Anastasia froze in the middle of the room with a box of wedding invitations in her hands. There were three days left until the ceremony, and she had come to her future in-laws’ apartment to discuss the final details. Georgy Pavlovich, Vitaly’s father, was standing by the window with his back to her, and his words sounded casual, as if he were talking about the weather.
“Sorry, what?” she asked, convinced she’d misheard.
“The apartment you and Vitaly bought with a mortgage, I’ve already promised it to my nephew Igor. His wife is pregnant, they need it more. And you two are young, you’ll live with us for now. Vitaly agrees.”
The box slipped from Anastasia’s hands, and the invitations scattered across the floor like a white fan.
“Vitaly… agrees?” Her voice sounded foreign to her. “AGREES TO WHAT, exactly?”
Georgy Pavlovich turned around, annoyance in his eyes at having to explain things that, to him, were obvious.
“Nastenka, don’t dramatize. The apartment is in Vitaly’s name, he has the right to dispose of it as he sees fit. Igor will move in there a month after your wedding. By that time you’ll already have settled in with us.”
“But… the down payment was made with MY parents’ money! I sold my grandmother’s jewelry! We saved for two years!”
“Money is just pieces of paper,” Georgy Pavlovich waved it off. “Family is forever. Igor is our blood, and Vitaly understands that.”
Vitaly himself appeared in the doorway. He looked pale and avoided meeting Anastasia’s eyes.
“Nastya, Dad is right. It really is hard for Igor right now…”
“Hard?” Anastasia felt a wave rising inside her with such force it became hard to breathe. “And it’ll be EASY for us to live in a walk-through room in your parents’ place?”
“Not a walk-through,” corrected Klavdia Sergeyevna, Vitaly’s mother, appearing right behind him. “In the former nursery. We’ve already prepared it for you. We re-papered the walls, a nice pink pattern, very cute.”
Anastasia looked at the three people standing before her as a united front and realized: this wasn’t a spontaneous decision. This was a plan that had been discussed behind her back for who knows how long.
“Vitaly,” she addressed only the groom, ignoring his parents. “Tell me directly: are you really giving away OUR apartment—the one we’ll be paying for another fifteen years—to your cousin?”
“I’m not giving it away, just temporarily…” he began, but Georgy Pavlovich cut him off:
“No ‘temporarily’. Igor is moving in for good. And enough with the hysterics, Anastasia. In our family, such matters are decided by the head of the family—that is, by me. Vitaly understands this, and I advise you to accept our rules if you intend to become part of the Krasnov family.”
“Part of the family?” Anastasia burst out laughing, and that laugh made all three of them feel uneasy. “You’ve just taken my home away from me and are offering me a nursery room with pink wallpaper, and I’m supposed to be grateful for the honor of becoming part of your family?”
“Nastya, come on…” Vitaly took a step toward her, but stopped when he saw her eyes.
“DON’T COME NEAR ME!” she screamed so loudly the glass in the cabinet rattled. “You’re a traitor! A coward! You sold our future for Daddy’s approval!”
Klavdia Sergeyevna threw up her hands.
“Vitalik, what is this! We wanted to discuss everything peacefully, and your fiancée is behaving like some market fishwife!”
“Market fishwife?” Anastasia turned to her. “A MARKET FISHWIFE? Yes, I’m bargaining! I’m bargaining for my life, for my dignity, for the right to live in my own home and not in a pink cage under your supervision!”
“Anastasia, you’re forgetting yourself,” Georgy Pavlovich said coldly. “In my house people do not raise their voices.”
“And in my house people do not steal!” she shot back. “Because this is theft! Plain, simple theft!”
“How dare you!” Klavdia Sergeyevna flared up. “We are honest people!”
“Honest? HONEST?” Anastasia snatched her bag from the table. “You plotted behind my back to take the apartment! You manipulated Vitaly, knowing he’s incapable of standing up to you! You turned him into a rag!”
“Nastya, that’s enough!” Vitaly finally found his voice. “Don’t you dare insult my parents!”
