— Sveta, come on, she’s my sister. Mom won’t survive it if she has to live in a dorm,” Dmitry’s voice was coaxing and pleading. It was the third time that evening he’d started up the same old record, carefully skirting the sharp corners he himself had created.
Svetlana silently set her fork down on the plate. She didn’t clatter it, didn’t toss it down in irritation—she placed it there with deliberate, icy precision. She listened to the end of his speech about “sweet little Olya” and the “horrors of dorm life” that existed only in his mother’s fevered imagination. The whole time she wasn’t looking at him but somewhere through him—at the wall, as if trying to make out a crack she’d never noticed before. When he finished, a pause fell—so dense it seemed you could touch it. Dima shifted in his chair, unable to endure the silence. He was expecting shouting, an argument—anything but this suffocating void.
She rose slowly from the table. Her movements were free of fuss; they didn’t convey fatigue so much as a final, frozen resolve.
“— I don’t give a damn what your mother wants, Dima! I said your sister is not going to live with us while she’s studying! And I don’t care what your relatives think about it! I’m not turning our apartment into a boarding house for five years!”
He jumped up, knocking over a napkin. His face began to flush.
“— But it’s Olya! My own blood! How can you—”
Svetlana didn’t listen. She walked past him to the other end of the living room, where her desk stood—an island of order and logic in this home. He trailed after her, still muttering about family ties and basic human decency. She ignored him completely, as if he were nothing more than an annoying fly. Pulling open a drawer, she took out a perfectly white, clean A4 sheet of paper and an expensive fountain pen with a heavy barrel.
“— Sveta, listen, we can come to an agreement…” he started, but broke off at once when he saw what she was doing.
“— Fine. Let’s draw up an agreement,” she said without looking at him.
She sat down, placed the sheet on the smooth surface of the desk, dipped the nib into the inkwell, and wrote in a crisp, nearly calligraphic hand: “Agreement for Paid Provision of Accommodation Services.”
Dima froze behind her, peering over her shoulder. He couldn’t believe his eyes. It felt like some absurd, bad dream. And she, paying him no attention, continued to write point after point as if she weren’t issuing an ultimatum to her own family, but drafting an ordinary commercial document.
“The rent for use of a room with an area of 12 sq. m. is set at 20,000 (twenty thousand) rubles per month. Payment is due by the 5th day of each month.
Utility payments (electricity, water supply, heating, internet) shall be paid by the Tenant in the amount of 1/3 of the total bill issued by the management company.
Meals are not included in the cost of accommodation. Groceries are purchased by the Tenant independently. Use of shared kitchen utensils and appliances is permitted from 8:00 to 22:00.
Cleaning of common areas (kitchen, bathroom, toilet, hallway) shall be performed by the Tenant according to a schedule approved weekly by the Landlord.
Consultations and the Landlord’s (Svetlana’s) personal time spent resolving the Tenant’s household and personal issues (help with appliances, handling everyday matters, psychological support, and so on) shall be billed at a rate of 5,000 (five thousand) rubles per hour.”
She put down the final period and blotted the ink with a special press. Then, unhurriedly, she stood up, turned to her husband, and held the sheet out to him. Her face was utterly unreadable.
“— Here. Let your sister sign it. You’ll act as guarantor. As soon as you pay a three-month deposit, I’ll give her the keys.”
Dmitry stared at the paper as if it weren’t a sheet at all, but a venomous snake poised to strike. His fingers seemed to go numb. He blinked several times, trying to force his brain to accept what was happening. The neatly written words danced before his eyes, forming a mocking, absurd picture: rent, utilities, personal time billed by the hour. He could physically feel the air in the room grow dense and prickly.
“— Are you… are you kidding me?” he rasped. It wasn’t really a question—more a convulsive attempt to shove away this new, ugly reality. “What is this circus?”
Svetlana lowered her hand and placed the sheet on the polished surface of the desk. She looked at her husband the way you look at an incompetent employee who can’t grasp a simple instruction.
