“Tamara, don’t be upset,” Mother said, adjusting the shawl around her shoulders. “I’ve decided to transfer the house to Polina. She needs it more.”
The table was set for seven people in Mother’s cramped city apartment, smelling of cabbage soup. Aunt Lyuba, Uncle Kolya, our cousin Rita, my husband Gennady, and the three of us—Mother, Polina, and me. It was an ordinary Sunday lunch transformed into an unappealable verdict.
I placed my fork on my plate without a sound. For eight years, I had been investing my life, money, and labor into that country house.
Father bought the property in 1998, before Polina had started school. It was a log house on six hundred square meters of land, forty minutes outside the city. When Father left, the house remained in Mother’s name, but she neither wanted nor was able to care for it. Her blood pressure, her legs—it was all too much for her delicate constitution.
So, I took over.
Since 2017, I spent every summer and almost every weekend there. Over eight years, I replaced the roof three times, changed the plumbing twice, installed a new gas boiler, reinforced the veranda, painted the fence, and mowed the sprawling property.
I kept every receipt in a thick yellow cardboard folder secured with an elastic band, with HOUSE written across the cover in my precise draftsman-like handwriting. As a construction cost estimator, I recorded every expense. Those receipts added up to almost nine hundred thousand rubles—excluding my time, petrol, and sacrificed vacations.
During those same eight years, Polina had visited perhaps five times. She grilled meat, posted photos, and left. She never asked where hot water came from or why the roof didn’t leak.
“Mom, did I understand you correctly?” I looked at her. “You’re giving Polina the house I invested almost nine hundred thousand rubles in?”
Mother squeezed her napkin. “Tamara, that’s enough. Polina is alone after her divorce, with two children. She needs a summer house and fresh air. You’re settled. You have an apartment, a husband, and a salary.”
“My salary is what paid for that house.”
“Stop twisting everything!” Mother slammed her hand on the table, making a glass of fruit drink jump. “Yes, you helped. Thank you. But the house belongs to me, and I decide who receives it.”
“Did you even think to ask me? Maybe I had plans for the house too. Eight years isn’t ‘helping.’ I maintained it.”
“Oh, she maintained it!” Mother scoffed. “You replaced the roof for yourself so you could visit comfortably.”
“And Polina didn’t even come to paint the fence.”
Aunt Lyuba studied the plastic tablecloth. Uncle Kolya concentrated on his fish. Rita buried her face in her phone. Under the table, Gennady pressed my knee firmly. Not now.
Polina sat silently, pushing salad around her plate. She was forty, divorced for two years, with two children—Dima, twelve, and Alyonka, eight. I felt sorry for her, but not enough to swallow this quietly.
“Mom, over eight years, I spent nearly as much as it’s worth. Did you look at the receipts?”
“What receipts?” Mother yelled. “Everything with you is numbers and kopecks! Your sister is alone, and you’re waving receipts in my face!”
“Faina Grigoryevna,” Gennady tried to intervene, “perhaps this should be discussed—”
“You keep quiet! The two of you live comfortably while Polinka is struggling alone with children, while you don’t have a single child! What do you need a house for?”
I adjusted my glasses. We hadn’t been able to have a child. Three attempts, two surgeries, years of hope. Mother knew, yet used it against me without shame.
My hands were dry, with a scratch on my index finger from painting the fence a week earlier. The house that would no longer be mine.
“All right,” I said, rising. “I won’t be upset. Since you asked me not to be.”
Mother nodded, her shoulders relaxing. She thought she had won. Gennady and I left silently, and in the car, he said, “Take the folder of receipts out of the house.” I already planned to.
Two weeks later, Mother finalized the deed of gift. The house became Polina’s. I learned about it from Rita.
Mother didn’t call, but Mikhailovich, the plumber who maintained the house for four years, did.
“Tamara Sergeyevna,” he said, “who is paying me now? The new owner hasn’t said anything.”
“What did she say?”
“The first time, she asked why she needed a plumber if everything worked. The second time, she didn’t answer. The third time, she said she’d call back.”
“Mikhailovich, do you remember what you told me about the foundation?”
“Old Soviet strip foundation. The paved area around the house is cracked, and there’s no drainage. In autumn, water rises ankle-deep. If they don’t waterproof and reinforce it, cracks will appear after winter. The estimate is at least four hundred and fifty thousand rubles.”
“I remember. Thank you.”
“Should I tell the new owner?”
“That’s no longer my concern.”
Besides the foundation, the second-floor pipes were corroded and needed replacing for another one hundred and twenty thousand rubles. Altogether, nearly six hundred thousand rubles—about what Polina earned in a year. Polina didn’t know. Mother didn’t know. Only Mikhailovich and I knew.
