“Maria, my dear daughter!” her mother’s voice trembled with tears. “Save me! I have no strength left, no money at all. The utility debts are strangling me, and there’s no food left!”
Maria stood at the threshold of her mother’s apartment in a panel-block building, holding three-year-old Kirill in her arms. Her son clung tightly to her jacket, as if sensing the tension.
“Mom, you know we ourselves…” Maria began.
“No!” her mother cut her off sharply, wiping her eyes with the sleeve of her robe. “You’re my only daughter! Who will help me if not you?”
Maria sighed. In her wallet were her last fifteen thousand rubles — money for groceries and kindergarten fees. But looking at her mother’s drawn face and her dimmed eyes, she could not refuse.
“All right, Mom. Here’s what I have,” she said, handing her the bills. “But this is the last money until payday.”
“Oh, thank you, darling!” her mother squeezed the money feverishly. “You’re a real daughter, unlike some people!”
A week later, the call came again.
“Mashenka, dear, there’s trouble again! They cut off the electricity, and now they’re threatening to shut off the gas!”
And once again Maria gave everything she had. Then again. And again.
“Seryozha, I’ll have to borrow from my coworkers again,” she said quietly to her husband that evening. “Mom is asking for help.”
Sergey looked up from the computer, his face darkening.
“Masha, have you completely lost your mind? We barely make ends meet ourselves! We have a child, a mortgage…”
“But she’s my mother!” Maria cried. “How can I abandon her?”
“And can you abandon us, your son and me?” Sergey asked coldly. “Kirill hasn’t gone to kindergarten for two weeks — there’s no money to pay for it!”
Maria pressed her lips together. Sergey was right, but what could she do? Her mother called every two days, crying and begging for help.
“I’ll find a way,” she muttered.
“What way?” Sergey stood up, his voice taking on a hard edge. “You’ve already gone around asking everyone you know for loans! At work they’re looking at you sideways!”
“Seryozha, please…”
“No, Masha!” He slammed his fist on the table. “Either you stop this madness, or… or I’m leaving. I can’t watch you destroy our family for the sake of a mother who doesn’t even properly say thank you!”
Her husband’s words cut straight into her heart. But how could she abandon her own flesh and blood in trouble?
The next day, her mother called again.
“Daughter, one last request! They’re threatening to evict me. I urgently need thirty thousand!”
Maria closed her eyes. Thirty thousand — half her salary.
“Mom, I can’t… we have problems ourselves.”
“What do you mean you can’t?” her mother’s voice turned harsh. “So some money matters more to you than your own mother? You’re heartless, Masha! Who did you take after?”
“Mom, listen…”
“I don’t want to listen! Find the money, if I mean anything to you at all!”
The line went dead. Maria sat in the kitchen, staring out the window at the gray apartment blocks. Kirill played nearby with his toy cars, occasionally glancing at her with his big eyes.
That evening, she took out a loan.
A month later, Sergey packed a suitcase.
“Masha, I can’t do this anymore,” he said tiredly, not looking her in the eye. “You chose your mother over your family.”
“Seryozha, wait!” Maria grabbed his sleeve. “It’s temporary, I’ll pay everything back…”
“Temporary?” He gave a bitter laugh. “You’ve been saying ‘temporary’ for six months. We’re drowning in loan debt, Kirill walks around in torn boots, and you keep giving everything to that…”
He did not finish, but Maria understood.
“She’s my mother!”
“And who are we?” Sergey picked up the suitcase. “Kirill, Daddy is leaving. Be a good boy.”
The boy began to cry, not understanding what was happening. Maria held him tightly, barely holding back her own tears.
After her husband left, the apartment felt empty. Maria worked two jobs to pay the mortgage and support her mother. Kirill was often sick — there was no money for doctors.
“Mom, things are very hard for me,” she admitted to her mother over the phone. “Maybe you could find a part-time job? At least temporarily?”
“At my age?” her mother exclaimed indignantly. “Are you serious, Masha? I have blood pressure problems, my heart hurts! I worked my whole life. Now it’s your turn to take care of me!”
“But Sergey left, I have a child…”
“That’s your problem! You should have kept a better eye on your husband!”
Maria silently hung up. Her mother’s words hurt worse than any knife.
Soon, the worst began. The bank threatened to take the apartment for missed mortgage payments. Maria rushed between jobs, borrowed from everyone she knew, but the hole in the budget only grew larger.