“— This isn’t a circus, Dima. It’s a business offer. You said we could come to an agreement. These are the terms on which I’m willing to talk. You keep saying Olya is already an adult, an independent young woman if she’s enrolling in college. Great. Then she’s capable of understanding and accepting the conditions of living on someone else’s property.”
The words “someone else’s property” hit him like a slap. He stepped forward, his face twisting with a mix of anger and humiliation.
“— Someone else’s? This is our home! We live here! And Olya is my sister! What the hell kind of rent is there between family? Have you completely lost your conscience?”
“— Conscience has nothing to do with it. This is pure economics,” her calm was impenetrable. “This apartment is my asset. My parents helped me with the down payment long before our wedding, and I paid the mortgage on it for seven years, denying myself a lot. It’s worth money now. And so is its use. Your sister will occupy a room, use water and electricity, my furniture and appliances. That has a price. Or does your mother think all of that materializes out of thin air?”
He snatched the cursed sheet from the desk. In his hands it didn’t feel like paper, but like a heavy gravestone laid over their relationship.
“— And this?” he jabbed a finger at the fifth clause. “ ‘Personal time billed by the hour’? So you’ve priced talking to me and my family at five thousand an hour? Are you out of your mind?!”
“— I didn’t price conversation,” she corrected, and a cold glint flashed in her eyes. “I priced my time that will be spent dealing with problems of your ‘sweet little girl.’ Helping her figure out the washing machine, listening to her complaints about professors, calming your mother down on the phone that her daughter’s fed and healthy. My time is my main resource, Dima. I spend it working to provide the standard of living you’ve grown so used to. And I’m not going to give it away for free to service infantile relatives.”
Dmitry realized he was choking. He was trapped. Every emotional argument he made shattered against her icy logic. He tried to press on pity, on family feelings, on their shared life—and she answered with numbers and paragraphs. He was defenseless. He paced the room like a caged animal, while she simply stood by the desk, watching him with detached curiosity. And then, realizing his complete helplessness, he did what he always did in a dead end: he pulled out his phone.
Svetlana saw the gesture, and the corner of her mouth twitched in a faint, contemptuous smirk. She knew what would happen now. That motion was his admission of surrender—proof that he wasn’t a man capable of handling problems in his own family, but a boy running to complain to his mother.
“— Hello, Mom?” His voice instantly changed; whiny, complaining notes crept into it. “Mom, Svet… she’s totally lost it. You can’t imagine what she’s pulled… Yeah, because of Olya… She wrote some paper… Says Olya has to pay for the room…”
While he spoke—rambling and confused, recounting the humiliating points of the “agreement”—Svetlana silently turned away, went to the dining table, picked up her plate of cold pasta, carried it into the kitchen, and began washing it. The measured, ordinary routine—the rush of water, the soft clink of dishes—was a deafening contrast to his hysterical whisper into the receiver. She wasn’t listening. She methodically rinsed off the remains of dinner, as if she were washing his family—along with their endless demands—out of her life.
Dmitry ended the call and looked at her with defiance. There was a spark of gloating in his eyes. Now he wasn’t alone.
“— Mom’s coming over. Now you’ll talk to her.”
Svetlana turned off the tap. She took a clean towel and slowly, carefully dried her hands. Then she turned to him.
“— Good. I was just about to speak with the guarantor on the agreement.”
Exactly forty minutes passed. In that time Dmitry managed to circle the apartment several times, like a tiger pacing a cage before feeding. He would stop and stare at Svetlana, waiting for her to come to her senses, then resume his nervous pacing, muttering fragments of phrases and rehearsing the conversation to come. Svetlana, by contrast, was the embodiment of Olympian calm. She brewed herself coffee in a cezve, filling the apartment with a thick, bitter aroma, and sat in an armchair with her cup. She didn’t pick up her phone or turn on the TV. She simply sat, slowly sipping the hot drink and looking out at the bustling evening city. Her serenity worked on Dima like poison.
