“I’m leaving you for another woman,” Andrey said. I nodded and asked him to take only what he had bought himself.
“Fine,” Ekaterina said, closing her laptop. “Then take only what you bought yourself.”
Andrey stood in the middle of the living room looking like a man who had stepped onto a stage to deliver a grand monologue, only to receive neither tears nor shouting in response, but a dry, businesslike remark.
Behind him, the new television glowed softly. His jacket lay across the armrest of the sofa. A cup of tea was cooling on the coffee table, untouched while he had been preparing himself to announce the beginning of his new life.
From Sonya’s room came the quiet rustle of turning pages. Her niece was pretending to study her notes, but Ekaterina knew perfectly well that she could hear everything.
“You’re not even going to ask who she is?” Andrey asked with a strained, self-assured smile.
“No.”
“And you don’t care why I’m leaving either?”
“I’m more interested in something else. What exactly you’re planning to leave with.”
He blinked, as though he had not immediately understood what she meant.
The apartment around them looked exactly the way Ekaterina had spent ten years making it look.
Light-colored walls without cheap decorative swirls. A gray-beige sofa from a new collection that she had managed to get through her corporate discount. A tall wardrobe in the hallway, custom-built to her measurements. A kitchen with matte cabinet fronts that Andrey liked to call “my taste” whenever guests came over, even though he had visited the showroom only once and stayed for twenty minutes.
In the bedroom stood a proper bed with an orthopedic base instead of the squeaky nightmare they had slept on during the first years of their marriage. On the enclosed balcony were shelves for boxes of documents and seasonal belongings.
Andrey had long ago incorporated all of it into his own biography.
It was convenient that way: living inside someone else’s carefully built order and presenting it as proof of your own success.
“Have you decided to humiliate me now?” he said through clenched teeth.
“No. I simply don’t want any confusion. You’re leaving, so take what belongs to you.”
“Everything in this apartment belongs to both of us.”
Ekaterina looked up at him.
“Then let’s start with the apartment.”
He gave a short laugh.
“Don’t start with your accounting tricks. I’m not at work.”
“Too bad. At work, at least you understand that numbers speak more clearly than people do.”
Andrey snatched his jacket from the chair, tossed it back down, sat, then immediately stood again.
He had expected a completely different reaction.
She could see it in the nervous movements of his shoulders. She could see it in the irritation quickly breaking through the elegant performance of “I’m leaving.”
He had wanted a scene after which he could walk away as the hero.
A man burdened by a difficult decision.
A tired man who had suffered for too long.
A man entitled to say, “I endured this for years.”
Ekaterina had destroyed the entire performance with one sentence.
“Have you had someone else for a long time?” Sonya asked quietly from the doorway.
She stood there barefoot, wearing a casual house sweater, her phone in one hand, looking as though she could not decide whether to go back to her room or stay.
Andrey jerked his head toward her.
“Stay out of adult conversations.”
“She lives with me,” Ekaterina replied. “And this is her home too while she’s here. So she’ll hear exactly as much as you decided to bring into this living room.”
Sonya said nothing else. She merely leaned her shoulder against the wall and looked away.
Suddenly, Andrey softened his voice, almost becoming condescending.
“Katya, don’t turn this into a marketplace argument. I’m not your enemy. I want us to separate like civilized people. Without being petty. Without this nonsense about who bought which fork or which stool.”
“You can leave the forks. I don’t mind. But you seem to have already promised someone the car, the television, the coffee machine, and the furniture.”
He froze.
It was barely noticeable—a brief tightening in his neck, a heavy look, a pause that lasted slightly too long before he answered.
But Ekaterina had worked in sales for fifteen years.
She knew what a person looked like when they had not yet been caught but were already calculating how many exits remained.
“What are you talking about?” he asked, far too evenly.
“I’m saying that people don’t make announcements like this empty-handed. You already have a picture in your head of your new life. And apparently, in that picture, you didn’t arrive with just one suitcase.”
“You’re imagining things.”
“I have a good memory.”
She stood, walked toward the enclosed balcony, opened the upper cabinet, and took out a blue snap-button folder.
Andrey followed her with his eyes, his irritation visibly growing.
Sonya remained in the doorway.
“Are you serious?” Andrey laughed briefly. “Are you actually going to calculate who screwed in how many lightbulbs?”
Ekaterina placed the folder on the table.
“I’m going to calculate what is registered in my name and what I paid for. You can take the lightbulbs as a bonus.”
He stepped toward the table, opened the folder, scanned the first document, and grimaced.
On top was the contract for the sale of the room Ekaterina had owned before their marriage.
Below it was a bank statement showing the money being deposited.
Under that was the payment for this apartment.
Then came the renovation estimate, the kitchen order, installment agreements for the appliances, and documents showing the car loan had been paid off.
