— “Al, I’m coming from Mom’s. She’s decided to start a renovation,” Igor tossed his keys onto the hall table and walked into the kitchen, where Alla, bent over a large sheet of drawing paper, was meticulously sketching with a fine mechanical pencil. The air smelled of freshly brewed coffee and graphite. “She wants everything brand-new, you know, a refresh. Says she’s tired of this ‘granny’ style.”
Alla didn’t lift her head; only her hand froze for a moment above the drawing. She finished the line, calibrating it with uncompromising precision. This project mattered—complex commission, respectable client, big money. She was fully immersed in a world of proportion, texture, and light.
“Wonderful,” she said neutrally, without looking up. “The market offers plenty of options right now. She can find a crew for any taste and budget.”
Igor stepped closer, peering over her shoulder. He smelled of his mother’s perfume—a heavy, cloying scent Alla could recognize instantly. That smell always heralded trouble.
“Crews have nothing to do with it… You’re a designer. A professional. So Mom thought… Well, she wants you to handle it. Give her a gorgeous renovation. You know her tastes; you can please her. Help her choose everything, supervise it… you know, create beauty with your own hands.”
The pencil in her hand stopped. Alla straightened slowly and set it down with utmost care, as if it were a surgical instrument after a difficult operation. She turned to her husband. The face that had been focused and calm became an inscrutable mask.
“What do you mean ‘handle it’?” she asked softly, in an almost colorless voice.
“What do you mean, what?” Igor, missing the shift in her mood, kept going enthusiastically. “You’ll go over there, take a look at everything, draft the design, pick the materials and furniture. Do it top-class. For Mom! It’s family help, a son’s duty, so to speak, which we together…”
She stood up so abruptly the chair toppled. The crash made Igor recoil and finally fall silent. Alla stared straight at him, and there was no calm or professional detachment left in her eyes—only a cold, searing fire.
“Oh sure, I’ll run right over and throw myself into doing your mother’s renovation! What am I to her—a free construction crew? Let her hire people for that! Especially since she has the money.”
His face lengthened. He clearly hadn’t expected that reaction.
“Al, what’s with you? She’s my mother… Why hire a crew? Why pay strangers when there’s a specialist of your level in the family? She just wants it done with heart.”
“With heart?” Alla gave a smile that held no amusement. “Your mother doesn’t want a heartfelt renovation. She wants to watch me, tail between my legs, run around the building markets, lug tile samples, and bow at the waist for each of her ‘brilliant’ ideas. She wants to make me her personal slave, so she can tell all her friends how she bent the willful daughter-in-law. That’s her ‘gorgeous renovation,’ Igor—that’s the real goal!”
Igor frowned, his face taking on a hurt, stubborn look.
“You’re overcomplicating it again. You just don’t like my mother and you’re looking for a reason to make a scene. We’re talking about ordinary family help. I’m her son; I should help her. And you’re my wife.”
They stood facing each other in the middle of the kitchen. The tension had thickened to the breaking point. Looking at his confused, angry face, Alla understood: any further refusal would lead to weeks of silence, reproaches, and accusations. She’d fought this battle many times and knew that in open combat she’d lose, drowned out by his rhetoric about “family values.” So she made a decision. The storm in her eyes subsided as suddenly as it had flared. She took a slow breath, walked to the chair, and calmly set it upright. Then she looked at Igor, a faint, barely noticeable smile touching her lips.
“Fine,” she said evenly, businesslike. “You’re right. It’s a family duty. I’ll help your mother.”
Igor was taken aback by the quick change. He’d expected more shouting, certainly not sudden agreement.
“Really?” he asked skeptically. “Just like that?”
“Yes.” Her smile widened a fraction, but her eyes remained ice-cold. “I’ll make her the best design. Luxurious. The kind she couldn’t even dream of. Tell her I’m starting immediately.”
The next evening, Alla didn’t wait for Igor to get home. She set the table in the living room with a light dinner—his favorite. Nothing in her behavior betrayed yesterday’s storm. She was calm, graceful; her movements were controlled; a polite, almost warm smile played on her lips. When Igor came in, he exhaled with relief. The conflict seemed resolved. He gladly accepted the new rules of the game, deciding his wife had “cooled down” and “seen reason.” He even felt a surge of pride: he’d stood his ground, shown manly firmness, and voilà—peace restored.
They dined almost in silence, but it wasn’t oppressive. Igor talked about work; Alla listened, nodded, asked clarifying questions. She was the perfect wife. Only her eyes, when she looked at him, stayed cold, like a camera lens dispassionately recording its subject.
“I’m finished,” she said when they’d cleared the dishes. She gestured to the table, where a thick black, embossed folder with her design logo lay.
“Already?” Igor was genuinely surprised. “So fast? I thought it would take at least a week.” He picked up the folder. It was heavy, substantial, smelling of fine paper and printer’s ink. He opened it. The first page was a photorealistic 3D rendering of his mother’s living room. Igor whistled. This wasn’t Tamara Pavlovna’s apartment. It was something from a glossy luxury-interiors magazine: perfectly orchestrated lighting, elegant transitional furniture, walls finished with complex decorative plaster shimmering with pearly undertones, a dark wood parquet laid in French herringbone.
