Marina woke up to noise from above — someone was moving furniture too vigorously. A dog started barking again behind the wall, and the March wind began to tap on the window as if on purpose. She lay there for a long time, hoping this day wouldn’t start.
The hallway was cool. She threw on Alexey’s hoodie, which he had forgotten on the coat rack back in December, and slowly walked through the apartment. Everything was in its place.
The doorbell rang unexpectedly. She didn’t even immediately understand where the sound came from. She looked at the clock — 9:15. A courier? Neighbors?
A woman stood on the doorstep. Young, dressed too brightly for such a morning, with shiny lipstick and heavily lined eyes. In one hand — a mobile phone, in the other — keys on a pink keychain.
“Hi. Excuse me, who are you?” Marina squinted, not understanding why this stranger was smiling at her.
“Oh, you’re still here? I thought Alexey had already taken care of everything,” the woman adjusted the collar of her trench coat and stepped a little closer, as if preparing to come in.
Marina instinctively blocked the way.
“I live here. And you?”
“Alya. Well, Alexandra officially. I’m… his fiancée. Alexey, you know, told you? We’re going to live here now. He put the apartment in his name a year ago.”
A rush of thoughts flashed through Marina’s mind.
“No,” she exhaled, not believing what she heard. “Alexey didn’t tell me anything. We… we’re still married.”
Alya shrugged as if it was nothing.
“Well, that’s just a formality. He already filed the papers, said you don’t mind. I didn’t want to be rude, just thought you had moved out.”
Marina stepped back a step. The scene felt theatrical, badly directed, but the play was happening on her own stage, in her home.
“Please leave.”
“I didn’t want any conflicts,” Alya stepped closer again. “My hands are freezing, and I don’t understand why he didn’t do everything as promised.”
Marina slammed the door right in front of her face. Her heart was pounding as if she had just run a marathon. A few minutes later, a message came to her phone. From Alexey. He wrote that he would be there in an hour. Asked to talk calmly.
Alexey arrived forty minutes later, without calling, as if afraid she might change her mind about opening the door. He entered the hallway as if he were still the owner here. He was wearing the very jacket Marina had given him for his birthday two years ago. It had been hanging in the closet all that time but now smelled of someone else’s perfume.
“Can we talk calmly?” he stopped by the table where their photos used to stand. Now only the TV remote lay there.
Marina stood by the window, not turning to him.
“Are you marrying her?” she asked quietly.
Alexey slowly nodded as if it were not a wedding but a business trip.
“I didn’t think everything would coincide like this. You know yourself, things haven’t been right between us for a long time. We were just living next to each other.”
“I lived here. I cleaned, woke up with you. Not next to you. With you. And you were silent all this time.”
“I wanted to say something but was afraid you’d lose it. You’re always such… a storm. And now I want peace.”
Marina turned around. Her eyes were dry, but her voice was steel.
“Then go to your peace. I’ll move out. Today.”
Two hours later, she was already standing on the stair landing. A panel building, fourth floor, elevator stuck between the second and third floors. Her mother lived here. She opened the door without asking anything. Hugged her tightly for a second, then went to put a pot on the stove.
Marina went into her old room. Wallpaper with faded flowers, a plush hippopotamus on the windowsill, a bookshelf with notebooks and diplomas. Here she first cried over a boy. Here she decided to become a stylist. Here she hid cigarettes from her mom, which she never learned to smoke.
In the evening, she went outside. The park behind the house had hardly changed. The same bench under the birch tree where pensioners argued about the weather, and the shawarma vendor who was always short on change. She sat on the edge of the bench and watched people pass by. Someone hurried with bags, someone walked with children. Among them was a man in a black hooded jacket who stopped as he passed by.
“Marina? You’re Marina, right? We worked together on a shoot two years ago. I’m Maxim, a photographer.”
He sat down next to her, took off his hood. His hair was a little tousled, and dark circles under his eyes showed lack of sleep.
“I recognized you immediately. You had a green scarf then, remember? We argued whether it matched the makeup artist’s coat.”
Marina smiled slightly. A bright room, the smell of hairspray, and the soft noise of hair dryers surfaced in her memory.
“Yes. I remember. You were shooting a catalog then.”
Maxim nodded, pulling out a notebook.
“I’m launching a new project. Looking for a stylist. Someone who knows how to work with color, not just shuffle clothes around. You had a light touch.”
Marina looked at him. He was neither a savior nor a knight, just a person who reminded her she had something of her own. She nodded slowly.
“Call me tomorrow. I’ll think about it.”
