“Mom, what are you doing?” Yegor froze in the bedroom doorway, gripping the doorframe.
“What do you think? I’m helping you live normally!” Olga Romanovna decisively flung open the cabinet with the children’s toys and began scooping them into a large bag. “The children aren’t babies anymore, and this place is a mess. Sasha is seven, and there are toy cars lying underfoot!”
Ksenia entered the room and stopped dead. Sunday morning had only just begun; she had not even fully woken up yet, and her mother-in-law had already staged a complete takeover. On the bed where the children usually slept when they played tent, there was a large burgundy suitcase. A second, smaller one stood by the wall. Bags were piled on the table.
“Olga Romanovna, what is going on?” Ksenia’s voice came out quieter than she had intended.
“What is going on?” her mother-in-law turned around, straightened up, and put her hands on her hips. “I’m moving in with you. My upstairs neighbors flooded my apartment. There’s water all over the floor, the ceiling collapsed in the hallway. Repairs will take at least a month, maybe more. Where do you expect me to live? I have the right to live here, and I will!”
Yegor gave his wife a guilty look. Ksenia swallowed. Dozens of questions rushed through her mind, but only one escaped her lips.
“Why didn’t you call us? Why didn’t you warn us?”
“Why should I warn you?” Olga Romanovna went back to sorting the toys. “This is my son’s apartment. I’m his mother. Or are you saying I’m a stranger here?”
Yulya peeked from behind the doorway, her eyes wide open. Behind her stood a disheveled Sasha in Spider-Man pajamas.
“Grandma, where are you putting our toys?” Yulya asked quietly.
“We’ll put them on the balcony, my dear. You’re a big girl now. Dolls should be played with neatly, not scattered all over the apartment.” Olga Romanovna spoke affectionately, but she continued stuffing toys into the bag so quickly it was as if she feared someone would stop her.
“Maybe we should talk?” Ksenia stepped forward. “In the kitchen?”
“We’ll talk later,” her mother-in-law waved her off. “I still have to unpack my things. Yegor, help your mother open the suitcase. The lock is stuck.”
Yegor obediently went over to the suitcase. Ksenia looked at her husband, then at her mother-in-law, then at the children. Sasha had already climbed toward the balcony to see where Grandma was putting their treasures. The situation was slipping out of control with every passing second.
“Children, go have breakfast,” Ksenia said and turned toward the door.
In the kitchen, she switched on the kettle and leaned against the countertop. Something tightened in her chest. Just like that—she had arrived, announced she would be living here, and had not even asked. She had not even called in advance. Ksenia remembered how six months earlier, she and Yegor had gone to his mother’s birthday. Even then, Olga Romanovna had hinted, “If only I lived closer to my grandchildren, I would look after them properly. You both work, and the children are growing up on their own.”
Back then Yegor had only made an indistinct sound. Ksenia had stayed silent, though she had wanted to say that the children were growing up perfectly well without additional supervision.
The kettle boiled. Ksenia took out mugs and automatically began getting cereal and milk. Yulya and Sasha entered the kitchen quietly, uncertainly.
“Mom, is Grandma going to live here forever now?” Sasha asked, climbing onto a chair.
“Temporarily,” Ksenia replied, and immediately thought that “temporarily,” when it came to Olga Romanovna, could stretch into an indefinite period.
Ten minutes later, her mother-in-law entered the kitchen. She swept a critical glance over the table.
“Cereal? Cereal again?” She shook her head. “Children should eat proper food. You need to cook porridge, with butter. Cereal is all chemicals.”
“Mom, don’t start,” Yegor came in after her and sat down at the table.
“What do you mean, ‘don’t start’? I care about my grandchildren!” Olga Romanovna opened the refrigerator and took out eggs. “I’ll make them a proper breakfast now.”
Ksenia tightened her grip on her mug. She had already poured herself coffee, but she no longer wanted to drink it. She wanted to leave. Simply take herself out of her own apartment, out of her own kitchen, where another woman was now dictating what her children should eat.
