“Can you imagine, Yarik? I’ve worked like a dog all year—no vacations, those ridiculous Saturdays, nonstop. And now—look at this!” Alexandra set her fork down on the empty plate like a trophy and leaned back, her eyes shining. “I didn’t even expect it to be that much. This is… this is the Maldives! Or almost the Maldives. Exactly what we wanted. Two weeks. White sand, warm sea, and not a single alarm clock. Ever. We can go tomorrow and start choosing a hotel.”
Yaroslav chewed slowly, staring past her at the wall. He didn’t share her excitement. His face held a thoughtful, almost mournful expression. He pushed his half-eaten dinner away, clasped his hands together, and sighed heavily, as if preparing to deliver bad news.
“Sash… there’s something. I talked to my dad today.”
Alexandra straightened at once. Her bright anticipation drained into wariness. Conversations with Viktor Nikolaevich rarely meant anything good. They usually ended with requests to “help until payday,” “lend money for car repairs,” or “borrow like neighbors” a sum that never returned.
“And what is it this time? The generator in the garage broke? Or the dacha roof started leaking again?”
“Worse,” Yarik muttered. “Things are a total mess between him and Mom. One thing led to another—she’s been putting his stuff out in the hallway for a week already. Says he doesn’t pay attention, doesn’t appreciate her, ruined her whole life. You know how she is. Dad’s not himself—he doesn’t know what to do.”
He paused, waiting for sympathy. Sasha stayed silent, knowing perfectly well that these “breakdowns” happened with her mother-in-law like clockwork—usually before big holidays or whenever Irina Pavlovna got bored.
“So I thought… we need to save the situation,” Yaroslav continued, and his voice turned confident, businesslike. “Dad says she’s been wanting to go to the theater for ages—this new production, impossible to get tickets. And a nice restaurant too, so everything looks proper. And I came up with an idea.”
Alexandra’s fork stopped halfway to her mouth. She lowered it slowly, watching him. Something in his tone—this sudden certainty—made every internal alarm start buzzing.
“You’ll give your bonus to my father,” he said it not as a request, but as a settled decision. “All of it. He’ll take Mom to the best restaurant in the city, then they’ll go to the theater—best seats. Flowers, taxi, the whole package. So she understands she matters to him. That he values her. It’ll shake them up, make them reconcile. Perfect plan.”
A silence fell over the kitchen—so thick it felt like you could touch it. Sasha blinked slowly, trying to digest what she’d heard. She understood each word, but her mind refused to arrange them into anything that made sense. It was too absurd, too outrageous to be real.
“Wait,” she shook her head as if trying to fling off a bad dream. “Maybe I heard you wrong. Are you actually suggesting I give every last ruble I earned from a year of overtime to your father… so he can entertain your mother?”
“Yeah,” Yarik answered plainly, looking at her with sincere confusion, like she was missing something obvious. “And what’s the big deal? They’re parents, Sash. They need help. Their marriage is falling apart, and you’re talking about sand.”
The warmth that had filled the cozy kitchen a moment earlier vanished. The delicious dinner suddenly tasted dull and flat. Alexandra felt a cold, angry wave rise inside her. She looked at her husband—this grown thirty-year-old man sitting across from her with a straight face, asking her to sacrifice their shared dream, her personal victory, for his mother’s whims.
“Yarik, let’s go again, slowly, for anyone who’s hard of hearing. That’s my bonus. Mine. I earned it. We’ve been planning this trip for six months. We picked the country, counted down the days. And now you’re telling me I should just hand all that money over… for theater?”
“Sash, you don’t understand,” he started to get irritated, his brows pinching together. “It’s not just theater. It’s… it’s an investment in family peace. In their family. Which means in ours too.”
“An ‘investment’?” Alexandra repeated the word like it tasted spoiled. She set her glass of water down carefully, and the clink in the sudden silence sounded like a gunshot. “You’re calling this an investment? Yarik, your parents’ problems aren’t because they haven’t been to the theater lately. It’s because your mother is a seasoned manipulator and your father lets her twist him around her finger. And you want me to pay for their next little show out of my pocket?”
Yaroslav’s face darkened. He leaned forward on his elbows, and his voice shifted from pleading to hard, pressing.
“You’re talking about my mother. Watch it. She gave us money for our wedding, back when we had nothing. Or have you already forgotten? That’s called gratitude, Sasha. A debt, if you like. Sometimes debts have to be repaid.”
It was a cheap shot—and he knew it. Alexandra felt everything inside her turn to ice. She met his eyes, and there wasn’t a trace of the old warmth left.
“A debt? You want to talk about debt, Yarik? Fine. Your mother gave us a tea set that’s still sitting in a box on the top shelf, and an envelope that covered the photographer. And my parents—so we could make the down payment on this apartment—sold their old car. That beat-up ‘Nine’ my dad used to drive me to music school. They gave us everything they had, and not once—do you hear me? not once—did they throw it in our faces or ask us to ‘repay’ anything. So don’t you dare talk to me like that.”
