“Mom, hi, I urgently need your help.”
Her son’s voice on the phone sounded as if he were speaking to an annoying subordinate, not to his mother.
Nina Petrovna froze with the remote in her hand, never turning on the evening news.
“Kiryusha, hello. Did something happen?”
“No, everything’s fine,” Kirill exhaled impatiently. “It’s just that Katya and I snagged a last-minute trip, flight’s tomorrow morning.
And there’s no one to leave Duke with. Can you take him?”
Duke. A huge, slobbery Great Dane who, in her tiny two-room apartment, took up more space than the old sideboard.
“For long?” Nina asked cautiously, already knowing the answer.
“Well, for a week. Maybe two. We’ll see. Mom, who else if not you? Putting him in a dog hotel would be cruelty. You know how sensitive he is.”
Nina Petrovna looked at her sofa, newly reupholstered in a light fabric. She’d saved for six months for it, denying herself little things. Duke would destroy it in a couple of days.
“Kirill, I… it’s not very convenient. I just finished the renovations.”
“Mom, what renovations?” open irritation crept into his voice. “You re-papered the walls?
Duke’s well behaved, just don’t forget to walk him. Anyway, Katya’s calling—we need to pack. We’ll bring him over in an hour.”
The line went dead.
He hadn’t even asked how she was. He hadn’t congratulated her on her birthday last week. Sixty-five.
She’d waited for the call all day, made her signature salad, put on a new dress. The children had promised to stop by, but never showed up.
Kirill sent a short message: “Ma, HBD! Drowning at work.” Olya didn’t write at all.
And today—“I urgently need help.”
Nina Petrovna slowly sank down on the sofa. It wasn’t about the dog or the ruined upholstery.
It was about that humiliating feeling of being a function. She was free boarding, the emergency service, the last resort. A person-as-function.
She remembered how, many years ago when the children were little, she dreamed they would grow up and become independent.
And now she understood that what’s scarier than being alone in an empty apartment is waiting for a call with a sinking heart, knowing you’re needed only when someone needs something from you.
Begging for their attention, bargaining for it at the price of your own comfort and self-respect.
An hour later the doorbell rang. Kirill stood on the threshold, holding the huge dog by the leash. Duke happily lunged inside, leaving muddy prints on the clean floor.
“Mom, here’s the food, here are his toys. Walk him three times a day, you remember. We’ve got to run or we’ll miss the plane!” He shoved the leash into her hands and, pecking her cheek in passing, disappeared through the door.
Nina Petrovna was left standing in the hallway. Duke was already busily sniffing the chair legs.
From deeper inside the apartment came the sound of tearing fabric.
She looked at her phone. Maybe call her daughter? Olechka—maybe she would understand? But her finger froze over the screen.
Olya hadn’t called for a month. She was probably busy too. She had her own life, her own family.
And at that moment, for the first time, Nina Petrovna didn’t feel the usual hurt. Something else came instead. Cold, clear, and very sober understanding. Enough.
The morning began with Duke, deciding to show affection, leaping onto the bed and leaving two dirty paw prints the size of saucers on the snow-white duvet cover.
The new living-room sofa was already ripped in three places, and her favorite ficus, which she’d been growing for five years, lay on the floor with chewed leaves.
Nina Petrovna poured herself valerian straight from the bottle and dialed her son’s number. He didn’t pick up right away.
Waves and Katya’s laughter sounded in the background.
“Mom, what is it? We’re great, the sea is amazing!”
“Kirill, about the dog. He’s tearing the place apart. He shredded the sofa, I can’t handle him.”
“What do you mean?” her son asked, genuinely surprised. “He’s never scratched anything. Maybe you’re locking him up? He needs freedom. Mom, don’t start, okay? We just got here, we want to relax. Just walk him longer and he’ll calm down.”
“I walked him for two hours this morning! He pulls so hard I almost fell. Kirill, please come get him. Find another sitter.”
There was a pause. Then Kirill’s voice turned hard.
“Mom, are you serious? We’re on the other side of the world. How am I supposed to get him? You agreed yourself. Or do you want us to drop everything and fly back because of your whims? That’s selfish, mom.”
