Eduard sat at the kitchen table, calmly spreading butter over a slice of bread. His movements were slow and measured, as if he were talking about the weather rather than a decision that could change their entire life.
“She’ll sleep on the sofa in the living room,” he said calmly, taking a bite of his sandwich. “It’s temporary, Sveta. A month or two at most.”
Svetlana leaned against the kitchen counter, trying to process what she had just heard. They had been renting this apartment for the second year now. Thirty-eight square meters that barely fit the two of them. A kitchen-living room and one bedroom — that was their whole world.
“Edik, are you serious? We barely have enough space for the two of us! And now you want Galina Petrovna to move in here too?”
“If you don’t want it, rent yourself a separate apartment,” her husband interrupted without even looking up from his plate. “I can’t abandon my mother when she’s in a difficult situation. She sold her apartment to pay off my father’s debts. She has nowhere to go.”
Svetlana froze.
In two years of living together, she had grown used to many things — his late nights, his refusal to help around the house, his constant remarks about how little she earned. But this…
“Wait,” she said, sitting across from him and trying to keep her voice steady. “Are you suggesting that I move out of our shared apartment so your mother can live here?”
“Svetlana, don’t twist my words. I’m giving you options. Either we all live here together, or you rent something for yourself for a while. What’s so terrible about that?”
“Why doesn’t your mother rent a place for herself?”
Eduard grimaced as if she had suggested something outrageous.
“She doesn’t have any money right now. None at all. She used everything to pay off the debts. You and I both work. We have a stable income. We can afford two apartments.”
“We can barely afford one!”
“That’s you who can barely afford anything with your fifteen thousand a month at that museum. I earn decent money at the construction company.”
Svetlana clenched her fists under the table. There it was again. She worked as a guide at a history museum, and yes, the pay was low. But she loved her job, and Eduard had known that from the very beginning.
“Fine,” she said suddenly, surprising even herself. “I’ll think about your offer.”
Eduard raised his eyebrows in surprise. He had clearly expected a scandal, tears, maybe even hysteria. But Svetlana simply stood up and walked into the bedroom.
“Great,” he called after her. “Mom is coming in three days. You have time to think it over.”
The next two days passed in strange silence. Svetlana went to work, came home, and cooked dinner. Eduard was satisfied. His wife had accepted the situation without unnecessary drama. He even became a little more affectionate, apparently feeling something close to gratitude.
On the third day, exactly at noon, the doorbell rang. Eduard rushed to open it.
“Mom!” he said, hugging a short, plump woman with dyed reddish hair. “Come in, make yourself comfortable!”
Galina Petrovna swept into the apartment, looking around with an assessing eye.
“Edik, my dear, what a little hole you live in! How do the two of you even manage here?”
“It’s fine, Mom. We manage. Sveta, come out and say hello!”
Svetlana came out of the bedroom carrying two suitcases. She was wearing her coat, and there were keys in her hand.
“Hello, Galina Petrovna. Make yourself at home. I’m just leaving.”
Eduard stared at the suitcases in confusion.
“Where are you going? On a business trip?”
“No. You told me to rent a separate apartment. So I did. I found a suitable place yesterday, and today I’m moving.”
“But… we didn’t agree on anything final…”
“Yes, we did,” Svetlana said calmly. “You said either we all live together, or I rent my own place. I chose the second option.”
Galina Petrovna watched the scene with barely hidden satisfaction.
“That’s right, dear. No need for three people to crowd each other here. Edik and I will manage perfectly well together. Right, son?”
Eduard was still trying to understand what was happening.
“Sveta, wait. Let’s talk about this. You can’t just take your things and leave like that!”
“I can, and I am. You suggested it yourself. I’m simply following your advice.”
She walked past her stunned husband toward the door. At the threshold, she turned around.
“By the way, the rent is paid until the end of the month. After that, it’s your problem. I rented my own place, just like you told me to. Now I’ll be paying for it.”
The door closed.
Eduard stood in the hallway, not knowing what to do.
“Oh, let her go!” Galina Petrovna snorted. “A gray little mouse. She only ruined your life. You’ll find someone better! And for now, we’ll live together, just like in the good old days.”
Eduard nodded automatically, but anxiety settled somewhere deep inside him. Something had gone wrong. Very wrong. Not at all the way he had planned.
A week passed.
Eduard tried calling Svetlana, but she didn’t answer. At her workplace, they told him she had taken vacation leave.
Meanwhile, chaos ruled the apartment. Galina Petrovna had spread her belongings everywhere, taken over all the closets, and filled the bathroom with her cosmetics.
“Mom, maybe you should still look for your own apartment?” Eduard asked cautiously during dinner.
“Why would I?” Galina Petrovna said indignantly. “I’m perfectly fine here. And I have no money, you know that.”
“But Sveta used to pay half the rent.”
“Then let her keep paying! Nobody kicked her out!”
“Mom, she moved out. She won’t pay anymore.”
“What an ungrateful woman! Well, never mind. You’ll manage. You have a good salary.”
Eduard said nothing. His salary had been enough for half the rent and his personal expenses. Now he would have to cover the full rent, plus support his mother, who clearly had no intention of looking for work.
