Unveiling the Truth of the Inheritance
Valentina Petrovna stood in the hallway, her cheeks flushed with anger, pointing a finger at me. Meanwhile, I remained silent. I simply stood there, gripping the very document I had discovered just an hour earlier behind the radiator in the storeroom.
“I will evict you from this apartment!” the mother-in-law screamed.
“Why are you silent?” she continued, more agitated than before. “Do you think that just because my foolish son married you, that makes you the owner here? Ha! The apartment is mine, and I have the papers!”
Of course, she claimed to have the documentation. However, how can I put this delicately? Not all papers were in her possession.
“Valentina Petrovna,” I said softly, “are you certain that you possess all the paperwork?”
She jumped, exclaiming, “What?! Are you speaking in riddles? Of course, I have everything! This apartment belonged to me after my husband passed away; I am the sole heir!”
Yes, the sole heir, according to her wishful thinking. Little did she know that Grandpa Mikhail Stepanovich, may he rest in peace, had a different viewpoint. He had taken the necessary precautions and had a will drafted and notarized. Yet, this charming woman chose to conceal it from everyone.
“You know what,” she continued her rant, “tomorrow we will go to the lawyer and arrange for your eviction. I am fed up with you, like a splinter under my fingernail!”
I unfolded the paper. I could recognize Grandpa’s handwriting amongst thousands—small and neat. He always wrote like that; I remembered from my childhood with Seryozha. When we begun dating, he would leave little notes for his grandson: “Don’t forget to buy bread,” “Call Lena.” And Lena is me. He loved me from the start, unlike that woman, the mother of his son.
“Valentina Petrovna,” I repeated, “are you absolutely sure you’ve seen all the documents?”
“Why do you keep harassing me?” she shouted, her voice reaching its peak. “What other documents? I have the certificate of inheritance, nothing else is needed!”
Hmm. But it is needed. Oh, how it is needed.
“Have you read Grandpa’s will?”
Her expression shifted. First, surprise, then something resembling fear?
“What will? There was no will!”
“There was,” I replied calmly, showing her the paper.
She turned pale. Absolutely pale, as if all the blood had drained from her face.
“Where… where did you get this?”
“Oh, where you concealed it. Behind the radiator in the storeroom. Under the crumbling floorboard. Did you really think no one would find it?”
Valentina Petrovna sat down heavily on a stool, her legs trembling.
“This… this is a forgery!” she exclaimed.
“No,” I shook my head. “This is the authentic will of your father-in-law, Mikhail Stepanovich Komarov. Handwritten, dated May 23, 2009, three months before his death. Notarized by Svetlana Viktorovna Petukhova.”
“It can’t be…”
“It can. And deep down, you know this well. That’s why you hid the will. Because it holds information that you would rather not know.”
She fell silent. Simply sat and stared at the floor.
As I read aloud:
“I bequeath my apartment located at Gagarina Street, house thirty-two, apartment fifty-eight, to my grandson Sergey Anatolyevich Komarov. In the event of his death, the apartment passes to his wife Elena Alexandrovna Komarova…”
“Enough!” the mother-in-law yelled.
“No, it’s not enough. It gets more interesting: ‘To my son Anatoly Mikhailovich and his wife Valentina Petrovna, I leave a bank deposit of fifty thousand rubles at Sberbank.’ That’s it. Nothing more. Even the furniture has been assigned to the grandson.”
Valentina Petrovna raised her head. Her eyes were filled with rage.
“And what now? Do you think you’ve won?”
“I don’t think, Valentina Petrovna. I know. I know that for ten years you have been living in an apartment that is not yours. I know that you deceived your husband by telling him there was no will. I know that you inherited unlawfully.”
“Prove it!”
“Easily. First, we go to the notary—Svetlana Viktorovna is still working; I’ve already called. Then to court. And there… we’ll see who evicts whom.”
She jumped off the stool, “You… you wouldn’t dare!”
