“Where’s my boy?” Valentina Petrovna burst in with a cake, not even bothering to knock. “My son is turning forty, and I baked his favorite Napoleon!”
“Your boy isn’t here,” I said, blocking the way to the kitchen with my arms folded. “And he won’t be.”
“What do you mean he isn’t here? His car is outside!”
“The car is outside. The boy isn’t. He’s been gone for a month. Moved in with Svetka from the third entrance, if you really want to know.”
The cake slipped slowly from her hands and hit the floor. Cream smeared across the parquet I had polished to a shine just yesterday. Valentina Petrovna turned pale and grabbed the doorframe.
“You’re lying… He would have told me!”
I gave a dry laugh. For ten years this woman had treated me like hired help for her precious son. For ten years I kept quiet while she barged in without calling, criticized my cooking, my parenting, even the color of my hair.
“Sit down,” I said, pushing a stool toward her. “I’ll tell you what kind of golden boy you raised.”
The first warning came three months ago. Sergey started coming home late. One time it was an urgent report, another time some meeting ran long. I’m not stupid. I work in accounting in the office next door. I know when they actually have meetings.
Then came the “corporate parties.” Every Friday. He would come home at dawn, smelling not of vodka, but of women’s perfume. Cheap perfume, sweet and cloying. I kept silent. Our daughter had exams, and she didn’t need a scandal in the house.
“Mama, why is Dad sleeping in the guest room?” Alyona asked me one day.
“He snores too loudly. He keeps me awake.”
“Why didn’t it bother you before?”
Children notice everything. But I held on. I thought he would get over it. A midlife crisis, that’s what I told myself. It happens. The important thing was to keep the family together.
I knew Svetka. She had gotten divorced a year earlier and immediately pumped up her lips and fixed her chest. She sat outside by the building, luring men in—asking one to fix something, another to help her carry groceries. And they came buzzing around like flies to honey.
Sergey helped too. Put together a wardrobe for her, hung a curtain rod. I even joked once:
“Careful. Don’t get caught on her hook.”
He laughed. “Come on. She’s an empty-headed fake.”
Empty-headed, sure. But she knew exactly how to work men. First the small favors, then, “Oh, Seryozhenka, you must be tired, sit down, have some tea.” And from tea to bed is only one step.
Valentina Petrovna listened, clutching the edge of the table until her knuckles turned white.
“It can’t be… Seryozha is such a homebody, he would never…”
“Oh, he absolutely would,” I said, pouring her a glass of water. “Your homebody is now mopping Svetka’s floors and hauling in her groceries. I saw him yesterday dragging five shopping bags from the store.”
A month ago I came home early from work. My head was splitting, so I left early. I turned the key quietly—I didn’t want to wake Sergey if he was asleep after a night shift.
There was someone in the bedroom, all right. But he wasn’t sleeping. And he wasn’t alone.
I stood in the doorway looking at my husband’s naked backside and Svetka’s enhanced curves. She had her legs wrapped around him, moaning like she was in some cheap movie.
You know what was worst of all? It was our bed. Our bedroom. Our wedding photo was sitting right there on the nightstand.
I didn’t scream. I didn’t make a scene. I walked calmly into the kitchen, took out my grandmother’s heavy cast-iron frying pan, and slammed it onto the floor with all my strength.
They came flying out like they’d been burned. Svetka clutching a sheet to her chest, Sergey trying to pull on his underwear backwards.
“Lena, it’s not what you think!”
“Oh? And what exactly am I supposed to think? That you two were playing chess in there?”
Svetka tried to slip past me. I grabbed her by the hair—extensions, thankfully, so I didn’t feel sorry.
“Not so fast, sweetheart. Get dressed in front of me. And then get out. I never want to see you in here again.”
Sergey started with the usual excuses. The classics—you don’t understand me, you’ve gone cold, all you care about is work. I listened while packing his things. Methodically. Calmly. Underwear with underwear, socks with socks.
