The manager was holding the card terminal, and beside her lay a printed receipt showing 49,280 rubles.
That was only the deposit.
The entire banquet would cost almost one hundred thousand. My husband was sitting just a few steps away, finishing his salad and pretending we had simply come here for dinner after work.
He asked for my card like he always did
Anton was the one who invited me to the restaurant. He chose the place himself, booked the table, and even texted me during the day asking me not to be late.
That kind of planning was completely unlike him. Usually, he remembered dinner only when I was already on my way home or standing at the stove.
I was actually pleased. After nine years together, our life had become predictable: work, grocery shopping, household chores. I thought my husband had simply decided that we should spend an evening alone together.
We ordered hot dishes, salads, and tea. Anton spent most of the evening looking at his phone. At first, he said he was messaging someone about work. Then he stepped outside to take a call.
 
The waitress brought dessert cutlery, placed the spoons on the table, and leaned closer to me.
“Don’t give your husband your card,” she whispered so quietly I almost didn’t hear her.
I thought I had misunderstood.
“What?”
She glanced toward the entrance. Anton was standing there with his back to the dining room.
“He came here earlier today. He arranged a banquet. He said his wife would come tonight and pay the deposit.”
Then she immediately walked away to another table.
Anton returned about a minute later, sat down, and held out his hand.
“Give me the card. I’ll pay. Their terminal is at the front desk.”
He knew my PIN. We had always handed each other our bank cards without thinking twice—at supermarkets, gas stations, when paying for deliveries. Until that moment, I had never considered it strange.
“How much was dinner?” I asked.
“About four thousand. Come on, I’ll be quick.”
I put my wallet back into my handbag.
“We’ll go together.”
He went silent for a second.
“Marina, why are you starting this?”
The strange thing was that I hadn’t started anything yet.
At the front desk was a reservation for twenty-eight people
 
The manager was waiting for us. In front of her was a printed banquet menu.
A private room, appetizers, a choice of two main courses, table decorations.
At the bottom of the page it said:
“Larisa’s Birthday. Deposit — 50%.”
Larisa was Anton’s older sister. She would turn fifty-one in twelve days.
“Anton Sergeyevich, everything has been confirmed,” the manager said. “You can pay 49,280 rubles now, and the remaining balance can be paid on the day of the event.”
I looked at my husband.
“What event?”
The manager fell silent and placed the terminal on the counter.
“Marina, let’s not do this here,” Anton said.
“Where should we do it? You’ve already chosen the room, the menu, and the number of guests. Apparently, all that’s left is for me to tap my card.”
“It’s not your card. It’s ours.”
There were 214,600 rubles in that account. It included my salary and the money we had been saving for a new kitchen. Anton had contributed some of it, and so had I, but we had never once discussed spending nearly one hundred thousand rubles on a birthday gift for his sister.
I took out my phone and froze the card through the banking app.
“What are you doing?” Anton asked.
 
“Making sure you don’t pay for the banquet.”
“I already promised Larisa.”
“When?”
“Last week.”
“And when were you planning to tell me?”
He looked away.
“Today.”
“Before paying or after?”
Anton didn’t answer.
The manager politely suggested that we move aside so we wouldn’t hold up the other customers.
I asked whether the reservation could be canceled.
“It hasn’t been confirmed yet,” she explained. “No deposit has been paid.”
“Don’t cancel anything,” Anton interrupted. “We’ll sort this out.”
“We already have.”
His sister knew exactly whose card would be used
 
Anton’s phone rang while we were still standing at the counter.
Larisa’s name appeared on the screen.
He declined the call, but she immediately called again.
“Answer it,” I said.
Anton walked toward the window. He spoke quietly, but Larisa’s voice was loud enough for me to hear.
“Did you pay? They told me there was some kind of delay.”
It turned out that Larisa herself had chosen the banquet room, approved the dishes, and already invited the guests.
Anton had told her that we would pay for the celebration.
We.
I asked him to give me the phone.
“Larisa, I’m not paying for this.”
She was silent for a moment.
 
“Anton said you two had decided to give me this as a gift.”
“Anton decided. He never asked me.”
“But we’re family.”
“Exactly. That’s why expenses this large should be discussed beforehand.”
“The guests have already been invited. What am I supposed to do now? Humiliate myself in front of everyone?”
In nine years, Larisa had personally called me maybe ten times. Usually, it was because she needed the number of a repairman, wanted me to collect a parcel near my workplace, or urgently needed some recipe.
But now, suddenly, she remembered that we were family.
Anton took the phone away from me.
“Enough of this performance. Larisa only turns fifty-one once.”
“And we use our kitchen every single day.”
It sounded almost ridiculous when I said it, but I wasn’t in the mood to laugh.
Anton suggested that we at least pay the deposit and then gradually put the money back.
His plan was to return it from his salary into our shared household budget. In other words, he wanted to take our savings first, then contribute less money at home for several months and call that “repaying” us.
I only unlocked my card when it was time to pay for our actual dinner.
The bill was 3,740 rubles.
Anton stayed behind, talking to his sister.
I went home alone.
The banquet turned into a family dinner
The next day, Larisa wrote in the family group chat that I had put her birthday celebration at risk.
My mother-in-law was the first to respond.
“You don’t treat family like this.”
One of Anton’s cousins reacted with a heart.
Everyone else stayed silent.
Anton came home late that evening. He told me I had embarrassed him in front of the restaurant staff and made him look like a liar in front of his sister.
“And what did you make yourself look like in front of me?” I asked.
He didn’t answer.
He took a pot from the refrigerator, reheated his dinner, and ate alone in the kitchen.
 
The following morning, I transferred our savings to a separate account with no additional card attached to it.
I simply didn’t want to keep wondering what other amounts Anton might have promised to someone on our behalf.
Two days later, he told his sister that he could give her twenty thousand rubles from his next bonus.
Larisa replied that twenty thousand wouldn’t even be enough to put together a proper table.
In the end, her birthday was celebrated at my mother-in-law’s apartment.
Twelve people came instead of twenty-eight.
 
Anton spent the morning buying groceries from the list his sister had given him and later brought folding chairs from our garage.
Larisa removed me from the family group chat.
A week later, the kitchen cabinet door fell off again.
Anton silently took out a screwdriver and finally installed the new magnetic catch.