“What if I just get up and leave?” Marina’s voice sounded calm, but strangely out of place against the clinking of the spoon against the plate.
Vladimir lifted his eyes from his soup and frowned.
“Where are you going this time?” he muttered. “You’ve got a shift the day after tomorrow. Or is this your usual evening hysterics?”
Marina didn’t answer right away. She sat opposite him, slightly hunched, holding a cup of warm tea in her hands. The kitchen smelled of onions and damp. From behind the closed door came the children’s voices—their daughter was asking her brother to give back the tablet, and he, as usual, snapped at her. Everything was—as always.
“I’m not talking about hysterics, Volodya. I’m serious. What if one day I just disappear? Say I’m going to the shop… and never come back.”
He smirked, burying himself in his smartphone.
“Then don’t bother warning me—no need to tire yourself. I won’t go looking for you.”
She didn’t answer. Just turned her gaze to the window, where the slow blue of evening stretched out. And in that moment she knew for sure. There would be no more.
He didn’t even look up.
Later, when she was putting Liza to bed, Marina thought that she could have screamed, dropped the cup, slammed the door. But what for? He had already left. He just hadn’t closed the door behind him.
Vladimir had become someone else. Not all at once, not at the snap of a finger. He changed like an old coat coming apart at the seams—bit by bit, stitch by stitch. And one day he just became a complete stranger.
Before, in that old apartment back in Peskí, he used to wake her up in the mornings with the smell of toasted bread. He would brew coffee in a cezve, quietly grumble at the boiling kettle, and she, lying under the blanket, would laugh and think that this was what happiness was.
Then came the mortgage, the children, double shifts. He laughed less, stayed late more often, said “not now” and “later” more and more. And one day he started turning off his screen whenever she walked into the room. The smell of his clothes stopped being hers. Even his breathing became somehow hurried, as if he were suffocating beside her.
She noticed. All of it. But pretended not to.
Until that evening, when Kostya, playing games on Vladimir’s phone in the living room where the Wi-Fi was better, handed it to her to charge. She plugged in the cable, the screen blinked on, and a notification popped up in front of her eyes: “You smell like my dreams.”
Marina froze.
She didn’t immediately start digging through the phone. She put it aside—Vladimir was at work and had forgotten his phone at home that day. She made dinner. Put the children to bed. Washed the dishes. Everything—as usual. Only afterward, in the kids’ room, sitting down on the carpet, she took the phone, unlocked it—the password was Liza’s birthday. The same one where it said: “Tue. Aftern”.
The messages were… explicit. No flirting, no hesitation.
“Won’t work today. Marina is suspicious, I’ll say it’s a meeting. As always.”
“You can’t imagine how much I want to see you. These days with her are like prison. I only live when I’m with you.”
She reread it like a textbook where every line was a formula. Only instead of answers—silence. Glassy. Deaf.
A glass of water stood nearby, and she held onto it as if it were the only anchor.
No tears, no hysteria. Only a decision: no more being a gray mouse, no more living in the shadows. I can still live—and I will. Not driving myself into a corner with routine and endless family problems. Not losing myself in a role that was forced on me.
The next day, after an almost sleepless night, Marina, as if answering the emptiness inside, automatically did her hair, took out that scarf from the closet—the one that had been gathering dust on the shelf for ages. She just wanted not to look the way she felt. She wanted—to hold on. At work a colleague glanced at her and raised her eyebrows in surprise.
“It’s like you’ve become younger,” she said.
Marina just smiled.
That day Vladimir looked at her differently. Squinted slightly. Asked, “Why are you all dressed up?”
“I just remembered that I’m a woman,” she replied.
He shrugged. And left. Said there was a meeting. She simply noted the time—7:40 p.m.
Later, in the kitchen, she opened the notes app on her phone and wrote: “Tue, 19:40 — leaves again. Doesn’t answer calls. Returns at 22:18. Smells like ‘Si’.”
She made notes every day. Screenshots, bank statements, receipts—everything went into a folder. Calmly. Methodically. Like someone who no longer hopes, but knows they have to finish what they started.
And yet the worst thing wasn’t the cheating. It was the silence between them. You couldn’t photograph it, print it, or present it to the court. But it lived in every glance, in every dinner where he ate without lifting his eyes.
