Victor stood by the stove, frying eggs in the pan. My phone was still in my hand after the call from the registry office.
A woman’s voice rang in my ears: “Marina Sergeyevna, your husband has a problem with his documents. Come today. And it’s better if you come alone.”
— Marin, I’m saying, shall we go to the sanatorium? — Victor put a plate in front of me. — For three weeks. Your bakeries can manage without you.
— I need to take care of some business.
— Do you want me to drive you?
— No need.
He shrugged. Strong, calm. Two weeks ago I thought I was lucky. Forty-two years old, three bakeries, a two-room apartment in the center — and finally someone by my side.
The foreman, who had come to fix the new workshop, stayed. His mother, Antonina Pavlovna, even baked a cake for our engagement, but the whole time she kept asking about the apartment and income.
At the registry office, the woman pulled out a folder without lifting her eyes.
— Your husband married fifteen years ago. To Svetlana Kovaljova. There’s no divorce in the records.
I looked at the copy of the certificate. Young Victor with long hair. Next to him, a girl with short hair and big eyes. Witnesses: Antonina Pavlovna Sergeyeva.
— His mother was the witness?
— Yes. So the marriage is invalid.
— She told me he was never married.
The woman was silent. Then she quietly added:
— If I were you, I wouldn’t rush home.
In the car, I called Andrey. We had been friends since school, he was the local police officer, once helped with the papers for my first bakery. He arrived in twenty minutes and looked at the photos of the documents.
— Svetlana Kovaljova. From the orphanage, right? No parents.
— Andrey, what does that mean?
He started the car without answering. We drove to the outskirts and stopped by a leaning fence.
— Victor and his mother lived here fifteen years ago. Then they moved.
The neighbors said Antonina Pavlovna had ordered her son to pour the basement with concrete. Because of the dampness, supposedly. Right after the young wife went to her relatives.
— Svetlana had no relatives.
Andrey nodded.
— I thought so. I need to pull up the old case. Marina, go home, act normally. Don’t say anything. Give me two days.
Antonina Pavlovna sat at my desk. In front of her were folders with lease agreements, the LLC charter, the apartment ownership certificate.
— Marin, you’re back at last. — She smiled. — I was thinking, everything must be arranged properly. You’re not alone now, you have a family. We’ll transfer management to Victor, and you can finally rest.
— Why do you want my bakeries?
She froze.
— What are you saying? We are family.
— Why didn’t you tell me Victor was married?
The silence stretched tight like a string. Antonina Pavlovna slowly set the papers aside.
— That was a long time ago. The girl from the orphanage clung to him. They broke up.
— Where did she go?
— To some acquaintances. I don’t remember.
— They forgot to divorce officially?
Her face lost all softness.
— You don’t understand. Victor is a good boy. He deserves a normal life. That girl was nothing. But you… you’re different. You have everything.
I walked to the door and opened it.
— Leave.
She gathered the documents slowly, deliberately. At the door, she turned:
— You’ll regret it. We’re not the kind who give up.
In the evening, Victor made soup, talking about work. I looked at his hands. These were the hands that poured concrete fifteen years ago.
— You’re quiet. — He sat across from me. — Mom said you argued.
— She wanted me to transfer the business to you.
— She overstepped. No need to transfer anything. Yours is yours, mine is mine.
He spoke so simply, so convincingly. I would have believed him if it weren’t for those documents.
— Victor, were you married before?
He froze. The spoon hovered over the plate, then slowly dropped.
— Who said?
— Doesn’t matter.
Victor leaned back in his chair, running a hand over his face.
— It was long ago. I was young, foolish. I married the first girl who agreed. She left afterwards. We didn’t divorce officially, but what difference does it make?
— Where did she go?
— She said she was leaving, and she left. I didn’t stop her.
— Did your mother know?
Pause.
— She knew. She was against the marriage. Said Svetka would use me. She was right.
— Why didn’t you tell me?
— Why? The past is the past.
I got up from the table. He came up behind me and hugged me.
— Marin, don’t invent unnecessary things. I love you. Everything else doesn’t matter.
I stood motionless, thinking: what if Andrey finds nothing?
Andrey called in the morning. I went out to the balcony and closed the door.
— We found her. In the basement of the old house. Under concrete. About twenty-five years old. Next to her, a hairpin with the initials S.K.
My legs shook. I sat on the cold floor.
— Svetlana Kovaljova.