The point was unarguable, and Yaroslav realized it. But he wasn’t going to back down. When logic failed, he switched to feelings.
“You just don’t like them,” he leaned back and crossed his arms. “My parents. You’ve always looked down on them—like they’re some rural nobodies, not your kind of people. And now, when they’re actually in trouble, you wash your hands of it. You don’t care if they divorce? You don’t care that Dad hasn’t slept in nights, walking around like he’s drowning? You want their divorce on your conscience—over some damn money?”
He was shifting the focus expertly. Now it wasn’t about his outrageous demand—it was about her “coldness.” Somehow she was to blame for the collapse of a family she hadn’t built and didn’t live in.
“Stop talking nonsense,” she snapped. “Their ‘divorce’ happens every six months—right before Irina Pavlovna’s birthday, or whenever your dad wants to go fishing overnight. That’s their game. They’ve been playing it for thirty years. And I’m not buying front-row tickets to that performance. Especially not at that price.”
“For you it’s just money, but for me it’s my family!” his voice grew louder. “You don’t understand! I’m their son! I have to help them! And you’re my wife—you’re supposed to help me, not put obstacles in my way! Are we one team or not?”
Alexandra stood up from the table. The conversation had stopped being a simple argument—it was exposing something deeper and uglier. She walked to the window and looked out at the city lights. And suddenly, with crystal clarity, she understood: she and her husband lived in completely different worlds. In her world, family was the two of them—their home, their plans, their future. In his, they were only a branch office of his parents’ household: a resource center meant to solve problems and finance his mother’s whims on demand.
“Our team, Yarik,” she turned back, her voice calm and cold, “was going on vacation. With money one player earned while the other was on the phone telling his mom that everything was fine. I’m not sponsoring your parents’ entertainment. That’s my final decision.”
“Final?” Yaroslav stared at her as if she were speaking some foreign, barbaric language. His face twisted. Certainty and righteous anger gave way to open malice. He sprang up like a coil had snapped, and began pacing the kitchen, wall to wall, like an animal in a cage. “You’re serious? That’s your final decision?”
“Completely,” Alexandra confirmed without moving. She watched his pacing with detached, icy curiosity. Her entire posture—down to the tips of her shoes and the hard line of her shoulders—said she would not bend.
“You’re just sorry to part with the money! Sorry!” he spat, jabbing a finger at her. “You’ve always been like this—calculating, stingy! I thought it was being practical, but it’s just plain greed! My parents poured their souls into us, and you can’t spare a miserable wad of paper for them!”
He stopped in front of her, breathing hard. He expected shouting back, tears, a fight. But Alexandra stayed silent, and her silence enraged him more. In her eyes he didn’t see fear or guilt—he saw something he couldn’t understand, and it drove him mad.
“Why are you quiet? Nothing to say? You’re selfish, Sasha. All you think about is your Maldives, your clothes, your comfort! You don’t care about anyone but yourself! You don’t even try to understand this matters to me! That’s my family—my blood! And you… you’re just some outsider who doesn’t give a damn!”
His words lashed at her, each one soaked in spite and selfishness. He wasn’t trying to reach an agreement—he was trying to humiliate her, grind her down, force her to feel small and guilty. And when he saw that even that wasn’t working, he played his last, dirtiest card.
“Any normal wife,” he hissed, lowering his voice to a venomous whisper, “would have offered it herself. No arguments. Because a normal wife understands that a husband’s family is sacred. She would support him, help, find comforting words. But you… you’re acting like a total bitch.”
That word—“normal.” In that instant something inside Alexandra, some final fuse, burned out with a dry click. All the hurt, all the irritation she’d been holding for the last half hour evaporated at once. In its place came something else—heavy, icy, painfully clear understanding. She looked at the man she’d lived with for five years and saw not a partner, not family, but a stranger: an infantile, angry boy stamping his feet because he wasn’t allowed to take someone else’s toy. And inside her there was nothing left but cold and contempt.
She took a step toward him. He instinctively recoiled from her stare.
“There will be no money for your mother, Yarik. None. Remember that. I don’t work so I can pay for your parents’ theaters and restaurants. I work so our home is secure and so you and I don’t lack anything. And as for them—I don’t owe them a thing.”
It wasn’t just refusal. It was a verdict—on his immaturity, his selfishness, his idea of “family” in which she was only a convenient add-on, a cash machine that had to dispense money whenever his real family—his parents—demanded it. Yaroslav blinked, stunned by the directness. He was used to her giving in, smoothing things over, compromising. But now a different woman stood in front of him.
“So that’s who you are…” he muttered, losing all his staged confidence. “And I thought we were a family. Turns out you’re just a roommate counting who put what into the pot.”