Only the children sometimes asked:
“Mom, did you and Dad have a fight?”
She smiled:
“We’re just a little tired. It happens.”
At night, when she couldn’t sleep, Marina scrolled through the photos in her phone. Old ones: the sea, laughter, Liza on Vladimir’s shoulders. It all looked real. But now—like frames from someone else’s movie. The actors looked the same, but the plot had already changed.
One of those evenings she called Rita—an old friend from school, now a nurse at the local clinic, who had always known how to listen without unnecessary questions.
“You feel everything, don’t you?” her friend asked from the first words. “I can hear it in your voice.”
Marina stayed silent.
“Come over. We’ll just talk. I’m off today. I’ve got raspberry tea. Or… something stronger.”
She came. They sat in the kitchen for a long time, hardly saying anything. Then Rita said:
“We’ve got a lawyer working at the clinic on Saturdays. He’s good. Helped my sister get divorced. If you need— I can put you in touch.”
Marina silently nodded.
The first visit to the lawyer was strangely calm. Anton—a man of about fifty with a tired face and a polite voice—listened without interrupting.
“I need everything to be quiet. No fights. No mud-slinging. Just… fair,” she said.
“That’s what we’ll do,” he nodded. “Everything you’ve collected will be useful. And there’s a few more things we can check. The accounts. The investments.”
He handed her a business card. On it was written: “Family law. No unnecessary noise.”
At home, Marina carried on with her life as if nothing was happening. Made breakfast, walked Liza to school, checked Kostya’s homework.
And in parallel—she kept gathering. Writing. Laying out the path to the exit.
Vladimir snapped at her more and more often. Didn’t answer questions. Went out “to meetings” even more. Sometimes he brought her coffee, setting it down on the table without looking at her.
One morning, after an especially tense night, she said:
“I have vacation days. I’ll take a week. Just to rest.”
He shrugged:
“Do what you want.”
She smiled. And went to take care of herself.
She got up early, ran in the park, bought a gym membership. Even went for a massage. Then to the market for fresh vegetables. The flat smelled of salad, citrus, soft music. The neighbors were surprised—before, all they heard from there were cartoons and the washing machine.
When Rita came over again that evening, Marina opened the door in a dress she hadn’t worn in five years.
“You’re glowing,” Rita said, hugging her.
“I’m just remembering who I am. Not for him. For myself.”
And that very night, for the first time in many years, she fell asleep not with anxiety, but with quiet inside.
In the morning Marina woke up before the alarm. The room was still half-dark, but outside you could already hear a few birds—those early spring sounds that seem to creep under your skin. She lay on her back staring at the ceiling and, for the first time in a long while, didn’t think about Vladimir. Only one phrase spun in her head: “I don’t have to carry everything alone.” And there was something liberating in that.
In the kitchen the kettle was quietly beginning to boil. She poured oatmeal into a saucepan and set it on low heat. Liza shuffled in, sleepy, in bunny pajamas, yawned and laid her head on Marina’s stomach.
“Mom, can you take me to school today? I feel calmer when I’m with you.”
Marina ran her hand through her daughter’s hair. She didn’t answer, just nodded.
Vladimir came closer to noon. He didn’t apologize for not being home that night, didn’t explain where he’d been. He acted as if he’d just come back from an important meeting or been held up at work, like it went without saying. He threw his jacket on a chair and went to the bathroom. He smelled of a woman’s perfume—sharp, sweet, unfamiliar. Marina didn’t say a word. She just wiped down the table and went to put the laundry away in the wardrobe.
With each day, a strange certainty grew inside her. As if she were standing on the edge of a cliff, but the wind no longer frightened her. It seemed to whisper: jump. Down there is not death. Down there is freedom.
A week later she met with Anton again. The lawyer was composed and attentive. In the folder were printouts of bank transfers, receipts in Vladimir’s name, the mortgage data they had paid off together. He carefully laid everything out, making notes.
“Here are the joint investments. Here’s proof that the renovation was paid from the shared account.”
He placed a sheet in front of her with the heading: “Payment details: contractors, finishing, appliances.”
“You understand,” he said, “we’re not going in looking for a fight. We’re just presenting facts. This isn’t revenge; it’s your protection.”
