The lawyer’s call came at seven in the morning.
“Ana, a new transfer was made yesterday. The money again came from the joint account.”
I was standing by the window, holding a tiny white baby sock in my hand. It was still attached to the tag.
“How much?”
“One thousand two hundred lari.”
A chill ran through my body.
I called Luka.
“Did you do this?”
“Mom said it was urgent.”
“Without my consent?”
“Ana, don’t turn everything into a war.”
“It is no longer a war. Now there are only consequences.”
He hung up quickly.
Ten minutes later his lawyer called me. I thought I would hear a threat, but his voice was tired.
“Mr. Luka asked me to put pressure on you regarding the apartment. I cannot do that.”
“Why?”
“Because the bank records and messages are sufficient against him. Also, his mother’s signature on the new document is clearly visible.”
That same day Luka went to the bank, tried to block the account, and found out there that I had already changed the access. Within a few minutes I had twenty-one missed calls.
I answered none of them.
In the evening I found him in the entrance of our building. He was holding a paper cup, but there was no coffee in it anymore. Only wet cardboard was crumpling between his fingers.
“Give me five minutes.”
“Say it.”
“I’ll explain everything.”
“You already explained it.”
“I didn’t want to deceive you.”
“Then why did you write that if I asked about the money, you should mention a friend?”
He lowered his eyes.
“Mom told me.”
“You wrote it.”
“I was afraid.”
“You chose the lie.”
I said these words to him for the first time without my voice trembling.
On the lawyer’s advice, I recorded our conversation on the phone. Luka stood silently for a long time, then again repeated the same phrases: that his mother needed help, that the debt was his family’s problem, and that I, as his wife, should understand.
The next day we listened to this recording at the meeting. Luka was sitting right there. When he heard his own voice, his face changed.
“I don’t talk like that,” he said.
“That is your voice,” the lawyer answered.
In the recording he said: “If Ana leaves, everything will fall apart for me, so she must not know yet.”
Luka covered his ears with his hands.
“Turn it off.”
“You said that,” I told him calmly.
This time he could not find an answer.
We no longer needed to sell the apartment. Under the contract, my share was protected, while repayment of the remaining debt was defined as Luka’s personal obligation, because the payments had been made without my consent. The bank began an investigation into the new transfer. It turned out that his mother had attempted to use an old power of attorney.
When the police called, Luka shouted at his mother for the first time.
“Why did you do this?”
“To protect you!”
“You ruined my life!”
I was standing in the kitchen and pouring tea. Their voices struck against the walls, but I no longer ran to calm them down.
I used to do that all the time. I separated people from their own lies.
Not anymore.
A few days later his mother put her key into the mailbox. Luka stood in the living room for a long time before leaving the apartment.
“Is it really ending?”
“What we had ended already when you did not come to my child’s doctor’s appointment because your mother’s tap was more important.”
“Maybe I can fix everything.”
“You can fix yourself. I can no longer do that instead of you.”
He left.
And I remained alone in the living room. His old game controller still lay beside the sofa. The sink was empty. The closet stood silently.
The child’s room hit me hardest.
The clothes washed with his mother’s scent were no longer there. I folded them and put them in a box. One small sock remained on the shelf, exactly the one I had held that morning.
I sat by the bed and for the first time did not feel guilty for wanting peace.
Three months later my daughter, Elene, was born.
The first snow of winter came precisely that day. From the hospital window I watched the white roofs until Elene’s little finger wrapped around my finger.
Mari came every day and quietly left food for me. Once she brought me a small drawing. On the paper, Mari and Elene were drawn, and above them was a large yellow sun.
“You are laughing again,” Mari told me.
“Now I have a reason.”
I changed many things in the apartment. I installed a dishwasher in the kitchen. I left a new lock on the door. In the mornings I no longer drank coffee standing up; I sat by Elene’s crib and listened to her breathing.
I returned to work part-time. I still wrote down the patients’ stories, but for the first time I also believed my own story.
Luka wrote to me once a week.
At first he apologized.
Then he said that his mother was guilty of everything.
Then he wrote that he had changed.
One evening I received a message: “Come, let’s start over. At least for Elene.”
I stared at the screen for a long time. Earlier I would have answered such words immediately. I would have started explaining, proving, pleading.
Now I wrote only one sentence:
“The best thing for Elene is to grow up in the truth.”
Then I turned off the phone.
Luka came once more. He stood at the door, but I did not let him in. He put a small key into the mailbox.
“Is this your mother’s key?” I asked.
“No. It is my old key.”
“Then keep it.”
“I don’t need it anymore.”
“Neither do I need to keep the door open for someone who comes home only when he needs to hide something.”
He looked at me for a long time.
“Are you happy?”
Elene stirred in the room. I went to her crib and picked up the little sock that I had kept from the shelf. Now I knew why I had kept it.
It was the only thing from that time that was not connected with a lie.
“I am at peace,” I told him.
Luka left.
And I put Elene’s sock into a small wooden box. I went to the window. Snow was falling outside, and white points flickered on the streetlamps.
Elene smiled in her sleep.
I locked the door.
And for the first time, this locking felt not like a prison, but like a home.
Missed the beginning?
