Veronika arrived by bus, just like she always does.
She got off at the bus stop—urban, stylish, wearing a long faux leather coat and a hand-knitted scarf. A backpack was slung over her shoulders, a bag in her hand. Inside the bag: soy milk, tofu, avocado, and a pack of gluten-free crispbreads. As she stepped onto the village road, now covered in its first layer of frost, she instantly noticed the smells. Wood smoke. Manure. Damp autumn leaves. Childhood scents—the ones she’d spent three years deliberately and persistently trying to forget.
The house stood by the river—old and made of logs, with carved window frames her grandfather had once crafted. Her mother came out onto the porch, wiping her hands on her apron.
“You’re here. Well, come inside, what are you waiting for?”
Her mother’s name was Galina Ivanovna. Sixty-three years old. Her entire life spent in the village. First on the farm, later in the fields, now retired. Vegetable garden, chickens, a goat. Her hands were cracked from work, but her eyes were alive. Sharp.
They hugged each other. Veronika took a deep breath—her mother smelled familiar: smoke, bread, and an elusive warmth.
“You’re so thin,” her mother said, inspecting her at arm’s length. “So pale. What do they feed you in the city?”
“Mom, I’m on a plant-based diet.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I don’t eat meat, fish, milk, eggs. Nothing from animals.”
Galina Ivanovna was silent for a moment. Then she asked:
“Then what do you eat?”
“Plants. Vegetables, fruits, grains, legumes. It’s healthy, mom. It’s ethical. You can’t kill animals.”
“Uh-huh,” her mother replied and went back inside.
Veronika followed her.
They sat in the kitchen. Veronika unpacked her groceries on the table: avocado, tofu, soy milk, quinoa.
“Here,” she said, “this is tofu. Soy cheese. It has more protein than meat. And this is avocado—healthy fats. Zero cholesterol.”
Her mother looked at the avocado.
“Looks like a pear. Is it expensive?”
“Well… it’s okay.”
“Okay means how much exactly?”
“Two hundred rubles each.”
Her mother grunted.
“Two hundred rubles for a pear? Are you out of your mind?”
“Mom, it’s not a pear. It’s a superfood.”
“A what?”
“A healthy product.”
“Uh-huh,” her mother replied. “Sure, sure.”
Veronika sighed. She pulled a brochure from her backpack: ‘Ethical Eating: Why We Don’t Eat Animals.’ She placed it on the table.
“Here, read this. It’s all here. About farms, about antibiotics, about how cows and chickens suffer…”
Her mother didn’t pick up the brochure. She looked at her daughter for a long moment. Then she stood up.
“Alright. Make yourself comfortable while I get dinner ready.”
“Mom, just no meat, please.”
“No meat, no meat. I hear you.”
And she went to the stove.
Veronika unpacked her things in her old bedroom. Everything was just like it used to be: faded floral wallpaper, a bookshelf with worn out books, her father’s photo on the wall. Her father passed away six years ago. A heart attack. Veronika was a sophomore in college at the time. She made it to the funeral, but didn’t get to say goodbye.
She sat on the bed. Her father smiled at her from the photo—squinting in the sun, little Veronika perched on his shoulders. She remembered his hands. Big, warm, smelling of diesel and bread. He was a tractor driver and always brought home a fresh loaf of bread. He’d break off the crust and hand it to her.
A smell drifted in from the kitchen.
Veronika breathed in. And froze.
It wasn’t the smell of soy tofu or avocado. It was the scent of fried potatoes. The real kind—crispy and golden straight from the skillet. And mixed in with it was another aroma. Rich. Heavy. Painfully familiar.
Pork cracklings.
Pork fat.
Mom was frying potatoes with pork fat.
Veronika stepped into the kitchen.
She saw the frying pan: golden potato slices, crisped up to perfection. Pieces of pork fat melted into clear grease. Cracklings—dark, shriveled, crunchy. And finely chopped onions that her mom tossed in at the very end.
Veronika felt a pang of betrayal deep in her stomach.
“Mom! I asked you not to do this!”
“What did I do?” her mom turned away from the stove. “It’s just potatoes. It’s plant-based.”
“And the pork fat?”
“I don’t eat the fat. I just add it for the aroma. And I take out the cracklings afterwards.”
“Mom, this isn’t funny. Pork fat is an animal product. It soaks into the potatoes. It goes against everything I believe in!”
Her mom turned off the stove, sat down on a stool, and folded her hands on her knees.
“Listen, Veronika. I waited three years for you. Three years. This is the first time you’ve come home in all that time. I wanted to feed you. Like people do. Like before. Remember when you were a child? Fried potatoes with pork fat was your favorite.”
Veronika remembered. Oh, she remembered. After she came home from school, frozen to the bone, her mom would set a plate in front of her. Big. With golden, crispy potatoes. And bread. And a pickled cucumber. She would eat—fast, greedy, burning her mouth, while her mom sat nearby, watching and smiling.
