— “What’s this?” Ira was sorting through documents—she needed her husband’s passport, which she was looking for in his bag. But the passport had “caught” on something else.
— “I thought you wouldn’t find that…” Andrei muttered, blushing.
That morning Irina woke up alone. Andrei had left early—nothing unusual. Ira reached for her phone: the screen blinked with a notification, meaning a new message had arrived.
“I’m fine. How are you? I love you.”
Getting a message like that from her husband surprised Ira. Unexpected. He usually didn’t text her in the morning—mornings for him were always “about work.”
She was about to reply, but hesitated. Something about the message seemed odd. Probably the fact that it looked like an answer to a question she hadn’t asked.
Ira set the phone down again.
In the evening, while they were having dinner together, she asked casually:
— “Who were you texting this morning?”
— “No one.”
— “Strange, I got this…”
He smirked and hugged her.
— “Ah… I just wanted to say everything’s fine. You text me so rarely.”
She looked at her husband and smiled. Everything seemed perfectly normal. Only the odd feeling, once it appeared, didn’t go away.
The next day Irina was gathering laundry. She always washed her husband’s shirts separately. At some point, as she was loading them into the machine, she caught a scent on one of them. Not hers. Something cloyingly sweet, floral.
She brought the shirt closer to her face. The same scent. Not fabric softener, not detergent. And certainly not her perfume, nor his deodorant.
— “Odd smell, isn’t it?” she asked Andrei. He sniffed, shrugged.
— “I don’t know,” he mumbled, looking away. A couple days later he brought her a gift.
— “Perfume?” Ira was surprised. She usually chose her fragrances herself.
— “I wanted to make you happy. And you guessed too early. That smell… on the shirt—it’s perfume from the store. You know how, when you test them, the salespeople don’t spray on the tester but somewhere off to the side. So I ended up reeking.”
She took the bottle.
— “What’s the occasion?”
— “No reason. You’re beautiful. And beautiful women should have an expensive scent.”
— “Thank you,” Ira thought he sounded sincere, smiling. She thanked her husband. And although the fragrance wasn’t hers, when she went into the bathroom and spritzed her wrist, the scent seemed familiar.
Irina arrived early to meet her friend and was finishing her coffee when Evelina walked in. Tall, striking. Many people thought they were sisters—they were so alike, and yet so different.
— “How are you, darling? You look tired.”
— “A bit,” Irina nodded. “Andrei went to some meeting this morning. Said he’d be home late.”
— “Work again?” Evelina laughed. “Why can’t they just be present, instead of always ‘on a project’?”
Ira gave a wry smile.
— “He’s trying, apparently. Almost always gets home on time. Last week he even brought my favorite cake, just because. And yesterday he sent a morning text: ‘I love you.’ And he gave me perfume. What do you think?” Ira showed the bottle.
Evelina flinched slightly, then covered the movement with a sip of coffee.
— “A romantic!” she smiled stiffly. “I know that perfume. My ex gave me the same one. Right before we broke up.”
— “Really? Now I understand.” Ira looked away.
— “Understand what?!”
— “Why the scent is familiar. It’s your scent. Not mine.”
Evelina nearly choked on her coffee.
— “Well… I hardly use that fragrance.”
— “I didn’t like it. It suits you better. If you want, I’ll give it to you.”
— “No. Don’t. Thank you. I still have a full bottle,” her friend adjusted her hair and changed the subject, but Ira still voiced her doubts.
— “You know, I was never jealous before, but that text… it threw me off. We haven’t had the honeymoon phase in a long time. And Andrei isn’t sentimental. What if he didn’t mean to send it to me, and it went to my number by accident?”
Evelina giggled.
— “Ir… don’t you think you’re just overtired? Honestly. Constant control is exhausting. Sometimes we invent reasons ourselves—and then… we find what wasn’t there. Go to a spa, relax. I saw an ad the other day for a lovely place… foam massage, hammam… The salon is called Fairy Orchid. Write it down. I’m thinking of going too.”
