Liliya Yakovlevna Vishnevskaya absolutely disapproved of her son’s relationship with a girl from a modest family. But Galya became pregnant even before Professor Vishnevskaya had time to do anything about it.
Of course, such matters aren’t resolved when status, connections, and money are involved. Yet Galya was a student at the university where Liliya Yakovlevna taught, and the entire university already knew that Galya was pregnant by her son…
“Mom, don’t listen to him,” Marina fed Galya yet another dose of lies, “Yesterday we watched a movie about family problems. A melodrama, basically. We thought Vladik was asleep. You know he’s a dreamer—he can talk a mile a minute.”
And when a few days later Galya returned the visiting grandson, she did not hold back in the realm of falsehoods either:
“Don’t listen to him, we got carried away with action movies. Karate, car chases, Eastern martial arts. No, I tried to put on some cartoons for him, but he said he wasn’t little anymore. Marina, so don’t pay any attention to his flights of fancy!”
Both Marina and Galya fully understood that they were lying to each other. But it was easier that way.
Only Vladik couldn’t understand why everything was always being pinned on him. He wasn’t that impressionable, and he knew how to keep his tongue in check.
And even though he was only seven years old, he had already grasped that all problems should be left at home.
What he couldn’t understand, though, was why life with his mom and dad was so different from life with his new grandparents.
“Marina, how many times do I have to tell you that you need to pour tea into my cup!” Igor bellowed. “Not just any cup, my cup!”
“She wasn’t in a drying cycle,” Marina babbled.
“And can’t you open your eyes? Walk around the apartment? Look, she’s standing right by the computer!”
“I’ll pour some right now,” Marina said readily.
“I’m going to pour it so hard that your pouring device will break!” Igor shouted, swinging his hand. “I already took a swig, so fine—I’ll drink from it. And take my cup to the kitchen and wash it!”
“Okay, sure,” Marina managed to say in a frightened tone as she grabbed the cup and dashed off to the kitchen.
“That’s how it is,” Igor commented with satisfaction about his own behavior, “if you don’t keep a woman on a leash, there’s no order in the house!”
Vladik was too young to form his own opinion, but he didn’t like his father’s yelling or his mother’s tears. What he disliked most of all was when his mom would smear her bruises near the mirror.
At those times, his mother’s face looked unreal, and she would also say things like:
“Imagine, Vladik, I fell!”
She’d also mention a cabinet door she had hit or a door frame she hadn’t noticed.
And the story was completely different with the new grandmother Galya.
“Grab the trash and take it out quickly! And there’s still dishes waiting for you!” she barked orders at Grandpa Fedor.
“Galya, I’m not thirty years old, hopping around like a little goat!” Grandpa Fedor protested.
Then Grandma Galya would take a candy—a treat she simply adored—and slyly toss it at Grandpa Fedor. He would squeal like a little child and, mumbling to himself, do as he was told.
Vladik didn’t understand the meaning of almost any of the words with which Grandpa Fedor commended Grandma Galya, and for repeating some phrases he even got a smack from his father. Yet his dad refrained from punishing him for repeating one particular phrase, only saying:
“God has rewarded you with a relative!”
His tone was clearly disapproving.
And that phrase was:
“Z-e_chka Thai!”
In general, Grandma Galya often hit Grandpa Fedor. But not continuously—more like in a joking manner. No, Grandpa Fedor would really shriek and curse, wholeheartedly. But Grandma did it with a smile, not with malice.
While dad shouted at mom with anger, Vladik got the impression that Grandma Galya never really got angry at all.
When Vladik accidentally broke a vase, he thought that they’d beat him up like they did with Grandpa Fedor, but she only smiled and said:
“Grandson, I see a flaw! Too many large pieces!”
Then she handed Vladik a stick and insisted that he break everything into tiny fragments.
“Vladik, you must always finish what you start!”
The new grandmother was very dear to Vladik. No one had told him where she had come from or where she had been before. But with her appearance, Grandpa Egor and Grandma Zhanna disappeared.
And that made Vladik happy too, because they were just as angry as his dad and, like his dad, were constantly yelling at his mom.
