Oksana Mykolaivna set down her fork and looked across the table at her son and daughter-in-law. Steam curled from the pelmeni she had made that afternoon. The good bottle of red wine stood on the sideboard, saved for an occasion. “I have news,” she said.
“I looked at the studio apartment this morning. Our neighbors from flat 63 are selling it. Fresh renovation, new wiring, even a separate breaker for the induction hob. They’re already sitting on their suitcases, so the price can be negotiated.
” She paused. “I’m buying it, and you two are moving in. ”
Maxym froze mid-chew. Then his face split into a wide, boyish grin.
“Mom. Seriously? Here? ”
“Seriously.
Tomorrow I put down the deposit. ”
He jumped up and hugged her across the table. “Mom, you’re incredible. Soli, do you hear that?
We’ll leave that rented place. Twenty-five thousand a month, gone. We can finally save for our own apartment. ”
Solomiia smiled.
The smile didn’t reach her eyes — just the corners of her mouth, her gaze fixed on her plate. The silence stretched too long. Maxym, still glowing, noticed nothing. “Maxym,” Solomiia said quietly, “can we discuss this before we decide anything?
”
“Discuss what? It’s a free apartment, Soli. ”
“Everything,” she said. Her voice went flat.
“It’s on your mother’s floor. Through the wall. We won’t even lock our door before she’s inside with advice. Every morning.
”
Oksana lowered her fork slowly. “If we’re going to buy property, we choose where,” Solomiia went on. “Near my office. Or in another district.
Not practically inside your home. ”
“Buy with what money? ” Oksana asked. “You don’t have a down payment for a mortgage.
”
“Then we rent until we do. I’m not trading one rent for a debt that comes with my mother-in-law as a neighbor. ”
Oksana looked at her son. Maxym’s jaw was tight, his eyes flicking to his wife.
And then Oksana saw it — a sharp movement below the table. Solomiia’s elbow drove into his ribs, hard enough to make him flinch. “Say it, then,” Solomiia hissed. Maxym’s face flushed.
“Mom, maybe we should look at something else. In another area. You still want to help us, right? It doesn’t have to be this exact place.
”
Oksana turned to him. The warmth drained from her voice. “Maxym, you’re not saying what you actually think. When I told you about the flat, your eyes lit up.
I saw genuine joy on your face. ” She paused. “I also saw your wife kick you under the table. I’m not blind.
”
Solomiia went pale, then flushed. “Yes, I kicked him. Because he’d never tell you the truth on his own. We decide our future together.
And I will not live three meters from my mother-in-law. I want my own home, where I’m the only mistress. Not somewhere I have to wonder every morning whether you’ll let yourself in. ”
“Have I ever come to your apartment uninvited?
” Oksana asked, her voice cold. “Give me one example. ”
“It’s not about invitations. It’s about distance.
You chose this place because it’s convenient for you. ”
“Actually, I chose it because it’s finished, it’s affordable, and it stops my son from throwing away money on rent. ” She stood. “Now listen to me carefully.
I am buying that studio. If Maxym wants it, it’s his. If you don’t want to live there, Solomiia, that’s your choice. Let your parents buy you the flat you prefer.
But nobody decides where I invest money I worked for all my life. ”
Solomiia rose, shaking. She grabbed her coat and bag, then wheeled on Maxym. “Are you coming?
”
Maxym raised his head. His face was hollow. “I’ll stay. We need to talk.
”
“Your mother just called me greedy, and you sit there like a statue. ” Her voice climbed. “You call this help? You’re breaking us apart on purpose.
”
“I didn’t call you greedy,” Oksana said calmly. “I said you kicked my son to make him speak your words. I saw it with my own eyes. You can’t argue with a fact.
”
Solomiia slammed the door so hard the walls shook. Oksana sank back into her chair. The pelmeni had gone cold. “Maxym.
What was that? ”
“She’s just… she’s hurt. ”
“She’s twisting you around her finger.
” Oksana’s voice was quiet but sharp. “You’ve been married six months. Six months — and you’re already afraid to speak in front of her. When I said the word ‘apartment,’ you almost cried with joy.
