Vera Nikolaevna arrived at the clinic at 6:45 AM. The doors wouldn’t open until eight, but already five people were gathered by the entrance. There was a woman in a burgundy down jacket with the collar pulled up, an elderly man leaning on a cane, two quiet workers in matching uniforms, and a petite old lady in a knit hat pulled down to her eyebrows.
The February air carried the scent of wet metal and exhaust fumes from the minibuses at the nearby stop. Vera adjusted her scarf, pulled a slip of paper with her appointment room number from her pocket, and joined the end of the line. Her feet in winter boots started to freeze almost immediately, despite her house being just three stops away from the clinic.
In her bag, she carried a folder. Thick, made of cardboard, fastened with a pharmacy rubber band. Vera had packed everything she might need inside: her insurance policy, pension card, passport, a hospital discharge summary from last year, and results from tests she’d done in November. Every document sat neatly in its own plastic sleeve, each one labeled in her careful teacher’s handwriting.
For twenty-nine years, Vera Nikolaevna Lebedeva taught Russian language and literature at school number seventeen. The habit of order stuck to her like chalk on her fingers. Even after retiring three years ago, she still woke up at six each morning, made her bed, and prepared breakfast, as if she still had to rush to her first class.
But today, she was hurrying here. To see therapist Kirill Andreevich Stepanov in office 212. She needed a referral to the rheumatologist at the regional hospital. Just one piece of paper. One stamp. One quick visit she’d been putting off since autumn, since her knees ached tolerably and traveling out of town was far and troublesome.
Now it was getting harder to bear. Her right knee had swollen so much it hurt to pull on her pants, and going up stairs meant gripping the railings with both hands. She was fifty-eight, and she knew this wasn’t old age. It was something else—something that needed a name and treatment.
Her phone vibrated in her pocket. On the screen: “Artyom.” Vera glanced at the time, frowned, and hit “decline.” Her son almost never called in the mornings. But she didn’t feel like returning the call now, out in the cold, among strangers.
Later.
The little old lady in the knit hat turned around.
“Are you the last in line?”
“Yes, I am,” Vera nodded.
“Faina Stepanovna,” the old lady introduced herself, as if they were at a birthday party rather than waiting to see the therapist. “And who are you here to see?”
“Stepanov, office two-twelve.”
“Me too. Looks like we’re partners in misfortune.”
Faina Stepanovna was short, barely over five feet, with lively dark eyes and a way of speaking as if she was continuing a conversation long in progress. She wore glasses on a chain around her neck and held a bag with a corner of a thermos peeking out.
Morning at the clinic
“I’m here every month,” she stated before anyone could ask. “To get prescriptions. My blood pressure’s all over the place. Sometimes it’s 140, sometimes 180. The doctors say it’s stress. But what stress? I live alone, nobody bothers me. Even the cat is calm.”
Vera smiled. She liked people like this—open, easy to talk to. Back at school, she always got along with the students’ parents, mostly because she was such a good listener.
But she never enjoyed talking about herself.
At exactly eight o’clock, the doors swung open. The security guard—a hefty man around sixty wearing a wrinkled dark suit—held the door and stepped aside. The line shuffled forward.
Inside, the air was thick with the smell of bleach and something rubbery, the scent every clinic has in winter when wet footprints are left on the floors from outside shoes. The neon lights above buzzed just softly enough that only Vera seemed to notice. She always picked up on these things: the faint, background noises that everyone else just tuned out.
The reception desk was right at the entrance. Three windows, a sign above each. Only two were staffed. At the first, a young woman with tired eyes, and at the second, a woman of about sixty, wearing large earrings and an expression that clearly said: don’t even try.
Vera joined the line for the second window. The queue for the first was much longer.
“Good morning. I need to see the therapist, Stepanov. I have an appointment for eight-thirty.”
The woman behind the glass looked up. Her badge read: ‘Raisa Pavlovna Zakharova, Senior Registrar.’
“Last name.”
“Lebedeva. Vera Nikolaevna. Born 1968.”
