— How can you be buying an apartment? After all we’ve done for you! Traitors! — the in-laws fumed.
“I asked you—don’t turn the dishwasher on after ten. The whole house hums, and I can’t rest!”
Natalya froze with a plate in her hands. Vladimir Sergeyevich stood in the doorway, pulling his terry-cloth robe tighter. His gray hair stuck out in different directions from lying on the couch.
“I’m sorry, I wasn’t going to…” Natalya set the plate back on the table. The leftover Olivier salad had dried onto the porcelain.
“In someone else’s home, you have to follow the rules,” her father-in-law said, adjusting his glasses on the bridge of his nose. “How many times do I have to tell you?”
Natalya nodded, looking at the tower of dishes by the sink. Salad bowls, cups, saucers were piled on top of one another. On the stove, a frying pan sat congealed with burnt oil.
Vladimir Sergeyevich turned and shuffled down the hallway in his slippers. The clock above the refrigerator read half past ten. Natalya turned on the tap and reached for the sponge. Hot water scalded her fingers.
Natalya was dusting the porcelain shepherdesses in the living room when she heard a familiar cough behind her.
“You’re wiping with the wrong side of the cloth again,” Lyudmila Pavlovna stood in the doorway, arms crossed over her chest. “How many times do I have to tell you—microfiber is for glass, flannel is for porcelain.”
“Okay, Mom,” Natalya replied automatically, turning the cloth over. The same thing for the fourth year. The fourth year of “temporary.”
Her father-in-law’s voice carried from the kitchen:
“Artyom! Don’t hold the spoon in a fist! Like some sort of man!”
Their three-year-old son sat at the heavy oak table, his legs dangling in the air. Vladimir Sergeyevich loomed over him, repositioning the child’s fingers on the spoon.
“Dad, he’s still little,” Igor tried to defend him, but his father just waved him off.
“In our family, everyone held their cutlery properly from the age of two.”
Natalya bit her lip. Four years ago, when Igor was laid off from the factory, they thought it would be a month or two at most. Renting an apartment was out of the question—they saved every kopek for a mortgage down payment. “You can live with us for now, there’s plenty of room,” her mother-in-law had offered generously. Igor found a job six months later, but the salary was half as much. After Artyom was born, they had to forget about their own place—diapers, formula, doctors ate up all their savings. “For now” stretched into four years.
Her phone vibrated in the pocket of her apron. Mom.
“Natushenka, call me back urgently when you can talk in private,” her mother’s voice trembled with excitement. “Do you remember Uncle Kostya, your dad’s second cousin? He died a month ago and left me a plot of land near Klin. I spoke to a realtor—it can be sold very profitably. The money is yours, Natasha. It’ll be enough for an apartment—small, but your own.”
Natalya froze with the cloth in her hand. The porcelain shepherdess smiled at her with rosy cheeks.
“Did you fall asleep over there?” her mother-in-law asked irritably. “The whole display cabinet still needs to be wiped.”
Natalya woke to the smell of burnt porridge. Her mother-in-law had forgotten to turn off the stove again. Going down to the kitchen, Natalya silently scraped the charred crust from the bottom of the pot. Her hands moved mechanically, while her thoughts wandered far away—to that very apartment Igor had been telling her about.
For several days she walked around as if in a fog. Falling asleep on the narrow couch in the проходная room, she pictured white walls without the darkened portraits of someone else’s relatives. She saw a child’s room where Maksim could scatter toys without fearing a shout. A kitchen—her kitchen—where no one would stand behind her with a comment like, “You’re chopping the onion wrong.”
“Daydreaming again?” her mother-in-law came into the kitchen, shuffling in worn slippers. “Did you buy the milk?”
“It’s in the fridge,” Natalya turned toward the window.
Yesterday Igor brought up the apartment again. He showed photos on his phone—an ordinary two-room place in a residential neighborhood, but theirs. Natalya could see how nervous he was.
“How are we going to tell your parents?” she asked then.
Igor was silent for a moment, then put an arm around her shoulders.
“We’ll manage.”
But Natalya remembered the last attempt at a conversation. Vladimir Sergeyevich had stood up from the table, pushing away his half-eaten borscht:
“We took you in. You still have to earn that—your independence.”
Now, drying the plates with a towel, Natalya felt something new inside. Not fear, but determination. Let there be a scandal. Let them not speak for weeks. She would endure it—for Maksim, for their little family.
Artyom was laying out puzzles on the floor when Lyudmila Pavlovna came into the living room.
“Put it away immediately! Guests will be here in an hour!”
The boy hurriedly gathered the cardboard pieces into the box. One slipped from his hands and rolled under the sofa.
“Clumsy!” his grandmother yanked him by the arm. “Who did you take after, being so awkward?”
Natalya was ironing Igor’s festive shirt in the corner of the room. In the kitchen, dishes clattered—the housekeeper had been hired specially for her father-in-law’s anniversary.
