Oksana heard the key turn in the lock. Strange — Oleg usually did not come home before seven, and now it was barely past five. She set her laptop aside and listened.
Voices. Several voices. One belonged to her husband, the second to her mother-in-law. The third Oksana did not recognize.
Three years earlier, the apartment had looked completely different. Peeling walls, old Soviet wiring that sparked every time the kettle was switched on, and a heavy smell of dampness soaked into every corner. Back then, Alla Petrovna had thrown up her hands and said, “What can you do? There’s no money for repairs. Maybe you and Oleg can fix it up little by little. You’re going to live here anyway, and later it will go to the children.”
Oksana had agreed. Foolish, trusting, in love — she had agreed.
At the time, she worked as an accountant at a construction company and earned forty-five thousand a month. Oleg was listed as an employee at some shady little company that either did consulting or only pretended to. His salary was unpredictable and constantly changing — twenty thousand in a good month and absolutely nothing in the others. But Oleg made up for his financial instability with intense self-improvement activity: reading business books, listening to motivational podcasts, making grand plans. Not one of those plans had ever turned into anything tangible.
Oksana, on the other hand, did things for real. She carved channels into the walls herself for new wiring because hiring an electrician was too expensive. She straightened crooked corners on her own — watching YouTube videos, buying plaster, spatulas, and guides. She fought mold in the bathroom, changed the pipes, laid down tile. Everything — with her own money, on her own weekends, with her own hands.
Meanwhile, Oleg was busy “finding himself.”
“You understand, Oksana, I can’t waste my talent on routine,” her husband would say, lying on the couch with a Kiyosaki book in his hands. “I need to find my true calling. Something that brings not just money, but fulfillment.”
Oksana understood. Or rather, she kept convincing herself that she did. She washed his shirts, cooked dinners, paid the utility bills, and kept plastering the walls. After all, Alla Petrovna had promised — all this was for the children. Someday the apartment would belong to her and Oleg, and later to their future children.
The apartment was registered in her mother-in-law’s name. Officially, it was supposedly to avoid some mythical tax complications. Oksana never looked closely into it. She trusted them.
Now three pairs of feet shuffled in the hallway, and an unfamiliar female voice said admiringly:
“Oh wow, it’s so cozy here! And the renovation is fresh too, right? It’s hard to believe it used to be such a mess.”
Oksana stepped out of the room and froze in the doorway.
In the hallway stood Alla Petrovna — in the same brown coat she had been wearing for the last ten years. Next to her hovered Oleg, looking like a guilty schoolboy. And between them stood a young woman of about twenty-five, slim, with long dark hair and large eyes. She held a travel bag in her hand and looked around with the air of a new owner inspecting her property.
“Oh, this must be Oksana?” the stranger smiled. “I’m Inna, Alla Petrovna’s niece. I’ve heard about you.”
“Hello,” Oksana said slowly. “What is going on?”
“Innochka is going to stay with us for a while,” Alla Petrovna announced in a tone that did not allow objections. “She needs to settle into the city and find a proper job. She can’t sit in the village forever with her education.”
“Stay with us?” Oksana turned to her husband. “Oleg?”
Her husband shrugged and stared at the floor.
“Well, Mom has already decided everything. What is there to discuss?”
“And where exactly is she going to stay?” Oksana felt something hot and sharp rising inside her.
“In the living room, of course,” Alla Petrovna waved toward the room. “The couch folds out. There’s plenty of space.”
“My home office is in the living room.”
“What office?” her mother-in-law frowned. “A table and a computer. You’ll make room.”
“I work remotely three days a week. I need a place where I can sit quietly with my laptop.”
“You can sit in the kitchen. Or in the bedroom.”
Oksana took a deep breath. Everything inside her was boiling, but she did not want to explode into shouting. Not yet.
“Alla Petrovna, couldn’t you at least have warned me? Called me? Asked?”
“Why would I ask?” her mother-in-law raised her eyebrows. “This is my apartment, in case you forgot. I have the right to decide who lives here.”
“Your apartment, into which I have put all my savings over the last three years. I did the renovations. I pay the utilities. I bought the furniture.”
“Oh, here we go,” Alla Petrovna rolled her eyes. “These endless speeches about money again. You’re so mercenary, Oksana, that’s what I’ll say. Always counting, always keeping score.”
