The voice of Nina’s sister-in-law rang out so loudly and sharply that Nina’s hand jerked, and she accidentally deleted an entire row of mature trees from the landscape plan. A blank green patch suddenly appeared on the laptop screen.
Nina sighed heavily, pressed the shortcut to undo the mistake, and slowly turned toward the person who had interrupted her.
Lera, her husband’s younger sister, stood in the doorway of the spacious open-plan kitchen and living room. She was wearing a silk robe she had shamelessly borrowed from Nina’s wardrobe three days earlier. Her hair was twisted into a messy knot on top of her head, and her expression showed genuine outrage at the idea that the hostess of the house—apparently regarded as unpaid staff—had dared to focus on something other than serving her guests.
“Lera, there’s yogurt, cottage cheese, cereal, and milk in the refrigerator,” Nina replied calmly, fighting to keep her irritation under control. “The boys are eight years old. They’re perfectly capable of pouring themselves some cereal. I have to send a design draft to a client in an hour. I can’t stand at the stove right now.”
 
“Yogurt is not proper food for growing children!” Lera protested as she walked over to the coffee machine.
She pressed the button, but the machine responded with a pitiful beep, indicating that the grounds container needed to be emptied.
Lera clicked her tongue in annoyance and folded her arms.
“Well, wonderful. There isn’t even any coffee. Nina, we’re guests. You could show a little hospitality. We came here to relax and get some fresh air, but you act as though we’re a burden.”
Nina closed her eyes and silently counted to ten.
She worked as a landscape designer and ran a small studio of her own. Her profession demanded intense concentration, constant communication with nurseries and suppliers, detailed budgeting, and a strong sense of spatial planning.
It was partly thanks to Nina’s income, together with her husband Pavel’s good salary, that they had been able to build this beautiful country house with panoramic windows, a wide terrace, and a large plot of land that Nina had transformed into a genuine work of landscape art.
Pavel’s relatives—his mother Zinaida Petrovna, his sister Lera, Lera’s husband Vadim, and their two hyperactive twin boys—had arrived the previous Friday.
“Just for the weekend,” his mother had chirped over the phone. “We’ll grill some meat, use the sauna, and then head home.”
Today was the eighth day of their supposedly short visit.
For Nina, those eight days had turned into a small version of hell.
The weekend had quietly become the workweek, but no one showed the slightest intention of leaving.
Vadim, Lera’s husband, wandered around the property from morning until night in stretched-out sweatpants, regularly opening cans of beer that Nina had been expected to buy by the case.
Zinaida Petrovna spent her days criticizing everything about the house, from the color of the curtains to Nina’s choice of plants.
“Why did you plant those ridiculous thuja bushes instead of normal potatoes?” she had complained.
The twins raced across Nina’s carefully maintained lawn, tore unopened buds from rare rose bushes, and had already scratched the oak flooring in the living room with their remote-controlled cars.
Pavel, Nina’s husband, was gentle by nature and deeply attached to his family. He constantly tried to smooth things over.
He worked as a technical director for a large IT company and was currently working remotely as well. From morning until late evening, he hid in his office on the second floor, escaping the twins’ shouting under the excuse of important video conferences.
Nina understood perfectly well that Pavel was avoiding confrontation and hoping his relatives would eventually decide to leave on their own.
“Lera, you just need to empty the coffee grounds into the trash, rinse the container, and put it back,” Nina said, turning once more to the drawing of a complicated terraced flower bed. “It takes one minute.”
 
“I had my nails done yesterday,” Lera snorted, admiring her long manicure. “You could have cleaned it yourself. You are the hostess, after all. Fine, I’ll drink a tea bag instead. Oh, and Vadik said you should buy some decent meat for tonight. Those sausages you bought yesterday were too dry. And pick up some dark beer when you go shopping.”
Nina looked away from the monitor and stared at her sister-in-law.
“Lera, I am not going to the store today. I have a project deadline. The refrigerator is full of food. If Vadim wants beer, he can get into his own car and drive to the supermarket. He can buy the meat while he’s there.”
Lera rolled her eyes as though speaking to Nina required heroic patience.
“Nina, why are you making such a big deal out of this? You own your own company. You have money. Vadik is still trying to figure out what he wants to do with his life, you know that. We’re going through a temporary financial rough patch. Like they said in that old movie, don’t tell me how to live—help me financially instead! We’re family. We’re supposed to support each other.”
That speech about “temporary difficulties” had been going on for five years.
Vadim was always searching for his true calling. First he had tried opening a tire repair business. Then he began reselling cheap imported sneakers. Later he invested money in questionable cryptocurrency schemes.
Lera worked as an eyebrow technician, but she accepted clients only a couple of times a week, claiming that she suffered from constant exhaustion.
Nina and Pavel regularly helped them financially—school supplies for the children, washing machine repairs, installments on yet another one of Vadim’s loans.
Nina said nothing and saved her project.
Arguing with Lera was pointless. It only drained energy she could use elsewhere.
 