“That was childhood,” Veronika said. “Now I’m an adult. My values are different.”
“Values,” her mom echoed. “Go on, sit down.”
Veronika sat. Her mom fixed her with a long, heavy look.
“Have you ever gone hungry?”
“Mom…”
“No, answer me. Have you ever not eaten for three days in a row?”
“What do you mean?”
“Exactly what I said. Have you ever woken up in the morning and thought: ‘Oh God, what will I feed the kids? Only a handful of flour. No potatoes. The last piece of pork fat; nothing for tomorrow.’ Have you ever woken up like that?”
Veronika stayed silent.
“But I have,” her mom said. “Back in the nineties. You were little then, you don’t remember. Your father lost his job. The farm shut down. Salaries went unpaid for six months. I knitted socks to sell—one ruble a pair. But I still had to feed you. And Vanya. Your brother. He was still alive then.”
Veronika flinched. They almost never talked about her brother. Vanya died in the army, in Chechnya. He was nineteen.
“Back then, I kept a goat,” her mom went on. “The last one. There was barely anything to feed her, but she gave us milk. Half a liter a day. I gave that milk to you kids. I brewed grass tea for myself. And you know what saved us?”
Veronika shook her head.
“Pork fat. Your father shot a wild boar in the forest that fall—by chance. We butchered it. Cured the fat in a barrel. All winter, we survived on that. There was a sack of potatoes. And the pork fat. I fried potatoes in it—and we were fed. Thanks to that pork fat, you’re sitting here now, educated, with your avocados and your animal rights.”
Her mom fell silent. The kitchen was quiet. Only the cooling pan on the stove still sizzled softly.
“You have to understand,” her mother said, “I’m not arguing with you. Maybe you’re right—maybe it really is better not to eat animals. Maybe that’s good. But I’ve seen winters in this village when an animal saved a person. Not the other way around—the animal saving the person. You talk about ethics. But for me, ethics means not letting your children starve. That’s my kind of ethics.”
Veronika sat with her head lowered.
«I didn’t know,» she whispered quietly.
“How would you know? You live in the city. There, if you run out of food—you just go to the store. But here? We have one shop, and it’s in the district center, forty kilometers away. In winter, the road gets buried in snow—and you’re trapped, like in a siege. You live on whatever food you have. The salted pork that’s prepared for the whole winter. The potatoes stored down in the cellar. That’s your superfood, right there.”
Her mother stood up. She walked to the stove, took a plate, and served some potatoes—right from the side where there was barely any pork fat. She set the plate down in front of her daughter.
«Eat up. I took away most of the pork fat. It’s just potatoes now. You won’t get poisoned.»
Veronika stared at the plate. At those golden pieces. At the crispy crust. The onions, translucent and sweet from frying. Then, suddenly, she picked up her fork.
She loaded up a piece. Blew on it. Put it in her mouth.
The taste of childhood. Exactly as she remembered. Rich, a little salty, with a hint of smoke and the old cast-iron skillet. The taste of home. The taste of her mother.
And she started to cry.
Silently. She sat there, eating the potatoes with bits of pork, as tears rolled down her cheeks. Her mother watched her—and she cried too. Silently, standing by the stove, wiping her eyes with the corner of her apron.
«Mom,» Veronika said. «I’m sorry.»
«Sorry for what?»
«For coming here with my rightness… as if I was somehow above you. But I’m not above anyone. I just forgot. I forgot everything.»
«You didn’t forget,» her mother said. «It’s just that your life is different now. That’s not a bad thing. It’s a good thing. Look at you—so smart and beautiful. But remember: if life ever gets really hard, you can always come back here. And I’ll feed you. Potatoes with pork fat. Or pies. Your philosophy can wait. Because when someone’s hungry—they’re no philosopher at all. They’re just hungry.»
Veronika got up. Walked over and hugged her mother. She was just as warm as in childhood. She still smelled like smoke and bread.
«I’ll fry you some tofu,» Veronika said through her tears. «Do you want some?»
«Let’s do it,» her mother replied. «Fry your tofu. Just don’t put any pork fat in it.»
And they both laughed. Through tears. Standing in the kitchen of that old house, as the first snow swirled outside the windows and the skillet with potatoes cooled on the stove.
In the morning, Veronika woke up early. She went into the kitchen. Her mother was already bustling near the stove.
«Mom, I was thinking…»
«Well?»
«Maybe we should get a chicken? Just one. But let her roam free. Raised ethically, like people say.»
Her mother turned around. Looked at her daughter and grinned.
«Two chickens. And a rooster. So they won’t get lonely.»
«Two chickens and a rooster,» Veronika agreed. «But I’m still going to eat tofu too.»
«Eat what you want,» her mother said. «No one’s stopping you. As long as you’re a good person, what you eat—it doesn’t matter.»
And for breakfast they had porridge. Simple millet porridge made with water and pumpkin. And it was the most delicious porridge Veronika had tasted in the past three years.