On the tenth day, something unexpected happened.
That evening, while he and his mother were eating dinner, the doorbell rang. Eduard opened the door and found a courier standing there.
“Eduard Nikolaevich Melnikov?”
“Yes, that’s me.”
“Please sign here. Documents for you.”
Eduard signed and took the envelope. Back in the kitchen, he opened it — and froze.
“What is it?” his mother asked, helping herself to salad.
“Divorce papers,” Eduard breathed out.
“What?!” Galina Petrovna dropped her spoon. “How dare she?”
Eduard read through the documents. Svetlana was asking for a divorce and the division of marital property. They didn’t really have much property — everything in the apartment was rented. But there was a list of debts she was asking to divide.
“There’s… something here about a loan in my name,” Eduard said, confused.
Galina Petrovna went pale.
“That’s… that’s not important. The main thing is that she wants a divorce! Go to her immediately and sort this out!”
“I don’t know where she lives.”
“Then find out! Are you a man or not?”
Eduard dialed Svetlana’s number. This time, she answered.
“Sveta, what are these documents? What divorce? Let’s meet and talk!”
“There is nothing to talk about, Eduard. You made your choice, and I made mine.”
“But we can’t just…”
“We can. Either you sign the papers voluntarily, or I file through the court without your consent. Your choice.”
“Sveta, have you lost your mind? What is all this about? Just because my mother is staying with us temporarily?”
“Temporarily?” Svetlana’s voice turned ironic. “Edik, your mother already acts like the apartment belongs to her. She isn’t going anywhere, and you know it.”
“Even if that’s true, is that really a reason for divorce?”
“The reason for divorce is that you suggested I move out of our home to make room for your mommy. The reason is that you humiliated me and practically showed me the door. The reason is that in two years, you never once put me first. Is that enough?”
“Sveta…”
“And one more thing, Edik. About that loan in your name. Your mother took it out three months ago using forged documents. Yes, I know. I accidentally saw the papers the last time she visited us. Five hundred thousand rubles. I wonder where she spent it.”
Eduard turned to his mother. She sat pale, gripping the edge of the table.
“That’s slander!” Galina Petrovna cried. “She’s lying!”
“Check your credit history, Edik. Then sign the divorce papers. You have one week.”
The line went dead.
Eduard spent the next morning at the bank. The loan officer confirmed his worst fear — a loan for five hundred thousand rubles had indeed been taken out in his name three months earlier. The signature was forged, but proving it would be difficult.
“How could you?!” he shouted when he returned home.
Galina Petrovna shrank back on the sofa.
“Edik, my son, I wanted to do the right thing! I needed money to pay off your father’s debts! Otherwise, they would have taken the apartment!”
“You told me you sold the apartment!”
“I… I was going to. But the buyer backed out at the last moment. And the collectors wouldn’t wait! What was I supposed to do?”
“Not forge my documents!” Eduard paced the room furiously. “Do you understand that I now owe half a million? With interest, it’s more than seven hundred thousand!”
“I’ll pay it back! As soon as I sell the apartment, I’ll pay everything back!”
“Who needs your wrecked one-room apartment in an old Khrushchev building? And why did Sveta know about this when I didn’t?”
Galina Petrovna burst into tears.
“She saw the documents by accident. I begged her not to tell you so you wouldn’t be upset. I promised her I would fix everything myself.”
“And she kept quiet for three months?”
“She was probably waiting for the right moment to hurt you as much as possible! What a snake!”
Eduard grabbed his head. Everything was falling apart. His wife was leaving. A massive debt was hanging over him. His mother had lied and manipulated him. How was he supposed to fix any of it?
He called Svetlana again.
“You knew about the loan and kept silent!” he blurted out instead of saying hello.
“Yes, I knew. Your mother begged me not to tell you. I was a fool to agree. I should have gone straight to the police.”
“You could have warned me!”
“I could have. But your dear mother swore she would settle everything. And I believed her. That was my mistake. But now it’s no longer my problem.”
“Sveta, let’s meet. We need to discuss everything.”
“Come to the café on Sadovaya tomorrow at three. Bring the divorce papers.”
She gave him the address and hung up.
Eduard turned to his mother.
“Pack your things. Tomorrow you’re going back home.”
“But Edik…”
“No buts! You created this mess, and I’m the one who has to clean it up. You’re leaving. That’s final.”
Galina Petrovna cried even harder, but Eduard remained firm. His life had turned into a nightmare, and he still couldn’t understand how it had happened.
The café was small and cozy. Svetlana was already waiting for him at a table by the window.
She looked… different.
At first, Eduard couldn’t understand what had changed. A new hairstyle? No. Makeup? It seemed the same. Then it hit him — she looked calm. Peaceful. As if she had finally put down a heavy burden.
“Hi,” he said, sitting across from her.
“Hi. Did you bring the documents?”
“Sveta, let’s talk first. Maybe we shouldn’t make such a drastic decision…”
“We should,” she interrupted. “Edik, I have made my decision. It is final.”
“But why? Because of Mom? She’s gone now! I kicked her out!”
