My Sister Forcefully Entered the House, but Her Confident Smile Immediately Disappeared at Her Mother’s Unexpected Appearance

My mother accused me on the threshold of throwing my own sister’s children out into the street, while their father was taking things from my bags in my house.

It was seven o’clock in the evening. My mother stood behind the door, her feet swollen, and she held a black umbrella in her hand as if it were a weapon. Behind her stood Marina, her eyes red, while Igor leaned against the wall and nervously played with his phone.

“Sveta, did you really threaten your own sister with the police?” my mother asked me.

“Mother, you don’t yet know what happened.”

“I know what Igor told me. The children became sick, and you made a fuss about jewelry.”

Marina immediately sighed.

“I wasn’t doing anything in her house, Mother. I simply asked for help. But she humiliated me and called me a thief in front of my children.”

I clung to the door handle. The belt around my waist cut into my skin, but my mother’s gaze hurt me more than the pain. In her eyes there was not doubt, but an already pronounced verdict.

“Your earrings are in a pawnshop,” I said. “Igor admitted it himself.”

“I pawned them temporarily,” Igor interrupted. “The children needed food.”

“Are shrimp, caviar, and whiskey food?”

Igor clenched his jaw. Marina immediately grabbed my mother’s hand.

“You see? She always speaks to me like this. She has money and no humanity left.”

My mother looked around the room. A child’s plastic car lay on the floor, while the sofa still had a broken leg. Damp sea air entered through the window and slowly moved the curtain.

“This house is not only for you,” my mother said. “Marina sacrificed her childhood for you.”

“I sacrificed my health too. I am waiting for an operation, Mother.”

“Everyone has their own pain.”

These words broke me more than Marina’s shouting. Andrei stood by the kitchen door. This time he did not remain silent.

“She couldn’t walk for three days,” he said. “Before your arrival, she was dealing with the doctor.”

“Don’t interfere,” my mother shouted at him. “A man living on someone else’s money should not lecture anyone about morals here.”

Andrei’s face turned pale, but his voice did not tremble.

“I rented out my apartment. All the money goes toward Sveta’s treatment.”

Marina chuckled ironically.

“How noble you suddenly turned out to be.”

I looked at them and wanted someone, just once, to ask why I hid my medicines, why I woke up from pain, why I kept my phone under my pillow at night. But no one had any questions.

On the kitchen shelf stood a small wooden boat that Andrei had bought during our first trip. Its fallen sail reminded me every time that peace had once lived in this house.

“Marina, you have to leave today,” I told her.

“You can’t throw me out.”

“Why?”

Marina looked at my mother, then at Igor. Igor silently took the phone from his pocket.

“Because soon you yourself will have to leave this house,” he said.

A heavy silence fell over the room.

“What does that mean?” I asked.

Igor smiled.

“Ask your sister. Or your mother.”

At that moment someone knocked on the door. Three times. Exactly the way a debt collector knocks.

Andrei looked toward me. Marina held her breath. My mother gripped the umbrella more tightly.

I opened the door. An unfamiliar woman stood on the threshold, holding a brown folder in her hand.

“Mrs. Sveta,” she said, “it is time for you to learn everything.” And she reached toward the folder’s clasp…

The woman introduced herself to me as Mariam and entered the apartment directly.

“I am a lawyer,” she said. “But today I came here only at your invitation.”

“I invited no one,” Marina shouted.

Mariam looked at her calmly.

“You did not. But your husband called us yesterday.”

Igor immediately stepped back.

“That’s nonsense.”

“Then perhaps you will call this recording nonsense too.”

She placed the phone on the table. I heard our own voices in the room: Marina was saying that I could endure everything, while Igor was admitting pawning the earrings.

My mother covered her mouth with her hand.

“How was this recorded?”

“My phone was in the kitchen,” I answered. “On the night when Kosta had an attack, I did not turn off the recording.”

The color disappeared from Marina’s face.

“You were spying on your own family?”

“No. I was trying to protect myself in my own house.”

Mariam opened the folder, but she did not have time to show the first sheet. Her phone rang. She listened, her eyebrows knitted, and she turned toward me.

“Sveta, they are calling from the police station. They have already found the person who submitted another document with your signature. And this document concerns your house…”

Mariam ended the call, and such silence fell over the room that I could hear every strike of the wall clock.

“What document?” I asked.

“A power of attorney for selling the apartment,” she said. “As if you were giving Marina permission to sell the house.”

My mother looked at Marina.

“Did you do this?”

“I did nothing!” Marina shouted. “Igor said everything was legal.”

Igor searched for the door with his eyes.

“It was simply a preliminary agreement.”

“You forged my signature?” I barely uttered.

Mariam took two sheets of paper from the folder. My name was written on one, but the letters were copied roughly and unusually. A notary’s stamp could be seen on the second.

“The document was submitted yesterday,” she said. “The buyer was supposed to come this morning.”

Andrei clenched his fists.

“That is why Igor was talking to someone on the stairs.”

Marina looked at her husband.

“You told me we only needed help!”

“You forced me! You said Sveta would help us forever!”

“I didn’t tell you to make a forged signature!”

Their shouting crashed into each other. My mother sat down on a chair. Drops of water fell onto the floor from the umbrella lying on her lap.

Mariam turned on the phone.

“Now listen to the whole thing.”

Marina’s voice sounded in the recording. She was telling Igor to pawn the earrings first, then tell me that my mother was unwell, and finally obtain a power of attorney from me. Igor was laughing.

“If she does not sign,” Marina was saying, “I will bring Mother to her and tell everyone that she has become sick and ungrateful.”

Marina hid her face in her hands.

“It wasn’t like that…”

“It was exactly like that,” I said. “I heard everything.”

My mother raised her head.

“Marina, why?”

For the first time my sister could not answer anything. Her lips were trembling.

Mariam handed me the second sheet.

“And this is the pawnshop receipt. The earrings were pawned in your name, while the money was transferred to Igor’s account.”

Igor pushed the chair so hard that its wooden leg scratched the floor.

“You can’t prove anything.”

“It has already been proven,” I said. “We handed the bank statement, the recording, the camera footage, and the forged document to the police.”

At these words Marina raised her head.

“To the police?”

“Yes.”

Someone knocked on the door again. This time the sound was heavier. Two police officers entered, and behind them stood the owner of the pawnshop. He was holding a small box in his hand.

“Mrs. Sveta,” one of the police officers said, “we found your earrings. But first I must tell you something else. The forged power of attorney does not bear only Igor’s fingerprints. A third person’s trace was also found there.”

Everyone looked at my mother.

My mother slowly stood up and said quietly:

“I touched that paper only once…”

And Mariam received a new message on her phone. She read it, and her expression changed.

“Sveta, this matter no longer concerns only your family. The man who tried to buy the house has now stated that a complaint has already been filed against you…”