Part 4 — My husband did not buy shoes for our son, but suddenly turned pale when talking about the money he spent on himself

…the knocking on the door was stronger the second time.

Igor jumped up from the chair.

“Do not open it.”

The manager signaled to the security guard, but Nino stopped him with her hand.

“The door must be opened. An official inspection is already taking place here.”

A woman’s voice sounded from the corridor.

“Igor, I know you are inside!”

I recognized her voice immediately, although I had never heard it before. Sometimes a person recognizes danger even in the tone of a completely unfamiliar voice.

Igor leaned against the wall.

“This woman is not what you think.”

“I don’t think anything yet,” I said.

“Please, Valia.”

“For three months you have been taking debts in my name. Now all you have left is ‘please’?”

Security opened the door.

A thirty-five-year-old woman entered the room. She held a plastic folder in her hand, and her eyes were red.

“I am Marina,” she said. “They call me Igor’s brother’s widow. But he has already been abroad for two years, and these debts are not his.”

Igor seemed to grow old in one instant.

Marina put the folder on the table.

“You told me that Valia knew everything. That she herself gave you money from the house. That is why I was taking it.”

I looked at Igor.

“What were you telling her?”

“Nothing, just…”

“Just what?”

Marina opened the folder. There were his letters, transcripts of voice messages, and several pictures in which Igor promised her to return the debt.

Nino took one of the sheets.

“It says here: ‘My wife will not find out anything soon. They already know her signature at the bank.’”

Igor lowered his eyes.

For the first time he heard his own words through another person’s mouth.

“I did not write this,” he whispered.

Marina smiled bitterly.

“You wrote it. You simply thought then that no one would dare to read it.”

I was no longer crying. That was the strangest thing. Three months of fear, resentment, and endless questions seemed to gather in one small place and stop there.

Nino put the documents in order.

“Mr. Igor, the bank is immediately suspending the loan. An examination of the signatures will be appointed. A notification will also be sent to the police about possible forgery.”

“No,” Igor said. “This is a family matter.”

“No,” the manager replied. “When a debt is created with someone else’s signature, this is no longer only a family matter.”

Igor came toward me.

“Valia, think of the child. If this case proceeds, everything will fall apart.”

I looked at the little wooden elephant that I held in my palm.

“Everything already fell apart on the day you decided that my fear would be useful for covering your money.”

That evening I went home alone. Antoshka was at my mother’s. In his room I found one sock left on the bed, and in the corner lay his drawing: three people, one of them holding a very large phone.

Igor called me late.

“The lawyer told me that if you do not write a statement, everything may be settled peacefully.”

“Your lawyer refused to defend you until you tell the full truth,” I answered.

“Did you turn him against me?”

“No. Your documents did this.”

The next morning Igor tried to go to work, but they were already waiting for him there. His work card lay on the table, while the head of security stood at the door.

“Hand over your things,” he told him.

“I worked here for ten years.”

“And that is exactly why we need answers about the transfers made over ten years.”

Igor sat down on the chair. The clock hanging on the wall ticked just as it had that morning in our kitchen.

A few days later the examination confirmed that my signature on the loan application had been forged. Marina gave testimony. The bank removed the debt from my account. An investigation was opened against Igor, but I did not come to the courtroom to have him punished.

I came to get my name back.

When the judge announced the final decision, Igor sat in the back and rubbed his hands together. He no longer had either a new phone or loud confidence.

Only a tired man remained.

Weeks passed.

Antoshka and I moved into a small apartment, close to the school. In the morning the sound of the tram could be heard from the window. I started working at a library and for the first time in my life I was no longer afraid of the messages arriving at the end of the month.

Antoshka had new shoes. And the wooden elephant that had fallen from his hat was now attached to my keys.

“Mom, will Dad come back?” he asked me one evening, when snow was beginning.

I was standing by the window.

“He may want to come back.”

“And will we let him in?”

His question was small, but I searched for the answer for a long time.

“You should give people a second chance when they acknowledge the first mistake. Dad has only begun talking about the consequences so far.”

Antoshka nodded and turned back to his drawing. In the new drawing there were the two of us, holding hands. The phone was no longer there.

Three months later Igor sent me a message.

“I want to see you. Now I understand everything differently.”

I looked at the screen for a long time. Then I calmly wrote back:

“I understand it differently too. That is why I am no longer going to return.”

He wrote me only one word.

“Valia…”

I did not answer anymore.

That night I sewed Antoshka’s hat. I attached the wooden elephant in its place again, only with a new thread and a small, firm knot.

Beyond the window the first snow was quietly falling onto the yard.

The wooden elephant was not carried away by the wind.

Nor was I carried away by someone else’s wind.