The word “selfishness” landed like a slap. She, who had lived her whole life for them, was a selfish person.
“I’m not being capricious, I—”
“That’s it, Mom, Katya brought cocktails. Entertain Duke there. I’m sure you’ll bond. Kisses.”
And the line went dead again.
Nina’s hands trembled. She sat down on a kitchen chair, farther from the wreckage. The feeling of helplessness was almost physical. She decided to call Olya. Her daughter had always been more reasonable.
“Olya, hi.”
“Hi, Mom. Is it urgent? I’m in a meeting.”
“Yes, urgent. Kirill left his dog with me and flew off. This dog is out of control. He’s wrecking the furniture, I’m afraid he’ll bite me next.”
Olya sighed heavily.
“Mom, well Kirill asked you. That means it was a last resort. Is it so hard to help your own brother? We’re family. So he tore the sofa—buy a new one. Kirill will pay you back. Probably.”
“Olya, it’s not about the sofa! It’s about the attitude! He just presented it as a done deal!”
“How was he supposed to do it? Beg on his knees? Mom, stop. You’re retired, you’ve got tons of free time. Watch the dog, what’s the big deal? I have to go, my boss is looking.”
The call was over.
Nina Petrovna put the phone on the table.
Family. What a strange word.
In her case it meant a group of people who remember you when they need something and accuse you of selfishness if you can’t or won’t immediately fulfill their demand.
That evening the downstairs neighbor rang the bell, furious as a fury.
“Nina! Your dog has been howling for three hours straight! My child can’t sleep! If you don’t quiet him down, I’m calling the police!”
Duke, standing behind Nina, barked happily, confirming the neighbor’s words.
Nina closed the door. She looked at the dog, wagging his tail, waiting for praise.
Then at the shredded sofa. At her phone. A dull, heavy anger was building inside.
She had always tried to solve everything nicely. To persuade, explain, put herself in others’ shoes.
But her logic, her feelings, her arguments—no one needed them. They shattered against a wall of condescending indifference.
She picked up the leash.
“Come on, Duke, let’s go for a walk.”
She led the dog down the park alley, feeling the tension in her shoulders turn into a dull, throbbing ache.
Duke lunged ahead, nearly yanking the leash from her weakening hands. Each jerk echoed in her mind with her children’s words: “selfishness,” “tons of time,” “is it so hard to help?”
Coming toward her with a light, almost dancing gait was Zinaida, her former colleague. Bright scarf, stylish haircut, laughing eyes.
“Ninochka, hi! I hardly recognized you! So busy again! With the grandbaby?” She nodded at Duke.
“It’s my son’s dog,” Nina answered dully.
“Ah, got it!” Zina laughed carelessly. “You’re our eternal go-to girl. And me—imagine—I’m flying to Spain in a week! Signed up for flamenco, can you believe it?
At my age! I’m going with the girls from class. My husband grumbled at first, then said, ‘Go, have fun, you’ve earned it.’ And when did you last take a vacation?”
The question hung in the air. Nina couldn’t remember. Vacation had always meant the dacha, the grandkids, helping the children.
“You look tired,” Zinaida said with sincere sympathy. “You can’t carry it all on yourself.
The kids are grown—let them handle their own things. Otherwise you’ll be babysitting their dogs while life passes you by. Okay, I’m off—rehearsal!”
She flitted away, leaving a trail of expensive perfume and ringing emptiness.
“While life passes you by.”
That simple phrase worked like a detonator. Nina Petrovna stopped so abruptly that Duke looked at her in surprise.
She looked at the huge dog, at her hands clenched around the leash, at the gray buildings around her.
And she realized she couldn’t do it anymore. Not one more day. Not one more hour.
Enough. That’s it.
She took out her phone. Her shaking fingers opened a search. “Best dog hotel Moscow.”
The very first link led to a site with glossy photos: spacious kennels, a pool, a grooming salon, one-on-one sessions with a trainer. And prices that took her breath away.
Nina Petrovna resolutely tapped the phone number.
“Hello. I’d like to book a room. Yes, for a Great Dane. For two weeks. Full board and spa treatments.”
