The morning chaos at Anna’s house began as usual—with shouting and stomping upstairs.
“Sonya, you took my nail polish again!” shouted the younger daughter.
“Ksusha, it’s actually my polish. Look at the date—I bought it last month!”
“Girls,” Anna smiled, stirring her coffee, “you have a whole makeup bag of those polishes. Can’t you just share?”
Maxim, her husband, came downstairs, rubbing his eyes sleepily:
“I thought they’d quiet down as they got older…”
“Wishful thinking,” Anna pecked him on the cheek. “Coffee?”
“Yes, I won’t survive otherwise. Especially today—I have meetings all day.”
A thud was heard from above, then hurried steps down the stairs, and a disheveled Nikita appeared in the kitchen, his shirt unbuttoned.
“Mom, have you seen my tie? The blue one I need for graduation?”
“In the closet, top shelf,” Anna replied without turning around, taking milk out of the fridge. “And button up your shirt, you’re a future graduate.”
“Mom, graduation is still a month away!”
“Exactly—only a month. And you can’t even find your tie.”
The doorbell rang. Marina, the neighbor with whom Anna had long held a tradition of morning coffee on Fridays, appeared at the door.
“Oh, it’s always lively here,” Marina sat at the table, accepting a cup from Anna. “You know, looking at your kids—they are all so beautiful! Nikita is the spitting image of young Maxim, and the girls… Especially Sofia—she’s just like you.”
Anna smiled, but her gaze briefly turned distant.
“You must have fabulous genes!” Marina continued. “Three kids, and all so…”
“Just lucky,” Anna gently interrupted her. “You know, genes are like a lottery.”
After Marina left, Anna went up to her office. She rarely cleaned here, and dust lay thickly on the old albums. One of them accidentally slipped from the shelf, opening in the middle. A glossy, slightly faded photo fell out of the pocket—a large bright room with rows of cribs. Anna by the window, young, bewildered. Maxim beside her, holding her hand.
“Can we live with this truth?” His words then sounded like a sentence. She remembered her fear, her doubts. Remembered how her hands trembled when signing the papers…
“Mom!” Nikita’s voice brought her back to reality. “I’m going to Dimka’s, I’ll be back late!”
“Wait! What about your homework?”
“Mom, how much longer? I’m eighteen already! I’m not a little kid!”
“Exactly—you’re not a little kid. So you should understand…”
“What do you understand!” he snapped, turning around abruptly. “You and Dad just control every step. I’m suffocating here!”
The front door slammed shut. Anna stood there, clutching the old album to her chest. Sofia appeared in the hallway.
“Is Nikita rebelling again?” she shook her head. “Mom, sometimes it’s like you don’t understand us. We’re not dolls you can control.”
Anna watched her departing daughter, and something inside painfully clenched. “Maybe it’s because they’re not my own?” The thought appeared suddenly, unbidden, making it hard to breathe. She hastily shoved the photograph back into the album, as if trying to hide not just the picture, but the thought itself.
At the end of the hallway, Ksenia’s silhouette flickered—she too was apparently going somewhere. Anna wanted to call out to her, but remained silent. Lately, it seemed she was increasingly losing connection with her children. As if an invisible wall was growing between them—transparent but insurmountable.
Her phone vibrated in her pocket—a message from Maxim: “How are things at home? Maybe we should go out somewhere as a family tonight?”
“As a family…” Anna smirked bitterly. What would the neighbors say if they knew the truth? What would the children say? She typed a reply: “Of course, dear. Just need to wait for Nikita—he’s at Dimka’s.” She added a smiling emoji, though she felt far from smiling.
A conversation with the neighbor flashed in her mind.
“Anna, did you hear?” Marina whispered. “They say in the next district they found some gang… They steal children and sell them to childless couples.”
Anna froze.
“What nonsense, Marina? Where did you get such news?”
“Well, Galina Petrovna was telling me…” Marina looked around nervously. “You know, I’ve been thinking… Your children, they’ve been… strange lately.”
“What do you mean—strange?” Anna felt a chill down her spine.
“Well, that Nikita of yours… Completely out of control. And Sofia… Saw her in the park yesterday—she was sitting alone, drawing something so gloomy. Normal kids don’t behave like that.”