“Lena, come on, let’s talk! It didn’t mean anything!”
“If it meant nothing, then even more reason for you to leave. Why would I want a husband who throws himself away for nothing?”
He tried to yank the suitcase out of my hands. I smacked his knuckles with a rolling pin. Not hard, but hard enough.
“Are you out of your mind?”
“No. I finally opened my eyes. Go live with your Svetka. She’s young, she’s hot. Let her mop your floors and cook your borscht—if she even knows how.”
Alyona came back from university and found her father standing on the landing with his suitcases.
“Dad, are you going on a business trip?”
“Something like that,” he muttered.
“For long?” She looked at me. She understood everything without a word. “Oh. Okay then. Good luck.”
Then she went straight to her room. She didn’t even say goodbye.
Of course Valentina Petrovna stormed over the next day. She screamed that I had thrown her son out and destroyed the family. According to her, all women cheat on their husbands and good wives are supposed to forgive.
“Would you forgive your husband if you caught him with the neighbor?”
“That’s different! My Kolya was a decent man!”
“Was. And he died of a heart attack at fifty. Maybe family bliss had something to do with it.”
She nearly choked with outrage. But she left. And her darling son didn’t move back in with Mommy—he stayed with Svetka. Valentina Petrovna started visiting them all the time, bringing pies. Svetka welcomed her gladly. Free food delivery is hard to refuse.
But then things took a turn. Three weeks later Sergey was sitting on a bench outside with a black eye.
“What happened to you?” the neighbor Kolyan asked.
“Oh, nothing… got hit by a door.”
A door, sure. Svetka’s ex had shown up to collect his things and found my ex-husband there instead. He explained very clearly what he thought of the situation. Sergey actually got off lightly—just a black eye and a split lip.
Yesterday Sergey called. His voice sounded pitiful, like a kicked dog.
“Lena, can we talk?”
“You’re talking.”
“No, I mean meet in person. I understand what I’ve done. Forgive me. Svetka… she’s not who I thought she was.”
“And who did you think she was? An angel?”
“Lena, don’t be sarcastic. Can I come over?”
“No.”
“But I need my documents! And there are still some things I didn’t take!”
“Saturday, from ten to twelve. The door will be open. Come get them. Just make sure you’re gone before I get back.”
He kept mumbling something about making a mistake, about a midlife crisis. I hung up.
Valentina Petrovna sat there, still trying to process everything she had heard. The cake was still spread across the floor, cream leaking over the parquet.
“And now what?” she finally asked.
“Nothing. I live in peace. Alyona passed her exams with top marks. I got promoted at work—now I’m chief accountant. And your boy can figure out his own mess.”
“But he’ll fall apart without a family!”
“He’ll survive. He still has you, doesn’t he? Baking pies, washing his socks.”
She got to her feet, swaying a little. I didn’t help her. Let her manage on her own, the way I had all these years.
“You know something?” she said, turning at the door. “I always knew you weren’t right for him. Too independent. Men don’t need women like that.”
“Perfect. Then this works out for everyone.”
The door slammed shut.
I looked at the smeared cake, got out a mop and a bucket, and started scrubbing the floor. And while I cleaned, I thought: she was right about one thing. It really was better this way. No more lies. No more cheating. No more mother-in-law with her cakes.
My phone buzzed. A text from Sergey: “Svetka kicked me out. Can I come back? I swear everything will be different.”
I deleted the message before I even finished reading it.
Then I took a bottle of wine out of the fridge—a birthday gift from a friend. Expensive French wine. I had been saving it for a special occasion.
And what could be more special than the first day of your new life? A life without a forty-year-old “boy” who never became a man.
I poured a full glass and raised it to myself.
“To not bending. To standing my ground. To being free.”
And you know what? The wine was excellent.
So was life without an immature husband and his overbearing mother.
And Svetka? Oh, Svetka would teach him a few more lessons yet. Men like him are exactly the kind she devours for breakfast.
