Nikolai Vorontsov had been used to unconditional recognition of his merits since childhood. His mother idolized him, teachers admired him, girls swooned. And how could it have been otherwise? Tall, well-built, with a perpetual half-smile on his lips and a sly squint in his gray eyes. At university they nicknamed him “the lucky one”—he always seemed to get lucky on exams, and in life in general.
“Kolenka, you were born with a silver spoon in your mouth,” his father, Anatoly Petrovich—a gray-haired engineer at a railway depot—often told him. “Just don’t get conceited. Remember: fortune is a capricious lady.”
Kolya would nod, but deep down he believed he deserved everything he had. When he met Marina in his final year, there was no doubt—she was his. Slim, with a mane of red hair and a spray of freckles across her sharp little nose, Marina seemed to him the embodiment of everything he needed.
“Marry you? You?” Marina laughed brightly when he proposed after only a month. “Nikolai Anatolyevich, you’re out of your mind.”
But six months later they were already married, and a year after that they moved into their own two-bedroom apartment, which Kolya’s father helped them buy.
Married life flowed steadily and predictably. Marina worked at a bank; Kolya built his career at a construction company. Everything was proper, as if following a script written by someone else—until Vitya Solovyov appeared.
“Kolyan! Long time no see!” Vitya popped up at the office door like a jack-in-the-box.
Kolya hadn’t seen his former classmate in about seven years. Vitya had changed—he’d grown a beard, put on weight—but his eyes were the same: restless, with golden sparks.
“So how are you? Married? Kids?” Vitya rattled on, waving his hands as if conducting an invisible orchestra.
“Married. No kids yet,” Kolya felt a strange awkwardness in the face of that whirlwind of energy.
“And I’ve been roaming the world—got stuck in Asia for three years. Now I’m back, starting a business. Listen, let’s meet up, sit down, remember the good old days. Bring your wife—I’ll come with my Svetka. We’ll get acquainted, have a drink, chat.”
Kolya agreed, though something inside him resisted. Marina took the idea of dinner with a former classmate without much enthusiasm.
“Kolya, why? We don’t know him—we haven’t seen him in ages,” she said, washing dishes without turning around.
“Not ages—seven years,” Kolya corrected. “Is it really that hard for you to make dinner? I don’t want to waste money on a restaurant.”
Marina shrugged.
“As you say. When should we expect them?”
On Saturday Vitya showed up with his wife—a petite blonde with enormous blue eyes. Svetlana, or Sveta as she introduced herself, didn’t talk much, but she smiled often, sincerely.
“Wow, what a place!” Vitya whistled, looking around the apartment. “Kolyan, you’ve got yourself set up!”
Kolya proudly showed off the home he and Marina had spent years putting together. Expensive furniture, the latest appliances, designer trinkets—everything spoke of comfort and taste.
“It’s very cozy here,” Sveta said quietly when she and Marina were alone in the kitchen. “Did you come up with all of this yourselves?”
“Mostly me,” Marina said, spooning salad onto plates. “Kolya’s busy with work.”
“And what do you do?” Sveta watched the hostess’s precise movements with interest.
“I work at a bank. Mortgage department.”
“Do you like it?”
For the first time Marina looked up at the guest.
“Not really. But it’s stable. What about you?”
“I’m a photographer. Freelance. When we lived in Thailand, I shot for tourist magazines. Now it’s mostly weddings and family photo sessions.”
“Thailand?” Marina froze with the spoon in her hand. “You really lived there?”
“Three years,” Sveta smiled. “Vitya taught English, I took photos. Then there was Vietnam, Indonesia…”
Suddenly Marina felt something tighten inside her. She remembered how she’d once dreamed of traveling, how she’d planned to see the world before settling down. But then Kolya appeared, then the mortgage, then work…
The evening turned out unexpectedly lively. Vitya told stories about life abroad, Sveta showed photos on her phone, Marina laughed the way she hadn’t laughed in a long time. Kolya watched his wife in surprise—she seemed to glow from within as she listened.
