The kitchen smelled of toasted bread and coffee brewed in a cheap cezve. Olga was sitting by the window in an old robe with worn-out elbows — something domestic and comfortable, not meant for guests. Pots with dried-up violets crowded the windowsill. Flowers had never taken root with her, no matter how hard she tried.
Dmitry came in the way he always did: wearing a T-shirt with a stretched-out collar, gloomy, phone in hand. He sat down and planted his elbows on the table.
“Coffee without milk again?” he said, twisting his lips in displeasure.
“You finished the milk yourself yesterday,” Olga snapped without looking up. “I asked you to leave some.”
A pause followed. He said nothing, but his face showed he was brooding over something. In recent months, he had become like a stranger — physically nearby, but as if there were walls between them.
“Listen, Olya,” he began, picking at his fried eggs with a fork. “We need to talk seriously.”
Here it comes, she thought. Again.
“Go ahead. Just without the theatrics, all right?” She pulled her robe tighter over her chest and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.
“I’ve been thinking for a long time…” Dmitry cleared his throat. “We’ve been living in this apartment for five years. Everything is yours. Everything is yours! And what am I? A lodger?”
“You’re my husband,” Olga replied calmly. “Or am I missing something?”
“A husband, yes. But with no rights. Even my registration here is temporary. I feel like a tenant in this place.”
Olga set her mug aside and stared at him.
“Dima, are you serious? This apartment belonged to my parents. They bought it back in the nineties, when the dollar was thirty rubles. I grew up here. I inherited it. This is my home.”
“Exactly! Yours. And what about me? Am I a stranger?”
He was speaking louder than necessary for an ordinary morning. The neighbors were probably already listening.
“And what are you suggesting?” Olga’s voice rang with steel.
“Put half of it in my name. Or better yet, the whole apartment. We’re family.”
She even laughed — nervously, briefly.
“Did you seriously just say that?”
“Absolutely.”
Olga looked at him closely, like a doctor observing a patient talking nonsense.
“Dima, do you understand that you’re asking me to give up the only thing I have left from my parents?”
“Don’t dramatize it. I’m not going to take anything away from you. It would just be fair. Everything should be shared.”
“Shared?” She stood up and walked over to the window. “All right, then let’s share everything. Will you transfer your car into my name?”
“The car is nothing. The apartment is serious.”
Olga turned around.
“Right. So your things are ‘nothing,’ and mine are ‘serious.’ Convenient logic.”
Dmitry slammed his palm down on the table. The cup trembled, spilling coffee.
“You’re always like this! Stubborn as a mule. I’m trying for us, and you…”
“For us?” Olga narrowed her eyes. “Or for your beloved self?”
The pause dragged on. He looked away and began nervously scrolling through his phone.
“Just understand, people will respect me when I have an apartment too. They won’t look at me like a man without a place of his own.”
“I don’t care how anyone looks at you,” Olga snapped. “That’s no reason to blackmail me.”
He lifted his head.
“If you don’t transfer it, I’ll file for divorce.”
The silence collapsed like a brick. Even the refrigerator in the corner seemed to fall quiet.
Olga sat back down, looking at her husband as if he were a stranger.
“Are you threatening me with divorce?” Her voice was trembling, but her eyes were firm.
“I’m not threatening you. I’m just tired of living like a nobody.”
She nodded slowly.
“So that’s how it is. I won’t give up the apartment. To anyone. Not to you, and not to your mother either, if she’s suddenly dreaming about it. This is my fortress. Stay if you want. If you don’t, you know where the door is.”
Dmitry stood up abruptly. The chair scraped against the floor.
“So you’re choosing walls over family?”
“No,” Olga said coldly. “I’m choosing myself. Because if I bend now, there will be nothing left of me.”
He opened his mouth to say something, then shut it. He slammed a cabinet door, grabbed his jacket, and stormed into the hallway.
A second later, the front door slammed.
Olga was left alone. The apartment smelled of coffee and fried onions, mixed with bitterness. She sat staring at the plate of half-eaten eggs and understood: this was it. The first shot had been fired.
The next day, Olga woke up to a strange silence. The apartment was empty — no sound, no smell of tobacco, which Dima usually filled the bathroom with in the morning. His jacket was gone from the hanger, and his sneakers had disappeared from the shelf.
She slowly walked into the bedroom. The wardrobe gaped open with empty shelves: jeans, shirts, tracksuit — everything was gone. On the top shelf, his tie from a corporate party lay there forlornly.
“What a bastard…” Olga whispered.
Her phone was blinking with unread messages. One was from Dima: “I’m at Mom’s. Think about it. Either we divide everything fairly, or I’m going to the registry office.”
Olga smirked.
“Of course. Mommy has gone into battle.”
Her mother-in-law, Valentina Petrovna, had never liked her. Not from day one. Everything was wrong: “the soup is too watery,” “your blouse is wrinkled,” “my son is tired, and you’re sending him to the store.” And now this woman was surely pouring fuel on the fire.
