The elevator got stuck somewhere between the third and fourth floors, so Veronica ended up running up the stairs, clutching a cake box and three white roses to her chest. Her phone had already buzzed twice in the pocket of her jacket.
She knew it was Gleb.
And she already knew exactly what tone he would use when he asked where she was.
The apartment door opened before she even had a chance to press the bell. Ksenia stood in the doorway wearing a shimmering dress, with balloons reading “5 Years” floating behind her.
“Nika! You’re alive!” she squealed, snatching the cake from Veronica’s hands. “I was starting to think aliens had abducted you.”
“The elevator abducted me,” Veronica said, kicking off her shoes. “It froze halfway up like a person trying to decide whether to completely change their life. Then it changed its mind and went all the way back down to the first floor.”
 
“Five years!” Ksenia shook the balloons excitedly. “Five! Do you realize Roman and I have lasted longer than some TV shows?”
“TV shows get canceled when their ratings are bad. Unfortunately, there’s no one around to cancel the two of you.”
Veronica handed her the roses.
“Congratulations, my dears. May your life together always be loud.”
Roman came out of the room with a towel over one shoulder and hugged Veronica with one arm. Guests were already seated around the table. Forks clinked against plates, music played softly, and someone was laughing about a story involving a broken wardrobe.
Everything felt warm, comfortable, alive.
Gleb, her husband, was sitting by the window with his phone in his hand.
He didn’t look at her.
Veronica walked over, touched his shoulder, and leaned down to kiss the top of his head.
He shifted exactly a few inches away—just enough for her to notice and no one else.
“You’re late again,” he said quietly. “Forty minutes this time. I’m tired of making excuses for you.”
“Making excuses?” Veronica sat beside him. “Gleb, I’m not a criminal. I’m a guest. A guest who brought cake. People forgive guests who bring cake.”
“Everyone was here at seven. Everyone except you.”
He finally looked at her.
“Where were you?”
Something mischievous took over.
 
The mood in the room was light, champagne was already being poured, and Veronica simply said the first ridiculous thing that came into her head.
“I got delayed,” she drawled. “That woman of yours called me. Your mistress. She wanted to know why you hadn’t called her back and why you didn’t come over. She sounded very unhappy, actually.”
The table erupted in laughter.
Ksenia clapped her hands.
“Nika, you’re terrible!”
Roman laughed.
“We demand a complete list of mistresses in alphabetical order!”
But Gleb didn’t laugh.
He stood up so abruptly that his chair scraped backward across the floor.
His face suddenly looked stiff and pale.
“Very funny,” he said. “Absolutely brilliant. In front of everyone. Well done.”
“Gleb, it was a joke.”
Veronica gave him a confused smile.
“You asked where I was.”
“A joke.”
He grabbed his jacket.
“Do you ever think before you speak? Or does your mouth live completely separately from your brain?”
“Where are you going?” Roman stepped toward him. “Come on, brother. Sit down. We haven’t even had a drink for our anniversary yet.”
“You drink.”
Gleb was already in the hallway.
“My mood’s ruined. Congratulations, guys. Nika, enjoy your evening.”
The door slammed shut.
An uncomfortable silence settled over the room while the music kept playing as if nothing had happened.
Veronica sat there with a glass in her hand, completely confused.
“Did he seriously get offended?” she asked. “Over a joke?”
Ksenia sat beside her and leaned close enough that their temples almost touched.
“Nika,” she whispered, “people don’t explode like that because they’re offended.”
Veronica looked at her.
 
