My son, little Tyoma, was in his third week of life. I slept in broken stretches of forty minutes, forgot to brush my hair, and lived almost entirely on cold tea and Maria biscuits because the baby had colic. He only left my arms long enough to start crying again in his crib.
My husband Denis was not ready for our new reality. During the first three days after we came home from the maternity hospital, he honestly tried to help. He would solemnly carry the baby for exactly five minutes, then hand him back to me and say, “He’s looking for something. He probably wants to eat. I’ll go sleep in the living room. I have work tomorrow, after all. I’m the only breadwinner now.”
The “only breadwinner” earned a modest sixty thousand at an office job. Before maternity leave, I had been the chief accountant and brought home twice as much. But now I was vulnerable, dependent, and so exhausted that all I wanted was to lie down in silence for at least half an hour.
It was on one of those days, when lack of sleep made my vision blur, that Nina Andreevna appeared at our apartment door. My mother-in-law.
She came without calling and without being invited. She simply rang the bell and swept into the hallway with bags in her hands.
“Oh, it’s so stuffy in here!” Nina Andreevna announced immediately, wrinkling her nose. “A child needs fresh air, and there’s nothing to breathe in this place! Come on, mother, accept some help. I baked cabbage pies. Denis loves them so much!”
I forced out a weak smile, holding sleeping Tyoma against my shoulder.
“Hello, Nina Andreevna. Thank you. But I can’t eat cabbage right now. I’m breastfeeding, and Tyoma’s tummy hurts all the time. And I’m afraid to air the room because of drafts…”
“Nonsense! These modern doctors of yours don’t understand anything!” my mother-in-law waved me off and walked straight into the kitchen. She threw her coat onto the kitchen bench and switched on the kettle. “Put the baby in his crib and come here. I need to have a serious talk with you. We need to think about Nikita.”
Nikita was my mother-in-law’s twenty-two-year-old son, who constantly ate at her place and asked for money. He was the complete opposite of my husband. Denis was calm and responsible, or at least that was what I had believed before giving birth. He was used to carrying everything on his shoulders. Nikita, on the other hand, was an eternal student, a seeker of himself, his mother’s pride and joy, and the main black hole in Nina Andreevna’s budget.
I carefully placed my son in his crib. Then I tiptoed back to the kitchen, dreaming only of my mother-in-law leaving in half an hour so I could close my eyes for a few minutes. But her next speech robbed me of sleep for a very long time.
Nina Andreevna sat at my table and looked at me with an expression of deep condescension.
“So, listen carefully,” she began, pushing a plate of those forbidden pies toward me. “You are parents now. Your status has changed, and your responsibilities have increased. But the family is big. You can’t think only about yourselves…”
I immediately tensed, expecting something unpleasant. My mother-in-law never came with good news.
“Our Nikitushka has been offered a job. A good one, with prospects! A sales representative position at a big company,” she declared proudly. “But there is one condition. He needs his own car. He doesn’t have one, as you know. And my pension isn’t made of rubber. They won’t give him a loan because his credit history is ruined because of that stupid phone, remember?”
I remembered. Nikita had bought the latest iPhone, and Denis had ended up paying off the debt because his younger brother couldn’t handle it.
“And what exactly are you suggesting?” I asked dryly. “We don’t have money for Nikita’s car either. Denis is the only one working now. We have a mortgage and a baby.”
My mother-in-law clapped her hands happily.
“Well, Denis and I have already discussed everything and come up with a plan!”
“Denis and I discussed it.”
My husband had been discussing our family finances with his mother behind my back.
“You’re about to receive your maternity money,” she continued. “A big sum! Plus the monthly childcare allowance until the baby is eighteen months old. Your salary was official, so it must come out to a decent amount, around thirty-five thousand a month, right?” Nina Andreevna’s eyes flashed greedily. “We decided that you don’t really need that money anyway. You breastfeed the baby, so there’s no need to buy formula. You already bought the stroller and crib. Denis can manage diapers from his salary. So you’ll transfer your allowance to a separate account and save it for Nikita’s car. In six months, we’ll have enough for a used foreign car!”
I stared at her, feeling as if I had fallen into some surreal nightmare.
“My maternity money? My child benefits? You want me to give them to a grown man for a car? Nina Andreevna, are you serious?”
Her syrupy tone instantly turned aggressive.
“What’s so shocking about it? You sit at home now, fully supported by my son! He works and feeds the family! And that money is from the government. What do you need it for? Manicures while your husband breaks his back? It’s family money! And Nikita is part of our family. Without a car, he’ll lose that job! Is that what you want?”
At that moment, the front door lock clicked. Denis had come home from work.
He entered the kitchen, saw my pale face and the red blotches on his mother’s neck, and immediately understood everything.