“Olga Romanovna, I’ve already made breakfast,” she said evenly.
“So what? I’ll add to it. I’ll make fried eggs.” Her mother-in-law was already taking out a frying pan. “You need to get ready for work, and I’ll manage here.”
“It’s my day off today,” Ksenia said coldly.
Olga Romanovna turned around.
“Then rest. I’ll handle it myself. Don’t tell me you thought I was going to be a guest here. No, I’ll be helping. This house needs order.”
Yegor sighed heavily but said nothing. Yulya chewed her cereal, staring into her bowl. Sasha reached across the table for a banana.
Ksenia left the kitchen. In the hallway, she leaned against the wall and closed her eyes. “This is my apartment,” she repeated to herself. The apartment her grandmother had left her. The apartment she had received before the wedding. She was the mistress here. And yet, for some reason, in that moment she felt like an outsider.
The rest of the day passed in a strange, unreal bustle. Olga Romanovna threw herself into activity. She washed all the mugs in the kitchen cabinet—“There was dust here”—rearranged the pots—“How can you store them so inconveniently?”—and pulled the leftovers from yesterday’s dinner out of the refrigerator—“This isn’t fresh anymore, it needs to be thrown away.”
Ksenia moved through the apartment like a shadow. Every time she tried to do something, her mother-in-law was already doing it herself—and in her own way. The children ran back and forth between Grandma and Mom, not understanding whom to listen to. Yegor shut himself in the small room with his laptop, claiming urgent work.
In the evening, when the children had finally fallen asleep, Ksenia went to her husband.
“We need to talk.”
Yegor looked up from the screen. He looked tired.
“I understand what you want to say…”
“No, you don’t,” Ksenia interrupted him. “Yegor, your mother moved into our apartment without even asking. She turned everything upside down in one day. She’s telling me what to feed my children!”
“Our children,” Yegor corrected quietly.
“Fine, our children! But that doesn’t change the point. Yegor, she should have at least warned us. Called. Discussed it. Instead, she simply arrived with suitcases and decided she had the right to run things here!”
Yegor rubbed his face with his palms.
“Ksyusha, what can I do? Her apartment was flooded. Where is she supposed to go?”
“To her friends. To her sister—your mother has a sister, Lidia Romanovna! She lives downtown. Or we can rent her a hotel…”
“A hotel?” Yegor looked at his wife as if she had suggested throwing his mother out onto the street. “You want my mother to live in a hotel?”
“I want her not to live here!” Ksenia blurted out, and immediately regretted the words.
Yegor turned toward the window.
“She’s my mother. She has a housing problem. I can’t refuse her.”
“And you can refuse me?” Ksenia asked quietly.
He did not answer.
Monday began with chaos. Ksenia got up at half past six, as usual, and went to the bathroom. The door was locked. The sound of running water came from inside.
“Olga Romanovna?” she called.
“Yes, I’m here! I’ll be out soon!”
“Soon” stretched into twenty minutes. When her mother-in-law finally came out, Ksenia realized she was running late. She quickly washed her face, rushed to the kitchen—and found Olga Romanovna at the stove.
“I cooked porridge for the children. Proper oatmeal. And I warmed the milk.”
The children sat at the table with sleepy faces. Yulya obediently ate her porridge. Sasha poked at it with his spoon and grimaced.
“Sasha, eat faster, we have to leave in ten minutes,” Ksenia said, pouring coffee into her travel mug.
“Don’t rush him. He’s not a hungry robot,” Olga Romanovna interfered. “Children should eat calmly. You’re always hurrying them.”
Ksenia clenched her jaw. This was not the time to argue. She quickly started slicing sandwiches for the children’s snack.
“They’re already sliced,” her mother-in-law pointed to a plate of sandwiches. “I made them. With sausage.”
