After the divorce, the husband met his happy ex-wife. But when he saw who came to pick her up from the maternity hospital, he stopped laughing…
What bothered Oleg most was not that Nadezhda calmly agreed to the divorce, but that she never once asked him to reconsider.
For some reason, he was certain that a few months would pass, her initial stubbornness would wear off, and his ex-wife would at least call him. She did not necessarily have to beg him to come back. She only had to say something that would make it clear that life without him had turned out to be harder than she had expected.
A month passed, then another, then six months.
Nadezhda did not call.
He was sure she would regret it eventually
They had lived together for eleven years. Oleg was forty-one, Nadezhda thirty-nine. They had no children together, and the apartment had belonged to Nadezhda before the marriage, so there was no long argument about who would stay where.
One Sunday morning, Oleg announced that he wanted to leave. He already had another woman, but that was not how he began the conversation. For about ten minutes, he talked about how their feelings had faded, how they had different interests, and how they had been living together more out of habit than love.
Meanwhile, Nadezhda was sorting freshly washed laundry. She listened, placed the towels on a shelf in the wardrobe, and only then asked:
“Have you already made up your mind?”
Oleg had expected a completely different conversation, so he even asked her to repeat herself.
“What do you mean?”
“Exactly what I said. Do you want to leave, or are you suggesting that we try to fix something?”
He was silent for a moment, looking toward the window, then said that he had made his decision.
“Then let’s not turn this into a performance,” Nadezhda replied. “Pack what you need right now, and we’ll deal with the rest of your things calmly.”
Her composure irritated Oleg more and more. He thought she was deliberately putting on a brave face, and before leaving he finally could not resist saying:
“Just don’t say later that I didn’t warn you. Right now you think being alone is wonderful, but six months from now things might look very different.”
Nadezhda closed the wardrobe door.
“Why is it so important to you that I end up miserable?”
“It isn’t important to me. I just know how life works. At our age, starting over from scratch isn’t that easy.”
She looked at him for several seconds but did not argue.
A few days later, they filed for divorce together. Since they had no minor children and both agreed to the divorce, the marriage was officially dissolved a month later. They divided the furniture and household items themselves. Oleg took what they had agreed upon, while Nadezhda remained in her apartment.
During their final meeting about his belongings, he once again could not resist.
“You’ll realize someday that I wasn’t the worst option.”
“Maybe,” she replied calmly. “But that will be my problem.”
And she closed the door behind him.
For some reason, his friend did not want to laugh with him
During the first few months, Oleg occasionally asked mutual acquaintances about Nadezhda. He always did it casually, as though it meant nothing: was she still working at the same place, was she planning to move, did she go out of town alone?
Once, he told his mother that Nadezhda was probably only pretending everything was fine out of pride.
The only person who quickly grew tired of these conversations was Pavel. They had been friends since their student days. For years, they visited each other, helped each other with renovations, and went on trips to the countryside together. Pavel knew Nadezhda well too.
One evening, Oleg once again started talking about his ex-wife and smirked.
“Give it time. We’ll see which one of us benefited more from the divorce.”
Pavel pushed his plate aside and frowned.
“Why are you always waiting for something bad to happen to her?”
“I’m not waiting for anything.”
“Then stop asking about her. You left her yourself. You have another life now. Nadia has her own life too.”
Oleg disliked both Pavel’s tone and the fact that his old friend had unexpectedly failed to take his side.
“Look at you, defending her.”
“I’m not defending anyone. I just don’t understand what you’re trying to prove.”
The conversation ended unpleasantly. After that, Oleg skipped calling Pavel a few times, and Pavel did not force the friendship either. A couple of months later, they were only exchanging short congratulatory messages on holidays, and eventually they practically stopped speaking altogether.
Oleg did not think anything particularly significant had happened.
People simply drifted apart as they got older.
A year and a half later, he saw Nadezhda outside a store
They ran into each other by chance near a shopping center.
Oleg was walking toward his car with a bag of groceries when he first noticed a familiar face. Only then did he realize why Nadezhda was walking more slowly than usual.
Beneath her light-colored coat, her pregnant belly was clearly visible.
She recognized him too and stopped.
“Hi,” Nadezhda said.
“Hi. Well, that’s some news.”
He smiled automatically, then asked:
“How long?”
Nadezhda looked at him in confusion.
“How long what?”
“Well… this.”
He nodded toward her, and she immediately understood what he meant.
“Long enough.”
For some reason, Oleg wanted to continue the conversation. A car slowly passed through the parking lot. Nearby, a woman was loading groceries into her trunk, while someone else returned a shopping cart to the shelter. Nadezhda clearly was not in a hurry, but she was also not planning to tell him anything.
