Nika was laughing so hard that she kept toppling sideways onto the carpet, and Yulia had to catch her by her round little belly. Yulia snapped the fastener on the snowsuit, caught one leg, then the other, then a third—no, there was no third leg; the child was simply wriggling around like a wind-up toy. The clock on the wall showed half past six.
“Nika, are we going for a walk, or are we going to wrestle?” Yulia asked, holding her daughter by the heel.
“Go walk!” Nika announced and kicked.
“A walk it is. But first the hat, then the glory.”
The evening was scheduled down to the minute like a musical score: dinner, getting ready, forty minutes around the block beneath the poplar trees, bath, book, sleep. Sergey would appear closer to nine, and if things ran late at his brother’s, even later. It had been like that for the past six months, and Yulia had long since stopped keeping dinner warm for seven.
She glanced into the guest room, where a putty knife lay on top of a stepladder. She had already smoothed half the wall into an even warm sand-colored surface; the other half was waiting its turn. Yulia had started the renovation by herself because Sergey had once said, “No time.”
“‘No time’ is such a convenient phrase,” she said aloud to Nika. “Two little words that can cover an entire life.”
“Wa-wa,” Nika agreed.
The doorbell rang just as Yulia was putting on her jacket. Tamara Petrovna stood on the doorstep, wearing her coat and carrying a bag, with the expression of someone who had not come merely to say hello. Their relationship was reasonably good. A couple of years earlier they had argued about walks and the child’s routine, but that dispute had long since burned itself out.
“Yulenka, I’m only here for a minute! Going for a walk? I brought you some cookies. Children’s ones, sugar-free.”
“Come in. Nika, who’s here?”
“Granny!” Nika yelled and hugged Tamara Petrovna’s boot.
Tamara Petrovna sat down in an armchair without taking off her coat and began from a distance—with the weather, prices, and the fact that Artyom had lost eight kilograms.
“The kids are exhausted, Yulia. They took on a lot of orders, but there aren’t enough hands. Dasha is at the job sites from morning till night, and I’m looking for clients myself. Can you imagine? Me, at my age, persuading people over the phone!”
“I can imagine. Actually, that’s harder than carrying sacks.”
“Exactly! See, you understand! And you know how to do it. You’ve always had a gift for talking. You could explain anything beautifully to anyone. And you understand interiors.”
“Tamara Petrovna, you’re going to praise me for another three minutes and then finally tell me what you really came to say. Let’s save ourselves three minutes.”
Tamara Petrovna laughed awkwardly and adjusted the strap of her handbag.
“We need you. Even for half a day. You could handle the clients, and the rest of us could finally breathe.”
“And where does Nika breathe while I’m doing that?”
“Well… we’d think of something.”
“‘We’d think of something’ isn’t a plan. It’s a horoscope. I have a daughter, not a hamster you can leave for a week with a full water bottle.”
“Yulia, I’m asking nicely.”
“And I’m answering nicely. Nicely, but with a no.”
Tamara Petrovna sighed, patted Nika on the head, picked up her empty bag, and left. From the stairwell, Yulia could hear her feeling around for the next step with her foot for quite some time.
Yulia took the stroller outside and pushed it beneath the poplars for forty minutes, counting streetlights. Nika pointed at every dog they passed. Yulia couldn’t get the conversation out of her head, but she didn’t feel panicked by it. It was simply the familiar formula: “We need extra hands, and we know exactly where to find free ones.”
Sergey came home at twenty past nine, took off his shoes, walked in, and ate in silence. Yulia washed the dishes and wiped the table while listening to his fork clinking against the plate.
“Is Nika asleep?” he asked.
“Asleep. She asked for ‘Daddy’ for half an hour, then gave up.”
“I was working.”
“I’m not accusing you. I’m stating a fact.”
Sergey pushed his plate away, wiped his mouth, and looked at her as though he were about to announce the results of an election.
“My mother and I have decided: the child goes into a boarding nursery, and you go work for my brother.”
