Victor was sitting in his office, sorting through contracts, when his phone exploded with a frantic shriek.
“Vitya, do something about your wife! She threw me out on the street! Who does she think she is?!”
His sister Kristina’s voice shook with fury and tears. Victor shoved the folders away, a familiar headache already pulsing at his temples.
“Kristina, breathe. What happened?”
“What happened?!” Her voice jumped an octave. “Your wife—this… this woman—she dragged all my stuff out into the stairwell! Just grabbed it and dumped it there! Like garbage! I’m standing in the building hallway right now, and the neighbors are staring at me like I’m… like I’m some homeless person! Do you get it, Vitya?! She humiliated me! In front of everyone!”
Victor closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. For the past two weeks he’d felt something sour building at home. Anna had turned quiet and tense, while Kristina… Kristina kept behaving like she was staying at a luxury hotel with full service.
“What happened right before that?” he asked carefully.
“Nothing! Absolutely nothing!” Kristina babbled. “I was just living my life, studying for exams, not bothering anyone. And this morning she barged into my room—well, the guest room—and started yelling that I had to move out! I told her I came to my brother, that it’s your home too, and she… she started stuffing my things into bags! Vitya, she didn’t even let me pack properly! She just shoved me out the door with my stuff!”
Anger flared inside Victor. How dare Anna? Kristina was his little sister, practically still a kid. She’d come to take entrance exams—and this is how she was treated? In his home?
“Has she completely lost it?” he blurted out. “Where are you?”
“On the landing! With three bags! Vitya, I don’t even have anywhere to go! My exam is the day after tomorrow, I need to study, and I—”
“Stay there. I’ll handle it,” Victor cut in, and before her sobbing could spill any further, he ended the call.
His fingers trembled as he dialed his wife. The ring sounded endless.
“Yes?” Anna answered—her voice steady, almost unnervingly calm.
“Anna, what is going on?!” Victor burst out. “Can you explain why my sister is standing in the stairwell with her things?!”
A pause. He could hear her breathing—measured, controlled.
“Because I asked her to move out and she refused,” Anna said, still calm. “So I helped her move.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me!” Victor’s voice broke into a shout. A few coworkers glanced over; he turned toward the window and dropped his tone to a furious hiss. “That’s my sister! A nineteen-year-old girl who came here to apply to university! You tossed her out like she was—”
“Victor, don’t finish that,” Anna’s voice turned icy. “Don’t say something you’ll regret.”
“I’ll regret it?!” he choked out. “You’re the one who just threw my sister out! A child! Do you even understand what you did?!”
“A child,” Anna echoed—and something sharp flickered under her words. “A child who hasn’t washed a single plate in two weeks. A child who throws parties in our apartment while we’re at work. A child who took my new dress without asking and spilled wine on it. A child who told me this morning she’s not leaving because ‘her brother lives here.’”
“So what?!” Victor cut in. “Her brother does live there! It’s my home too, or did you forget?”
“No, Victor,” Anna said, quieter now—and somehow more dangerous because of it. “It’s my home. My apartment. I bought it with my own money three years before I married you. You live there because you’re my husband. Your sister lived there because you begged me for two weeks and I agreed—temporarily. Just for the admissions period.”
“So what if it’s your apartment?!” Victor snapped, feeling the ground tilt under him but refusing to admit it. “We’re family! Or does that mean nothing to you?”
“Exactly because we’re family, I’m talking to you instead of simply changing the locks,” Anna shot back. “Victor, your ‘little girl’ behaved like a selfish, ill-mannered person. I tolerated it for two weeks. I tried to talk. I explained that in someone else’s home you clean up after yourself, you don’t make noise at night, you don’t rummage through other people’s things. Do you know what she told me?”
Victor went silent, teeth clenched.
“She said, ‘This is my brother’s home and I’ll do whatever I want. If you don’t like it, that’s your problem.’ Word for word. And when I told her to find somewhere else to stay, she announced she wasn’t going anywhere. So yes—I carried her things out into the stairwell. Neatly, by the way.”
“That was your responsibility!” Victor blurted out, already realizing how ridiculous he sounded but unable to stop. “You’re the one running the house! You should’ve found a way to make it work!”
“My responsibility?” Anna sounded genuinely stunned. “Victor, are you serious? It’s my responsibility to raise your adult sister?”
“She’s not an adult! She’s nineteen!”
“I was eighteen when I rented a dorm room and worked evenings to pay for it,” Anna replied, voice like ice. “And I still managed to clean up after myself and not insult the person whose place I was living in. So don’t lecture me about age.”
“That’s different!” Victor felt he was losing the argument, and the helplessness only made him angrier. “Kristina was raised differently. She’s used to—”
“Used to what?” Anna cut him off. “Used to everyone cleaning up after her? Used to getting whatever she wants? Used to her big brother solving everything? Victor, she’s nineteen. People get married, have children, serve in the army at that age. And you’re telling me she’s a child?”