— Yes. They opened the missing person case. Neighbors saw her packing and crying. Antonina Pavlovna yelled at her that no one could leave this family. The next day Svetlana was gone, and the concrete was poured.
— He killed her.
— We’re going to your place. There will be an arrest. Can you handle it?
I looked toward the kitchen. Victor sat there, drinking coffee. A normal morning.
— I can handle it.
Victor opened the door and saw Andrey with the officers. His face went pale.
— Victor Olegovich, you are under arrest in connection with the disappearance of Svetlana Kovaljova.
— I don’t know what you’re talking about.
— We found her in the basement. Under the concrete you poured.
Victor was silent. Then he turned to me:
— Marin, tell them it’s nonsense.
I stood by the wall and watched. This man, who two weeks ago spoke of love. Who was planning the sanatorium. Who might already have been thinking how to get rid of me.
— Leave my apartment.
They took him away. At the door, he looked back — with that honest, open gaze. But I already saw something else. A frightened girl with short hair, who just wanted to escape.
Antonina Pavlovna was taken an hour later. She screamed through the stairwell that she protected her son from the “orphan-clinging girl,” Svetlana was to blame — “she wanted to enter our family, to be an outsider.”
Neighbors peeked out, someone filmed on their phone.
The investigator later said: the mother confessed everything. Svetlana wanted to leave Victor.
— I couldn’t let her use him. — Antonina Pavlovna insisted. — He’s my son. I protected him.
Victor tried to blame everything on his mother. But the investigation showed the blow was delivered by a man’s hand. The mother only helped hide it. Both were sentenced.
I applied to have the marriage annulled. The process was quick — invalid marriage, fraud. The lawyer said I was lucky: a little longer and they could have transferred the property.
For a month, I tried to recover. I didn’t close the bakeries, didn’t change my phone.
I just worked. At night, I sat in the kitchen thinking: how did I not see it? How did I believe this calmness, these right words?
Andrey sometimes came with documents. Once we stayed late, drinking coffee in silence.
— Did you know from the start that something was wrong?
— I got suspicious when you told me about his mother. She asked too much about money.
— And if they hadn’t found anything?
— You would have divorced the bigamist and lived on. But you definitely wouldn’t have given up the bakeries.
I smiled for the first time in a month.
He stood, preparing to leave. At the door, he turned:
— Marina, maybe we could have dinner sometime? Just like that. No business.
I looked at him. Andrey stood there in his old coat, tired police face. Never offered the apartment, never asked about income. He was just there beside me.
— Okay — I said.
Half a year passed. Victor got fifteen years, Antonina Pavlovna ten. At the trial, she insisted until the end it was all for her son. Victor sat with his head down.
Svetlana was buried in the city cemetery. I went once, laid flowers. I stood thinking: she just wanted to leave. To start a new life. They didn’t let her.
I was saved.
Andrey now comes without documents. We walk, go to the movies, have dinner in quiet places.
He doesn’t say beautiful words, doesn’t make ten-year plans. He just holds my hand when we cross the street. Asks how I am. Listens.
Sometimes I catch myself thinking: what if that call from the registry office hadn’t come? If that woman hadn’t dared to call and asked me to come alone?
I’d probably be under another layer of concrete now. Or sitting without papers, without money — thinking how it all happened.
But the call came. And I got there in time.
A few days ago, a letter arrived from Antonina Pavlovna in prison. She wrote that I destroyed their family, Victor suffers, it’s all my fault. I read it and threw it away. Other people’s pain no longer had power over me.
Yesterday, Andrey and I sat in the car by the river. He talked about work, I watched the water, thinking: here it is, real life. No show, no pretty promises. Just a person beside me who won’t betray me.
— What are you thinking about? — he asked.
— That call from the registry office saved my life.
Andrey nodded, not taking his eyes off the water.
— That woman took a risk. She could have stayed silent, processed the documents, and forgotten. But she called.
— She said to come alone. I didn’t understand why she spoke so strangely. But she was only afraid that Victor would come with me.
— Smart woman.
We sat in silence. Then Andrey took my hand.
— Marina, I don’t know how to speak beautifully. But I’m glad you’re alive. And that you’re here.
I looked at him. At his usual face, these tired eyes. No pretense, no vows. Just truth.
— I’m glad too.
Perhaps love really lives nearby — we just don’t always recognize it behind the loud words of others. Svetlana only wanted freedom.
Now I live her life too. Every day, opening the bakeries, signing documents, or simply walking down the street — I remember. She couldn’t. But I was given a chance.
And I lived it.
