…and then Lenka from Accounting brought in a cake, can you imagine? It was her cat’s birthday. The whole department was laughing. There were even candles—tiny ones, like for a birthday cake.”
Andrey’s voice—habitually upbeat and packed with the day’s impressions—died mid-sentence the moment he stepped into the kitchen. He expected to see his wife at the stove, hear the usual question about how his day went, catch the smell of something frying or baking. But there was no smell. The burners were cold and dark. Olesya sat at the impeccably clean kitchen table with her hands folded in front of her. She looked not like a wife tired after work, but like an investigator waiting to begin an interrogation. In front of her, on the gleaming countertop, lay a single sheet of paper printed from a computer.
“Long day?” he asked cautiously, setting his briefcase on the floor and loosening his tie. The atmosphere in the kitchen felt wrong—foreign. “Did something happen?”
She didn’t answer. She simply, slowly—deliberately slowly—without taking her eyes off him, slid the sheet toward him. The paper glided across the smooth surface and stopped right in front of him. Andrey looked from her face to the document. It was a statement from an online banking account. A familiar header with the logo, her full name—“Kravtsova Olesya Viktorovna”—and below it lines that made everything inside him go cold and clamp tight: “Consumer loan No. 7458… Amount: 150,000 rubles. Date issued: 14/05/2024. Status: Overdue debt.”
“What kind of nonsense is this?” he tried to sound confused, even forced a chuckle. His voice came out fake. “Some scammers again? Or a bank mistake? We need to call them, give them hell. They’ve gotten completely shameless—sending people all kinds of garbage.”
He kept talking, but his eyes never left her face, searching for anything—any hint that she believed him. But her expression was utterly unreadable. No anger, no hurt, no surprise. Just a cold, detached observation, as if she were studying a rare insect pinned under glass. And that calmness genuinely frightened him. His performed cheer evaporated; the words stuck in his throat.
“Andrey,” she said, and her voice was as even and cold as her gaze. “I already called. The bank—and the security hotline. There’s no mistake. The loan was taken out online. Confirmed via an SMS code. The code was sent to the phone number linked to my passport data. Meaning my phone. A month ago.”
She paused, letting him absorb every word, every detail of that measured, lethal fact. He stayed silent, thinking frantically about what to say next. Every retreat route was cut off. Lying no longer worked.
“Talk.”
It wasn’t a question. It was a demand. And he broke—like a dry twig underfoot.
“Les, listen… I wanted to tell you everything, I swear!” he babbled, his voice instantly turning pathetic and pleading. He stepped to the table, bracing himself with his hands. “It’s… it’s for Vitya. He had a wedding. Remember? I couldn’t show up empty-handed or give some cheap little thing. He’s my best friend since childhood! And there were all those respectable guests, big gifts in envelopes. I didn’t want him to look poor compared to everyone else because of my modest present. I just… I borrowed a little. I was going to pay it all myself, little by little, from my salary, from my bonus. You wouldn’t even have found out, I swear! I just accidentally missed the first payment, got swamped at work, reports… It’s a misunderstanding. I’ll pay everything tomorrow.”
For a few seconds there was absolute, dead silence in the kitchen, broken only by the low hum of the refrigerator. Andrey looked at Olesya with hope, the way a drowning man looks at a life ring thrown his way. He’d laid it all out: reason, motive, remorse, a promise. He expected the ice to crack. That maybe she’d yell for show, but then understand. After all, he’d done it for a friend, not for himself.
But instead of yelling, she laughed.
It wasn’t cheerful laughter. Not even hysterical. It was a short, dry, contemptuous snort that cracked through the quiet kitchen like a whip. She leaned back in her chair, and for the first time all evening something living appeared in her eyes—cold, venomous amusement.
“You wouldn’t have found out?” she repeated, savoring each word. “Are you seriously telling me the main problem is that I found out? Not that you went behind my back and climbed into my passport, my phone, my life—but that I, what a shame, sniffed it out?”
He opened his mouth to answer, but she didn’t let him.
