— “Karina, you should at least eat properly,” my mother-in-law, Zinaida Arkadyevna, said, her voice scraping my nerves like a dull knife. “You’ve gone practically transparent. What is our Dmitry thinking? Skin and bones.”
I slowly lifted my eyes from the plate with the barely touched salad. The entire Voropayev family was at the table.
My husband Dima, his father, Gennady Stepanovich—silent and, as always, withdrawn. Dima’s two sisters—the elder, Svetlana, a copy of their mother right down to the predatory curve of thin lips, and the younger, Olga, whose face always wore an expression of sympathetic sorrow.
They were all looking at me. Studying. Judging.
“Mom, don’t start,” Dima drawled wearily, not lifting his eyes from his plate. I knew that tone too well—a plea for peace that was, in fact, capitulation.
“What did I say?” Zinaida Arkadyevna raised her perfectly styled brows theatrically. “I’m concerned about your health. We want grandchildren, but how are they supposed to appear if our daughter-in-law is starving herself?”
Svetlana let out a quiet snort into her fist, and Olga pursed her lips, gifting me a look full of fake pity.
“I’m not starving, Zinaida Arkadyevna,” I said evenly, though inside everything was tightening into an icy knot. “I just don’t have an appetite.”
“Appetite comes with eating. And also with a good life,” she pressed on with a precise thrust. “Apparently Dima can’t provide you with a good life.”
The blow landed masterfully. Straight on the sore spot. She knew I’d lost my job a month ago and we were living mostly on my husband’s salary, counting every kopeck.
Gennady Stepanovich gave a barely audible cough, pretending to be absorbed by the pattern on the tablecloth. He never interfered. His silence was as much a form of violence as her words.
“We’re managing,” I said firmly, looking straight into my mother-in-law’s cold eyes.
“Exactly—‘managing,’” she drawled the word as if tasting my humiliation. “But one should live. Truly live. We’ve discussed it with Gennady…”
She paused, savoring the effect. Even Dima looked up from his food.
“We’ve decided it’s time for you to expand. You’ll sell that hole of yours, add your savings—if you have any. We, with Father, will be generous enough to help. We’ll get you a nice three-room apartment. In a new building.”
For a second, something stirred in my chest. Could it be? Had I misjudged her?
“Really?” slipped out of me.
“Of course,” Zinaida Arkadyevna nodded with a magnanimous smile. “We’ll put it, naturally, in my name. For safety. You never know what goes on in young people’s heads.”
Dima hunched his shoulders. He didn’t even look in my direction.
I felt my fingers find the smooth body of my phone in my pocket. Stored in the device was my only trump card. A recording I’d made a week earlier.
Not by accident. I’d turned on the voice recorder when I gave my mother-in-law a lift to the mall.
She’d been talking on the phone, and suspecting her of some scheming with the money we had been lending her, I decided to be cautious. I expected to hear something about finances, but what I heard was much worse.
“That’s a very… generous offer,” I said slowly, my lips going numb.
“I’ve always been generous to my family,” my mother-in-law declared with pomp. “Not everyone knows how to appreciate it.”
She swept her gaze around the table triumphantly. Husband, daughters, son—they all looked at her with obsequious admiration. At me—with contemptuous pity. They thought they’d cornered me. That I’d burst into tears or meekly agree.
But they were wrong. Very, very wrong. At that moment I realized the evening was about to get interesting.
“Dima,” I turned to my husband, trying to keep my voice steady. “Maybe we can discuss this later? Just the two of us.”
Zinaida Arkadyevna jumped in at once, not letting him open his mouth.
“What is there to discuss in private? We’re a family, not a secret society. Or are you hiding something from us, dear Karina?”
“I’m not hiding anything,” I looked her in the eyes again. “I just think decisions this serious take time. And… perhaps there are other options. For example, putting the apartment in Dima’s name. Or in both our names.”
My mother-in-law let out a short, dry chuckle.
“In yours? My girl, you’re terribly naïve. Dima has a soft heart. You’ll wrap him around your finger before he knows it. Today you’re his wife—but tomorrow? And an apartment is a foundation.”
“It’s capital I’m building for our family’s future. And it has to be in reliable hands.”
“Mother’s absolutely right,” Svetlana chimed in, setting down her fork. “Real estate isn’t a toy. We know that type—get in good, then leave the man with nothing.”
I looked at my husband, searching his eyes for a drop of support. But he stared into his plate, prodding a piece of meat.
“Karina, Mom just wants what’s best,” he mumbled. “She knows about these things.”
It was betrayal. Quiet, ordinary—therefore all the more disgusting.