The doorbell wasn’t merely insistent—it was commanding, almost aggressive: three short, piercing rings that left no doubt who was behind the door and how little they intended to wait. Dmitry sprang up and rushed into the hallway, while Svetlana, taking one last sip, unhurriedly set her cup on the saucer and only then stood.
Valentina Petrovna stood on the threshold, and behind her, like a frightened fledgling, Olya hid. The mother wore a severe coat; her face was pinched into a grimace of righteous indignation. She didn’t enter—she invaded. Stepping into the apartment, she swept the entryway with an owner’s assessing stare, like an inspector on a surprise visit.
“— Well, hello, Dima,” she said, addressing only her son and pointedly ignoring the apartment’s owner. “Here, I brought you your sister. I see you’ve settled in nicely. Spacious.”
Dmitry fussed, helping his mother take off her coat, taking Olya’s bag from her hands. The girl timidly stepped inside, her eyes darting around in fear.
“— Hello, Valentina Petrovna. Hi, Olya,” Svetlana’s even voice made both of them flinch. She stood leaning against the wall, and her calm posture sharply contrasted with the tension the guests had dragged in with them.
Valentina Petrovna finally granted her a look. It was a look full of cold contempt.
“— Svetlana. Dima told me about some kind of… misunderstanding. About some stupid little paper. I hope you’ve cooled off and realized what nonsense you started. We’re family. Family helps each other, it doesn’t send invoices.”
She spoke as if scolding an unreasonable child. Her tone didn’t allow for dialogue; it stated a fact: Svetlana was wrong, and now she should apologize and fix everything.
“— It isn’t a misunderstanding,” Svetlana replied just as calmly. She walked to the coffee table where the sheet still lay. “It’s a formal proposal. Since you’re here, we can discuss it together.”
She picked up the agreement and set it on the table directly in front of her mother-in-law, who had already planted herself on the sofa in the central seat. Olya perched beside her on the very edge, ready at any moment to pull her head into her shoulders.
Valentina Petrovna gave the sheet a contemptuous glance but didn’t read it.
“— Discuss what? This worthless scribble? The girl will live here because she is my son’s sister, and this is his home. Period.”
“— This is my home,” Svetlana corrected gently but firmly. “And since you care so much about Olya’s well-being and want her to live exactly here, I prepared these conditions. So everything is honest and transparent. Dmitry said you won’t survive it if Olya ends up in a dorm, which means her comfort is your priority. I’m simply proposing that you participate in providing that comfort financially. You’ll act as guarantor under the agreement, yes?”
For a few seconds the room fell completely silent. Valentina Petrovna stared at her daughter-in-law, and a dark crimson blot of anger slowly spread across her face. She—a master of emotional blackmail—had encountered for the first time a situation where her manipulation was translated into commercial terms. Her main weapon—“a sense of duty”—was useless against a price list.
“— How dare you…” she began, choking with indignation. “How dare you speak to me in that tone? Put my care for my granddaughter into rubles? Are you out of your mind? We are family! And you’re turning this into a marketplace!”
“— A marketplace is when someone tries to get a service for free, hiding behind family ties,” Svetlana shot back without raising her voice. “I’m offering civilized, partner-style relations. Olya gets comfortable housing in the city center, and I get compensation for the use of my property and resources. Fair.”
“— Dima!” Valentina Petrovna screeched, turning to her son, who had been standing like a post in the middle of the room. “Do you hear what she’s saying?! You’ll let that— that street vendor talk to your mother like that? Are you a man in this house or what?!”
Dmitry jerked as if struck. He looked at his mother, then at his wife. He was trapped between hammer and anvil.
“— Mom, Sveta… let’s not… let’s just talk…”
“— I’m not talking to you!” Valentina Petrovna snapped, burning him with her gaze. “I can see talking to you is pointless. You let her sit on your neck! I didn’t raise you like this!”
She turned back to Svetlana; her eyes threw lightning.