Raisa Pavlovna began tapping at the keyboard, peering at the screen over her glasses. Then she paused, tapped again, and frowned.
“You don’t have an appointment.”
“How’s that possible? I registered through Gosuslugi day before yesterday. Got a confirmation email.”
“Through Gosuslugi?” Raisa Pavlovna repeated the words in the same tone teachers use to repeat a wrong answer in class. “We use a different system here. Show me the confirmation.”
Vera pulled out her phone. Her fingers were stiff from the cold and didn’t move easily. She opened her email, found the confirmation message, and held her screen up to the window.
Raisa Pavlovna didn’t even bother to lean forward.
“I can’t read it from your phone. Print it out and bring it here.”
“But I… Where can I print it? Is there a printer here?”
“This is a clinic, not a copy center. Print it at home and come back.”
Someone behind Vera sighed heavily. The line was getting longer. Faina Stepanovna, two people back, rose up on tiptoe to try and see what was going on.
Vera put her phone away. Her cheeks were burning—and not from the cold.
“Can’t you check the system? By my insurance number? I did book, and I have confirmation.”
“Ma’am,” Raisa Pavlovna took off her glasses and set them on the desk, “I am explaining to you, in plain Russian: there’s no appointment in the system for your name. Maybe you booked at the wrong clinic. Maybe the system made an error. But without an appointment, I can’t give you your medical file.”
The tone wasn’t rude—it was indifferent, which somehow felt worse. The way people talk to a piece of furniture.
Vera stepped away from the window. Her shoulder ached under the weight of her bag, filled with a folder of meticulously labeled documents. All those files, all those certificates. She felt like a student who’d been banned from the exam for lacking a single piece of paperwork.
Her phone vibrated again. Artyom. She pressed ‘decline’ and slipped the phone into her pocket.
On the corridor of the second floor, plastic chairs were lined up in groups of four. They were hard, cold, and had armrests that dug into your sides. Vera found an empty spot near room 212 and sat down.
She had no idea what to do next. She could go home, print out the confirmation, and come back. But then she’d lose half the day, and there were no available appointments with Stepanov until the end of next week. She’d checked.
She could try to get in without an appointment. But that meant waiting until the end of the day and hoping the doctor would see her as an extra.
The corridor was filling up with people. A woman around forty with a folder of x-rays sat down next to Vera. Across from them, a man in a work jacket settled in, immediately closed his eyes, and looked as if he had fallen asleep. Then a nurse came out of room 210, called a name, and the man’s eyes snapped open as he got up. He wasn’t sleeping, just saving his energy.
A few minutes later, Faina Stepanovna appeared. She shuffled down the corridor, holding onto the wall for support, carrying two plastic cups in her hands.
“Here you go,” she handed one to Vera. “From the vending machine. Still tastes awful, but at least it’s hot.”
Vera took the cup. The heat bit into her fingers. The coffee smelled synthetic, but the warmth from the cup felt real.
“Thank you.”
“I heard what happened with you at reception. Zakharova, right? Raisa Pavlovna?”
Vera nodded.
“Oh, I know her,” Faina Stepanovna sat on the chair next to Vera. “She’s been sitting there for about fifteen years. You know what people call her behind her back? ‘The Wall.’ Because it’s impossible to get through her.”
“I really do have an appointment. I saw the confirmation.”
“I believe you. But what does she care? If it’s not in her computer, it doesn’t exist. She doesn’t believe that computers can be wrong. The computer’s like the Bible for her. If it’s there, that’s how it is.”
Vera took a sip. The coffee tasted bad, but it was hot, and that helped.
“I’ll wait. I’ll try to get in without an appointment.”
“That’s the right thing to do. Stepanov’s a good guy. If he has any time left, he’ll see you. He’s not the type to just leave right at twelve.”
They fell silent. In the corridor, an elderly woman walked by with her five-year-old grandson. The boy was pulling along a giant stuffed bear, which dragged over the linoleum, collecting dust.
“Do you have any children?” Faina Stepanovna asked.
“A son. Artyom. He’s thirty-two.”
“Far away?”
“In Kaluga.”
“Does he call?”
