Everything started with the shoes.
As always on Saturdays, Oleg was getting ready to go “fishing.” Methodically, he packed his huge canvas backpack with tackle, a thermos, a camouflage jacket. Vera had watched this ritual for ten years; it was as unchanging as the seasons. But today something was off.
“Are you taking your city shoes?” she asked when she noticed him setting by the door not his heavy waders but the expensive leather shoes he wore to the office.
“Yes,” he said without turning around. “The road down to the lake got washed out, so I’ll have to walk a couple of kilometers from the car along a proper road. These are more comfortable. Logical, isn’t it.”
There wasn’t a shadow of doubt in his voice. Logic was his religion. But this time logic failed him. No fisherman in his right mind would head to a washed-out lake in dress shoes.
It was a tiny, almost invisible crack in the monolithic wall of his legend. But it was enough for Vera. All those little oddities she had chalked up to his quirks over the years suddenly assembled into a single picture.
He kissed her on the cheek. Habitually, with nothing in the gesture but protocol.
“I’ll be back tomorrow evening. Don’t miss me.”
When the door closed behind him, Vera didn’t, as usual, make herself tea. She silently put on her coat, took the keys to her own car, and went out after him.
The door smelled of someone else’s life.
The stale smell of fried onions, a cheap “sea breeze” air freshener, and something else—childish, sour. The smell hit Vera like a slap, sobering her more than the icy wind outside.
Her world—the world of Vera and Oleg—smelled completely different. Of books, lemon verbena, and the ozone after the humidifier had run.
She pressed the doorbell. The melody was silly, squeaky, from some old cartoon.
A boy of about nine opened the door. Fair hair, serious gray eyes. Oleg’s eyes.
Vera looked at him, and the air stuck in her lungs.
“Who are you here for?” the boy rumbled, trying to sound grown-up.
A woman appeared from the depths of the apartment. Tired, in a simple house robe, hair twisted into a bun. Katya. Vera had seen her once at one of Oleg’s corporate events, in passing. “A colleague from a related department.”
Katya froze when she recognized Vera. Her face twisted for an instant, but she quickly pulled herself together.
“Hello.”
“Is Oleg here?” Vera’s voice was even, not a quiver in it. As if she had come to check the meters.
“He… he can’t right now,” Katya began, trying to block the way.
But Oleg was already standing behind her. In home sweatpants and a T-shirt. Not in camouflage and waders. In those very city shoes.
There was no panic on his face. Only a cold annoyance. Irritation that a well-oiled mechanism had broken down.
“Vera? What are you doing here? Your appearance here is absolutely illogical.”
Her gaze slid past him into the entryway. A child’s jacket hung on the wall, and from a backpack tossed on the bench dangled a keychain: a bright orange fish-shaped lure.
The very “unique, handmade” lure that Oleg had supposedly ordered from some craftsman in Karelia. He’d waited two months for the package. He’d told her it was his secret weapon for catfish.
Here it was just a cheap plastic toy on a school backpack.
“Bite’s good today, Oleg?”
He frowned, still trying to maintain control over a situation he had always considered his.
“Vera, stop it. We’ll talk at home. Making a scene is irrational and destructive.”
She looked him straight in the eyes. There was no warmth, no love, no hurt left in her gaze. Only a cold, crystalline calculation.
“Ten years. For ten years you’ve been going on this fishing trip.”
Vera turned and headed for the stairs. Without looking back. She didn’t want him to see her face.
She heard the boy behind her ask, “Dad, who is that?”
She didn’t hear the answer. Only the clinging smell of someone else’s life seemed to have soaked into her coat forever.
The drive home passed in a ringing emptiness. The radio was silent. There were no thoughts. Only disgusting, crystalline clarity. Every flash of headlights, every crack in the asphalt, every snowflake melting on the windshield. Suddenly the world had a sharpness that made her eyes ache.
She entered their apartment, their ideal, calibrated world. Took off her coat and hung it in the closet, trying not to inhale the foreign smell that seemed already part of the fabric.
The apartment was quiet. But it wasn’t the soothing quiet she had always cherished. It was the emptiness of dead stage scenery.
Her home. Their home.
She didn’t cry. Tears seemed inappropriate, irrational. Like the scenes he so disliked. Instead, a cold, methodical researcher awoke in her. She needed facts. Proof. She needed to understand the scope of the “project.”
She went into his study. His territory. Impeccable order. She walked up to the bookcase.