“Stop with the sermons!” he snapped. “Do you even realize what you did?! She’s standing in the hallway! Her exam is in two days! She has nowhere to go!”
“She has a mother two hours away,” Anna replied evenly. “She has a dorm if she gets accepted. And she has money for a hotel—the money you transfer to her regularly.”
“How do you know about the transfers?” Victor blurted.
“Because it’s our shared account, genius,” Anna said tiredly. “And I see every transaction. Five thousand for pocket money. Ten for clothes. Another seven—no note. In two weeks, Victor. Twenty-two thousand.”
“She’s my sister!”
“And she’s been my problem!” Anna raised her voice for the first time. “A problem that ended exactly an hour ago when I put her outside the door!”
“You… you’re insane!” Victor spat, fully losing control. “You’re a heartless, selfish woman who doesn’t care about my family at all!”
“Stop,” Anna said softly. “Victor, did you just call me insane and selfish?”
Something in her tone made him falter.
“I… I reacted emotionally…”
“No—wait. Let’s finish that thought,” Anna continued, frighteningly calm. “I’m selfish because I don’t want to live in a mess in my own apartment? Because I don’t want a stranger digging through my closet? Because I’m tired of cleaning up after a grown girl who doesn’t even say thank you?”
“Kristina isn’t a stranger!”
“To me, she is, Victor. I’ve seen her three times in my life—at our wedding, at New Year’s, and at your mother’s birthday. And every single time she acted like I was hired help. So yes, to me she’s a stranger who abused my hospitality.”
“Fine! Great!” Victor snapped, barely hearing himself. “So my family are strangers to you! Maybe I should move out too—so I don’t ‘defile’ your kingdom!”
The pause was so long Victor checked whether the call had dropped.
“You know what, Victor,” Anna finally said, her voice sounding tired and resolute at the same time. “Your sister can come back. Tonight. She’ll collect the rest of her things, apologize to me for her rudeness, and leave. If you think that’s ‘wrong,’ then go with her. I bought this apartment before we married; it’s entirely mine. Take your things and live wherever you want—at your mother’s, with your sister, sleep in your office for all I care. I don’t care anymore.”
“You’re threatening me?!”
“No, Victor. I’m protecting my home. I’m doing what I should’ve done two weeks ago. You can keep yelling, insulting me, blaming me. But every next word brings you closer to the door with a suitcase. Your choice.”
Silence hung on the line. Victor breathed heavily, the adrenaline slowly draining away, leaving cold clarity behind.
“I want your decision by seven,” Anna added. “Your sister can pick up the rest of her things from eight to nine. If you come with her, make sure she doesn’t cause a scene. I don’t have the strength for drama. That’s it.”
The call ended. The dial tone sounded like a sentence.
Victor sank into his chair and stared at his phone screen. His thoughts tangled. On one side was Kristina—the little sister he’d defended since childhood, the girl crying into the phone. On the other was Anna—his wife of four years, the woman he loved… or thought he did.
His phone lit up again. Kristina.
“So? Did you talk to her? Did she apologize? When can I come back?”
Victor rubbed his face with both hands.
“Kristina… tell me again. In detail. What exactly happened.”
“What do you mean, ‘in detail’?” Her voice turned wounded. “Vitya, you don’t believe me?”
“Just tell me. From the beginning.”
“Well… I woke up like usual. Around eleven. Went to the kitchen—”
“Eleven?” Victor repeated. “And what time did you go to bed?”
“Um… maybe three. The girls and I were talking, then I finished a series…”
“Hold on. The girls were at our place?”
“Yeah, they came over. So what? We were being quiet!”
Victor remembered how Anna, on Monday, had silently swept up a broken wine glass in the living room—something that had “accidentally” fallen off the shelf.
“Go on.”
“So I go to the kitchen, I want breakfast, and Anna’s there. And she immediately starts with how I have to wash dishes after myself. I said I’d do it later—I needed to eat first. And she says ‘later’ always means by evening, and she’s tired of cleaning up after me. Can you imagine? Like I’m trashing the place!”
“Did you wash the dishes?” Victor asked flatly.
“Vitya!” Kristina snapped. “Whose side are you on?!”
“I’m asking.”
“Well… sometimes I forgot. I have exams coming up! I need to study!”
Victor shut his eyes. “Sometimes I forgot” from Kristina usually meant “never.”
“Next.”
“Then she starts complaining I’m noisy at night. That she gets up early. Okay, I sometimes listen to music, but not loud! And besides, the apartment’s big—she shouldn’t even hear me!”
“It’s a three-room apartment, Kristina,” Victor said. “Not a palace.”
“Still! And then I saw she was ironing my dress. The blue one I wore to a party. So I asked why she took it, and she says it’s her dress! Can you believe that?!”
Something cold sank in Victor’s stomach.
“Kristina. The blue dress you posted in your Instagram photo last week?”