“Hey, why don’t you come with us to Georgia in August?” Vitya suddenly suggested. “We’re renting a little house there for two weeks—plenty of room. We’ll sit on the veranda, drink wine, go hiking.”
“Are you kidding?” Kolya shook his head. “I’ve got work, Marina too…”
“I’d go,” Marina said suddenly, and the room fell silent.
After the guests left, Kolya pounced on his wife.
“Are you serious? What Georgia? We have other plans for our vacation.”
“What plans, Kolya?” Marina gathered plates from the table. “Lie by a pool in Turkey? We do that every year.”
“So what? You don’t like it?”
“I do. But I want something different. Did you hear their stories? They lived, Kolya. They really lived.”
“And we don’t live, then?” he felt himself boiling over. “An apartment, a car, a stable job—what, in your opinion, that isn’t life?”
Marina sank onto a chair, exhausted.
“That’s not what I mean. It’s just… sometimes it feels like we’re stuck in some endless Groundhog Day. Work-home-vacation-work. And like that until retirement?”
The conversation left a bitter aftertaste. Kolya couldn’t fall asleep for a long time, thinking about what Marina had said. Was she really bored with him? Did their life seem bland to her?
A week later Vitya called again.
“Kolyan, decide already! Tickets are going to get more expensive soon.”
“Listen, I don’t know…” Kolya hesitated. “My vacation is only in September…”
“Then take unpaid leave! Two weeks, big deal. You only live once, brother!”
After long arguments, Marina got her way. They bought tickets to Georgia, and Kolya was surprised to find himself looking forward to the trip. Maybe they really did need to change something in their measured existence.
Tbilisi greeted them with heat and aromas. The little house Vitya rented turned out to be an old stone building on the outskirts of the city, with a huge veranda and a view of the mountains.
“Well? How is it?” Vitya beamed, showing them their room. “Not a five-star hotel, of course, but it’s got atmosphere!”
Kolya didn’t know what to say. The room was small, with a simple wooden bed and a dresser. No air conditioner, no TV.
“It’s wonderful,” Marina said, stepping up to the window. “Look at that view!”
The first days were filled with excursions, wine tastings, and endless conversations on the veranda. Vitya knew the city like the back of his hand and took them to places that weren’t in guidebooks. They ate in tiny family restaurants, drank homemade wine with Vitya’s chance acquaintances, wandered old streets until dawn.
Kolya noticed how Marina was changing. It was as if she’d cast off some invisible weight. She laughed louder, spoke more, even moved differently—lightly, freely. One evening, as they sat on the veranda, Sveta began taking pictures.
“Can I photograph you two?” she aimed the lens at Kolya and Marina. “The light is so beautiful.”
“Oh, I’m not photogenic,” Marina waved her off.
“Everyone is photogenic if you catch the right moment,” Sveta kept clicking the shutter. “Just relax and talk.”
A few days later Sveta showed them the shots. Kolya stared at photos of his wife in surprise—she looked completely different. Bright, alive, with mischievous sparks in her eyes.
“Is that really me?” Marina studied the photos distrustfully.
“The real you,” Sveta smiled. “That’s how I see you.”
On the second-to-last day of their stay in Georgia, Vitya suggested going into the mountains, to some village where a winemaker acquaintance lived.
“Are you out of your mind?” Kolya protested. “It’s a winding mountain road, and your car is ancient—no air conditioner.”
“But the views!” Vitya wouldn’t let up. “Come on, just for one night. We’ll be back tomorrow.”
Marina looked at her husband pleadingly.
“Kolya, let’s go? When will we ever get here again?”
And they went. Vitya’s old Opel groaned around the turns but steadily carried them higher and higher into the mountains. The road was narrow; sometimes the car passed within inches of a drop-off. Kolya sat in the backseat, gripping the door handle, cursing the day he agreed to this adventure.
