“Come in, Marina. Dinner needs to be cooked—the groceries are in a bag in the kitchen. The laundry’s in the basket. Wipe the dust in the living room; I haven’t gotten around to it in ages,” the future mother-in-law rattled off, and then, as if casually, added, “And Vanya and I will watch a movie in the living room for now.”
Marina is twenty-seven. As her mother, Svetlana Vladimirovna, likes to say, her daughter just managed to catch the last train to marriage. At that age, no one will take her anymore.
And the one “taking” Marina as a wife was her mother’s friend’s son, Ivan. Oh, how highly Svetlana Vladimirovna praised him: smart, well-mannered, from a good family. While Marina was presented as something defective.
It’s not as if Marina were crooked or cross-eyed—nothing of the sort. She was perfectly fine. An ordinary girl: finished university, got a job, loved sports and embroidery. Nothing special, but far from the worst option.
Even so, every day her mother drilled the same thing into her:
“Marina, hold on to Vanya or you’ll be done for. You won’t find another like him at your age. Do you understand you’re almost thirty? At that age women aren’t needed by anyone.”
“Mama, what are you saying…” Marina would try to object timidly. “People get married at forty these days. Age isn’t an obstacle.”
“That’s what you’ve seen on your internet?” Svetlana Vladimirovna would wave her off. “Real life is completely different!”
Marina would sigh and fall silent. She was used to her life seeming to belong to her mother. Svetlana Vladimirovna decided whom her daughter should see, what to wear, and where to go.
She and Ivan didn’t start dating by chance. Svetlana Vladimirovna talked her friend Lena into setting the young two up.
“Aunt Lena is coming today,” Svetlana Vladimirovna told her daughter one day. “Help set the table. Everything must be perfect.”
“Why the table? You usually sit in the kitchen and drink tea.”
“Because it needs to be done! And don’t ask unnecessary questions,” her mother said, carefully spreading a festive tablecloth. “And dress up a bit. Lena is coming with her son.”
“With her son? The one who works in IT?”
“Yes, Vanechka. That’s enough! No more questions. Go change. And hurry up!”
And so, a month after they met, Marina was already sitting at the family table at her future mother-in-law’s, and Ivan introduced her as his girlfriend. Svetlana Vladimirovna was clapping with delight in her mind—look how neatly she’d arranged everything.
And on the surface, everything seemed fine. Ivan really was polite, attentive, not stingy. But Marina couldn’t shake the feeling he hadn’t chosen her out of great love—she was just a convenient option, and it was time to get married.
Sometimes in the evenings she would catch herself thinking: “Does he love me? Do I love him?”
But then she’d remember her mother’s words: “Just try to let him slip away. You’ll be biting your elbows later.”
Svetlana Vladimirovna and her friend Yelena Ivanovna were calling each other more and more often, discussing plans for the children’s future. Both were convinced: they needed to take matters into their own hands.
“Lena, I’ve been thinking,” began Yelena Ivanovna. “If we want everything to work out for our kids, we need to test little Marina. Let her live with us for a while. At least a couple of months. Vanya and I will see what she’s like in everyday life. She’s a nice girl, but I still don’t feel at ease. What if she’s lazy? What if she can’t cook?”
“Of course,” Svetlana Vladimirovna chimed in eagerly. “Let her live with you, and then we’ll decide.”
The women thought they were making a wise, proper move. Marina knew nothing about this conversation. Ivan was in the loop but didn’t dare tell his beloved. He only shrugged and figured it would be simpler this way: his mother calm, Svetlana Vladimirovna satisfied, and Marina… well, Marina was used to doing what everyone told her.
“Marina, how about you stay with us for a bit?” he suggested offhand one evening. “You know, while we’re getting ready for the wedding. To be closer, and to help Mom.”
“Me?” the girl was surprised. “But we’re not married yet…”
“Yeah, so what?” Vanya smirked. “You’ll move in later anyway. This way we’ll at least get used to each other.”