“I count because otherwise there would be nothing here to count.”
Inna shifted awkwardly from foot to foot, clearly uncomfortable. But she did not leave. She stood there with her bag and waited to see how it would end.
“Oleg,” Oksana said again, turning to her husband. “Are you going to say anything at all?”
He lifted his head and looked at his wife with dull, cloudy eyes.
“And what exactly can I do? Mom decided. Inka is family. We can’t just throw her out into the street.”
“So it is fine to squeeze me out, but impossible for her to be left without a place?”
“You’re being dramatic.”
“I’m stating a fact.”
A heavy silence settled over the apartment. Alla Petrovna remained standing in her coat, not even intending to take it off, staring holes through her daughter-in-law. Oleg buried himself in his phone again, scrolling with fake indifference. Inna stared at the toes of her sneakers.
Oksana leaned against the doorframe and crossed her arms over her chest.
“All right. If someone is going to live here, then they will share the expenses. Utilities come to around five thousand a month now. Plus internet, plus groceries.”
“What expenses?” Alla Petrovna snorted. “Inna only just arrived. She doesn’t even have a job yet. How is she supposed to pay?”
“That is not my problem. I’m not going to support a stranger.”
“A stranger?!” her mother-in-law’s voice shot upward. “She is my own niece!”
“To me, she is a stranger. We don’t even know each other.”
“Well, now you will!”
“I don’t want to.”
Oleg looked up from his phone and gave his wife a reproachful look.
“Oksana, come on. So what if she stays a couple of months? Is it really that hard for you?”
“Yes. It is. I resent losing my time, my money, and my space. The space I built with my own hands.”
“There you go again — my own, my own. We all live here together.”
“No, Oleg. You all live here. I’m the one who works here, pays here, and cleans here.”
Alla Petrovna stepped forward, her eyes narrowing.
“How dare you, girl? Speaking to your elders in that tone?”
“I dare to speak the truth. The truth you do not want to hear.”
“The truth?” her mother-in-law let out a dry, unpleasant laugh. “What truth? That you think you are queen here? That everything would collapse without you?”
“Yes. Exactly that.”
“You’ve become unbelievably arrogant!”
Oksana did not move back. She stood straight, looking her mother-in-law in the eyes.
“Three years, Alla Petrovna. For three years I have been putting money into this apartment. For three years I listened to your promises that it would ‘go to the children.’ For three years I put up with your son ‘finding himself’ while living off me. And now you simply bring your niece here and announce that my opinion does not matter?”
“Because it doesn’t!” Alla Petrovna’s voice rose into a shriek. “This is my home! My apartment! You are nobody here!”
“Then why am I the one paying for this home?”
“Because you live here!”
“I live here because I’m married to your son. Who, by the way, has not earned a single kopeck toward this household in three years.”
“Don’t you dare talk about Olezhka like that!” Alla Petrovna flared up as if burned. “My son is a smart, talented man! He just needs time!”
“Time for what? Another failed startup? Another self-help book about success?”
Oleg jerked his head up, hurt flashing in his eyes.
“Oksana, that’s too much.”
“Too much is your mother deciding for me who gets to live in the apartment I’m paying for. That’s too much.”
“The apartment belongs to Mom.”
“And the repairs, the furniture, the appliances — who do they belong to? Who changed the wiring? Who straightened the walls? Who got rid of the mold?”
“Good God, not the renovation again!”
“Because that is the only thing here that is actually mine!”
Inna stepped backward toward the door, but Alla Petrovna grabbed her niece by the hand.
“Stay, Innochka. Don’t go anywhere. We’ll deal with this arrogant woman right now.”
“Arrogant woman?” Oksana gave a humorless smile. “Me? The one who carried this entire household for three years? Wonderful.”
“You are here on borrowed rights!” her mother-in-law snapped, pointing a finger at her. “If I want, I can throw you out tomorrow!”
“Try it.”
“What?”
“Try throwing me out. Let’s see how you manage without me. Who is going to pay for the electricity, water, and gas? Who will buy the groceries? Who will fix things when something breaks?”
“Oleg will manage!”
Oksana looked at her husband. He stood with his head pressed into his shoulders, looking as though he wanted the floor to swallow him.
“Oleg?” Oksana raised an eyebrow. “Will you manage?”
“Well… uh…” he stammered. “We’ll think of something.”
