— And the sauce for the meat—did you make it yourself, Len?” Katya asked, spearing a browned piece with her fork.
I nodded, trying to smile as casually as possible.
“Yeah. I’m trying a new recipe. Cranberry.”
From the far end of the table my husband, Stas, gave a snort. That sound—like a fork scraping a plate—was his signature mark of disapproval. I pretended not to notice.
My friends—Katya, Olya, and Kira—seemed to do the same. They were used to it.
“It’s really good,” Kira said softly. She always spoke quietly, but for some reason her words carried more weight than loud compliments.
Stas set his utensils down and leaned back in his chair, folding his arms across his chest—a master-of-the-universe pose he’d clearly rehearsed in front of a mirror.
“Tomorrow I’m meeting the new department head,” he tossed out into the air, not addressing anyone in particular. “They say he’s from the capital. Tough, but sharp. We’re going to launch a project that’ll turn the whole place upside down.”
Olya, the most emotional of my friends, reacted immediately.
“Whoa, Stas—congrats! Is that a promotion?”
“Not exactly.” He grimaced as if she’d offered him something insignificant. “It’s an opportunity. For people who know how to work—not just sit around doing nothing.”
“In our department there are two of those. Me—and one other guy. The rest are dead weight.”
His gaze swept over my friends.
Katya—a single mom, working as an administrator at a beauty salon.
Olya—trying to sell her paintings online.
And Kira, who’d recently quit her job as a lawyer at a small firm and now answered vaguely that she was “finding herself.”
I felt something tighten inside me. Here it comes.
“And you, Katya,” Stas leaned forward. “How much longer are you planning to glue lashes onto clients? That’s your ceiling. No growth. No ambition.”
Katya went pale.
“Stas, my job lets me feed my son and be close to him. That’s what matters most to me.”
“What matters is development,” my husband cut her off. “Not sitting in your comfort zone. Life is for the strong. The rest just… exist.”
He paused, savoring the effect.
“Take Olya’s… creativity, for example.” He twisted his mouth around the word. “Who needs landscapes in the twenty-first century? People make money with digital art. And this… is just smearing paint to decorate a hallway.”
Olya shot to her feet, knocking her chair backward.
“How can you say that?!”
I rushed to her, trying to calm her down.
“Olya, please—don’t. He doesn’t mean it…”
But Stas was unstoppable now. He’d caught a buzz, feeling like an alpha male surrounded by weak, bewildered females. His eyes landed on silent Kira.
“And you—you’re the brightest example of all,” he went on. “A lawyer who quit practicing. Realized you couldn’t handle it, huh? Competition, tough cases… That’s not like shuffling papers.”
Kira slowly raised her eyes to him. There was no hurt in her look. No anger.
Only a cool, calm curiosity that made me uneasy.
“What’s the point talking to you,” Stas exhaled, half-drunk, sweeping everyone with a contemptuous stare. “You’re all nothing but losers!”
Katya pressed her lips together and silently lifted Olya’s chair.
Kira was the only one who didn’t look away from my husband. The corner of her mouth flickered in the faintest smirk.
“Maybe you’re right, Stanislav,” she said evenly. “Everyone has their own criteria for success.”
The girls left quickly, their goodbyes rushed and awkward. I didn’t try to stop them.
When the door closed behind them, I turned to my husband.
“Why did you do that?”
“What did I do?” he asked with sincere surprise, chewing another piece of meat. “I told the truth. Maybe it’ll shake them up.”
He got up, came over, and kissed the top of my head.
“Don’t worry, sweetheart. Your friends are just… kind of hopeless. Anyway, I’m going to bed. I have to get up early tomorrow. I need to be in top form for the new boss.”
In the morning, Stas was confidence incarnate—whistling as he picked out his most expensive tie, throwing me patronizing looks.
“Alright, I’m off. Today we’ll see who in this company is actually worth something.”
He left behind a trail of expensive cologne and the sense of an approaching storm. I wandered around the apartment, cleaning up the remains of last night’s dinner, unable to shake a bad feeling.
At the office, Stas felt like he was on top of the world. He walked into the conference room where the key department staff had already gathered and took a seat as close as possible to the head chair.
Everyone knew their future careers depended on the new leader.
Stas mentally rehearsed his speech. He was going to present his project—bold, groundbreaking, as he saw it. He was sure the boss from the capital would appreciate his drive and ambition.
The door opened. The CEO entered—and behind him… a woman.
Stas frowned. He’d expected a stern older man, not an elegant figure in a tailored pantsuit.
“Colleagues, allow me to introduce,” the CEO announced solemnly. “Our new Head of Strategic Development—Kira Andreyevna Volkova.”