“Then why?”
“Because they’re scared.”
The evening continued.
There were speeches, music, photos, laughter. Roman danced with Ksenia’s sister. Veronica smiled, raised her glass, and said all the appropriate things about five happy years and how real love meant never keeping score of who had done more.
But somewhere inside her, a little mechanism had started clicking.
She couldn’t turn it off.
Later, she and Ksenia stepped out onto the landing.
“Ksyusha,” Veronica said, “I really did just blurt it out. I wasn’t suspicious. I wasn’t trying to test him.”
“I know.”
Ksenia took a drag from her cigarette.
“But did you see his face? That wasn’t the face of a man who felt insulted. That was the face of a man who felt caught.”
“Gleb?”
Veronica gave a short laugh.
“For three years he couldn’t even tell me he hated the way I cooked fish.”
“Exactly.”
Ksenia pointed at her with the cigarette.
“A man who stays silent about fish but suddenly jumps up and runs away when you mention a mistress? Do the math.”
“I don’t know anything,” Veronica said. “No name. No phone number. No suspicious messages. Nothing.”
“Maybe there really is nothing.”
Ksenia blew smoke to the side.
“Maybe he’s just having a bad day.”
“Maybe.”
Veronica looked toward the apartment door.
“But somehow I’m standing out here discussing it instead of dancing.”
She forced herself to stay cheerful for another hour.
She helped cut the cake, argued about television shows, wished Ksenia and Roman another fifty years together and at least one peaceful evening per week.
All the while, one sentence kept repeating in her head:
People don’t react like that because they’re offended. They react like that because they’re scared.
She walked home afterward. It was only ten minutes through the courtyard.
Her phone rang as she passed a children’s playground.
The screen showed one name.
Daria.
Gleb’s sister.
“Nika, hi,” Daria said. Her voice was slightly louder than usual. “Listen, I’ve been trying to reach Gleb for three hours. He isn’t answering, and I urgently need him. Is he with you?”
And once again, Veronica’s strange mood took over.
Not anger.
More like stubborn, reckless amusement.
“He left the party,” she said evenly. “Probably went to see his mistress. That’s usually where he goes when someone ruins his mood.”
There was a long, impressive silence.
“Nika,” Daria finally said, her voice turning cold, “you have a very strange sense of humor. I don’t find that funny.”
“You know what? Neither do I anymore.”
“Good night.”
The call ended.
Veronica stood outside her building staring at the intercom buttons.
Daria was normally calm and sensible and never interfered in their marriage. Veronica hadn’t meant to be rude to her.
“Idiot,” she muttered to herself. “For the first time in my life I repeat the same joke twice, and both times I hit someone straight in the forehead.”
She entered the code and went upstairs.
While unlocking the apartment door, she called her friend Alice.
She needed to tell someone the whole ridiculous story.
Alice was the kind of person who could always organize chaos into neat little boxes.
“Alice, hi,” Veronica said into the phone as she turned the key. “I’m about to tell you the stupidest story imaginable. Don’t laugh. I already feel like a retired circus clown.”
The apartment door swung open.
Gleb was standing in the hallway wearing slippers, his sleeves rolled up.
 
He looked furious.
“Finally,” he said. “Come in, comedian.”
Veronica automatically lowered the hand holding her phone and slipped it into the pocket of her sweater.
She didn’t hang up.
She simply forgot the call was still connected.
“Do you even understand what you’ve done?” Gleb demanded, stepping toward her before she could remove her coat. “Nobody called you! That woman never called you! I already checked!”
Veronica froze.
Her coat was still hanging from one shoulder.
“You checked?”
She repeated the words slowly.
“Gleb. Who exactly did you check with?”
“That doesn’t matter.”
“Oh, it matters.”
She removed her coat and hung it carefully.
“I made a joke about a woman who supposedly doesn’t exist. You jumped up, left the party, came home, then contacted someone to ask whether she had called me.”
She looked directly at him.
“Do you realize you just served yourself to me on a silver platter?”
“Don’t twist my words!”
“I’m not twisting anything. I’m listening.”
Veronica walked into the living room.
“You gave yourself away in nine seconds. Some people take longer than that to lose a chess match.”
“You could have talked to me properly at home!” Gleb followed her, his voice climbing higher. “Like a normal person! Instead of announcing things in front of Roman and Ksenia so everyone could gossip afterward!”
Veronica raised one finger.
“Stop.”
He fell silent.
“You said I could have talked to you at home.”
She stared at him.
“So there is something to talk about.”
Gleb’s expression changed.
“You aren’t arguing that nothing happened. You’re arguing about where I should have brought it up.”
“Stop picking at every word!”
“I’m not picking. I’m taking notes.”
She sat down in an armchair and folded her hands.
“All right. Let’s do this properly, just like you wanted. Sit down and explain everything from the beginning. How long has it been going on? Where did you meet? Who started it?”
Gleb stopped in the middle of the room.
 
