“Family matters more.”
“Great,” Dasha said with a nod. “Then starting today, your share of the mortgage comes out of your personal savings, and feeding your sister is now entirely your department. If she wants salmon, you can go buy it yourself.”
“Family matters more, right?” Mike’s face fell. He had been saving that money for a new set of rims for his truck, and subsidizing his sister’s lifestyle was not part of the plan.
By Friday, the atmosphere in the condo felt like the air before a thunderstorm. Dasha shut down every attempt Susan made to establish her own rules. When Susan tried to take over the TV during Nastya’s evening cartoons, Dasha simply removed the batteries from the remote and slipped them into her pocket.
“Screen time is over,” she said. “Susan, doctors say reading a real book before bed helps with anxiety. There’s an insect encyclopedia on the shelf. Very educational.”
Eleanor, seeing that direct confrontation wasn’t getting her anywhere with her daughter-in-law, switched to whisper campaigns. In the evenings she sat in the kitchen with Mike and worked on him. “Mike, honey, you’re letting your wife run over you.”
“A home should be open to family.” “And she’s hiding her cosmetics, counting groceries.” “The way she looks at Susan, like our girl did something wrong because life dealt her a hard hand.”
Mike sighed and nodded, but he was too afraid of a direct fight with his wife to push back. He knew perfectly well that if Dasha got truly angry, she might start listing exactly who paid the utilities and whose bonus had covered the bathroom remodel. But Dasha wasn’t angry. She was observing.
Her professional habit of noticing details and reading a situation before making a move served her well. Susan did not look like a woman in deep depression. She spent hours laughing on the phone out on the balcony and ordering trendy clothes online.
Saturday afternoon, while Dasha was helping Nastya with math, she caught part of a phone conversation from the balcony. The window was cracked open. “Girl, I landed in the perfect setup,” Susan chirped.
“I already rented out my studio to a couple of tech guys for at least a year.” “Why let it sit empty? Mike’s a pushover anyway.” “Mom twists him around, and he goes right along.”
“You just lean on people’s sympathy.” “I cried a couple times about my terrible diagnosis, and that was it. They’re practically serving me the best of everything”…
