After Finding Out About My Mother-in-Law’s Gift, I Filed for Divorce
“Gena, did Anna Grigoryevna buy an apartment?” Nina, Gennady’s wife, asked, showing her husband the purchase agreement for a one-room apartment registered in his mother’s name. She had found it while sorting through papers and was terribly surprised.
At first, Gena looked confused. Then, as if he suddenly came to his senses, he slapped his forehead and exclaimed:
“So that’s where it was! I thought I’d lost it! I thought I’d already given it to my mother.”
“You didn’t answer my question,” his wife insisted.
“Well, yes, she bought it. For our son, Arseny, for the future, so he’ll have a place of his own when he grows up. She wanted to make it a surprise, but that didn’t work out. You’re always sticking your nose where it doesn’t belong!” he grumbled irritably, looking at his wife with reproach.
“What news!” Nina said happily, ignoring his tone. “I never expected that from Anna Grigoryevna!”
Her mother-in-law, Anna Grigoryevna, had never been especially fond of Nina, but she had never interfered in their family life either. Sometimes she took her grandson to her dacha, fed him strawberries, gave him presents, and took him to New Year’s celebrations.
“Arsyusha is lucky! No one ever gave me gifts like that. Is it at least a good apartment?” Nina continued questioning her husband.
“It’s fine,” Gena answered reluctantly. “It just needs renovation, and there’s no furniture at all.”
“That’s nothing!” Nina said enthusiastically. “What, are we not going to renovate our own son’s apartment? And we’ll buy furniture too! Besides, he’s only ten. For now, we can rent the apartment out and put the money into an account for him. It’ll be some kind of help when he goes to university.”
Arseny was growing up weak and sickly, and Nina devoted herself entirely to him. Still, she performed all her duties as a wife properly: the house was clean and cozy, the fridge always had soup, a main course, compote, and, of course, dessert for her son and a bottle of her husband’s favorite drink.
Nina felt that life had turned out well. Gena held a good, well-paid position, and Nina herself also earned well. They had bought their apartment with a mortgage and had almost paid it off. They had a decent car, a foreign model, and they went on vacation twice a year to mountain-and-seaside resorts, as the doctors recommended for their son’s health.
“I don’t have time to deal with renovations,” Gena brushed her off, interrupting Nina’s thoughts about the future. “I have more than enough to do. Work is a complete mess.”
“If Anna Grigoryevna gave me the keys, I could slowly start arranging everything there,” Nina suggested.
“Fine, I’ll get the keys from her myself. If you want to renovate it, go ahead, since apparently you have nothing better to do,” her husband smirked.
After a month of reminders, Gena finally brought Nina the keys to the apartment.
“Here,” he said, handing them over.
“You should at least tell me the address,” his wife laughed. “Otherwise I’ll go looking for it, but I won’t know what I’m looking for.”
Once she learned the address, Nina decided to inspect the scope of work.
“The building isn’t bad,” she reasoned, examining it from the outside. “High ceilings. Thick walls, so the soundproofing must be good.”
When she went up to the right floor, Nina was disappointed to see that the front door was old and very flimsy.
“One kick and it would fall apart,” she said aloud while unlocking the door.
“Who are you?” a creaky voice sounded behind her.
Nina flinched and turned around. An old woman’s head was sticking out from the door across the hall. The lady was clearly the curious and talkative type.
“Hello. This is my mother-in-law’s apartment. She recently bought it for her grandson, my son. So I decided to see what kind of repairs the place needs,” Nina reported to the neighbor, not even understanding how she had ended up explaining herself.
“Hm, your mother-in-law seems rather young,” the old woman snorted. “I saw her come here with a man. She looked around, pouted her lips, and acted all displeased.”
“You must have mixed something up. Maybe those were other buyers viewing the apartment,” Nina said, confused.
“I didn’t mix anything up! I’m not senile yet, and I don’t suffer from dementia!” the old woman said, offended, then slammed the door, leaving Nina bewildered.
Deciding to ask Gena that evening who the woman was who had come with him, Nina entered the apartment.
“Well,” she said, assessing the scale of the work. “All right. We’ll manage!”
That evening, once her husband came home, Nina first decided to find out who he had come to the apartment with.
“The neighbor told you that?! What a person to listen to,” Gena got angry, then fell silent as if thinking through his answer. “That was the realtor! She was showing me the apartment. Yes, exactly, I remember now. The old woman was sticking her head out of that dump of hers. What an old gossip!”
This explanation fully satisfied Nina, and she began dreaming about how she would finish the apartment for her son and furnish it with furniture and appliances.
After they finally paid off their mortgage, the couple realized there was more money in the family budget. Nina suggested to her husband that they start working on their son’s apartment.
“I don’t know,” Gena kept making excuses. “We’ve only just started living normally, with extra money showing up. At least now we don’t have to count every kopeck from paycheck to paycheck.”
“It’s not like we were poor. Fine, I’ll handle it myself,” Nina said, surprised, but she did not insist any further. She decided she would start little by little on her own, and then maybe her husband would join in.
Over six months, Nina turned the shabby little apartment with its outdated renovation into a cozy nest. She put up good wallpaper, replaced the front door with a sturdy one that was not cheap either, furnished the place, bought the necessary appliances, and even bought a vase with dried flowers for decoration.