Irina nodded. She wanted to believe her husband. But inside, she felt unpleasant, as if something important was just beginning to surface, though it still wasn’t clear what.
And it “surfaced” a week later.
— “What’s this?” Irina frowned.
She was looking for Andrei’s passport—she needed to urgently send a copy for insurance. Andrei was on the phone at that moment. Irina rummaged in his bag, unzipped the pocket. The passport was in a side compartment, but it snagged on the corner of something—stiff, glossy.
It was an envelope. White, with the spa’s logo.
Ira pulled out her find and turned it over in her hands. Thick, expensive paper. On the back—a drawing of a flower.
— “What’s this?” she repeated, louder.
Andrei was already standing in the kitchen doorway. His gaze fell on the envelope, and for a moment he seemed to be at a loss for words.
— “I thought… you wouldn’t find that,” he muttered.
— “What exactly wasn’t I supposed to find?” her voice trembled.
— “It’s… well, I wanted to surprise you,” he took a step closer, “a spa, a program for two. Massage, thermal area… I was going to give it to you on Friday. And you’ve gone and found my gift early again.”
— “Really?” she looked at him closely. “Then why is only your name on the envelope? Not a word about me.”
He hesitated. Looked away for a second.
— “I just didn’t bother with that. But if you want, I can write your name myself.”
She nodded silently and set the envelope on the table. Perhaps she really had been working herself up for nothing.
They went to the spa. Everything was romantic, like at the very start of their relationship. It seemed—everything was fine. Irina even relaxed. She felt lighter. Her husband was with her, it seemed. What more did she need? He came home on time, his phone was “clean,” he brought gifts, planned surprises.
Maybe the propaganda of unhealthy relationships just influences women’s minds too much? Affairs everywhere—in movies, in books, in an insurance company’s ad, in love songs, in girlfriends’ gossip…
When Ira suddenly realized it was all nonsense and her imagination, she bought her husband a return gift and decided to arrange a candlelit evening at home. Like before.
And then, the day before that evening, she got a call:
— “Good afternoon. We’re from the Fairy Orchid spa. You left a bracelet with us. We found your number on the guest form.”
— “I didn’t leave anything,” Ira started, startled. The salon’s name cut her ear. Someone had mentioned it, and she hadn’t even looked at the salon’s sign. Some kind of flower logo… Orchid, was it…
— “Are you sure? It was you and your husband who were here.”
— “All right, I’ll come by,” Irina agreed for some reason. She decided to confirm her suspicion and get to the bottom of it. That same evening she went to the salon she’d visited with Andrei.
The receptionist looked at her and suddenly faltered.
— “You were here… recently, right? With…”
— “With my husband.”
Silence fell.
— “I’m sorry. It’s just… he was here yesterday. At lunchtime.”
— “Alone?! Are you sure?”
— “I thought he was with you, the bracelet was left behind… The girl who was with him looks very much like you. Only she didn’t behave nearly as politely and graciously as you. She demanded champagne, rose petals… My coworkers and I even thought you’d changed so much in a week that you must have a split personality or PMS… Oh, I’m sorry, I don’t know why I’m saying this,” the girl got flustered, blushing.
[Image]
— “Where’s the bracelet?” Ira asked coolly.
— “Here…” The administrator pulled a bracelet from a drawer. Costume jewelry, familiar to Ira. She had recently given that trinket to Evelina, brought it back from vacation. A pretty bauble, unusual, memorable.
— “Oh, then I can’t give it to you… It isn’t yours!” the girl caught herself.
— “Not mine?” Ira repeated. “The husband is mine… And the bracelet belongs to my friend.”
— “Hm… yes, that’s awkward. I’m sorry.”
— “Give it to me. Trust me, I’ll return the lost item. Personally, into the hand of that… not-too-bright woman. And I’ll also have a talk with my husband about why he’s taking my friends to a spa…”
Ira did manage to come to an arrangement with the salon administrator.