“— So here’s how it’s going to be. You’re getting no money. Olya will live here. And if you try to throw her out, you’ll be sorry you ever got involved with our family.”
Valentina Petrovna’s threat hung in the air—thick and poisonous, like swamp gas. She delivered it with the certainty of a monarch announcing her will to an unreasonable subject. Her face froze in the expression of a victor who had just put an upstart in her place. She expected tears, pleading, surrender. Dmitry seemed to shrink, dropping half a head in height. He looked from his mother to his wife, his face pale and miserable, like someone publicly whipped. Olya, nearly invisible until then, pulled her head into her shoulders so hard it seemed her neck disappeared.
But Svetlana didn’t cry. And she didn’t shout. Instead, something strange happened. On her face—until then a cold, impenetrable mask—an expression appeared… relief. As if she’d been solving a difficult problem and had just found the one correct, elegant answer. A faint smile touched the corners of her lips—not cheerful, but predatory, like a surgeon who has pinpointed the tumor and now knows exactly where to cut.
She slowly swept her gaze over all three of them: first her mother-in-law, whose eyes burned with the fire of smug power; then Olya, voiceless and terrified, a puppet in her mother’s hands; and finally Dmitry. She looked at him for a long time, studying him as if seeing him for the first time—not as a husband, but as a foreign object in her apartment. She saw not a man, not a partner, but the weak link, a pass-through for other people’s desires, an eternal son who had never become a husband. And at that moment she made her decision.
“— You’re right, Valentina Petrovna,” she said unexpectedly softly.
Her mother-in-law straightened triumphantly. Dmitry lifted hopeful eyes to his wife. Had she given in?
Svetlana stepped to the table and picked up the agreement. She held it with both hands as if it were something valuable. Then, in front of the stunned family, she slowly tore it in half with a clear, dry crack. And then again. And again. She didn’t tear it in rage; she destroyed it methodically, coldly, turning the document into a handful of neat, identical scraps. It wasn’t an emotional outburst—it was a deliberate ritual. When she finished, she opened her hand and the paper bits drifted soundlessly into the expensive rattan trash bin by her desk.
“— There will be no agreement,” she continued in the same calm, even voice. Turning to the frozen Valentina Petrovna, she added: “No invoices and no payments.”
“— Well, thank goodness. Finally it got through to you,” her mother-in-law hissed with a victorious smirk.
Svetlana ignored her. Her gaze shifted to Olya.
“— Olya will not live here. Not a single day.”
Valentina Petrovna’s face began to change. The smile slid off; crimson patches bloomed again on her cheeks, but now it wasn’t righteous anger—it was bewildered confusion.
And then Svetlana delivered the last, crushing blow. She looked straight at her husband again.
“— And you, Dima, won’t either.”
The words dropped into the silence like stones into a deep well. Dmitry froze, his mouth parting, but no sound came out. He looked as if all the air had been sucked out of him at once.
“— You didn’t hear me,” Svetlana repeated, meeting his eyes with merciless calm. “I said you don’t live here anymore. You have exactly one hour to pack your things. You can take everything you personally bought. Then you’ll take your sister and go with her to your mother’s. She has a big apartment. The two of you will be very comfortable there.”
A complete, ringing silence fell. Valentina Petrovna stared at her daughter-in-law as if she’d turned into a monster. She had come to move her daughter into this apartment—and instead her own son ended up on the street. Her brilliant tactic had turned into a catastrophe.
“— You… you can’t…” Dmitry finally forced out, grasping at air.
“— I can. This is my apartment,” Svetlana cut him off. “The hour starts now. If you’re all not off my property in an hour, I’ll call a service to open the lock and install a new one. Your things will be waiting for you in bags on the landing.”
She turned away without granting them another glance and calmly walked into her bedroom. She didn’t slam the door. She simply closed it quietly behind her, leaving the three of them in the living room—confused, humiliated, crushed. Finally and irrevocably strangers in this home. The scandal was over. There was no family anymore…