“Ah, what a nice little apartment! I’d live here myself… but we need the money,” Nina said, rephrasing her grandmother’s saying.
After finishing the transformation and feeling pleased with the result, she decided to show her work to her mother-in-law.
“I never expected you to decide to give Arsyusha an apartment. Thank you!” Nina said.
“So you know?” Anna Grigoryevna said in surprise, then went to see the result of the work.
“Gena had to tell me everything. I’m sorry the surprise didn’t work out. I just accidentally found the apartment documents,” the daughter-in-law admitted.
“Yes, I never thought you would make such a sweet little place out of the den that used to be here,” Anna Grigoryevna said admiringly. “And Genka never once told me that renovations were in full swing here. When did he even find the time? He’s always disappearing at work!”
“He didn’t do anything here,” Nina shrugged. “I did it myself, slowly, bit by bit, without rushing. It turned out well, didn’t it?”
“Yes, wonderful. Well done, Nina!” the mother-in-law said, surprised, looking at her daughter-in-law in a new way.
“What won’t you do for your only son?” Nina blushed at the praise.
That day, something changed in the relationship between the daughter-in-law and mother-in-law. But the happy fairy tale, as often happens, was spoiled by the husband.
A couple of weeks later, Gena told his wife he was leaving her. He said he had fallen in love with someone else, asked her to forgive him, and said their marriage had been a mistake. He would live with his new love in that very apartment Nina had so lovingly furnished.
“Thanks, everyone. You’re all free to go,” he said, taking the apartment documents.
“But… Gena! How can this be?!” Nina turned pale.
It was a serious blow for her. But what hurt even more was that her mother-in-law, apparently, had known about Gena’s affairs and had not said a single word when she came to look at the apartment.
“And I thought she was a good woman. Well, well…” Nina grieved, clutching her heart.
Overwhelmed by his new feelings, Gena completely disregarded his family. He did not even bother to talk to his son. He simply packed his things and left.
“So that’s the ‘grandson’ you were planning to give the apartment to?!” Nina called her mother-in-law and, with a bitter smirk, was about to hang up, but Anna Grigoryevna’s question caught her off guard.
“Nina, what are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about your son’s new woman, the one he’s now going to live with in Arsyusha’s apartment. Fool that I am, I poured so much money, effort, and time into it. And you knew everything and were happy that it all worked out so conveniently?!” Nina could barely restrain herself from shouting as she tried to hide her agitation, but she still added sarcastically, “What won’t you do for your only son, right?”
“I don’t understand anything. But I’m very displeased. Wait for me, I’ll come soon. Try not to do anything rash,” Anna Grigoryevna said sternly and ended the call.
When the mother-in-law found out what her son had done, she flew into a rage.
“Oh, the scoundrel! He lied to me too: ‘I bought an apartment for my son, but so my wife won’t ask unnecessary questions about where I got the money, I’ll register it in your name, Mom.’”
“So where did he get the money after all?” Nina became interested in that question. It was no wonder Gena had been worried about it.
“He said he took out a loan and had also been saving from his salary,” the mother-in-law shook her head. “What a disgraceful man! Hiding his dirty deeds behind his mother! I’ll deal with him! Come on, let’s go to the kitchen.”
A plan had already formed in Anna Grigoryevna’s mind. And all great plans are always discussed in the kitchen.
A month passed. Gena and his lady were settling into the apartment that his ex-wife had furnished and renovated. After learning about the betrayal, Nina immediately filed for divorce. Gena did not object, and Anna Grigoryevna’s connections helped speed up the process.
One evening, when the lovebirds were at home enjoying intimate company, someone loudly banged on the apartment door.
“Open up! Police!”
Gena pulled on his pants, opened the door, and indeed, police officers were standing on the threshold. The curious old woman was peeking out from the neighboring door, and behind the officers stood Nina.
“What’s going on?” Gena asked, confused.
“A complaint has been filed against you for unlawful entry and residence in property that does not belong to you,” one of the men in uniform stated sharply.
“Excuse me, but this is my apartment. More precisely, my mother’s,” Gena tried to convince the police, still not understanding anything.
“We have different information. The apartment belongs to this woman,” his partner nodded toward Nina. “We checked the documents. Everything is in order. So I ask you to leave the apartment immediately.”
“Gena, what is going on here, and who are these people?” a young woman wrapped in a sheet peeked out into the hallway.
“Hey, Nina, is that your mother-in-law?” the old neighbor called out from behind her door, pointing a finger at Gena’s new lady.
“No, looks like that’s the realtor,” Nina smirked. “Come on, Gena, pack up your junk and get out of my apartment.”
“You told me this was our apartment!” his lady stared at Gena. “You lied?! Because of you, I stopped dating Pashka from accounting! I’m leaving you now! Broke loser!”
She slapped him loudly, and five minutes later she had already rushed out of the apartment. Gena also took his things and went to his mother to clarify the situation.
“What did you expect?” Anna Grigoryevna refused to let him inside. “You were going to lie to your mother, your wife, and your son, and I was supposed to cover for you? Absolutely not! I gifted the apartment to Nina. She, at least, will definitely give it to her son!”
Gena left his mother’s place, sat down on a bench in the park, and realized that his life had cracked apart. He had no apartment, no family, and no beloved woman for whom he had started all this. But he did have a huge loan that he still had not paid off.