“Wow…” he murmured, turning the page. Next came the kitchen. Instead of the old, water-swollen cabinetry—an immaculate run of ivory fronts with integrated pulls, a solid slab of dark stone for the countertop, the latest built-in appliances. He flipped further: bedroom, hall, bathroom. Each image was a work of art. Alla hadn’t just “freshened” the place; she’d reimagined it entirely, creating a space of dignity, style, and polished luxury.
“Al, this is… incredible,” he looked up at her, delighted. “Mom will lose her mind from happiness! You’re a genius! I knew you could do it!”
“I simply did my job,” she replied calmly. “Flip to the end.”
Enthused, Igor paged through several more sheets of drawings and elevations and reached the last section: “Estimate.” His eyes ran over the first lines: “Demolition,” “Wall leveling on beacons,” “Installation of new wiring”… The figures opposite each line added up to alarming sums. He turned pages: Italian tile, German plumbing fixtures, Belgian lighting, an oak engineered plank floor… His smile slowly faded. On the last page, at the bottom, a bold total stood out.
One million one hundred forty thousand rubles.
Igor froze. He reread the figure several times, as if hoping there was an extra zero, a typo. He lifted his head slowly. The delight in his eyes had turned to complete bewilderment, rapidly hardening into anger.
“Are you out of your mind? A million?”
“No,” Alla said evenly, looking him straight in the eye. She took a sip of her cooling tea. “That’s the market cost of materials and labor for a project at this level. I chose only quality items. No cheap laminate, no bargain imports. Your mother wanted a luxurious renovation. This is it.”
She slid another document toward him—a slim folder of forms. “I didn’t even include my design fee or the project cost. That’s thirty percent of the estimate. Consider it my gift to your mother. And this,” she tapped the top folder lightly with a fingernail, “is the service contract.”
Igor stared, stunned, at the neatly printed pages.
“What contract?”
“Standard,” Alla explained with a lecturer’s patience. “Your mother signs it, pays a seventy-percent advance, and my crew starts immediately. I’ll personally provide author’s supervision on site, as promised—making sure every fixture is exactly placed and every paint shade matches the spec. Like a professional.”
She leaned back and folded her arms.
“You wanted a luxurious renovation? You’ll have it. For luxurious money. Or did she think humiliating me comes free of charge?”
Igor didn’t argue. He grabbed his phone and, without a word, stepped out onto the balcony, sliding the glass door shut. Alla could hear his muffled, indignant voice—snatches where the word “Mom” came up most often. She didn’t eavesdrop. She calmly poured herself more tea, sat down, and laid her hands on the black project folder. This was her territory, her fortress. She waited.
Forty minutes later, the key turned in the lock. Tamara Pavlovna entered the apartment not like a guest but like an inspector arriving at the scene. Her face was pinched with righteous indignation; she shrugged her expensive coat onto her son’s arms as if he were a footman. She headed straight for the living room, where Alla sat at the table, and stopped opposite her, drilling the daughter-in-law with a heavy stare.
“Well, hello there, business lady,” she said with poisonous courtesy. “My boy told me about your… appetites. Decided to make a fortune off a poor old woman, did you?”
Alla calmly indicated the chair across from her.
“Good evening, Tamara Pavlovna. Please sit. I think we should discuss the project details in a businesslike setting. Igor, make your mother some tea.”
Flustered, Igor hung the coat and hurried to the kitchen. Snorting, Tamara Pavlovna reluctantly sank into the chair. Her posture radiated supreme disdain.
“What details?” she spat. “There’s only one detail: my daughter-in-law turned out to be a greedy, unscrupulous person who wants to fleece her husband’s mother.”
Alla opened the folder to the living-room render. She spoke in a level, calm voice, as if presenting to an important client.
“You wanted a luxurious renovation. This design fully meets that definition. We’ve used premium finishes. For example, the walls—” she tapped the image “—Venetian plaster by Oikos. Very striking and durable. The floor—Coswick engineered plank, Canadian oak.”
“I don’t care if it’s Canadian or African!” the mother-in-law exploded. “Why does it cost a million? Are you planning to make it out of gold?”
“No, not out of gold. Out of the materials listed in the estimate,” Alla flipped to the last page and pushed the folder toward her. “Here—take a look. Every line has a SKU and name. You can check prices with any authorized dealer. They’re market rates. Moreover, my firm has discounts with some suppliers, and those are reflected here.”
Igor returned with a cup of tea, set it before his mother, and stood behind her like a loyal page.
“Mom, maybe there’s a way to make it cheaper? Al, seriously, this is a lot of money…”
“There is,” Alla nodded, without taking her eyes off her mother-in-law. “We can completely revise the concept. Instead of engineered plank, we lay Class-32 laminate. Instead of Venetian plaster, we hang paintable vinyl wallcovering. The kitchen cabinetry—domestic laminated chipboard instead of Italian fronts. We can cut the estimate by two-thirds. But it won’t be a luxurious renovation. It’ll be a budget one. I can prepare that design too, if the original brief has changed.”