Ksenia looked at the sandwiches. They had cheap boiled sausage in them, the kind she never bought.
“You bought sausage?”
“No, it was in your refrigerator. On the very bottom shelf.”
Ksenia remembered—it was something Yegor sometimes bought for himself for work. It was probably no longer fresh.
“Olga Romanovna, that sausage is already…”
“What’s wrong with it? It’s perfectly normal sausage! I’m not giving my grandchildren poison!”
Yulya looked at her mother fearfully. Sasha put the sandwich down.
“Mom, can I not eat it?”
“Sasha!” her mother-in-law’s voice became stern. “Grandma tried for you, and now you’re being fussy!”
“All right,” Ksenia said quickly. “Children, take your backpacks. Let’s go.”
She grabbed the coats and keys and practically pushed Yulya and Sasha out the door. In the car, she exhaled. Her hands were trembling as she turned the key in the ignition.
“Mom, is Grandma going to live with us forever now?” Yulya asked from the back seat.
“Temporarily, sweetheart. Her place is being repaired.”
“When will it be finished?”
“Soon.”
“Please let it be soon,” Ksenia thought as she pulled away.
At work, she could not concentrate. She received patients, scheduled appointments, answered calls—all mechanically. At lunch, she called her sister.
“Sveta, I have a problem.”
“What kind of problem?”
Ksenia briefly told her about the morning situation. Sveta was silent, then snorted.
“Okay, stop. Question number one—are you absolutely sure her apartment was flooded?”
“She said so herself…”
“Ksyukh, did you check?”
Ksenia was taken aback.
“No. Why would I? Why would she lie?”
“Because your mother-in-law retired a year ago and, in my opinion, got bored. Remember what she said at her birthday? That it would be nice to live closer to the grandchildren?”
“But that’s…” Ksenia faltered. “Sveta, that’s absurd. She couldn’t have just invented a flood.”
“She could. Listen, are you free after work today? Go to her building. Go upstairs to the neighbors. Ask whether there was a leak.”
“That feels… awkward.”
“Ksyusha, you feel awkward checking the truth, but she didn’t feel awkward moving into your apartment without asking? Go. Check. Then we’ll talk.”
That evening, Ksenia really did go to her mother-in-law’s building. She went up to the fifth floor and stood in front of the door where the upstairs neighbors lived. Her heart was pounding. “This is stupid,” she thought. “They’ll confirm there was a flood, and I’ll be ashamed.”
She rang the bell. The door was opened by a young woman of about thirty with a baby in her arms.
“Hello. I’m sorry to bother you. I’m from the apartment below… well, that is, I’m the daughter-in-law of the woman who owns the apartment below…”
“Yes?” the woman looked at her questioningly.
“You didn’t have a leak, did you? Something that reached the neighbors below?”
The woman frowned.
“A leak? No, everything is fine here. What happened?”
“So there weren’t any problems with the pipes? Recently?”
“None at all. We’ve lived here for three years, and everything’s been fine.” The woman held the baby closer. “Why are you asking?”
Ksenia opened her mouth, then closed it. Everything in her head turned upside down.
“Sorry for bothering you. Thank you.”
She went downstairs on trembling legs. She got into the car and simply sat there, staring into nothing. So there had been no flood. Olga Romanovna had lied. She had simply taken it upon herself to lie so she could move in with them.
She returned home around eight in the evening. The children were already doing their homework—or rather, Yulya was doing hers, while Sasha fidgeted at his desk. Olga Romanovna sat beside the boy and spoke sternly.
“Sasha, you’ve been sitting over one problem for half an hour! Focus!”
“Grandma, I don’t understand…”
“That’s because you’re distracted! Your mother is always at work, and you’re growing up unsupervised!”
Ksenia entered the room. She looked at her mother-in-law. Olga Romanovna raised her head.
“Oh, you’re back. I already fed the children. We had pasta with cutlets. Though your cutlets are a bit dry; next time I’ll make them myself.”
