Faina Leonidovna stood motionless in the middle of the living room, her hands folded over her stomach. As usual, she was wearing a mustard-colored knitted vest, and a necklace of large amber beads hung around her neck. Whenever she moved, the beads clicked softly against one another.
Three enormous black construction bags, each with a capacity of one hundred and twenty liters, were piled beside her feet.
Maya froze in the doorway.
She had just returned from a shift at the printing house. The faint smell of solvent and fresh ink still clung to her hair, while a stubborn blue stain marked her index finger after she had spent part of the day struggling with a faulty cartridge. After eight hours of working with almost no opportunity to sit down, her back ached badly.
“Good evening, Faina Leonidovna,” Maya said, slipping her hands into the pockets of her jacket. “Would you mind explaining the construction bags? They seem a little too large for ordinary household trash.”
 
“Because these bags are stronger,” her mother-in-law replied dryly. “I prefer to do things properly. Your belongings have already been packed. I even sorted them by season. Winter clothes are in the bag on the left, summer clothes in the one on the right. I put your shoes into separate shopping bags so they wouldn’t dirty anything.”
Maya slowly turned her gaze toward the room.
Eduard was sitting at the computer desk in front of the flickering monitor. He was wearing his favorite velvet jacket, which he somehow managed to wear even at home. According to him, dressing that way helped him enter the right creative state of mind.
At that moment, however, the creative genius was doing his best to pretend that the situation had nothing to do with him. He clicked the mouse rapidly and stared intently at an almost empty program window.
“Edik?” Maya called. “Perhaps you’d like to explain what’s going on.”
Eduard visibly flinched.
His fingers stopped moving the mouse. Several seconds passed before he reluctantly turned his chair around, carefully avoiding his wife’s eyes.
“Maya, you understand perfectly well,” he drawled, rubbing the bridge of his nose. “Our relationship hasn’t been healthy for a long time. You’re always putting pressure on me. I need emotional energy to grow and develop, but you keep dragging me down with all these domestic complaints. Living with you has left me completely burned out.”
 
“Burned out?” Maya tilted her head slightly.
Images from the previous eighteen months immediately flashed through her mind.
Eduard usually woke up around noon. He ordered prepared meals for delivery and paid for them with Maya’s salary card. Then he sat down at his computer and spent hours searching for suitable reference pictures and inspiration for the 3D models he planned to create someday.
In a year and a half, he had not completed a single project well enough to sell it.
There was always a new excuse. Sometimes a client supposedly had no understanding of art. Sometimes the software he needed suddenly malfunctioned. At other times, his inspiration simply vanished.
“Exactly,” Faina Leonidovna immediately added, stepping forward as though she intended to physically shield her son from his wife. “The poor boy has been driven to complete exhaustion. You’ve subjected him to constant stress. A man needs a woman who can provide a stable and supportive home. But you spend your entire day hanging around those machines of yours. You come back irritable and worn out, reeking of chemicals. What good are you to a family? You provide neither a comfortable home nor proper emotional support.”
 
“All right. Let’s make this perfectly clear,” Maya said calmly. “You want to end our relationship, and you, Eduard, are the one making that decision. Is that correct?”
“Well, yes,” her husband muttered, turning back toward the monitor. “Mom is right. It would be better for us to separate. But let’s do it without hysterics or scandals, like reasonable adults. You take your belongings and leave. I’m even willing to let you keep the multicooker we bought for our anniversary.”
“How incredibly generous of you,” Maya replied with a smirk.
Faina Leonidovna adjusted her amber necklace with a familiar gesture.
“And I’ll be living here from now on,” she announced as if reading out the final decision of an official committee. “Edik needs proper meals and a peaceful atmosphere so he can concentrate on his work. I’ll rent out my apartment in the region, move in here permanently, and take responsibility for the household. So let’s not drag this out. Leave your keys on the cabinet and go.”
Maya said nothing.
She looked from her husband, who stubbornly refused to meet her eyes, to her mother-in-law, who behaved as though her decision were the only possible solution and could not be questioned.
Maya did not even have time to feel hurt. Her resentment was almost immediately replaced by a cold, practical calm—the same state of mind she entered whenever she double-checked a design before sending it to print.
A mistake at work could cost money. A mistake in one’s personal life could cost much more.
 
