Anna stood at the window of her living room, watching the wind ruffle the golden leaves of the old maple in the courtyard. This apartment was her quiet haven, her own little world—one she had inherited from her grandmother. An old building with high ceilings, decorative molding, wide windowsills where her favorite violets bloomed. Every creak of the parquet floor, every scuff on the antique sideboard felt familiar to her, holding the warmth of her childhood, her grandmother’s voice reading her fairy tales.
Her husband, Dmitry, had appeared in that world seven years earlier. He came, fell in love with her, and then, it seemed, fell in love with the home too. He never disputed her rights as the mistress of the house; on the contrary, he helped maintain the coziness with real enthusiasm—he repaired a dried-out kitchen window frame himself, hung a new chandelier in the hallway. They lived in perfect harmony, and Anna felt that her quiet harbor had become even warmer and safer with him. She trusted him, their future, the unshakable stability of their small world.
But in recent days Dmitry hadn’t been himself. He walked around gloomy, often slipping away for long, hushed phone calls and coming back even more sullen. Whenever Anna asked, he brushed her off: “It’s nothing—work stuff.” But she could feel it wasn’t work. The air smelled like an approaching storm.
That evening he came home with a bouquet of her favorite white chrysanthemums. But the flowers didn’t bring joy. They looked out of place—fake—like an attempt to soften her up before an unpleasant conversation. He didn’t eat dinner. He sat opposite her in the living room, silent for a long time, fidgeting with the TV remote in his hands.
“Anya,” he finally began, and his voice was unfamiliar in its harshness. “We need to talk. Seriously.”
Anna’s heart tightened with тревога.
“What happened, Dima?”
“My sister has problems. Lena. More precisely—Irka, my niece.”
Ira, the daughter of his older sister Lena, was a bright, capable girl. She was finishing ninth grade, and Lena dreamed of getting her into a prestigious math-focused lyceum located right in their district.
“For Irka to get in, she needs registration. Permanent. In our district,” Dmitry went on, looking not at his wife but somewhere at the wall. “Without it—no chance. You know what it’s like: elite place, huge competition.”
“I understand,” Anna nodded. “But… how can we help? Rent them a room here for a while? Or arrange temporary registration? I checked—it’s possible…”
“Temporary won’t work!” he snapped, cutting her off. “It has to be permanent! Lena already looked into everything. She says a fake registration is risky—they can check and kick her out. And renting here… they don’t have that kind of money. You know Lena’s raising Irka alone.”
He stood up and started pacing the room. His movements were nervous, jerky.
“I promised Lena I’d help. I said we’d figure something out. And I did.”
He stopped in front of her. There wasn’t a trace of doubt in his eyes—only cold, stubborn determination.
“You have to register Irka. Here. In your place.”
Anna froze. She thought she must have misheard.
“What?” she whispered. “Register her? In my apartment? Dima, are you out of your mind? This is… this is my grandmother’s apartment!”
“And Irka is my niece!” he shot back. “My blood! And her future depends on this stupid registration right now! What, are you really so stingy you can’t put a stamp in a passport? Will the apartment get smaller?”
“It’s not about a stamp, Dima!” Anna stood too, feeling a wave of outrage rise from deep inside her. “You know what permanent registration means! It’s the right to live here! It’s not being able to sell or exchange the apartment without the consent of everyone registered! It’s potential problems later! This is my only property—my safety net—my memory!”
“Memory, safety net…” he mimicked her with a nasty little smirk. “You’re thinking about yourself! Did you think about the child? About a girl who has a chance to make something of herself, get a brilliant education? And you’re ready to take that chance away from her because of your selfish fears!”
“I’m not willing to risk my home to solve your sister’s problems!” she nearly shouted. “Why didn’t Lena think about this earlier? Why did she decide I’m supposed to sacrifice my future for her ambitions?”
“Because we’re family!” he roared. “And in a family, people help each other! And if you don’t understand that, then you’re not my family!”
He stepped right up to her. His face was twisted with anger. He grabbed her by the shoulders.
“I’m not going to argue with you, Anya. I’ve decided everything. Lena and Irka will come tomorrow morning with the documents. And you’ll go with them to the MFC.”
“I’m not going anywhere,” she said firmly, looking him straight in the eyes.
He let go and took a step back. His eyes turned cold as ice. He spoke quietly, but his words cracked through the room like a whip.
“Either you register Ira in your apartment, or tomorrow I’m filing for divorce,” my husband said, demanding I register his niece.
