Arthur had long stopped living under the same roof with his parents. After graduating from university, he stayed in Moscow — a city full of opportunities, noise, lights, and a wild pace. There he got a promising job, rented a cozy apartment overlooking an old park, and began a new chapter of his life. His parents, people with a different worldview, still lived in a quiet suburban village near Moscow, where time seemed frozen in the distant past. They lived modestly, simply, in a rustic way — with a vegetable garden, chickens, an old TV, and strict views on life.
He rarely called them. Sometimes there was no time, sometimes no energy, and sometimes just the thought of talking to them caused a slight tension. But one day, after almost two years, Arthur suddenly felt it was time to return. Not just to visit — he wanted to introduce them to Lina. His fiancée. His love. His future.
“Mom, Dad… This is Lina. My fiancée,” he said proudly, opening the door of his childhood home.
In the doorway appeared a tall, fragile-looking girl with a bold, almost defiant style. Her green hair sparkled like spring leaves, her makeup was bright and unusual, and tattoos on her neck and arms seemed to tell a story only she knew. She wore a short leather jacket, ripped jeans, and heavy boots that looked like they could withstand any storm.
Arthur’s father was the first to rise from his chair. His face instantly went pale as if he had seen a ghost from childhood fears. His mother only pressed her hand to her mouth, trying to hold back a scream escaping her throat.
“Hello…” Lina said quietly but clearly, taking a cautious step forward.
Arthur’s mother instinctively recoiled, as if Lina were not a person but something foreign and incomprehensible.
“Is this a joke?” the father finally spat out, clenching his fists. “Is this your fiancée, Arthur?”
“Yes!” he answered sharply, feeling a wave of protest rising inside him. “We love each other. What the hell is the problem?”
“Problem?” his mother shouted, unable to hold back her emotions. “Look at her! She looks… like a homeless person! Like she came off the street! What will the neighbors think? And Grandma? She’ll have a heart attack!”
Lina lowered her eyes. She tried not to let tears escape, but her fingers visibly trembled. In her gaze was not resentment but pain — old, familiar, as if she had been through this before.
“We live in 2025,” Arthur said calmly but firmly. “She’s an artist. Works with children. A volunteer at an animal shelter. She’s the kindest and most sincere person I’ve ever known. And you judge by appearances?”
His mother sank down onto a stool as if her strength suddenly left her. His father silently walked past without looking at Lina and went out to the yard, leaving a thick silence behind him.
“Sorry, Lina…” Arthur whispered, squeezing her hand. “I didn’t think it would be so… harsh.”
But Lina suddenly straightened up. Something greater than resentment sparked in her eyes — pride.
“I understand everything. I also grew up in a family that didn’t accept me. But I didn’t break. I became myself. And if your parents ever want to truly know me, I’ll be ready.”
She looked him in the eyes and squeezed his hand tightly.
“Let’s go home.”
Outside the window, as if in response to her words, a warm, fine rain began. Drops ran down the glass as if washing away the first offense, erasing the traces of first misunderstanding.
The long drive home passed in silence. Arthur gripped the steering wheel so tightly his knuckles turned white. Inside him raged anger, shame, and guilt all at once. Lina sat quietly, looking out the window, with only tiredness hiding in the corners of her eyes, as if she knew — this was only the beginning.
“Sorry,” he finally broke the silence. “I really thought they would at least try to understand you.”
“Arthur,” she answered softly. “It’s not your fault. It’s their fear. Not mine.”
“But they’re my parents…”
“And you’re an adult. You can choose who to build your life with. You chose me. That’s what matters. Everything else will either pass or stay in the past.”
Days passed. They returned to their usual life — morning coffee, work, Lina’s workshop, evenings by the fireplace under the warm glow of a table lamp. Arthur tried not to remember that visit. He thought it was settled. But one evening, while Lina was cooking dinner, the doorbell rang.
He opened it — and his mother stood on the doorstep. Without warning. In a simple jacket, holding a bag of homemade pies.
“Hello, son.”
Arthur froze.
“Mom?.. What happened?”
“May I come in? I… I didn’t come to argue. I want to talk.”
He let her in. Lina came out of the kitchen, saw her mother-in-law — and froze. The two women met eyes. A few seconds felt like eternity.
“Forgive me,” Arthur’s mother suddenly said, lowering her eyes. “I was scared. Not of you personally. But of everything I don’t understand. I thought it over. I realized that you are a person, not a cover. That you won’t ruin my son but, on the contrary, have already made him better.”
Lina didn’t immediately believe it. But then, cautiously, as if afraid to scare away the moment, she stepped forward and took the bag from the woman’s hands.
“Thank you,” she simply replied.
And now they were sitting at the table, drinking tea with pies, laughing, remembering how the mother herself in her youth wore green eyeshadow and wrote poems in notebooks in the margins.
It wasn’t a perfect fairy tale. It was real life, where fears sometimes have to give way to understanding.
Two weeks passed since the mother’s visit. Everything was going well. She called Lina, came to visit, sent photos of homemade cutlets, even once asked for advice on a gift for a niece. Arthur watched with relief as a thread of trust began to grow between the two most important people in his life.
But one day he came home earlier than usual and found a tense silence. His mother sat at the table, arms crossed, with a stone face. Lina stood by the window, not turning around.
“What happened?” he asked cautiously.
“Ask her,” his mother hissed. “Ask why she hid that she was married. And that she has a son in an orphanage!”
The silence fell like a knife to the heart.
Lina slowly turned. There were no tears in her eyes. Only tiredness. Only surrender.
“I didn’t hide it. I just… didn’t know how or when to say it. Yes, I had a difficult period. I gave birth at nineteen. My mother kicked me out. My husband turned out to be a drug addict. I gave my son to a foster family because I lived in a basement. I worked all this time, saved money, searched for him. I’m processing custody now. He’ll come back to me in a month…”
“Arthur,” his mother said sharply, “do you want to live with a woman who has such… secrets?”
He looked first at his mother, then at Lina. And suddenly realized he was looking not at a secret, but at strength. At a person who survived where others broke.
“I do,” he answered firmly. “And if you’re not ready to accept her — that’s your decision. But you will no longer bring lies disguised as ‘concern’ into our family.”
His mother stood up. Said nothing. Just left.
A month later Lina really brought her son home. Little Danya was withdrawn, quiet, afraid of loud noises and strangers. But Arthur did everything so the child would feel at home. They molded clay together, made little boats, read fairy tales, and slowly, like spring ice, the tension in the little heart melted away.
And on one warm spring day, Arthur’s mother returned after all. Not with flowers, not with apologies, not with pomp. She just came. With a children’s book in her hands. She hugged Danya. And for the first time said:
“Hello, I’m your grandmother.”
Lina held back tears. She understood: for something to grow, you don’t just need to plant the seed. Sometimes you just have to wait for the ice to melt.