“So the apartment stays with Eduard,” Maya said, not as a question but as a summary of what she had heard.
“You’re presenting the situation entirely incorrectly,” Faina Leonidovna said with a condescending smile. “The apartment isn’t simply staying with Edik. He is the one who pays for it. My son works practically around the clock and earns very good money, while you’ve been living here at his expense. I know perfectly well what people earn at your printing house. Pennies. You probably barely make enough to cover your transportation costs.”
Maya raised her eyebrows slightly and looked at her husband.
Eduard suddenly started coughing and attacked his keyboard with extraordinary enthusiasm, although the screen in front of him still showed nothing but an empty desktop.
That was all Maya needed to understand the truth.
For years, her beloved mama’s boy had apparently been feeding his mother impressive stories about his enormous fees. He had probably invented prestigious clients, major projects, and substantial bank transfers so that the woman who worshipped him would never discover that he had been living entirely at his wife’s expense.
Faina Leonidovna genuinely believed that her talented son supported his ungrateful spouse.
“Fine. Let’s get to the point,” Maya said as she slowly unfastened her jacket. “You want me to leave immediately.”
“That’s correct,” her mother-in-law confirmed. “I’ve already ordered a car to take you to the railway station. It should arrive in about fifteen minutes. The license plate number will be sent to my phone. I’ve taken care of everything.”
 
“Wonderful.”
Maya walked past Faina Leonidovna and entered the kitchen.
She opened the upper cabinet, removed the coffee machine she had bought with last year’s bonus, and carefully placed it on the table. Then she went to the windowsill and picked up the microwave.
“What do you think you’re doing?” Faina Leonidovna demanded.
“I’m taking the things that belong to me,” Maya explained calmly. “You’ve already been considerate enough to sort my clothes into bags. Now it’s time for the household appliances.”
She returned to the room where Eduard’s computer desk stood.
Beside the system unit was a large black router with four antennas and blinking green lights. Six months earlier, Eduard had created an enormous drama because he insisted that he needed gigabit internet to transfer huge files and produce complicated renders.
Maya had paid for both the equipment and the expensive internet plan with her own salary card.
Without saying a word, she reached for the socket and pulled out the plug.
The green lights immediately went dark.
“Hey! What are you doing?” Eduard shrieked, almost jumping out of his chair. “The internet is gone!”
 
Maya calmly disconnected the provider’s cable, coiled the power cord, and placed the heavy router inside her work backpack.
“It belongs to me,” she said briefly. “I bought it with my money, and I still have the electronic receipts.”
“Maya! Put it back immediately!” Eduard’s face became covered in red blotches. “I can’t work without it! How am I supposed to send files to my client? I have deadlines!”
“Use your phone as a hotspot,” his wife suggested. “Just remember to pay your phone bill first. I deliberately didn’t top up your balance yesterday, exactly as you requested. I’m sure you’ll manage on your own.”
Faina Leonidovna drew in a sharp breath.
“How incredibly petty!” she hissed. “Taking the internet away from a working man! Edik, don’t worry. I’ll buy you another router tomorrow—one that’s even better than this.”
“Mom, you don’t understand! It’s complicated to configure!” Eduard whined, clutching his head. “I have a dedicated IP address! Now I’ll have to call a technician from the provider!”
“You’ll survive for one day,” Faina Leonidovna snapped before turning back to Maya. “Is that all? Is your little performance finally over? Have you collected all your worthless trinkets? Then leave the keys on the cabinet and get out of the apartment.”
 