He stared at her from under lowered brows, breathing heavily.
Veronica could practically see the calculations running through his mind.
She knows everything.
There’s no point denying it.
Better confess and control the damage.
“You already know everything,” he muttered. “Don’t make me look like an idiot.”
“I want to hear it from you.”
Veronica’s voice remained calm.
“Her name.”
“Why do you need her name?”
“I’m starting a collection.”
She smiled without humor.
“Name, Gleb.”
He exhaled sharply.
“Alice.”
Veronica didn’t move.
“You already figured it out. Alice.”
The silence lasted only a second.
Then Veronica slowly pulled her phone from her pocket.
The screen was lit.
Call duration: seven minutes.
Alice.
“Alice,” Veronica said into the phone. “Did you hear that?”
The line went dead.
A thin disconnected tone sounded.
Gleb turned so pale that the dark stubble on his face suddenly looked much more obvious.
He stared at the phone in her hand as though it were an explosive device.
“What is that?” he whispered.
“That,” Veronica said, placing the phone on the armrest, “was your Alice.”
 
She looked at him.
“I was calling her when I walked into the apartment. You attacked me so quickly that I forgot to hang up. She heard everything.”
She paused.
“Including her own name. Directly from you.”
“You…”
Gleb stepped backward.
“You did this deliberately. You set me up.”
“Gleb.”
For the first time, Veronica almost felt sorry for him.
“I knew nothing.”
She separated the words carefully.
“Nothing.”
“I joked at the table because I was in a good mood and late to the party. Everything else was done by you. Voluntarily. Without help.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
She stood.
“You know what your biggest problem is? You were so sure you’d been caught that you never stopped to check whether there was even a trap.”
His phone rang.
Gleb looked at the screen, grimaced, and answered.
“Yes, Dasha. What?”
 
His face tightened.
“What conversations about a mistress? Who told you…”
He looked sharply at Veronica.
“I see. Fine. I’m handling it. We’ll talk later.”
He ended the call and stared at his wife.
The fury in his eyes was intense enough to light a cigarette.
“You told my sister too?”
“She called me looking for you.”
Veronica shrugged.
“I gave her the explanation I still believed was a joke.”
She tilted her head.
“Turns out it wasn’t a joke. It was a prediction.”
“Do you understand what you’ve done? In front of my entire family—”
“I did something?”
Veronica raised her eyebrows.
“Darling, I barely touched you. You simply told the truth for the first time tonight and got shocked by how loud it sounded.”
She walked into the bedroom and closed the door.
There was nothing left to discuss.
A husband.
A friend.
And that ridiculous phrase—“I’m handling it.”
Gleb sat alone on the sofa calling Alice again and again.
She ignored the first call.
Then the fifth.
Ten minutes later, his phone rang.
Timur.
“So?” Timur said cheerfully. “Did you solve your problems? Wife, mistress, everything under control?”
“No.”
Gleb’s voice was flat.
 