Vera glanced at her phone. Two missed calls.
“He calls,” she replied quietly.
Time moved differently inside the clinic. Every ten minutes felt like half an hour. The hands of the wall clock in the corridor seemed to struggle, jerking with each tick as though it was hard for them.
Vera sat and watched. It was the only thing she could do.
About eight people had gathered near room 212. Some had appointments, some had just come to ‘ask a question,’ others peeked in to see if the doctor was seeing anyone. The nurse, a thin woman with her hair pulled into a tight ponytail, came out every fifteen minutes, called a name, and shut the door again. Everything was smooth, mechanical, like an assembly line.
By nine in the morning, Vera realized the line was moving much slower than she had hoped. By her calculations, there were still six people with appointments ahead of her. And she didn’t even have an appointment.
Faina Stepanovna struck up a conversation with the woman sitting to her left, an elderly lady in a headscarf, and was already telling her all about her cat who brings her slippers—’just like a dog, honestly.’
Vera pulled out her phone and checked her messages. There was one from Artyom: ‘Mom, call me when you can. We need to talk.’
She read it twice. ‘We need to talk.’ Not ‘how are you’ or ‘hi.’ Just ‘talk.’
Artyom never liked long conversations. In fact, he never liked anything long—whether it was chats, letters, or visits. When he came to visit every other month, he’d stay just one night. In the morning, he’d have coffee and say, ‘Mom, you know how it is, work,’ kiss her on the cheek and leave. Every time, Vera felt there was an invisible thin fishing line stretched between them—never close enough, but never breaking.
She never called first. She was afraid of seeming pushy. She remembered, years ago when Artyom was in college, calling him three times in one night, and he had answered in irritation: ‘Mom, I’m an adult. You don’t have to check every hour if I’m alive.’ He was nineteen then. She never forgot that.
Since then, she always waited. She always waited for someone to call her.
Her phone buzzed in her hand again. It was Artyom. For the third time that morning.
Vera glanced at the screen. Her finger hovered over the ‘answer’ button. But the hallway was crowded, quiet, and awkward. She didn’t want to talk in front of everyone.
She typed: ‘I’m at the clinic. I’ll call you back later.’
The reply came back a second later: ‘Ok.’
One letter, one period. Vera put her phone away.
At half past nine, a tall man in glasses and a white coat approached room 212. Kirill Andreevich Stepanov. Vera recognized him from the photo on the clinic’s website.
In the photo, he looked younger, fresher. Now he seemed about forty-five. There were shadows under his eyes, and his lips turned down at the corners. He strode down the hallway, clutching a pile of medical records to his chest, not looking around.
‘Kirill Andreevich!’ Faina Stepanovna called out to him. She clearly seemed to know everyone at this clinic, just like her neighbors. ‘Good morning! When will you see me?’
He stopped and gave a slight smile.
‘Faina Stepanovna, you always come in without an appointment. High blood pressure again?’
‘Of course. It was one sixty this morning.’
‘Come in after two more people. I’ll write your prescription quickly.’
He opened the door to the office and disappeared inside. Faina Stepanovna turned to Vera with a victorious look.
‘See? He’s a good man. Just make sure you wait.’
Vera nodded. Waiting—this was something she did best.
By ten o’clock the hallway was even more crowded. People arrived with referrals from other departments; a man came in loudly demanding to be let in out of turn because he had a workday and couldn’t wait. The nurse explained that only certain people could skip the line. The man left, grumbling.
Vera watched it all like it was a stage play. Everyone who arrived brought along their own story, their impatience, their pain. A woman holding X-rays kept nervously shifting them from one hand to the other. An elderly man, sitting two seats away from Vera, coughed quietly into his handkerchief, turning toward the wall. A young girl with a pale face sat with her eyes closed, leaning her head against the wall, her headphones softly hissing music.
Everyone was waiting. That was the only thing they had in common.
Faina Stepanovna was called in at half past ten. She marched into the office confidently, as if it were her own home, and came out seven minutes later, waving a prescription.
“All good,” she announced as she took a seat next to Vera. “Are you still waiting?”