Maya took the key ring from her pocket.
Without any ceremony, she placed it on the wooden cabinet. The keys struck the surface with a dull metallic sound.
“As you wish,” she said calmly.
Maya put on her backpack and dragged the three heavy construction bags into the hallway one by one. The car had already arrived. With the help of the silent driver, she loaded everything into the trunk.
The cold autumn wind stung her face.
Maya settled into the back seat and gave the driver her mother’s address, but asked him to wait before leaving.
She took out her phone, scrolled through her contacts, and found the landlord’s number.
“Good evening, Valery,” Maya said when he answered. “This is Maya—the tenant from Parkovaya Street. I’m sorry for calling so late.”
A calm male voice responded.
 
“My circumstances have changed unexpectedly,” she continued in the same steady tone. “I want to terminate the rental agreement as of today. Yes, I remember the terms. You don’t need to return the final month’s deposit. You can keep it as compensation for the sudden termination.”
Valery asked something in surprise.
A year and a half earlier, he had hesitated for a long time before agreeing to rent the apartment to the couple. Maya had been required to bring a certificate from the printing house and show him a bank statement proving that she could make the payments regularly.
The rental contract had strict terms and had been signed exclusively in Maya’s name.
Eduard’s name did not appear anywhere in the document.
“Yes, I’ve already moved out,” she said, gazing through the tinted window. “The keys are on the cabinet in the hallway. But there is one additional detail, Valery. There are currently two unauthorized occupants inside the apartment.”
Maya paused briefly.
“My former husband and his mother are still there. However, the lease was signed only by me, and every payment for the past eighteen months came from my bank card. From this moment onward, I accept no financial responsibility for the apartment. You can discuss the matter directly with them. If they want to sign a new lease, that is entirely up to you. Goodbye.”
She ended the call.
For a moment, Maya imagined Faina Leonidovna confidently arranging her belongings on the newly emptied shelves. She pictured Eduard anxiously struggling with his phone, trying to share its internet connection so he could at least watch another collection of funny videos before going to bed.
Maya nodded to the driver.
The car pulled away smoothly.
For the first time in years, she no longer had to carry that unbearable burden on her shoulders. She would never again have to listen to Faina Leonidovna’s lectures about proper family life. She would no longer be forced to finance the endless creative journey of a grown man who had spent years trying—and failing—to “find himself.”
About two weeks later, mutual acquaintances happily told Maya how the story had ended.
Valery arrived at the apartment the very next day.
He was a practical man who disliked wasting time on pointless conversations. Once he learned that the responsible tenant who had always paid on time had moved out, he offered Eduard the chance to sign a new lease in his own name.
 
There was only one condition: Eduard had to pay two months’ rent in advance and provide an additional security deposit.
According to the witnesses, the resulting scandal was spectacular.
Faina Leonidovna loudly insisted that the apartment belonged to her son and that he had been the one paying for it all along.
Valery did not bother arguing with her.
He simply produced a copy of the rental agreement, which displayed Maya’s name, and reminded them whose bank card had been used for every payment during the previous eighteen months.
In front of the landlord, Eduard was forced to confess to his mother that he had not contributed a single penny toward the rent.
 
Naturally, neither he nor Faina Leonidovna had enough money to meet Valery’s conditions. His mother had not even listed her apartment in the region for rent yet, while the brilliant 3D specialist had no savings whatsoever.
They were given twenty-four hours to pack their belongings and leave.
But according to their acquaintances, the most amusing part was what happened next.
Eduard and his mother had nowhere to put their possessions. There were no suitcases left in the apartment, and they could not find any suitable cardboard boxes.
As a result, they had to visit the nearest hardware store and purchase several enormous, heavy-duty black construction bags, each with a capacity of one hundred and twenty liters.
They were exactly like the bags Faina Leonidovna had so carefully used to pack Maya’s belongings only a short time earlier.