“No matter how much a rope coils, you can’t hide a needle in a sack!” became the motto for Galya’s return to her “own” people. And her reappearance in public brought serious health problems. As everyone knows, the heart is not made of stone.
“Marinochka, I am your real mother!”
“But I don’t know you,” Marina replied, scrutinizing the guest.
Galya was thin and wrinkled, but not yet an old woman.
“For some reason, I always thought so,” she nodded, “but you can ask your dad—he won’t deny it.”
Egor Olegovich confirmed it, because Galya was the one who had found him first.
“Yes, Galya is your mother,” he said dryly, “and Zhanna simply adopted you.”
He then distanced himself from any further explanation, and two days later Marina learned that her dad and Zhanna had set off for the Far East with their belongings, with no intention of coming back.
“Mother Galya, how is it that I’m twenty-six now, and you’ve only just found me?” Marina asked, the most important question of all.
“Oh! My dear, what an interesting story it is!” Galya smiled, though her smile was not warm. “I wish your grandmother, Liliya Yakovlevna, could have told it to you herself. But, happily for her, she didn’t live to see that day!”
Marina was astonished, yet her curiosity only grew.
Young provincial Galya had been charmed by Professor Vishnevskaya’s courteous and attentive son, Egor. She practically gave in without a fight and lost her head on the very first date. The romance promised to be brilliant, but as it turned out, it was fleeting.
And Professor Vishnevskaya herself, Liliya Yakovlevna, did not approve of her son’s relationship with a girl from a modest background. But Galya became pregnant even before the professor could take any action.
Of course, such matters aren’t resolved when status, connections, and money are involved. Yet Galya was a student at the university where Liliya Yakovlevna taught, and the whole university already knew that Galya was pregnant by her son.
“Reputation is more important to me,” Liliya Yakovlevna declared at home, “get married, have children, and then we’ll see.”
It was at that moment that the tangled web of endless lies began to unravel.
Liliya Yakovlevna lied, claiming she was delighted about her son’s marriage and was expecting grandchildren.
Egor lied, saying he was content with married life, which supposedly had helped him settle down and focus on important matters.
And Galya pretended not to notice any of these lies.
At the appointed time, Marina was born—a robust, healthy, and unmistakable copy of her father.
“Our kind!” Professor Vishnevskaya proclaimed with importance, showing everyone the photo of her granddaughter. “We’ll take her from the breast, set her on her feet, and focus on her development and upbringing! We’ll start at two years old! She will be a genius!”
But in this picture of the world, there was no place for Galya.
“At your second birthday,” Galya would recount, “Egor and I received a ticket to Thailand from Liliya Yakovlevna. For an entire month. And for two years of your infancy, I was so exhausted that I no longer knew when I was asleep and when I was awake. I even dreamed that I was changing diapers and washing baby clothes.”
Marina nodded in understanding; she had struggled with Vladik too. Igor only started showing interest in his son once he turned three.
“In the first week, I just slept; I didn’t give a damn about exotic trips or anything else,” Galya continued, “while Egor was out having the time of his life. After all, his mother wouldn’t let him sully his reputation at home. And then—in another three days before returning home—he appeared. Sober, tanned, and very pleased with himself. I thought the little rascal must have gotten into some trouble with the cabbage, you know. But I decided not to dwell on it, leaving it for later. Only ‘later’ never came.”
Galya fell silent, and her face revealed that recalling those memories was painful.
“I was already here when I returned and learned the whole story. I thought I would die right there. Just 100 meters from the airport, local police stopped us, pinned us face-down in the dirt, and found a packet of white powder in my suitcase.”
Egor immediately shouted that it wasn’t his and that he knew nothing about it. Only your dad was good at English, and I later learned it from him. They pointed at my suitcase and asked, “Is this yours?”
Galya smiled sadly.
“I only saw the suitcase. And then I blurted out, ‘Mine!’ They grabbed me by my white hands and took me to the station, and from there—to the ‘na_ry’ (a euphemism for prison).”
“What about dad?” Marina asked.
“Dad flew straight home. He found that ‘thing’ in Thailand and stuffed it in my suitcase.”
