My mother-in-law greeted me at the gate by telling me there weren’t enough clean towels in the house. I hadn’t even turned off the engine yet, and at first I couldn’t understand where she had come from or why she was at our country house in the first place.
Two unfamiliar cars were parked outside the gate. My husband’s sister and her husband were talking loudly on the porch, while their two sons were already carrying sports bags into the house. Aunt Zoya, whom I had previously seen only once at a family anniversary celebration, was standing nearby giving everyone instructions.
Andrey had left the city an hour before me, supposedly to open up the house and check the water pump. I had to stop by the store, so we had agreed to meet at the dacha. There had been absolutely no discussion about guests, especially overnight guests.
Instead of a Quiet Weekend
We had planned to spend two days alone together in the countryside. During eight years of marriage, weekends like that were rare. I worked as an administrator at a grocery store, Andrey repaired household appliances, and during the summer we also had the garden plot to take care of.
Before leaving, I bought groceries for the entire coming week. I picked up chicken, ground meat, cheese, eggs, vegetables, fruit, dairy products, and everything else we needed for our work lunches.
The total at the checkout came to 9,340 rubles.
Normally, we paid for groceries with our household card, into which we each transferred an agreed amount. But the day before, Andrey had taken money from it for an urgent car repair and promised to put it back once a customer paid him.
When I opened the trunk, the nephews grabbed the bags and started carrying them toward the house.
“Wait, leave those here for now,” I asked.
But Lyudmila Pavlovna was already peering inside one of the insulated grocery bags.
“Finally, the food has arrived,” she said. “The boys have barely eaten anything since morning.”
The “boys” were fifteen and nineteen years old. The younger one had a volleyball tucked under his arm, while the older one was asking Andrey where he could charge his tablet.
Judging by the size of their bags, it was obvious no one had come for just a couple of hours.
I called my husband around the back of the house so we wouldn’t argue in front of everyone.
Andrey pulled the veranda door closed behind us and immediately grimaced.
“Don’t start. They’re only staying until tomorrow. They’ll leave after lunch.”
“Did you tell me exactly who was coming?”
“I mentioned that Sergey might stop by.”
“Sergey is one person. Your mother is here, your sister and her husband, their children, and Aunt Zoya. That’s six guests.”
Andrey glanced toward the house, where we could already hear dishes clattering.
“Well, that’s just how it turned out. I couldn’t exactly tell my relatives to turn around and go home. Let’s welcome them properly now, and we’ll discuss everything tonight. You can quickly put something on the table. It’s nothing complicated.”
His confidence didn’t even surprise me.
He had invited people over, yet for some reason I was the one who was supposed to “quickly put something on the table.”
The Dinner He Had Promised on My Behalf
In the kitchen, Lyudmila Pavlovna was already assigning sleeping arrangements.
My husband’s sister and her husband were supposed to sleep on the sofa. The nephews would get a folding bed and an inflatable mattress, while Aunt Zoya was supposed to stay in the small room where we kept gardening supplies.
Meanwhile, Lida had taken the ground meat out of one of my grocery bags.
“You can make cutlets with this,” she said, putting the package on the table. “The boys love homemade ones. Just add plenty of onion or they’ll turn out too dry.”
“Lida, did you bring any food with you?”
She pointed toward the windowsill.
There was a watermelon, a loaf of bread, and a package of sweets.
“We were on the road. When were we supposed to cook anything? Andrey said you already had everything bought and that there would be food ready.”
My husband started stacking plates, even though no one had asked him to.
“When exactly did he tell you that?” I asked.
“On Wednesday. He wrote in the family chat on MAX that everyone could come. That’s why we made plans.”
For three days, Andrey hadn’t said a single word to me.
He had managed to invite his relatives, promise them overnight accommodations and a prepared table, yet he hadn’t bought any food, taken out any bedding, or even checked whether the inflatable mattress was still usable.
“So there was no phone call this morning?” I asked, turning toward my husband.
“What difference does it make now?” He put the stack of plates on the table and shrugged. “I knew you’d start counting how much everyone ate. They’re family, not strangers.”