An hour later, the phone rang. It was her mother-in-law’s number.
“Yes?” Olga answered dryly.
“Olya, hello,” Valentina Petrovna said in a poisonous-sweet voice. “Forgive me for interfering, but I will support my son. He is right, after all. A man without an apartment is not a man. And you have a perfect opportunity to show that family comes first for you.”
“Valentina Petrovna,” Olga sighed. “I’m not touching the apartment. It’s an inheritance. It is not subject to division. Do you know the law?”
“The law is the law, but life is life. Do you think people will respect a family where the wife dominates the husband?”
“And do you think I’ll allow myself to be walked all over?”
Indignant puffing came from the other end of the line.
“How ungrateful. I’ve always tried so hard for you…”
“Really?” Olga interrupted. “You tried? All you ever did was tell me how to live. Well, from now on, you won’t be telling me anything.”
She ended the call. Her heart was pounding, her hands trembling.
By evening, the door slammed — Dima had returned. With two bags.
“Well,” he said without looking at her. “Have you decided?”
“I have,” Olga replied calmly. “Live with your mother.”
He dropped the bags in the hallway.
“Are you serious? You’re ready to ruin our marriage over four walls?”
“These aren’t walls, Dima. This is my life.”
He stepped closer, his eyes filling with anger.
“I told you: either we do this fairly, or it’s over.”
“Then it’s over,” she cut him off.
At that moment, he suddenly grabbed her by the arm.
“Do you even understand what you’re doing?”
Olga yanked her arm free.
“Let go. Immediately.”
They stood facing each other like two enemies in a ring.
“Fine,” he hissed through his teeth. “Tomorrow I’m going to a lawyer. I’ll find out how to arrange everything. You’ll regret this.”
“Good luck,” she said, and closed the door behind him.
Late that night, the phone rang.
“Mom, are you asleep?” It was the voice of her daughter, Katya, twenty years old. “Dad called… He said you kicked him out. That you had a scandal. That you’re crazy.”
“Katya,” Olga said tiredly. “Don’t believe him. Things are complicated between us, but I’ll handle it.”
“Mom, he was crying, can you imagine? He said you destroyed the family.”
Olga sat silently in the kitchen, clutching the phone. She wanted to scream, but she only closed her eyes.
A week passed. Olga lived alone, and the apartment seemed larger than usual. In the evenings, the silence rang; even the refrigerator hummed louder than before. Sometimes she wanted Dima to come back, but as soon as she remembered his eyes when he demanded the documents, everything inside her turned to stone.
The phone rang every day. Sometimes it was her husband, sometimes his mother, sometimes even colleagues and “family friends.” Everyone urged her to “meet him halfway,” “save the marriage,” “stop being stubborn.”
On Friday evening, the doorbell rang. Both of them were standing on the doorstep: Dmitry and Valentina Petrovna. He looked grim in a leather jacket. She was dressed up, with a handbag tucked under her arm and the expression of a general.
“We’re here to talk,” the mother-in-law declared without even saying hello.
“Come in,” Olga said, crossing her arms over her chest.
In the kitchen, the samovar began to boil. Valentina Petrovna sat down, placing her hands on the table as if she were conducting an interrogation. Dmitry stood silently by the window.
“Olya,” her mother-in-law began, “I’m a straightforward woman, so I’ll say it openly. You must transfer the apartment to my son. Then the family will be preserved, and Katya won’t suffer.”
Olga smirked.
“Must? Are you serious?”
“Absolutely. A man is the master of the house. But there is no master here. You’re keeping my son in humiliation.”
“Your son put himself there.”
Dmitry stepped closer.
“Olya, I don’t want to fight. Sign it, and everything will be settled peacefully.”
“Peacefully?” Olga lifted her eyes. “You’re blackmailing me with our child, with your mother, and now with this ‘peacefully’.”
She abruptly stood up and took a folder from the drawer of the dresser. Papers landed on the table.
“This is a court petition. I’m filing for divorce.”
Her mother-in-law gasped. Dmitry turned pale.
“Have you lost your mind?” He grabbed the folder, but Olga pulled it back.
“No. I’ve simply had enough. You wanted to strip me of the only thing I have. But I chose myself.”
Valentina Petrovna jumped to her feet, her face twisted.
“You’ll regret this, girl!”
“No,” Olga replied calmly. “You’re the ones who will regret it.”
Dmitry stamped his foot like a teenager.
“Fine. Do whatever you want. I’m leaving. But know this: I’m never coming back.”
“Excellent,” Olga said. “The door is right there.”
They left. The door slammed.
The apartment fell silent again. Olga sat down at the table and poured herself a cup of tea. For the first time in many years, it was quiet inside her. No fear, no humiliation. Only emptiness — but it was her emptiness.
She looked at the photographs of her parents on the wall.
“I did the right thing,” she whispered.
And for the first time in a long time, she smiled.