She decided to finish the estimate and then go outside to inspect the new hydrangeas. Among her plants, she could always recover some sense of peace.
Two hours later, after successfully sending the documents to her client, Nina put on gardening gloves, grabbed her pruning shears, and stepped outside.
The day promised to be hot.
She walked around the house toward the flower bed at the far end of the garden, directly beneath the first-floor guest bedroom window.
The window had been left slightly open for ventilation, and voices drifted outside.
Nina had no intention of eavesdropping. She simply crouched beside the flower bed to trim several dried blossoms when she heard her husband’s name.
“Pasha is never going to throw us out,” Vadim said confidently. “He’s too soft. Just tell him the kids need fresh air until the end of summer and he’ll give in.”
Nina froze. Her hand holding the pruning shears stopped in midair.
“Of course he won’t throw us out,” Zinaida Petrovna agreed. “It’s his house. A son has every right to let his own mother stay. And that fancy wife of his can keep playing around with her little bushes and earning money. Her cooking isn’t anything special, if you ask me. Everything has to be so pretentious. But I suppose it’s tolerable.”
“Mom, I checked the account balance this morning,” Lera said cheerfully. “The tenants transferred the deposit and the August rent. Forty-five thousand rubles! And they paid July in cash before we left. If we stay here until October with all expenses covered, we should save enough to get Vadik a decent car before winter. His old wreck is falling apart.”
“Exactly. Renting out your two-bedroom apartment was the smart thing to do,” Vadim added approvingly. “Why leave it empty? Here we’ve got nature, barbecues, a sauna. We don’t even have to go grocery shopping. Our dear Nina has plenty of money and always brings back a trunk full of fancy food. Just don’t let Pasha find out we rented the apartment. He might start making a fuss. We’ll tell him they’re replacing the pipes in the whole building and it’s impossible to live there.”
Nina slowly lowered the pruning shears to the ground.
Something inside her seemed to snap—a string that had been stretched tighter and tighter for years.
Suddenly, she saw the entire situation with painful clarity.
 
They were not merely taking advantage of her kindness.
They were openly laughing at her.
They had rented out their city apartment to earn passive income and moved into the house Nina had helped create, expecting to live entirely at her expense.
For eight days, she had cooked for six people, cleaned up their messes, tolerated insults, and watched them dismiss the value of her work, all while they planned to buy a new car with the money they saved by letting her pay for everything.
Nina pulled off her gardening gloves and dropped them onto the grass.
Then she walked straight back toward the terrace.
She entered the house, went upstairs, and headed directly to the bedroom she shared with Pavel.
She took a small travel bag from the wardrobe and began packing methodically: jeans, T-shirts, underwear, cosmetics, a phone charger.
Her movements were quick and precise.
There were no tears.
No dramatic outburst.
Only cold, clear thinking and the absolute certainty that she would not tolerate this one minute longer.
Then she opened her banking app.
 