“Mom, I need help,” she said when she came to her mother’s apartment. “We may be evicted.”
“What do I have to do with it?” her mother shrugged. “You’re the one who took out the loans.”
“But I took them out to help you!”
“Nobody forced you. You decided yourself — now deal with it yourself.”
Maria looked at her mother and did not recognize her. Where was the woman who had cried and begged for help?
“Mom, I have a small child…”
“Then you should have thought earlier,” her mother snapped. “I’ve lived my life. I’ve had enough worries.”
A week later, what Maria feared most happened. The bank began eviction proceedings.
“Mom, they’re throwing us out on the street!” Maria burst into her mother’s apartment with Kirill in her arms. “Let us stay here until I find a way out!”
Her mother stood in the kitchen, slicing sausage. The refrigerator was packed with food — expensive yogurts, red fish, imported cheeses.
“What is this?” Maria froze. “Mom, where did you get so much food?”
“What’s wrong with that?” her mother turned away. “I saved up little by little.”
“Saved up?” Maria’s voice trembled. “A month ago, you told me there was nothing to eat!”
“So what? I saved money, that’s how I managed.”
Maria noticed a receipt from an expensive store lying on the table. The amount made her go cold — almost twenty thousand rubles.
Receipt forms
“Mom, that’s more than I bring you in a month…”
“Masha, enough questions!” her mother cut her off sharply. “As for housing — I can’t take you in. There’s not enough space.”
“Mom!” Maria could not believe her ears. “You live alone in a two-room apartment! Kirill and I could sleep on the sofa…”
“I can’t, and that’s final!” her mother raised her voice. “I have… I have my own plans.”
At that moment, a man of about fifty came out of the bathroom wearing a house robe.
“Len, what’s all the shouting?” he asked, yawning.
Maria froze. Everything fell into place.
“Meet him,” her mother blushed. “This is Valera. We… we live together.”
“Mom,” Maria struggled to get the words out, “for six months you cried that you were alone, that you had no money…”
“What does Valera have to do with it?” her mother said defensively. “He works, he helps me.”
“Helps you?” Maria pointed at the full refrigerator. “So there is money, but you told me you were starving?”
“Mashka, don’t make a scene!” Valera interfered. “Your mother is a grown woman. She decides for herself whom to help.”
“Shut up!” Maria exploded. “Because of her, I lost my family and got buried in debt!”
“Nobody asked you!” her mother snapped. “You volunteered to help yourself!”
“You did ask!” Maria was choking with outrage. “You called every day, cried, said you would die without my help!”
“So what? That doesn’t mean I owe you anything!”
Kirill began crying from the loud voices. Maria held her son close.
“Mom, let us stay at least for a week…”
“No!” her mother said categorically. “Valera is against it, and besides, it’s inconvenient for me. Find something yourself.”
“Where am I supposed to go with a child?”
“I don’t know! To a shelter, to your friends — that’s your problem!”
Maria looked at her mother as if she were a stranger. Six months of sacrifice, a destroyed family, debts — and all for this?
“All right,” she said quietly. “I understand.”
For a week, Maria and Kirill drifted from friend to friend. They slept on folding beds, sofas, sometimes simply on the floor. Her son was sick, and she had no money for medicine.
“Mashenka,” her neighbor Galina Petrovna said sympathetically, “maybe you should contact social services? They’ll help you with the child.”
“I don’t want them to take Kirill away,” Maria replied, rocking her feverish son in her arms.
Then she went to a lawyer.
“Look,” said an older man in glasses after studying the documents, “you have the right to demand support from your mother. You supported her for six months. You have all the transfers, receipts…”
“Support from my mother?” Maria could not believe it. “Is that possible?”
“Of course!” the lawyer became animated. “Article 87 of the Family Code. Adult children who supported disabled parents can recover the money spent if the parent concealed income or deceived them.”
“But she’s my mother…”
“And who are you to her?” the lawyer asked sharply. “A cash cow? File a lawsuit. You have an excellent chance.”
A month later, the hearing took place. Her mother arrived with Valera, wearing a new coat.
“Your Honor,” Maria said, holding certificates of debt, “for six months I supported my mother, believing she was in need. I lost my family, got into debt…”
“And where is the proof of need?” her mother’s lawyer asked sarcastically. “Perhaps the daughter decided to help on her own?”
