“This is my apartment, Valentina Petrovna! Mine! And I’m the one who decides who lives here and who doesn’t!” Oksana’s voice trembled with anger, but she sounded determined.
Her mother-in-law lifted her eyes from the kitchen table, where she was sorting buckwheat, and stared at Oksana in surprise. In twenty-three years of living together, Oksana had never once raised her voice at her.
“Oksanka, are you feeling alright? Since when is this your apartment? Andryusha is my son, I’m his mother, so the apartment is half mine too!” Valentina Petrovna stood up, wiping her hands on her apron. “And tell me, where am I supposed to go? Out on the street?”
“Why should I care!” Oksana shouted back, suddenly startled by her own bravery. “I’ve put up with this for twenty-three years! For twenty-three years you’ve been giving orders in my home! I won’t stand it any longer!”
Valentina Petrovna was taken aback. She was used to her daughter-in-law being silent, nodding her head, and following every command. Quiet, meek, convenient. Even Andryusha sometimes complained to his mother that his wife was absolutely spineless, with no opinions or will of her own.
“You’ve lost your mind!” the elderly woman snapped. “I taught you everything, you silly girl! How to cook, run a household, raise kids! And this is how you talk to me now!”
“Taught me?” Oksana laughed bitterly. “You humiliated me every single day! ‘Oksanka, your borscht is too salty!’, ‘Oksanka, you ironed that shirt badly!’, ‘Oksanka, you’re talking to the kids wrong!’ And I stayed silent, thinking maybe I really didn’t know how to do anything…”
The two women stood facing each other in the cramped kitchen of their Khrushchyovka apartment. Oksana, forty years old, thin, with tired eyes and graying temples. Valentina Petrovna, seventy-two, heavyset, with an authoritative face and stern gaze.
“You really didn’t know how to do anything!” her mother-in-law persisted. “From the village, uneducated! My Andryusha could have married a real beauty, but he chose you!”
Oksana had heard these words a thousand times before. In the past, they hurt her, making her feel worthless. But today, something inside her had snapped.
“You know what, Valentina Petrovna? That’s enough!” She straightened up, as if throwing off an invisible weight from her shoulders. “Yes, I’m from the village. Yes, my only education is high school. But I’ve worked my fingers to the bone for your precious son for twenty-three years! I work from dawn till dusk, run this household, raise the kids, and all he does is come home from work, then sit on the couch and turn on the TV!”
“A man needs to rest!” Valentina Petrovna chirped indignantly. “He provides for the family!”
“Provides?” Oksana slapped her hand on the table. “And who’s the one working as a cleaner at the hospital? Who washes the neighbors’ laundry on weekends just to earn enough for the kids’ clothes? Me! Your precious son can’t even buy groceries properly on his salary!”
Valentina Petrovna blinked in confusion. She was not used to her daughter-in-law pushing back like this. Normally, Oksana would listen to all the criticism in silence, at most quietly whimper and slip off to the bathroom to cry.
“What’s this, Oksanka, are you rebelling now?” her mother-in-law’s tone softened, sounding almost conciliatory. “We’re a family, why are we fighting?”
The daughter-in-law finally spoke up for herself
“Family!” Oksana scoffed bitterly. “What kind of family? You and your son decide everything without me! You even picked out the wallpaper in the bedroom without asking me! ‘Oksanka, be quiet, no one’s asking you!’ Do you remember that?”
The door slammed, and heavy footsteps echoed in the hallway. Andrei was home from work.
“What’s with all the yelling?” Andrei walked into the kitchen and saw his wife’s flushed face and his mother looking flustered. “Oksana, why are you shouting at Mom?”
“See!” Valentina Petrovna quickly switched to playing the victim. “Andriusha, your wife is throwing me out of the house! Says the apartment’s hers and that I’m just in the way!”
Andrei frowned and looked at his wife, confused.
“Have you lost your mind? Mom is registered in this apartment; she has just as much right to it as we do!”
“As we do?” Oksana turned to her husband. “Since when do ‘we’ have rights? Have we ever actually decided anything together?”
“What are you even talking about?” Andrei took off his jacket and hung it over a chair. “You’re tired, right? Go rest. Mom and I will make dinner.”
“I don’t need your charity!” Oksana burst out. “I’m not the maid in this house! And I’m not some mute doll, either!”
“Quiet!” Andrei snapped. “The kids will hear you!”
“Let them hear! Let them know their mother has a voice! That she’s not just some helpless rag!”
Fourteen-year-old Nastya peeked into the kitchen, fearfully eyeing her parents.
“Mom, Dad, why are you fighting?”
“Go to your room, sweetie,” Oksana said tiredly. “This is a conversation for adults.”
“Mom’s right,” the girl suddenly said. “Grandma is always yelling at you, and you just stay quiet. And Dad just watches TV.”
“Nastya!” Andrei called her name sternly.
“Don’t yell at the child!” Oksana defended her. “She’s telling the truth!”
“What truth?” Andrei looked bewildered first at his daughter, then at his wife. “Am I a bad father? A bad husband?”
“Not a bad one,” Oksana suddenly felt utterly exhausted. “You just… you don’t see me. None of you do. I’m just a function: cook, clean, do laundry, take the kids to school.”
Valentina Petrovna stayed silent, realizing it was best not to interfere. Andrei rubbed the back of his head, unsure.
“But that’s how it is in every family… The woman keeps the house, the man works…”
“And the woman doesn’t work?” Oksana pointed to her hands, red from constant washing and cleaning. “Do you see these hands? And what do I owe your mother for? Why does she humiliate me every day?”
“Mom just wants what’s best…”
“Best for whom? For you! Has anyone thought about me?”
