“Looks like we’ve got a kept woman in the family,” Tamara Vitalyevna said as she helped herself to some potatoes. “She sits at home all day while my son works himself to the bone.”
Elya put down her fork. For the third Sunday in a row, the conversation was going around in the same circles.
“Tamara Vitalyevna, I do work. I just work from home.”
“Work is when you get up to an alarm and go to an office,” her mother-in-law said with a shrug, as though this were an obvious truth. “Sitting in front of a computer in your slippers isn’t work—it’s just fooling around.”
Igor shifted uneasily in his chair but said nothing. He always did that around his mother—he froze, as though hoping the subject would simply disappear on its own.
Elya had married Igor six years earlier, back when she still worked in an office and commuted every day, just as her mother-in-law believed everyone should. Two years after the wedding, the agency moved her to remote work. Since then, every family gathering had turned into the same discussion about what counted as a “real job.”
Two years ago, in the spring, Tamara Vitalyevna retired and immediately complained that she was barely making ends meet. Her pension covered food, she said, but there was nothing left for her blood-pressure medication or the extra charges on her apartment bills. Igor asked Elya to help.
She agreed immediately, without argument, and set up an automatic bank transfer of 18,000 rubles every month, scheduled for the second day of the month, with no reminders necessary.
The money had been transferred punctually ever since.
Elya had not heard a single word of gratitude.
“By the way,” Tamara Vitalyevna continued, putting a piece of cutlet into her mouth, “my neighbor Valentina still works double shifts at the post office. At her age! Now that is what I call real work.”
“So apparently I don’t know what real work is,” Elya said with a slight smile, although her eyes remained cold.
“You sit around in slippers,” her mother-in-law snapped. “Forgive me for speaking plainly.”
Elya looked at Igor. He was cutting his cutlet with intense concentration, as though the fate of humanity were being decided on his plate.
“Tamara Vitalyevna, I earned 140,000 rubles last month,” Elya said evenly. “That’s a little more than Igor’s salary. Would you like me to show you my bank statement?”
“I don’t want to see any statements,” her mother-in-law said, waving her hand dismissively. “You can put any numbers you like on a screen. But when someone comes home exhausted from a factory, you can see it immediately on his face.”
Elya remained silent. There was no point in continuing the argument. Her mother-in-law did not believe in figures; she believed in the weary face of someone returning from a shift. There was no changing her mind.
“And another thing,” Tamara Vitalyevna continued as she poured herself some fruit compote, “Valentina looks after her grandchildren on weekends, too. When was the last time you helped me with anything besides sending money?”
Under the table, Elya tightened her grip on her fork. In two years, her mother-in-law had never once thanked her for those transfers. She had only complained that the money was “electronic, not real.”
“I’m not actually obligated to send you anything at all, Tamara Vitalyevna,” Elya said quietly, more to herself than to the older woman. “I do it because you asked for help.”
“I asked—so what? Are you going to remind me about it forever?” her mother-in-law snorted, offering no real answer.
After dinner, when they were already in the car, Igor touched Elya’s hand.
“I’m sorry about Mom. She’s from another generation. Remote work is difficult for her to understand.”
“This isn’t the first time she’s said it, Igor. It’s the third.”
“I know.” He sighed. “I’ll talk to her again.”
Elya turned toward the window. He had already spoken to his mother three times, and none of those conversations had changed anything.
On Monday, Igor announced that his friends were inviting them to a barbecue on Friday. His mother was going too. She had heard about the gathering and invited herself, saying that she “hadn’t been out in the countryside for ages.”
Elya sighed but did not object. Her mother-in-law had joined them on outings before. There was nothing unusual about it.
At the time, Elya had no idea that Friday would become the second round of the same conflict.
Kostya and his wife were hosting the barbecue. They owned a plot of land outside the city, had a barbecue grill, and regularly entertained a lively group of around fifteen people. Igor had worked with Kostya for five years, and they held gatherings like this about three times each summer.
Tamara Vitalyevna arrived dressed for the occasion, wearing a new headscarf. The first thing she did was settle beside Kostya’s wife, who was pouring tea.
Elya placed the salad she had brought on the table and involuntarily listened to the women’s conversation. Experience had taught her that her mother-in-law always approached a fresh attack from a distance.
“Tell me,” her mother-in-law began after taking a sip from her mug, “does your husband work at a factory? Does he do real work?”
“Yes. Kostya is a section supervisor,” the hostess replied with a nod.
“Exactly! But in our family,” Tamara Vitalyevna said, nodding toward Elya, “my daughter-in-law sits at home. She calls it work. In my opinion, it’s nothing more than a vacation—sitting at a computer in slippers.”