Huge, floor to ceiling, it was their shared pride. She ran her fingers along the spines. Here were the art books she loved. And there—a whole section on economics and business planning.
Her hand reached for a row of thick leather-bound day planners. Last year. The year before. Five years back. She took one out and opened it at random.
“July. 15–25. Fishing. Astrakhan.” Neat, almost calligraphic handwriting.
Below, in pencil, an addendum: “Nikita. Camp. Pay for session. 45k.”
Nikita. That was the boy’s name. The serious boy with his eyes.
Vera leafed on. “September. Fishing.” And again the addendum: “School uniform. Shoes. Backpack.” “November. Fishing.” Addendum: “Katya. Winter tires.”
This wasn’t the diary of a lover. It was a financial report. A business plan for maintaining the second branch of his life.
Her eyes fell on their photo in a silver frame. The wedding. They were so young, so happy. She remembered that day. She remembered how he’d said to her: “You and I—we’re the perfect project. Long-term and the most successful.”
He hadn’t said “family.” He’d said “project.”
And any good project needs risk diversification. A second asset. A fallback airfield.
Suddenly she remembered her father’s words, spoken a month before the wedding when he had transferred the deed to an apartment into her name: “Ver, he’s a good lad, driven. But he looks at life like a chess game. And in a game like that, you must always have your own strongest piece that moves as it pleases. This apartment is your queen. Never forget that.”
She went to the safe hidden behind a painting. Oleg kept his documents there. She knew the code. It was laughably predictable—the founding date of his first company. Inside, in a separate folder, lay her documents. There it was—the deed of gift. Her queen.
Her phone buzzed in her pocket. A message from Oleg.
“Vera, I understand your state, but your actions were impulsive and destructive. Let’s approach this in a balanced way. I’ll be home soon.”
She laid the folder with the documents on the desk and went to the kitchen. Perfect cleanliness, steel surfaces, built-in appliances. Everything as he had designed it. “Ergonomics is the key to efficiency, Vera.”
She opened a drawer. Among the expensive chef’s knives lay an old corkscrew. Simple, Soviet-era, inherited from her father. Oleg had told her many times it should be thrown out. “It ruins the whole aesthetic; it’s a nonfunctional relic.”
She took it in her hand. The cold, heavy metal sat pleasantly in her palm.
The phone came alive again. “Your silence is non-constructive. We have to discuss the logistics of next steps. I’m responsible for both sides, and my duty is to minimize damage for all participants in this process.”
Participants in the process. Logistics. Minimize damage.
Vera smiled. For the first time that evening. It was a grim, joyless smile. She was no longer a participant in the process. She was going to become the one who would lead it.
The lock clicked.
Oleg walked into the apartment. He took off his shoes and set them neatly on the mat. Hung up his jacket. He moved calmly, evenly. He was preparing for tough negotiations.
Vera was waiting for him in the living room. She stood by the window, looking out at the night city. She was still holding the old corkscrew.
“Vera,” he began in the very tone he used to open meetings. “I understand what you’re feeling…”
“You don’t,” she cut him off without turning. Her voice was as even as his. “You don’t know what I’m feeling. You’re analyzing it. Trying to calculate risks and develop a crisis-management strategy.”
“Emotions are a poor adviser right now. We need to discuss everything. I’m ready to be completely honest. There’s a situation. It needs to be resolved.”
“A situation?” she turned slowly. “You’ve had a second family for ten years, Oleg. That’s not a ‘situation.’ That’s a lie ten years long.”
“Terminology-wise, yes. But in fact, it was a parallel structure. It didn’t affect our main project in any way. I always fulfilled all my obligations to you. Our standard of living didn’t suffer.”
“The main project…” she repeated. “So I’m your main project. And Katya and Nikita are a venture startup? A backup asset in case the main one goes under?”
“That’s a cynical interpretation. I took care of them. And I took care of you. I allocated resources efficiently.”
“Resources… yes. You are a master at allocating resources.”
She walked over to his pride and joy—the wine cabinet built into the wall. Perfect temperature, lighting, bottles stored at the proper angle. His collection. His investment.
“What are you doing?” he asked warily.
“Conducting an audit,” she said, opening the glass door.
She took out a bottle. Château Margaux. He’d bought it at auction. He had said that in ten years it would be worth as much as a car.
“Vera, don’t you dare. That’s not just wine. It’s an investment.”
“You’re right. An investment. In the future. In cozy evenings, in memories. Only the future turned out to be fake.”
She brought the old, unaesthetic corkscrew to the neck. It bit into the cork with a strained creak.