“Oh, I would. You know what angers me the most? It’s not the deception you inflicted upon us. It’s not the way you made us feel like burdens for ten long years. It’s the fact that you betrayed Grandpa’s memory. He loved Seryozha. He wanted his grandson to have a home of his own. And you… you stole everything.”
“I didn’t steal anything! This apartment was meant to be mine! I cared for the old man; I cooked him soups, administered him injections!”
“You did it for money. I recall how you would extract three thousand rubles a month from him just for care. ‘Valya, lend me for the hospital,’ ‘Valya, give me for the medicine.’ And he would give because he was kind-hearted. And naive.”
“Shut up!”
“I won’t be quiet! You know what I’m doing tomorrow? I’m going to Svetlana Viktorovna to restore all the documents. Then I will file a lawsuit declaring the inheritance certificate you received as invalid. And the day after tomorrow… you’ll start packing.”
Valentina Petrovna stood, shaking. Truly shaking, like a leaf trembling in the wind.
“Lena,” she suddenly spoke in a different tone, “my dear… Let’s come to an agreement?”
Ah, now I’m “dear.” Just moments ago she was threatening to evict me, and now she’s sweet-talking.
“What are we to negotiate?”
“Well… the apartment is large; it’s three rooms. We could split it. You take two rooms, I’ll take one. And we can share the kitchen.”
I laughed out loud. Honestly, I laughed.
“You’re offering a friendly arrangement? Where was this ‘friendliness’ ten years ago? Where was ‘friendliness’ when you would hold a piece of bread over our heads every single day?”
“Len, come on… We are family…”
“Family? Seriously? Family is when you stand together in joy and sorrow. What were you doing when Seryozha had severe health problems? Do you remember?”
She turned away.
“I remember. You said, ‘Why spend money on treatment? He will die anyway.’ You were talking about your own son.”
“I… meant it differently…”
“No, you didn’t. You meant exactly that. And when he recovered, suddenly you talked about how nice it would be to renovate the apartment. With our money, of course.”
Valentina Petrovna sat back down on the stool, her shoulders drooping.
“So what will happen to me now? Where will I go?”
“Where would we have gone if you had evicted us? Did you think about that?”
“But you have a job, you’re young…”
“I’m forty-three, Valentina Petrovna. Not so young anymore. And my job is hardly glamorous—salesperson in a store. Meanwhile, you have a generous pension plus those fifty thousand from Grandpa. You’ll find a roof over your head.”
She started to cry. Sitting there, she sobbed like a child. Yet somehow, I felt no pity. On the contrary, it was a relief as if a heavy burden had been lifted off my shoulders.
“Len,” she sniffled, “could you at least leave me for a while? Just a month, two… until I figure something out?”
I pondered. Truly pondered.
“You know what, Valentina Petrovna? Grandpa was a kind person. He wasn’t one to hold grudges. Perhaps I can try to be the same. I’m giving you one month. One month to find a place and move out. But with a condition.”
“What condition?”
“Apologize to Seryozha. Apologize before me for all these years. For every cruel word, for every act of humiliation.”
“I… I will think about it…”
“Don’t think about it. Either you apologize today, or tomorrow we head to court and that month is off the table.”
She wiped her eyes with her sleeve.
“But you… you won’t change your mind? Can we negotiate somehow?”
“No. We won’t negotiate. For ten years I dreamed of this day. The day when the truth would come to light. And that day has come.”
Valentina Petrovna rose from the stool and approached the window.
“You are cruel, Lena.”
“I am fair, Valentina Petrovna. And you know what? Grandpa was right. He saw through you. That’s why he wrote such a will. He understood what could not be done with you.”
In the evening, when Seryozha returned from work, I showed him the will. He stayed silent for a long time, reading and rereading.
“And what now?” he finally asked.
“As Grandpa wished,” I replied. “The apartment is ours. By law and by justice.”
And the mother-in-law never apologized. She retreated to her room, locking the door. But that’s alright; there’s still a month ahead. Time to think.
The will is now in my possession, safely stored in a bank vault. No one will hide it ever again.