“Nika locked herself in the bedroom. And Alice… Alice heard everything. The call was still connected.”
There was silence.
“Wait.”
Timur’s voice changed completely.
“What Alice?”
Gleb frowned.
“What?”
“Her last name.”
Gleb gave it.
Timur went quiet for so long that Gleb said hello three times.
Then Timur spoke in a low voice.
“She said yes.”
Gleb didn’t understand.
“What?”
“I proposed to her. We picked out the ring on Saturday.”
The call ended.
Timur lowered his phone onto the small café table.
Alice was sitting across from him, pale, her lower lip trembling.
She had already heard enough.
There was no need for an explanation.
“Tim,” she started. “Please listen. I ended things with him. I did. Before you—”
“You ended things.”
Timur repeated the phrase slowly.
“Nice wording.”
He looked at her.
“And before you ended things, what exactly were you doing? Looking me in the eye? Telling me you loved me?”
“I didn’t want to lose you!”
“You weren’t afraid of losing me. You were keeping me as insurance.”
He laughed bitterly.
“You know something, Alice? I’m not particularly proud. But I’m not anyone’s emergency landing strip either.”
“Timur, please…”
He stood, took cash from his pocket, and placed it beneath the salt shaker.
“There won’t be a wedding.”
He looked at her one last time.
“Don’t call me.”
An hour later, someone rang Veronica’s doorbell.
Gleb opened the door and recoiled.
Alice stood there with messy hair and half-laced boots.
“You?”
He stared at her.
“You’re the last person who should be here. Leave.”
She pushed past his shoulder without answering and walked straight toward the bedroom.
Veronica was sitting on the bed with her hair loose, holding a book she had not actually been reading.
“This is all your fault!” Alice shouted from the doorway. “Because of you, Timur left me! We were getting married! Do you understand? Married! He proposed to me!”
In the hallway, Gleb slowly lowered himself onto a small bench.
“What proposal?” he asked.
He looked at Alice.
“Timur proposed to you? And you never told me?”
 
Veronica put down the book and gave a short laugh.
“Guys,” she said, “let me summarize.”
She pointed toward Alice.
“You’re sleeping with my husband.”
Then toward herself.
“And somehow I’m responsible for ruining your wedding.”
She shook her head.
“Brilliant. Did you come up with that yourself, or did someone help you?”
Alice opened her mouth.
Nothing came out.
“I… that’s not what I meant.”
“What you meant to say was, ‘Nika, I’m sorry I’ve been lying to you for six months.’”
Veronica stood.
“But apparently those words were too difficult, so you decided the guilty person must be whoever happened to be holding the phone.”
“Alice, go,” Gleb said. “Let’s not make this worse. It’s over. You lied to me. You accepted Timur’s proposal and kept quiet while I trusted you.”
Alice turned toward him in disbelief.
“You trusted me?”
Her voice rose.
“You’re married!”
Veronica applauded.
Actually applauded.
“Fantastic. Two grown adults, both genuinely offended that the other one betrayed them.”
She pointed toward the door.
“That’s enough. Show’s over. Both of you, out of my apartment.”
The doorbell rang again.
Veronica went to answer it herself.
Timur stood outside with his jacket hanging from one shoulder and a hard expression on his face.
“Nika,” he said, “I’m sorry for coming this late. I need to hear it from you. Did your husband really have a mistress? Or did he invent this to get back at me for something?”
He stopped mid-sentence.
He had noticed Alice in the hallway.
Gleb was trying to push her toward the door.
“…leave. That’s it. I never want to see you again.”
The entire situation explained itself.
Alice froze.
She looked at Timur and couldn’t even turn away.
 
“So it’s true,” he said.
“It’s true,” Veronica confirmed.
She gently took his arm.
“Come sit in the kitchen.”
Then she looked toward Gleb and Alice.
“And you two stay out of my way. I have work to do.”
She returned to the hallway.
For the first time all evening, she felt completely calm.
Gleb was the first one through the door.
The slap was loud and clean.
Alice grabbed her bag and hurried out on her own, apparently deciding she might be next.
“Nika!” Gleb shoved his foot into the doorway. “Nika, let’s talk!”
“We already did.”
Veronica pushed his shoe away.
“You were extremely honest. Thank you.”
“Then why is Timur staying? What is he doing in my apartment?”
“My apartment,” Veronica corrected.
“He’s sitting down and recovering. Later, the two of us will decide how to take revenge on both of you.”
She smiled.
“We’re very creative people.”
 
