“What are these slippers doing in our entryway?” Antonina froze on the threshold without taking off her shoes and stared at the shabby blue house slippers—blue like paint left out on a shed two summers ago. Not hers. And definitely not Sergey’s.
“Mom stopped by,” her husband’s voice drifted in from the kitchen. Even. Smooth as a freshly ironed sheet. No surprise, no embarrassment. With him everything was always “according to plan”—whose plan, though, was anyone’s guess.
Antonina set down her bag slowly and shrugged off her jacket. Her heart was pounding—not from trudging through three rain-soaked bus stops or from the stifling minibus with its wheezing radio, but from something sticky and unpleasant inside her. She knew that calm tone too well: Sergey only spoke like that when he was hiding something. Or pretending nothing was happening.
“Just like that?” she walked into the kitchen. “Dropped in for tea and a little chat?”
Sergey was sitting there in pajamas even though it was only seven in the evening. His face looked detached, like a janitor on a Sunday. His eyes flicked around, and he kept tapping his mug against the saucer. That was his tell: I’m about to lie, but carefully.
“We sat, we talked. You were late—I didn’t know when to expect you.”
“Uh-huh.” Antonina poured herself tea and noticed her hands trembling slightly. “I had a meeting until nine today. On my feet all day. You didn’t ask. You could’ve called.”
“Oh come on, Tonya, you said not to bother you. Work is work…” he muttered, not looking up.
She sat across from him in silence, watching him perform “relaxed at home,” while something inside her began to simmer—quietly, no whistle. She knew Sergey: when he started wriggling, a whole tail of lies was already dragging behind him.
“Listen, Seryozha—tell me straight. Why does she come here? Not just for tea, right?”
“What’s the big deal? She’s alone, her pension’s a joke. She came over, we sat. Everyone’s mom has sons.”
“Moms have sons, Seryozha. But moms don’t leave their slippers in someone else’s apartment where two adults live together. We had an agreement: no constant guests—especially ones who go through other people’s things.”
“There you go again. Exaggerating. Mom’s a good person. She just has her way. She wants us to live like normal people.”
“Like normal people—meaning she rearranges my underwear in the closet? Stuffing my hairbrush into the medicine cabinet? Calling me ‘that of yours’ like I’m some shift assignment you got issued?”
Sergey snorted through his nose. Outside, a neighbor’s dog started barking, and it somehow highlighted the absurdity of the evening: strangers’ slippers, a husband in pajamas playing indifferent, and the feeling that their home wasn’t entirely theirs anymore.
“Alright, don’t boil over,” he exhaled. “She suggested… well, an idea. About the apartment.”
“What kind of idea?”
Silence hung. You could hear air hissing in the radiators.
“We’ve been saving… together. But maybe we could register the place in Mom’s name. Temporarily. She’ll live here, we’ll help her, and then she’ll sign it back.”
“Are you out of your mind?”
“Don’t yell. She’d feel safer. Renting is hard, and her neighbor Galina is harassing her…”
“Just say it: have you already signed, or not yet?”
He said nothing. Rubbed the bridge of his nose and stood up.
“We’ll talk later. I’m tired.”
“And I’m fresh as May lilac, right?” she scoffed. “You decided to screw me over, Seryozha?”
He stood hunched like a schoolboy who forgot his homework.
“I’m just thinking about Mom…”
“And who am I to you—some cafeteria lady handing out portions?”
He turned away, and Antonina suddenly understood: this is the moment when a person is physically beside you, but no longer with you. You speak, and it’s like you don’t exist.
“Tomorrow I’m taking the day off. I’m going to a lawyer. And if your mother sticks her nose in here again—she better not be surprised if her dentures get knocked loose.”
Sergey walked into the bathroom without a word. Water roared.
And in Antonina’s head, a plan was already forming—cold, precise, simple. For the first time in a long while, she felt calm.
She woke to a strange crackling sound—like someone peeling protective film off brand-new furniture. She reached for her phone: 07:03. Saturday. She could’ve stayed in bed… but the crackling happened again, and with it came a familiar cough. Antonina already knew: the morning was ruined.
Barefoot, she stepped into the hallway—her feet stuck to the linoleum, where yesterday’s mud prints had already dried.