“Don’t. You didn’t want your friend to look poor? Your friend?” Her calm finally cracked, releasing something sharp and dangerous. Her voice stopped being level—it became cutting, like a shard of glass. “Andrey, you didn’t want to look poor next to him! It’s your ego, your pride, your need to show off—paid for out of my pocket! You put my credit history, my name, my financial future on the line so some manager at Vitya’s wedding wouldn’t think you’re broke!”
She stood up abruptly—one precise movement. Now she towered over him as he hunched at the counter. His miserable posture screamed guilt, but stubbornness was already blooming in his eyes.
“So you took out a loan in my name, forged my signature, so your friend wouldn’t look poor at his wedding?! Do you even understand what you’ve done, Andrey?”
She practically threw the words in his face; each one landed like a blow.
“Stop it!” he finally snapped back, his voice breaking into an offended shout. “You don’t understand anything! This is friendship! Things you women can’t understand! I had to support him! And you reduce everything to money, to some papers! I said I’ll pay it back! Why are you making a tragedy out of 150,000?”
He didn’t even notice when he shifted from excuses to accusations. He desperately needed to make her the guilty one—cold, mercenary, anything at all.
“Money?” she laughed again—quietly, but now there was no humor in it, only pure, distilled fury. “Yes, Andrey, I reduce everything to money. To my money. Which you stole. You didn’t ‘borrow a little.’ You stole. You’re a thief who robbed the closest person to you. Not to save someone’s life—but to buy yourself an expensive ticket into your pathetic theater of vanity. And don’t you dare cover your cowardice and complexes with big words about friendship.”
The word “thief” hung in the kitchen air, heavy and sticky like tar. It didn’t just insult Andrey—it nailed him in place, stripping him of the last chance to defend himself. He stared at his wife, hurt battling confusion. He’d expected anything: screaming, reproaches, even a plate-smashing scandal. He hadn’t expected this cold, legally precise brand.
“Lesya, stop… How can you say that? To me?” He took a step forward; his voice trembled—not with remorse, but with outrage. He tried his last weapon: their shared past. “We’re family. Eight years together. We built this home, chose the kitchen tiles together, remember? How can you call me a thief? I’m not a stranger to you!”
He hoped mentioning their life, the warm moments, would soften her—that she’d see not the failure standing there now, but the man she once loved. But he miscalculated.
“Don’t you dare,” she cut in. Her voice was quiet, but there was so much steel in it that Andrey involuntarily stepped back. “Don’t drag what used to be into this. You just burned those eight years yourself—so you could throw more ash on the vanity bonfire of your buddy. Family? Family is trust. And you betrayed my trust in the dirtiest way. You used me like a faceless financial tool. So don’t talk to me about kitchen tiles. It doesn’t work anymore.”
She moved around the table and stopped by the window. She wasn’t looking outside; her gaze fixed on the dark glass where the kitchen reflected back at them, turned into a battlefield.
“You think this is a tragedy over 150,000? Fine. If it’s not money to you, then returning it won’t be difficult.”
“Of course!” he seized the ghost of a chance. “I’ll borrow it, re-borrow it, take a loan in my own name! I’ll fix everything, Les—just give me a little time…”
“You don’t have time.” She turned sharply. “You have exactly five minutes. Here’s what you’re going to do. You’ll take your phone. Call your best friend Viktor. And you’ll say to him, word for word: ‘Vitya, I’m sorry, something terrible happened. That envelope I gave you at the wedding wasn’t a gift. It was money taken as a loan by fraudulent means. It must be returned immediately.’”
Andrey froze; his face began to drain of color. He stared at her as if she’d suggested he jump out the window.
“Are you… out of your mind?” he whispered. “Never. I’m not doing that. Humiliate myself? Humiliate him? Tell him his best friend is a fraud and a pauper? Humiliate his wife, make them count wedding money? Never in my life!”
“So humiliating your wife by hanging a loan on her is fine?” she clarified with icy curiosity. “But humiliating a friend who’s celebrating with money stolen from your family is taboo? I understand your value system now, Andrey. It’s very telling.”
