Olesya wrapped her cardigan tighter around herself, stepped to the door, and peered through the peephole.In the stairwell, under the flickering light, two police officers stood in thick winter coats. Between them, Antonina Sergeyevna—her mother-in-law—paced nervously,
her fingers clenched around the strap of her expensive leather bag.Olesya slowly turned the key.The door swung open, and the damp smell of the stairwell hit the entryway immediately: wet coats, cold air, and the suffocatingly sweet cloud of her mother-in-law’s perfume.
“I told them exactly that over the phone!” Antonina Sergeyevna snapped, pointing a freshly manicured finger at Olesya. “Hello, police? My daughter-in-law, who isn’t in her right mind, has blocked all my accounts! Arrest her immediately! She robbed me! I was sitting in a respectable place with respectable people,
and she left me penniless!”The older officer, with deep circles under his eyes, sighed wearily.“Ma’am, a little quieter, please? You’ll wake the whole building,” he said flatly as he stepped inside. “Let’s clarify this. Who robbed whom? You claim this lady took your money?”
Olesya leaned against the doorframe.Inside, she felt only emptiness. Not fear. Not trembling. Just a deep, dull exhaustion.She looked at the flushed, cashmere-coated woman and tried to understand how they had ended up here.Just four months ago, she had escorted her here herself, gently by the arm.
That fall, Roman’s father had died suddenly. He went down to the garage for potatoes, sat on an old rubber tire—and never got up again.The loss shattered the family. Roman barely spoke for days. He sat in the kitchen, staring into space, crumbling bread into tiny pieces on the tablecloth.
“How can he stay alone now?” Olesya had whispered one evening. “That apartment reminds him of his father constantly. He cries all the time. Let’s bring him here. We have an empty room.”Olesya agreed without thinking.In the first weeks, her mother-in-law was quiet, barely leaving her room.
She moved through the apartment like a shadow.By mid-December, grief had transformed into something else entirely: energetic, demanding, and all-consuming.Antonina Sergeyevna decided: this apartment would now be her domain.
Exactly at ten, when Olesya’s online meetings began, the old vacuum roared to life in the hallway.“Antonina Sergeyevna, I have a meeting!”“Oh, you’re just staring at your monitor!” her mother-in-law waved her off.Then came the kitchen.
Olesya cooked light meals; her mother-in-law prepared greasy, heavy dishes. The apartment reeked of fried oil. Objects disappeared because they had been “put in order.” Nothing was where it belonged.When her mother-in-law asked for money, Olesya handed over her bank card.
She had been saving for months—planning to buy a new computer.“For groceries only,” she requested.At first, small amounts went missing.Then the alerts came.Luxury spas. Italian shoes. Cosmetic treatments.In a single day, nearly half her savings vanished.
“I’ve spent my whole life on others!” her mother-in-law shrugged. “Now I want to live too!”Olesya said then:“Do it again, and I’ll block the card.”Two weeks later, another attempt: a bill at an expensive seafood restaurant.Olesya blocked the card with a single movement.
Hours later, there was a knock.The police quickly clarified the situation: the card was in Olesya’s name. Her mother-in-law had used it without permission.“Do you want to file a complaint?” one asked.Olesya answered calmly:“No. Let this be a lesson.”
The next day, Antonina Sergeyevna moved out.When Roman came home, he listened to the story. First, he looked at his mother. Then, silently, he carried the suitcases to the door.That evening, he said only:“Forgive me. I was blind.”Now his mother lived in her own apartment.
Roman helped her, but he made one thing clear: there would be no dispute over money—or over his wife.Olesya learned one of life’s most important lessons:Compassion does not mean letting someone cross your boundaries.
And if protecting those boundaries means having the police explain the law in your own entryway—so be it.