“Olga Romanovna, I need to speak with you.” Ksenia’s voice sounded calm, but everything inside her was boiling.
“We’ll talk later. I’m helping my grandson with his homework.”
“Now.”
Something in her tone made her mother-in-law stand up. They went out into the hallway. Ksenia closed the door to the children’s room.
“I went to your upstairs neighbors.”
Olga Romanovna’s face twitched.
“Why?”
“I asked about the flooding.” Ksenia looked her mother-in-law straight in the eyes. “There was no flooding. Everything is fine at their place. They’ve lived there for three years and have never had any leaks.”
Silence hung between them. Olga Romanovna straightened, her face hardening.
“And what are you trying to say?”
“You lied. You invented the flooding so you could move in with us.”
“So what?” her mother-in-law’s voice grew louder. “What’s so terrible about that? My son lives in this apartment!”
“Yegor lives here because this is my apartment and he is my husband! You are not registered here!”
“But I am his mother!” Olga Romanovna stepped forward. “And I have every right to be close to my son and grandchildren! Or do you think that just because the apartment is in your name, you’re the queen here?”
“I think you should have asked permission!”
“Permission? From whom? From you?” her mother-in-law sneered. “My son doesn’t need to ask his wife’s permission to invite his own mother!”
“He didn’t invite you! You came yourself! With suitcases! And you lied about repairs!”
Their voices were getting louder. Yulya peeked out of the room, her face frightened. Ksenia drew a breath and forced herself to speak more quietly.
“Olga Romanovna, you cannot simply move into someone else’s apartment.”
“Someone else’s?” her mother-in-law lifted her chin. “For my son, this is not someone else’s apartment!”
“For you, it is.”
“We’ll see what Yegor says.”
Yegor came home half an hour later. Ksenia met him in the hallway.
“We need to talk. Seriously.”
From the look on her husband’s face, she understood that his mother had already managed to call him. He silently went into the kitchen and sat at the table. Ksenia sat opposite him.
“Your mother lied. There was no flood.”
“I know,” Yegor said quietly. “She called me and said you went to the neighbors.”
“And what do you think now?”
Yegor was silent, looking out the window. Then he sighed heavily.
“Ksyush, well, yes, Mom exaggerated the situation a little…”
“Exaggerated? Yegor, she lied! She invented a flood so she could move in with us!”
“Well, maybe she just… maybe she’s lonely. Retirement, sitting alone in her apartment…”
“And that gives her the right to lie and invade our life?”
“She’s my mother!” Yegor raised his voice. “It’s hard for her to be alone! What’s so bad about her living with us?”
Ksenia leaned back in her chair. She looked at her husband and no longer recognized him.
“Yegor, listen to yourself. Your mother lied to both of us. She moved in without asking. She has already managed to turn the entire apartment upside down. She tells me how to feed the children, how to clean, what to cook. And you’re defending this?”
“I’m not defending it! It’s just…” He faltered. “She’s my mom. And I can’t throw her out.”
“No one is asking you to throw her out. I’m asking you to set conditions for her. To tell her that this is unacceptable. That we have our own life, our own rules.”
“She won’t understand.”
“Then let her move out.”
“Ksyusha!”
“What, ‘Ksyusha’?” She stood up. “Yegor, this is my apartment. I got it from my grandmother long before our wedding. And I am not obligated to tolerate a person in it who lies, manipulates, and disrespects me!”
Yegor stood up too.
“So you want me to choose—my mother or you?”
“I want you to behave like a husband, not like a mama’s boy!”
The words hung in the air. Yegor turned pale, turned around, and left the kitchen. A minute later, the front door slammed.
Ksenia sat alone in the kitchen. Her head was empty. She wanted to cry, but there were no tears—only a heaviness in her chest and bitterness in her mouth. She heard Olga Romanovna appear in the hallway.
“Are you satisfied? You drove my son out of the house.”
Ksenia slowly raised her head.