In the kitchen, by the table, stood Nadezhda Pavlovna. Her robe wasn’t just green—it was that odd shade fashion magazines would call “broccoli fog,” and real life would call “should’ve been thrown out years ago.” In one hand she held a knife, in the other a loaf of bread, slicing it on the diagonal as if she weren’t making breakfast but delivering a culinary punishment.
“Oh, you’re finally awake. Good morning, Antonina,” she said without turning her head. Her voice was flat and cold, like a morgue clerk filling out forms. “Can’t sleep? Well, not everyone’s conscience lets them sleep peacefully.”
Antonina swallowed. This wasn’t “Mommy popped in for tea.” No—this looked like an operation. Planned. Covered from every angle.
“And what are you doing here?” her voice came out rough, like an old radiator in winter. “Sergey said you just stopped by yesterday…”
“Sergey?” her mother-in-law narrowed her eyes and smirked. “Getting Sergey to tell the truth is like washing a cat. You can try to raise him all you want—it’s all the same.”
“He’s not my pupil. He’s my husband.”
“Oh really? In the passport—maybe. In reality…” Nadezhda Pavlovna lifted an eyebrow. “My late Fyodor Pavlovich wouldn’t even turn on the kettle without me. And yours is like he’s on a chain with you. He registered the apartment in your name, God help us. The boy is thirty-nine and still in custody.”
Antonina turned and walked into the room. She came back with papers and placed them on the table.
“A copy of the gift deed. Lose something?”
The knife kept clicking against the cutting board, then stopped. Her mother-in-law set the loaf down and wiped her hands on the robe.
“So you found it… So what? You’re going to sue your husband’s family?”
“I don’t have my husband’s family. I have one man I spent seventeen years saving up with for this apartment. I wore pantyhose where the toe tore faster than a schoolgirl’s. And now, it turns out, Mommy ‘deserves’ it in her old age. And I’m just… a worker bee.”
Nadezhda Pavlovna looked at her as if the deed weren’t paper but an abscess cut open.
“You’re dramatizing, Tonya. We just wanted things calm. If the home is in my name—lower taxes, and… fewer issues. Sergey’s job is unstable. But me—I’m reliable. Years, experience…”
“Experience? You can’t even pay your phone bill without help! Want me to remind you how to open Sberbank Online? Or will you write passwords down on a piece of paper again?”
Her mother-in-law clicked her tongue.
“Ungrateful. I raised my son. And you? You can’t cook. Your dumplings stink. The meat is oversalted. And the home—empty. No curtains, no pillows. No warmth, no coziness. A woman should keep the hearth, not run to lawyers.”
Antonina felt something inside her snap.
“The hearth, you say? I’ll give you such a hearth you’ll burn in it yourselves—along with your little deed!”
She grabbed her favorite mug with a kitten on it and hurled it at the wall. The kitten shattered into tiny shards. Silence fell in the kitchen. Even the fridge stopped humming.
Sergey appeared in the doorway—wearing underwear, hair a mess, scratching his stomach.
“What the hell is going on here?”
Antonina turned slowly.
“Ah, and here’s the master of the house. It’s simple, darling. Your mother’s running things, registering the apartment her way. And I’m just… getting a little fresh air.”
“Tonya, you misunderstood…”
“No, I understood perfectly. You’re just late.”
Nadezhda Pavlovna walked up to her son and took his hand.
“Tell her. She’ll leave anyway. She’s not your person. She’s against family. And anyone against family is an enemy.”
Sergey opened his mouth, closed it. Then opened it again.
“Maybe… we should live apart for a while. To think.”
Antonina sat down, propped her head on her hand, and smiled.
“For a while? Great. You and Mom can go to her communal apartment. The room with that Galina who screams Pushkin out the window at night. And I’ll live in our apartment—because you, dear, aren’t registered here. Want to guess who’s going to court tomorrow with an eviction filing?”
Sergey went pale.
“Have you lost your mind?”
“No, Seryozhenka. I just finally saw clearly. You thought I was safe. Quiet. That I didn’t notice. But I was saving up—not just for the apartment. For the moment I’d stop believing. And you know what?”
Antonina stood, went to the door, turned the key, and pulled it wide open.
“Here it is. Get out.”
Nadezhda Pavlovna silently picked up her bag—the same one she’d already rummaged through, spreading her parcels across the kitchen shelves.
Sergey stood in the hallway like a schoolboy at assembly, with those empty eyes you can drown in—and find nothing.
