Sasha set his cup down with such force that tea splashed onto the tablecloth. Lena watched the stain spread and thought she’d have to wash it tomorrow—again. Though no, not tomorrow. The day after, because tomorrow she had a meeting with suppliers for the new collection.
“We need to talk,” Sasha said in the kind of tone people usually use when they’re passing a sentence.
Lena put her phone aside. On the screen, a half-finished caption for tomorrow’s post about a basic wardrobe sat frozen. She knew that tone. It was the same tone Sasha had used four years ago when he announced they’d be living with his parents for the first six months after the wedding. The same tone he used when explaining why a trip to Turkey was a waste of money when they could visit his cousin in the Tver region instead.
“I’m listening,” she said, folding her hands in her lap.
Sasha paced around the kitchen, opened the fridge, took nothing, closed it again. Then he turned to her, and Lena noticed something new in his eyes—determination, maybe. Or stubbornness.
“Dad’s having a hard time,” he began. “He’s sixty-eight. Fifth floor, no elevator. Every day, up and down with bags. His blood pressure spikes, he gets short of breath. The doctor says he needs fresh air and rest.”
Lena listened, already sensing where he was going.
“So what are you suggesting?” she asked evenly.
“A dacha,” Sasha breathed out, as if it were obvious. “A decent little house outside Moscow. About fifty kilometers from the city. Fresh air, he can plant a garden. And he can rent out his apartment. Can you imagine the extra income? At least fifteen thousand a month. Maybe more.”
“And where will he live in winter?” Lena asked almost automatically, because she already understood the entire plan.
“Well, it’ll be insulated. A stove, electricity. Plenty of people live there year-round.”
“Sash,” Lena rubbed the bridge of her nose, “your dad is almost seventy. Living alone at a dacha in winter? That’s not realistic.”
“Not alone!” Sasha snapped. “We’ll come out. I’ll help—bring firewood, clear the snow.”
“Drive back and forth a hundred kilometers every weekend?”
“So what? Other people do it!”
Lena stood and walked to the window. Outside, a February evening was settling in; the streetlights were already on, lighting up the falling snow. She was tired. Today she and Olya had unpacked a new shipment of coats, worked until nine, then spent more time discussing how to run a giveaway for Defender of the Fatherland Day. More customers, a growing account—bloggers were already reaching out and offering promotions themselves. Lena’s legs buzzed with fatigue, but inside she felt a quiet happiness: she was doing something of her own, and it was working.
“How much would a place like that cost?” she asked, still staring out the window.
“Two and a half million. Maybe three. Depends on the land and the condition.”
“Three million,” Lena repeated. “And you want me to—”
“You’ve got a good salary now,” Sasha cut in. “Better than mine. One hundred twenty a month—you told me. I make ninety. We can take out a mortgage, and you’ll put more toward the payments.”
Lena turned around and looked at him—his lips pressed tight, his hands clenched together, that stubborn chin.
“Sasha, we’ve lived together eight years. Married for five. I remember you discouraging me from taking marketing courses because they were ‘money down the drain.’ I remember you laughing when I worked as a cosmetics promoter in the mall—‘standing there calling people over like it’s a market.’ When I tried furniture sales, you spent the whole evening telling me it was unstable and I should just sit as an accountant at your company for thirty thousand—at least it was guaranteed.”
“What’s this about?” Sasha frowned.
“It’s about the fact that when Olya invited me to join her shop, you were against it again. ‘Another experiment,’ you said. ‘Another gamble. That little shop will shrivel up in six months and you’ll be left with nothing.’”
“Well, I was wrong,” Sasha muttered. “I admit it. I’m happy for you. But that’s not the point right now.”
“It is the point,” Lena said, stepping closer and sitting across from him. “The point is I finally found something I enjoy. Something that brings in money. And I earned that money myself. I come up with promotions, I run the social media, I talk to customers, I work twelve-hour days. And now you want me to hand that money over for a dacha for your father?”
“Not hand it over—invest it!” Sasha protested. “In real estate! It’s an investment!”
“An investment in someone else’s property,” Lena corrected. “Bought while we’re married, too.”
“He’s my father!” Sasha slammed his fist on the table. “My father! How do you not understand? He worked his whole life, lived on a pension, denied himself everything—well, he denied himself, but gave me everything! He fed me, clothed me, raised me!”
