Fifteen people, at least!” Sergey’s loud voice carried from the living room. “Yeah, at our place—why waste money on a restaurant!”
Anna froze at the sink. A mountain of unwashed plates loomed before her—the remains of last night’s dinner, which she’d spent three hours cooking. Warm water ran over her hands, and a familiar knot of anger tightened in her stomach.
Sergey paced the living room with his phone, gesturing with his free hand. His unfinished tea cooled on the coffee table—the third mug he’d abandoned somewhere today.
“Olivier salad, herring under a fur coat, a hot course…” he listed to his buddy. “Anya will do it all—she’s great at it!”
Anna slowly turned off the tap. She wiped her hands on an apron with faded sunflowers—a gift from her mother-in-law for their eighth wedding anniversary. She sat down at the table, fists clenched.
“Again it’s all on me,” throbbed at her temples. “And then he’ll say, ‘Great party.’”
Anna was still sitting at the kitchen table when Sergey finished his phone call. Memories of last New Year’s spun through her head—three days at the stove, mountains of salads, a roasted duck, homemade pies. And then two days of cleaning until her back hurt so much she had to take painkillers. Sergey spent the whole evening basking in compliments: “Man, what a cozy home you’ve got!”
Twelve years together. The first years were different—they rented a studio on the outskirts of Voronezh and saved for their own house. They built it themselves, at the site every weekend. Anna mixed mortar right alongside him, hauled bricks. When they moved in, they were happy—their own nest, a spacious kitchen, a veranda.
But after the move, something changed. Sergey suddenly grew fond of “having people over.” Every holiday meant a table for fifteen or twenty.
“Anyut, look here!” Sergey walked into the kitchen with a notepad. “I did the math. If we celebrate at home, it comes out almost half the price of a restaurant!”
Anna lifted her tired eyes to him. Yesterday she’d stayed at work until nine—quarterly report. Today after lunch she’d gone to her mother, Galina Petrovna—helped with the cleaning; she was still weak after surgery.
“Cheaper,” she said slowly, “because my time is free?”
Sergey blinked in surprise.
“Why would you say that? You’re the homemaker; you like to cook. Remember how Mom always says a woman creates the cozy home.”
Anna stood and went to the window. A February evening darkened beyond the glass. A withered geranium sat on the sill—no time to water it.
Anna stepped onto the veranda with a cup of tea. Her hands trembled slightly after the conversation. She sat in the old wicker chair—they’d bought it at a clearance sale when they’d just moved. Back then it seemed there would be so many evenings together on this veranda.
Children’s voices drifted from the neighbor’s yard—the Petrov twins were playing hide-and-seek. Their mother, Svetlana, had recently opened her own hair salon. Her husband helped with the renovations and drove the kids to school. “And we don’t have children,” Anna thought. “First we built the house, then we kept putting it off… And now it’s too late.”
Something snapped in her chest and everything felt light. As if the heavy stone she’d carried for years suddenly vanished. “Enough. Let him handle it.”
Anna got up and went inside. Sergey sat in the living room watching hockey.
“Seryozha,” she stopped in the doorway. “If you want—celebrate your birthday at home. But I’m not cooking. I won’t even chop a salad.”
He tore himself from the screen and smirked:
“Oh, come on, Anyut. Are you sulking? You won’t be able to watch things fall apart. I know you—you’ll grumble and still do everything. You’ve got golden hands!”
Anna looked at him in silence. On the screen, the puck flew into the goal and the commentator shouted. Sergey turned back to the match with a dismissive wave:
“Don’t pout, it’ll be fine. You’re my smart girl.”
She turned and went to the bedroom. She lay down without undressing and pulled a throw over herself. In the dark she smiled—for the first time in a long while she felt free. The decision was made, and she knew—there was no going back.
Saturday morning. Two days left until Sergey’s birthday. Anna sat at the kitchen table, breakfast crumbs still on it. In her hands— a glossy magazine; nearby, a third cup of coffee had gone cold. Sergey burst into the kitchen holding a notepad and pen. His T-shirt stuck to his back, his bangs were damp—he’d already spent an hour racing around the apartment making lists.
“Anyut, where’s your list? What do we need to buy?” He flipped through his notes. “How much salad for fifteen people? Three kilos? Five?”
“Doesn’t matter to me,” Anna turned the magazine page, eyeing a pie recipe. “I told you—I’m not taking part.”
The pen rolled across the floor. The notepad drooped in his hand.
“Are you serious? The guests are invited!” his voice cracked into a shout. “The whole department is coming, and Dima and Natasha are coming in from Moscow just for this!”
“It’s your party. Your guests,” she finished her coffee.