Marina nodded.
“And one more thing… this is unofficial,” he took out a few screenshots. “We can’t build the case on moral damage, but the judge is human too. If we need to strengthen the position, we’ll show what was happening. No yelling, no accusations. Just so they can understand why you left.”
That evening Marina sat on the windowsill for a long time, looking at the wet asphalt. Her phone lay by her feet. Only one thought kept turning in her mind: “He never even realized how he lost everything.”
Three days later she said out loud:
“I’m filing for divorce.”
Vladimir was sitting at the laptop, typing something. He didn’t turn around.
“Big deal,” he snorted. “More of your usual blackmail? I’m not falling for it.”
“I’m not blackmailing you. I’m just informing you. It’s already been filed.”
He turned only then. First with disbelief, then with irritation.
“Are you out of your mind?”
“No. I just don’t want to live like this anymore. You’re on your own. I’m going back to myself.”
He slammed the laptop shut, stood up, paced around the kitchen. Then came up close to her.
“Look, Marina, you’re making a stupid mistake right now. I’m warning you. I’m not the only one who’s going to lose here.”
“I’m not losing anything. I’m taking back what’s mine.”
After that he fell silent. Started coming home even later, hardly spoke. But the air between them grew heavy, like before a thunderstorm. Sometimes she caught his gaze—alert, prickly, unfamiliar. As if he was looking not at his wife, but at an opponent.
One day he came home in the middle of the day. Took a stack of documents off the shelf and leafed through them openly. There were copies of mortgage contracts, furniture invoices, bank transfers.
“So you really want to leave me without my pants on?”
Marina silently took the papers from his hands and put them back in the cupboard.
“I just want fairness.”
Everything happened quickly. The summons came a week later. The court date was set for mid-March.
On the day of the hearing, Marina dressed simply but strictly. A dark blue dress, hair pulled back, neutral makeup. Anton met her at the courthouse door. He nodded, as if to say: “I’m here, everything’s under control.”
Vladimir arrived later. In a wrinkled shirt, nervous. He didn’t say hello.
The hearing was brief. The judge—a woman of about forty with a tired face—asked precise, dry questions.
“Was the apartment purchased during the marriage?”
“Yes,” Marina answered.
“Who paid the mortgage?”
Anton handed over the documents:
“Both spouses. Here is the account activity. These are the payments for appliances and renovations. All from the joint budget. In addition, here are printouts confirming transfers to third parties unrelated to household expenses.”
“This has nothing to do with the case,” Vladimir cut in sharply.
“Indirectly, it does,” the lawyer replied calmly. “It helps the court see the overall picture of the relationship.”
The judge leafed through the papers. No surprise or condemnation on her face. Just work.
“Are the parties willing to settle the dispute voluntarily?”
“No,” Marina said. “I want everything done according to the law.”
When she said that, Vladimir gave a barely noticeable shake of his head. As if he still didn’t believe it had gone this far.
The decision was handed down the same day: the apartment remained with Marina, as the person who proved her financial contribution, payment, and permanent residence there with the children. The agreement also stated that the children would remain living with their mother on a permanent basis. The divorce was granted.
After the hearing Vladimir didn’t approach her. He only threw over his shoulder:
“You’re going to pay for this. Everything comes back around.”
Anton, watching him walk away, sighed.
“No, it doesn’t. Not like that.”
Marina said nothing. But inside she felt a strange warmth. As if, for the first time in a long time, no one was blaming her, manipulating her, or belittling her.
In the evening she sat in the kitchen with a cup of tea, looking out the window. Liza was playing in her room, Kostya was doing his homework.
Her phone buzzed: a message from Rita.
“You did great. If you want—come over tomorrow. We’ll just sit.”
Marina smiled. For the first time she felt that she hadn’t stepped into nowhere, but into herself.
The next morning, while the flat still breathed the freshness of a weekend, Marina took off the duvet cover and folded it neatly into the laundry basket. The cotton fabric still held a trace of cleanliness—the smell of washing powder, a bit of sunlight, a bit of childhood. Liza laughed in the next room—she was telling Kostya about some cartoon. In that simple moment there was a strange feeling of stability. As if, finally, the floor under her feet had become solid.