“Yeah. It’s pretty! I thought Anna wouldn’t notice—she hasn’t worn it in forever…”
“Oh God,” Victor groaned. “Kristina, you took her clothes without asking?”
“Vitya, we’re practically family! What’s the big deal? Sisters share stuff!”
“You aren’t sisters.”
“Almost! And anyway I was going to wash it and give it back, but there was this accident…”
“What kind of accident?”
“Well… some wine spilled. Red. But I didn’t do it on purpose!”
Victor felt his righteous anger evaporate into something far heavier.
“And what did Anna say?”
“She said the dress cost twenty thousand and she wore it once, to a corporate event. And that I either pay for dry cleaning or buy a new one. And I said, where am I supposed to get that kind of money? And honestly, it’s just a dress—she can buy another. And then she went all pale and said I had to move out.”
“And what did you say?”
“What was I supposed to say?!” Kristina’s voice turned indignant again. “I said I came to my brother, that it’s your home too, and I’m not leaving! If she doesn’t like it, she can leave!”
Victor dragged a hand down his face.
“Kristina,” he said slowly, “it’s not my home. It’s Anna’s apartment. She bought it before we got married.”
“So what? You’re married!”
“That means legally I’m just registered there. It’s her property.”
“But you’re her husband!”
“And that’s why I live there,” Victor said. “But you don’t.”
The silence on the line said more than words.
“So you’re… on her side?” Kristina finally whispered, voice shaking. “Against your own sister?”
“I’m trying to understand what happened,” Victor said wearily. “Kristina, be honest. Did you clean up after yourself?”
“Well… not always…”
“Did you wash the dishes?”
“Vitya…”
“Kristina. Yes or no.”
“I… sometimes forgot,” she mumbled.
“Did you bring friends over without warning?”
“Once…”
“How many times?”
“Twice,” she admitted quietly. “Maybe three.”
“And you took Anna’s things without asking.”
“One dress! And I was going to return it!”
“With a red-wine stain.”
Kristina sniffled.
“Vitya, why are you being so mean? I didn’t do it on purpose! I just… I thought we were family…”
“Family isn’t a free pass to be rude,” Victor said, and felt his last illusions crumble. “You acted like a spoiled child, Kristina. And Anna had every right to put you out.”
“But—”
“No. Listen to me. You can come back tonight, from eight to nine. You’ll take what you left behind. You’ll apologize to Anna—properly, like an adult. And you’ll leave. Either go to Mom’s or rent a room. You have money—the money I’ve been sending you.”
“What about my exam?”
“You have two days,” Victor replied. “That’s enough time to find temporary housing. Kristina, you’re nineteen. It’s time you learned responsibility.”
“So you choose her,” Kristina spat.
“I’m choosing common sense,” Victor said. “And yes—I’m choosing my wife. Because she’s right. Completely.”
“You’ll regret this!” Kristina threw at him, and the line went dead.
Victor stared at his phone and let out a long breath. Then he dialed Anna.
“Yes?” Her voice was cautious.
“I’m sorry,” he said simply. “You were right. About everything. I fell for her tears and didn’t even try to understand. I’m sorry.”
A pause.
“You talked to her?” Anna asked carefully.
“I did,” Victor said. “And I realized I was a complete idiot. Anna, I’m sorry—for yelling, for insulting you, for not backing you up right away. You tolerated it for two weeks, and I didn’t even see it…”
“I tried to tell you,” Anna replied softly. “But you brushed it off every time. ‘She’s just a kid.’ ‘She’ll adjust.’ ‘Give her time.’”
“I know,” Victor admitted. “I was blind. Or I didn’t want to see. It was easier to pretend everything was fine.”
“Victor… I’m not a monster. I really tried. But when she told me I should be the one to get out… that was it. I knew that if I didn’t end it then, she’d just stay. Because you’d never be able to say no.”
“You’re right,” he said. “I wouldn’t have. So thank you—for being the one with the backbone.”
“You’re not angry?” Anna asked after a beat.
“At myself—yes. At you? No,” Victor answered. “You did what I should’ve done myself. You protected our home.”
Anna exhaled quietly, and he could hear the tension loosening.
“She’s coming tonight?” Anna asked.
“Yes. To take the rest of her things. And… Anna, I’ll be there. I’ll make sure it stays calm. And that she apologizes. For real.”
“Okay,” Anna said after a short pause. “Victor… maybe I went too far when I said you could pack your things…”
“No,” he interrupted gently. “You didn’t. I deserved it. But I really hope you’ll give me a chance to make it right.”
“We’ll see,” a faint smile colored her voice. “For starters, make sure your sister doesn’t turn tonight into a circus.”
“She won’t,” Victor said. “I promise.”
When he hung up, he noticed his hands weren’t shaking anymore. For the first time all day, he felt clear—maybe for the first time in the last two weeks.
He glanced at the clock. Five hours until evening. Enough time to think through what he needed to say in a long-overdue conversation with his sister.
And for now—he still had a report to finish.
It was time for everyone to grow up.
Including him.