“I do understand,” Lena said calmly. “I understand you love him. I understand you want to help him. But, Sasha, I have plans for that money.”
“What plans?” Sasha’s voice turned wary.
“I want to go to the sea. Greece. Or at least Turkey. Somewhere warm, somewhere beautiful, somewhere you can forget winter and dirty snow. I’ve never been farther than Sochi in my life. I’m thirty-two, Sasha.”
“The sea?” he repeated, as if she’d suggested flying to Mars. “You want to waste money on a vacation instead of helping an elderly person?”
“I want to spend my money on myself,” Lena corrected. “And I also want to renovate the kitchen. Look at our wallpaper—it’s fifteen years old. The tiles are cracked. The faucet leaks.”
“Renovation can wait.”
“It can,” Lena agreed. “So can a dacha. That can wait too.”
Sasha leaned back, crossing his arms over his chest.
“So you’re refusing to help my father?”
“I’m not refusing,” Lena said. “I’m saying there are other options. He could swap his apartment for a first-floor one. Or sell it and buy a dacha with the difference—an apartment on the fifth floor in his area is worth good money.”
“He doesn’t want to sell,” Sasha said stubbornly. “That’s his home. He’s lived there thirty years.”
“Then let him live there,” Lena shrugged. “I don’t understand why his comfort matters more than mine. Why I have to give up the sea and renovations for a dacha I don’t even need.”
“Because we’re family!” Sasha’s voice rose. “Because families help each other! Because he’s my only father, he’s struggling, and you have money!”
“You have money too.”
“I have less!”
“Exactly,” Lena said, standing up. “You have less. You’ve spent your whole life in one company—stable job, stable paycheck, no risks. And you were always the one deciding what we spent money on. When I earned less, you’d say, ‘Let’s be sensible, Len. Save for a rainy day. Put it away.’ And now that I earn more, you’re demanding I buy your father a dacha.”
“I’m not demanding. I’m asking.”
“No,” Lena said. “You’re demanding. And here’s what’s most interesting: it wasn’t my idea to work in the shop. It wasn’t you who supported me when I was unsure. Olya believed in me. She gave me a chance, taught me, and shares profits with me honestly, even though she could’ve paid me next to nothing. I’m grateful to her.”
Sasha stayed silent, staring at the floor.
“I’m thirty-two,” Lena said more softly. “I want to live. I want to travel, wear beautiful clothes, fix up our home. I don’t want to spend my entire life saving for old age and for other people’s needs.”
“Other people?” Sasha lifted his head, something angry flaring in his eyes. “You’re calling my father ‘other people’?”
“That’s not what I meant…”
“If you don’t buy my father a dacha, I’m leaving you,” Sasha declared when he found out my salary, and Lena repeated it almost to herself. “So that’s it, Sash? Blackmail?”
“It’s not blackmail,” he said, standing and moving to the window with his back to her. “It’s my position. I can’t be with someone who refuses to help my father. Someone who puts her whims above family values.”
“A vacation is a whim?”
“When an elderly person needs help—yes, it’s a whim.”
Lena stood behind him for a moment, staring at his back—his tense shoulders, the way his hands gripped the windowsill.
“Alright,” she said very calmly. “I understand.”
She walked into the bedroom, took out her laptop, and opened the travel agency website she’d kept bookmarked for the past two months. Two weeks, a hotel with a sea view—one hundred thirty thousand rubles. She entered her card details and clicked “pay.” Her heart pounded like she was about to jump out of a plane.
When she returned to the kitchen, Sasha was still standing at the window.
“I bought the trip,” Lena said. “I fly on March twenty-eighth.”
He turned, confusion on his face.
“What?”
“I’m going to Turkey. For two weeks. Olya will let me go—we already talked.”
“You’ve lost your mind,” Sasha said slowly. “I just told you…”
“That you’d leave? I remember. You can go. The door isn’t locked.”
They looked at each other across the small kitchen, across eight years together, across every compromise Lena had made and every decision Sasha had made for them.
“You’ll regret this,” he said, taking his jacket from the hook.
“Maybe,” Lena sat back at the table and picked up her phone. “But it will be my choice. My money, my decisions, my life.”
The door slammed. Lena sat still for about ten minutes, then opened a chat with Olya.