“We’re here!” Vitya announced happily, stopping in front of a small house surrounded by vineyards.
The host turned out to be an elderly Georgian man with thick gray mustaches and kind eyes. He didn’t speak Russian, but Vitya chatted fluently with him in Georgian, translating now and then.
“Gogi says we must stay for dinner and try his wine,” Vitya explained. “If we refuse, we’ll offend him to the point of mortal insult.”
Dinner dragged on until late at night. Gogi told stories that Vitya translated; they drank homemade wine, ate khachapuri and shashlik. Kolya, tense at first, gradually relaxed. The wine was both tart and sweet; the night air intoxicated no less than the alcohol, and the old winemaker’s stories made him think about things he’d never thought about before.
“He says a person should live where their soul sings,” Vitya translated Gogi’s words. “Otherwise life passes by.”
“And if your soul doesn’t sing anywhere?” Kolya suddenly asked.
Vitya translated. Gogi looked at Kolya attentively and answered.
“He says that doesn’t happen,” Vitya translated. “Sometimes we just stop listening.”
Back in Moscow, Kolya and Marina seemed to have brought home a piece of Georgian serenity with them. They often remembered the trip, rewatched the photos Sveta sent. But gradually routine pulled them back in. Marina returned to her bank job; Kolya plunged into a new project.
In October something unexpected happened. The company where Kolya worked announced mass layoffs.
“Don’t worry,” he reassured Marina. “My performance is good—they won’t touch me.”
But he was among the first to be cut. Kolya was in shock. He—always successful, always in demand—was suddenly out in the cold. For the first few weeks he actively sent out résumés, went to interviews, but everywhere he got polite rejections: “We’ll call you back,” “We’re considering other candidates,” “Unfortunately, your experience doesn’t quite match our requirements.”
Marina quietly watched her husband’s frantic attempts. She didn’t blame him, didn’t pressure him—she was simply there. One evening, as Kolya once again sorted through job listings online, she sat down beside him.
“Maybe it’s a sign?”
“A sign of what?” he snapped irritably.
“That you need to change something. Try something new.”
Kolya closed the laptop.
“What are you talking about? We have a mortgage, a car loan. We need money, not philosophical speeches.”
“I know,” Marina said softly. “But maybe you should think about something you genuinely enjoy doing?”
“I liked my old job. Stable salary, career prospects…”
“Did you really like it?” She looked him straight in the eyes. “Did you wake up every morning thinking, ‘How great that I’m going there’?”
Kolya wanted to snap back, but suddenly realized he couldn’t. No, he didn’t wake up with that thought. He woke up thinking about traffic, about reports due, about having to listen to his boss’s lectures…
“Do you remember what that old man in Georgia said?” Marina continued. “About living where your soul sings?”
Kolya stayed silent. He remembered that evening—the wine, the stars above the mountains, and the strange sense of freedom that had come over him.
In November Vitya called.
“Kolyan, how are you? I heard you got laid off. Don’t hang your head—we’ll break through!”
Kolya reluctantly told him about his fruitless job search.
“Listen, want to join us?” Vitya suddenly предложил. “A few of us are building a business—tours for foreigners to unusual places in Moscow. Not mountains of gold, of course, but enough to live on. And freedom—you come when you want, leave when you want.”
“My English isn’t good enough,” Kolya brushed him off.
“But you’re a native Muscovite! You know the city like the back of your hand. And you can learn anything.”
Kolya promised to think about it, but deep down he doubted it. Work as a tour guide? That was ridiculous. That was for students or retirees, not for an established professional.
Yet the longer his jobless existence dragged on, the more he thought about Vitya’s предложение. One day he decided to just see how it worked and asked to tag along on one of the tours.
The group consisted of five Americans and a couple of English people. Vitya led them through Moscow courtyards, showed graffiti, told stories about ghosts in old buildings, secret underground passages, and legends tied to each place. Kolya watched in surprise as the city transformed in his friend’s narration—how the walls came alive, how the listeners’ eyes lit up.
