“Oh, Seryozha! Yulia and I have already planned everything here! She wrote it all down. She’s such a good girl, even if she’s a little strange.”
Yulia sat in front of a wide monitor, her fingers flying over the keyboard at incredible speed, occasionally switching to the mouse. On the screen, as if by magic, the outlines of a luxurious living room slowly appeared. She was a true virtuoso in her field.
The work of an interior designer required not only impeccable taste, but also enormous technical knowledge. Yulia masterfully handled every advanced program: from the most complex 3D modeling systems to the latest rendering engines capable of calculating the refraction of light in a crystal chandelier down to the tiniest glimmer.
She did not simply draw pretty pictures. She created ergonomic spaces, thought through to the millimeter, where every light switch was placed exactly where the hand would instinctively reach. Clients adored Yulia. And not least because she herself was the perfect showcase of her own talent. She closely followed global trends not only in architecture and décor, but also in fashion.
There were no random items in her wardrobe. Perfectly tailored trouser suits made of dense silk, cashmere turtlenecks in deep, sophisticated shades, minimalist yet expensive jewelry in complex geometric shapes. She always looked stylish, refined, and expensive. When clients saw such a woman in front of them, they immediately trusted her, understanding that someone with such flawless appearance simply could not create a tasteless interior.
However, this triumph of aesthetics and professionalism ended exactly where her husband’s territory began.
Sergey worked as an ordinary middle manager in a large but completely faceless corporation. His life followed a strict schedule five days a week, from nine in the morning until six in the evening. He wore standard blue suits, ate business lunches in the cafeteria on the first floor of the business center, and sincerely believed that he was one of the pillars holding up the country’s economy.
Sergey treated his wife’s profession with condescending contempt bordering on open aggression. To him, her work was something unserious, like a child playing with dolls, only on a computer.
The fact that Yulia earned several times more than he did was something Sergey preferred to ignore, explaining it away with phrases like “fools get lucky” and “rich people don’t know what to do with their money, so they pay for those little pictures of yours.” His wounded male pride demanded compensation, and he found it in constant nitpicking.
Weekends irritated Sergey most of all. Interior design was not the kind of field where one could turn off the phone on Friday evening and forget about a project until Monday. Construction did not wait. Clients investing huge sums into their homes often wanted to discuss details precisely on their lawful days off. So Yulia often spent Saturdays and Sundays at her desk, making changes to drawings or selecting material textures from online catalogs.
“You’re staring at that monitor again!” Sergey would snap, pacing around the room and deliberately shuffling his slippers loudly. “Normal wives bake pies on weekends, iron shirts, watch television with their husbands! And you? Do you even live in the real world? You’re obsessed with your visualizations! Who even needs those hidden-baseboard things of yours?”
“Seryozha, I have a deadline on Monday morning,” Yulia replied calmly, without taking her eyes off the screen, where a complex texture of natural marble was being calculated. “The construction crew needs the wall elevations. If I don’t submit the project today, their work will stop, and I’ll have to pay a penalty.”
“I couldn’t care less about your penalty!” her husband would flare up, feeling that his own importance was once again losing the competition to some piece of marble. “I mean nothing to you! You’re not a woman, you’re a cyborg with a mouse in your hand!”
Scandals like this broke out regularly. Sergey would work himself up, wind himself into a rage, then theatrically slam the wardrobe door, pull on his jacket, and announce that he was leaving for somewhere “where he was valued and understood.” He could disappear until late at night, returning toward morning, soaked in the smell of tobacco, alcohol, and someone else’s sickly-sweet perfume.
At first, Yulia, immersed in her projects, tried to talk to him, save the marriage, and explain the specifics of her profession. But over time, she simply gave up.
All that remained of their relationship was habit and a stamp in the passport. She found an outlet in her only hobby — pottery. Once a week, she rented a spot in a workshop, sat at the wheel, and spent hours shaping perfect, smooth bowls and vases out of shapeless lumps of clay. This tactile contact with earth calmed her, restoring balance after the digital geometry of her working days.
