Part 1. Lead-Framed
“Have you lost your mind, Margo?” Leonid stood in the doorway of my workshop, looking with open disgust at the shelves filled with colored glass. “That apartment is mine too. I did the renovation. And for the record, I haven’t moved out.”
I kept my eyes on the stained-glass panel in front of me. The soldering iron in my hand felt like a hot, steady extension of my own body. Usually, the scent of rosin and molten tin calmed me. Today it felt sharp and suffocating, just like my husband’s presence. Leonid, a successful writer of quest scenarios, had spent years believing the world revolved around him. There he stood in his pretentious camel-colored coat, absurdly out of place among dust and glass splinters, dripping arrogance.
“You paid for that renovation with my money, Lenya,” I said calmly, guiding the solder along a seam. “As for Diana, though, you slept with her for free. Or was she paying extra for effort?”
Leonid smirked and strolled farther into the studio, nudging a crate of glass scraps with the toe of his shoe.
“Oh, spare me the melodrama. Diana has nothing to do with it. We just outgrew each other. I’m a creative person. I need air, inspiration, freedom. And you… you’re always buried in grime, with cut-up fingers and that apron on. You’ve become boring, Margo.”
“Boring?” I finally set the soldering iron down and turned to face him.
I looked at the man I had spent seven years with and saw a stranger. An arrogant, self-satisfied stranger who, for some reason, believed he still had the right to stomp through my life.
“You slept with your school friend’s wife,” I reminded him. “Does Pashka know?”
“Pashka’s an idiot,” Leonid said dismissively, picking up a glass cutter from the table and twirling it in his hand. “And stop changing the subject. The apartment. I put my soul into that place. I picked the wallpaper, I supervised the workers. By any law of fairness, half of it is mine. Or you can buy me out. Let’s say… five million. Then I disappear.”
“You’ll disappear either way,” I said, stepping up and taking the tool from his hand. “Your things are already with the courier. I made sure your mother’s address was correct.”
“If you start a war, Margo, you’ll lose.” His eyes narrowed. “I have connections. I have lawyers. I can crush you mentally. You’re just some little craftswoman.”
He stepped close enough to loom over me. That used to make me shrink back, smooth the edges, avoid the confrontation.
“Leave,” I said quietly.
“I’ll leave when we settle the money. Otherwise I’ll come back with company, and then the conversation will be very different. Think carefully, Margosha. You’ve got three days.”
He turned and walked out, slamming the metal door behind him.
I stood there staring at it. I wasn’t afraid. What I felt was disgust—and a growing urge to scrub this city clean of him.
Part 2. Dinner with the Taste of Bitterness
The restaurant was loud, stylish, and absurdly overpriced. Exactly the kind of place Leonid loved. I hadn’t come for the food. Our mutual “friend” Larisa had invited me there, swearing she had some important documents Leonid had supposedly left at her summer house six months earlier.
Every instinct I had screamed not to go. I went anyway.
Larisa was sitting at a table by the window, but she wasn’t alone. Leonid was sprawled lazily beside her, and on his other side sat Diana—the very woman for whom my marriage and Pavel’s marriage had both been destroyed.
“Oh, look who came,” Leonid announced loudly, turning heads at nearby tables. “Sit down, wife. Or should I say almost ex-wife?”
Diana, a striking brunette with predatory makeup, laughed behind a hand tipped with long, pointed nails.
“Lenya, must you be so rude?” she purred. “Margarita, sit down. We were just discussing how to settle your… apartment issue peacefully.”
Larisa stared down at her salad, doing everything she could to avoid my eyes.
“You knew they’d be here?” I asked her, ignoring the sugary pair beside her.
“Rit, just try to understand,” she mumbled at last, raising a guilty, restless glance. “Lenya asked me to arrange this. You’re civilized people. Why all this drama? The eviction, the scandal? He just wants what’s his. He’s a man. He needs somewhere to live, somewhere to build a new family…”
“A new family built on the bones of the old one?” I cut in. Anger was beginning to pound at my temples—not from pain, but from the sheer audacity of it all. “And you, Larisa, what are you now? Their little fixer?”
“Watch your mouth,” Leonid snapped. He’d already been drinking, and his face had taken on that ugly reddish color it always got when aggression started bubbling up. “We’re offering you a deal. You sign the dacha over to me, and I graciously leave you your miserable little apartment.”
“My father left me that dacha,” I said slowly. “You have nothing to do with it. You never drove in a single nail there, ‘man.’ All you ever did was show up and stuff your face with barbecue.”
“How vulgar,” Diana said with a sneer. “Lenya, was she always this trashy? No wonder you left her for me. With me, you feel like a king.”
“Exactly, baby.” Leonid stroked her knee under the table on purpose, making sure I saw it. “Margarita, don’t be stupid. We have leverage. Pashka, by the way, knows everything. And he’s on my side. We’re business partners now, so don’t sit there dreaming he’ll show up to punch me. Everything’s taken care of.”
