Pasha, you promised to help me.
“Son, you have to marry her for the apartment!” his mother insisted. “Then we’ll quietly transfer part of it to me, and she’ll never know.”
“Mom, that’s not fair! I love her, not her apartment,” Pavel objected, nervously glancing toward the bedroom door.
Pavel and Olga had married a year earlier. Their marriage seemed happy, but soon after the wedding Pavel began to feel pressure from his mother. She constantly reminded him of her inconvenient housing situation and demanded that he use his new family ties to improve their overall circumstances.
“Pasha, you promised to help me,” his mother kept repeating. “If you’re careful, Olga won’t even notice.”
“Mom, I can’t do that to her,” Pavel tried to resist, but inside he felt the pressure mounting.
Olga, a lawyer by profession, was intelligent and perceptive. She began to notice that Pavel had grown nervous and often stepped out to talk to his mother on the phone. Her anxiety grew, but she decided to observe first.
One evening, when Pavel thought Olga had gone to meet friends, he sat down at the computer and opened his chat with his mother. Olga, who had come home early, saw him tensely reading something on the screen.
“Pavel, what are you doing there?” she asked suddenly, making him start.
“Nothing—work,” he blurted, quickly closing the chat window.
But Olga was no fool. She started checking his phone and laptop when he wasn’t looking. Soon she discovered the messages in which his mother insisted on carving up the apartment and transferring part of it to her. Olga was shocked, but decided not to make a scene right away. She knew she needed to prepare.
Meanwhile, Pavel felt increasingly torn. He didn’t want to deceive Olga, but he couldn’t refuse his mother, who grew more insistent by the day.
Olga began gathering evidence to protect her rights. She consulted colleagues to make sure Pavel wouldn’t be able to take the apartment without her consent. One evening, when Pavel came home, she met him in the living room with documents in hand.
“Pavel, we need to talk,” she said.
“About what?” he asked warily.
“I know everything about your plans with your mother. I found your messages. You wanted to deceive me for the sake of the apartment.”
Pavel turned pale.
“Olga, it’s not what you think…” he began, but she cut him off.
“It’s exactly what I think. I’ve filed for divorce, and here are the papers. You can pack your things and leave. The apartment stays with me.”
Pavel couldn’t believe his ears. He had lost not only his wife, but also the apartment his mother had so persistently pushed him to scheme for. When he told his mother what had happened, she flew into a rage and cursed everyone around her, including her own son.
Olga, finally freed from the betrayal, felt a sense of release. She went traveling to forget the past and start a new life. During one of her trips she met Ivan, a kind and honest man who loved her for who she was, not for her property.
Having realized his mistake, Pavel was never able to restore his relationship with either Olga or his mother. He was left alone, reflecting on how greed and deceit had destroyed his life.
In the end, truth and justice prevailed. Olga found her happiness, and those who tried to deceive her were left with nothing.
