The legend that every child within the walls of a state orphanage waits, holding their breath, to hear the words “Someone’s come for you” shattered against Alisa’s stone calm. She sat on the edge of her institutional bed, her fingers digging into a snag on the worn blanket, and Irina Petrovna’s words sounded to her not like a saving ray, but like a sentence—deafening and merciless.
— Come on, Alisa, move it—why are you standing there like a statue? — The head of the educational department sounded tired, but with a note of insistent optimism.
Irina Petrovna looked at the girl, and in her experienced eyes, which had seen so much, there flickered genuine bewilderment. An orphanage is no resort. It’s lining up for state porridge, it’s shared toys long faded from their former brightness, it’s the quiet but relentless tally of days. Many children ran away from here wherever their eyes led, just to avoid seeing those washed-out walls. And now—going home, to a mother—and this girl was staring out the window as if seeing off the last departing ship of salvation.
— I’m not going, — Alisa said quietly, but with a steely, decidedly unchildlike firmness, turning toward the windowpane beyond which a sullen winter day was slowly dying.
Her friend Katya, sitting opposite and up until then absorbed in sketching something in a battered notebook, froze, casting Alisa a quick, puzzled glance from under her brows. She herself would have given anything to hear those words addressed to her. But no one was looking for her. Her silence was absolute and lightless.
— Alisa, what’s wrong with you? — Irina Petrovna took a step forward, her shadow falling across the girl. — Your mother is there. She’s waiting. She’s missed you.
— I don’t want to see her. I’m not going back to her. Ever.
A ringing, awkward silence fell over the room. The girls stopped whispering and put down their books; every gaze, prickly and full of mute questions, turned to Alisa. Irina Petrovna realized this conversation was not for other ears. Not for these walls that had absorbed so many tears and secrets.
— Come with me.
Gently but firmly, she took Alisa by the elbow and led her down the long corridor, familiar down to every stain on the linoleum. The door to the small psychologist’s office (he came here once a month) clicked shut, shutting out the world. The room smelled of dust and old paper.
— I understand, your mother… she made mistakes, — began Irina Petrovna, sitting across from the girl and looking at her with unfeigned sympathy. — But people change. She must have passed all the checks if they’ve allowed her to take you. She’s trying.
— You think this is the first time? — A bitter, crooked smile touched Alisa’s lips. Her eyes, far too grown for such a young face, were dry and fathomlessly sad. — I’m here for the second time. The first time was exactly the same. A sham cleaning, bottles hidden under the bathtub, food bought in a rush, a couple of inspection visits—and that was it, the performance was over. She needed me for one thing only—to keep the allowance from being cut off. And then everything went back to the way it was. Only worse.
— Baby, I can’t ignore this. But home is home. A roof of your own, your own walls… — even to herself, Irina Petrovna’s voice sounded unconvincing.
— A roof of my own? — Alisa shot her a sudden look, and for the first time fire lit in it—anger, pain, despair. — Do you know what it’s like to fall asleep to wild laughter and the crash of bottles behind a thin partition? To wake up to the reek of booze and cigarettes soaked into every rag? Do you know what it means to go to school in torn sneakers when it’s twenty below outside and icy drafts howl through the stairwell, and to try to walk so you don’t step in a puddle because you’ll soak through and freeze? And hunger? Not the kind where you just want to eat, but the kind where your stomach aches and gnaws from emptiness because Mom begged the last money not for bread but for another “mineral water”? And the fear when, in the night, some drunken man staggers into your room, and you, shaking all over, try to push him out while he grunts and laughs? Why hasn’t she been deprived of her rights yet? Why?!
Tears finally welled in her eyes, but Alisa wiped them away with the back of her hand in fury, as if angry at her own weakness. Yes, the orphanage wasn’t paradise. But there was routine here. There was breakfast, lunch, and dinner. There were identical but clean sheets. There wasn’t that all-consuming, animal fear.
— I can’t go against the law, — Irina Petrovna admitted quietly, with endless weariness. — My hands are tied.
— Can I live on my own? — a plea broke through in Alisa’s voice. — I’d go to work. I’d mop floors, anything. I’d rent a corner. I can do it.
— Only from eighteen, — the woman shook her head. — You know that.
— I’m almost sixteen! I’ve been an adult for a long time! I’ve supported myself since I was twelve!