Svetlana shook her head.
“It’s not about your mother. It’s about you. About how easily you told me to get out of our home. About how you didn’t even think about my feelings. About how you always put me last.”
“That’s not true!”
“Oh, really?” Svetlana raised her voice for the first time. “Your friends are more important than me. Your work is more important. Your mother is more important. For two years, I tolerated your neglect, hoping you would change. Hoping you would start appreciating what we had. But then you told me to move out as if I were a piece of furniture you could simply move aside.”
“I thought it was temporary…”
“No, you didn’t think at all. You never think about other people. Only about yourself and your own comfort.”
Eduard fell silent. There was truth in her words — bitter, unpleasant truth.
“And the loan? You could have warned me…”
“Yes, I could have. And that was my mistake. I believed your mother when she said she would fix it. But you know what? If you had ever paid attention to what was going on in your own family instead of only caring about yourself, you would have noticed it on your own. But you didn’t care.”
“What am I supposed to do with the debt now?”
“That’s your problem. You can file a police report against your mother for fraud. You can pay it yourself. You can sell her apartment. It has nothing to do with me anymore.”
“Sveta, can you really just erase everything like this? Two years of marriage…”
“For two years, I tried to build a family with a man who didn’t need one. You needed a convenient woman beside you — someone to cook, clean, and keep quiet. But I don’t want to be convenient anymore. I want to be happy.”
She stood up from the table.
“Sign the documents and send them to the address listed there. If you refuse, we’ll meet in court. And yes, I hired a good lawyer. He’ll help me recover half of all the debts you accumulated during our marriage. Including your mother’s loan.”
“That’s blackmail!”
“That’s justice. You pushed me out of the home. I’m leaving your life. Fair enough.”
She walked toward the exit, but at the door she turned around.
“You know, Edik, I should thank you. If you hadn’t suggested that I move out, I would have kept putting up with everything for a long time. But you freed me yourself — from you, from your toxic mother, from that miserable apartment where we were barely surviving. I rented a lovely studio closer to work. Small, but mine. A place where nobody will tell me what to do. A place where I can finally live instead of just survive.”
The café door closed behind her with the soft ring of a bell.
Eduard remained sitting at the table, staring at the divorce papers. In the section marked “reason,” it said: “Irreconcilable differences and impossibility of further cohabitation.”
That was it. The end.
He had lost his wife, gained a huge debt, remained in a rented apartment he now had to pay for alone, and finally understood that he had no one to blame but himself.
His phone vibrated.
A text from his mother: “Son, I have nowhere to live. I can’t sell the apartment — it’s been seized because of the debts. Can I come back to you? Just for a little while, I promise.”
Eduard cursed under his breath.
To hell with all of this.
He placed some money on the table for the coffee he had never even ordered and stepped outside into the falling snow. In his pocket were the divorce papers. On his phone were messages from his mother. In his soul, there was only emptiness.
And somewhere across the city, Svetlana was making herself tea in her small but cozy studio apartment. On the wall hung a calendar where today’s date was circled in red marker.
The day of freedom.
The day she stopped being convenient and became herself.
On the table lay a ticket to Saint Petersburg. She had long dreamed of going there to visit the Hermitage, but Eduard had always said it was a waste of money. Now nobody could forbid her anymore.
Nobody.
Svetlana smiled and lifted her cup of tea as if it were a glass of champagne.
“To a new life,” she said softly. “Without toxic people, without humiliation, without the need to endure.”
At that same moment, Eduard stood at an ATM, checking his balance. He had enough money to cover the rent for one more month if he saved on absolutely everything. After that, he would either have to find a cheaper place or take in a roommate.
He couldn’t go back to his mother — his pride wouldn’t allow it. Besides, he had his own scores to settle with her now.
The snow grew heavier, turning into a real blizzard. Eduard raised the collar of his jacket and walked home. Back to the empty apartment where no one was waiting for him. Where his mother’s blanket still lay on the sofa, and one of Svetlana’s forgotten blouses still hung in the closet.
He took out his phone and tried calling his wife one last time.
“The subscriber is unavailable.”
She had changed her number.
She had removed him from her life completely.
“What have you done, you idiot?” he shouted into the emptiness.
But it was too late.
Far too late.
Three months later, the landlady threw him out for failing to pay the rent. He had no choice but to move back in with his mother, into her debt-seized apartment, where the hot water had already been cut off and they were threatening to disconnect the electricity too.
Galina Petrovna greeted him with tears of joy.
“Well, isn’t this wonderful, son! Now we’ll live together, just like I always wanted!”
Eduard silently walked into his old childhood room, which over the years had turned into a storage space for his mother’s junk. He sat down on the old creaking sofa and covered his face with his hands.
He had received exactly what he wanted — to live with his mother.
Only the price had been far too high.
His wife, a normal apartment, his dignity — all of it was now in the past.
Meanwhile, Svetlana was returning from Saint Petersburg, full of impressions and plans for the future. In her bag was a souvenir — a small jasper cat figurine.
The cat was smiling.
And Svetlana was smiling too.
Her life was only just beginning.