“I bought a trip to Greece. Sasha left. I think I just ruined my life.”
The reply came almost instantly: “Or you just started building it. Hang in there. See you tomorrow—we’ll talk.”
Lena poured herself the cold tea, looked at the stain on the tablecloth. She’d wash it tomorrow. Or the day after. It didn’t matter now.
For the first three days, Sasha stayed with his parents. He called her at work, texted her: “We need to talk,” “Have you thought about it?” “Len, this is stupid.” She answered briefly: “We have nothing to discuss,” “I’m not changing my mind,” “Have a good day.”
On the fourth day, her father-in-law called. Lena was at the shop, sorting through a new shipment of blouses, when her phone buzzed.
“Hello?”
“Lenochka,” Vladimir Petrovich’s voice sounded tired. “It’s me. Sorry to bother you.”
“Hello, Vladimir Petrovich.”
“Sasha’s here with us. He told me you two have… some kind of misunderstanding.”
“It’s not a misunderstanding,” Lena corrected, setting aside a sea-green blouse. “It’s a matter of principle.”
“I understand,” her father-in-law sighed. “Lenochka, I’m not asking you to buy any dacha. I never asked at all. That was Sasha—he decided…”
“I know,” Lena cut in. “I figured as much.”
“He’s a good son. Caring. But sometimes… he gets carried away. I’ll manage in this apartment. I’ve lived here my whole life.”
“Vladimir Petrovich, this isn’t really about a dacha,” Lena said quietly. “It’s about how Sasha presented it. It’s about him deciding for me how I’m supposed to spend my own money. It’s about the ultimatum.”
Her father-in-law fell silent for a moment.
“He got scared,” he admitted at last. “You started earning more than he does. You became more independent. And he feels like he’s losing control.”
“Control?” Lena repeated. “Over me?”
“Over the situation. Over the family. Sasha likes everything predictable—when he’s the one in charge.”
“I know,” Lena said, smoothing her palm over the fabric. “But I can’t spend my entire life being predictable.”
“And you shouldn’t,” Vladimir Petrovich replied unexpectedly firmly. “Go to your Turkey, Lenochka. Rest. And we’ll have a talk with Sasha here—man to man.”
After that call, Lena felt a strange relief, like someone had lifted a heavy backpack off her shoulders.
Olya had been right—work helped keep her mind from spiraling. They launched a new promotion: every tenth customer got fifty percent off the next purchase. Women left smiling, told their friends, and the follower count jumped by a hundred a day.
“You know,” Olya said one evening as they locked up, “I think we could open a second location. On the other side of the city. The demand is there.”
“Seriously?” Lena turned, fiddling with the key in her hand.
“Absolutely. I ran the numbers. It pays for itself in a year.”
“Then I’ll need to find someone for the first shop,” Lena said. “I can’t be in two places at once.”
“We’ll find someone,” Olya nodded with confidence. “We found you, didn’t we?”
They laughed, and Lena thought Olya was the only person in years who had believed in her without conditions.
Sasha came back a week later. He arrived in the evening while Lena was on the couch with her laptop, scheduling posts for the week. She heard the key turn in the lock, and her chest tightened.
He entered quietly, took off his shoes, hung up his jacket, then lingered in the hallway.
“Hi,” he said finally.
“Hi.”
“Can I come back?” he asked. “Home?”
Lena closed her laptop and looked at him. He seemed tired—unshaven, guilty.
“Sash, if you’re here to start the dacha conversation again—”
“No,” he shook his head quickly. “No, Lena. I’m here to apologize.”
She didn’t answer.
“I was wrong,” Sasha said, stepping into the room and sitting opposite her. “Dad said a lot to me… long story short, I acted like an idiot. It’s your money. You earned it. You have every right to spend it however you want.”
“You mean that?”
“I do.” He rubbed his face with both hands. “Lena, I got scared. When you told me how much you make… I felt… defective. Like I wasn’t the ‘main’ one in the family anymore.”
“You don’t have to be the main one,” Lena said softly. “We’re partners, Sash. Equals.”
“I get it,” he said. “I really do—now.”
They fell silent. Outside, the wind rattled the windows; February was running out, spring was on its way.
“I’m still going on that trip,” Lena said. “It’s paid for.”
“I know. Go,” Sasha lifted his head and looked at her. “Maybe we both need a pause. Time to think.”