Irina Petrovna knew that wasn’t an exaggeration. Alisa was precocious, sharp, tenacious. Life had tempered her like steel—and left its scars. The woman felt the terrible injustice of what was happening, but her hands were bound by red tape.
— By law you must be under an adult’s guardianship. Maybe there’s someone else? Some relative? We could start the process of terminating your mother’s parental rights and transferring guardianship to someone else. A grandmother, grandfather? An aunt?
— No one, — Alisa stared at the floor again, her voice turning muffled. — While my mother’s mother was alive, I sometimes ran to her. She hid me. But she died a year ago. There’s nowhere to go now.
— And your father? — asked Irina Petrovna almost in a whisper.
— He’s gone. He found his comfort at the bottom of a bottle before my mother did, and he found his end in some clammy alley. For me he died long ago.
She spoke with a soul-chilling calm, a detached practicality, as if it were a long-accepted fact. It was worse than hysteria.
— Did he… have any relatives? Maybe his parents?
Alisa paused, sifting through scraps of old, fuzzy memories; bitter phrases her mother had dropped in rare lucid moments.
— Supposedly… he had a mother. My grandmother, I guess. But they didn’t speak. He probably drove her to her last nerve too. I never even saw her. I don’t know if she’s alive.
— Let’s try this, — Irina Petrovna leaned toward the girl, a new note in her voice—weak, but hopeful. — You go to your mother. I’ll give you my number. You keep me updated. Meanwhile I’ll look for any leads and try to track down that grandmother. Agreed?
Alisa nodded silently. What else could she do? Rebel? Run? She didn’t have the strength even for that. Only a submissive, bitter consent.
The reunion scene had been calculated and rehearsed by her mother down to the smallest detail. Hysterical sobs, wails, hugs smelling of cheap tobacco and even cheaper cologne to mask the booze. “Baby! Forgive me! I’ll fix everything! We’ll be happy!”
Alisa stood like a stone statue, not returning the embrace. She saw not a mother, but an actress burning herself out. She knew what would happen next. And so it did. The first day passed in a frantic show of cleaning. On the second, she came back from the store not with bread and milk but with that all-too-familiar, ominous green bottle. And the infernal mechanism that had halted for the time she’d been gone creaked and started up again.
Life turned into a waking nightmare. Constant hunger, humiliation, drunken screams at night. The last straw was the night when one of her mother’s “friends” staggered into her room. The smell coming off him was so thick and vile it took her breath away. Gasping with terror, she shoved him into the hall with a wild cry, then barricaded the door with a chair. She spent the rest of the night sitting with her back to the door, quietly crying from helplessness and fear.
At dawn, as soon as the light came, she called Irina Petrovna. Her voice was hoarse and detached: “Either I go back to the orphanage, or today I’ll jump under a train. I don’t care.”
— I found something, — the voice on the line sounded reassuringly firm. — Your grandmother is alive. Valentina Sergeyevna Orlova. I’ve already spoken to her on the phone. A very… reserved woman. But she agreed to meet. I’ll pick you up in an hour.
Alisa’s heart pounded wildly. The last straw. An unknown grandmother who hadn’t even known she existed. Who most likely hated the memory of her son. What could she offer? Only a plea.
The door to a neat, well-kept apartment in an old but solid building was opened by Valentina Sergeyevna herself. A woman of about sixty-five, with a straight, proud posture, in a plain house dress. Her gray hair was gathered in an elegant chignon. A face marked by traces of former beauty, etched not so much with age as with the lines of a hard character and many trials. A gaze—clear, piercing, appraising.
— What do you want? — Her voice was even, without a hint of emotion.
— Valentina Sergeyevna? — asked Irina Petrovna. — We spoke on the phone. This is Alisa.
— I’m your granddaughter, — Alisa blurted, no longer able to bear the uncertainty. She was used to hitting straight on. — Your son Artyom’s daughter.
A swift, flash-like shadow of pain flickered in the woman’s eyes. But not a muscle moved in her face.
— I see. And how can I help you? — Her tone remained icy.
— May we talk? Just fifteen minutes, — Irina Petrovna intervened gently but firmly, sensing that Alisa was on the verge of breaking.
Valentina Sergeyevna silently stepped aside to let them in. The home smelled of fresh baking and some floral cologne. Everything was clean, polished, in order. And that made it even scarier. This was another world—foreign, unfamiliar.
