― Nadya, are you really not jealous of your husband at all? If I were you, I wouldn’t be so calm.”
Veronika said it with a smile and took a sip of juice, as though she had asked something completely ordinary.
Several people were talking at once around the long table. The company anniversary celebration was coming to an end. The waiters were clearing away the dishes, and some guests were already saying goodbye.
Alexey was sitting closer to the director, talking with his colleagues.
Nadezhda turned toward Veronika.
“Why should I be jealous of you?”
“Alexey and I work together quite often. Sometimes we stay late or go out to meet clients. Not every wife would be comfortable with that.”
Veronika had worked at the company for less than six months. She was well-groomed, confident, and knew how to quickly win people over. Nadezhda had actually liked her before.
Alexey had also spoken well of the new employee. He said she was quick to understand complicated issues and knew how to deal with dissatisfied clients.
“If work requires him to stay late, then he has to stay late,” Nadezhda replied. “Lyosha is a grown man. I’m not going to check up on him.”
Veronika raised her eyebrows.
“That’s a rare attitude. Especially after so many years of marriage.”
Nadezhda was about to ask what exactly she meant by that when Alexey approached the table.
“Are you ready to go? I called a car. It’ll be here soon.”
For a second, Veronika looked at his hand when he touched the back of Nadezhda’s chair.
Nadezhda noticed the look.
For a while, they rode in silence.
Alexey unbuttoned the top button of his shirt and leaned back against the seat.
“I’m exhausted. The director could have spent another hour telling us what an amazing team we are.”
Nadezhda looked out the window.
“Your Veronika is interesting. She asked whether I was jealous of you because of her.”
Alexey immediately grimaced.
“She shouldn’t have said that.”
Nadezhda turned toward him.
“Why not? Is there some reason I should be jealous?”
He didn’t answer immediately.
“Sometimes I get the feeling she likes me as more than just a colleague.”
“And how long have you felt that way?”
“I started noticing it gradually. At first I thought it was just the way she communicated.”
Nadezhda felt an unpleasant chill inside.
“And you decided not to tell me?”
Alexey rubbed his chin with his palm.
“Because nothing happened. I didn’t want to turn a few hints into a family problem.”
“Does she text you after work?”
Her husband hesitated again.
“Sometimes. She might message me in the evening and ask what I’m doing. A couple of times she suggested we go for coffee after meeting with a client.”
“Did you go?”
“No. Not once.”
Nadezhda turned back toward the window.
The direct answer made her feel a little better.
But only a little.
At home, she didn’t interrogate him. While she changed her clothes, Alexey put the kettle on, took out two cups, and returned to the conversation himself.
“Nadya, I understand that I should have told you earlier. It just didn’t seem serious to me.”
She sat down opposite him.
“Did you ever tell her directly that you weren’t interested in her attention?”
“Not directly. I just didn’t encourage it.”
“Lyosha, if someone knocks on a closed door several times, sometimes you have to actually tell them the door is closed.”
Alexey nodded, but Nadezhda noticed something else in his expression.
“Be honest. Do you enjoy the fact that she’s interested in you?”
He looked at his wife.
“Sometimes I do. I don’t want to lie to you. When a woman makes it clear that she likes you, it’s difficult to feel absolutely nothing.”
Nadezhda had expected almost any answer except such a calm admission.
“So you did like it.”
“I liked the attention. I don’t want an affair with her. Those are two different things.”
“But you never drew a line.”
“Yes. You’re right about that.”
Nadezhda ran her finger along the rim of her cup.
She felt hurt, yet at the same time she was relieved that her husband wasn’t pretending to be a man completely immune to another woman’s interest.
“I’m not going to tell you what you should write to Veronika. Decide for yourself whether you’re comfortable with this situation.”
Alexey didn’t answer immediately.
“I’m not comfortable with it. I just kept hoping she would understand on her own.”
For a while, they didn’t return to the conversation.
Nadezhda went about her business, but several times she caught herself imagining Veronika standing beside her husband.
Comparing the two of them.
Remembering Veronika’s dress, her hair, her confident smile.
And getting angry with herself for it.
Alexey came home from work later than usual and, right there in the hallway, held out his phone to his wife.
“I wrote to her. Not because you demanded it. I realized myself that it was wrong to leave things as they were.”
Nadezhda didn’t take the phone.