She pulled up a statement of everything she had spent over the past eight days: supermarkets, the local market, medicine for Lera’s children, and the hardware store where she had been forced to buy replacement parts for the lawn mower after Vadim decided to drive it like a racing vehicle and crashed it into a brick wall.
The total was staggering.
Seventy-two thousand rubles.
In one week.
Nina picked up the travel bag, grabbed the heavy set of house and gate keys from the table, and went downstairs.
The entire group had gathered in the living room.
Lera was eating a sandwich made with Brie cheese. Vadim was lazily flipping through channels on the enormous television. Zinaida Petrovna was working on a crossword puzzle.
Pavel had also come downstairs to get some water and was standing by the breakfast bar, rubbing his tired eyes.
The moment Nina entered with a travel bag in her hand, the room went silent.
She walked over to the large solid-oak dining table and dropped the keys onto it.
The metallic clang made Zinaida Petrovna flinch.
“Nina? Are you going somewhere?” Pavel asked, approaching his wife. “Do you have a meeting at one of your sites?”
“I’m going back to our apartment in the city,” Nina replied in an even, emotionless voice. “I need to work. I need to sleep properly. And I need to live somewhere clean.”
“Oh, good riddance,” Lera scoffed without even stopping her chewing. “We’ll manage perfectly well without you. Pasha can cook us some pasta.”
Nina turned toward her sister-in-law and gave her such a cold look that Lera nearly choked on her sandwich.
“No, Lera. You won’t manage,” Nina said loudly enough for everyone to hear. “Because you’re going upstairs right now, packing your things, and leaving this house within one hour.”
A heavy silence settled over the living room.
Vadim lowered the remote control.
Zinaida Petrovna put down her pen.
Pavel frowned, clearly unable to understand what had happened.
“Nina, what’s going on?” he asked cautiously. “Did they do something to upset you?”
 
“Upset me?” Nina gave a humorless laugh.
She took out her phone and opened the bank statement.
“Pasha, in eight days of your wonderful family’s visit, I have spent seventy-two thousand rubles on food and household expenses. Your brother-in-law wrecked our new lawn mower. Your nephews destroyed a rare hydrangea and scratched the parquet flooring. But those are minor details compared with the best part.”
“What best part?” Pavel asked, his voice tightening.
“Nina, don’t you dare start making things up!” Lera suddenly shrieked, her face turning red. She jumped up from the sofa. “Pasha, she’s trying to get rid of us! She has always hated us!”
“The most interesting part, Pasha,” Nina continued calmly, looking directly into her husband’s eyes, “is that your sister and her unemployed husband rented out their apartment. They took payment for July and August and came here to live with us. At my expense. They are planning to stay until October so they can save enough money to buy Vadim another car. I just heard the whole conversation through the open window.”
Pavel’s face slowly changed.
Confusion disappeared first.
Then came disbelief.
Finally, cold anger.
He turned toward his mother.
“Mom. Is that true? Did they rent out their apartment?”
Zinaida Petrovna immediately clutched her chest and began breathing dramatically.
“Pashenka, sweetheart… How can you believe that… that woman? She’s lying! She just wants to turn us against each other! My heart… Vadik, give me some heart medicine!”
“There’s no need for medicine, Zinaida Petrovna,” Nina said, crossing her arms. “You know perfectly well I’m telling the truth. I heard you say Pavel was too soft to throw his mother out, and that I would keep feeding all of you because I have plenty of money.”
“Who the hell are you to count my money?” Vadim shouted, stepping toward Nina. “We’re family! We have every right to visit her brother! And you’re nobody here—just some hanger-on obsessed with her bushes!”
 
Pavel was beside Vadim before anyone had time to react.
He had never been a fighter, but years of handling heavy server equipment early in his career had left him with a strong grip.
He grabbed Vadim by the front of his shirt and shoved him backward onto the sofa.
“Shut your mouth,” Pavel said in a low, frightening voice.
Vadim sank into the cushions.
“You are standing in my wife’s home. A house she helped design and a house we both worked to pay for while you were running around taking out loans.”
Pavel turned toward his sister and mother.
His hands were trembling from anger.
Nina had never seen him like this before.
Normally calm, reasonable, and desperate to avoid arguments, he now looked like a man who had just realized that the people closest to him had betrayed him.
“Here’s what’s going to happen,” Pavel said, his voice stretched tight with rage. “It is eleven-thirty. At exactly twelve-thirty, none of you will still be on my property.”
“Son!” Zinaida Petrovna wailed when she realized her pretend heart attack was not working. “Where are we supposed to go? The apartment is rented! There are people living there! The children have a routine!”
“Book a hotel, a hostel, or a short-term rental with the money you got from your tenants!” Pavel snapped. “I do not care. You lied straight to my face. You ate at my wife’s expense, insulted her inside her own home, and treated me like an idiot.”
“Pasha, you can’t do this to us!” Lera sobbed, smearing the remains of yesterday’s makeup across her cheeks. “We’re your family! How are you going to live with yourself after this?”
“Very comfortably, Lera. Quietly, too. Your hour has already started. If you are still here when it is over, I will call the community security service and have you escorted out.”
Pavel walked over to the table, picked up the keys Nina had dropped there, and held them out to her.
“Take your bag back upstairs, Nina. You’re not going anywhere. This is your home.”
Nina looked at her husband and felt a lump rise in her throat.
She had expected anything but this.
She had imagined he might beg her to stay. She thought he might try to compromise or offer to pay for another place for his relatives.
Instead, he stood firmly beside her without hesitation.
 