“Normal kids…” Those words echoed in Anna’s head all evening. She mechanically set the table, arranging plates, while old memories whirled in her mind.
“Mom, I’m not eating this porridge,” Ksenia poked at her plate with a fork.
“You will. I didn’t cook it for nothing…”
“Here we go again,” Nikita loudly pushed back his chair. “You know what? I’m moving out. Found an apartment, I’ll live on my own.”
“What?!” Maxim put down his newspaper. “With what money, may I ask?”
“My own! I’ve been working at the auto service for a month. And you know what? They at least respect me as a person there!”
Sofia snorted:
“A person… Just admit you want to hang out with your Masha without parental control.”
“Shut up!” Nikita snapped back. “You sit all day in your room, drawing your depressive pictures…”
“They’re not depressive! It’s contemporary art! Just everyone here is… so fake! Pretending we’re a perfect family!”
Anna felt a lump rise in her throat. Maxim placed his hand on her shoulder:
“Okay, everyone calm down. Nikita, you’re not moving anywhere until you finish school.”
“We’ll see,” Nikita stood up from the table. “I’m already an adult, in case you forgot.”
That evening, Anna found Maxim in the garage—he was fiddling with the car, although he usually didn’t.
“Maybe tell them?” her voice trembled. “They feel something… Children always feel.”
“No,” he wiped his hands. “We decided back then… And besides, it could only make things worse.”
“And now what, it’s not ruined?”
Maxim hugged her:
“It’s just that age. A transitional period. It’ll pass.”
“And if it doesn’t? Did you hear what Sofia said about being fake?”
“Anya, stop. We did everything right. Loved them, raised them…”
A week later, another scandal erupted. Sofia declared she wanted to apply to an art school instead of the economics faculty.
“No,” Anna cut her off. “We’ve already decided.”
“You decided! Did anyone ask me?”
“Sofia, understand…”
“Understand what? That you’re trying to make me someone else? Are you scared they’ll take us back?”
Anna turned pale. Sofia froze, looking at her mother with a strange, probing gaze.
“What did you say?”
“Nothing,” Sofia turned away. “Forget it.”
That evening, Anna sat in the bathroom for a long time, staring at her reflection in the fogged-up mirror. Long ago, before she and Maxim decided on adoption, a psychologist had told them: “The main thing is to be honest. With yourselves and with the children.” They didn’t listen. They decided it would be better—to raise them as their own, without the stigma of “adopted.”
A knock on the door made her flinch.
“Mom,” Ksenia’s voice sounded unusually quiet. “Are you coming soon?”
“Yes, sweetheart, I’m coming out now.”
“Mom… Can I sit with you for a while? Like we used to?”
Anna opened the door. Ksenia stood there in her favorite unicorn pajamas—the ones they had picked out together before the new year.
“Of course, baby.”
They settled on the living room couch. Ksenia snuggled up to her mother like when she was a child:
“You know, I was thinking today… Why are we all so different? Nikita is such a rebel, Sofia is an artist, and I…”
“And you are our wisest,” Anna stroked her daughter’s head, feeling her heart squeeze.
“Really?” Ksenia looked up. “Then why…” she paused.
“What?”
“Nothing. Just… Sometimes it feels like we’re all from different worlds. Like something doesn’t fit in the puzzle, you know?”
Anna understood. Understood all too well. But instead of answering, she just hugged her daughter tighter, inhaling the scent of her hair, so familiar, so… their own. Not by blood, but definitely by love.
In the next room, something fell. Sofia’s muffled voice came through:
“Damn! Mom, do you have a new canvas?”
“Check in the storeroom,” Anna responded.
“I’ve already turned that place upside down!” Sofia appeared in the doorway, disheveled, with a paint stain on her cheek. “Oh, you’re hugging? Can I join you?”
And then there were three of them on the couch, like in childhood when everything was simpler. Only Nikita was missing—he was again with his Masha.
“Mom,” Sofia suddenly said. “Do you love us?”
“Of course! More than life itself.”
“Even when we’re… wrong?”
“You are the most right children in the world.”
Anna said this, and every word was the truth. The absolute, crystal clear truth. Perhaps the only truth in all this story of lies meant to save.
And in the storeroom, behind Sofia’s old canvases, in a dusty box, lay the documents. Those very ones. And one of them, the most important, had somehow slipped from the folder and was now slowly yellowing among the canvases, waiting for its time.