“I thought we were going to live separately. Like you promised. Weren’t we?”
“Of course—later. Just a little later…”
Marina nodded. Something worried flickered in her eyes, but she said nothing more aloud. She had no idea she’d become a marionette in the hands of two grown women—and that Ivan’s love was anything but sincere and honest.
Vanya kept courting her, brought flowers, sometimes took her to the movies, but more and more he seemed indifferent. And his proud title of “IT specialist” gradually evaporated. In reality, Vanya worked at a small warehouse company where he fixed printers, set up computers, and sometimes reinstalled software. There were no “developments and projects” his mother bragged about—nothing of the kind.
Marina found this out by accident when she dropped by his work with lunch. Svetlana Vladimirovna insisted that good wives do exactly that, and Marina herself could eat in the evening. The “office” turned out to be a cramped room with two desks buried under broken towers and bundles of cables. Vanya sat on a chair, clutching an old mouse in his hand.
“Vanya, you said you had serious projects…” Marina said, taken aback.
“Well…” he scratched the back of his head. “Mom embellished things a bit. She thinks my best days are still ahead.”
“I see…” Marina mumbled, handing over a bag with containers of pasta and cutlets.
On her way back to work, Marina couldn’t shake the thoughts. Her intuition kept whispering: don’t rush. She and Vanya had known each other only three months—was that really enough to think about a wedding, let alone moving into his house? But every time she tried to voice her doubts, she’d picture her mother and hear:
“Marina, don’t miss your chance. You won’t find another fool like him! Who else would even look at you?!”
And she’d fall silent. With a mother like that it was hard to build trust, so Marina had never told her about the guys she dated.
One day Ivan invited her to his place.
“Come by tonight,” he said over the phone. “Mom will be happy.”
Marina agreed, thinking it would be an ordinary visit: tea, conversation, maybe dinner. But what awaited her in the apartment turned out to be entirely different.
The moment she crossed the threshold, Yelena Ivanovna greeted her with a distant look.
“Come in, Marina. Dinner needs to be cooked—the groceries are in a bag in the kitchen. The laundry’s in the basket. Wipe the dust in the living room; I haven’t gotten around to it in ages,” the future mother-in-law rattled off, and then, as if casually, added, “And Vanya and I will watch a movie in the living room for now.”
Marina didn’t immediately realize she was serious.
“Excuse me… I’m supposed to cook dinner?” she asked timidly.
“What’s the problem?” Yelena Ivanovna gave a chilly smirk. “You’re my son’s future wife. It’s time to show what you can do. Or did you think you’d only be getting flowers and going to the movies? Vanechka has already spent more than fifteen thousand on you. So it’s time you made up for everything we’ve invested in you.”
Marina felt a flush of shame burn her face. She looked to Vanya, hoping he’d intervene. But Ivan only looked steadily at his girlfriend and said:
“Mom wanted you to show yourself…”
And then Marina realized this wasn’t hospitality. This was a housekeeping test dreamed up by two grown women, with her as the lab rat.
Her heart clenched. Marina silently walked into the kitchen and opened the grocery bags, but inside she was boiling.
“That’s more like it. She was pretending not to understand,” said Yelena Ivanovna as she headed to the living room with her son.
“Do I really have to prove my worth by frying cutlets and mopping floors? Is this love? Is this how families are built?” Marina thought as she stood in a stranger’s kitchen.
She stood for a few seconds at the counter, let out a heavy sigh, and decided to play by their rules—while slightly changing the outcome.
She chopped the meat far too finely, tossed it into a pan, and left it to fry over high heat. The smell of burning filled the kitchen, but Marina stirred with a wooden spatula with indifference, showering the meat with salt as generously as if she were salting a winter road. She poured the pasta into boiling water and, after a couple of minutes, pulled it out undercooked, with a slight crunch to the bite.
“Perfect,” she murmured, turning off the stove.
