Zoya stood frozen in the entryway, her handbag clenched in her hand. Anton was at the door, rolling the car keys between his fingers, refusing to meet her eyes. They were supposed to go to Marina’s birthday party—Zoya’s best friend since their university days. Marina’s country house was about thirty kilometers away, and taking the subway and then a bus would mean wasting at least two hours.
“Anton, we agreed we’d go together. Marina’s expecting us at seven—I won’t make it…”
“You will,” he cut in, fastening his jacket. “I need the car for a meeting. Igor called—said there’s a promising business proposal. We’ll meet at a restaurant and talk it through.”
“Igor? What Igor?” Zoya blinked, genuinely baffled. “You’ve never mentioned him.”
“Because it’s my business,” Anton snapped. “Not yours. You wanted to see your friend—so go. Nobody’s stopping you.”
He opened the door, and a blast of raw October air swept into the apartment. Zoya shivered and pulled her cardigan tighter around her shoulders.
“Wait, but… We were invited as a couple. Marina asked about you—she’s making your favorite dishes…”
“I’m not going to your Marina,” Anton suddenly barked, spinning toward her. “I’m sick of wasting time at those little gatherings. You sit there and gossip about your silly women’s nonsense, and I’ve got more important things to do!”
Zoya flinched. In eight years of marriage she had grown used to his coldness, to the way he spoke down to her—but she hadn’t expected such blatant cruelty.
“Anton, what’s happening to you? Lately you’ve been—”
“Nothing is happening!” He slammed the door. “I’m just tired of pretending I care about your friends and your life. I have my own plans, understand? And you don’t really fit into them.”
She stood there staring at him. Anton pulled out his phone, typed a quick message to someone, and smirked.
“And don’t wait up tonight,” he added. “I’ll be late. Or I might not come back at all—if we stay up talking, I’ll just crash at Igor’s.”
“At Igor’s?” Zoya’s voice shook. “Anton, do you hear how that sounds?”
“I don’t care how it sounds!” He was already heading down the stairwell, tossing his words over his shoulder. “Live however you want, Zoya. I’ll live however I want. I’m done with this—family dinners, joint trips, your girlfriends… I’ve had enough.”
Zoya reached Marina’s place only around eight-thirty. In the crushed, overcrowded subway car and then the stuffy bus, she had plenty of time to replay everything. Anton’s words kept grinding in her head like sand: You don’t fit into my plans. What was that even supposed to mean?
Marina met her at the gate and immediately noticed that Anton wasn’t with her—and that Zoya’s eyes were swollen from crying.
“Zoya… what happened? Where’s Anton?”
“He had… something to do,” Zoya tried to smile, but it turned into a miserable twitch. “Marin, can I stay the night? I don’t want to go back home today.”
In the living room—bright with balloons and string lights—guests were already gathered. Zoya did her best to talk, to laugh at jokes, to look present, but her thoughts kept snapping back to the morning. When had it all gone wrong? When had Anton become so vicious?
Around eleven, as people started to leave, Zoya’s phone rang. A woman she didn’t know asked:
“Is this Zoya? Anton Sergeyev’s wife?”
“Yes… Who is this?”
“My name is Kristina. I…” The woman hesitated. “This is really uncomfortable, but I have to tell you something. It’s about your husband.”
Zoya’s stomach dropped. She stepped out onto the terrace, away from the noise.
“I’m listening.”
“I work at the Golden Horseshoe restaurant. Your husband was here today… with a woman. Young—around twenty-five. They were in a private VIP room, drinking wine, laughing. And then…”
“And then what?” Zoya’s voice sounded distant, almost hollow.
“He paid for dinner with your shared card. I know because I saw the name—‘Z. Sergeyeva.’ And also… he took off his wedding ring. Put it in his pocket when the woman went to the restroom. I’m sorry. I just thought you deserved to know.”
Zoya ended the call and leaned against the ice-cold railing.
So that was the truth. No Igor. No business deal. Just another woman—young, beautiful, probably. And Zoya was expected to ride the subway like some kind of servant while her husband entertained his mistress on her money.
“Zoy, are you okay?” Marina came out and draped a blanket over her shoulders. “You’re shaking.”
“He’s cheating on me,” Zoya said aloud, and the words made her chest feel a fraction lighter. “Anton. He has someone else.”
Marina hugged her, and Zoya finally let herself cry. Not for long—anger quickly pushed the hurt aside. Anger at herself for not seeing it, anger at Anton for the betrayal, anger at the unknown woman who had stepped into her life without shame.
“You know what,” Marina said, pouring her a splash of cognac. “Stop crawling for him. How long are you going to live like that? He doesn’t respect you, Zoy. He hasn’t for a long time. And you keep enduring it, hoping he’ll change. He won’t.”
“But we’ve been together eight years…”
“And?” Marina sat down next to her. “For the last few years he’s been wiping his feet on you, and you let him. Remember when he forbade you from taking that massage course? Said it was a stupid hobby for housewives. And your dream of opening your own salon—he mocked you, said you didn’t have the brains to run a business.”