Then she kicked you, and suddenly you’re agreeing to rent forever just to keep the peace. ”
“She’s not —”
“Stand up and listen. ” Oksana pressed her palms flat on the table. “I’m not telling you to leave her.
I’m telling you to look at what just happened. She decided for you. She pushed you like a button. And you folded.
”
Maxym stared at the table. “The studio is bought tomorrow,” she went on. “Not against you — for you. If you want it, it’s yours.
If she refuses to live there, that’s between you and her. Decide with your own head, not with her foot on your leg. ”
He stayed another hour. They drank the wine, and he talked about work — new equipment at the auto service, more complex jobs, better pay.
He didn’t mention Solomiia. When he left, his shoulders were heavy. Three days later he appeared at her door late in the evening with a sports bag over his shoulder. His face was gray, unshaven, crumpled.
Oksana looked at the bag, then at him, and stepped aside. He dropped onto the couch and stared at the floor. “Three days of screaming. She kept saying you humiliated her.
I told her, over and over, you never said those things. She called me a mama’s boy. Said I always take your side. Yesterday I came home and she was gone.
Packed up, moved to a friend’s place. ” He swallowed. “Left a note: decide who’s more important — your wife or your mother. ”
Oksana poured a glass of cold water and handed it to him.
“She said she’ll come back only if I make you sell the studio and buy us something in a district she chooses. In both our names. ”
“And what did you tell her? ”
“That I can’t ask you to do that.
It’s your money. ” He drained the glass. “But she wants what she wants. ”
Oksana sat down across from him, her voice not unkind, but firm.
“Maxym, you’re twenty-six. You have a good job, good hands, a clear head. You don’t owe anyone anything except yourself. A woman who loves you doesn’t make you choose between her and your mother.
She doesn’t shove you under a table like furniture. That’s control. Today it’s the apartment. Tomorrow it’s ‘don’t see your mother.
‘ The day after, it’s ‘quit your job. ‘ You’ll spend your whole life jumping to her beat. Do you want that? ”
“No,” he said quietly.
“Then don’t go back to her on your knees. You packed your bag. You came here. You already chose to stand up.
” She softened. “Don’t undo it now. ”
He was silent for a long time. “Mom, I’m not a spineless mama’s boy.
I just… don’t want to be controlled anymore. ”
“I know, son. I know.
”
That night, when his breathing evened out from the bedroom, Oksana slipped into her robe, took the keyring from her pocket, and stepped onto the landing. Three new keys. She unlocked the studio next door and switched on the light. White light flooded the empty room.
Fresh walls, a clean smell, no furniture, no voices. She stood at the wide window and looked out at the city’s yellow lights. She had done what she had to do as a mother. Gave her son a place to land, a start, a roof that wasn’t someone else’s property.
The rest was up to him. She wasn’t going to push. She let the door click shut behind her. The next morning, Maxym called Solomiia and asked her to meet at a café near her office.
She arrived with her chin raised, certain he had come to beg. He placed the keys to the studio on the table. “The flat is ours, rent-free. We can save everything and buy our own place later.
I want to build a future with you. But the flat stays. ”
She pushed the keys back. “Then we have nothing to talk about.
” She gave her final terms: he makes his mother sell the studio, buys somewhere Solomiia chooses, in both their names. Only then would she come back. Maxym listened. Then he picked up the keys, paid for his coffee, and left.
A week later he rented a small van and moved his things into the studio. He unpacked slowly: his tools on a pegboard by the window, a simple bed, a desk. The rooms filled with his life again. He and his mother saw each other almost every day — not as a leash, but as neighbors, as family who left the door open when needed and closed otherwise.
On a warm Saturday morning, Oksana knocked and then came in carrying a large ficus in a ceramic pot. “For your new home,” she said, setting it on the windowsill. “Every house needs something alive in it. ”
He was kneeling next to a cardboard box, fitting a shelf bracket.
He looked at the plant, then at her, and smiled — the same open smile from that evening at the dinner table. Only this time nothing was hiding behind it. Oksana touched the edge of the windowsill and looked around the room.
He had made it his own.