Antonina took his phone from the cabinet and pressed it into his palm.
“Call your lawyer. Or your mother. Either way… what’s the difference.”
She shut the door after them—firmly, with a sound like she’d cut off not only their footsteps, but an entire layer of her life.
But she knew they’d come back.
Because greed is like mold. You can scrub and scrub, but if a speck remains, it grows again.
Which meant another war was ahead. And by the looks of it—dirty.
The phone rang at exactly eight in the morning. As if someone deliberately chose the time to ruin her Saturday.
Antonina, barely awake, knocked the phone off the nightstand and fumbled for it.
“Yeah?”
“This is Officer Yeremin, Tonya. Sergey Pavlovich filed a report—says you illegally threw him out of the apartment and are keeping his things.”
Antonina sat up in bed, tugging at her crooked T-shirt.
“Officer—first, I didn’t throw him out. He left on his own and waved at the doorknob. Second, he isn’t registered here; he lives with his mother. His stuff is in the hallway—in a Letual bag, by the way. Very symbolic.”
“I have to come by. File a report.”
“Come. I’ll pour you tea if you want. Or poison.”
The apartment was so quiet even the refrigerator started dripping, like it was complaining.
Antonina sat at the table, twirling a pen. Across from her sat a young lawyer with a “just crawled out of the tax office through a window” hairstyle and a folder labeled “Property Defense.”
“You filed for eviction—good. But now there’s a new problem.”
“What now?” Antonina squinted.
“Your mother-in-law’s niece has surfaced. Yulia. She claims her father—Uncle Lev—gave money for the apartment.”
“What Uncle Lev? He’s been in Canada since the fifties.”
“Yes. But here’s a letter—says in 2012 he sent eighteen thousand dollars ‘for the family’s needs.’ If that money went to the apartment, they’ll argue they own a share.”
“Oh, wonderful. A new kind of scam: ‘apartment on installments for relatives.’”
The lawyer shrugged.
“They have a strong attorney. They’ll try to freeze the eviction through court.”
“Fine by me. I’d house them all in here: Sergey, his mom, the niece with eyes like a starving moose. And Uncle Lev on Zoom—let him participate too.”
The next day there was a knock. On the doorstep stood Yulia—skinny, in a gray suit, with the face of someone who sells insurance and eats people like you for breakfast. Behind her hovered Sergey, like an unpleasant echo.
“Good evening. We came peacefully. We want to discuss this without going to court.”
Antonina let them in. Put the kettle on. Not out of politeness—just because the conversation promised to be bitter, and her tea always doubled as a laxative.
“Speak, Yulya dear. Just don’t use ‘we’re one family’—I’m allergic.”
Yulia pulled out a tablet.
“All transfers are here. Eighteen thousand dollars in 2012. Purpose: for the family of Sergey and Nadezhda. If it went toward the purchase, you must compensate or allocate a share.”
Antonina laughed—short and dry.
“You want me to show you a receipt from Pyaterochka too? 2013. Has ‘cheese, sausage, cabbage.’ That’s ‘for the family’s needs,’ too. Should I give you a wardrobe?”
Sergey grimaced.
“Tonya, we don’t want war…”
“Really? Then why were you trying to borrow a key from the neighbor at night? Think he won’t talk? Our building is old, but not deaf. Aunt Klava from the third floor described your whole outfit yesterday. Sweatpants with a knee stain—perfect for covert ops.”
Yulia clenched her teeth.
“If you won’t agree, we’ll file a lawsuit. We’ll include moral damages.”
“For what—breaking a cup, or breaking my illusions?”
“We warned you. The court will decide.”
“And tell Nadezhda Pavlovna I’ll return her jar of jam as soon as she returns her attempt to steal my life.”
Two months later, the court decision arrived.
Antonina won. The Canadian transfers were recognized as a gift unrelated to the apartment. Sergey’s eviction was confirmed as lawful.
A week later—a letter. On paper, in a чужой handwriting, surely his mother’s.
“Tonya. Everything went wrong. Forgive me. There’s nowhere to live. Mom got sick. Yulia left. If you can… let it go.”
Antonina read it twice. Slowly tore it up. The paper ripped easily—like their marriage.
She turned on music, took a bottle of wine from the closet, sat by the window.
And for the first time in years, she exhaled deeply.
She had an apartment.
She had a heart.
And at last—there was quiet inside it.