Stas’s breath caught. He stared at the woman taking the seat at the head of the table and couldn’t believe his eyes.
It was Kira. My friend Kira. The very “loser” who “couldn’t handle” being a lawyer.
She scanned the room with a calm, appraising look and held her gaze on Stas for a fraction of a second.
There was no surprise in her eyes. No gloating. Only a faint, almost imperceptible recognition—like she’d seen him for the first time after some accidental, insignificant encounter.
“Good afternoon,” she said. The voice that had seemed so quiet yesterday now filled the room with authority and certainty. “I’ve reviewed the current projects. The level, frankly, leaves much to be desired. We’re going to change everything. Radically.”
Stas felt an unpleasant chill crawl down his spine.
Kira began to speak—about new markets, digital transformation, implementing systems their company had never even heard of. She tossed out terminology, cited statistics, sketched diagrams on the flipchart that made half the room’s eyes widen.
This wasn’t the Kira he thought he knew. This was a predator. A top-tier professional.
Pulling together what was left of his willpower, Stas decided to act. He had to show himself.
“Kira Andreyevna,” he forced himself to say her first name and patronymic. “I have a proposal. A project that could become the locomotive—”
“Yes, Stanislav, I saw your folder,” she cut him off without even turning her head. “The idea is interesting, but completely unworkable in the current reality.”
“You failed to account for three key risk factors and ignored competitive analysis. Your strategy is about five years out of date.”
“We’ll come back to this when you prepare a more detailed report. With real numbers—not fantasies.”
Her words hit harder than a slap. She didn’t just reject his idea. She demolished it—calmly, methodically, in public.
The meeting went on for another hour—an hour during which Stas sat pressed into his chair, feeling his world collapse.
His career. His ambitions. His smug confidence. All of it was now in the hands of the woman he’d publicly humiliated the night before.
When it ended, Kira came up to him.
“Stanislav, come to my office in an hour. We’ll discuss your responsibilities. And performance criteria. Judging by everything, yours and mine differ quite a lot.”
An hour later, pale and drawn, Stas walked into the office he’d dreamed of occupying that very morning. Kira sat behind a massive desk, scrolling through documents on a tablet. She looked up, and he felt like a schoolboy called to the principal.
“Have a seat, Stanislav.”
He perched on the edge of the chair.
“Kira… I… about yesterday…”
“Yesterday was yesterday,” she said, cutting him off. “Today we’re talking about work.”
“I reviewed your personnel file. Your results are average. Your initiative looks high on paper, but as we’ve already established, it isn’t backed by analysis.”
She paused, looking him directly in the eyes.
“I’m not going to fire you. That would be too easy. And unprofessional. I’m giving you a chance.”
Stas leaned forward, hope flashing in his face.
“You’ll lead a working group on… archiving. We need to systematize all department projects for the last ten years. Meticulous work. Requires attention to detail. Can you handle it?”
The humiliation was so intense Stas didn’t even find his voice right away. Head of an archiving group. That was a position for rookies—for people they wanted out of sight without firing. Exile.
“Is… is this a joke?” he rasped.
“I don’t joke at work,” her voice turned icy. “This is your new assignment. Progress report—every Friday on my desk. You may go.”
He stumbled out, swaying. All his swagger, all his forced confidence, evaporated. He was crushed.
He came home late that evening. Silently went to the kitchen, poured himself water, and drank it down in one gulp. I watched him, already knowing everything. Kira had called me.
“So?” I asked quietly. “Talk to the new boss?”
He spun toward me. In his eyes swirled rage and despair.
“It’s all you! You and your little friends! You set it up!”
“Set it up?” I gave a bitter smile. “What exactly did we set up, Stas? That Kira turned out to be smarter, stronger, and more successful than you?”
“That she studied abroad for years while you went around bragging about your ‘opportunities’? That she built a career while you humiliated anyone who seemed weaker?”
He stared at me like he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. I’d never spoken to him in that tone.
“She’s just getting revenge. For yesterday!”
“No,” I shook my head. “She’s working. And do you know the difference between her and you?”
“She would never call someone a loser just because they don’t fit her picture of the world. She’s giving even you a chance. And you… you’d crush anyone.”
I stepped closer.
“I called Katya. They offered her a manager position at a new branch of her salon.”
“And Olya sold three of her ‘smears’ to a private collection. For very good money. So who’s the loser here, Stas?”
He stayed silent, looking at me with a lost expression. In one night, his world—where he was king—crumbled into dust.
I slid my wedding ring off my finger and set it on the table.
“I’m going to stay with Kira for a while. Looks like she has a big apartment now. And you can stay here. In your comfort zone. Sort out your archives