“Settled, then,” Zinaida Arkadyevna clapped her hands, beaming. “We start tomorrow. Gennady, you and Dima go to the banks first thing in the morning—we need to withdraw all his savings to the last kopeck. Svetlana, you call our realtor. And you, Karina, can start packing.”
“I’m not agreeing to hand over my share from the sale of the apartment,” my voice rang out unexpectedly loud. “Half of that ‘hole,’ as you called it, belongs to me.”
Zinaida Arkadyevna’s face turned to stone.
“Your share? My girl, what are you talking about? You don’t even work. Everything you have is thanks to my son—thanks to my upbringing. You should be grateful we’re even letting you into the new place at all, instead of throwing you out onto the street, where Dima picked you up to begin with.”
There it was. The limit.
Calmly, I took out my phone.
“You know, Zinaida Arkadyevna, you’re right. I really have been ungrateful. And I’d like to fix that right now. I’ll just play one recording to remind all of us—first and foremost you and your husband—what exactly I should be so grateful to you for.”
“What nonsense are you making up?” she snorted, but a shadow of worry flickered in her eyes. “Put the phone away, don’t embarrass yourself.”
“No, Mom, let her play it,” Olga said unexpectedly. “I’m actually curious what kind of kompromat she’s got.”
I pressed “Play.”
Music from some cheap radio station poured out, and then my mother-in-law’s voice. But not the usual domineering, lecturing tone. This voice purred like a cat.
“…yes, my kitten, of course I miss you. I think about you every minute. Just imagining your hands and I…”
Gennady Stepanovich, who had been staring blankly at his plate, slowly raised his head. His face began to turn a deep crimson.
“…no, Gena won’t suspect a thing. He’s a milksop—he does whatever he’s told. Sits all day doing his crosswords. The perfect husband, ha-ha…”
Zinaida Arkadyevna sprang to her feet, knocking over her chair.
“Turn that off! Turn it off this instant! It’s fake!”
I only turned up the volume.
“…everything with the apartment will go smoothly. I’ve already worked my little Dimochka over. He’s a mama’s boy; he’ll do exactly as I say.
And that little frump of his… well, she’ll put up with it. The main thing is that the apartment will be in my name. Then we’ll sell it to hell and the money will be ours. We’ll buy that little house by the sea, just like you dreamed of, my darling. Far away from this family of idiots…”
“Mom?” Dima whispered. He looked at his mother as if seeing her for the first time.
“…yes, yes, the girls won’t guess a thing either. They idolize me. Think I care about them. And I care only about you and me, beloved…”
“Zina!” roared Gennady Stepanovich, slamming his fist on the table so hard the plates jumped. “What is this?!”
“It’s a lie! It’s edited! She faked it all!” my mother-in-law screeched.
At last the recording ended. I pressed stop.
The first to break the deafening silence was Gennady Stepanovich. He stood up slowly.
“Out,” he said quietly. “Get out of my house. Now.”
Zinaida Arkadyevna rushed to her husband, then to her daughters, but they turned away from her in disgust.
At that moment, Dima stood. But he didn’t come to me with apologies. He did something more important. He came over and simply took my hand. Firmly, so I felt the warmth of his palm drive out the cold inside me.
He turned to his father.
“Dad, we’re leaving.”
Then he looked at his mother sobbing on the floor.
“No apartments in your name. No more family dinners. No more ‘what’s best’ for us. Karina and I are a family. And we’ll decide for ourselves how to live.”
He didn’t wait for an answer. He pulled me along, and we walked out of that room, out of that house, leaving them to sort through the ruins of their lies.
We walked down the street hand in hand. I was silent, and he was silent. And in that silence there was more than in any words.
It was the silence of two people who had just gone through hell together and come out of it truly united.
Six months passed.
We were sitting on the floor of our new apartment. It smelled of paint and happiness. We’d invested our money.
Dima had found a second job; I’d gotten back into my field. We barely slept, we were exhausted, but every night, falling asleep in each other’s arms, we knew we were doing everything right.
“Father divorced her,” Dima said, handing me a mug of tea. “They split the property. She tried calling, writing to my sisters… but nobody wants to talk to her.”
“I’m sorry,” I said quietly.
“Don’t be,” he shook his head. “She chose her path. And I chose mine.”
He pulled me close and kissed me.
“Forgive me. For being blind and weak. For letting her speak to you like that. That evening… it changed everything. I saw the woman I could have lost, and I realized I would never again put anyone or anything above you.”
“I love you,” I whispered, burying my face in his shoulder.
“And I love you,” he answered, holding me tighter. “You know, I’ve understood one thing. Family isn’t the people who dictate how you live. Family is a fortress. A place where you’re always protected.”
We sat cuddled among the boxes, in our little fortress, and I knew that from now on we could handle anything. Together.