She wasn’t planning to throw a tantrum or stage a scene right then. All night Ira thought about how to get back at her husband. As for Evelina—she simply decided not to speak to her anymore.
She spent the entire next week on herself, on her looks. Ira no longer wanted to resemble her friend. She dyed her hair, changed her cut, started dressing differently, and emptied Andrei’s card in the process.
But her revenge didn’t lie in that. She prepared a special “dish” for her husband. For dessert.
— “Where have you been?” Andrei asked a couple of days later.
— “A work meeting. I should have focused on my career a long time ago.”
— “But we were planning to have kids…”
— “No, I’ve decided I’m not ready yet.”
He looked at her suspiciously.
Several times that week Evelina texted. Once she even called.
— “Ir, let’s meet. I need to tell you something…”
— “I’m busy, sorry.” Irina hung up. She guessed exactly what Evelina wanted to say. And Evelina immediately sent screenshots of social media messages.
“Yes, your husband and I are… close. I’m sorry,” she added to the photos.
Ira realized that now it was definitely over. She could see that her husband was nervous. And Andrei, for his part, no longer recognized his wife.
— “What’s with you?” he asked when she was getting ready for yet another evening meeting. In a cocktail dress, with her hair done.
— “I’m tired of sitting at home. Friends are fickle—no way to build anything with them…”
— “Then maybe we could go out together somewhere?”
— “I’m busy tonight.”
— “Hey! Do you have someone?!” Andrei pressed his lips together like a sulky teenager, then tried to hug her. She pulled away and didn’t answer. That night she came home very late.
Two weeks passed.
Andrei couldn’t find peace, he thought about his wife constantly. He was jealous.
His anxiety spilled over into his work. A major project was coming up, and Andrei had a business meeting scheduled at a restaurant. He wasn’t very prepared for it, because Ira hadn’t come home the night before and he’d been trying to reach her. Toward morning Ira finally answered: it turned out she had “been at her mother’s.”
He didn’t believe it. But there was no time for scenes; he had to get ready for the meeting.
Andrei barely managed to arrive on time. Only there was a surprise waiting in the dining room. At the table he saw Irina. She was sitting across from his boss. Explaining something. Calm, confident. The boss nodded to Andrei:
— “Oh, hi. Have a seat. Your wife—well, almost your ex—she’s a very competent candidate for my deputy. A pity you didn’t mention earlier that she’s so good at sales strategy. She and I decided that you need to be relieved of some load. You’ll take over the routine work, where a lot has piled up already, and she’ll handle the new project.”
Andrei sat down. But he no longer heard what they were saying. He stared at his wife’s hand, where there was no wedding ring.
She didn’t go home. She didn’t talk to her husband. She simply notified him that she had filed for divorce.
A week later Andrei was moved to a lower position, and Irina started her new job.
As it later turned out, Ira had approached Andrei’s director by “accidentally” meeting him at lunch in a restaurant. They exchanged a few words, she charmed him with her knowledge, her neckline, and her feminine charisma, and he—no less of a womanizer than Andrei—offered her a job. And something else, without strings attached.
Ira hinted she wasn’t opposed, but kept her chastity, thereby stoking the interest of a man who wasn’t exactly a paragon of principles. After a couple of weeks he no longer thought of her as his subordinate’s wife. He wanted to win her. And he was ready for personnel reshuffles.
— “You cheated on me? With my boss?!” Andrei asked, catching Ira in the office lobby. He was dejected, confused, and didn’t understand what was going on.
— “No,” she answered, flashing a predatory smile. “Not yet. But as soon as you and I are divorced, I’ll be sure to make up for lost time. Or are you the only one allowed to fool around?”
— “What are you talking about?!”
— “Stop pretending. I know everything,” Irina walked off quickly, leaving her husband standing alone, watching her go.
It was over between them. Ira got what she wanted—she let her husband go to the other woman and got her revenge in full. After all, all philandering men need to be taught a lesson. Don’t they? Or maybe she should have talked? Heard his side…