“Leave.”
“You leave!” her mother-in-law stepped into the kitchen. “You’re destroying the family! Turning my son against his mother!”
“I said leave.”
“I’m not leaving! I’m staying here! My son will come back and choose me, not you! He has always chosen me!”
Ksenia stood up. She came very close to her mother-in-law. She spoke quietly, but every word struck like a blow.
“You are a liar. You lied about the flood. You invaded my apartment. You are trying to manipulate your son. And I will not allow you to destroy my family.”
“Your family?” Olga Romanovna laughed. “You don’t even have a family! Your husband ran away, and your children are afraid of you!”
“The children aren’t afraid of me. They’re afraid of you. Because you shout at them when I’m not looking. Because you criticize their every step.”
“I’m raising them properly!”
“You’re frightening them!”
Yulya appeared in the doorway. The girl’s eyes were wet.
“Mom, don’t fight…”
Ksenia went over to her daughter and crouched in front of her.
“Yulya, everything will be all right. Go to your room.”
“But Dad left…”
“Dad will come back soon. Please go.”
Yulya looked at her grandmother, then at her mother, and left. Olga Romanovna crossed her arms over her chest.
“You see? The child is crying. Because of you.”
“Because of you,” Ksenia said calmly. “You came here and created chaos. Now my children don’t understand whom to listen to. My husband is torn between us. And all because you cannot accept that your son has grown up and has his own family.”
“He is my son!”
“And he is my husband. And the father of my children. And he lives in my apartment because I love him and want to be with him. But you…” Ksenia paused. “You simply want to control him. The way you controlled him his entire life.”
Olga Romanovna jerked as if she had been struck.
“How dare you say that!”
“I dare. Because it’s true. And you know it.”
Her mother-in-law turned around and went to her room, slamming the door loudly. Ksenia remained standing in the kitchen. Her hands were shaking. She took out her phone and called her sister.
“Sveta, can you come? I need support.”
Yegor returned late at night. He smelled of cigarettes—apparently he had been standing somewhere outside, though he did not smoke himself, just near people who did. Ksenia was sitting in the living room. Sveta had already left, and the children were asleep.
“I’m sorry,” he said, sitting down beside her.
“For what?”
“For not supporting you right away. For trying to sit on two chairs at once.”
Ksenia looked at him.
“Yegor, I’m not throwing your mother out onto the street. I just want there to be rules. For her to respect us. Our home. Our choices.”
“I understand.” He rubbed his face. “It’s just that Mom has always been difficult. She… she’s used to deciding everything for me. And I’m used to obeying.”
“You’re thirty-four years old.”
“I know.” He gave a sad little smile. “Sounds stupid, doesn’t it? A grown man afraid to upset his mother.”
“Not afraid. You don’t want to hurt her. Those are different things.”
Yegor took her hand.
“Tomorrow I’ll talk to her. I’ll tell her she has to leave. We’ll help her find temporary housing, pay if we need to. But she will not stay here anymore.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes. Because if I don’t do anything, I’ll lose you. And the children. And that… that is worse than upsetting my mother.”
Ksenia leaned against him. For the first time in these days, she felt she was not alone.
In the morning, Yegor really did speak with his mother. Ksenia was not present for the conversation—she simply got the children ready for school and tried to pretend everything was normal. Voices came from the room. At first calm, then louder and louder.
“You’re choosing her over me!” Olga Romanovna shouted.
“Mom, I’m choosing my family,” Yegor answered firmly.
“I’m your family too!”
“Yes. But you cannot live here on your own terms. This is Ksenia’s apartment. And you lied about the flooding.”
“So what? I wanted to be closer to my grandchildren!”
“You wanted to control us. As always.”
Silence fell. Then his mother spoke more quietly, but Ksenia still heard through the door.
“So I’m a stranger to you now?”
“No. But you have to respect my life. My choice. My wife.”