The conversations at the neighboring tables fell silent. One of the guests coughed awkwardly. Igor froze with a skewer in his hand.
“Her imaginary job supposedly supports my son,” her mother-in-law continued, raising her voice so that the people at the far end of the table could hear her. “Although, if we’re being honest, the kept woman in our family is my daughter-in-law.”
Elya felt heat rush into her cheeks. It was the second time that month—and now it had happened in front of fifteen strangers.
“Tamara Vitalyevna,” Elya began calmly, although everything inside her tightened, “do you know how long your pension would last without my financial help?”
Her mother-in-law blinked, clearly not expecting the question at that moment.
“I’ve been transferring 18,000 rubles to you every month for the past two years,” Elya continued, looking directly into her eyes. “For your medication and apartment expenses. Without that money, how long would your pension last—a week or two?”
Silence descended over the table. The only sound was fat sizzling over the coals. Kostya looked away, while another guest suddenly became extremely interested in the salad.
“And that 18,000 isn’t a once-a-year gift. I send it every month,” Elya added, feeling her voice beginning to tremble despite her efforts. “On the second day of every month, without reminders—twenty-four times in a row so far.”
Kostya’s wife awkwardly placed the teapot back on the table, as though it had suddenly become too heavy.
“Why are you saying this now, in front of everyone?” Tamara Vitalyevna began, but her voice faltered and the sentence died halfway through.
“You were the first to call me a kept woman in front of everyone,” Elya said with a shrug. “I merely answered in the same tone.”
Igor immediately leaned toward his mother and whispered something to her. She demonstratively turned toward the woman sitting on her right and began asking questions about seedlings. The conversation moved on, and the guests gratefully picked up the topic of gardening.
A dense silence filled the car on the way home.
“Why did you have to say that in front of everyone?” Igor finally asked. “She’s older than you. Just tell her that she hurt your feelings and leave it at that.”
“I did tell her, Igor. Three times. You heard me,” Elya said, staring straight at the road. “She doesn’t care about conversations. The only thing that matters to her is showing everyone who the real hardworking person in the family is.”
Igor did not answer. He merely tightened his grip on the steering wheel. He remained silent for the rest of the drive.
That evening, as Elya lay in the dark, she heard him calling his mother from another room. She could not make out the words, only his tense tone.
The following morning, he told her briefly that his mother was offended. She admitted that she might have been wrong, but she refused to apologize in front of everyone because of her pride.
Elya nodded and remained silent. She already understood that there would be no apology—not now and not later. There would merely be another excuse for the next attack.
A week later, Tamara Vitalyevna wrote in the family group chat that she would come to Igor’s birthday party to “say a few words in front of the whole family.”
Elya read the message twice. Something told her that those words would not be about gardening.
They celebrated Igor’s birthday at home. Around ten people came: Igor’s parents, his aunt and her husband, and his cousin and his wife. The table was overflowing with appetizers, while the cake waited in the refrigerator.
Tamara Vitalyevna was one of the first to arrive. She brought her son a blanket as a gift and immediately took the seat at the head of the table, as though the apartment belonged to her.
Elya noticed that her mother-in-law did not even greet her personally. She merely nodded from a distance and immediately began talking to Igor’s aunt.
Everything went smoothly during the first half hour—there were toasts, laughter, and conversations about the cousin’s vacation. Elya relaxed and began to think that her mother-in-law’s promise to say something in front of everyone had only been a figure of speech.
She was wrong.
“I’d like to make a toast,” Tamara Vitalyevna said, rising with a glass of juice and looking around the table. “To my son, who carries the entire family on his shoulders. It’s just a shame that his wife is no help to him.”
The table fell silent. Igor’s aunt exchanged a glance with her husband.
“Mom, don’t start,” Igor said quietly.
“What did I say?” she asked with a shrug, sweeping her gaze over the guests. “I’m only telling the truth. Igor works himself to the bone at the factory while a freeloader sits at home in slippers, moving a computer around. Is that supposed to be work?”
The cousin lowered his gaze to his plate. Igor’s aunt nervously adjusted her napkin. Igor opened his mouth, but before he could say anything, Elya spoke.
Her hands had turned cold, as though someone had opened a window and allowed a draft into the room. It was the third time—and now it was happening in her own home, in front of the entire family.
“Tamara Vitalyevna,” Elya said evenly, although her heart was pounding, “I want to ask
you something right here, in front of everyone.”
Her mother-in-law raised her eyebrows in surprise, clearly not expecting a response at that moment.
“I’ve been transferring 18,000 rubles to you every month for the past two years,” Elya said, taking her phone out of her pocket. “Twenty-four months. Shall we calculate together how much that comes to?”