Alice gasped.
Gleb moved forward, but the door had already shut.
They were left alone on the landing.
And through the door, Veronica could hear everything.
It was surprisingly educational.
“This is all your fault!” Gleb hissed. “You started it! You messaged me first. You called me. You came to see me!”
“Me?”
Alice’s voice went high.
“You told me your marriage had been dead for years! You said you were only living together out of habit!”
“You were trying on engagement rings with Timur and never told me!”
“And you never left your wife! Six months of ‘soon, soon, I’m almost ready’! I lost my fiancé because of you!”
“I lost my wife because of you!”
“Then we’re both single now!” Alice shouted. “Congratulations to us!”
Veronica walked back into the kitchen.
Timur sat at the table, turning a keychain between his fingers and staring at the floor.
“Stay here another half hour,” she said. “There’s a rat war happening on the landing. They’re currently deciding which one of them is the victim. It may not be safe to go outside.”
“I can hear them.”
A faint smile touched the corner of Timur’s mouth.
“Nika, how are you?”
“This morning I was a married woman.”
She shrugged.
“By evening, apparently I’m not. Efficient service.”
“I’m sorry I came barging into your home.”
“You came looking for the truth, not a scandal.”
She paused.
“Those are different things.”
Then she looked at him.
 
“And by the way, congratulations.”
“For what?”
“For finding out before the wedding.”
She leaned against the counter.
“Imagine learning this a year from now. Shared apartment. Shared plans. A wedding with a hundred guests. Maybe a child.”
She exhaled.
“This way, you lost one evening and one ring.”
“I understand that logically.”
Timur nodded.
“It still feels disgusting.”
“That’s normal.”
Veronica checked the time.
“It means you’re alive.”
She looked toward the kettle but didn’t move.
“Don’t take this personally, but I’m not making tea. I have absolutely no patience left tonight.”
“Don’t.”
Fifteen minutes later, Timur stood.
“I should go.”
He looked at her.
“Nika, thank you. Really.”
Outside the building, Gleb was smoking.
He watched Timur come through the entrance and felt a wave of anger rise inside him.
What had the two of them been doing alone in that apartment for so long?
Why couldn’t Veronica have spoken to him quietly at home like a normal person instead of making jokes in front of everyone?
Why did his sister have to call?
He cursed Alice for hiding the engagement.
He cursed Timur for showing up.
But more than anyone else, he blamed Veronica.
Everything had started because of her.
One stupid sentence at the dinner table.
Alice walked in the opposite direction without watching where she was going.
She was shaking.
Gleb was a coward who had spent six months feeding her promises.
But in her mind, the real enemy was his wife.
Veronica had created that ridiculous scene with the open phone call.
Veronica had destroyed her engagement.
 
Timur walked toward his car, breathing steadily.
He felt sick, humiliated, and heartbroken.
But beneath it all was one clear realization.
He had been lucky.
Lucky to discover everything one week earlier than he might have.
Back inside the apartment, Veronica washed her hands and switched off the music that was still playing softly in the living room.
Then she sat on the bedroom windowsill simply because she needed somewhere to sit.
That morning, she had been a married woman.
She had run into Ksenia’s apartment carrying cake and white roses and casually joked about a mistress she genuinely believed did not exist.
Now everything was different.
Veronica opened the divorce application on her phone and filled in the first few fields.
Then she sent Daria a message.
“Dasha, I’m sorry about tonight. Get the sofa ready for your brother. He has nowhere to sleep. He can explain everything himself. He seems very good at that.”
The reply came almost immediately.
“I understand. Nika, I’m so ashamed of him.”
Veronica typed back:
“You have nothing to be ashamed of.”
She had never been the kind of woman who endured things for years.
She didn’t swallow humiliation, quietly collect evidence, or wait for the perfect moment.
She asked a question.
And that same evening, she got her answer.
What hurt was something else.
She had loved Gleb.
Once, life with him had been good.
Warm.
Funny.
Real.
She was angry, of course.
But it was a clean kind of anger.
Dry, useful anger.
The kind that gets you out of bed the next morning and helps you start building a new life.
Her phone lit up.
 
A message from Timur.
“Sorry everything happened like this. Maybe we could have coffee sometime?”
Veronica smiled faintly and typed:
“Probably not.”
She had no intention of becoming someone else’s shoulder to cry on.
She had enough tears of her own.
And she wasn’t planning to cry those either.