Every document had dates, amounts, and her signature.
“You kept all of this?” he asked, no longer smiling.
“Of course.”
“Why?”
“Because furniture can be beautiful, but people can be very temporary.”
Ekaterina herself was surprised by how calm her voice sounded.
She was not trying to hurt him with a clever phrase.
She wanted him, finally, to see what he had been living on all these years.
Not comfort.
Someone else’s payments.
Someone else’s contracts.
Someone else’s late-night calculations after work.
Andrey tossed the first document aside.
“I invested in this family too.”
“Where exactly?”
“In everything.”
“Excellent answer. But a notary will probably want something a little more substantial than air.”
Sonya moved her phone behind her back.
Apparently, she had already started recording.
Andrey noticed.
“Put that away!” he barked.
“Don’t yell at her,” Ekaterina said quietly. “It’s not helping you anymore.”
He turned sharply toward his wife.
“Have you decided to make me look like a nobody just because I’m leaving?”
“No. You worked very hard to do that yourself.”
Ekaterina’s phone vibrated.
The screen showed the name: “Tamara Ilyinichna.”
Andrey saw it and immediately straightened, suddenly looking a little more confident.
“Answer it. Mom will explain to you that this isn’t how people separate…”
The continuation is just below in the first comment.
“I’m leaving you for another woman,” Andrei said.
Ekaterina looked up from her laptop, nodded once, and closed the screen.
“Fine,” she replied calmly. “Then take only what you bought yourself.”
Andrei froze in the middle of the living room.
Clearly, this was not the reaction he had expected.
He had probably imagined tears, accusations, questions about the other woman. Instead, Ekaterina sat there as if they were discussing an invoice.
“Aren’t you even going to ask who she is?”
“No.”
“You don’t care why I’m leaving?”
“I’m more interested in what exactly you plan to leave with.”
His expression changed.
Around them stood the life Ekaterina had spent ten years building: the expensive sofa she had bought through a corporate discount, the custom hallway cabinets, the renovated kitchen, the orthopedic bed, the television, the coffee machine, and countless other things Andrei had gradually begun treating as evidence of his own success.
“Are you trying to humiliate me?” he asked.
“No. I just don’t want confusion. If you’re leaving, take what belongs to you.”
“Everything here belongs to both of us.”
Ekaterina raised her eyes.
“Then let’s start with the apartment.”
Andrei gave an irritated laugh.
“Don’t start with your accounting nonsense.”
“That’s unfortunate,” she said. “At work, at least you understand that numbers are more reliable than words.”
From the doorway appeared Sonya, Ekaterina’s niece, who had been staying with her. She had obviously heard everything.
“Have you had someone else for a long time?” she asked quietly.
“Stay out of adult conversations,” Andrei snapped.
“She lives here,” Ekaterina said. “So she has every right to hear what you decided to announce in this living room.”
Andrei changed tactics.
“Katya, I want us to separate like civilized people. No pettiness. No arguments about who bought a fork or a chair.”
“You can take the forks,” Ekaterina said. “But I suspect you’ve already promised someone the car, television, coffee machine, and furniture.”
Andrei went still.
That tiny reaction told her enough.
Ekaterina had worked in sales for fifteen years. She knew what people looked like when they had been caught before they were ready.
“What are you talking about?”
“You already have a picture of your new life. And I doubt you planned to enter it carrying one suitcase.”
“You’re imagining things.”
“I have a good memory.”
She walked to the enclosed balcony, opened a cabinet, and returned with a blue folder.
Andrei laughed nervously.
“What now? You’re going to calculate who paid for every light bulb?”
“I’m going to calculate what is registered in my name and what I paid for.”
She opened the folder.
Inside were the documents from the sale of the room she had owned before their marriage, bank statements showing where the money had gone, payments toward their apartment, renovation invoices, appliance installment contracts, and records showing how the car loan had been paid.
Almost everything led back to her.
“You kept all this?” Andrei asked.
“Of course.”
“Why?”
“Because furniture can last a long time. People don’t always.”
His face hardened.
“I contributed to this family too.”
“Where?”
“To everything.”
“Then bring proof.”
Before he could answer, Ekaterina’s phone rang.
It was Tamara Ilyinichna, Andrei’s mother.
Andrei visibly relaxed.
“Answer it. Mom will explain that decent people don’t separate like this.”
Ekaterina put the call on speaker.
“Katya,” her mother-in-law began, “Andrei told me everything. There’s no need to humiliate him by counting sofas and spoons. You were married. Everything was shared.”
“I’m not counting spoons. I’m counting payments.”
“What difference does it make who paid?”
“It may not matter to you. It matters to a notary.”
“A notary?”
“Yes. Tomorrow.”
For the first time, Andrei looked genuinely nervous.
“You’re really taking this to a notary?”