While Yulia worked, Sergey did not waste time. During one of his “offended” evenings, he met a charming but extremely mercenary young woman named Milana. Milana worked as an administrator at a beauty salon and dreamed of a beautiful life, expensive resorts, and a generous patron.
Encouraged by the attention of a young woman, Sergey quickly slipped into the role of a successful businessman whose unloved, boring, computer-bound mouse of a wife was waiting for him at home. He showered Milana with compliments and promises of an imminent divorce, although in reality his salary barely covered visits to mid-range restaurants.
The intrigue revolved around one circumstance that Sergey discovered completely by accident.
Several months earlier, Yulia had made a major purchase. Thanks to several successful premium projects and smart investing, she had managed to buy a magnificent, spacious open-plan apartment in an elite residential complex still under construction. It was her personal achievement, her secret project. She had registered the property in her own name, using money saved in her personal account.
Yulia planned to make an incredible renovation there, pouring all her design ambitions into it, and then either resell it at a profit or… move there herself, starting a new life from scratch, without the eternally dissatisfied Sergey.
The documents and keys to the new apartment lay in the bottom drawer of her work desk. Sergey, who had never been interested in his wife’s papers, once rummaged through that drawer looking for a stapler and stumbled upon the purchase agreement and a heavy set of keys with a magnetic chip. Seeing the address of the elite complex, he was stunned. He could not comprehend that his wife was capable of such purchases.
But instead of asking questions, a cunning and brazen plan formed in Sergey’s mind.
He decided to use the vacant apartment, still in rough finish, to impress his mistress. Sergey carefully made a duplicate set of keys. To Milana, he presented the story in an entirely different way: supposedly, he, a successful investor, had bought luxury real estate for their future life together, and as soon as he threw out his useless wife, they would move into these magnificent quarters.
Milana was delighted. She demanded that he show her “their” new love nest. Sergey brought her there several times in the evenings, opening the door with the duplicate keys. The bare concrete walls and absence of partitions did not bother Milana. She saw the panoramic windows and the prestigious district. But soon she wanted more. She wanted to become the mistress of the place and personally choose the furnishings.
Sergey, carried away by his oligarch role, promised to hire her the best realtor-designer from the developer, who would help with the furniture and renovation while he was “busy with important negotiations.”
There was only one thing Sergey did not know: Yulia had already begun supervising the preparatory work.
That Saturday, the construction crew had taken the day off, and Yulia decided to go to the site alone so she could calmly take final measurements with a laser tape measure and check the floor level. She dressed comfortably, but, as always, impeccably: beige cashmere palazzo pants, a thin milky sweater, her hair gathered into an elegant low ponytail. In her hands was a tablet with electronic drawings.
Yulia was standing with her back to the entrance, making notes on the screen with a stylus, when a key suddenly turned in the lock.
The door swung open. On the threshold stood a striking brunette with inflated lips, wearing an acid-colored puffer jacket and carrying a massive designer bag that was clearly a fake. The girl stepped inside with the air of an owner, her heels clicking on the concrete screed, and stopped when she saw Yulia.
Yulia froze. For the first second, she thought it might be someone from the management company or a neighbor who had mistaken the floor.
“Oh, you’re already here!” the stranger said brightly, looking Yulia up and down with an appraising gaze. “Seryozhik said you might be late. You’re the realtor from the agency, right? The one who also does design? My man told me you’d help me plan everything here.”
Yulia’s mind, used to processing terabytes of information, assembled the puzzle in a fraction of a second. “Seryozhik.” Duplicate keys. A young woman with pretensions of glamour, convinced she was standing in her man’s apartment. And that man was her own husband, Sergey.
A hot wave of anger rose to her throat, but Yulia suppressed it by sheer force of will. Her face remained completely expressionless. Control was what she did best. If this girl thought she was hired staff, then this was a perfect chance to find out just how deep her dear husband’s lies had gone.
“Yes, good afternoon,” Yulia said with a slight smile, an ideal professional smile that carried a pleasant chill. “Come in. My name is Yulia. And you must be the future mistress of the apartment?”