“Still here,” Vera replied.
“How many are ahead of you?”
“Three. And a man without an appointment who showed up before me.”
Faina Stepanovna pursed her lips.
“Listen, have you tried going back to registration? Maybe there’s a different shift now. Zakharova leaves at lunchtime and Lenochka takes over. She’s nice—very understanding.”
“I’ll try to see the doctor without an appointment. If they take me.”
“They’ll see you,” Faina Stepanovna replied confidently. She fell silent for a moment, then said quietly, “You know, I once sat here just like this. But not for myself. For my daughter.”
Vera turned to her.
Faina Stepanovna stared straight ahead, at the faded vaccination poster on the opposite wall.
“My Lena, she was twenty-six back then. She had just given birth, and after the delivery, complications started. They transferred her from the maternity hospital to the regional hospital. She needed surgery, but to get it, she needed a referral from our gynecologist. And that gynecologist was on vacation. The substitute refused to sign the papers, saying he hadn’t been treating her and couldn’t take responsibility.”
She spoke in a steady, even tone. The way people recount things that happened long ago but are never truly forgotten.
“So I went to the chief doctor. Through the secretary, through the reception, through all those appointments, tickets, and waiting. Two days. Two days I went back and forth, asking. I didn’t argue. I asked. Until finally, he signed.”
“And your daughter?”
“She’s fine. She’s forty-seven now, lives in Samara. Calls me every Sunday.”
Faina Stepanovna pulled a thermos from her bag, unscrewed the lid, and poured herself some tea. The scent of mint filled the air.
“But I remember those two days better than my own wedding. I remember how they wouldn’t let me through to the chief doctor. I remember the secretary’s face as she told me, ‘He’s busy, come back tomorrow.’ And I remember finally getting into his office, setting the papers on his desk, and my hand was shaking so much I pressed it to my thigh so no one would see.”
She took a sip of tea.
“You know what I realized? They’re not bad people. I mean, each of them on their own. The secretary is just doing her job. The doctor is afraid of responsibility. The registrar just looks at the computer and sees what’s on the screen. It’s the system. And you stand in front of this system, small, with your folder in hand, and you beg. But the system doesn’t hear you, because it has no ears.”
Vera listened silently. The coffee in her plastic cup had long since gone cold.
“But don’t think I’m telling you to be humble,” Faina Stepanovna squinted. “You have to ask. Just don’t do it quietly. If you ask quietly, the system thinks you don’t exist.”
By eleven o’clock, Vera realized the office hours would end at noon. In front of her were two people with appointments and a man without an appointment who had arrived before the clinic opened. Her chances were slim.
Her right knee was aching. From sitting too long in one position, the pain was worse than usual. Vera stood up to walk around, and felt a sharp pain shoot down her leg. Instinctively, she grabbed the back of the chair for support.
Faina Stepanovna noticed.
“Your knee?”
“Yes.”
“How long has it been?”
“Since the fall. Getting worse.”
“You’re here for a rheumatologist?”
“First the general practitioner. Need a referral.”
Faina Stepanovna shook her head. She wanted to say something, but just then the door to the doctor’s office opened and a nurse stepped out.
“All appointments for today are finished. If you don’t have an appointment, please wait.”
The man without an appointment, who had been sitting by the wall, stood up first. Vera did the math: if he spent fifteen minutes with the doctor and she only needed ten, she could still make it before noon.
The man went into the doctor’s office. Vera was now the only one left in line without an appointment.
She took out her phone. Still nothing new from Artyom. That last message—“Ok”—was still sitting unanswered. Vera thought maybe she should call. But what would she say? “I’ve been sitting in the clinic for four hours, my knee hurts, and I don’t have an appointment”? It would sound like a complaint—and she didn’t know how, or want, to complain to her son. It seemed to her that a grown son shouldn’t have to worry that his mother was helpless in the face of a local clinic’s registration desk.
The man emerged from the doctor’s office after twelve minutes. Vera stood up.
The nurse peeked out into the corridor.
“Lebedeva? You don’t have an appointment?”