“Well?” Vitya asked after the tour. “Impressed?”
“Honestly? Yes,” Kolya admitted. “I had no idea there was so much interesting stuff in these places.”
“Because you’re used to walking the same routes. Home-work-supermarket. But the city is huge, alive, full of stories.”
That evening Kolya wandered around central Moscow for a long time, studying buildings where he’d never before noticed the plasterwork, bas-reliefs, or quirky window frames. He suddenly realized he had never truly seen the city he’d lived in all his life.
At home a surprise awaited him. Marina was sitting in the kitchen with shining eyes.
“Kolya, they offered me a promotion. With a relocation.”
“Where?” he dropped into the chair opposite her.
“To Sochi. The bank is opening a new branch there—they need a head of the mortgage department. Higher salary, they provide a company apartment…”
Kolya looked at his wife and didn’t recognize her. She seemed to glow from within, spoke quickly, gestured.
“And you want to go?” he asked carefully.
“Why not?” she shrugged. “What’s keeping us here? We can rent out the apartment, sell the car…”
“What about me?” it slipped out of him. “I’m supposed to drop everything and go with you?”
Marina fell silent, looked at her husband внимательно.
“No, Kolya. You don’t have to. You can stay here, keep looking for your dream job. Or you can come with me and try something new.”
They talked all night. Marina spoke about the offer, the prospects, how much she wanted change. Kolya listened and gradually understood that for the first time in a long while his wife truly wanted something. Not just drifting along, playing the role society prescribed, but actually striving for something.
“I’ll think about it,” he said at dawn. “Give me time.”
The next few days Kolya spent in thought. He wandered around the city, remembered their life with Marina, wondered whether they were truly happy—or merely acting out some imposed script.
One evening the doorbell rang. Vitya stood on the doorstep with a bottle of wine.
“I can tell you need to talk.”
They sat in the kitchen, drank Georgian wine that Vitya had somehow gotten, and talked.
“Is there anything keeping you here?” Vitya asked. “Work? No. Parents? They’re in another city. Friends? Well, I can come visit you.”
“It’s not that simple,” Kolya sighed. “We spent so many years building a life here…”
“And what did you build?” Vitya looked serious, without his usual smirk. “An apartment with a mortgage? A prestigious job you lost? What else?”
Kolya fell silent. He suddenly realized he couldn’t name anything that truly tied him to Moscow. The only thing he truly valued was Marina. And she wanted to leave.
“You know,” Vitya continued, “when Sveta and I left for Thailand, everyone thought we were crazy. Quit a promising job, leave the apartment… But we just realized we wanted more from life. Not money, not status—impressions, experience, freedom.”
“And you don’t regret it?”
“Not for a second,” Vitya smiled. “There were difficulties, of course. But we’re alive, healthy, and happy. Isn’t that the point?”
After Vitya left, Kolya sat on the balcony for a long time, looking at the night city. He remembered the winemaker’s words about living where your soul sings. He remembered how Marina had glowed in Georgia—how she laughed, how greedily she absorbed new impressions. And he compared it to their usual life, where she quietly and unnoticed did what she was “supposed” to do—work, cook, keep the home.
In the morning he made his decision.
“I’m coming with you,” he said to Marina over breakfast. “Let’s try a new life.”
She looked at him in disbelief.
“Really? You won’t throw it in my face later?”
“I won’t,” he smiled. “Maybe it’s what we both need.”
Packing took two weeks. They rented out the apartment, sold some belongings, said goodbye to friends. Vitya promised to visit and bring a bottle of that same Georgian wine.
Moving to Sochi wasn’t as scary as Kolya had imagined. The company apartment was small but уютная, with a view of the sea. Marina dove into work, and Kolya… Kolya suddenly discovered he liked being a homemaker. He cooked, explored the city, took photos—Sveta had taught him the basics during their trip to Georgia.