“Milana,” the girl said, proudly lifting her chin. “Yes, this is Sergey’s and my home. He’s such a clever man, grabbing a place this big! True, it’s bare concrete for now, but we’ll fix everything quickly. He has money to burn.”
Yulia raised one eyebrow almost imperceptibly, pretending to enter information into her tablet. Sergey, who had thrown a tantrum the previous day because she had bought cheese that was too expensive for the house, was apparently a millionaire.
“Excellent, Milana. Then let’s discuss the concept,” Yulia said evenly and softly. “I’ve already prepared a preliminary zoning plan. Here we were planning a spacious master bedroom with a walk-in wardrobe, and the area by the panoramic windows would become a bright living room in a minimalist style with Japandi elements. Natural wood, stone, hidden storage systems.”
Milana grimaced as though someone had shoved a spoiled lemon under her nose.
“What minimalism? Are you kidding me?” she waved a hand with long extended nails, rhinestones flashing in the light. “That’s so boring! Like a hospital! No, no, no. I want it to look rich and expensive. Sergey said I could have anything I wanted.”
The girl pulled a glossy magazine from her bottomless bag and began fussily flipping through the pages.
“Look here, Yulia. In the living room, we’ll put a sofa. A huge one. Pink velvet! And around it — armchairs with golden legs. We’ll put wallpaper with monograms on the walls, you know, shiny ones. And on the ceiling — a crystal chandelier, a multi-tiered one!”
Yulia listened to this stream of consciousness, fighting laughter and disgust inside herself. Pink velvet and golden legs in a loft space with three-meter ceilings and panoramic glazing. It was a design crime that deserved a trial.
“An interesting choice,” Yulia replied neutrally, pretending to take notes. “And what about the kitchen?”
“The kitchen has to be black, glossy, so the fronts shine like mirrors! And the backsplash should be red glass!” her husband’s mistress announced enthusiastically, pacing across someone else’s concrete floor. “And a bar counter with Swarovski crystals. Seryozhik loves it when everything sparkles.”
“Really?” Yulia tilted her head slightly. “And I heard some men prefer calmer interiors. How does Sergey’s… family feel about this style?”
Milana snorted disdainfully, adjusting the collar of her puffer jacket.
“What family? You mean his wife? Oh, please! She’s not a wife, she’s a misunderstanding. A gray mouse. Can you imagine, she sits at the computer all day, playing some games or drawing her little plans. Ugly, unkempt, walking around in greasy sweatpants. Sergey simply howls because of her! He says she can’t even fry an egg. He only lived with her out of pity, can you imagine? And now he’s bought this apartment, he’ll renovate it, and then kick her out. She’s good for nothing, just staring at a screen.”
Yulia slowly lowered the tablet. Her gaze turned sharp, almost tangibly cold. “Greasy sweatpants,” then. “Good for nothing.”
“How interesting,” Yulia said quietly. “And Sergey told you all this himself?”
“Of course! We don’t hide anything from each other! He’s so sincere, so reliable,” Milana rolled her eyes dreamily. “And in the bedroom I want a round bed. And a canopy! Write that down, write it down. Are you even keeping up with me? You’re a little slow for a realtor.”
“I’m recording everything, Milana. Every word,” Yulia said, taking a step forward. Her posture became even straighter. “And did Sergey tell you exactly when he plans to… kick his wife out?”
“Any day now! As soon as we put the pink sofa here, then immediately…”
At that moment, hurried footsteps sounded behind Milana. A breathless Sergey appeared in the doorway. In his hands he held a lush but tastelessly arranged bouquet of red roses wrapped in rustling transparent film.
“Milanachka, baby, sorry, traffic!” he shouted from the entrance. “So, how do you like our realtor? Did she show you everything? I told you that…”
Sergey stopped short. His gaze focused on the woman standing opposite Milana. The roses slowly slipped from his weakened fingers and fell with a soft thud onto the dusty concrete floor.
His face rapidly changed color: from healthy pink to deathly pale, then broke out in ugly red blotches. He opened and closed his mouth like a fish thrown onto shore, but could not make a sound.