“What, DOES THE TRUTH HURT YOUR EYES?” She turned to him. “Look at yourself! Thirty-two years old, and still Daddy’s puppet! He pulls the strings and you dance!”
“Control your fiancée, Vitaly,” hissed Georgy Pavlovich. “Or I’ll do it myself.”
“Try it!” Anastasia stepped toward him. “GO AHEAD, TRY! What will you do? Throw me out? I’ll leave myself! But first you’ll listen to me!”
She looked at all three of them.
“Do you know what the vilest thing in all this is? Not that you took the apartment. But that you did it behind my back! You smiled at me, called me ‘daughter’, accepted gifts from my parents, and all the while you were already dividing up our property!”
“It’s Vitaly’s property,” Georgy Pavlovich repeated stubbornly.
“Which was bought with MY money!”
“It’s registered in his name.”
“Because I TRUSTED him!” Anastasia turned to Vitaly. “I trusted you! I thought we were a team! And you… you didn’t even warn me! You didn’t even try to protect what was ours!”
Vitaly was silent, head bowed, and that silence was worse than any words.
“You know what?” Anastasia pulled her phone from her bag. “I’m going to call my father right now. He deserves to know what kind of family he was about to give his daughter to.”
“There’s no need to call anyone,” said Georgy Pavlovich quickly. “Let’s settle this among ourselves.”
“Among ourselves? You’ve already settled everything among yourselves—without me!”
She started dialing, but Vitaly snatched the phone from her.
“Nastya, stop! Don’t disgrace me in front of my parents!”
“DISGRACE?” She couldn’t believe her ears. “I’m disgracing you? You’ve disgraced yourself! You’re a smear of a man! A nobody!”
The slap cracked through the quiet room like a gunshot. It was Klavdia Sergeyevna who had struck Anastasia. She snatched her hand back.
“In our house no one insults our son!”
Anastasia pressed her palm to her burning cheek and burst out laughing.
“There it is—the true face of the ‘refined’ Krasnov family! You settle things with your hands!”
“Mama, why did you…” Vitaly began, but his father cut him off:
“She did the right thing. This girl has forgotten her place.”
“My place?” Anastasia straightened up. “MY PLACE? You know where my place is? Definitely not in your little family!”
She tore the engagement ring off her finger and threw it at Vitaly.
“The wedding is off!”
“Nastya, what, are you crazy?” He tried to catch the ring, but it rolled under the sofa. “The wedding is in three days! The guests are invited!”
“Let them come! You can tell them the bride turned out unworthy of the honor of marrying into the noble Krasnov clan!”
“Anastasia, think this over,” Georgy Pavlovich changed his tone to conciliatory. “You’ll say a lot of foolish things now and regret it later.”
“REGRET IT? The only thing I regret is not seeing through you sooner!”
“We’re willing to compromise,” Klavdia Sergeyevna quickly added. “You’ll live with us for a year, and then maybe…”
“NO!” Anastasia shouted. “No compromises! No ‘maybe’! You’ve shown your true faces, and for that I’m even grateful!”
She turned to Vitaly.
“And you… I thought you loved me. But you’re not capable of loving. You’re capable only of obeying!”
“Nastya, I love you…”
“DON’T YOU DARE! Don’t you dare say those words! Someone who loves doesn’t betray! Doesn’t allow his woman to be humiliated!”
“But they’re my parents…”
“And I was supposed to become your wife! YOUR WIFE! But you chose them!”
Georgy Pavlovich stepped between them.
“Enough. Anastasia, you’re behaving like a hysteric. Leave and come back when you’ve cooled down.”
“Cooled down?” She laughed through her tears. “I won’t cool down! I’ll be BOILING! With anger! With disgust! From the thought that I almost tied my life to this… to this nothing!”
“Don’t you dare talk about my son like that!” Klavdia Sergeyevna intervened again.
“What, is it not true? Look at him! He’s thirty-two and can’t make a single decision without Daddy’s approval! He betrayed the woman who was about to become his wife! And for what? So Daddy would pat him on the head?”
Vitaly clenched his fists.
“Nastya, leave. Leave right now.”