“So life worked out after all?” he asked with the same smile he had once used whenever talking about her future.
“Yes.”
“Happy?”
Nadezhda adjusted the strap of her handbag on her shoulder and answered without any challenge in her voice.
“Yes, Oleg. I’m happy.”
She said it so matter-of-factly that he did not immediately know how to respond.
If she had started describing what a wonderful man she had met, what a beautiful home they had, and how perfect everything was, Oleg would have decided she was deliberately showing off to spite him.
But Nadezhda simply said goodbye and walked toward her car.
That evening, he told his mother about the encounter.
“I saw Nadia today. She’s expecting a baby.”
His mother continued wiping the table.
“I know.”
Oleg was surprised.
“How?”
“We talk sometimes.”
“You still talk to her?”
She hung the kitchen towel on a hook and looked at her son.
“Why should I have stopped talking to her? She never did anything bad to me.”
Oleg smirked.
“Fine. Best friends, then.”
His mother did not bother explaining anything.
At the maternity hospital, he first saw Nadezhda — and then Pavel’s car
Several months later, his mother called him during the day and asked him to pick her up around four o’clock.
“From where?” Oleg asked.
She named the city maternity hospital.
After his encounter with Nadezhda near the shopping center, he immediately understood whom his mother had gone to visit, but he did not comment. He only told her to send him the exact location where she would be waiting.
A minute later, the address and building number arrived by message.
Oleg got there a little early. Several cars were parked outside the entrance. People stood holding flowers and bags filled with baby things.
He spotted his mother almost immediately.
She was talking to Nadezhda, who was holding a baby in her arms.
“Of course,” Oleg thought.
He was already about to get out of his car when a dark station wagon pulled up to the curb and stopped nearby.
The driver’s door opened.
At first, Oleg only stared, unable to understand why the man looked familiar.
Then the man straightened up.
Pavel.
He closed the car door and walked directly toward Nadezhda. She noticed him, smiled, and said something. Pavel took her bag, looked down at the baby’s face, then briefly wrapped an arm around Nadezhda’s shoulders.
Oleg got out of his car.
Pavel noticed him when only a few steps separated them. Surprise flickered across his face, but it disappeared almost immediately.
“Hi,” he said.
Oleg looked at him first, then at Nadezhda.
“Who are you picking up?”
Pavel paused.
“Nadia and our son.”
The smile vanished from Oleg’s face.
“Your son?”
Nadezhda let out a tired breath and adjusted the edge of the baby’s blanket. Oleg’s mother, standing nearby, immediately realized where the conversation was heading.
“Please, no scene.”
Oleg seemed not to hear her.
“How long have you two been together?”
Pavel did not pretend he misunderstood.
“Since last autumn.”
“So even back then?”
“What do you mean, ‘back then’?” Pavel frowned. “You had already been divorced for nine months by that point. We happened to meet at some mutual friends’ place, then started talking. There was nothing between us before your divorce.”
Oleg turned his gaze toward Nadezhda.
“And you decided my friend was a great option?”
She did not answer immediately.
“When we started dating, the two of you had already barely spoken for almost a year. And I had not been your wife for almost a year either.”
Oleg’s mother gently touched his arm, but he pulled away.
“Mom, you knew everything?”
“Of course.”
“And you didn’t say a word to me?”
“Why would I?” She looked at her son, now with much less patience than before. “You were the one who left Nadia. What exactly are you trying to find out now?”
Oleg did not answer.
Meanwhile, Pavel opened the rear door of the car. A baby car seat was already secured inside.
Nadezhda walked closer. Pavel put her bag in the trunk and held the door open for her.
No one tried to justify themselves to Oleg or prove that what had happened was somehow acceptable.
Nadezhda said goodbye to his mother, thanked her for the flowers, and got into the back seat beside the baby.
Pavel closed the door, walked around the car, and paused for a moment beside Oleg.
“I never lied to you,” he said. “If that matters to you.”
Oleg said nothing.
Pavel got behind the wheel and drove out of the parking lot.
Oleg’s mother watched the car leave, then calmly headed toward her son’s vehicle.
Oleg silently opened the door for her.
Once they were on the road, he finally asked:
“How long have you known?”
“That they’re together? Almost a year.”
“And you decided not to tell me.”
His mother turned toward the window.
“It wasn’t my story to tell you.”
They drove the rest of the way in silence.
For the first time in two years, Oleg could not think of a single joke about how Nadezhda was doing without him.