“Stop this circus!” his voice broke into a shout for the first time. “This is irrational! You’re destroying a valuable asset!”
With a loud pop, the cork came out. The aroma of blackcurrant, violets, and fine leather filled the room.
“I’m not destroying. I’m writing off losses.”
And, looking him straight in the eyes, she tipped the bottle over the expensive Persian rug. The dark ruby liquid gushed onto the light pile, spreading out in an ugly, blood-like stain.
Oleg froze. He looked at the rug as if she had poured the wine onto his heart. His face contorted. It was horror. Physical pain at the sight of value being destroyed.
“You… you’re insane…”
“No. I’ve simply become a good student. I’ve learned your main lesson—disposing of illiquid assets in time.”
He took a step toward her, then stopped. He tried to regain his usual tone.
“Fine. I understand. You vented your emotions. Now let’s talk numbers. I’m ready to offer generous compensation. Name a sum.”
“I don’t want your money, Oleg. I want to take back what’s mine.”
“This apartment is ours,” he tensed at once. “It was bought during the marriage.”
“This apartment was gifted to me by my father a month before our wedding. The documents are on the desk. So your ‘any court’ will be very brief.”
He looked at the folder on the table, and his face slowly changed. The mask of rationality slipped, revealing confusion. He had miscalculated.
“What do you want?” he asked in a completely different voice.
“I want you to leave.”
“Where? It’s night.”
“You have somewhere to go. It smells there of fried onions and childhood. They’re waiting for you. You ‘bear responsibility’ for them.”
“Our joint accounts… the shares…”
“We’ll divide it all. With lawyers. Civilly. Just the way you like it. But that will be tomorrow. Tonight you’ll simply pack your things. Your ‘fishing’ gear is in the guest room. I think that’ll do for a start.”
Oleg—the man who chaired boards of directors—stood in the middle of his perfect living room turned crash site and didn’t know what to do. His superpower—logic—had failed.
For the first time in his life he couldn’t see the next move.
Vera walked past him, went to the stereo, and turned it on. Soft, calm classical music—what he had always called “objectless background”—filled the room.
She sat in an armchair, took a book from the table, and opened it. She didn’t look at him. She simply gave him time. Time to realize that his “main project” had just announced its closure. And that he no longer held even a minority stake in it.
Oleg stood there for another minute, then silently turned and went to the guest room.
Vera didn’t lift her eyes from the book. She felt no triumph. She felt no pain. She felt only how the air slowly returned to her own home, cleansed of lies by the scent of expensive wine.
Half a year later.
She threw out the Persian rug the very next day. Now in its place lay simple light wooden floorboards. They smelled of resin and wax.
The whole apartment had changed. From a sterile, calculated space, it had become a home. Where the shelves of business books had been, there were now studies and unfinished canvases. It smelled of paint, freshly brewed coffee, and the dust of old books.
The division of property went surprisingly smoothly. Faced with her implacable calm and a competent attorney, Oleg chose not to fight. War is an irrational waste of resources. He preferred to fix the losses and focus on his second, now main, “project.”
Sometimes Vera saw him from afar. At the supermarket, with tired Katya and sullen Nikita. Oleg pushed the cart, and his face wore the same expression he had while studying market reports—focused dissatisfaction with falling quotes. It seemed the new asset demanded far more unplanned contributions than he had expected.
This morning an email arrived. From him.
Subject: “Finalization of Property Matters.”
The text was predictably dry: “Vera, in the course of auditing remaining joint assets, a collection of vinyl records (classical music) purchased during the marriage was identified.
Market value is minor, but to maintain legal clarity I propose one of two options: 1. Compensation to me of 50% of the appraised value. 2. Transfer of the collection to me for subsequent disposal.”
Vera read the letter twice. Not a word about the past. No “how are you?” Only audit, assets, compensation, disposal. He hadn’t changed.
She looked at the turntable in the corner. Those very records. She listened to them almost every evening. Earlier she would have been angry. Now she felt only a light, almost weightless sadness.
She typed a reply.
“Oleg, keep them. I hope Nikita is doing well.”
She didn’t mention that her father had once given her those records. For Oleg that would have been just one more irrational argument. The gesture wasn’t for him. It was for her.
She hit “send,” and then, without a second thought, deleted his contact from her address book. A small but final act. Writing off the last, most toxic asset.
She went to the window. Spring sun flooded the room with light. She was no longer someone’s project. Successful or failed.
She was simply Vera. And for the first time in many years, that was more than enough