20 years later.
20 years flew by like a single day. Anna looked at herself in the mirror—gray hair had completely overtaken her temples, wrinkles radiated from her eyes. Maxim embraced her from behind:
“What are you thinking about?”
“About how quickly they grew up.”
On the mantelpiece—framed photographs: Nikita in a white coat (now a famous cardiothoracic surgeon), Sofia in front of her art gallery (she had insisted on her own path), Ksenia in a sharp suit (the youngest partner at a law firm).
“You know,” Maxim adjusted his glasses, “sometimes I wonder if we were too protective of them?”
“And sometimes I think, maybe not enough,” Anna sighed. “Look, they’ve all flown the nest…”
The doorbell interrupted their conversation. On the doorstep stood Sofia—in a paint-splattered jumpsuit:
“Surprise! I have an exhibition nearby next week, decided to stay with you for a couple of days. Won’t you turn away an old daughter?”
Anna laughed:
“How are you old? We’re the old ones here.”
“Sure,” Sofia kissed her mother on the cheek. “To me, you’ll always be young. Hey, can I rummage through the storeroom? I want to find my old sketches.”
An hour later, Sofia came down to the living room holding a yellowed sheet of paper:
“Mom, Dad… What’s this?”
Anna paled, recognizing the adoption document.
“I’ll call the guys,” Sofia said quietly. “I think we all need to talk.”
That evening, they gathered around the big table—for the first time in years as a whole family. Nikita arrived straight from his shift, still in hospital attire under his jacket. Ksenia rushed over, canceling an important meeting.
“So,” Sofia placed the document on the table, “we were adopted?”
Silence. Only the ticking of the old clock on the wall.
“My God,” Ksenia covered her face with her hands. “I always felt… Always felt something was off.”
Nikita was silent, staring at a spot. Then suddenly stood up, approached their parents, and hugged them tightly:
“Is that why you freaked out when I was moving out? Afraid I’d find out?”
Anna couldn’t hold back tears:
“We… we just wanted to love. And back then, no one loved you. You were so small, so lonely…”
“And you decided not to tell us?” Ksenia’s voice held hurt. “All these years…”
“We were afraid,” Maxim spoke softly. “Afraid you’d reject us if you knew the truth. That you’d hate us for the deception.”
Sofia suddenly laughed:
“You know, I guessed it. Back in my teens. I accidentally overheard your conversation with Dad. But then I thought—what difference does it make? You loved us. Truly loved us.”
“And love you,” Anna wiped away tears. “Every day, every minute.”
“Remember,” Nikita suddenly said, “when I broke my arm at twelve? Fell off the bike. Mom, you didn’t sleep for three days, sat by my bed…”
“And how you, Dad, taught me to skate?” Ksenia picked up. “You fell yourself, but never let go of my hand.”
“And my first paintings?” Sofia smiled. “Those clumsy watercolors? You still keep them.”
Anna looked at her children—so different, so very much her own. Remembered their first steps, first words, school festivities, illnesses, quarrels, reconciliations… Could any piece of paper negate all that?
“Mom,” Sofia took her hand, “you didn’t have to be afraid. Love is more than blood. Much more.”
“Exactly,” Nikita nodded. “Though, you know… Now it makes sense why I’m so handsome—your genes aren’t mine!”
Everyone laughed. The tension began to ease.
“Okay,” Ksenia stood up, “now I want cake. And stories. All the stories. From the very beginning.”
“Oh,” Maxim smiled, “that will take a while.”
“Are we in a hurry?” Sofia winked.
They sat until deep into the night. Talking, crying, laughing. Remembering. Anna brought out the old albums—the very ones, with photos from the orphanage. Told how she chose each of them, how afraid she was of not coping, how they learned to be a family.
And outside, snow fell—just like on the day they first brought little Nikita home. He had been so amazed then: “Is all this for me? A whole room?” Then the girls arrived, and the house filled with laughter, and their real life began.
“You know what?” Sofia said when the clock struck three in the morning. “I think we were very lucky.”
And that was the pure truth. Because a real family isn’t sometimes about kinship. It’s about love, stronger than fear. About hands that catch you when you fall. About eyes that always read: “You are mine. My own. Forever.”