Yulia turned off the water. She dried her hands on the towel and carefully hung it back up by one corner.
“Say that again, please. Slowly. I want to savor the wording.”
“What’s so hard to understand? A twenty-four-hour daycare, nursery, boarding facility—I don’t care what it’s called. They have a schedule, caregivers, other children. And you go work for Artyom. That’s it.”
“Just like that? ‘That’s it’? Not even a ‘please’?”
“Yulia, don’t start.”
“I’m not starting anything. I’m clarifying. You’ve just checked a two-year-old child into a storage locker so you can free up another worker. That isn’t a solution. That’s logistics.”
“You’re twisting my words… you’re exaggerating!” Sergey raised his voice, then immediately glanced toward the nursery. “Children grow up in daycare all the time, and they’re perfectly fine!”
“In daycare during the day. With their mothers in the evening. You’re suggesting that she sleep surrounded by strangers so your brother can finish his job estimates.”
“He’s my brother, and he’s my family!”
“And whose is Nika? The neighbors’?”
Yulia picked up her phone from the table, found a number, and pressed call. The ringing came through the speaker.
“Who are you calling?” Sergey asked warily.
“Ilya. He’s another available labor unit, isn’t he?”
“Hello, Aunt Yulia?” a cheerful voice answered.
“Hi, Ilya. One quick question. Your son—how old is he now? A year and a half?”
“A year and eight months.”
“Are you prepared to put him into a twenty-four-hour boarding nursery so your wife can go work at Artyom’s job sites? This isn’t a joke. It’s an official family proposal.”
The silence lasted long enough for them to hear Ilya’s television in the background.
“Uh… what? Aunt Yulia, are you serious?”
“Completely. That is exactly what I was just offered.”
Sergey lunged across the table, snatched the phone away, and ended the call. Then he twirled a finger beside his temple.
“Are you insane?! Why are you dragging him into this?!”
“I’m not dragging him into anything. I’m checking how your idea sounds when it’s said about someone else’s child instead of mine. You know what? It sounds wonderful. Exactly like a joke, except nobody’s laughing.”
“That’s different!”
“Of course it is. Your own people are precious. Other people are expendable.”
“Yulia, you are going to work.”
“No. I’m not sending my daughter anywhere, and I’m not going to work for Artyom in exchange for a thank-you and ‘we’re family.’ I know how to count, and I don’t like the result.”
Sergey grabbed his phone, went into the other room, and a minute later was already talking loudly and angrily without bothering to lower his voice.
“Artyom, she refused. Yes. Flat-out. What am I supposed to do?! Yes, I’ll talk to her again.”
Yulia washed the last spoon and turned off the light. In her sleep, Nika rolled over and hugged her stuffed bunny.
The next morning, Tamara Petrovna arrived again—with a bag, some apples, and the tone of a diplomatic negotiator.
“Yulenka, I thought about it all night. You have to understand, it makes no difference to her where she is. She’s so little. She won’t even remember! And your skills are going to waste. You know how to persuade people better than anyone.”
“I do. Watch me use that skill right now: I’m not going.”
“Just for a month!”
“Tamara Petrovna, ‘she’s little, she won’t remember’ may be the most dangerous phrase in the Russian language. You can use it to excuse anything—even an entire childhood.”
“You’re cruel.”
“I’m consistent. People often confuse the two.”
“But Artyom is family!”
“He is. And I respect him. He works like an ox. But he built his company around the principle of ‘hire relatives because relatives won’t let you down and won’t ask about money.’ That isn’t a team. It’s a family business with indefinite compulsory labor.”
“Nobody’s asking you to work for free…”
“Right. They’ll pay me ‘when the orders start coming in.’ I’ve heard that song before. It has three verses and no chorus.”
Tamara Petrovna stood up, buttoned her coat with an offended air, and left with her lips pressed tightly together. Nika waved goodbye.