Her businesslike tone infuriated Tamara Pavlovna far more than any shouting would have. The older woman realized she was being trapped. To agree to a cheap renovation was to admit she couldn’t afford what had been offered and sign off on her own inadequacy.
“You’re making a fool of me!” she hissed, red blotches rising on her face. “You knew perfectly well this was about help! About doing it the family way!”
“‘The family way’ is my discount on author’s supervision and the design work, which amounts to over three hundred thousand rubles,” Alla parried, her voice turning to steel. “But the work of a certified crew, procurement of materials, and logistics are commercial processes. They don’t have ‘family’ categories. Or are you suggesting I ask the builders to work for free out of respect for you?”
Igor tried to intervene:
“Alla, stop, that’s not what Mom means…”
“What does she mean, Igor?” For the first time that evening, Alla looked at her husband. “That I should drop my paid work for several months to become your mother’s unpaid foreman, purchaser, and designer? So she can then point out every flaw made by some rock-bottom crew and say I’m incompetent? I know this script. We lived it when I helped her glue wallpaper in the hall. No, thank you.”
Tamara Pavlovna stood. The mask of civility fell away, revealing malice and hatred.
“I knew you weren’t our equal. All arrogance, no heart. Always thinking only about money.”
Alla stood as well. They faced each other across the table, which had become a front line.
“You’re right. I do think about money. Because my professionalism costs money. And the humiliation you had planned for me—that’s priceless. But I’ve invoiced it. At market rates. If the amount doesn’t suit you, you can always hire another crew. Or hang the wallpaper yourselves. Like last time.”
When the front door closed behind Tamara Pavlovna, Igor didn’t move. He stood behind the empty chair where his mother had just sat, staring at Alla. Anger, confusion, and a kind of childish hurt mingled in his gaze. He finally realized the situation had slipped from his control. He had brought his mother in as heavy artillery to crush a mutiny—and instead watched her total defeat. Now he was left alone with the victor.
“Happy now?” His voice was dull, stripped of its usual authoritative notes. “You humiliated my mother. In our own home.”
Alla calmly gathered the sheets back into the folder. Her movements were steady and precise, like tidying a desk after closing a complicated deal.
“I didn’t humiliate anyone. I offered commercial terms for a commercial job. Your mother declined. That’s standard business practice.”
“What business practice, for God’s sake!” he burst out, slapping the back of the chair. “She’s my mother! And you’re my wife! We’re a family, not a service company! Don’t you get it?”
“No, Igor. It seems you don’t get it,” she closed the folder and looked at him. Her gaze was tired but firm. “Family is when people respect each other. Not when one person uses another for their own ends, hiding behind pretty words. Your mother has never seen me as family. She’s seen me as a free add-on to her son. A convenient function to activate at will. And you’ve always been fine with that.”
He came around the table and stood right in front of her, looming, trying to overwhelm her with his height, his presence.
“This is all sophistry, Alla! I’m talking about us! About what you’ve done to us! You put your stupid principles above our relationship! You sent my mother a bill! Do you understand how that looks from the outside?”
“I don’t care how it looks from the outside. I care what it is,” she didn’t back down, didn’t lower her eyes. “And what it is—the only way to end years of wiping their feet on me.”
His face contorted. He saw he couldn’t pierce her armor. So he made one last, desperate move—put everything on the line.
“Fine. Got it. Then listen. You have a choice. Right now. Either you tear up all these papers, call my mother, apologize, and tomorrow you go to her place and do the renovation like a normal wife and daughter-in-law. For free. Like a decent person. Or…”
He paused, giving the ultimatum time to sink in.
“Or you can consider we no longer have a family. I won’t live with a woman who declared war on my mother. Your choice.”
For a few seconds, absolute silence fell. Alla looked at her husband as if seeing him for the first time. There was no fear or anger in her eyes—only cold, crystal clarity. She nodded slowly.
“You’re right. That kind of choice changes everything.”
Igor tensed, expecting her to capitulate. He was sure she’d break. She had to. But she did what he couldn’t have predicted. She took a pen from the table, opened the folder to the last page—the estimate. Then she opened the contract. Her hand didn’t tremble. She found the line that read: “Development of the design project and author’s supervision provided free of charge as a family bonus.” With two firm strokes she crossed it out. Then she returned to the estimate, grabbed her phone’s calculator, and quickly figured thirty percent of the total. Three hundred forty-two thousand. She added a new line to the estimate: “Designer’s services,” and wrote that figure opposite it. Below, she entered a new grand total: one million four hundred eighty-two thousand rubles. She circled the new total so it would stand out.
Then she raised her calm, businesslike gaze to the stunned Igor.
“Since we’re talking about there being no family anymore, the family bonuses are annulled. This is the full cost of the project, including my work. I think that’s fair.”
She set the pen carefully next to the folder and slid the documents toward him.
“The validity of the quote is three business days. I’ll await your decision and the advance payment…”