Maria took out her phone.
“I have recordings of our conversations. My mother asked for help and said she was dying without money.”
Her mother’s voice filled the courtroom: “Mashenka, save me! There’s nothing to eat, the electricity has been cut off!”
The judge frowned.
“Elena Viktorovna,” she addressed Maria’s mother, “did you really say these words?”
“Well… maybe I did,” her mother said, embarrassed. “But I didn’t force my daughter to give me money!”
“And when did your cohabiting partner appear?” the judge continued.
“What does Valera have to do with this?” her mother flared up.
“The fact that he was supporting you all this time while your daughter believed you were in need,” the judge replied dryly.
Valera shifted in his chair.
“I… I didn’t move in with her right away…”
“When exactly?” the judge pressed.
“In February…” he muttered.
“And your daughter started helping you in January,” the judge stated, looking at the documents. “So you deceived her for at least a month.”
Her mother turned pale.
“Your Honor,” her lawyer intervened, “my client is an elderly woman. She had the right to receive help from her daughter…”
“She did,” the judge agreed, “but not through deception. Elena Viktorovna, did you conceal from your daughter the existence of your partner and his material support?”
“I… that’s my personal life!” her mother protested.
“Not when you ask your daughter for money while claiming need,” the judge cut her off. “The court recognizes that the defendant misled the plaintiff about her financial situation.”
Maria listened and could hardly believe it. Could justice really exist?
“To recover from the defendant in favor of the plaintiff one hundred and fifty thousand rubles,” the judge announced. “The case is closed.”
Her mother sat pale, while Valera whispered something in her ear.
“Mashka,” her mother called after her daughter at the exit, “you won’t really… We’re family…”
Maria stopped.
“Family?” she repeated. “Where was that family when my child and I ended up on the street?”
“Well, I didn’t know… Valera said…”
“Valera said,” Maria repeated. “And what did your heart say, Mom?”
Her mother was silent, staring at the floor.
Three months passed. Maria received the money through court bailiffs and managed to settle her debt with the bank. She was able to save the apartment.
Kirill started going to kindergarten again and got sick less often. Little by little, the two of them began rebuilding their life.
“Mom, why doesn’t Grandma come over?” her son asked one day while playing with his toy cars.
“Grandma is busy, sweetheart,” Maria answered, stroking his head.
Her mother called regularly.
“Mashenka, stop sulking already!” her voice sounded offended over the phone. “I’m your mother! Valera says you’ve become completely full of yourself after the court case.”
“Valera says many things,” Maria replied calmly. “And you, Mom — what do you think?”
“What am I supposed to think? You dragged me to court like I was some nobody! Now the neighbors point fingers at me!”
“Mom, I’ll ask you one simple question,” Maria said, sitting down on the sofa and tiredly rubbing her temples. “Do you regret deceiving me?”
Silence.
“What deception? I just… didn’t tell you everything.”
“Didn’t tell me everything,” Maria repeated. “And the fact that my family fell apart, that my child was sick without medicine — was that also just ‘not telling everything’?”
“Mashka, why have you become like a stranger? We’re of the same blood!”
Maria looked at her son, peacefully building a garage out of blocks. There it was — real blood. Defenseless, trusting, needing protection.
“Mom, you know what,” she said firmly, “don’t call anymore. If you want to see your grandson, apologize. Truly apologize. Admit that you were wrong.”
“What?” her mother cried indignantly. “How dare you! I gave you life!”
“You gave me life,” Maria agreed. “But you never learned how to love.”
She hung up and turned off her phone.
That evening, her neighbor Galina Petrovna came over for tea.
“You’re doing the right thing, Mashenka,” she said, watching Kirill show off his new toy. “Family isn’t only blood. Family is when people stand up for one another.”
“Yes,” Maria sighed. “I thought my mother would always support me. But it turned out she only did when it benefited her.”
“Not all parents know how to love, my dear. But you do. Your Kiryushka is growing up happy.”
Maria hugged her son, who had nestled against her with a book.
Outside the window, lights were coming on in the neighboring apartments. Somewhere, families were gathering for dinner. Somewhere, children were doing homework. Somewhere, elderly people were watching television surrounded by loved ones.
And here, in a small two-room apartment, a mother and son were building a new family. Small, but honest.
The phone remained silent.