“You said you wanted to separate properly.”
That night, Andrei did not leave.
He paced through the apartment, smoked in the stairwell, texted someone constantly, and repeatedly glanced at the expensive appliances as if mentally packing them.
Late at night, Ekaterina heard movement.
She opened her eyes.
Footsteps.
A cabinet door.
The sound of a box scraping across the floor.
When she entered the living room, Andrei was carrying the coffee machine toward the door.
“Put it down.”
He turned sharply.
“I’m taking my things.”
“That coffee machine is in my name.”
“We both used it.”
“Using something doesn’t mean you bought it.”
Sonya appeared with her phone.
Andrei became furious.
“You turned her against me too?”
“You’ve done that perfectly well yourself,” Ekaterina replied.
Then she looked directly at him.
“Try to remove something I paid for again and I’ll call the police. Then Diana probably won’t have the evening she was expecting.”
Andrei went pale.
“Who’s Diana?”
“You wanted me to ask about her earlier. Now it’s too late.”
He put the coffee machine down.
The following morning, they met at the notary’s office.
Tamara Ilyinichna was already there, sitting rigidly in the hallway as though she had arrived to defend her son from some great injustice.
The notary, Valery Petrovich, listened quietly while Andrei spoke about their marriage, shared responsibilities, and his “contribution to family life.”
Then he turned to Ekaterina.
“Do you have the documents?”
She placed the blue folder on his desk.
He went through everything carefully.
The apartment had been purchased using money from property Ekaterina owned before marriage.
The renovation had been paid from her account.
The appliances were tied to her installment agreements.
The car loan had largely been paid from her salary card.
Andrei kept trying to interrupt.
“But I lived there for ten years.”
“Living somewhere is not the same as paying for it,” the notary replied.
“We both used the car.”
“Who made the payments?”
Ekaterina silently handed over another statement.
The notary nodded.
Andrei’s frustration grew.
“So I’m nobody?”
“I didn’t say that,” Valery Petrovich answered. “You are free to provide proof of your financial contribution. At the moment, I have not seen any.”
Then Andrei’s phone vibrated.
He rejected the call.
Ekaterina saw the name.
Diana.
Seconds later, a message appeared on the screen.
“When are you coming? I told them you’d arrive today with the car and the appliances.”
Silence filled the office.
Tamara Ilyinichna stared at her son.
“Andrei… who did you promise all that to?”
He said nothing.
At that moment, Ekaterina’s last doubts disappeared.
She had wondered whether she was being too harsh, too calculating, too focused on money.
Now she understood.
Andrei had not been asking for a fair separation.
He had already promised another woman a lifestyle financed by Ekaterina.
The notary tapped his pen against the desk.
“The apartment, most of the furnishings, the appliances, and the car are all documented as being financially connected to Ekaterina Igorevna. Unless another agreement is reached, I see no basis for treating these items as Andrei Sergeyevich’s personal property.”
Andrei stared at the table.
“So what am I supposed to do? Leave with one suitcase?”
Ekaterina looked at him.
“That’s what I told you yesterday. Take what you bought yourself.”
“And what exactly is that?”
She opened the final sleeve of the folder.
“The old blue drill you bought before our renovation. Two shirts you bought during a business trip. And the suitcase your mother gave you.”
Tamara Ilyinichna looked down.
“Katya, you didn’t have to be so harsh.”
Ekaterina turned toward her.
“I spent ten years being gentle. You can see where that got me.”
Outside, Diana was waiting in the parking lot.
She wore a light coat and a bright scarf.
At first she smiled when she saw Andrei.
Then she noticed his empty hands.
Then she saw the old drill sticking from his suitcase and the two shirts hanging over his arm.
That evening, Andrei returned to collect the rest of his belongings.
There were no speeches this time.
No accusations.
No dramatic declarations.
He packed his razor, charger, shirts, drill, and a few personal items into the suitcase.
At the door, he paused.
“Is that everything?”
“Yes.”
He seemed to wait for something—a tear, perhaps, or one final plea for him to stay.
It never came.
When the door closed behind him, Sonya stepped out of her room.
“Do you need anything?”
Ekaterina listened to the quiet apartment.
No television murmuring in the background.
No keys thrown carelessly onto the hallway shelf.
No footsteps belonging to someone who had mistaken her work for his entitlement.
“No,” she said softly. “Just stay home.”
Later, Ekaterina walked slowly through the rooms.
She touched the chair she had chosen herself, straightened the blanket on the sofa, and turned off the bright kitchen light, leaving only the warm lamp above the table.
Everything was still exactly where it had always been.
But now the apartment no longer looked like a stage built for someone else’s comfort.
She returned the blue folder to the cabinet on the balcony and closed the door.
For the first time, the silence did not frighten her.
She had simply stopped paying for someone else’s life.