“Oh, Mom, you’re already here,” he tried to smile, but the smile came out pathetic and cowardly. “Olya, why are you frowning like that? Did Mom already tell you about our plan?”
I slowly stood up from the table. My exhaustion disappeared instantly.
“Plan, Denis?” I asked quietly so I wouldn’t wake the baby. “The plan to take the money the government gives me to support our son and hand it over to your lazy brother?”
Denis hesitated, scratched the back of his head, and looked away.
“Come on, don’t start. Honestly, what do we need that much for right now? We’re sitting at home anyway. Nikita needs a start in life. As his older brother, I’m supposed to help him. You and I will manage on my salary. I’m not refusing to feed you.”
“Feed us?” my voice shook. “The mortgage, utilities, doctors, things the baby needs… When was the last time you went grocery shopping? What if Tyoma gets sick? What if I need dental treatment?”
“Oh, don’t start playing poor!” my mother-in-law cut in, triumphantly crossing her arms. “People have lived on less! I raised two children in the nineties! Denis made the right decision. He is the head of the family. And you, Olya, should obey your husband instead of being greedy. Besides, Denis has the card with your benefits anyway. He’ll withdraw the money himself.”
I turned sharply to my husband.
“You have my salary card? Why?”
“You don’t leave the house anyway. What do you need it for?” he stepped back toward the hallway as if frightened by my stare.
“So you don’t know banking apps exist?”
They stood in front of me, two people who sincerely believed they had the right to control my life, my health, and my child’s future. They had already divided everything. They had erased me and Tyoma from their list of priorities and placed the comfort of a twenty-two-year-old infantile man on a pedestal.
From the bedroom, my son began to cry softly. That sound seemed to switch on something ancient inside me. The instinct of a mother wolf realizing that the pack has turned away from her cub.
I did not cry, although the lump of hurt in my throat was almost unbearable. I walked to the refrigerator, where an electricity bill hung under a magnet, took a pen, and turned to that “family coalition.”
“Here is what’s going to happen,” I said, my voice cold and even. “Nina Andreevna, put on your coat and leave. Take your pies with you. You are no longer welcome in my home.”
“What?!” my mother-in-law shrieked, turning red. “Denis! Do you hear how she talks to your mother?”
“I hear. And now he’s going to hear something else,” I said, turning my icy gaze to my husband. “Denis, you have exactly one minute to return my bank card. If it isn’t in my hand within sixty seconds, I’ll block it through the app. Then you won’t be able to do anything with it.”
Denis had known me for a long time. He knew that, unlike him, I did not throw words around.
“Olya, have you lost your mind? We’re family!”
“Family?” I smiled bitterly. “My family, Denis, is sleeping in the next room wearing a diaper. You are just people who decided to rob a young mother. The card. Now.”
With trembling hands, Denis pulled out his wallet, fished out my card, and placed it on the table. Meanwhile, Nina Andreevna was frantically putting on her coat, showering me with curses.
“Snake! We warmed you at our hearth! I always knew you only cared about money! My poor boy, what a trap you fell into!” she wailed as she stormed out the door.
Denis and I were left alone in the kitchen. Behind the wall, Tyoma was crying louder and louder.
“Olya… why did you have to be so harsh? Mom will be offended now. Her blood pressure will go up…” my husband mumbled, staring at the floor.
I took my card from the table and squeezed it tightly in my hand.
“Go to the bedroom and pack your things.”
“What do you mean? Where am I supposed to go?” he blinked in confusion.
“To your mother. To your brother. Go earn money for their cars, apartments, and iPhones. My son and I will somehow survive on ‘my money.’ Without a head of the family who is ready to take food out of his own child’s mouth.”
Denis left slowly, with theatrical sighs and a dramatic show of packing his things into a sports bag. He threw clothes into it and kept glancing sideways at me. He was waiting for me to break. Waiting for me to throw myself at his neck, cry, and say, “Denis, please stay. I overreacted. Take my maternity money, just don’t leave me and Tyoma.”
But I stood in the doorway and silently watched him pack. Inside, I felt empty. There was only pain for my son, whose own father had begrudged him money for the sake of his overgrown brother.
“Olya, you do understand you won’t manage on your own, don’t you?” he said at the threshold, zipping up his jacket. “You’re emotional after childbirth. Hormones are messing with you. You’ll sit alone for a week, howl like a wolf, and come to your senses. But remember this: I’ll only come back if you apologize to Mom. She’s an older woman. Her opinion deserves respect.”
The door slammed shut. I turned the key twice, slid the latch into place, and sank down the wall to the floor. The tears finally burst from my eyes. From hurt, from exhaustion, from fear of the future. But when Tyoma’s strained little cry came from the bedroom again, I wiped my face on the sleeve of my robe, took a breath, and went to my son.