More silence. Then Olga Romanovna came out of the room. Her face was like stone. She walked past Ksenia without looking at her and disappeared into the room where her things were.
Yegor came out after her. He looked exhausted.
“She’ll pack today. I called Aunt Lida. She agreed to take Mom for a week or two until we find something else.”
Ksenia nodded. There was no joy, no relief. Only exhaustion.
Olga Romanovna packed slowly and theatrically. She put things away with loud sighs, slammed the suitcase lid, and dropped something on the floor. When it was time to leave, she put on her coat and stood in the hallway.
“So this is how it is,” she said, looking at Ksenia. “You’re throwing out a close family member.”
“No one is throwing you out,” Ksenia answered evenly. “You can come visit. You can see your grandchildren. But living here permanently, telling everyone what to do—no.”
“I understand everything,” her mother-in-law lifted her chin. “I understand who’s in charge here. And Yegor understands too—that you have him under your heel.”
“Mom, enough,” Yegor said tiredly, reaching for the suitcase.
“Don’t touch it! I’ll carry it myself!”
She grabbed the suitcase and rushed toward the door. Yegor followed and picked up the second suitcase. They left. Ksenia remained in the apartment with the children.
Yulya came over to her mother and hugged her around the waist.
“Grandma won’t come back anymore?”
“She will. To visit. But she won’t live with us.”
“That’s good,” Sasha suddenly said. “She was always scolding.”
Ksenia stroked her son’s head. She sat down on the sofa. The children settled beside her. That was how they sat until Yegor returned.
He entered the apartment, closed the door, and leaned his back against it.
“That’s it. I took her to Aunt Lida’s.”
“How is she?”
“Offended. Angry. Said I would regret it.”
“And you?”
Yegor looked at his wife, then at the children.
“No. I don’t regret it.”
He came over and sat beside them. Sasha climbed onto his lap. Yulya pressed against her mother. They sat like that—the four of them—and it felt right. This was their family. Without invasions. Without manipulation. Without lies.
That evening, after the children were already asleep, Yegor’s mother called him. Ksenia saw his face tense when he looked at the screen.
“Will you answer?” she asked.
“No. Not now. I’ll call her back tomorrow.”
He put the phone on the table. It was a small but important step. For the first time, Yegor had not rushed to obey his mother’s demands. He had not jumped up, had not run. He had simply postponed the call.
Ksenia went to the window. It was already dark outside. January dusk had settled over the city. Somewhere out there, in another district, Olga Romanovna was sitting at her sister’s and probably telling her what an ungrateful daughter-in-law she had. Or calling her friends. Or simply fuming alone.
Ksenia did not feel victorious. Only relief—like after a long illness, when the fever breaks and breathing becomes easier. Her apartment was her apartment again. The children were calm again. Her husband was once again her husband, not an intermediary between two women.
“What are you thinking about?” Yegor asked, coming up behind her.
“That it was hard.”
“Yes. But necessary.”
“Do you think she’ll forgive us?”
Yegor was silent for a moment.
“I don’t know. Maybe with time. Or maybe not. But I can’t live the way she wants anymore. I have my own life. My own children. My own wife.”
He hugged Ksenia from behind. She closed her eyes. Somewhere inside, warmth spread—from those words, from that embrace, from the understanding that they had made it through. Not perfectly, not beautifully, but they had made it through.
“Do you think she’ll come to Sasha’s birthday?” Ksenia asked. “It’s in a month.”
“I don’t know. We’ll invite her. If she comes, good. If not…” Yegor shrugged. “That will be her choice.”
They stood like that for a little while longer. Then Yegor stepped away and went to check whether the children’s door was closed. Ksenia remained by the window. She looked at the dark street, at the few lit windows, at the snow that had begun to fall.
Life lay ahead—ordinary life, with work, children, daily routines, and occasional visits from a mother-in-law who might never forgive them, might never understand. But it was their life. Their family. Their choice.
And that was the most important thing.