She poured tea into delicate porcelain cups without a word. From time to time her studying, heavy gaze came to rest on Alisa, as though she were trying to find in her features a resemblance to the one she wished she could forget.
Nervous, Irina Petrovna began to explain the situation. She spoke about the orphanage, about the mother, about the dire circumstances, about the possibility of guardianship.
— And why would I do that? — Valentina Sergeyevna cut her off coldly. — I’ve lived a hard life. My son… was my cross. He brought me so much grief and shame that I buried him in my mind long before his actual death. I walled myself off from that past. I want to live out my days in peace. I have problems of my own.
Alisa’s heart sank. She understood this woman. She understood all too well. But there was nowhere to retreat.
— Valentina Sergeyevna, — Alisa’s voice was quiet but carried that same unchildlike firmness that had so struck Irina Petrovna in the office. — You don’t know me. I don’t know you. And to be honest, I have no desire to burst into your life and change anything. I perfectly understand why you don’t want to see me. I’m a living reminder of your son. Of your pain.
She paused to gather her thoughts. For the first time, Valentina Sergeyevna looked at her with a slightly raised brow, showing genuine interest.
— I don’t need anything from you. Not love, not care, not some family idyll. I need only one thing: your formal consent. Your signature on papers that will keep me from having to go back to the hell you’ve now heard about. I just need to survive two years. Two years, and I’ll be of age. I’m finishing ninth grade and I’ll go straight to work. I’ll earn my own money for food, clothes, everything. The money the state will transfer to you as my guardian will be yours. I won’t lay claim to it. Consider it compensation for the trouble. I only need time and a formality. If I had any other choice, I would never have come to you.
Under the table, Irina Petrovna clenched her fists, silently begging the girl to stop. But she had already said everything.
Valentina Sergeyevna set down her cup. A long, viscous pause hung in the air. It seemed the clock on the wall had slowed.
— They say drunkards’ children are usually… not very bright, — she said at last, and for the first time her voice held other notes—not ice, but rather surprised curiosity. — But that’s clearly not your case. And so? You’ll just live here for two years like a quiet ghost, and then disappear? And I’ll never hear from you again?
— I give you my word. I’ll vanish from your life and never trouble you again, — Alisa answered without a shadow of doubt.
— Fine, — Valentina Sergeyevna said abruptly. — I agree. But with conditions. You don’t call me Grandma. You don’t touch my things without asking. You don’t bring your friends into my home. You live by my rules. Understood?
— Perfectly, — Alisa nodded. Something fluttered in her chest—relief, or a new, as yet unknown anxiety.
The paperwork took time. Inspectors visited Alisa’s mother, and this time the situation was so dismal that the question of terminating parental rights was settled quickly. Signing the documents, Valentina Sergeyevna did so like someone concluding a business contract—strictly, judiciously, without emotion.
Despite all her bravado, Alisa felt like a small animal lost in a trackless forest. She was scared. She had no money at all. School would end in two months. And what if this iron woman really did leave her to fate?
But on the very first evening, when Alisa, holed up in her new, clean, yet so alien room, was trying to do homework, there was a knock at the door.
— Dinner is on the table, — Valentina Sergeyevna said curtly.
At the kitchen table, eating the soup her grandmother had cooked, Alisa wanted to cry. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d eaten something so tasty, real, homemade. Not a dry roll with tea, not institutional porridge, but actual food prepared with… not love, no. But with responsibility. With a concern that it be good and nourishing.
The next morning, getting ready for school, Alisa was tugging on her torn sneakers. Valentina Sergeyevna’s gaze fell on them and she grimaced, as if she’d seen something repulsive.
— I’ll meet you after school at the entrance. We’re going to buy you proper shoes. And clothes. I can’t look at this, — her tone brooked no argument.
— I don’t have any money, — Alisa mumbled, staring at the floor.
— I’ll pay for everything. It’s easier for me to spend the money than to burn with shame if someone thinks I’m the one keeping you in this state.
They went to a store. To Alisa’s surprise, Valentina Sergeyevna wasn’t stingy. She bought her several pairs of shoes, jeans, sweaters, even a pretty “going out” dress. And the most unexpected thing—she asked Alisa’s opinion. “Do you like this color?” “Is this style comfortable?” She treated her not like a burden, but like… a person.
