On December twenty-eighth it was so damp and gray that Alisa stood by the office window, watching the wet snow stick to the windshields of the cars in the parking lot, feeling her usual fatigue.
The end of the year is always hectic for an accountant.
— Alisa, did you send the VAT report? — the chief accountant, a heavyset woman, shouted from the corridor.
— I sent it, Elena Petrovna, and I reconciled with the suppliers too.
— Good girl, go home before the traffic jams start, you have to feed your husband.
Alisa smiled. Feeding her husband had been her main job responsibility for the past five years.
She put on the down jacket she had bought on sale three years ago (the zipper stuck, but she hated spending money on a new one), wrapped a scarf around her neck, and went outside.
Her phone vibrated in her pocket. A text from Maxim: “Buy beer and shrimp, I’m tired.”
Alisa sighed. Maxim was tired. He sold plastic windows at a company that had about one and a half clients a day. Most of the time he played tank games on his work computer or smoked outside the entrance.
Yet he was as exhausted as if he had been unloading coal wagons.
In the store, Alisa calculated in her head. There were twenty-two thousand rubles left on the card. For gifts (her mother-in-law had ordered a multicooker), for the holiday table (caviar, fish, meat), for utilities. And there were still two weeks until payday.
She chose the smallest shrimp on sale and went to the checkout.
At home it was stuffy, the radiators were blasting, but no one opened the windows — Olga Nikolaevna, her mother-in-law, was afraid of drafts.
— You’re here, — she said instead of greeting, coming out of her room in a velour robe and curlers. — We’ve been waiting.
Maximka is hungry, he’ll ruin his stomach with such a schedule.
— I was working, Olga Nikolaevna.
— Working… — her mother-in-law snorted. — Shuffling papers, while a man is on his feet all day. Did you buy everything?
— Everything.
Maxim was sitting in the kitchen, staring at his phone.
— Oh, you’re back. Come on, put it on the table. Boil the shrimp with dill, the way I like.
Alisa silently put down the bags.
— Maxim, we need to talk about money.
— Here you go again? — he grimaced without looking up from the screen. — Let me eat in peace.
— I’m not starting anything, we just have a hole in the budget. Your salary didn’t come again this month?
— It’s delayed, I told you! The boss said he’ll pay after the holidays. Why are you nagging? Is it my fault there’s a crisis in the country?
Alisa knew he was lying. Nothing was delayed. Maxim had already spent his salary (a pathetic thirty thousand rubles). On what? Bets? Beer with friends? New seat covers? He never accounted for anything. “I’m a man, I earned it, I spent it.”
That evening the first thing happened that should have opened her eyes. But out of habit, Alisa preferred to close them.
Maxim, softened by beer, suddenly said:
— Listen, Alis. There’s this sure thing.
— What thing? — she was washing dishes with her back to him.
— A buddy, Seryoga, is offering an investment. You put in a hundred thousand, in a month you take out three hundred.
Alisa froze.
— Maxim, no. No investments. We’re barely making ends meet as it is.
— You don’t get it! — he jumped up and hugged her from behind (a rare show of affection). — This is our chance! We’ll break out of poverty! I’ll buy you a fur coat, send Mom to a sanatorium.
— We don’t have a hundred thousand.
— A loan! — he whispered in her ear. — Take it out in your name. They won’t give it to me, my credit history is bad. Yours is clean. I’ll pay it off with the first profit! I swear!
Alisa looked into his eyes. A gambler’s fever was burning there.
— No, Maxim. I’m not taking out a loan. End of discussion.
His face changed instantly.
— You’re stupid, you’ll count pennies all your life. I’m trying for the family and you…
He slammed the door. Alisa was left with the dirty dishes and a heavy sense of trouble.
The next morning Alisa was already at the stove. Olga Nikolaevna had made up a menu worthy of a reception: Olivier salad, herring under a fur coat, Mimosa, crab stick salad (with real crab, she insisted, though Alisa bought sticks), aspic, roasted meat.
— Alisa! — her mother-in-law shouted. — You overcooked the carrots! Maximka likes them crunchy!
Maxim was lying in the living room, on a day off.
At five in the evening the doorbell rang.
— That’s for me! — her mother-in-law perked up. — Alisa, open! Set the table in the living room, get the fancy service!
Alisa opened the door.
On the threshold stood a young woman. White mink coat, high-heeled boots, expensive perfume.
— Hello. Does Olga Nikolaevna live here?
— Lidochka! — her mother-in-law beamed. — Come in!
Maxim ran out in a freshly ironed shirt.
— Lida! You look… amazing!
— And who is she? — Lida asked, pointing at Alisa. — The cleaning lady?
— You could say that, a household helper, — her mother-in-law giggled. — She lives here… out of charity.
— I’m Maxim’s wife, — Alisa said.
— Wife? — Lida looked at Maxim.
— We’re in the process of divorce, we haven’t lived like husband and wife for a long time, — he muttered.
The words hit like a slap.
From the living room came her mother-in-law’s voice:
— Maxim needs a status wife! This was just a youthful mistake.
Alisa packed her things. Clothes, documents, her son’s belongings. Then in the kitchen she took everything she had bought: caviar, sausage, parmesan, red fish, roasted meat. In the fridge she left only mayonnaise and half a lemon.
She took the medicines too. Unscrewed the light bulbs. Turned off the circuit for the living room. Put the gate remote in her pocket.
She got into a taxi.
— Where to?
— To my new life. To Forest Street, to my sister’s.
At home there was chaos. The fridge was empty. The young lady stared at the frozen dumplings.
— Dumplings for New Year? Seriously?
Lida left offended. Maxim stubbed his toe in the dark. The mother-in-law called an ambulance for blood pressure of 140. The paramedics scolded them.
Her sister took Alisa in.
— Cry today, tomorrow we start a new life.
Alisa cried. Then she went back to work. Her mother-in-law wrote a complaint accusing her of stealing money. With the help of a lawyer, Alisa responded, and the accusations stopped.
She met Kolya, the maintenance engineer. He wasn’t rich, drove a Lada, but he brought warmth into her life. Six months later they got married.
Maxim went downhill. Lost his job, debts, drinking. Lida left him.
Ten years later
A clinic. Alisa looked good, calm. Across from her sat an aged, bitter mother-in-law and a worn-out Maxim.
— Lend me a hundred till tonight, — Maxim said.
— I don’t have cash. And I won’t transfer anything.
She left with Kolya.
— Who were they?
— Ghosts of the past.
In the evening there was Mimosa salad on the table. Her son was telling stories, Kolya was laughing.
Alisa knew: happiness is not status. Happiness is when you lay your head on the pillow and fall asleep without fear.
And when Mimosa salad is just salad — not a reason for reproach.
Now it’s your turn.
Could you do that? Leave with an empty fridge in one sweep? Or would you feel sorry and feed them one last time?
Do you believe in boomerang karma, or was Alisa just lucky?
Write in the comments. And remember: you have only one yourself, and you always deserve light.