“Think about what?”
“About who we want to be. Together… or separately.”
Lena nodded. Something pinched in her chest—not pain, but the realization that for the first time they were speaking honestly.
“Alright,” she said. “Then this is the deal: I go for two weeks. When I’m back, we decide.”
“Deal.”
He stood, went to the kitchen, poured himself water. Lena watched him and thought that maybe this was what adult love looked like—not fireworks, not dependence, but the ability to negotiate. The ability to defend your boundaries without destroying the other person.
The hotel greeted her with warm wind and the smell of the sea. Lena stood on the balcony, staring at water shimmering in dozens of blues, and couldn’t quite believe she was there—she’d actually done it. She’d bought the trip in spite of everything.
The first few days she simply rested: lay on the beach, read books she’d downloaded in winter and never had time to open. She ate fresh fish in little tavernas, drank cold wine, walked barefoot on the sand.
On the fourth day she met Vika, a woman from Moscow who had come after her divorce.
“My husband wanted me at home with the kids,” Vika told her over dinner, “and I dreamed of starting my own business—a beauty salon. He’d say, ‘That’s silly, it’s money down the drain.’ Then he found someone else—younger, easier to manage. Want to know what I did after the divorce?”
“What?” Lena asked.
“I opened the salon. On borrowed money. This is my third year now—I paid it off ages ago. And I came here to celebrate: three years of freedom.”
They clinked glasses, and Lena thought life was a strange thing. Sometimes you had to lose something to finally find yourself.
She didn’t write to Sasha much—mostly sea photos and short messages: “It’s beautiful here,” “Tried octopus,” “Going on an экскурсия tomorrow.” He replied: “I’m glad for you,” “You look rested,” “I’m thinking about looking for a new job—something more interesting.”
Maybe, Lena thought as she read that last message, maybe we both needed this shove. This fight. To understand we’d been stuck, frozen in place.
She returned tanned and refreshed, with two suitcases—one full of clothes, the other full of gifts. Sasha met her at the airport with a bouquet of tulips.
“I’m sorry,” he said before she could speak. “I’m really sorry. I was a complete idiot.”
“You were,” Lena agreed, but she smiled.
They rode home in a taxi while Sasha told her he’d taken a new job—at a design firm, higher pay, a more flexible schedule.
“And my dad,” he added after a pause, “my dad decided to switch apartments. A two-room place on the first floor. He found an option where he won’t even have to pay extra. He said you were right.”
Lena looked at him.
“Seriously?”
“Seriously. He said, ‘Why do I need a dacha when I’ve lived in the city my whole life? I’m used to my neighbors, my shops nearby.’ He’s moving in May.”
“I’m glad,” Lena said quietly.
At home it smelled clean—Sasha had obviously tidied up. Tulips stood in a vase on the table, groceries were stacked in the fridge.
“I missed you,” he said, wrapping his arms around her from behind as she stood by the window, looking down at the familiar yard and familiar buildings. “A lot.”
“I missed you too,” Lena admitted—and it was true. She had missed him. But she’d also learned something in those two weeks: she could be alone. And she wasn’t afraid of it. That knowledge made her stronger.
“And the kitchen renovation?” Sasha asked. “Do you still want it?”
“I do.”
“Then let’s do it together,” he said. “I set some money aside. We can do it your way—replace the tiles, the wallpaper, the faucet.”
Lena turned to him and met his eyes.
“Together,” she repeated. “That’s the most important word, Sash. Together. Not you deciding for me, not me ordering you around—together.”
“Together,” he nodded. “I promise.”
They stood hugging in the middle of a kitchen with old wallpaper and cracked tiles, and Lena thought maybe this was happiness—not a perfect life without conflict, but the ability to move through conflict and stay human. Stay yourself.
Outside, evening was settling in; the city lights blinked on. And ahead of them was a whole life—renovations and travels, work and plans, arguments and reconciliations.
“You know,” Lena said, “Olya wants to open a second shop. She offered to make me a partner—invest in it.”
Sasha tensed for a second, then eased.
“And what do you think?”
“I think it’s a good idea.”
“Then let’s run the numbers,” he said. “We’ll calculate everything—together.”
Lena smiled. Yes, they would manage. They would learn. Because where there is respect, there is a chance.
And a chance is all you really need.