A week passed. Valentina Sergeyevna called Alisa into the living room.
— How are things at school?
— Fine, — Alisa shrugged.
— Show me your gradebook.
— Ours is electronic, — the girl barely suppressed a smile.
— Good Lord, what technology has come to, — the woman sighed. — All right, show me your electronic one.
Alisa opened the app on her phone. She studied well—very well. School was her only refuge, her personal fortress no one could take from her.
— Hm… Not bad, — Valentina Sergeyevna concluded, skimming the list of grades. There was something almost like approval in her voice. — With results like these, you should go on to tenth grade. Prepare for university.
— University is for those who have families to support them, — Alisa said with a bitter smirk. — I need to work.
— Here’s the deal, — Valentina Sergeyevna cleared her throat, assuming her “businesslike” demeanor. — You’re going to tenth grade. You’ll live here. You’ll prepare for entrance exams. This is not up for discussion.
Alisa was struck dumb. She looked at this woman, not believing her ears. Her deepest, long-buried dream suddenly wasn’t just attainable—it was being offered to her on a platter.
— I… understood, — she managed to breathe out.
From that day, the ice between them began to thaw. Slowly, almost imperceptibly. Valentina Sergeyevna began taking an interest in school matters, sometimes, as if in passing, asking about her son—not who he became, but what he had been like as a child, what he liked. She was ashamed of her interest and masked it as practical questions, but it broke through anyway. Alisa answered sparingly, carefully, understanding that each word was like a sharp stone for this woman.
She finished school with an excellent record. To her own surprise, Valentina Sergeyevna hired tutors for her in key subjects. “So you don’t waste time and so you can win a tuition-free spot. I’m not going to pay for your studies,” she justified herself. But she put in both effort and money.
Alisa was admitted to university tuition-free. Life seemed to be getting better. She spent the summer before her first year working as a waitress, saving every penny for dorm life. Their silent agreement still stood: school was over—time to be independent.
In late August, a few days before leaving, Alisa came home from work late. The apartment was quiet and dark. At first she thought Valentina Sergeyevna was already asleep. But the door to her room stood ajar. Peering in, Alisa saw her lying on the floor by the bed, unconscious, her face twisted with pain.
Alisa’s world collapsed in an instant. Cold terror gripped her head to toe. She thought the woman was dead. That she was alone. Alone again.
The ambulance arrived quickly. Diagnosis: a massive heart attack. The surgery was successful, but a long, difficult recovery lay ahead.
When Alisa was allowed to visit, she rushed into the ward, breathless, a lump in her throat.
— Grandma! — burst out of her on its own. — How are you? Are you alive?
She caught herself at once and, abashed, stepped back. — I’m sorry… Valentina Sergeyevna… how are you feeling?
The woman, pale and weakened, lay against the pillows. But in her eyes—always so stern—there shone a new, unfamiliar softness. She gave a faint smile and slowly, with a trembling hand, stroked Alisa’s hair. It was the first tender gesture in two years.
— Call me Grandma, — she said quietly. — Turns out it… feels nice. I’m going to be fine. The doctors say I need time. But I’ll manage. Don’t worry.
— I’ll stay with you! — Alisa blurted at once, grabbing her cold hand and squeezing it tight. — I’ll take care of you until you’re completely better! I’m not going anywhere!
— No, — Valentina Sergeyevna shook her head weakly. — I don’t want to be a burden. You must study. You have your own life.
— I was your burden for two years! — Alisa exclaimed, and at last tears poured from her eyes, washing away years of pain, fear, and distrust. — A stranger, an uninvited child dropped on your head! And you… you gave me everything. You gave me more than my own mother did in my entire life! You gave me quiet. You gave me safety. You gave me a future. And now I’ll take care of you. Whether you like it or not.
Valentina Sergeyevna closed her eyes. A single, clear, shining tear rolled down her wrinkled cheek. She drew a deep, slightly labored breath.
— All right, — she yielded. — But there’s a condition.
— What is it? — Alisa smiled, wiping her wet cheeks.
— No dormitories. You’ll live with me. You’ll commute to your classes from here. In those slums where students live, God knows what might happen.
Alisa broke into a wide, happy, truly childlike smile—the first she’d had in many, many years.
— Agreed, Grandma.
And she hugged her. Carefully, gently, so as not to hurt her. She hugged her grandmother. Her quiet. Her home.