“Yes. I made an appointment through the State Services portal, but the front desk said…”
“Please wait. I’ll ask Kirill Andreevich.”
The door closed. One minute passed. Then two. Vera stood in front of the closed door, and felt just like she used to feel outside the principal’s office—even though she hadn’t done anything wrong.
The door opened.
“Come in.”
The office was small. A desk, a cabinet with files, a couch shielded by a screen, and a sink by the wall. On the windowsill sat a plastic water bottle and a ballpoint pen.
Kirill Andreevich was sitting at the desk, finishing some notes on the previous patient’s file. He looked up at Vera and nodded towards the chair.
“Please, have a seat. What brings you here?”
Vera sat down. She opened her folder and took out a medical summary.
“My right knee. Since last September. Swelling, pain when walking, limited movement. I need a referral to a rheumatologist at the regional clinic.”
He took the summary, glanced over it, removed his glasses, wiped the lenses, and put them back on.
“Do you have recent test results?”
“From November. Here.”
She handed over the paper. Kirill Andreevich looked it over.
“November. That’s four months ago. You’ll need new ones. General blood test, C-reactive protein, rheumatoid factor.”
“How long will the results take?”
“About three days, if everything’s fine.”
“And then I come back to you? For the referral?”
“Yes. With your results. Then we’ll complete the paperwork.”
Vera was silent. She was counting in her head. Get the tests done. Wait for the results. Make another appointment. Go back again. Get a referral. Book an appointment at the regional clinic. Go there. That’s more weeks, maybe even a month. And her knee hurt every single day—no breaks, no weekends, no holidays.
“Kirill Andreevich,” she said, her voice quieter than she expected. “Can I get the tests done here, today? Until what time is the lab open?”
“Until twelve.”
Vera checked the time. Quarter to twelve.
“Will I make it? If I go right now?”
He hesitated. Then he wrote out the referral. Big, unreadable handwriting, just like all doctors have.
“The lab’s on the first floor. Room one-o-five. Hurry.”
Vera took the slip and left.
She walked as fast as her knee allowed: down the hallway, to the stairs, gripping the railing on the way down. Each step echoed in her leg. Her right hand clutched the referral, her left dragged her bag with a folder inside.
On the first floor, she turned toward room 105. The door was closed. A sign hung on it: “Sample collection from 8:00 to 11:30.”
Quarter to twelve. She was fifteen minutes late.
Vera stood in front of the closed door. The hallway smelled of bleach and wet floors: the cleaner had just passed by with a mop. The lights buzzed. Voices drifted from reception.
She waited another minute. Then slowly turned and walked toward the exit.
Faina Stepanovna found her on the front steps. Vera was fastening her jacket, looking out over the parking lot in front of the clinic. The February sun peeked through the clouds—pale and powerless.
“So, you didn’t make it?”
Vera shook her head.
“To the lab. They need fresh tests. Without them, they don’t give you the referral. And the lab is closed.”
Faina Stepanovna pressed her lips together. She stood silently beside her for a moment.
“So… back here again? Tomorrow?”
“Not tomorrow. Tomorrow’s Saturday. On Monday.”
“And do you need to book with Stepanov again?”
“No. You can do the tests without an appointment, on an empty stomach, from eight to eleven-thirty. Then come back for the results in three days. And then back to Stepanov. But he’s booked a week ahead.”
She said it calmly, like she was reciting the schedule. But Faina Stepanovna heard something else.
“Vera. You’re not going to quit, are you?”
Vera looked at her.
“I’m not quitting.”
“Because you know… I’ve seen so many. They come once, twice. By the third time, they don’t show up again. They figure, well, I’ll just put up with it. It’ll stop hurting eventually. But it doesn’t. It only gets worse.”
“I know,” Vera said. “I’ll come.”
Faina Stepanovna pulled out a candy in a crumpled wrapper from her pocket and handed it to her. A hard candy. Vera took it and unwrapped it. It tasted a bit sour, with a faint hint of mint, as if it had been in the pocket for weeks.