“Dad?” Marina exclaimed in surprise.
“He did it himself, and his professor-mother taught him how,” Galya replied.
They fell silent. Marina remembered the steely demeanor of Grandma Lily, but this… it just didn’t make sense.
“Your grandmother knew that in Thailand, for such a thing, the death penalty was on the table. She decided to get rid of a country bride like me. You understand, the merchandise isn’t cheap. She didn’t spare even a fortune. Only Professor Liliya didn’t account for the fact that women are very rarely executed. The king there constantly grants pardons to the fairer sex. As for me, as a foreigner, my death sentence was commuted to twenty years in prison.”
“Goodness gracious!” Marina’s mouth dropped open in astonishment.
“Well, compared to the death penalty, it’s almost heavenly,” Galya smirked, “only Professor Lily didn’t count on a pardon. We got divorced remotely, and I was stripped of my rights as well.”
“I didn’t know any of that,” Marina murmured.
“You shouldn’t have known,” Galya nodded, “Zhanna was the candidate approved by Professor Vishnevskaya to be her daughter-in-law. It was all about calculation and profit.”
“Now it’s clear why she always yelled at me and hit me,” Marina sighed, “they just don’t punish their child like that.”
“Well, my dear, I didn’t have it easy either. The Russian prison, compared to the Thai one,” Galya chuckled, “is like a sanatorium with full board! The conditions, the food, the treatment—you name it, it couldn’t get worse. And your life there costs exactly as much as you’re willing to pay for it. Either you or them. No alternatives.”
Galya omitted further details so as not to shock her daughter, and continued her story from the moment she returned to the Motherland.
“Honestly, it was like landing on another planet,” Galya recounted, “Twenty years is a long time. Everything changed—people, buildings, cars. These technologies of yours. That’s when I encountered Fedor on my way. He’s a good man, but lazy. Luckily, he loves me. And he’s as proud as that hedgehog who won’t fly unless you poke him. A real eagle!”
“For four years we searched for you all. Who would have known you’d be drifting across the country—from address to address, city to city. I wanted revenge, you see. But now, there’s no one to take revenge on. Liliya Yakovlevna has already been summoned before God—she’ll be questioned without me. Egor has been punished by Zhanna. I saw her—a disgusting old woman. So I decided to be a mother, and at the same time, a grandmother…”
The reunion between mother and daughter happened like in the best lyrical novels. Blood is thicker than water. Although there were still too many lies and unspoken truths, everyone felt that it wasn’t worth interfering in relationships that had already formed, stabilized, and, in principle, suited everyone.
But one day, Vladik asked the new grandmother Galya:
“Can’t you raise my dad like Grandpa Fedor did? He yells at mom, and then mom cries.”
Yes, that was exactly what Marina had warned about—not to listen to the grandmother, because the boy had watched too many films and was now letting his imagination run wild. But Galya had a too serious school of thought behind her to fail to distinguish truth from lies.
“Will mom object if I take charge of raising you?” Galya asked her grandson.
“Even if she objects,” Vladik said in a surprisingly mature tone, “it’s still better for her with a well-raised dad.”
Galya, pressing her knee into the neck of Igor, who was lying on the floor, affectionately said:
“Listen to me, son-in-law! To break your neck, I only need to sneeze. Do you understand why I’m displeased?”
And Igor was only just recovering from his abrupt fall to the floor after his new mother-in-law’s elusive move.
“You’ll be arrested,” he croaked.
Galya burst into laughter:
“Oh, you scared a rabbit with a carrot! If my daughter can live peacefully, I’m ready to settle in our prison for life!”
She pressed her knee even harder:
“Message received? Got the meaning?”
She took the rasp in his voice as a sign of agreement. “Then I won’t hold you up any longer.”
Galya rose, fixing her disheveled hair, and added:
“Happy married life!”
“Z-e_chka Thai,” Igor muttered through gritted teeth as he got back on his feet.
“Talk to me some more!” Galya retorted by kicking Igor back to the floor. “And don’t forget—I, like the truth, am always somewhere nearby.”