“It’s not about whether they’re strangers or not. You decided how I would spend my weekend without asking me, and now you expect me to spend two days cooking for eight people.”
“Don’t exaggerate. We would’ve done everything together.”
After eight years, I knew exactly what Andrey meant by “together.”
He would light the grill, chat with the guests, and occasionally ask how soon the food would be ready.
The shopping, cooking, dishes, bedding, and cleaning would all be left to me.
I Took Back Our Week’s Groceries
I pulled out two shopping bags and began putting back everything we needed in the city for the following workweek: meat, cheese, eggs, dairy products, fruit, and vegetables.
I left the dry goods, tea, and everything the guests had brought inside the house.
Lida picked up the ground meat from the table and handed it to me.
“Oksana, maybe you don’t need to make such a demonstration out of this? We didn’t invite ourselves. Andrey invited us.”
“Exactly. Which is why I have no complaints about you.”
Lyudmila Pavlovna pursed her lips and folded her arms across her chest.
“People have come to visit, and the hostess is taking the food away. That has never happened in our family.”
“Maybe it hasn’t happened in your family. But in ours, things are going to be different from now on. Whoever invites guests is responsible for thinking ahead about what they’ll eat and where they’ll sleep.”
Andrey stepped toward the bags, but I zipped them closed and moved them toward the door.
“Leave the groceries. I’ll put the money back on the household card like I promised.”
“You will. But these groceries are for our workweek, not for a feast I found out about five minutes ago. The village is eleven kilometers away, and you all have cars.”
“Do you understand how this makes me look in front of my family?”
“I do. You hid the fact that you’d invited six people from your wife for three days because you planned to present me with a fait accompli.”
“You brought the whole family here, so you feed them!” I told my husband.
Then I took the groceries and drove away.
The drive back to the city took forty minutes.
Andrey called several times. Then he sent me a message on MAX saying I had made him look like a man incapable of hosting his own relatives.
I replied that now he had the perfect opportunity to prove otherwise.
Two Days of Hospitality
On Sunday evening, Andrey told me everyone had left and asked me to come back.
When I walked into the house, there was a mountain of plates on the kitchen table. Full garbage bags were piled near the car, and a heap of used bedding sat in front of the washing machine.
My husband had driven to the village to buy groceries.
He spent 12,680 rubles because prices at the small local shop were higher than in the city and there was very little choice.
That evening, he cooked meat and potatoes.
The next morning, he had to drive back again for cereal, milk, and cottage cheese.
Then it turned out that Aunt Zoya didn’t eat leftovers from the previous day, while the nephews were expecting a full lunch before the drive home.
Lida helped clear the table, but Andrey washed the dishes.
He was also the one who inflated the mattress, searched for an extra blanket, and replaced a burned-out light bulb in the small room because Aunt Zoya didn’t want to sleep in the dark.
“Mom is upset with you,” my husband said when I walked into the kitchen.
“I’m not surprised.”
“She thinks you could at least have left the groceries.”
“And I think you could at least have told me the truth on Wednesday.”
Andrey looked as though he wanted to argue, but then glanced at the dishes and remained silent.
For a while, he gathered cups from the table and placed them beside the sink.
“All right. What I did was wrong,” he finally said. “I invited everyone, but I wasn’t actually planning to take care of them myself. I thought you’d complain a little and then cook anyway.”
It wasn’t the most elegant apology, but at least it was honest.
I told him there would be no repeat of the situation.
From now on, we would invite guests only after discussing it together first.
If he invited his relatives on his own, then he would buy the groceries, prepare the sleeping arrangements, and clean the house after they left.
On Monday, Andrey returned the money to the household card and finished cleaning.
A week later, Lida messaged him again and suggested that the whole family come over at the end of August.
This time, my husband showed me the message first.
Then he replied that those dates didn’t work for us and that any future visit would have to be discussed in advance, including groceries and overnight arrangements.
After that, no one wrote that the table would already be waiting for them.