Marina stood in the middle of the space where flowers had recently been sold. The ceilings were high, windows almost floor-to-ceiling, the paint peeling from the walls. It was here, in a former shop on the corner near the metro station, that she decided to set up her mini studio. Maxim, the same photographer from the park, insisted on meeting the owner. The place was rented by his acquaintance, and according to Maxim, the price was “reasonable, especially if you plan to find your voice again.” Marina didn’t understand what he meant but didn’t ask.
“All this needs to be torn down,” she said, walking around the old shelves. “The lighting is terrible. Wiring looks like from the nineties.”
“But the place has spirit,” Maxim replied, sitting on the wide windowsill. “And you don’t notice how you move forward. That’s the main thing.”
The next day, they met in another place — a studio where he was shooting portraits for a new online magazine. The room was spacious, with white walls and softboxes in the corners. Marina held a fabric palette, choosing looks for the model. An eight-year-old curly-haired girl with a unicorn backpack entered the room. Behind her was a man with a slightly stooped back and a warm voice.
“Sorry to bother you,” he said, extending his hand. “My name is Andrey, I’m Maxim’s friend. This is my daughter, Tasya. We wanted to take a picture for grandma. Her birthday is next week.”
Marina smiled. Tasya stood watching her hands, stained with fabric dye, and suddenly asked:
“Do you choose who wears what color yourself?”
“Almost always,” Marina answered. “Sometimes the color tells you itself who it suits.”
Andrey stayed in the room while they tried scarves and tied ribbons. Marina explained how to pose for softer light, then noticed Tasya suddenly laughing. The girl caught her reflection in the mirror and suddenly said:
“I look like an actress. Like in the movies.”
After the shoot, they went into the corridor. Andrey handed Marina a bag.
“This is a bit strange, but Tasya drew you. She said you look like an artist who doesn’t have brushes in her hands but still creates paintings.”
Marina unfolded the sheet and saw colorful lines, a figure with flowing hair and big eyes. And among them, a childish handwriting inscription: “Marina. Kind. With magic.”
Later, returning to the flower shop space, Marina noticed a sign in the building opposite. It read “Alya and Partners Real Estate Agency.” The name stuck immediately.
She didn’t cross the street. Instead, she entered her still empty room, sat on the windowsill, and opened her phone. A new order from a classmate’s mother, an invitation to a master class, and a message from Maxim.
“Tomorrow’s shoot with a young designer. He asked for you. You’re his muse.”
Inside the former flower shop, the smell of fresh paint lingered. Marina stood on a stepladder, screwing in the last hooks to hang fabrics. Maxim, the photographer, came and went with rolls of paper, while Tasya — the girl from the previous shoot — sat in the corner with markers and new sheets. The whole studio space was gradually transforming. The sign Marina had hand-painted in big letters already adorned the window — “Clear.”
“Does this mean something to you?” Maxim asked as he brought a stool and sat opposite.
“Yes,” Marina answered, smoothing the fabric. “At some point, everything became blurry. I stopped seeing who I was, where I was, why I was living the way I was. Then it became clear. Not immediately. But it did.”
At that moment, the door flew open. A woman in a business suit, full makeup, phone at her ear, entered. The same Alya who once stood on Marina’s apartment doorstep saying she would live there now. Behind her came Alexey. He walked slowly, kept slightly aside, as if not fully understanding why he came.
“Are we interrupting?” Alya’s voice was polite but with a metallic edge.
Marina got down from the ladder, brushed her hands off. Maxim stood up and stepped aside, making it clear he didn’t intend to interfere.
“I saw the sign,” Alya continued, looking around the walls. “We’re opening an interior bureau nearby. We wanted to come in, find out who you are. Just in case of competition.”
Alexey was silent, his gaze sliding across the floor, the window, the paint on the walls but not meeting Marina’s eyes.
“This is my studio,” she said calmly. “Here is styling, visual projects, work with personal image. I don’t think we will cross paths.”
“Still funny,” Alya smiled. “You got active so fast… It took me longer to get over the divorce.”
Maxim came closer. He put a stack of papers on the counter and nodded to Marina, inviting her to move on and not linger in this scene.
“If you’re done, we’re about to start the shoot,” he said. “We have a schedule.”
Alya nodded and turned around without saying goodbye. Alexey lingered by the door. Only after Alya left did he come closer.
“I didn’t think you’d manage,” he said. “Amazing how you did it all.”
Marina looked at him and saw a man who once was close to her but now seemed transparent like a drawing on glass, through which a stranger’s life is visible.
“I always knew,” she answered. “You just never asked what I wanted.”
Alexey left without looking back. The studio grew quiet again. Tasya ran up to Marina holding a new drawing.
“That’s you,” she said. “But now with wings.”
Maxim smiled, turning on the lights. The first clients started arriving. And Marina, standing in the middle of the studio, realized that this time, in the frame, it was her. Real. Not someone’s background, not a reflection, not a shadow. But the leading role in her own life.