One day, walking along the embankment, he saw an advertisement: “Tour guide needed with knowledge of the city’s history. Training available.” Kolya himself didn’t understand why he wrote down the number and called.
A month later he was already leading groups of tourists through little-known corners of Sochi, telling them about architecture, history, legends. It turned out he had a talent for captivating people with stories, for making them see beauty in ordinary things.
One evening, when Marina came home from work, Kolya was cooking dinner.
“Why are you standing at the stove?” she asked in surprise. “Today is my turn.”
“Guests are coming to you—so you stand at the stove,” Kolya replied calmly.
“What guests?” Marina didn’t understand.
The doorbell rang. On the doorstep stood Vitya and Sveta with suitcases.
“Surprise!” Vitya spread his arms wide. “We’re here for a week. You taking us in?”
That evening they sat on the balcony, looked at the sea, and drank Georgian wine. Vitya talked about new projects, Sveta showed photos, Marina shared her successes at work. Kolya stayed quiet, watching them and thinking how strangely life sometimes turns.
“Do you regret it?” Marina asked softly when they were alone.
“Regret what?”
“That we left. That everything changed.”
Kolya looked at the sea, the stars above it, the sleeping city.
“No, I don’t regret it. You know, I realized one thing: it’s not about the place—it’s about how you relate to it. You can live your whole life in one city and never see its beauty. Or you can discover something new every day wherever you are.”
Marina rested her head on his shoulder.
“And where does your soul sing, Kolya Vorontsov?”
He was silent for a moment, looking at the night city.
“You know, I kept thinking happiness was some destination point. A prestigious job, an apartment in the center, status. But it turned out it’s simply the ability to choose your own path.”
Three years passed. Kolya stood on the embankment, examining the building he and Sveta had just bought for their tour bureau. An old house with peeling plaster and a wonderful history. He and Vitya had developed a whole network of routes along the Black Sea coast, and business was going fairly well.
The phone rang. Marina.
“How did it go?” Kolya asked.
“I turned it down,” her voice sounded firm and calm. “They offered a transfer back to Moscow—to the head office. Said it was career growth, twice the money.”
“And what did you tell them?” Kolya narrowed his eyes, looking at the sea.
“That my price is higher,” she laughed. “Don’t look so surprised. I realized offers like that will come again and again. And each time you have to decide: do we really need it, or is it just the temptation to slide back into the привычная колея?”
“And you don’t regret it?”
“Regret what?” She paused. “That we no longer measure success in square meters and numbers on a paycheck? No, I don’t regret it.”
In the evening friends gathered for the housewarming. Kolya looked at them and thought how oddly life had turned out—Vitya with his crazy ideas, Sveta with a camera slung over her shoulder, new friends they never would have met if they’d stayed in Moscow.
“So what are we drinking to?” Vitya asked, raising his glass.
“To the courage to change the rules of the game,” Kolya answered. “Because once you understand that playing by someone else’s rules means you’re bound to lose.”
The doorbell rang. A courier delivered a package from Georgia—a bottle of wine from old Gogi with a note, crookedly written in Russian: “When the soul sings, the sound carries far.”
Kolya thought it wasn’t the end of the story. It wasn’t even the middle. Just one turn on a long road with climbs and descents and остановки. But the главное was—they were choosing for themselves where to go next.
The тревога that had haunted him all his life—the fear of making the wrong choice, of missing something important—dissolved without a trace. He no longer clung to the illusion of control. There was no guarantee that tomorrow everything wouldn’t collapse—business, relationships, health. But now it didn’t scare him.
“You know what’s the strangest thing?” he said to Marina late that night after the guests had gone. “I used to think freedom was when you can do whatever you want. But it turns out real freedom is when you’re not afraid of losing what you have.”
Marina looked at him seriously.
“And if you do lose it?”
“Then we’ll start over,” he shrugged. “Isn’t that the point