That evening Yulia waited for her husband to come home and casually asked him:
“Could you give me three thousand, please? There’s a discount on household supplies tomorrow. We’re running out of laundry detergent, and Nika needs bath gel.”
Sergey slowly slipped his phone into his pocket.
“No.”
“What do you mean, ‘no’?”
“Exactly what I said. If you don’t want to work, you don’t get money. When you get hungry, you’ll find a way to earn some yourself.”
“I see.”
“What exactly do you see?”
“Everything, Sergey. You’ve just put our family on a pay-as-you-go accounting system. Fine. I know accounting too. No money means no groceries. No groceries means no breakfast and no dinner. We’ll keep the books balanced.”
“You’re going to starve me?!” He actually half-rose from his chair.
“I’m not going to starve you. I’m simply going to stop paying for your food out of my savings. The difference between ‘starving someone’ and ‘not sponsoring them’ is about the same as the difference between ‘throwing someone out’ and ‘not carrying them around in your arms.’”
“You have money hidden away. I know you do!”
“You do know. And it’s mine. This may come as a huge surprise, but the money I put aside when I was still receiving bonuses isn’t ours. It’s mine. Just like your ‘no time.’”
And so the quiet war began.
Sergey left at seven and returned at ten. He ate whatever he bought for himself and deliberately left the shopping bags where Yulia could see them. Yulia fed Nika, continued finishing the wall in the guest room, and calculated her remaining savings. At her current rate of spending, she had enough for about six months.
On Thursday, Kristina stopped by with a teddy bear for Nika and the tact of a sensible adult.
“I heard about the family contracting business,” she said, watching Yulia smooth putty into a corner. “And I heard about the boarding nursery too. Yulia, I’m not going to insult him. It’s your family.”
“Please don’t. I don’t need a lawyer. I need a witness.”
“A witness to what?”
“To the fact that I haven’t lost my mind. Sometimes when people repeat the same thing to you every day for twenty days, you start wondering whether maybe everything really is normal and you’re the strange one.”
“You’re not strange. You’re simply the first person who said ‘no’ out loud.”
Yulia smiled and drew the putty knife smoothly across the wall. It was turning out beautifully.
On Saturday, Tamara Petrovna came for the weekend, carrying bags and planning to bake pies. Sergey was just getting ready to leave for his brother’s place. He had been angry since morning because the table was empty.
He took out a frying pan, cracked three eggs, and slapped them into the hot oil. Tamara Petrovna froze in the doorway.
“Seryozha, why are you cooking for yourself? Yulia, didn’t you make anything?”
“I didn’t,” Yulia said calmly as she wiped Nika’s chin. “And I’m not going to.”
“Why on earth not?”
“Because your son has declared a financial boycott against me. There’s no money for groceries, no money for his daughter, no money for utilities. He pays only for himself. So naturally, I cook only for myself and Nika.”
Tamara Petrovna spun toward her son so abruptly that she nearly knocked over her bag.
“Seryozha? Is that true?”
“It’s true! And I’m not giving her anything until she goes to work for Artyom!” he barked while flipping his eggs. “Let her learn where money comes from!”
“Son, but there’s a child…”
“The child won’t starve! And she can think about her behavior!”
He finished eating while standing, grabbed his jacket, and left, slamming the door so hard that Nika flinched and pressed herself against her mother’s leg.
Tamara Petrovna lowered herself into a chair and remained silent for a long time. Then she said quietly:
“Yulia, don’t be angry with him. Things are difficult for him and Artyom right now. Maybe you really could go? Just part-time?”
“Tamara Petrovna, let’s be honest. This isn’t about full-time or part-time. It’s about the fact that nobody is asking me. They’re making decisions for me.”
“He’s a man. He’s under pressure.”
“He isn’t under pressure. He’s bargaining. And he’s using my daughter as the stake.”
“Yulia!”