“I thought so too,” her voice went even quieter, and somehow heavier for it. “I thought family meant looking in the same direction. Planning a future together. Being happy for each other’s wins. Not one person turning out the other’s pockets to patch holes in his parents’ marriage. You made your choice, Yarik. You’re not with me. You’re still there—with them. You’re not a husband. You’re just their son living in my apartment.”
Every word landed clean and precise, like a scalpel. She wasn’t accusing him—she was stating a diagnosis. And the diagnosis was fatal. She watched his face shift as understanding finally hit: he’d crossed a line you don’t come back from. And no one was going to offer him a path back.
“If fixing your parents’ problems matters to you more than our life,” she paused—one last pause to let the next words carry their full weight, “then it’s time for you to go to them. And fix their problems. In person.”
Yaroslav froze as if she’d struck him. Her words hung in the air, shattering the fragile illusion of their shared life. He stared at her with wide eyes full of confusion, hurt, disbelief. He’d expected anything—tears, pleading, a scandal—not this calm, icy sentence. She wasn’t throwing him out; she was pointing to his real place in the world, and it hurt a thousand times more.
“You… you’re kicking me out?” he stammered, and for the first time that evening his voice carried not anger but genuine, childish fear. “From our home? Because of my parents?”
“It’s not their fault, Yarik. And it’s not your home,” she said evenly. “It’s our apartment. Was ours,” she corrected herself—and that correction rang like a bell. “And you just explained to me that your family is them. That your main duty is to help them. I don’t want to get in your way. Go help. Live there. Be a good son. Apparently the role of husband was too difficult for you.”
He stepped back like he’d been burned. Reality began to seep through the thickness of his resentment. He understood: this wasn’t a bluff. This was the end. And in that moment his immaturity and ego twisted into one last ugly defense—trying to make her guilty for his own choice.
“Perfect,” he sneered bitterly, his face hardening again. “I get it. You just needed an excuse. You were never part of my family and never wanted to be. You wanted a husband-wallet who pays for your little wishes and keeps his mouth shut. But I’m not that. I won’t betray my old folks for your beach vacation. If I have to choose between you and my mother, I’ll always choose my mother. Because she gave birth to me, and you… you’re just a woman. There can be plenty like you.”
He said it—and even he flinched at his own words—but it was too late to take anything back. He turned and, without looking at her, went into the bedroom. Alexandra stayed in the kitchen, listening. She heard the closet open, hangers creak in irritation, something heavy hit the floor. She didn’t follow him. Everything had already been said. She just stood there, staring into the dark window, where her pale, still figure reflected back. No tears, no trembling. Only a huge, ringing emptiness where her love and her life had been an hour earlier.
A few minutes later he came out with a travel bag hastily stuffed with clothes. He was wearing his jacket, car keys in his hand. He stopped in the hallway, avoiding her eyes.
“I’ll stay with my parents until you cool down and realize what a stupid mistake you’ve made,” he threw over his shoulder—more for himself than for her. One last pathetic attempt to save face, to pretend he was leaving by choice and not because he’d been dismissed.
Alexandra turned slowly. She looked at him—his knitted brows, his tight mouth, the bag in his hand—and in that moment she felt not anger, not hurt, but a sharp, piercing pity. Pity for him, stuck at thirty in the role of mama’s boy. And pity for herself—for the five years she’d spent trying to build a family with someone who never grew up.
“Don’t bother waiting, Yarik,” she said softly. “I won’t change my mind.”
He jerked as if slapped, grabbed the keys from the console, and lunged for the door. The metallic clack of the lock, the slam, footsteps fading fast down the stairwell. And then—silence.
It was absolute, deafening silence. The kind that comes only after a long, painful illness. Alexandra stood in the hallway for a few minutes, listening to this new reality. Then she walked back into the kitchen. Two plates sat on the table—hers, empty, and his, still holding half-eaten dinner. Beside them lay his phone. He’d forgotten it in the rush. The screen glowed with a notification: “Mom. 2 missed calls.”
She picked up his plate and dumped the leftovers into the trash without a word. Then she washed it, washed hers, wiped them dry, and set them on the rack. She moved on autopilot, her hands doing familiar, practiced motions while her mind struggled to understand what had happened. When the last drop of water slid from her fingers into the sink, she turned off the kitchen light and went into the living room.
On the coffee table lay bright brochures from a travel agency. “Maldives. Paradise on Earth.” She picked one up. The glossy paper felt cold. She stared at the picture of a snow-white beach, a turquoise ocean, and a lone bungalow on stilts. That had been their dream—the dream that had just died. And then, looking at that image of happiness that would never happen, she finally felt the hot lump rise in her throat. The tears she’d held back for so long broke free.
But they weren’t tears of despair.
They were tears of release.
She cried for the life that had collapsed, for the years she’d lost, for love that had died. Yet through the pain, a thin, barely visible sprout of something else was pushing up—freedom. The bonus was still in her account. And now she knew she would spend it. Not on the Maldives.
On a new life.
Her own.