He lifted his wineglass and flicked a little onto the tablecloth in my direction.
“That’s your warning. Sign the papers nicely, or things get ugly. We can ruin your life. I know your clients. A couple of rumors that you steal materials or miss deadlines, and your reputation is finished.”
I looked at the red stain spreading across the cloth. Then I stood up.
“You think you’ve cornered me?” I asked, looking straight into his eyes. My voice came out low and hard. “You’re wrong, Lenya. You have no idea who you picked a fight with.”
“I picked a fight with a scared woman,” he laughed.
I turned and walked toward the exit. Behind me came Diana’s laughter and Larisa’s nervous muttering. They thought I was leaving defeated.
They didn’t understand I was leaving to prepare.
Part 3. A Wasteland of Disappointment
The unfinished cottage settlement where my father’s plot was located greeted me with damp wind and the barking of stray dogs. I had come to check the locks, but the gates were standing open.
Leonid’s car was parked near the construction trailer. Beside it stood another one—an old SUV belonging to his coworker Oleg. A slick, greasy type who always looked at women like slabs of meat.
I stepped out of my car, gripping my keys in my jacket pocket. Leonid, Oleg, and—to my surprise—Pashka, Diana’s husband, were standing by the foundation of the future house. Smoking. Laughing. Acting like they already owned the place.
“I’m telling you, the sauna goes right here!” Leonid was saying, waving his arms. “Right here, with an opening toward the woods. Ritka will sign it all over. She has no choice. I leaned on her hard yesterday—she was practically in tears.”
“You’re a real strategist, Lenya,” Oleg chimed in, spitting into the dirt.
Pashka said nothing. He looked rough. Apparently having your wife betray you and then staying friendly with the man she cheated with came at the cost of what little conscience he had left.
“What are you doing here?” I shouted as I came closer.
The three of them turned. Leonid’s face spread into a nasty grin.
“Well, look who’s here. The queen of the copper mountain herself. Come to hand over the keys?”
“This is private property. Get out,” I said, keeping my voice as even as I could while adrenaline surged through me.
“Listen, Rita,” Oleg said, taking a step toward me. He was big, soft, but strong. “Don’t get mouthy. Lenya and I are making plans here. He’s a man. He needs it more. You’ll find yourself some other… glass worker.”
They began to close in around me. Three men against one woman. The oldest intimidation trick in the book.
“Pasha, you too?” I asked, looking at the betrayed husband. “He’s sleeping with your wife, and you’re licking his boots?”
Pavel looked away.
“Business is business, Rit. Diana made her choice. Lenya offered me a share in the project. Nothing personal. If you won’t give up the apartment, then give up the dacha.”
“You’re pathetic,” I spat.
Suddenly Leonid grabbed my shoulder, his fingers digging in painfully.
“You’ll sign the transfer papers tomorrow. Or we’ll smash this foundation to pieces. And after that, we’ll come for your workshop. Do you understand me?”
At that moment, another car pulled up at the gate. A small, quick little hatchback. Out jumped Zoya—Leonid’s sister.
“Lenya! What the hell are you doing, you idiot?” she shouted, running toward us.
Leonid released my shoulder with a grimace.
“Zoya, get lost. Stay out of men’s business.”
“Men’s business?” Zoya stepped between me and her brother. She was tiny, but furious. “You’re trying to strip your wife of everything after cheating on her? You nearly gave your mother a heart attack whining that you were ‘thrown out into the cold,’ and meanwhile you’re driving around in an SUV and taking whores to restaurants?”
“Shut up!” Leonid roared, raising his hand.
I caught his wrist.
The hand I used every day to work with glass was tougher than he expected. I didn’t just stop him. I jerked his arm down and aside hard enough to make him stagger.
“Don’t touch her,” I growled. “And don’t ever try putting your hands on me either.”
“You…” he said, stunned.
Oleg and Pasha exchanged a glance but didn’t move. Zoya took advantage of the pause and grabbed my arm.
“Come on, Rit. Let’s go. They’re not worth breathing the same air.”
We backed toward the cars. Leonid kept screaming after us about lawsuits and how I’d regret all this, but I could see the confusion in his eyes.
He hadn’t expected me to fight back physically.
Part 4. The Office Aquarium
I didn’t go home.
I went straight to their office.
Leonid’s company occupied an open-plan office on the fifth floor of a business center. I needed to finish this while my anger was still burning clean.
It was lunchtime. Employees were lazily drinking coffee. I walked past reception without even glancing at the secretary. Zoya stayed in the car; I had forbidden her from coming in. This was my fight.
Leonid was sitting at his desk, discussing something with Diana, who, it turned out, was officially employed there as a “consultant.” The second he saw me, he went pale, then flushed crimson.
“What are you doing here? Security!” he shrieked.
“I brought your documents,” I said loudly.