“I’ll give you my number,” Faina Stepanovna said, fishing a torn scrap of paper and a pen out of her bag. “So you know who to turn to in case of emergencies.”
Vera smiled. For the first time that morning, it was a real smile.
She walked home on foot. Three bus stops. It usually took twenty minutes, but today it was longer—her knee wouldn’t let her hurry. The sun kept slipping behind the clouds. The snow along the sidewalk was gray, trampled, ugly.
Vera was thinking. Not about the clinic.
About her son.
“We need to talk.” What does that mean? Is Artyom planning to come over? Or maybe he’s thinking of going somewhere even farther away? Maybe something’s up at work. Maybe he wants to ask for something. Or say something she’s not ready to hear.
She pulled out her phone and dialed his number. The ringing. Once. Twice. Three times.
“Mom?”
His voice was anxious. Not irritated, not indifferent—just truly anxious.
“Hi. Sorry I didn’t call you back sooner. I was at the clinic.”
“I know, you texted. Are you okay?”
“Yes. I just went to see the doctor.”
A pause.
“Mom, what’s going on? You never go to the doctor.”
Vera wanted to say, “nothing special.” The words were already on her lips—familiar, practiced, safe. But something in her son’s voice, that sudden worry, that question asked not out of politeness, made her hold back.
“It’s my knee,” she said. “Since autumn. It hurts a lot. Walking is hard. I need a referral to the specialist, but there was some mix-up with the appointment, and I didn’t have time to do the tests. Typical clinic story.”
There was silence on the other end. She could only hear a faint rustling—Artyom was probably moving the phone from one hand to the other.
“Mom. Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Tell you what?”
“About your knee! You’ve been dealing with this since autumn and you said nothing?”
“I’m managing. I just…”
“You just keep enduring. Like always.”
His voice got tougher. Not angry—more confused. Vera knew that tone: he’d use it when he couldn’t find the right words and switched to reproach out of helplessness.
“Artyom, I’m managing.”
“Mom. Listen. I actually wanted to tell you… I’m coming on Monday. For a week. I’ll work remotely.”
Vera stopped in the middle of the sidewalk. A woman with a stroller walked around her.
“For a week?”
“Yeah. I decided a while ago but just hadn’t said anything. I thought I’d call in the morning and tell you. But you weren’t answering.”
“I was at the clinic.”
“I figured. Mom, on Monday I’ll come, and we’ll sort out that referral together. And the tests. And everything else.”
“And everything else.” From his lips, those words sounded almost like a confession.
Vera felt something warm rise from her chest to her throat. Not pain. Something else.
“Alright,” she said. “Come.”
She reached her building and walked up to the third floor, automatically gripping the railing with both hands. She opened the door. It was quiet and cool in the entryway. From the kitchen came the faint scent of morning tea, left unfinished when she rushed out.
Vera took off her shoes, hung up her jacket, and set her bag with the folder on the hallway table. All those documents—her medical policy, SNILS, discharge papers, test results neatly organized in sleeves—had sat in her bag all morning and hadn’t been needed once.
She went to the kitchen and switched on the kettle. Sat down at the table.
On the table was a piece of paper with Faina Stepanovna’s number, written in large, slightly shaky handwriting. Next to it, a note with the number of room 212, which Vera had written for herself the evening before.
Two pieces of paper. Two handwritings. One neat and teacherly—her own. The other sprawling and slanted, elderly.
The kettle started to hum. Vera took out a cup, added tea leaves. Then she paused and reached for a second cup. Just because. Out of a habit that had just begun.
On Monday, she arrived at the clinic at 7:45. Artyom walked beside her.
He had arrived the previous evening, backpack and laptop in hand, and the first thing he asked was, “So, show me where it hurts.” Vera pointed it out. Artyom examined her knee with the expression of someone who doesn’t really know what they’re doing, but wants to understand, and then said:
“We’re going together tomorrow.”
They stood by the clinic steps. The February air was just as cold, and the minibuses at the nearby stop were still roaring their engines. The same steps. The same doors. But this time, Artyom was beside her, wearing his hooded jacket, with ears reddened from the cold, sipping coffee from a cardboard cup he bought at the kiosk across the road.