“Tell me what you wrote. I don’t want to check your messages.”
Her husband lowered his hand.
“I wrote that we could communicate about work just as before, but I didn’t want any personal invitations or hints. I asked her not to bring it up again.”
“What did she say?”
“She said I’d imagined everything and thought too highly of myself.”
Nadezhda couldn’t help smiling.
“Convenient.”
“Very. But at least everything has been said clearly now.”
For several days, Alexey didn’t mention Veronika.
Nadezhda didn’t ask either.
She had almost convinced herself that the unpleasant situation was over when one evening her husband’s phone lit up on the kitchen table.
Alexey was in the bathroom.
Nadezhda didn’t touch the phone, but she saw the name on the screen.
Veronika.
Below it was part of the message:
“I still think you got scared for no reason…”
Nadezhda looked away.
Alexey returned, saw the message, and frowned.
“She’s writing again.”
“What now?”
He read the message.
“She says I misunderstood her friendly behavior. And that it’s ridiculous to ruin normal communication because I’m afraid of my wife.”
Nadezhda felt her cheeks burn.
“So it wasn’t you who rejected her. Your wife frightened you.”
Alexey started typing a reply, but Nadezhda stopped him.
“Don’t write anything right now. You’re angry and you’ll say too much. Answer later, calmly, and make it clear enough that she can’t pretend this is about me.”
He put the phone down on the table.
Later Alexey sent a short reply: his wife had nothing to do with it, he didn’t want a personal relationship, and from now on their communication would be strictly about work.
After that, Veronika stopped messaging him.
But Nadezhda didn’t feel calmer immediately.
She hadn’t expected another woman’s attention toward her husband to affect her so strongly.
She began noticing things she had never thought about before.
Alexey would put on a new shirt, and she would wonder whether Veronika would see him wearing it.
If he stayed late at work, her first thought was about her.
Whenever his phone made a sound, Nadezhda involuntarily looked toward it.
Alexey noticed.
At first, he said nothing.
Then one day he finally lost patience.
The reason was completely ordinary.
He had promised to buy groceries before their guests arrived and forgot. Nadezhda had already ordered everything herself.
Alexey came home and had barely taken off his jacket when he heard:
“If I had relied on you, tomorrow we’d be serving our guests nothing but tea.”
He looked tiredly at his wife.
“I forgot. It happens. You’ve already ordered everything, so why turn this into another argument?”
“Of course. A lot of things seem to ‘just happen’ with you lately.”
Alexey froze immediately.
“Don’t mix groceries with Veronika.”
“I’m not mixing anything.”
“That’s exactly what you’re doing. I drew a boundary. I told you everything. I’m not hiding anything from you. Tell me directly—what else am I supposed to do?”
Nadezhda put a plate down on the table more sharply than she intended.
“And I’m tired of always having to be reasonable. Not being jealous. Not asking questions. Calmly accepting the fact that you enjoyed another woman’s attention.”
Alexey raised his voice too.
“I never said I wanted another woman. I told you an unpleasant truth, and now that truth is being used against me every day.”
Nadezhda fell silent.
There was truth in that too.
If Alexey had lied and said he had never even noticed Veronika’s interest, perhaps Nadezhda would have felt calmer now.
But that calm would have been built on a lie.
“I don’t want to feel like a guard watching my own husband,” she said more quietly.
Alexey sat down at the table.
“Then you can’t become one. If I decide to deceive you, no amount of checking will stop me. And if I don’t want to deceive you, there’s no point suspecting every phone call.”
“That’s very convenient.”
He shook his head.
“It isn’t convenient. It’s frightening. Because I understand too that one day you could choose someone other than me. We’re both human.”
For the first time, Nadezhda looked at the situation from somewhere other than her own perspective.
She had grown used to thinking of their marriage as something already settled.
A home.
Shared habits.
Vacations.
Arguments about purchases.
Familiar jokes.
As though after so many years the choice had already been made forever, and all they had to do now was simply live.
It turned out the choice still had to be made.
Not ceremonially every day.
Sometimes it was simply a matter of telling someone else “No” at the right moment.
Alexey later told her himself about what happened in the office.
Veronika stayed behind with him after a client meeting. They quickly finished discussing the work issue, but she was in no hurry to leave.
“Can I say something directly? I’m tired of this game where we pretend there’s nothing between us.”
Alexey closed the folder.