On the bedside table the phone screen lit up. A message from the teacher: “Liza has become more active in class. You can see it’s calm at home.”
Marina smiled, wiped the screen with her sleeve, and went back to the laundry.
Three weeks had passed since the court. Vladimir had disappeared—no calls, no messages. Through the lawyer he’d passed on that he would “appeal everything,” but he filed neither an appeal nor a counterclaim. He had moved in with his mother, Nina Andreyevna. Sometimes the children stayed with them for the weekend, sometimes returned the next day. But gradually they themselves started saying:
“Mom, can we stay with you a bit longer?”
“Can we not go over there at all?”
Marina didn’t pry. Didn’t ask who he was with now. Didn’t interfere. She had enough to do.
Rita called on Friday.
“We’ve opened a support group at our center. Women who’ve been through all sorts of things. If you want—just come. You don’t have to say anything. Just listen.”
“I’m not a psychologist,” Marina waved it off.
“You don’t need to be. You’ve just already gone through what others still have ahead of them. Your silence is sometimes the most important thing. Come.”
Marina came. The room smelled of coffee and something citrusy. Women sat in a circle—some were silent, some talked about loans, some about the emptiness no one noticed. At the end of the meeting one of them said:
“Can I just ask Marina a question?”
She was taken aback.
“When did it get easier?” asked a woman with short hair.
Marina thought for a moment.
“When I realized I had the right. The right to exist. Not to be strong, convenient, or correct. Just to be myself. Even if not everyone likes it.”
After that they invited her more often. She didn’t give lectures, didn’t hand out advice. She just was. Attentive. Real. A woman who hadn’t broken, but had put herself back together.
One evening Kostya came up and said:
“Mom, are you mad that it’s just us now?”
“Why should I be mad?”
“Well, you do everything by yourself, and Dad…”
Marina hugged her son.
“I’m not by myself. I have you. And I have me. And that’s a lot.”
In the spring, in mid-April, someone first knocked on the door. Then the doorbell rang.
Marina opened it—and froze. Vladimir was standing on the landing. He looked exhausted; his face had grown gaunt, his jacket hung open.
“Hi,” he said quietly. “Can we talk?”
Marina narrowed her eyes slightly.
“About what?”
“About us. I… I don’t want it to end like this. I was wrong. I got confused. That… it wasn’t real. I get that now. My life is falling apart, Marina. I got kicked out of work like some kid. It’s hard for me.”
She didn’t step back, didn’t invite him in. Just stood there, leaning against the doorframe.
“Vova, for many years you didn’t understand what it was like with me. Now you’ve understood what it’s like without me. Those are two different things.”
He pressed his lips together.
“I’ll change.”
“I don’t need you to change. Just live. Only not next to me.”
He stood there for a long time. Then nodded, lowering his eyes. And left.
She closed the door and exhaled. Not with anger, not with triumph—but with relief. As if someone had hauled out a heavy wardrobe and suddenly the room had become spacious.
Two months later the kitchen smelled of apple pie. Liza was drawing at the table. Kostya was putting together a construction set. A schedule of activities hung on the wall: Marina was leading group meetings for women at the local center. Not as a psychologist—as a person who knew how to listen.
Geraniums bloomed on the windowsill. In the post she found a letter from her lawyer: the court’s decision had come into full legal force; no further property claims had been filed. The agreement stated that the children would live with her permanently.
She put the kettle on and set out the mugs on the table. Everything was—simple. Without tension. Without someone else’s breath at her back. Without the constant need to guess what was wrong.
Marina no longer waited for approval. No longer searched for excuses. No longer lived by someone else’s rules.
One day she walked up to the mirror and saw: her eyes no longer darted around. Her back was straight. Her neck relaxed. She wasn’t smiling—she just was.
In the evening Liza asked:
“Mom, are you happy now?”
Marina sat down beside her and hugged her.
“I’m real now. And that’s even better.”
Sometimes, to live for real, you don’t need to destroy another person—you need to restore yourself. Not to take revenge, not to prove anything, not to drag everyone into an endless battle—but simply to remember that part inside you that was abandoned, forgotten, broken. And give it light. Because revenge is short. Life is when you come back to yourself and stay. Without fear. Without guilt. With warmth.