“Mom, tell me about this Raisa Pavlovna,” he asked, interested, as if Vera was about to tell a funny story.
She told him. About the ‘Wall’, about the system that doesn’t listen, about the appointment slip that wasn’t in the system.
Artyom listened. He finished his coffee. Crumpled the cup.
“Alright, here’s the plan. First, the tests. Then, in three days, to the therapist. I’ll book your appointment myself: through the government services app, by phone, and in person at the registration desk. Three times. Just to be sure.”
“That’s too much.”
“Mom. It’s not too much.”
The doors opened. The same security guard, wrinkled suit, indifferent face. The same corridor, smell of chlorine, wet footprints on the floor. The same neon lights buzzing overhead.
But Vera wasn’t walking alone.
They found room 105. The laboratory. The door was open. Sitting by the door were three people: an elderly woman, a young man with headphones, and a man with a cane whom Vera remembered from her last visit, standing at the clinic steps among the first on Friday.
“Sit down,” Artyom said. “I’ll hold our place in line, you take a rest.”
“I’m not tired.”
“Mom. Sit.”
She sat down. The plastic chair was just as hard and cold as last time. Her knee began to ache by habit. But Artyom was by her side, already talking to the man by the door, clarifying how the line worked.
Vera looked at her son and thought he had changed. Not in appearance: he looked the same, skinny and tall, with the habit of putting his hands in his pockets and slouching slightly like anyone who spends too much time at a computer. But something had shifted in him. Or maybe she just hadn’t noticed before because she’d only seen him for fifteen minutes each visit.
The laboratory door opened. A nurse peeked out.
“Next.”
The elderly woman stood up and went in. The line moved forward.
Artyom came over and sat next to her.
“Mom.”
“What?”
“I wanted to tell you. Well… That ‘conversation’ I called about on Friday.”
Vera turned to him. Artyom was looking at his hands, then he looked up.
“They’re transferring me. To our city. To a branch of the company. Starting in March.”
Vera was silent. She heard the words, but didn’t immediately grasp what they meant.
“So… You’re moving?”
“Yes. Well, not directly with you. I’ll rent an apartment somewhere in the city center. But nearby. Ten minutes away by bus.”
He said it casually, as if he were announcing the weather. But Vera knew her son. She saw how he slightly pulled his head into his shoulders, bracing for her reaction. He used to do that as a child when he brought home a bad grade.
“That’s good,” Vera said.
Artyom smirked.
“Good? That’s it?”
“What do you want me to say?”
“I don’t know. I thought you’d be happy.”
“I am happy.”
“Doesn’t seem like it.”
Vera was quiet for a moment. Then she reached out and touched his sleeve.
“I am happy,” she repeated. “Just quietly.”
Artyom covered her hand with his. His palm was warm, his fingers long like his father’s. They sat like that for a few seconds, saying nothing.
Then the lab door opened again.
“Next.”
A guy with headphones stood up. The line moved forward by one.
Vera had her blood drawn at a quarter to nine. The nurse, young and quick, finished in two minutes. Vera barely felt the needle—just a slight pinch and the coolness of the alcohol swab in the bend of her arm.
“Results will be ready in three business days,” the nurse said. “You can check the website by number or come in person.”
“Thank you.”
She and Artyom walked out into the hallway. A cleaning lady passed by with a mop, leaving a wet streak across the linoleum behind her.
“There we go,” Artyom said. “First step.”
Vera nodded. They headed for the exit, and at the registration desk she slowed her pace. Behind the second window sat Raisa Pavlovna—the same earrings, the same expression. She was talking to a patient, not looking up from her monitor.
Artyom followed his mother’s gaze.
“Is that her?”
“That’s her.”
“Let’s sign you up to see Stepanov. Right now.”
He walked up to the window. Vera wanted to stop him, but didn’t make it in time.
“Good morning,” Artyom said in an even, polite voice. “We need an appointment with therapist Stepanov. Lebedeva Vera Nikolaevna.”
Raisa Pavlovna looked up.