Nastya carefully walked over to her mom and took her hand.
“Mom, what’s going to happen now?”
Oksana looked at her daughter, then at her son Maxim, who was standing in the doorway holding a textbook.
“Things are going to be different now,” she said firmly. “I won’t stay silent anymore.”
“And what’s that supposed to mean?” Andrei demanded.
“It means your mom is going to live somewhere else. She has a sister in Tver—she can go stay with her. Or she can rent a room with her pension.”
“You’ve lost your mind!” Andrei exclaimed. “I’m not abandoning my mom!”
“Then don’t abandon her—go live with her yourself,” Oksana answered calmly.
Valentina Petrovna threw up her hands in shock.
“Andriusha, do you hear what she’s saying? She’s throwing me out on the street!”
“Not on the street,” Oksana corrected her. “You have options. I didn’t have any for twenty-three years.”
“Mom,” Nastya said cautiously, “grandma really does always yell at you. I don’t like hearing it either.”
“Nastya!” Valentina Petrovna exclaimed indignantly. “I raised you!”
“Mom and I raised Nastya,” said eleven-year-old Maksim unexpectedly. “You just bossed everyone around.”
Andrey looked at his children, at his wife, at his mother—confused. His familiar world was falling apart before his eyes.
“Listen, Oksana,” he tried to keep his voice calm and peaceful. “Let’s talk this out—no shouting.”
“There’s nothing left to discuss,” Oksana moved toward the stove and began setting out ingredients for dinner. “I’ve said everything. In a week, your mother is moving out. Then we’ll start living as a real family.”
“And what if I don’t agree?” Andrey’s voice turned harsher.
Oksana turned around and looked her husband straight in the eyes.
“Then you can leave with her. The apartment belongs to me—remember? When we privatized it, you were on a binge and I handled all the paperwork.”
Andrey turned pale. He really had forgotten about that. Back then, household matters weren’t on his mind.
“That can’t be true…”
“It is. The paperwork is in the desk. Check for yourself.”
Valentina Petrovna sank onto a chair. Suddenly, she realized she had underestimated her quiet daughter-in-law. She wasn’t nearly as simple as she’d thought.
“Alright,” the older woman said unexpectedly. “Maybe it really is time for me to move in with my sister. Tamara’s been inviting me for ages.”
Everyone stared at her in surprise.
“Just remember, Oksana,” her mother-in-law continued, “without me, it’s going to be tough. Who will pick up the kids from school when you’re at work? Who will look after them when they’re sick?”
“I’ll manage,” Oksana replied shortly.
“We’ll see,” Valentina Petrovna said as she got up and headed out of the kitchen. “But don’t come asking me to move back in later.”
When the mother-in-law left, silence hung over the kitchen. The children stood there, unsure what to say. Andrey sat at the table, staring off at nothing.
“Dad,” Nastya said softly, “Mom is doing the right thing.”
“I didn’t ask for your opinion,” her father grumbled.
“But I’m asking for yours,” Oksana said as she sat across from her husband. “Are you staying with us, or are you going with your mother?”
Andrey looked up, studying his wife closely. For the first time in many years, he didn’t see submission in her eyes, but strength.
“Will you kick me out if I stay?”
“I won’t kick you out. But some things are going to change.”
“Like what?”
“We’ll do all the housework together. We’ll make decisions together. And we’ll take care of the kids together—not just me.”
“But I get tired at work…”
“And what, I don’t get tired?” Oksana stood up and began slicing bread. “But I still manage, don’t I?”
Andrey was silent for a long time, then sighed heavily.
“Alright. Let’s try it your way. But you shouldn’t have been so harsh with my mom…”
“She’s been harsh to me for twenty-three years. That’s enough.”
“Mom,” Maksim walked up to his mother and hugged her around the waist, “will you always be this brave now?”
For the first time that day, Oksana smiled truly and easily.
“I will, son. I definitely will.”
Later that evening, after the kids had gone to bed and Andrey stepped out to smoke on the balcony, Oksana sat in the kitchen drinking tea. She was scared by what she had done, but at the same time felt a lightness, as if she had finally lifted a heavy burden.
Valentina Petrovna came out of her room and sat across from her.
“I’ve decided we should have a real talk,” she said. “Just the two of us.”
Oksana nodded, her eyes still fixed on her cup.
“I’m not mean, Oksanka. It’s just… I always thought you were too gentle for my son. That he didn’t appreciate you enough. So I tried to toughen you up.”
“That’s a strange way to toughen someone up,” Oksana answered quietly.
“Yes, strange. Maybe the wrong way. But I wanted you to be strong.”
“But it turned out I was just unhappy.”
Valentina Petrovna sighed.
“It turned out that way. Forgive me, if you can.”
Oksana lifted her gaze and looked at her mother-in-law. There was something unfamiliar in her face—perhaps humility, maybe even respect.
“Are you really going to your sister’s?”
“I will. They’ll be happy to see me there. And here… Here I’m just extra now.”
“You’re not extra. But life needs to be different now.”
“I understand. But I’m already old, it’s hard for me to change.”
“Try.”
“No, Oksanka. It’s better if I leave. It’ll be easier for everyone.”
The women finished their tea in silence. Then Valentina Petrovna stood up and gently touched her daughter-in-law’s shoulder.
“You were right today. Right about everything. Just wish we’d done it sooner, maybe twenty years ago.”
“Back then, I was afraid.”
“And now you’re not?”
“Now I’m more afraid of living the rest of my life the way I did before.”
Valentina Petrovna nodded and went to her room. Oksana remained in the kitchen for a long time, getting used to the new feeling of freedom.