“Surely not in front of the guests,” Tamara Vitalyevna began, but stopped herself.
“Four hundred and thirty-two thousand rubles,” Elya said slowly, ensuring that everyone at the table heard the figure. “That is how much I’ve given you over the past two years—for your medicine and apartment expenses. And every time, the thanks I received was being called a ‘kept woman.’”
Igor sat there pale, looking from his mother to his wife. His aunt covered her mouth with her hand.
“My son supports me,” his mother-in-law said sharply, although her voice had begun to tremble. “Not some daughter-in-law with a laptop.”
“All right,” Elya replied, opening her banking app in full view of all the guests. “Then let your son support you, since he’s supposedly carrying the entire family on his shoulders.”
She found the scheduled payment and disabled it with two taps. Then she opened her mother-in-law’s contact and silently blocked her number.
“Let’s see, darling, how your mother manages without my money,” Elya said, looking directly at Igor before placing her phone facedown on the table.
Tamara Vitalyevna jumped up so abruptly that her chair scraped across the floor.
“How dare you?” she hissed, crumpling the napkin in her hand. “If you were my daughter, I would have raised you differently!”
“You’re right—I’m not your daughter,” Elya replied without looking away. “I’m simply the person who paid for your medication for two years. I won’t be doing that anymore.”
Her mother-in-law grabbed her handbag and left the table without saying goodbye. The front door slammed so hard that the dishes in the cabinet rattled.
Elya immediately felt the tension that had accumulated in her shoulders throughout the evening begin to ease. Her hands were still trembling slightly, but no longer from anger. They trembled because everything had finally been said aloud.
The table remained silent for several seconds. Then Igor’s aunt said quietly:
“Perhaps you were a little too harsh, Elya…”
Elya did not answer. She merely shrugged and picked up her fork.
Igor stared down at his plate and remained silent for three full minutes—Elya deliberately timed him using the clock on the wall.
“Did you really block her? Completely?” he finally asked, quietly, almost in a whisper.
“Completely,” Elya said with a nod. “If you want to support her, transfer the money yourself from your salary. I’m not obligated to pay for the privilege of being insulted.”
Igor said nothing. He poured himself more juice and drank half the glass in one gulp.
The guests gradually left, saying awkward goodbyes at the door, as though they were afraid of uttering one word too many. As Igor’s aunt was leaving, she still could not resist saying to Elya:
“Stay strong, but you shouldn’t have treated his mother that way.”
When the door closed behind the final guest, Elya remained alone in the kitchen. Plates, leftover cake, and the gift blanket forgotten on a chair surrounded her.
She sat down at the table, poured herself some tea, and felt her shoulders relax for the first time that evening.
An hour later, her sister Nastya called. Apparently, one of the relatives had already written about the incident in the family group chat.
“Well, you certainly went for it,” her sister said with a chuckle. “Right there at the table, in front of everyone?”
“Right there at the table,” Elya confirmed.
“Wasn’t that a little too much?” Nastya’s voice contained no condemnation, only genuine curiosity.
“Maybe it was,” Elya replied with a slight smile. “But for the first time in two years, I feel better.”
They laughed a little more, discussed the cake, and ended the call. Meanwhile, Igor silently washed the dishes in the kitchen without lifting his head.
Lying in the darkness that night, Elya thought that tomorrow her mother-in-law would undoubtedly tell everyone her version of what had happened.
Let her.
Two weeks passed.
Tamara Vitalyevna did not call or write even once—not to Elya and not directly in the family group chat. However, a long message soon appeared in that very chat, which was normally used only for holiday greetings. It spoke of an “ungrateful daughter-in-law” and a “son abandoned to his fate.”
According to Igor, Tamara Vitalyevna’s neighbors now knew the entire story as well—exclusively her version of it, of course.
Igor began visiting his mother alone on Saturdays and always returned home in silence. Whenever Elya asked what had happened, he gave the same brief answer: his mother was complaining to everyone who would listen that she had been left without support.
The automatic payment remained disabled. His mother’s number remained on Elya’s blocked list. Elya did not even open their message thread to see whether the woman had tried to contact her.
Yesterday, Igor passed along a request from his mother. She wanted Elya to speak with her, explain herself, or at least call. Tamara Vitalyevna refused to make the call herself—her pride would not allow it.
“Maybe you should contact her after all,” Igor said that evening, avoiding Elya’s eyes. “She is my mother.”
“Then ask her to begin by saying thank you for once,” Elya replied calmly. “Not for the money—for the fact that I managed to speak politely to her at all for two years.”
Igor did not respond. He understood it himself: his mother would never be the first to call.
Elya listened to him, nodded, and returned to her work on the laptop.
