“I am not your cook or your maid to also take care of your son! If you bring him here, you need to look after him too!”
Gisela froze, holding a knife in the air. The aroma of sautéed onions and garlic that she had been preparing for her dinner suddenly seemed to dissipate, replaced by a rising wave of frustration in her throat. She turned her head slowly. In the armchair, buried beneath cushions, was a pile of crumpled clothes—jeans, t-shirts, and socks that had turned into hard lumps. Everything carried the scent of teenage sweat and street grime.
She remained silent, gazing at Oliver lounging on the sofa, completely absorbed in the engine roars of a Formula 1 race on television. He didn’t bother to look at her as he issued his demands, speaking to her as if she were a voice assistant or a piece of furniture meant to serve on command.
In the adjacent room, behind a closed door, sat the real troublemaker: sixteen-year-old Lars, her temporary roommate for four months now. The clicking of a mouse and his annoyed mumbling revealed he was once again lost in some video game. It didn’t even cross his mind to handle his own laundry or food because, after all, Gisela was there to take care of it.
“I am not your cook or your maid! If you want him here, you need to take care of him yourself!”
Her voice trembled with resolve, echoing louder than the screeching tires coming from the speakers.
Oliver furrowed his brow, reluctantly turning around, his face a portrait of genuine confusion, as though she had spoken in a foreign language.
“What’s the issue now? Is it really too much to ask? You’re going to start the washing machine anyway. Does it matter if there are two or four shirts in there? You’re cooking for everyone, so what’s all this fuss about?”
He said it so casually, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, that Gisela felt an icy clarity wash over her. To him, it seemed there was no distinction. She was merely a function, a component of the household, like the refrigerator or washing machine—dirty laundry in, wash cycle going. Empty shelves meant grocery shopping. He failed to see her exhaustion after work, didn’t register how she spent hours in the kitchen while he and Lars lounged about. He simply wasted her time and her energy.
Without uttering another word, she strode towards the armchair, grabbed the pile of dirty clothes with two fingers, and carried it not to the bathroom but out to the balcony.
“Where do you think you’re going with that?” Oliver asked suspiciously, sitting up.
Gisela silently opened the balcony door, and the cold November air hit her face. She stepped outside, walked to the railing, and let go. The dark mound of clothes disappeared silently into the night, landing in the grass below.
When she returned inside and closed the door behind her, Oliver stared at her, wide-eyed. He slowly stood up, his expression shifting from disbelief to a deep shade of red.
“Have you gone mad?!” he shouted as he finally regained his voice.
“No, I have come to my senses,” Gisela replied calmly, returning to her frying pan. “I agreed to live with you, not to adopt your grown son. From now on, you both need to handle your own chores: laundry, cooking, cleaning. My patience has run out. And tell your son that his school clothes are lying on the lawn. He should hurry before the janitor collects them.”
The roar of the car engines on the television faded, replaced by Oliver’s furious huff. Lars came out of his room, drawn in by the shouting. His face, usually marked by boredom or gaming obsession, now looked uncertain. He looked back and forth between his flushed father and the composed Gisela, who calmly chopped vegetables for her salad.
“Dad, what’s going on?” he murmured.
“What’s going on?” exploded Oliver, pointing towards the balcony. “Your clothes are fertilizing the grass! She threw them out! Go and collect your stuff before the dogs tear it apart!”
The humiliation on Lars’s face was palpable. Here he was, the king of his virtual realm, reduced to a demeaning task of retrieving his own dirty laundry from outside the apartment building. Without daring to look at Gisela, he slipped into his sneakers and vanished.
Oliver stood in the middle of the room, heavy breaths escaping him, like a bull on display. He was expecting her reaction: more shouting, conflict, perhaps even an apology. Yet she simply continued cooking. Her icy calm perturbed him more than any argument could.
“You’ll regret this, Gisela. Bitterly,” he hissed, collapsing back onto the sofa, glaring at the dark screen.
From that evening, the apartment transformed into a battlefield—quiet, yet intense. Oliver and Lars, who returned with a bundle of damp, filthy clothes, adopted a strategy of passive resistance. They were convinced it was merely a phase that would pass if they applied enough pressure. So, they made life hell, hoping she would relent.
The kitchen became the first front. The next morning, Gisela did her usual routine: brewing her coffee, enjoying her yogurt, washing her dishes, and heading off to work. Meanwhile, Oliver and Lars confronted an empty refrigerator with no breakfast in sight. Their attempt to cook ended with a kitchen disaster: a stove covered in milk, a pan full of burnt egg remnants, and a mountain of dirty dishes left behind. They abandoned everything. The first shot had been fired.
When Gisela returned home that evening, she calmly surveyed the kitchen, took her plate, prepared her dinner, ate, and washed her dish. The filthy heap in the sink seemed to not bother her.
Day by day, the situation escalated. Pizza boxes littered the floor, chip bags cluttered the sofa, and sticky rings marked the coffee table. The air filled with the staleness of fast food and their silent defiance. They blatantly ignored the garbage bin, piling waste beside it, waiting for her to cave in.
However, Gisela stood her ground. She drew an invisible line. Her path was clear: hallway, bathroom, kitchen, bedroom. She only cleaned her own space. She cooked solely for herself. Her bedroom became her sanctuary, a pristine oasis amidst the chaos.
“It’s almost impossible to breathe in here,” Oliver commented one evening as she passed by.
“Perhaps in your section of the apartment,” she replied without turning around. “Mine suits me just fine.”
He ground his teeth in frustration. Her tranquility, her indifference irritated him. They were losing this cold war, but admitting it was impossible.
After a week, the apartment had morphed into a foreign, hostile environment. Oliver realized their tactics weren’t working anymore. So, they switched to offense.
One day, when she came home, she found her new cream-colored coat smeared with pizza crumbs and pickled cucumber juice. Something inside her broke—neither anger nor sadness, but a clear, icy determination.
She called a locksmith. “I need a new lock immediately.”
When Oliver and Lars returned that evening, their key no longer fit. They pounded on the door, yelling. Gisela sipped her tea peacefully.
“Get lost! Your belongings are outside. This is no longer your home.”
Oliver raged, “This is my apartment too! I’ll break down the door!”
“Good luck,” she replied. “That would be considered breaking and entering.”
An hour later, silence fell. She could hear them hauling their black garbage bags down the stairs.
Gisela flung open all the windows. The cold November wind swept through the rooms, banishing the stench of takeout and male ego. She lit a pine-scented candle, fresh and clean.
Then she began to clean—not as an obligation but as a release.
One week later, Oliver rang the bell. He looked disheveled. “Gisela, let’s talk. This has gone too far.”
She accepted the bag containing her things that he had taken.
“We were wrong. I’m sorry,” he said, but the old sense of entitlement lingered in his eyes, suggesting that she would give in. “Lars has nowhere to stay. We’re at my mother’s place. This isn’t a life.”
“Not for you,” she replied. “But for me, my life is just beginning.”
“But we’re family!”
“No, Oliver. Family is built. You were my burden, and I have freed myself from it. Don’t come back.”
She closed the door. The sound of the new lock clicking into place was the sweetest music.
Later, she learned through acquaintances that Oliver had rented a room on the outskirts of town, and Lars had been sent back to his mother. They had to learn to fend for themselves.
Gisela, on the other hand, discovered something entirely different: how to be happy. She finally signed up for the pottery class she had always wanted to take. She spent weekends according to her desires, enjoying time with friends or simply reveling in her clean, tranquil home.
Key Insight: Establishing boundaries is essential for self-respect and personal fulfillment.