“Look at the list. He does nothing with Nika. In the past month, not one walk, not one book. Around the house—zero. I even finished the guest-room wall myself. He deliberately refuses to give me money. He hasn’t planned a vacation with us in three years. Tell me honestly, woman to woman: what exactly is he needed for?”
“He’s your husband!”
“That’s a status, not a function. A status doesn’t feed me, look after my child, or hang wallpaper.”
Tamara Petrovna pressed her lips together, but her eyes looked confused.
“You’ve become hard.”
“I haven’t become anything. I’ve always been like this. There simply wasn’t a reason before. I’ve never been someone who endures things for years. I don’t collect resentments. I resolve problems.”
“He’ll cool off.”
“He won’t cool off. He’ll get used to it. Those are two different verbs.”
That evening Sergey returned home agitated after talking to his mother on the phone and immediately went on the offensive.
“You’re a tattletale! You complain about me to my mother! That’s disgusting, do you hear me?! Discussing your husband behind his back!”
“I didn’t complain. I answered the question, ‘Why is there no breakfast?’ Would you rather I lie next time? I can tell her the stove broke and I forgot what a frying pan looks like.”
“Stop clowning around!”
“Sergey, I’m tired. One question, and then I’m going to bed. Do you want a family?”
His voice shot up so high that it was almost funny.
“Not one like this! Not a family where a wife refuses to understand her husband! Where she digs her heels in like a ram and lets everyone down! I don’t need a family where I ask for something and get told to go to hell!”
Yulia nodded. Slowly, as though ticking a box on a checklist.
“All right. Work it is.”
Sergey exhaled, straightened his shoulders, and immediately grabbed his phone.
“Artyom! Hey, we’ve got a deal! She agreed! Yes! I told you I’d wear her down! She’ll talk the clients into anything. That tongue of hers is like a concrete mixer—it’ll grind through everything!”
Yulia went into the nursery, adjusted Nika’s blanket, and stood beside the crib for a moment.
The plan had been ready since Wednesday.
All that remained was to make one phone call and order a truck.
On Sunday at 2:50 p.m., Yulia dialed a number.
“Good afternoon, Tamara Petrovna. Please come to your building by four o’clock.”
“Why? Is something wrong with Nika?”
“Nika is perfectly fine. Just be outside the building at four.”
“Yulenka, is this about work? Are we going to discuss a client?”
“In a manner of speaking.”
At exactly four o’clock, Tamara Petrovna stepped out of a taxi in front of her apartment building.
A Gazelle moving truck stood by the curb with its cargo area open. Nearby, two men wearing work gloves were unloading an armchair.
Yulia stood a little farther away with Nika in her arms.
“Yulia! What is this?!” Tamara Petrovna pressed her handbag against her chest.
“This is your son. More precisely, his belongings. Yesterday he said he didn’t need a family—not the kind he currently had. I thought about it and decided to return him to where I got him from.”
“What are you talking about?!”
“The sofa is his. He bought it before we were married, so I’m not claiming it. Two armchairs. The wardrobe has been dismantled; the doors are separate. Three bags of personal belongings, a box of tools, his winter jacket. Everything is listed in the inventory.”
“You have no ri—” Tamara Petrovna gasped. “You can’t do this!”
“Apparently I can. Tamara Petrovna, I’m not shouting, crying, or making a scene. I’m simply carrying out his wishes. He asked not to have this kind of family. I can’t provide him with another one, but I can give him his freedom. Free of charge, with delivery included.”
“Take everything back upstairs! What am I supposed to do with him?!”
“If you want, they’ll carry everything into your apartment. Just tell them where to put it. If you don’t, we’ll leave it outside the building. The neighbors can keep an eye on it.”
Tamara Petrovna opened her mouth, but the movers were already carrying the side panels of the wardrobe.
Yulia turned to the head of the crew.
“Vladimir, please, when everything has been unloaded, photograph all of it. One wide shot and individual photos of every item, then send them to me. I don’t want anyone claiming later that half the property disappeared.”