She served everything and didn’t even wait for approval. She took a rag and went to “dust” the living room—wiping as if just waving her hand back and forth; streaks remained, and in places the dust didn’t disappear at all. As for the laundry, Marina forgot it entirely.
When Yelena Ivanovna sat down to eat with her son, her face twisted at once.
“What is this nightmare? The meat is salted to death, the pasta is raw!” she burst out. “And you, Vanya, praised her cooking!”
At that moment Marina calmly folded the rag and put it on the shelf.
“Thanks for the evening. I’m going home,” she said, put on her jacket, and left, leaving them at the table.
Later that evening, Svetlana Vladimirovna’s phone rang. On the other end was Yelena Ivanovna—her voice trembling with indignation.
“Sveta, your Marina is a disaster! She can’t cook at all! She smeared dust all over the furniture and didn’t even think about doing the laundry. I’ll be blunt—I won’t tolerate such a daughter-in-law in my house. And I won’t let Vanya near her again!”
Svetlana Vladimirovna tried to defend her daughter, but her friend was adamant:
“No, that’s enough. I thought we’d become relatives, but it turns out we wasted our time. Our friendship is over.”
Svetlana Vladimirovna set the phone on the table. She felt bitter—not so much for Marina as for her own frustrated plans. A few minutes later she called her daughter in for a serious talk.
“What was that today? You had an exam and you failed it!”
“An exam in home economics? Like at school?” Marina smirked. “I thought you seriously wanted to arrange my life. But it all felt like mockery. Vanya is king and god, and I’m his maid. Is that how we were supposed to live in the future? Do you really hate me that much? I don’t understand… Don’t you want your daughter to be happy?”
“You’re just silly and inexperienced! You don’t know what happiness is.”
“But I do know this: you don’t have to earn happiness by cooking and cleaning in someone else’s home.”
“It wouldn’t have been someone else’s home if you hadn’t behaved like that. It was plain swinish! Get out—I don’t want to talk to you anymore. Go think about your behavior.”
Marina left. And she thought. And then she decided she’d had enough of living with her parents. It was time to go her own way. The next day she packed her things and left her parents’ house.
Marina rented a small apartment on the outskirts. Ever since her student side jobs she’d been putting money aside—sometimes a little, sometimes more. Now she had enough for a down payment. The bank approved a mortgage, and though years of payments lay ahead, Marina felt, for the first time, the taste of real freedom.
Though the one-room flat was cramped and on the first floor of an old Khrushchyovka, it was her own space where no one told her how to live or what to do.
“Small, but mine,” she smiled the first time she shut the door behind her with a brand-new key.
The walls needed repair, and the floor needed replacing, but Marina felt happy. She bought a used sofa at a sale, a small table, and a couple of chairs. She gradually settled in: brought her books, laid out her embroidery, set out some plants.
Now in the evenings Marina came back not to a house where she was constantly criticized, and not to strangers expecting flawless cleaning services, but to her own cozy space.
When Svetlana Vladimirovna learned her daughter had bought an apartment, she was beside herself with outrage.
“Have you lost your mind? A mortgage? A first-floor flat in a Khrushchyovka? Who does that? You should’ve held on to Vanya—he would’ve supported you!” she shouted.
But Marina answered calmly:
“Vanya? I’ve been seeing another man for a while now. He’s caring, earns his own money, and lives apart from his parents. Your Vanya will live with his mother his whole life.”
Her mother nearly choked at such impudence.
“How dare you? Do you really think you deserve something more?”
“Yes. That’s exactly what I think. And stop planting complexes in me. That doesn’t work anymore. Better mind your own life. There’s actually a lot of interesting things out there.”
Marina put on her coat and left her parents’ apartment.
“You’ll come running back yet!” Svetlana Vladimirovna shouted after her.
But Marina never did. And she celebrated her thirtieth birthday with her beloved husband, Igor. He loved her for who she was, not for a set of skills. And no matter what her mother claimed about age, you can find your happiness at thirty.
Wishing everyone well!