I could have called Polina. But Mother told me not to be upset. The house belonged to Polina. Her foundation, her pipes, her rust. I stopped calling.
That summer, Polina moved in. Dima ran around the property, and Alyonka swung in a hammock. Polina posted pictures online, and comments poured in calling her lucky. Mother visited for two days, baking pies and admiring everything. Later, she told Aunt Lyuba that Polina had made the house “come alive”—implying it hadn’t been alive under my care, where I merely kept it from collapsing.
I used to pay sixty-eight thousand rubles a year for gas and electricity. Now Polina changed the accounts to her name, but didn’t warn her what autumn bills would look like when the gas boiler consumed twelve cubic meters a day. Not my house, not my gas usage.
In August, the family gathered for Mother’s birthday. Mother raised her glass: “I want to thank Polinka. She took responsibility for the house and put everything in order. She doesn’t complain or count every kopeck.” She looked directly at me. “Tamara, why are you silent?”
“Polina has done well,” I said evenly. “The flowers are beautiful.”
Mother frowned, wanting a scene. I gave her two sentences about petunias. Later, in the storage room, I took down the yellow folder of receipts and utility bills. Polina watched from the doorway in silence. Gennady waited in the car, and I placed the heavy folder on my lap as we drove away.
In October, Mother had Gennady tell me Polina couldn’t manage the utility bills and nearly fainted seeing the gas bill. The next morning, Mother called me demanding I help.
“Because the house is heated with a gas boiler, Mom. It costs sixty-eight thousand rubles a year,” I said.
“Are you joking?”
“No. I paid it for eight years.”
Mother hung up, spending the next two hours complaining to Aunt Lyuba that I was heartless. Three days later, Polina called me, her voice broken. She didn’t know how to prepare for winter, and Mikhailovich had called about the foundation and pipes.
“Call Mikhailovich,” I said. “Twelve thousand rubles for the season.”
“Twelve thousand? For what?”
“To make sure the house doesn’t flood in winter. Call him, Polina.”
“Tamara, could you call him yourself?”
“It’s your house. Deal with it.”
January brought brutal cold—minus twenty-seven on the third, minus thirty-one on the fifth. Polina called me on January ninth at ten-forty-five at night.
“Tamara! There’s water everywhere! A pipe burst on the second floor. It’s leaking into the first floor! I don’t know where to shut it off!”
“Turn off the main valve in the basement. Red handle. Right side of the entrance.”
Five minutes later, she shut it off, but reported ruined wallpaper, a swollen ceiling, and a massive diagonal crack downstairs in the foundation wall she had ignored since December.
“Polina, call a specialist in the morning. Have them inspect the foundation and pipes.”
“How much will it cost?”
“The foundation starts at four hundred and fifty thousand. The pipes are another one hundred and twenty thousand.”
There was a long silence, then quiet sobbing. “Tamara, I earn forty-five thousand a month. I’m paying off a car loan. Where am I supposed to get half a million?”
“I know.”
“Could you lend it to me? I’ll pay you back in installments.”
I walked to the window, looking at the January darkness. Gennady listened silently.
“Polina,” I said, “over eight years, I invested nearly nine hundred thousand rubles. I replaced the roof three times, the pipes twice, installed the boiler, and paid every bill. I have a folder containing every receipt.”
“Tamara, I didn’t know.”
“I know you didn’t. But when Mother gave you the house, she didn’t ask whether I wanted to give away everything I invested, nor whether you could afford it. A house isn’t a gift, Polina. It’s a responsibility every single day and every degree below freezing.”
“What am I supposed to do? Alyonka is running across the wet floor!”
“Find the money, or sell the house.”
“Tamara!”
“Mother told me not to be upset. And I’m not upset. But this is your house now. Your foundation. Your pipes.”
I ended the call. There was no triumph or relief, only exhaustion.
Two months later, Polina took out a bank loan for the repairs. The foundation was patched temporarily, the pipes replaced, and the kitchen ceiling rebuilt. Mother contributed fifty thousand rubles out of the nine hundred thousand I had spent, believing she had done a great deal.
Polina and I no longer spoke as we once had. At Father’s memorial in March, we sat at opposite ends of the table. A few days later, Polina sent a text: “Tamara, I didn’t know a house required so much work and money. Forgive me if you can.”
I replied, “I’m not angry with you. You weren’t the one who made the decision.”
Mother never wrote anything.
For the first time in years, I slept peacefully. I didn’t check weekend weather forecasts, worry about leaks, or calculate repair budgets.
For eight years, I invested everything in that house and knew about the foundation. Should I have warned Polina before the pipes burst—or were they right to deal with everything Mother had so generously given away?