“Natalya, at least you’ll put on a decent dress?” her mother-in-law looked her up and down. “Don’t disgrace the family in front of the Smirnovs.”
By seven o’clock the apartment was filled with guests. Vladimir Sergeyevich sat enthroned in an armchair, accepting congratulations. Gifts piled up on the coffee table—cognac, books, an expensive pen.
Natalya placed a boxed set of works by his favorite author in front of her father-in-law. A third of her salary, but she had hoped for a truce.
“Thank you,” he said dryly…
Lyudmila Pavlovna burst into tears into her handkerchief:
“We helped you, and you… traitors!”
“This isn’t betrayal,” Natalya said firmly, getting to her feet. “This is a normal life.”
“Out!” her father-in-law bellowed, flinging a napkin. “Don’t you ever set foot here again!”
The front door slammed behind them. Natalya carried a drowsy Artyom, Igor dragged a bag of the child’s things—they hadn’t had time to take anything else. Only the duty light was burning on the landing.
Silence hung in the car. Artyom snuffled in the back seat, pressing his nose into his bunny. Igor couldn’t start the engine for a long time—his hands were shaking.
“I’m sorry,” he breathed, staring at the fogged-up windshield. “I didn’t think Dad would…”
Natalya said nothing. Tears ran down her cheeks, but inside she felt strangely light. As if a heavy backpack had been taken off after a long climb up a mountain.
“Natalya, I’m so sorry. Only now do I understand what it was like for you. Every single day.”
She turned to him. In the dim light of the cabin, his face looked very young—as it had ten years ago, when they first met.
“Don’t,” she whispered. “We’ll be okay.”
Igor found her hand and squeezed her cold fingers. Natalya laced hers through his—tight, the way she had on their first date in the park.
At last the car started. They drove out of the courtyard, leaving behind the lit windows of his parents’ apartment. Artyom smacked his lips in his sleep, hugging the bunny tighter.
“Where are we going?” Igor asked at the traffic light.
“To my mom’s. And tomorrow we’ll start looking for a place of our own.”
Ahead of them was the unknown, but Natalya smiled through her tears.
Cardboard boxes were stacked in the entryway of the new apartment. Artyom dragged a plush bear over the threshold, scraping it along the dusty floor. Natalya unpacked dishes, unwrapping them from old newspapers.
“Mom, can I jump on the couch here?” their son asked, peeking into the living room.
“You can,” she smiled, and the boy ran and flopped onto the cushions.
Igor was painting the wall in the child’s room. The pale blue paint went on unevenly over the old plaster, but he carefully rolled on a second coat. The dried-out parquet creaked underfoot.
“They delivered the table,” he shouted from the room. “We’ll pick it up tomorrow—the neighbor will help with his car.”
They found the dining table from an ad—solid, the varnish peeling, but sturdy. Like the rest of the furniture: a dresser from a thrift shop, chairs from friends—only the couch was new, for Artyom.
In the evening they sat in the kitchen, drinking tea from mismatched mugs. Artyom drew at his little table, his tongue stuck out in concentration. He didn’t keep looking over his shoulder, didn’t flinch at every sound.
“You’re smiling,” Igor said, hugging his wife.
“Am I?”
Natalya hadn’t even noticed. In the past few weeks they hadn’t argued once. Igor came home from work and the first thing he did was hug her—not go report to his parents.
The phone stayed silent. Igor’s mother didn’t answer calls; his father declined, claiming he was busy. Igor frowned at the dark screen.
“They’ll come around,” Natalya said quietly. “Time heals.”
Natalya was turning pancakes in the frying pan when the intercom rang. Artyom ran to the handset, rising onto his tiptoes.
“Who is it?”
There was silence in the speaker, then a familiar voice:
“It’s Grandpa. Open up.”
Igor froze with his mug of coffee halfway to his mouth. Natalya turned off the stove.
Vladimir Sergeyevich stood on the threshold. His gray hair was tousled by the wind; shadows lay under his eyes. He was holding a cardboard box.
“Artyom’s toys,” he muttered. “Found them in the garage.”
Artyom peeked out from behind his mother’s back and reached for the box. Inside were his old toy cars and building set.
His father-in-law shifted from foot to foot, looking somewhere over their heads.
“I think…” he cleared his throat. “I should’ve understood earlier that children have the right to live their own lives.”
“Come in,” Natalya stepped aside. “Would you like some tea? I just made pancakes.”
Vladimir Sergeyevich walked in slowly, taking in the entryway with its homemade coat rack. Soft music drifted from an old radio in the kitchen. The table was covered with a checkered tablecloth, and a vase held dried rowan branches.
He sat down on the offered chair and accepted a cup. Artyom climbed onto his lap, showing him a new drawing.
“It’s nice here,” her father-in-law said quietly.
Natalya nodded. The hatred had gone вместе with the fear. Here, within their own walls, she could be herself.