“It’s different! It’s a man’s business! You can’t understand what honor is, what friendship is!” he shouted in desperation.
“Fine.” She nodded calmly, as if agreeing with a weather forecast. “I understand. You don’t want to call Viktor. I respect your delicate care for his feelings. Then I’ll be the one calling. Just not him. Why bother your friend over such trifles? I’ll call his young wife. Marina. And I’ll explain—very politely, woman to woman—that the generous gift from the Kravtsov family, which they may already be making plans for, needs to be returned. Because it was taken out in my name. Without my knowledge. And if the money isn’t returned, my next call will be a fraud report. Against you. Choose, Andrey. Whose call will they hear tonight? Yours, with ridiculous apologies? Or mine, with the full story?”
Andrey stared at her like she was insane. The ultimatum wasn’t just cruel—it was impossible, absurd. He, Andrey, had to call his best friend, practically a brother, and stammer out a confession of his own worthlessness while demanding the gift back. It was worse than humiliation. It was social suicide.
“I’m not doing it,” he repeated—this time firmly, with the stubbornness of an animal cornered. “Lesya, you’re asking the impossible. There are other ways. I… I’ll sell the car! Yes, to hell with it, I’ll sell the car and close this stupid loan. And there’ll still be some left over.”
He clung to the idea like a life raft. It seemed reasonable to him—manly, decisive. A sacrifice made to preserve honor. But Olesya didn’t even blink.
“You’ll sell the car?” she looked at him with icy condescension. “And how long will that take, genius? A week? Two? A month? The loan is already overdue. Interest is accruing every day, and my—not your—reputation with the bank is being ruined. Your car is later. I need the money now. Today.”
“I’ll take out a payday loan! Right now, online! I’ll cover the overdue amount, then sell the car calmly and pay the rest!” His brain churned out options, each crazier than the last.
“Another loan to cover the first?” She arched an eyebrow. “Andrey, do you even hear yourself? You’re suggesting we pour gasoline on a fire. I won’t let you drag us into a debt pit just because you’re afraid of losing face in front of your Vitya. Your face is the last thing I care about right now.”
He fell silent, breathing heavily. Every argument shattered against her unbreakable logic. He realized this was no longer a quarrel. It was the end. But he still couldn’t believe she was capable of the last, most terrifying step. He looked at her and saw his wife—the woman he’d gone to sleep and woken up beside—and couldn’t reconcile that image with the cold-blooded avenger standing in front of him. She’s bluffing. She won’t do it.
Seeing he wasn’t going to move, Olesya calmly took her phone from the pocket of her jeans. Her movements were steady, ordinary. She unlocked the screen with her thumb, swiped open a social media app. Andrey watched her hands, his heart pounding up in his throat. He saw her open the friends list, type “Marina Belskaya” into search, and the smiling profile picture of Viktor’s wife appeared.
“Lesya, don’t…” he rasped, stepping toward her. “Please… don’t do this.”
She ignored him. Her finger hovered over “Message,” then moved to the profile details where a phone number was listed. She copied it, pasted it into the dialer, and pressed the green call button. Then, staring him straight in the eyes, she turned on speakerphone.
“No!” He lunged in panic, trying to snatch the phone.
But she was ready. She stepped sharply to the side, braced her arm and shoved him in the chest. Off balance, he stumbled back. At the same moment, long rings sounded from the speaker, and then a cheerful, unsuspecting female voice answered.
“Hello?”
Andrey froze, staring at the phone in her hand with the horror of the condemned. He heard Marina—his best friend’s wife—and understood: that was it. The end of the friendship. The end of his reputation. The end of everything.
Olesya didn’t look away. There was no triumph in her eyes, no gloating—only a cold, empty statement of fact. The sentence was being carried out.
“Marina, good evening,” she said in an icy, deadly polite tone. “This is Olesya, Andrey Kravtsov’s wife. I’m calling about an unpleasant but very urgent matter that concerns the wedding gift from our family…