Then I opened the banking app and transferred all my money, including the rest of my savings, to a new account. After that, I ordered a replacement salary card so the old plastic card that had been in my husband’s hands would become nothing more than a useless piece of plastic.
Denis was right about one thing: the first week was hard. Tyoma still suffered with his tummy, I slept two hours a day, I didn’t have time to cook, and I lived on buckwheat and kefir.
But do you know what was surprising?
Inside that incredible physical exhaustion, there was suddenly a moral lightness. I no longer had to tiptoe around the apartment so I wouldn’t wake the “tired head of the family.” I no longer had to listen to complaints that his shirts were badly ironed or that the soup was not rich enough.
I was alone with my child, and we were coping. My benefits and savings were enough for good diapers, pediatrician visits, and grocery delivery.
There was no word from Denis for exactly two weeks. Apparently, he was waiting for me to crawl back on my knees. Then Nina Andreevna called me.
“Well, proud girl?” her voice dripped with poison. “Have you had enough of your independence? My Denis walks around gloomy, missing his son. And because of your greed, you’re depriving the child of his father!”
“Nina Andreevna,” I replied calmly, stirring porridge with my left hand while holding the phone with my right. “Nobody is forbidding Denis from seeing his son. He simply hasn’t called once to ask whether Tyoma has formula or diapers.”
“Why should he call? You kicked him out!” she shrieked. “Here is how it’s going to be. We discussed everything. Denis is ready to come back. But the condition is the same: your maternity money goes into Nikita’s account. And you’ll give the card to me. Otherwise, divorce. And remember, if you divorce, we’ll sue you for half the apartment! The mortgage was taken during marriage!”
I smiled.
How predictable.
“Nina Andreevna, please tell your elder son to check the mailbox at your registered address carefully. Yesterday I sent a registered letter there. Goodbye.”
I hung up and blocked her number.
The letter I mentioned contained a copy of my statement of claim. A woman on maternity leave who is legally married has every right to file for child support not only for the child, but also for her own maintenance until the child turns three.
Denis rushed over the next day after receiving the notice. He no longer looked so arrogant. Life with his mother and his freeloading younger brother had apparently turned out to be less sweet than he imagined.
He rang the doorbell. I didn’t open the door. I only asked through it what he wanted.
“Olya, let me in,” he said dully. In his hand dangled a small pack of the cheapest diapers. “What is this circus with court? Why are you humiliating us?”
“Am I the one humiliating you? Denis, I’m simply moving our relationship into a legal framework. Since I’m greedy and refuse to sponsor your brother, you will sponsor your son according to the law.”
“Olya, Mom got carried away! And I was an idiot! Nikita sleeps until noon, Mom keeps nagging me that I don’t earn enough. Now they’re demanding that I take out a loan in my name for Nikita’s car! Olya, I want to come home. To you. I understand everything now!”
I looked at the man I had once loved and felt nothing but disgust. He had understood nothing. He had simply run away from his mother once she started pulling money directly from him.
“There is no home for you here anymore, Denis. I live here with my son. As for the loan for your brother, go ahead and take it. You are the older one, after all. You are supposed to help.”
The divorce was long and dirty. My mother-in-law really did hire some lawyer who tried to prove that I had “illegally enriched myself” by keeping my maternity money and demanded that the mortgaged apartment be split in half.
But in court, Nina Andreevna faced an unpleasant surprise. As a chief accountant, I was used to keeping flawless records. I presented bank statements proving that the down payment for the apartment had been fully made from the sale of my personal studio apartment, which I had owned before marriage. I also showed that during the last months, I had been paying the mortgage entirely from my own funds because Denis had not contributed a single kopeck.
The court ruled that the apartment would remain mine, with only a tiny compensation paid to Denis for the months when the mortgage had been paid during the marriage. Child support for Tyoma and maintenance for me were also awarded fairly.
Nikita, of course, never got his car. He failed at the sales representative job in the very first month after arriving two hours late on his second working day. As for Nina Andreevna, she now calls mutual acquaintances and complains that I am a heartless witch who stripped her “golden boy” down to nothing.
Two years have passed.
Tyoma has started kindergarten. I returned to work and was promoted to financial director. We renovated the apartment, erasing every trace of that former life.
Sometimes I look at my son laughing as he builds things with his blocks on the new fluffy rug, and I think: what a blessing it was that my mother-in-law showed up that day with those pies. If not for her arrogance, I might have lived for many more years under the illusion of a perfect family, serving my husband’s selfishness and his relatives’ entitlement.
Instead, I simply closed the door on those shameless people in time.