“You… you traitor!” His fist slammed the table; the saltshaker jumped. “Twelve years together, and this is how you—”
Anna stood, closed the magazine. She took her bag from the hook by the door and checked for her keys.
“Where are you going?”
“To Mom’s. At least until your party is over.”
The lock clicked. Silence settled over the apartment.
Sunday, eleven at night. Sergey sat in the kitchen amid shopping bags—meat, vegetables, mayonnaise. Something hissed on the stove and started to burn. He grabbed his phone.
“Mom, help me out, I can’t handle this!” Panic in his voice. “The guests are coming tomorrow!”
An hour later the doorbell rang. His mother, Nadezhda Ivanovna, and his sister Lena. Mom in a flowery housecoat over her nightgown, Lena in a tracksuit, both with bags.
“She’s really ruined you,” Nadezhda Ivanovna grumbled, opening the fridge. “She used to at least cook properly—used to be a homemaker.”
The house smelled of scorched meat. Lena chopped vegetables, cursing under her breath. Sergey sat at the table with his head in his hands.
Birthday. Noon. The first guests were already ringing the bell. Wiping sweat from her brow, Nadezhda Ivanovna set out uneven slices of sausage. The Olivier salad turned out runny—Mom had gone overboard with mayonnaise.
“You spoiled her, Seryozha,” Lena hissed, pulling a burnt chicken from the oven.
About ten people gathered in the living room. Dima from Moscow asked awkwardly:
“Where’s Anna? Is she sick?”
“She went to her mother’s,” Sergey muttered, pouring vodka. “Let’s drink to the reunion!”
The toast hung in the air. The accountant’s wife, Marina, tasted the herring under a fur coat and winced—the beets were undercooked.
“Anna’s used to be better,” she whispered to her friend.
Sergey forced a smile, shot after shot. By evening his tongue was thick. The guests exchanged glances—he’d never gotten this drunk before.
Nadezhda Ivanovna collapsed onto the couch, clutching her lower back:
“That’s it, I can’t do any more. You all can wash the dishes yourselves.”
Sergey went into the kitchen. Piles of plates towered in the sink and on the table. Leftovers, sauce spilled on the tablecloth. He sank onto a chair and cradled his head in his hands.
Laughter drifted from the living room—guests were telling jokes without him now. “It’s my party, but there’s no joy,” pounded in his temples.
He sat in the dark kitchen, listening to other people’s merriment. His notepad with the calculations lay on the table—the savings had backfired. His phone was silent. Anna didn’t call.
Tuesday morning. Anna returned home from her mother’s. In the hallway she stumbled over an empty bottle. The air reeked of sour food and cigarette smoke. In the living room—heaps of trash, ashtrays full of butts, someone’s forgotten jacket on the couch.
The kitchen looked like after a bombing. Sticky floor, towers of dirty dishes, bits of Olivier floating in the sink. On the stove—a frying pan with congealed grease.
On the table amid crumbs lay Sergey’s crumpled T-shirt and his charger. Her husband himself was nowhere to be found.
Anna dialed his number—no answer. She called her mother-in-law.
“He’s with us,” whispered Nadezhda Ivanovna. “He’s been lying here for two days, says he needs to think. Anechka, maybe you two could talk? Make up?”
“Let him think,” Anna hung up.
She walked through the wrecked apartment and opened her laptop. Half an hour later a team from a cleaning company arrived—two women with professional equipment.
“Whoa, there’s four hours of work here,” the older one whistled.
“Go ahead. I’ll pay,” Anna handed over her card.
While the women scrubbed her home, she sat on the balcony with a cup of tea. Her phone showed missed calls from Sergey. She didn’t call back.
Two weeks later. Anna heard the key turn in the lock. Sergey stood in the doorway—unshaven, rumpled, with a bag in his hand.
“Hi,” he shifted from foot to foot. “Can I come in?”
She stepped aside. He went into the living room and sat on the couch.
“I’ve been thinking these two weeks… I’m sorry. I was an idiot. I thought I was saving money, but what came of it…” He rubbed his face with his hands. “You’re not a packhorse. You’re my wife. I get that now.”
Anna sat across from him.
“And now what?”
“Let’s try again? Without that stupid penny-pinching. Mom said they do birthdays well at the ‘Praga’ restaurant. Maybe we can celebrate your birthday there?”
“We’ll see,” she stood. “Want some tea?”
“I do.”
A year passed. They celebrated Anna’s birthday at Praga—waiters, live music, no dirty dishes. Sergey raised his glass:
“To my wife, who taught me a simple thing—a holiday should be a holiday for everyone.”
The guests applauded. Anna smiled—truly, for the first time in a long while.
From then on they celebrated all their holidays in restaurants. It cost more, but there were no fights