“I need to talk,” he said, standing in the doorway. Uncertainty in his eyes, a bouquet of white chrysanthemums in his hand.
Alisa didn’t move. She just looked at him—long, slow.
“You walked out that door yourself, and now you want to come back like nothing happened?”
He stepped into the kitchen and sat down. Set the flowers on the table.
“I was a fool. I understand everything now. I need you. I need Tim. I want to get it all back.”
“Get it back?” Alisa gave a short laugh. “You didn’t lose a key. You shattered it. And shattered things aren’t fixed—they’re thrown away.”
He lifted his gaze.
“I’ve changed. I miss home. I miss you. I feel awful.”
“Oh, did I feel good when you were laughing in that girl’s story near the train station? Or when you ‘flew to Kazan’ with her number tucked in your luggage?”
He fell silent. Got up again.
“You used to love me.”
“I did. Until I didn’t anymore.” She nodded toward the door. “Leave.”
As if asking him to close a window. Or take out the trash.
But her eyes… something in them had cracked. And there was no mending it.
It hadn’t been his first “business trip.” Once, supposedly leaving for Samara, he wheeled his suitcase to the door, waved, “I’ll call tonight!”—and vanished for two days. Late at night he returned, smelling not of the road, but of someone else’s perfume. Alisa silently pulled a receipt from his jacket pocket—an upscale Moscow restaurant. He hadn’t even bothered to invent a new cover story.
She didn’t make a scene. Just set the receipt on the table. He glanced at it, shrugged: “You’re starting again…”—and went to bed. As if it was nothing. As if it weren’t betrayal, but just a bad day.
Another time, he announced an urgent flight to Kazan: “Two days. Big client.” Left in a blazer, with his laptop, looking all business. The next morning, Alisa saw him on some girl’s social media—at a Moscow station, laughing, hugging her, drinking champagne from the bottle. Alisa didn’t cry. She shut her laptop and went to make oatmeal for their son, as if nothing had happened.
They had separated over a month ago. Not with slammed doors and broken dishes—quietly, as if a flame had burned out. But now the silence in the apartment rang differently—no key turning in the lock at night, no man’s footsteps, no scent of his aftershave. And still, Alisa caught herself listening.
How many such episodes had there been? She’d stopped counting after the fifth lie, the sixth woman, the tenth night he was “crashing with friends.” And still—she tried. She endured. She believed. Until that morning.
“Mama, why did you and Dad… you know, you used to be together,” Timofey asked, slicing his fried eggs with a fork. The bright kitchen smelled of toast, coffee, and something else—familiar yet uneasy.
Alisa froze with her cup in hand. Raised it to her lips but didn’t drink.
“There was a time… when we simply realized it was better apart than together.”
“What happened?”
“Adults have their reasons,” she said softly, looking at her son.
Timofey frowned. He hated evasive answers. Especially from his mother—she had always seemed like someone who didn’t lie, even if the truth cut like a knife.
“Did he cheat on you?” he asked suddenly.
Alisa flinched—not from the question, but from how precisely he’d struck.
“Tim…”
“I’m not stupid. I saw you crying at night when you thought I was asleep. And when you talked to Grandma—I heard. He… he ruined it, didn’t he?”
Alisa stayed silent. She didn’t want Timofey to grow up with rage, with hatred, with contempt for his father. Even if he deserved it.
“Sometimes adults do foolish things. Big foolish things. And they suffer for them. But that doesn’t mean you have to suffer too,” she said finally.
“I just want to know the truth,” he insisted. “I’ll find it myself.”
He found his father’s number by accident. Or almost by accident.
His mother’s old phone lay in a drawer among papers, chargers, and other forgotten junk.
Timofey was looking for a flash drive for school. Instead, he found a contact: “Ilya (do not call).”
He dialed. Hung up. Dialed again. His heart pounded.
“Tim?” The voice was both familiar and strange. “Tim, is that you?”
“Yes.”
“My God… son. I thought you… you didn’t want to talk to me.”
“I just want to understand. Why did you leave? Why did you… promise, and then forget?”
“That’s not true!” his father’s voice flared. “I always wanted to be there. It’s just… your mother, she… she ruined everything.”
Click.
The first lock in his head turned.
Timofey was silent.
“She told you I cheated. Is that true?”
Silence.
“I… It was complicated. But she drove me to it. Always controlling, hysterical. I couldn’t take it. But that doesn’t mean I’m a bad father!”
“Where were you when I waited for you at the football game? When I stood in the rain waiting for you to come?”
“I was late, but—”
“You didn’t come.”
“You found his number?” Alisa stood in the doorway, holding the phone. “He called back.”
Timofey nodded. He wasn’t hiding.
“I wanted to talk. I wanted to understand.”
“And did you?” Her voice wasn’t accusing—just tired.
“He says it’s your fault. That you controlled everything.”
Alisa gave a small, dry laugh.
“Maybe. I tried to save something that was already dead. I knew about his affair before he left. And still, I tried. For you. But he… left anyway. Because it was easier.”
“You’re not forbidding me to talk to him?”
“No. That’s your choice. Just… don’t build illusions. He won’t change.”
Timofey stared at the floor.
