
Maybe she would—
His phone vibrated again.
A message.
Happy birthday. Live your life—but without me.
Anton stopped in the middle of the sidewalk.
Today.
He was thirty-six today.
His mother hadn’t remembered.
Violetta hadn’t remembered.
No one had remembered except the woman whose door he himself had walked out of three months ago with his head held high.
He stood there with two bags and nowhere to go except back to his mother’s two-room apartment—the same mother who had split his lip that morning.
Would she let him in?
That remained to be seen.
But he had to try.
There was nothing else left to try.
Meanwhile, at the lake, Darya was shouting that the water was freezing, Ksyusha was squealing while wading in anyway, Igor was taking pictures, and Nina stood knee-deep in the water, laughing more freely than she had in a very long time.