“Oh, Seryozhik!” Milana happily rushed toward him, not noticing her lover’s condition. “Yulia and I have already planned everything here! Imagine, I chose a pink velvet sofa and a round bed! Yulia wrote it all down. She’s such a good girl, even if she’s a little strange.”
Sergey continued silently swallowing air, staring into his wife’s icy eyes. Yulia stood absolutely still, only a slight, condescending smirk touching her lips.
“Yulia?” Milana finally looked at Sergey, then back at Yulia, sensing the tension hanging in the air. The tension was so dense it could have been cut with a construction knife. “Seryozha, what’s going on?”
Yulia took two slow, graceful steps toward the couple.
“Allow me to clarify the situation, Milana,” Yulia said, her voice ringing clearly and echoing off the bare walls. “I am indeed Yulia. And I am indeed designing this space. But there is one tiny detail. I am not a realtor.”
Milana frowned, shifting her confused gaze from Sergey to Yulia.
“I am that very gray mouse in greasy sweatpants who cannot fry an egg. I am the wife of this astonishingly successful investor,” Yulia pointed her stylus at her trembling husband. “And this apartment, Milana, was bought entirely with my personal funds. Sergey has absolutely nothing to do with it. The only thing he did here was steal spare keys from my work desk in order to impress you.”
Milana recoiled as if she had been shocked.
“What?!” she shrieked. “Seryozha! Is that true?! Whose apartment is this?”
Sergey tried to squeeze something out, to take a step toward his wife, to stretch out his hands.
“Yulechka… Yulia, this isn’t what you think… It’s a mistake… I can explain everything…”
“Spare me your clichés, Sergey,” Yulia cut him off in a firm tone that tolerated no objection. “Your ability to improvise is as pathetic as your girlfriend’s taste. Pink velvet in a loft? Seriously? That’s even worse than your stories about business trips.”
Milana, who finally understood the full meaning of what had happened, turned crimson with rage. She realized that in front of her stood not only the lawful wife, but also the owner of the property, while her “successful businessman” had turned out to be an ordinary liar without a penny to his name.
“You broke loser!” Milana screamed, striking Sergey hard on the shoulder with her expensive fake bag. “You promised me mountains of gold! You told me you were a millionaire! And you brought me to someone else’s apartment?! Go to hell!”
She spun around sharply, nearly stumbling in her stilettos, and shot out of the apartment, slamming the front door so loudly that the echo rang through the neighboring rooms.
Sergey remained standing in the middle of the empty room, crushed and pitiful, with his trampled roses at his feet. He raised his eyes to Yulia, full of tears and fear. Fear of losing the comfortable life she had provided for him.
“Yulia… forgive me. I’m a fool. I just wanted to feel important… You’re always so busy, you’re so perfect, and next to you I felt like a nobody…”
“You didn’t feel like one, Sergey. You were one,” Yulia replied calmly, turning off her tablet screen. “Your problem is not that I work a lot. Your problem is that you are a pathological coward and liar. Importance is earned through actions, not by stealing someone else’s keys and dragging your own wife through the mud in front of girls from beauty salons.”
“I’ll fix everything! I’ll change!” her husband whined, trying to come closer.
“Don’t bother. And don’t you dare step on my new screed,” Yulia said, walking around him in a wide arc toward the exit. “Leave the keys to this apartment on the windowsill. Pack your things tonight while I’m meeting with the contractors. You’ll receive the divorce papers next week.”
She stopped in the doorway and looked around the large, light-filled space of her future perfect apartment. There would be no pink velvet here, no betrayal, no eternal dissatisfaction. There would be only clean lines, freedom, and harmony.
“And you know, Sergey,” she added without turning around, “I think I’ll still add a little red glass to the interior. In memory of your spectacular failure. Goodbye.”
Yulia stepped out into the corridor and carefully closed the door behind her. As she descended in the elevator, she felt an incredible, intoxicating lightness. There was a lot of work ahead: drawings, approvals, author supervision, furniture selection. But now every stroke in the program, every chosen material, would bring her only joy.
She was a talented designer, and today she had brilliantly redesigned not only an apartment, but her own life as well — throwing out the most useless and defective element from it.