She called a taxi right there in the park. In the car, Duke behaved surprisingly calmly, as if he sensed the change.
The hotel smelled not of dog but of lavender and expensive shampoos. A sweet girl in uniform handed her a contract.
Without blinking, Nina filled in “Owner” with Kirill’s name and phone number.
For “Payer”—his as well. She paid the deposit with the money she’d been saving for a new coat. It was the best investment of her life.
“We’ll send daily photo updates to the owner’s number,” the girl smiled, taking the leash. “Don’t worry, your boy will love it here.”
Back in her peaceful—if battered—apartment, for the first time in many years Nina Petrovna felt not loneliness, but calm.
She poured herself tea, sat on the intact edge of the sofa, and sent two identical messages. One to Kirill. The other to Olya.
“Duke is safe. He’s at a hotel. Direct all questions to his owner.”
Then she silenced her phone.
Three minutes later it started vibrating on the table. Nina looked at the glowing screen—“Kirill”—and took another sip of tea.
She didn’t answer. A minute later it vibrated again. Then a message from Olya arrived: “Mom, what does this mean? Call me back immediately!”
She turned up the TV volume. She knew exactly what was happening on the other end.
Panic. Outrage. Trying to understand how their convenient, ever-compliant mother could do such a thing.
The real storm hit two days later. The doorbell was insistent, almost aggressive.
Unhurried, Nina walked over and looked through the peephole. Kirill and Olya stood on the threshold. Tanned, but angry. The vacation, obviously, was hopelessly ruined.
She opened the door.
“Mom, are you out of your mind?!” Kirill shouted from the hallway. “What hotel? They sent us the bill—did you see those numbers? You decided to bankrupt us over some dog?”
“Hello, children,” Nina replied calmly. “Come in. Shoes off, please, I just washed the floors.”
Her calm threw them off better than any argument. They came in. Kirill looked around at the torn sofa and the overturned plant.
“There,” he jabbed a finger at the sofa. “What’s that?”
“That, Kirill, is the result of your well-behaved dog’s stay in my apartment. I called a repairman—he assessed the damage. Here’s the invoice for reupholstering the furniture and buying a new ficus.”
She handed him a neatly printed sheet.
“You’re billing me too?” Kirill gasped. “You were supposed to watch him!”
“I was supposed to?” For the first time in many years Nina looked at her son not with love, but with cool curiosity.
“I don’t owe you anything, children. Nor do you owe me. I take it you didn’t come to return my deposit for the hotel and compensate the damage?”
Olya stepped in, trying to smooth things over.
“Mommy, why like this? We’re family. We would’ve worked it out. Kirill lost his temper, it happens. Why go to extremes?”
“Extremes are when your own son calls you selfish because you don’t want your home turned into ruins.
Extremes are when your own daughter says you’ve got ‘tons of time’ to wait on her brother. And this,” she nodded at the invoice, “this is simply the consequence of your decisions.”
Kirill flushed dark red.
“I’m not paying for this! Not a kopeck! And not for your stupid hotel either!”
“Fine,” Nina said simply. “I didn’t doubt it. Then I’m selling the dacha.”
It was a punch to the gut. The dacha they’d already made plans for: barbecues, the bathhouse, weekends with friends. Their dacha. The place they came only to relax while their mother spent summers weeding beds and painting fences.
“You have no right!” Olya yelled, forgetting her peacemaking. “It’s ours too! We spent our whole childhood there!”
“The papers are in my name,” Nina shrugged. “And childhood, Olyenka, is over.”
What I get for it will be just enough to cover expenses, compensate me for moral damages, and maybe take a trip to Spain.
Zinaida says it’s wonderful there.
They stared at her as if she were a stranger. In front of them stood not their meek, compliant mother but a woman with a steel core they’d never suspected.
A woman no longer afraid of their anger, their manipulation, their offense.
For the first time in many years, tense silence settled over the room. An awkward lull of realization. They had lost.
A week later Kirill transferred the full amount to her card down to the last ruble. No apologies, no more calls.
And Nina Petrovna didn’t expect any. She took down her old, almost unused suitcase from the closet shelf. She called Zinaida.
“Zinochka, hi. Do you have one more spot for flamenco?”
