“Claire, have you seen my striped shirt?”
Daniel’s voice came from the bedroom, followed by the scraping of hangers as he hurriedly searched through the closet.
“Second shelf.”
A few seconds later, he called back irritably, “They’re all wrinkled!”
“The iron’s on the balcony. The ironing board is behind the wardrobe.”
Claire stood in the hallway, fastening the strap of her wristwatch while looking into the mirror. On the small cabinet beside her lay a thick burgundy envelope. In the lower-left corner, an old greasy stain was still visible on the cardboard. Time had never managed to erase it.
Daniel appeared in the corridor, pulling his crumpled shirt over his shoulders as he walked.
He worked as a manager in a large auto-parts store. Most of his day was spent on the phone, selling customers brake pads. At home, however, he behaved as if every household problem ought to solve itself without requiring any effort from him.
“I’m not ironing anything. We’re already late,” he announced, straightening his collar.
Then he noticed the envelope on the cabinet.
“How much did you put in there?”
“Enough.”
Daniel frowned.
“Claire, don’t start speaking in riddles.”
He moved closer and reached for the envelope, but Claire calmly covered it with her hand.
Daniel kept talking.
“Mom is turning sixty. It’s her anniversary, for heaven’s sake. The whole family will be there, along with the women from her homeowners’ association. I’m not going to look like some poor relation next to Andrew. He bought her a huge television. We need to put at least three thousand dollars in there. A proper, respectable amount.”
Claire slipped the envelope into her handbag.
“And where are we supposed to find three thousand dollars right now?”
“We’ll manage.”
“Daniel, the next mortgage payment is due in four days. And a week ago, you bought new alloy wheels for the car. If we take out that much money now, the budget simply won’t work.”
Her husband waved his hand in annoyance.
“Don’t start with your accounting again.”
He reached into his jacket pocket for the car keys.
“We’ll figure it out somehow. If necessary, I’ll borrow from someone at work until payday. Mom has done so much for us. Is it really impossible to thank her properly just once?”
“We’ll figure it out somehow,” Claire repeated quietly.
That sentence had long been Daniel’s favorite expression.
It was his universal answer to every problem he had no intention of dealing with immediately.
Claire had heard those same words a year and a half earlier, when they were sitting in a hotel room surrounded by torn wrapping paper after their own wedding.
The celebration had cost nearly fifty thousand dollars.
Claire had saved half of it herself. She worked as a cost estimator on apartment renovations, accepted extra jobs, drove constantly from one new development to another with a measuring tape in her bag, and prepared detailed calculations.
The rest had to be borrowed.
Margaret had insisted on a large wedding. She explained that, as the head of her homeowners’ association, she simply had to invite her friends, acquaintances, and the heads of several other buildings.
During the ceremony, Claire’s mother-in-law delivered a long, beautiful speech about how important it was to support a young family.
Then, to a round of applause, she solemnly handed her son and new daughter-in-law a thick burgundy envelope.
While the guests were taking photographs, Uncle Frank made an awkward gesture with the hand holding a canapé. A piece of smoked salmon fell directly onto the corner of the gift envelope.
Claire had tried to wipe away the grease with a damp napkin.
Late that night, once they were alone in the hotel room, the newlyweds opened the burgundy envelope.
There was nothing inside.
Absolutely nothing.
Not a single bill.
Daniel paced around the room in his unbuttoned shirt, inventing explanations as quickly as he could.
“Mom was simply overwhelmed. You understand—wedding, guests, the reception, everything happening at once. She probably forgot to put the money in. I’ll call her tomorrow and find out what happened. We’ll sort it out. Just don’t work yourself up.”
He did not call his mother the next day.
Nor did he call her the following week.
Eventually, Claire went to see Margaret herself.
The homeowners’ association office was on the ground floor of an ordinary apartment building.
Margaret sat behind a heavy desk. As usual, she wore a knitted vest over a formal blouse. In front of her, she was arranging residents’ payment notices.
Claire placed the same burgundy envelope on the desk.
“Did you forget?”
Margaret looked up and studied her daughter-in-law.
“My dear, I forget nothing. I’m responsible for five buildings. I remember every resident’s debt down to the last penny.”
Claire held her gaze.
“Then does that mean you deliberately handed us an empty envelope in front of a hundred guests?”
Her mother-in-law replied without the slightest hesitation.
“You may consider it a matter of principle.”