“He said he wants to go to St. Petersburg with me. Like we used to dream.”
Alisa walked into the kitchen without a word and set the kettle on.
“Dreams are good. But grown-up promises should be like train tickets: with a date and time. Don’t wait for a train that will never come.”
Three weeks later, Timofey had a competition.
He waited for his father. Even saved him a seat in the stands.
Ilya didn’t come.
Later, he called.
“Sorry, work… the boss called me in, I couldn’t refuse.”
“Of course,” Timofey said evenly. Too evenly. “You always have someone more important.”
His father fell silent.
“But we’ll still go to Petersburg. I’ll arrange it. Tickets, hotel, tours…”
“When?”
“Well, as soon as I can. Soon.”
“Don’t.”
“What?”
“Don’t promise if you’re not going to keep it.”
And he hung up.
That evening, Timofey came into the kitchen. Sat down.
Alisa was ironing shirts—one of them his.
“Mama…”
“Mmm?”
“Let’s go to Petersburg ourselves. Without him.”
She looked at him. He was growing up right before her eyes.
“It’s not a cheap trip.”
“I can save from lunches. Spend less.”
“I’ll set something aside too,” she said gently. “But we’ll go on a regular train. No luxury cars, no hotels. Just us two.”
Timofey smiled for the first time in a long while.
“I love you, Mom.”
“I love you too. More than you can imagine.”
The trip to Petersburg began in a half-empty third-class carriage, smelling of iron dust, tea in glass holders, and something baked that someone had brought in a paper bag. Timofey settled on the upper bunk, watching stations and frozen platforms slide past. Alisa read, glancing up now and then—just to make sure he was there. He was no longer the boy who woke from nightmares at night. But not yet an adult.
Somewhere in between. And here, she could still be beside him. Still be needed.
They rented a modest flat on Ligovka. Creaky parquet, heavy curtains, the scent of old wood and coffee from the café next door—it all felt like another time.
Timofey studied the walls hung with worn black-and-white photographs: trams, bridges, people in coats. Petersburg—what it was, and what it had become.
“Where should we go first?” Alisa asked, wrapping her scarf.
“The roof. I found a tour—look. You can see the whole city from above.”
“Only with instructors. And railings.”
“Mama, I’m not six.”
“I know. But I’m still afraid,” she smiled.
The roof was indeed beautiful. The leaden sky lay over the grey houses like a blanket over shoulders. From up there, you could see the city living its life—filled with loneliness, meetings, kisses, and someone’s quiet longing.
“It’s strange,” Timofey said. “So quiet here. Like all the noise stayed down below.”
He stood near the edge, hands on the railing, looking into the distance.
“I think I understand you better now, Mama.”
“Why?”
“Back then, you didn’t just suffer. You stayed. And you lived. No matter what.”
Alisa looked at him and felt something loosen in her chest. The weight she’d carried all those years—loneliness, fear for him, anger at Ilya, disappointment in herself. Everything she’d tried to hide. Everything he now understood without words.
The unexpected scene happened on the third day.
They wandered into a bookshop on Nevsky—just to warm up, just to browse.
Alisa browsed a shelf of women’s fiction—she’d gravitated toward such stories lately. Timofey vanished among the comics and history aisles. Suddenly:
“Alisa?”
She turned.
Ilya.
He stood with a well-groomed, confident woman. A book in his hand, shock on his face.
“You’re in Petersburg?”
“Yes.”
“With Timofey?”
She nodded.
He looked around.
“I wanted… I tried to reach out, but—”
“He doesn’t wait for you anymore, Ilya,” Alisa said quietly. “He’s grown up.”
“I… I miss him.”
“You don’t miss him. You miss the image you lost. But he’s real. Alive. And you never knew him.”
The woman beside Ilya lowered her eyes. She understood everything.
At that moment, Timofey emerged from behind the shelves. Saw them. Stopped.
Ilya took a step forward.
“Tim…”
“Hi,” he said calmly. No anger, no warmth. Just an adult, cold “hi.”
“I… You know, I’d like to—”
“Don’t,” Timofey cut him off. “I’m here with Mom. We have plans.”
He took Alisa’s hand.
“Shall we go?”
And they left without looking back.
It wasn’t triumph. It wasn’t revenge.
It was growing up.
The trip ended. Their last evening was in a small café by the Fontanka. Snow fell outside. Inside, old music played, and it smelled of vanilla and mulled wine.
“Mama…”
“Mmm?”
“Thank you for always being there. Even when I was angry. Even when I believed him instead of you.”
“That’s okay. Everyone has to walk their own path.”
“But I’m glad I walked mine with you.”
She smiled.
“And I’m glad you chose to stay.”
At the station, as the train pulled out, Alisa watched through the window.
The past had stayed in that city—in the form of a chance meeting, unspoken words, pain that no longer stabbed.
Timofey listened to music, but one tear glistened on his cheek. Not from grief—from release.
He looked at his mother and whispered:
“You’re strong.”
She wrapped an arm around his shoulders.
“We’re strong together.”
She didn’t seek revenge.
Life had done that for her.
And then it gave her more: a son who had grown up. And learned the most important thing.