“Think of what? Where will you get money for utilities? The bill comes next month, by the way. Six thousand. Do you have six thousand, Oleg?”
He did not answer. Alla Petrovna turned red.
“Stop humiliating my son! He’s a man, not a wallet!”
“A man usually provides for his family. Or at least helps with the expenses.”
“Olezhka is a creative person! He needs time to unfold!”
“He is thirty-four, Alla Petrovna. How much more time does he need?”
“How dare you!”
Oksana was tired. Tired of this conversation, of these people, of this apartment. Three years of work, three years of hope — and this was the result. Her mother-in-law brought in some niece, her husband hid behind his phone, and everyone expected Oksana to quietly accept it.
No.
“Alla Petrovna,” Oksana said, her voice suddenly calm, “I am asking one last time. Is Inna going to contribute to the household expenses or not?”
“No!” her mother-in-law cut in sharply. “Innochka is a guest! And stop bossing everyone around!”
Alla Petrovna turned to her son, her face twisted with anger.
“I am sick of her acting like she runs the place,” the mother-in-law spat. “Pack her things, son. Let her get out and go wherever she wants.”
Oksana waited.
She waited for Oleg to say, “Mom, that’s enough.” Or, “This is my wife, don’t speak to her like that.” Or at least, “Let’s calm down and talk.”
Instead, he shifted from foot to foot, looked at his mother, then at his wife, and muttered:
“Well, Mom… those are her things… she can decide herself…”
“What do you mean, she can decide herself?!” Alla Petrovna screeched. “I said she should leave! This is my home!”
“Well, yes… your home… you’re right…”
Something inside Oksana snapped. Not loudly, not painfully — it just gave way quietly, like an overstretched string. Three years. For three years she had believed she was building a family. That Oleg loved her. That his mother would someday accept her. That all of it meant something.
It meant nothing.
Oksana exhaled slowly. Then she smiled — coldly, at the corner of her mouth.
“Go wherever I want, you say?”
“Exactly!” Alla Petrovna lifted her chin triumphantly.
“All right. But I’m taking what is mine.”
“There’s nothing of yours here!”
“We’ll see.”
Oksana turned and walked into the living room. She went to the window and grabbed the curtain — heavy velvet ones she had bought during a sale the year before.
“What are you doing?!” Alla Petrovna rushed in after her.
“Taking down my property.”
Oksana yanked the curtain. The rings clattered against the rod. The fabric slid down, exposing the bare window.
“Stop that right now!”
“I bought the curtains. I bought the rod too.” She moved to the second window. “They’re mine.”
“Oleg! Stop her!”
He stood in the doorway with his mouth half open. Inna peered over his shoulder, horror written all over her face.
“What are you doing?!” Inna gasped, pressing her hands to her cheeks.
“Taking back the things I paid for.”
Oksana dropped the curtains onto the floor and went to the television. She pulled the cord from the socket.
“The TV is mine. The stand underneath it is mine too.”
“This is robbery!” Alla Petrovna lunged toward her daughter-in-law. “I’ll call the police!”
“Call them. I kept the receipts for everything. Let’s see what the police say.”
Her mother-in-law froze with her hand in the air. Oksana could see confusion flash in her eyes. Receipts. That had not occurred to her.
Oksana walked into the kitchen. She opened the refrigerator — the large two-door one she had bought a year and a half earlier.
“Oleg,” she called. “I paid forty-two thousand for this fridge. Give me the money back.”
“What?” he stared at her.
“Give me back the money. Or I’m taking the fridge.”
“How are you going to take it?”
“I’ll hire movers.”
“You’ve lost your mind.”
“No. I’ve finally come to my senses. For the first time in three years.”
Heavy footsteps sounded from the other room, and Yuri Mikhailovich — her father-in-law, who until then had apparently been napping in his room — stumbled into the kitchen. Heavyset, balding, wearing sweatpants and a sleeveless undershirt.
“What is all this noise?” he looked at everyone with sleepy, confused eyes. “Why are you all shouting?”
“Yura!” Alla Petrovna ran to her husband. “This madwoman is robbing us! She took down the curtains, unplugged the TV!”
“They are my curtains and my TV,” Oksana said calmly.
“How dare you, girl?” her father-in-law frowned. “Have you no fear left at all?”