An ultimatum. Hard. Merciless. He wasn’t asking—he was blackmailing her. He was putting their seven years together, their love, their shared future on the line—against her apartment. Against her right to her own home.
Anna stared at him—at this stranger, this ruthless man—and felt her cozy world, her quiet haven, turning into an icy desert. She was alone. And she had to make a choice where any outcome would be a disaster.
When Dmitry delivered his ultimatum, Anna’s world split in two. She looked at the man she had loved for seven years—the man she shared a bed with, dreams with, the man who had helped her hang a chandelier and fix a faucet—and saw a monstrous stranger. A blackmailer who, without hesitation, gambled their marriage to satisfy his sister’s ambitions and secure her daughter’s future at Anna’s expense.
Her first feeling wasn’t anger, but a deafening, paralyzing pain. The pain of betrayal. He knew what this apartment meant to her. He knew it wasn’t just walls—it was her roots, her memory, her only connection to the past. And he used that knowledge against her.
She didn’t answer. She turned silently and went into the bedroom, leaving him alone in the living room. She closed the door, but not with a key. She wanted him to understand: it wasn’t sulking, not a desire to shut him out. It was that the bridge between them had just collapsed.
All night she didn’t sleep. She sat in her grandmother’s armchair by the window and stared at the dark silhouettes of the trees. She went through their life in her head. Had there been signs? Hints that he was capable of this? Yes—there had been. His constant need to please his family. His inability to say “no” to his sister. His silent agreement when his mother criticized Anna. She had chalked it up to a gentle nature, to filial love. But it turned out to be weakness bordering on meanness.
She thought about her niece, Ira. The girl was not to blame. She was just a tool in the hands of adults. But the price of getting into that prestigious lyceum was Anna’s ruined life. Was it worth it?
By morning she had made a decision—heavy, frightening, but the only possible one. She could no longer live with a man who didn’t respect her, who was ready to trample her for the sake of his relatives. Love, no matter how strong, could not exist without respect. And he had killed that respect with yesterday’s ultimatum.
At exactly nine in the morning, the doorbell rang. Anna took a deep breath and went to open it. Dmitry, who had spent the night on the living room couch, jumped up and followed her. He looked exhausted, but stubborn determination still showed in his eyes. He still hoped she would break.
On the threshold stood Lena—Dmitry’s sister—and Ira. Lena held a folder of documents and looked at Anna with poorly concealed triumph. Ira hid behind her mother’s back, clearly uncomfortable.
“So, Anyachka, are you ready to make our girl happy?” Lena sang in fake sweetness. “We’re booked at the MFC for ten.”
Anna didn’t look at her. She looked at her husband.
“Dima?” she asked quietly. “Have you changed your mind?”
“What is there to think about?” Lena cut in. “Dima is a real man—he takes care of his family!”
“I’m asking my husband, Lena,” Anna snapped. “Dima?”
He looked away.
“Anya, I already told you yesterday. It’s for Ira’s good. Please don’t make this harder.”
“Don’t make this harder.” That was the last straw.
Anna turned to Lena.
“Lena,” she said calmly, in a tone that made her sister-in-law step back involuntarily, “Ira will not be registered in my apartment. Ever.”
“What?!” Lena gasped. “How dare you! Dima! Tell her!”
“Because this apartment is mine,” Anna continued, ignoring her scream. “And because your brother—my husband—has just stopped being my husband.”
She turned back to Dmitry, who stood pale as a sheet.
“I choose the apartment, Dima. I choose myself. I choose my grandmother’s memory. You can go ahead—file for divorce. Pack your things. And you can register your whole family in your own share. Oh right—you don’t have a share. Here, you’re nobody.”
She said it without rage, with the icy calm of someone who had just cut the rope holding them over an abyss.
“You… you’ll regret this!” Dmitry hissed. “You’ll be alone!”
“I’m already alone,” she answered. “I’ve been alone all these years—I just didn’t notice it. Now go. Both of you. Take your documents and your ambitions. And never come to my home again.”
She stepped back and closed the door in their faces. She leaned her back against it, and only then did her legs give way. She slid down to the floor. She didn’t cry. She simply sat in the silence of her apartment, which was once again hers alone.
She had made her choice. She chose the walls—not cold stones, but walls soaked in love and memory. Walls that, unlike a person, would never betray her. She knew it would be hard ahead. But she also knew that for the first time in many years, she could breathe freely.