Zoya stayed quiet. Marina was right. For years Anton had been dismantling her self-worth piece by piece—her plans, her ambitions, her wants. And she had swallowed it, thinking that’s how families worked: the husband is in charge, the husband decides.
“And there’s something else,” Marina continued. “Your grandmother’s inheritance—where is that money?”
“Anton invested it… in his business.”
“What business, Zoya?” Marina’s voice hardened. “Have you ever seen any documents? Any reports? Has he ever shown you even a ruble of profit?”
Zoya shook her head. Three years earlier she had inherited her grandmother’s two-bedroom apartment in the city center. Anton talked her into selling it—promised he’d invest the money into his project and within a year they’d buy a house. Three years had passed, and he hadn’t mentioned it since.
Zoya didn’t go home until morning. Anton wasn’t there—judging by the untouched bed, he hadn’t returned at all. On the kitchen table lay a note: “Went on a business trip for a week. Money’s on the card.”
Zoya crumpled it and threw it into the trash. A business trip—sure. When she checked their banking app, she saw that fifty thousand rubles had been withdrawn from their joint account the day before. The restaurant wasn’t his only expense.
The next few days moved in a strange numb fog. Zoya went to work at the travel agency where she was a manager, came home, cooked dinner out of habit for two, then threw away the extra portion. Anton didn’t call. He only sent brief messages: Everything’s fine. Meetings are going well. Don’t miss me.
On the fourth day of his absence, Zoya walked into his home office and decided to clean. Anton usually forbade her from entering—don’t touch my papers, it’s none of your business. But now she didn’t care.
In the bottom drawer she found a folder. Inside were documents: the contract from the sale of her grandmother’s apartment, bank statements, and various receipts. The more carefully she read, the colder she became. The proceeds from the sale—nearly five million rubles—had been transferred to an account belonging to a company called StroyInvest LLC. The company director listed was Viktor Antonovich Sergeyev—Anton’s father.
And it only got worse.
There were photos of Anton with a blonde woman Zoya had never seen: at a seaside resort, in restaurants, at the theater. The dates written on the back showed the pictures were over a year old. In some he had his arm around her waist; in others he was kissing her.
The final blow was a chat log—printed out for some reason. Anton had written to his father:
“Dad, everything’s going according to plan. Zoyka suspects nothing. I’ll hang on for another six months, we’ll file for divorce, and the apartment will end up mine—after all, I’ve ‘put so much into it’ with ‘our’ money. Then I can marry Lena. She’s pregnant already, by the way.”
The pages slipped from Zoya’s fingers.
Pregnant. His mistress was pregnant.
And Zoya—his legal wife—had spent two years undergoing fertility treatment, crying after every negative test, while Anton “comforted” her, saying children weren’t the main thing, that they’d be fine just the two of them…
A wave of rage crashed over her. No—not rage. Something wilder. The kind that makes your vision darken and your hands shake.
Zoya grabbed the desk lamp and hurled it into the wall. Then folders, papers, photos followed. She tore the room apart with fierce satisfaction, pouring out the pain and humiliation she had swallowed for years.
“Bastard!” she screamed, smashing his awards and certificates against the floor. “You filthy liar!”
When she had no strength left, Zoya sank to the floor among the wreckage and pulled out her phone. She called Marina.
“Marin, I need your help. And I need your lawyer brother’s number. I’m divorcing that monster—but first I’m getting back everything he stole from me.”
Anton came back three days later, cheerful and pleased with himself. Zoya met him in the entryway, outwardly calm.
“Hi, sweetheart,” he said, kissing her cheek carelessly. “How’d you manage without me? Miss me?”
“So much,” Zoya replied with a smile. “Especially our money—the money you transferred to your father.”
Anton froze. Then he laughed, but it came out sharp and uneasy.
“What nonsense is that? What money?”
“The money from my grandmother’s apartment. Five million. To StroyInvest’s account. Or did you forget?”
“You went through my papers?!”
“Yes, I did!” Zoya’s voice rose. “And do you know what else I found? Photos of you with your pregnant mistress! And messages to your dear daddy where you two discuss how to rob me blind!”
“Don’t you dare talk about my father like that!”
“I’ll talk however I want!” Zoya shouted. “This is my home—my apartment—and you’re getting out.”
“Your apartment?” Anton laughed. “Without me you’re nothing! I’ve supported you all these years!”
“Supported me?” Zoya pulled a thick stack of documents from her bag. “Here are the bank statements. Over eight years of marriage I earned one and a half times what you did. I just handed you my money, and you spent it on God knows what. Actually—now we do know. You spent it on Lena.”
“None of your business!”
“It is now,” Zoya said, placing a copy of a report on the entryway table. “The investigator thinks differently. Fraud on a massive scale. Forged documents used to move money. And by the way, your father is already giving statements. He sold you out completely—just to keep himself out of prison.”