“We’ll do it,” he nodded.
“Yulia,” Tamara Petrovna said more quietly now, “I did talk to him. I told him to compromise. But he dug in his heels. He said a wife is obligated to help.”
“Exactly. ‘Obligated.’ Not ‘ask her.’ Not ‘let’s work out the numbers.’ Not ‘thank you.’ Obligated. You know, an obligation without gratitude always ends with a truck parked outside someone’s building.”
“And what happens now?”
“Now I’m going home. Nika, wave goodbye to Grandma.”
Nika raised her little hand and waved diligently.
Tamara Petrovna mechanically waved back, watching as the second armchair was set down on the pavement.
Once inside the car, Yulia strapped her daughter into her seat, sat in front, and called her husband.
She didn’t want him to hear the news from his mother.
“So, are you on your way to meet Artyom?” he began cheerfully.
“Sergey, listen calmly. I changed the lock this morning. I filed for divorce yesterday online and booked the appointment. Your belongings are outside your mother’s building, every last screw. You’ll be sent photographs.”
“You… what?!”
“The apartment is mine. I bought it before our marriage, and you aren’t even registered there. I will not let you cross the threshold. If you try to break into the apartment, I’ll call the police and file a report for forced entry. No sentimental exceptions.”
“Yulia, wait…”
“There’s no point trying to persuade me. I’m not interested in a second season. Goodbye.”
She ended the call.
Nika cooed and reached toward the charm hanging from the rearview mirror.
Sergey stood in the middle of a job site with his phone in his hand, unable to believe that she had said all of it so casually—as though she had simply told him to buy bread.
A minute later, his mother called.
Come over. Collect your furniture. Bring Artyom with you. People are walking past the building and looking at everything. It’s embarrassing.
By evening, there was barely room to move inside Sergey’s old childhood bedroom. The sofa was standing on one end, the armchairs were stacked on top of each other, the wardrobe doors leaned against the wall, and bags blocked the walkway.
Sergey sat in the darkness on the edge of the sofa and answered no one.
He couldn’t understand what had gone wrong.
It made no difference to a child where she slept. She was little.
A wife was supposed to help her husband.
His brother was having a hard time, which meant everyone was having a hard time.
It was obvious.
His phone vibrated.
A message from Ilya:
“Uncle Sergey, I’m not coming in tomorrow. And it’s not up for discussion. My wife isn’t coming either. When I heard what you said about the boarding nursery, something clicked in my head. We don’t want to live like that.”
Ten minutes later, Artyom called. His voice sounded strange and breathless.
“Sergey, Dasha says she’s done. She’s leaving the job sites. She says I turned the family into a work crew and turned her into free labor. What the hell did you do?! What did you and Mom start over there?!”
“Me?! I didn’t start anything!”
“I’ve got three projects and nobody to work on them! Mom isn’t answering her phone! Do you understand? Everything is falling apart!”
Sergey disconnected the call and lowered the phone onto his knee.
A chain reaction.
That was what it was called.
One stubborn woman had said “no,” and everything had started collapsing.
It was Yulia’s fault.
Hers alone.
Her fault that she had thrown him out of a three-bedroom apartment.
Her fault that he was now sitting in his childhood room surrounded by his own wardrobe, dismantled into boards.
Her fault about his brother.
About Ilya.
About Dasha.
About his mother, who was silent on the other side of the wall.
Meanwhile, Yulia lifted Nika out of the bath, wrapped her in a large towel, and carried her into the nursery, kissing her damp forehead.
Nika giggled and tried to grab her mother’s nose.
“We’ll finish the wall tomorrow,” Yulia said. “One strip and one corner, and that’s it. It’ll be beautiful.”
“Pwetty!” Nika agreed.
Yulia tucked her daughter into bed, switched on the night-light, and sat down on the floor beside the crib, resting the back of her head against it.
The apartment was quiet.
And peaceful.
Everything was going to be all right.
Now, she was sure of it.
