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He was terrified he wouldn’t recognize her. Fifteen years is no joke. It’s a whole life squeezed into the gap between yesterday and today. The last time Artyom had seen Lika they were both fifteen—two angular, half-childish creatures trembling with unspoken feelings and hormones. Now they were thirty. He was a successful co-owner of a … Read more

The doors of the operating room swung open with a soft, damp sigh, releasing him into the sterile cool of the corridor. Lev Vyshinsky staggered out, swaying like the last drunk at the edge of town. He leaned against the cold, rough wall, feeling his hands—bandaged in exhaustion—betray him with a tremble, and his legs … Read more

Svetlana froze at the sink, a glass of water suspended in her hand. The sentence hung in the kitchen air so unexpectedly that at first it seemed like Sergey was joking. But her husband stood in the middle of the room with an absolutely serious face, waiting for a reaction. She was an engineer in … Read more

A two-story brick house on Sadovaya Street came to Irina from her aunt, Margarita Petrovna, under a deed of gift even before she married. A six-hundred-square-meter plot, fruit trees in the yard, a private well, a garage—true wealth for a twenty-seven-year-old woman. The papers were executed with a notary in the spring of last year; … Read more

Lena remembered the day Igor came home with a broad smile and a bottle of champagne in his hands. It was four years ago, when they still laughed together in the kitchen, when he still kissed her in the mornings before work, when she still believed they were a couple and not a master and … Read more

Rita turned off the engine and looked at the country house through the windshield. Nothing seemed to have changed—the same blue roof, the same birches around the perimeter of the plot, the same gate her father had once painted green. The only odd thing was that the veranda light was on. Maybe the neighbors? Except…the … Read more

“Eh, Anya, you’re rushing into marriage for nothing! You couldn’t wait for me… And you yourself once promised: when I grow up—we’ll get married. Fine then, I don’t wish you anything good! I even hope nothing works out for you—you’ll split up as soon as possible! Better yet—let him just die, and Anya will be … Read more

For most people, a cemetery is a place of farewell, grief, an ending. For Lyonya it had become something like home. Not in the literal sense: he had no roof over his head, unless you counted the weathered granite crypt he crawled into only in the harshest frosts. But in spirit, in his soul, he … Read more

Karina came back from work at seven on the dot, as usual. The August heat was easing, but the apartment was still stuffy. She kicked off her shoes by the door and headed to the bedroom to change. It had been a hard day—the travel agency where Karina worked as a manager was swamped with … Read more

The air outside was cool and damp, saturated with the smell of approaching rain, but inside the luxurious car a different atmosphere reigned—a mix of heat from the warmed leather seats and the subtle, dense scent of Alexander’s cologne. Elena sat beside him, clutching her purse on her knees, feeling a dread swell in her … Read more