Anton went pale. He grabbed the papers and scanned them.
“You… you couldn’t have…”
“I could. And I did.” Zoya stepped close. “Do you know what makes me angriest? Not even the cheating. It’s that you truly believed I was stupid. That I’d tolerate your rudeness, your contempt, your humiliations forever.”
“Zoya, let’s talk calmly…”
“No.” She shoved him back. “Enough. For eight years I listened to your ‘we’ll talk,’ your ‘you don’t understand,’ your ‘it’s none of your business.’ I’m done.”
Anton backed away. He had never seen her like this.
“Zoya, listen… this is a misunderstanding. Lena—she means nothing. And the baby isn’t mine, I checked…”
“How could you check if it isn’t even born yet? And honestly—I don’t care.” Zoya grabbed his jacket from the hook and flung it at his face. “Get out. Now. And I don’t want to see you here again.”
“This is my home too!”
“No.” Zoya’s voice turned glacial. “This apartment belongs to my parents. You’ve never been registered here. So get out.”
“You’ll regret this,” Anton tried to sound threatening, but it landed weak.
“You’re the one who’ll regret it,” Zoya said, opening the door. “And by the way—your Lena already knows about two other women you were sleeping with. What, you thought you covered your tracks? I sent her the photos. Along with all your promises to marry her—the same promises you give everyone. She filed a complaint too. Turns out you borrowed money from her ‘for business’ as well. And the baby? Well… good luck with that.”
Anton bolted out. Zoya slammed the door with satisfaction, turned every lock, and for good measure jammed a chair against it before collapsing onto it, drained.
Her phone rang almost immediately—Anton calling again and again. Zoya blocked his number and went to bed, sprawling across the entire mattress like it finally belonged to her alone.
A month and a half passed. The divorce went through quickly—Anton didn’t fight once he realized Zoya had enough evidence to bury him. Getting the money back took court, but she recovered almost all of it: Anton’s father panicked at the threat of criminal charges and transferred four million back, promising to send the rest soon.
Zoya sat in her new beauty studio—small but cozy, decorated in soft peach tones. Her dream had finally come true. With the same inheritance money she rented the space, bought equipment, and hired two technicians. Business was steady; word of mouth brought clients, and the women who came left happy.
The front door chimed. Zoya looked up from her paperwork—and went still.
Anton stood on the threshold. But not the Anton she remembered. The polish was gone. He looked worn, almost defeated.
“Zoya,” he said, stepping inside. “I need your help.”
“Get out,” Zoya said, rising from her chair.
“Please, hear me out! Lena… she turned out to be a con artist. The baby isn’t mine—the test proved it. She just wanted money, and when she found out I didn’t have any, she left. My father won’t speak to me—says I set him up. I’m having trouble at work. Zoya, I understand everything now. I was wrong. Let’s start over.”
Zoya burst out laughing. She laughed until tears streamed down her face, gripping the edge of the desk to keep steady.
“Start over?” she managed through the laughter. “Anton, do you even hear yourself?”
“But we were together for so many years…”
“No.” The anger surged again. “We weren’t together. I was your maid, your cash machine, your punching bag—and you were my tormentor.”
“Don’t say that…”
“I will say it.” Zoya came out from behind the desk. “You know what? I’m grateful to you. If not for your arrogance, your contempt, I would have kept enduring it my whole life. And now I have everything—work I love, friends, self-respect. And you have nothing. And that’s fair.”
“You weren’t like this,” Anton murmured.
“You made me like this.” Zoya flung the door wide. “Now get out. And if you show up again, I’ll call security.”
“Zoya, please…”
“Out!” she shouted so loudly that a frightened nail tech peeked from the next room. “Get out of here!”
Anton stumbled outside. Zoya slammed the door, flipped the sign to Closed, and sank onto the treatment couch. Her hands were trembling, but her chest felt light. She’d done it. She’d fought back. She hadn’t broken.
Her phone buzzed—Marina had sent a vacation photo. When are you joining us? The sea is incredible!
Zoya smiled and started typing a reply. Life went on. Her new life—real life.
That evening she heard from mutual acquaintances that Anton tried to get a job with an old friend, but was turned away—no one wanted to deal with someone tied to fraud allegations. Lena sued him for emotional damages and deception. His father cut him out of the inheritance.
Zoya turned off her phone and made herself tea. Outside, the sun was setting, painting the studio walls in warm gold. Somewhere in that cold October city wandered the man who once made her take the subway while he drove his car—who believed she didn’t deserve respect.
She took a sip of tea and picked up her tablet—she needed to review résumés for new hires. The studio was growing, regular clients were coming back. Everything was unfolding exactly as she’d dreamed.
And Anton? Well—everyone gets what they earn. He wanted to humiliate her, crush her, use her. In the end, he was the one humiliated and crushed. And Zoya felt no pity, no anger—only indifference. He was nobody to her now. An empty space. A bad memory with no power over her anymore.