“With pleasure! But first I’ll say one more thing!” She turned to all three of them. “You think you’ve won? You think that by taking the apartment you’ll get an obedient daughter-in-law? NO. What you’ll get is WAR!”
“What nonsense…” began Georgy Pavlovich, but she cut him off:
“The apartment is in Vitaly’s name, but the mortgage is in both our names! I’m a co-borrower! And the payments came from my account! I have all the paperwork, all the receipts! I’ll take this to court!”
“No, you won’t,” said Georgy Pavlovich confidently. “Scandal, publicity… Your parents wouldn’t survive that.”
“My parents? And you think YOUR reputation will survive? The respected university lecturer, Georgy Pavlovich Krasnov, tricked his son’s fiancée out of an apartment! How do you think your rector will like that? Your colleagues?”
Georgy Pavlovich’s face turned purple.
“Are you blackmailing me?”
“I’M DEFENDING MYSELF! You’re the ones who started this dirty game!”
Klavdia Sergeyevna clutched at her heart.
“Vitaly, what sort of girl have you brought us! She’s a real fury!”
“Yes, I’m a fury!” Anastasia agreed. “And you made me this way! I came here kind, trusting, loving! And you trampled all of that!”
“Nastya, please…” Vitaly tried to take her hand, but she jerked it away.
“DON’T TOUCH ME! And you know what? Your cousin Igor… I know everything about him! I know this is his third marriage! I know he has children from his two previous wives he doesn’t pay child support for! I know that his ‘pregnant wife’ is a woman he’s living with without even being officially registered!”
“How do you…” began Klavdia Sergeyevna.
“I have friends! Who know how to find information! And if you think I’ll let that leech of a gigolo live in MY apartment…”
“That’s not your apartment!” barked Georgy Pavlovich.
“We’ll see about that!” Anastasia took a folder of documents from her bag. “Here are copies of all the payments! Here are the receipts! Here is the purchase contract, where in black and white it says the down payment of three million rubles was made by MY parents!”
“But the apartment is registered to Vitaly,” Georgy Pavlovich repeated stubbornly.
“So what? You think that gives you the right to steal it? I’ll hire lawyers! The best lawyers! And we’ll see what the court has to say!”
“Anastasia, let’s not rush things…” Now it was clear that Klavdia Sergeyevna was nervous.
“What’s the matter, SCARED? Scared that everyone will find out about this story? That your neighbors, to whom you brag about how decent you are, will find out? That at the university, where you, Georgy Pavlovich, lecture on ethics, they’ll find out too?”
“That’s slander!”
“That’s the TRUTH! And I’ll tell it to everyone! I’ll post it online! Let everyone know what kind of people the Krasnovs really are!”
Vitaly grabbed her by the shoulders.
“Nastya, stop! You’ll destroy everything!”
“What’s left to destroy?” She tore herself free. “You already destroyed everything! Our love, our future, our family!”
“But we can still fix this…”
“FIX IT? How? You’ll give the apartment to your cousin and offer me a nursery with pink wallpaper? Under the watchful eye of your mommy who’ll teach me how to make borscht? Under the control of your daddy who’ll decide how many children we have and how we raise them?”
“Nastya…”
“NO! You know what I’ve realized? You’ll never be my husband. You’ll always be their son. And I’ll just be an attachment. A voiceless, rightless attachment.”
Georgy Pavlovich stood up.
“Enough. Leave, Anastasia. And don’t come back.”
“WITH PLEASURE! But this isn’t over! You’ll hear from me again! And from my lawyers!”
She headed for the door, then turned back.
“And you know what’s the funniest part? You could have had a loving daughter-in-law. Someone who would have cared for you in old age. Who would have given you grandchildren. But you chose war. So enjoy it!”
“Nastya, wait!” Vitaly ran after her.
“DON’T FOLLOW ME!” she shouted, already standing in the hallway. “And don’t call! Don’t text! As far as I’m concerned, you’re dead! All of you are dead to me!”
She ran out of the apartment, slamming the door so hard that a framed family photograph of the Krasnovs fell from the wall.