Like a wall.
Nina accepted the keys, gently touched Pavel’s hand, and silently went upstairs.
The next hour was complete chaos.
From below came Lera’s shouting, Vadim’s swearing as he struggled to force their bulging bags into the trunk of his old car, and Zinaida Petrovna’s endless complaints about the day her son had married “that poisonous snake.”
Pavel supervised the packing while standing on the porch with his arms folded.
He did not allow them to take a single item of food Nina had bought.
He even made them remove an opened stick of expensive smoked sausage from one of their bags.
At last, Vadim’s rusty sedan rolled through the gates, coughing smoke from its exhaust.
Pavel pressed the remote.
The gate slowly closed behind them.
He went inside, locked the front door twice, walked into the living room, and collapsed onto the sofa.
Then he covered his face with both hands.
Nina came downstairs.
She sat beside him, wrapped an arm around his shoulders, and rested her cheek against his unshaven face.
“I’m sorry,” Pavel said quietly without lowering his hands. “God, I’m so ashamed. I saw everything. I saw how they treated you. I saw how exhausted you were. And I still kept hoping it would somehow resolve itself. I ignored their behavior because I didn’t want a fight. If you hadn’t overheard them today, we probably would have put up with them until winter.”
“It’s over now, Pasha,” Nina answered gently, stroking his hair. “What matters is that you understand it now.”
“Never again,” he said firmly, lowering his hands.
There was certainty in his eyes now.
 
“No more loans. No more overnight stays. No more ‘but we’re family.’ You are my family.”
Three months passed.
September arrived, painting Nina’s garden in shades of crimson and gold.
The air was cool and transparent, carrying the scent of fallen leaves and distant smoke.
Nina sat on the terrace wrapped in a soft blanket, sipping hot thyme tea and admiring her peaceful garden.
A great deal had changed.
Lera and Vadim had indeed rented a cheap apartment on the outskirts of the city and quickly spent the money they had collected from their tenants.
Zinaida Petrovna tried to pressure Pavel through other relatives, calling distant aunts and telling dramatic stories about how Nina had somehow bewitched her son and thrown his poor mother into the street.
But Pavel had become unexpectedly firm.
He blocked Lera and Vadim’s numbers.
He spoke to his mother only once more, making his boundaries perfectly clear: he was willing to stay in contact with her, but the moment she asked for money again or insulted Nina, their relationship would end completely.
The financial support stopped.
Permanently.
 
Vadim eventually had to take a job as a warehouse loader.
Lera, deeply unhappy about it, started working full-time at a beauty salon.
Nina took another sip of tea and smiled.
She felt lighter than she had in years.
The foolish guilt she had always carried because she earned more money and lived better than some of Pavel’s relatives had completely disappeared.
She had finally understood something important.
You should help people who are genuinely in trouble.
You should not endlessly rescue people who have simply made themselves comfortable on your shoulders and decided they never want to climb down.
The front door opened.
 
A moment later, Pavel stepped onto the terrace carrying a tray with two plates. Warm steam curled above them.
“I made syrniki,” he announced proudly as he set the tray down. “I found the recipe online. I’m not sure they’re anywhere near as good as yours, but I really tried.”
Nina laughed as she looked at the slightly burned but wonderfully tempting cottage-cheese pancakes.
“Thank you, sweetheart. These are the best syrniki in the world.”
They sat together, eating a late breakfast and watching the autumn wind play with the yellow leaves scattered across the perfectly green lawn.
No children were trampling it now.
No relatives were criticizing the house.
No one was treating their kindness as an unlimited resource.
The house belonged to the two of them again.
And for the first time in a long while, its walls were filled with real, undisturbed happiness.