The entire office fell silent. Every head turned toward us. His coworkers knew Leonid as a charming, successful guy. They had never seen the rot underneath.
“What documents?” he asked cautiously, already hoping I had finally surrendered.
I walked up to his desk and dumped the contents of the bag in front of him. They weren’t apartment papers. They were printouts from his corporate email—an account he had foolishly left logged in on my old laptop. Messages where he discussed off-the-books kickbacks, trashed his business partners, and even mocked Diana herself, calling her “a temporary option for sex.”
“Read,” I said. “And all of you—read.”
Diana snatched up one of the pages. Her face went stiff.
“‘A dumb doll I’ll dump soon’? Lenya, what is this?”
“It’s fake! Photoshop! She’s lying!” Leonid shouted, springing to his feet.
“And the invoices to shell companies—are those fake too?” I asked, throwing a folder of financial reports onto the desk. “You were stealing from your own people, Lenya. Somehow there was never enough money for my apartment, but plenty for restaurants.”
He lunged toward me, trying to slap a hand over my mouth.
“Shut up, you bitch!”
He shoved me. My hip slammed into the desk, but I barely felt it. All I felt was cold, crystal-clear rage.
“You hit a woman?” a voice from a nearby desk said sharply. No one was smiling anymore.
I straightened my jacket.
“You lost the right to a decent life a long time ago,” I said. “And now you’ve lost your face too.”
Then I turned and walked toward the elevator. Leonid was shouting something behind me, Diana was shrieking and hitting him with her handbag, and several employees were already filming everything on their phones. The rat’s nest had begun to tear itself apart.
But I knew it still wasn’t over.
He would come for revenge.
Men like him never know how to lose with dignity.
Part 5. Concrete Box
That same evening. My apartment. My fortress—the one he had wanted to take from me.
I waited for him.
I knew he wouldn’t go to court. He had too many problems at work now, and soon he wouldn’t have the money for decent lawyers anyway. He would go all in.
The doorbell rang long and hard. I opened it.
Leonid stood there on the threshold. Drunk, disheveled, his shirt collar ripped—apparently Diana had done that much. Behind him loomed Oleg and some hulking brute I didn’t recognize.
“Open up, bitch!” Leonid shoved his way into the hallway, knocking me back with the door. “I’ll teach you to respect your husband!”
“You’re not my husband,” I said, stepping back into the corridor.
“This is my house! Guys, throw her junk off the balcony! And throw her out onto the landing with it!” he barked.
They moved toward me. They expected tears. Pleading. Hysteria. Men like that are used to women being prey.
What they forgot was that I work with stained glass.
I carry lead frames and crates of glass that weigh over a hundred pounds. My hands are not delicate. They are clamps.
When Leonid reached for my hair, I didn’t dodge.
I stepped forward.
All the anger that had been building inside me for weeks gathered into one single movement.
I grabbed him by the lapels of his coat and yanked him toward me with a force he clearly hadn’t expected, driving my knee straight into his groin.
He made a strangled sound and doubled over.
“You thought I’d cry?” I screamed into his ear. This wasn’t the cry of a frightened woman. It was the roar of an animal defending its territory. “You thought I was weak?”
I hurled him sideways into the shoe rack. He crashed into it, sending boots flying. The brute charged toward me, but I seized the heavy metal coat stand from the corner. Whatever he saw in my face made him stop dead.
“One more step and I cave your skull in,” I said quietly, and that quietness was worse than shouting. “This is self-defense. In my home.”
Oleg started backing toward the door.
“Lenya, forget it. To hell with this. You didn’t say she was insane.”
“Get up!” I snapped, lunging toward Leonid as he writhed on the floor. I grabbed him by the back of his coat; the fabric tore in my hand. With one violent yank, I hauled him upright, though he was heavier than I was. Rage lends inhuman strength. “Out!”
I drove him toward the door, shoving him from behind while he stumbled and whimpered. I literally threw him out onto the landing. He flew several feet and crashed into the door of the opposite apartment.
His “backup”—Oleg and the brute—were already fleeing down the stairs, leaping steps in their panic. Cowards. Rats abandoning a sinking ship.
Leonid looked up at me. There was animal fear in his eyes. For the first time, he was seeing the real me—not convenient Margo, but something feral, something capable of breaking him.
“Don’t ever come back here,” I said, looking down at him. “Forget my address. Forget my name. Because next time, I won’t stop.”
Then I slammed the door in his face and turned the lock.
Silence.
I looked at my hands. They were shaking, not from fear, but from adrenaline draining away. My knuckles were scraped raw. I went into the kitchen and poured myself a glass of water.
Outside, in the courtyard, an engine roared—and then immediately died. Apparently their car wouldn’t start either.
I smiled.
I felt utterly, endlessly free. My anger had done its work. It had burned away every trace of pain, leaving behind only clear, transparent peace.
Like glass after it has been fired.
