— So you all think it’s normal that I’m the one paying the mortgage on this apartment, and you moved my cousin into my room with her boyfriend without even asking?

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So you’ll tell him, Aunt Gal? Or should I?” Lera’s voice was as sweet as an overripe peach—and just as sticky. She lazily stirred sugar into a cup of cheap instant coffee, leaving brown rings on the saucer. “I’ll tell him, sweetheart. I will,” Galina—Kirill’s mother—waved her off with a plump hand. “Don’t worry. Kiryusha’s … Read more

Did you take the brand-new winter tires off my car and put bald junk from a dump on it so you could sell my wheels and pay off your loan?

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— Honestly, I only ever see stuff like this on cars headed for write-off. Where did you dig up this junk? The cord’s sticking out, the tread is worn down to nothing, and there are cracks all along the sidewall. Driving on this even in summer on dry asphalt is suicide. And in winter… Miss, … Read more

— I froze the account,” the wife said coldly. “The car is mine. The apartment is mine too. Now go ask your mommy

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— “Where have you been wandering around until eleven, huh?” Maxim’s voice carried from the bathroom. It slid into her morning like a drop of ketchup on a white shirt: not a disaster, technically, but it ruined the mood. Elena—already fully dressed to leave, keys in hand and a serious expression—froze in the kitchen doorway. … Read more

— On December 30th, be at my place by six in the evening. The table needs to be set, there’ll be lots of guests,” her mother-in-law barked into the phone—but Alyona didn’t come.

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— “So listen to me carefully,” Polina Markovna’s voice sounded as if she were issuing orders at a military parade. “On December 30th you will be at my place by 6 p.m. We need to set the table—lots of guests are coming. My entire ladies’ club will be there, ten people, maybe twelve. You’ll chop … Read more

First earn money for an apartment and buy one yourself—then you can play the master in it! Until then, don’t even open your mouth here

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“Yanka, hi! I’m nearby — can I swing by in half an hour? I grabbed your favorite cheesecake from that same pastry shop!” The voice message from Marina that popped up on Yana’s phone made her smile. She set her book aside and stretched, feeling lazy Saturday bliss spread through her body. Her apartment—bright, spacious, … Read more

—I don’t give a damn what your mother wants, Dima! I said your sister will not be living with us while she studies

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— Sveta, come on, she’s my sister. Mom won’t survive it if she has to live in a dorm,” Dmitry’s voice was coaxing and pleading. It was the third time that evening he’d started up the same old record, carefully skirting the sharp corners he himself had created. Svetlana silently set her fork down on … Read more

And we’ll move into your apartment since you’re at ours all the time,” the daughter-in-law taught her mother-in-law a lesson.

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Marina heard the familiar doorbell and gripped the ladle so hard her knuckles turned white. Tuesday. Eleven a.m. The punctuality with which Valentina Petrovna showed up could have put Swiss watches to shame. “Andy, your mom’s here!” came the voice from the entryway, and Marina closed her eyes and counted to ten. It didn’t help. … Read more

If you need money that badly, Marina Vitalyevna, then go and earn it—don’t extort it from me under the pretext that you’ll turn your son against me

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Your tea, Svetočka, is still tasteless. Just like grass. And in those little teabags too—like in a factory cafeteria.” Marina Vitalyevna said it in that special tone that both stated a fact and expressed the deepest sympathy for the wretchedness of someone else’s everyday life. She sat at Svetlana’s impeccably clean glass kitchen table and … Read more

— And now, darling, let me tell your relatives what you call them,” the wife said—tired of enduring her husband’s mockery in front of guests.

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Olga had felt it since morning — a heavy foreboding, like the air before a storm. Today all of Igor’s relatives would gather again. His mother’s birthday. A laid table, endless toasts, laughter, hugs. And his jokes. Always his jokes. She stood at the stove and looked out the window at the gray November sky. … Read more

— “We’re family—why all these IOUs?” my husband grinned, handing my stash of cash to his sister, who would “pay it all back later.”

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Anastasia left the office at exactly six in the evening, as always. The November wind slapped her in the face, but she was used to it. The bus took her to the right stop in twenty minutes; then it was five minutes on foot along the familiar route. The entranceway, third floor—the mother-in-law’s apartment. The … Read more