Six months passed. Vitaly sat in the courtroom and could hardly recognize the woman he had once planned to call his wife. Anastasia looked composed, confident, resolute. Beside her sat an expensive lawyer, with thick folders of documents laid out in front of him.
Georgy Pavlovich fidgeted with his tie. Klavdia Sergeyevna kept pressing a handkerchief to her eyes. Igor, their nephew—who had never ended up moving into the disputed apartment—sat in the back row looking lost.
“Your Honor,” said Anastasia’s lawyer. “We have presented the court with indisputable evidence. The initial down payment for the apartment was made by my client’s parents. All mortgage payments were made from her account. My client is a co-borrower on the mortgage contract. In fact, she has paid more than seventy percent of the apartment’s total cost.”
“But the apartment is in my son’s name!” burst out Georgy Pavlovich.
“I ask the defendant not to disturb the order of the proceedings,” the judge said sternly.
The lawyer continued:
“Moreover, we have witness testimony that the defendant planned to transfer the apartment to a third party without the knowledge or consent of the plaintiff. This constitutes fraud.”
“That’s slander!” shouted Georgy Pavlovich, jumping up.
“We have an audio recording,” the lawyer said calmly, taking out a recorder. “Made by the plaintiff during a conversation with the defendant’s family.”
Vitaly turned pale. He hadn’t known Anastasia had turned on the recorder on her phone that fateful day.
The court listened to the recording in dead silence. The words of Georgy Pavlovich about how the apartment had already been promised to Igor sounded like a sentence.
“Your Honor,” rose the Krasnovs’ lawyer. “It was just a family quarrel. Emotions…”
“Emotions?” Anastasia stood up. “Your Honor, may I speak?”
“Go ahead.”
“I loved this man. I trusted him. I trusted him so much that I agreed to register our shared apartment in his name. And he and his family took advantage of that trust. They wanted to turn me into a powerless servant, living in their house with no real rights. When I resisted, they called me hysterical. The defendant’s mother struck me across the face. And all this—out of greed. Out of a desire to control. Out of the belief that a woman should silently endure any humiliation.”
She turned to Vitaly.
“I’m not asking for much. Only for justice. The apartment should be sold, and the money divided proportionally to our contributions. That’s fair.”
The judge nodded.
“The court will retire to deliberate.”
An hour later, the verdict was read. The apartment was to be sold; seventy percent of the proceeds were to go to Anastasia, thirty percent to Vitaly. In addition, the defendants were ordered to pay compensation for emotional distress.
Georgy Pavlovich collapsed onto the bench. Klavdia Sergeyevna broke into sobs. Vitaly sat staring at a single point.
“Nastya…” he tried to approach her after the hearing.
“Don’t call me that,” she replied coolly. “For you, I’m Ms. Anastasia Vladimirovna.”
“I want to apologize…”
“Too late. You made your choice six months ago. Now live with it.”
She turned and walked toward the exit. At the doors, a tall man with a bouquet of flowers was waiting for her.
“How did it go?” he asked, wrapping an arm around her.
“Justice prevailed, Maxim,” Anastasia smiled.
Vitaly watched them leave together and understood—he had lost everything. The apartment would have to be sold. His father’s reputation was ruined—the story had made it into the university newspaper. Igor, having learned there would be no apartment, disappeared. His parents hadn’t spoken to Vitaly for a month, blaming him for “getting involved with that schemer.”
And Anastasia… Anastasia started a new life. Without lies, betrayal, or humiliation. And she was happy.
Georgy Pavlovich was the last to leave the courtroom. An internal investigation awaited him at the university. Colleagues turned away when they met him in the hallway. Students whispered behind his back.
“This is all because of you,” he hissed as he passed his son. “Couldn’t you have chosen a normal, compliant girl?”
Vitaly said nothing. He knew that what he had chosen was in fact a normal girl. Smart, determined, brave. He had just failed to protect her. Failed to be a man.
And now he was paying for his cowardice with loneliness in the pink nursery of his parents’ home—a room he now realized he might never escape