“Your wife lost all sense of limits when she decided to throw me out of the apartment I spent three years repairing with my own money.”
“She repaired it!” Yuri Mikhailovich snorted. “Big deal, she hung some wallpaper.”
“Wallpaper?” Oksana turned to face him. “I replaced the entire electrical system. The whole apartment. Because the old one was a fire hazard. I straightened walls so crooked that furniture could not stand against them. I got rid of the mold in the bathroom because it was impossible to breathe in there. I laid tile in the kitchen and hallway. With my own hands, Yuri Mikhailovich. While your son was reading books about business.”
“Don’t you dare talk about Olezhka like that!” Alla Petrovna exploded again.
“Why not? It’s the truth. For three years Oleg did not earn a single kopeck toward this household. I carried everything. And now you tell me to get out?”
“Exactly! Get out!”
“Fine. But I’m taking what belongs to me.”
Oksana left the kitchen and went to the bedroom. She pulled a large sports bag from the wardrobe and started packing her things.
Alla Petrovna stormed around the apartment, lamenting and cursing her daughter-in-law. Inna had backed herself into a corner of the hallway and was afraid to move. Yuri Mikhailovich returned to his room — clearly he wanted no part in the fight.
Oleg stood in the middle of the living room and watched as his wife methodically packed.
“Oksan,” he finally managed. “Come on… you understand… Mom got carried away…”
“Got carried away?” Oksana zipped up the bag. “She told you to pack my things. You stayed silent. That’s it, Oleg. The conversation is over.”
“But we can still talk…”
“For three years I tried to talk. All that time, you hid behind your phone.”
Oksana carried one bag into the hallway, then went back for the second. Then for the box of documents. Then for her laptop.
Alla Petrovna tried to snatch the box of dishes from her hands.
“That’s ours!”
“No.” Oksana firmly pushed her mother-in-law’s hand away. “I bought the dishes. The pots, the pans, the plates. I have receipts for everything.”
“You’re lying!”
“Check if you want.”
Alla Petrovna stepped back. Her eyes were full of rage and helplessness.
“You’ll regret this,” she hissed. “You’ll crawl back here yet.”
“I won’t. Do you know why?”
“Why?”
“Because an apartment is just walls. Life is people. You keep the walls. I’m taking back my life.”
Oksana called a taxi through an app. The driver helped her load the things — two large bags, three boxes, and the curtains rolled into a bundle. The television had to stay behind; it would not fit in the car. Never mind. She would come back for it later or count it as a loss.
For the last time, Oksana looked back at the building. Second floor, the apartment windows. Alla Petrovna stood at the window looking down with triumph on her face.
Celebrate while you can, Oksana thought. Let’s see how triumphant you’ll be when the utility bill arrives. When Inna realizes no one in that house knows how to cook. When Oleg discovers the refrigerator is empty and there is no money for groceries.
The taxi pulled away. Oksana leaned back against the seat and closed her eyes.
A week later, the calls began.
The first was from Oleg. His voice sounded pleading, pitiful.
“Oksana, come on… Mom overreacted, she already regrets it… maybe you could come back?”
Oksana did not answer. She hung up.
An hour later — Oleg again.
“Listen, there’s a problem… Inka can’t cook at all. We’ve been living on dumplings for a week. And Mom is demanding money, saying there’s nothing to pay the utilities with…”
She hung up again.
A day later came a message from Alla Petrovna. Long, confused, full of accusations and demands. Something about ingratitude, about a ruined family, about Oksana supposedly owing money for “damaging” the renovation.
Oksana read the first two lines, gave a quiet snort, and blocked the number.
Then she blocked Oleg too. And Inna — who for some reason had also tried to send some kind of peace-making message.
Oksana sat in her studio apartment — tiny, just twenty square meters, but peaceful. Rented with her own money, furnished with her own things. It smelled of freshness and silence. No mothers-in-law with demands. No husbands searching for themselves on someone else’s back. No nieces needing a place to attach themselves. Now all that remained was divorce and the division of property.
Three years. Three years of wasted time. Three years of money poured into someone else’s apartment. Three years of hopes that turned out to be empty.
But all of that was behind her now. From this point on, she would live for herself.
Oksana smiled. For the first time in a very long while — sincerely, peacefully, without forcing it.
Tomorrow would be a new day.
And that day would belong only to her.
