Andrei’s phone kept vibrating on the kitchen table. I stood there, feeling like a guest in my own flat, unable to take my eyes off the screen as one message after another flashed up.
‘Have you flown out yet? I miss you madly… I’m waiting for you. Your L.’
It felt as though something had snapped inside me. It wasn’t even pain. It was worse. Emptiness. The kind that makes you shiver, even when it’s warm indoors.
I didn’t even realise when I reached for the phone. I’d never been the sort of woman to go through other people’s things. I’d always thought: if people resorted to spying on each other, it meant there was nothing left between them. But now… now I needed the truth.
There was no password. He hadn’t even set one. He must have been sure I’d never dare to look.
And I wouldn’t have dared before. Until that day.
The messages opened instantly. Brutally. Without pause or warning.
‘I’ll be there soon, my darling. It’s all paid for. The best room is waiting for us.’
‘Did his wife suspect anything?’
‘What would she know? She’s at home, as usual.’
I read those lines over and over, as if I were waiting for them to suddenly change. For the letters to rearrange themselves, to become something else. But no. It was all crystal clear.
Two years. For two bloody years we’d been saving up. I’d scrimped on everything, counted every penny, forgotten my own desires. And he… he just took it and drove off there. To her.
I slowly sat down on a chair. I wanted to scream, throw the cup against the wall, ring him up and make a scene. But instead, I sat in complete silence. And for the first time in a very long time, I wasn’t thinking about us. I was thinking about myself.
Evening crept up on me without me noticing. I hadn’t eaten a thing. Just a cup of tea that had long since gone cold. Outside the window, the city carried on as usual: cars were driving by, windows were lit up, and people were laughing somewhere. But inside me, everything had come to a standstill.
And then—the doorbell rang.
I started. My heart pounded so hard, as if something terrible were about to happen. Although it seemed things couldn’t possibly get any worse.
I didn’t open the door straight away. First, I went to the peephole.
A man. A stranger. Around forty, perhaps a little older. A tired face, a tense gaze. His jacket was wet with snow.
I opened the door a crack, leaving the chain on.
‘Who are you looking for?’
He was silent for a few seconds, as if he couldn’t make up his mind.
‘I’m sorry… I realise this sounds strange. But I’ve nowhere else to go. I’ve been… kicked out. I’m not asking for anything special. Just a place to stay for the night.’
I was just about to slam the door shut. Normal people don’t turn up at strangers’ flats with requests like that. All the possible dangers immediately sprang to mind.
But he suddenly added quietly:
‘I won’t do anything to you. Honestly. It’s just… everything’s fallen apart for me today too.’
I couldn’t help but smile. Bitterly, almost silently.
‘Mine too.’
He looked up. And his expression changed — it became attentive, as if he really did understand.
And at that moment, I did something I would never have done before.
I took off my necklace.
— Come in.
He stepped inside cautiously, as if afraid to break the silence with a single unnecessary movement.
I didn’t know yet that from that very moment, my life would begin to take a different turn. Slowly. Painfully. But already irreversibly.
And that this stranger would turn out to be more than just a passer-by.
But someone who knows far more about Andrei than I do myself.
He stood in the hall, awkwardly clutching an old bag with both hands. And I suddenly realised just how crazy it all looked from the outside: a woman letting a stranger into her home on the very day she finds out her husband has been unfaithful.
Pure recklessness.
‘Take your shoes off,’ I said curtly. ‘Would you like some tea?’
‘If I may… thank you.’
His voice was steady, but beneath that steadiness I could hear weariness. Not the usual kind, not from travelling. But a deep weariness, as if he had been carrying a burden for too long, one he couldn’t tell anyone about.
I put the kettle on. My hands were still shaking, but no longer just from the pain — from the tension. Too much had come crashing down in a single day.
We sat down at the kitchen table. The very same table where, that morning, Andrei had been talking about ‘tiredness’ and ‘needing a rest’.
What an irony.
‘What’s your name?’ I asked.
‘Sergei.’
‘Irina.’
He nodded. He took a sip of tea, as if trying to warm himself not just physically, but from the inside too.
A pause hung between us. Long, sticky, awkward.
‘Why did you say you’d been kicked out?’ I finally asked.
He gave a wry smile, but there was no joy in it.