“Patient’s last name?”
“Lebedeva. Vera Nikolaevna. Born 1968.”
Clicking of the keyboard.
“Earliest available slot is Thursday, 9 a.m.”
“Book it.”
Raisa Pavlovna entered the appointment. No questions, no printouts, no unnecessary words. For her, it was routine. Just another patient among dozens.
Artyom took the appointment slip and handed it to his mother. A plain piece of paper, printed on a thermal printer: date, time, doctor’s name, room number.
Vera took the slip and put it in her folder—the one with plastic sleeves that had spent all Friday sitting useless in her bag. Now it held one more document. Small, light, meaningless to the system. But for Vera, it meant that on Thursday morning, she would step into room 212 not as a petitioner, but as a patient who was expected.
Outside on the porch, Vera paused. The same view: parking lot, minibuses, gray snow. But the sun felt brighter than it had on Friday—or at least it seemed that way to her.
Artyom pulled up his hood.
“Mom, are you hungry? There’s a bakery across the street. I saw it when I went for coffee.”
“I’m hungry.”
They crossed the street. Inside the bakery, it was warm and smelled like fresh dough. Artyom grabbed two rolls and two teas in paper cups. They sat by the window on high stools.
Vera bit into her roll. The dough was soft and just a little sweet, and she suddenly realized she hadn’t eaten since last night. The whole morning—early start, clinic, tests—on an empty stomach.
“This is good,” she said.
Artyom nodded. He chewed his roll, gazing out the window at the clinic across the street. People kept walking out the doors, one by one, each with their own story.
“Mom,” he said, not taking his eyes off the window. “I was just thinking…”
“What is it?”
“Nothing. I just thought I should have come sooner.”
“Sooner for what?”
He turned to her.
“Come sooner.”
Vera set her cup down on the table. She wanted to say, “You shouldn’t have, you’re busy enough as it is.” Or, “You have your own life, don’t make a big deal out of it.” All those familiar phrases she’d used for years to keep him at arm’s length lined up in her mind, like people queuing outside the clinic in the morning.
But she stayed silent. And said something else instead:
“You came. And that’s good.”
Her phone vibrated in her pocket. Vera took it out. An unfamiliar number. She answered.
“Vera Nikolaevna? It’s Faina Stepanovna. Well, how did it go today? Did you get through?”
Vera laughed. Quietly, into her fist, the way people laugh when they’re not used to doing it out loud.
“I got through, Faina Stepanovna. Got my tests done. Scheduled an appointment with Stepanov for Thursday.”
“Oh! See, I told you. I was just wondering if I should call or not. Then I thought, I’ll just call. You never know.”
“You made the right choice.”
“Are you alone?”
“With my son.”
A short pause on the line.
“Good for you,” said Faina Stepanovna. “Good that you’re not alone.”
Vera hung up. Outside the bakery, snow was falling. Tiny, light, almost weightless flakes—the first in a week. It settled on the gray asphalt of the parking lot, on the clinic steps, on the roof of a minibus that had just pulled up to the stop. And for a few minutes, everything around became a bit whiter and quieter than before.
Artyom finished his tea and stood up.
“Shall we go? I’ll walk you home. Then I’ll come back here, I still need to set up my laptop and get ready for a call.”
“Let’s go.”
They left the bakery. Vera zipped up her jacket, adjusted her scarf. The snow melted on her cheeks in small, cold dots.
They walked down the sidewalk, slowly, matching the rhythm of her right knee. Artyom walked alongside her, slowing his usual pace, not rushing her. Across the street, the clinic windows glowed, and behind them, in the corridors and offices, the usual morning went on: lines, tickets, medical charts, names, office numbers.
Vera didn’t look back. She was heading home, and the bag with the folder on her shoulder felt a little lighter than it had on Friday—not because there were fewer papers. In fact, there was one more sheet now. But her son was walking beside her, and Thursday was ahead, and somewhere in this city, in a small apartment with a thermos of mint tea, Faina Stepanovna was already telling her cat that she’d made an acquaintance at the clinic.
A good one.