“There really is nothing between us except work.”
Veronika smirked.
“You know perfectly well that I like you. And you like me too.”
Alexey didn’t pretend to be surprised.
“You’re an attractive woman. I enjoyed your attention. I didn’t even hide that from my wife.”
Veronika visibly brightened.
“Then why did you create all this drama?”
“Because enjoying someone’s attention doesn’t mean I want anything more.”
She was silent for several seconds.
“We don’t have to change anything. I’m not asking you to divorce her.”
After those words, Alexey could no longer pretend there was any possibility he had misunderstood her.
“No. I don’t want that.”
Veronika looked at him almost irritably.
“Because of your wife?”
“Because of me. But if you want the full answer, then yes, because of her too. I love Nadya, and I don’t want to lie to her.”
“After so many years, that’s probably more habit than love.”
Alexey shook his head.
“You see us for a few minutes at company events. Don’t explain to me what I feel for my own wife.”
Veronika stood up.
“I never thought you were such a righteous man.”
Alexey answered calmly:
“I’m not righteous. I just know too well who I don’t want to lose.”
That ended the conversation.
Alexey came home later than usual.
Nadezhda immediately saw that he wanted to tell her something.
“Just don’t scare me with that expression. Tell me normally.”
He told her everything without trying to make himself look like a hero.
Including repeating what he had admitted to Veronika: yes, he had enjoyed her attention.
Nadezhda listened until the end.
“You could have simply not told me about that conversation. I would never have known.”
Alexey nodded.
“I could have. But then there would have been a secret between us. Even though I rejected her, I still would have deliberately hidden what happened from you.”
Nadezhda walked over to the window.
She remembered a phrase she had once heard and thought was too beautiful for real life.
You can seduce a man who has a wife. You can seduce a man who has a mistress. But you cannot seduce a man who has a woman he truly loves.
Now its meaning seemed different to her.
A beloved woman does not make a man blind.
He still notices someone else’s beauty.
He can be flattered by attention.
He may even linger at the boundary longer than he should.
But eventually there comes a moment when he has to make the decision himself.
Nadezhda turned toward her husband.
“At the beginning, you still allowed this situation to go further than it should have. You didn’t deceive me, but you didn’t stop her either.”
Alexey didn’t argue.
“Yes. I liked feeling that I could still attract a woman. It was stupid, but it’s true.”
“A very unpleasant truth.”
“I understand.”
Nadezhda sat down beside him.
“But at least now I know what really happened. And I know what you did when she finally said it directly.”
After that, Veronika remained a work-related problem rather than a family mystery.
Her personal messages stopped.
Alexey didn’t look for excuses to communicate with her outside work and didn’t stay alone with her unless it was necessary.
Later, she was assigned a different group of clients, so they had fewer joint tasks.
Nadezhda learned about it accidentally when her husband mentioned his colleague’s new responsibilities over dinner.
“So you hardly work together now?”
“Hardly at all. Sometimes we see each other at general meetings.”
Nadezhda continued cutting vegetables.
“I see.”
Alexey looked at her.
“That’s all? I thought you’d be happy.”
“If my peace of mind depended only on whether Veronika sat next to you or in another office, then it would mean we hadn’t solved anything.”
Her husband opened the refrigerator.
“Have you seen the cheese? I’m sure I bought some.”
Nadezhda pointed with the knife toward the top shelf.
“It’s right in front of you.”
Alexey took out the package.
“See? That’s why I need you. Without you, I’d perish somewhere between the cheese and the butter.”
“Don’t exaggerate your helplessness. It’s impressive enough without embellishment.”
He laughed.
The phone in his pocket gave a short notification sound.
Alexey automatically looked at the screen.
“Work. Not Veronika.”
Nadezhda shook her head.
“I didn’t ask.”
He put the phone away.
“Right. I’m learning not to report everything.”
“And I’m learning not to expect a report.”
Nadezhda placed the vegetables on the table and reminded her husband to buy bread in the morning.
Alexey immediately set a reminder so he wouldn’t forget again.
They didn’t return to the subject of Veronika that evening.
Not because Nadezhda had suddenly stopped feeling jealous.
And not because Alexey had somehow become a man who would never again notice an attractive woman.
It was simply that, in their particular story, Veronika had finally received a clear answer—not from the wife, not from circumstances, and not from a changed work schedule.
