Chapter Text
Ocean was always the first one to arrive to her 5th period.
The small and underfunded choir room was a brief walk from her usual lunch spot, the corner of a large hallway with a couple couches for students to lounge when allowed to. She never wasted a minute loitering there, since she never felt the need to socialize with her peers. The lunch period’s primary use was for students to eat and catch up on work, obviously.
When Ocean walked through the door, she saw a figure move through the window of Father Marcus’s tiny office. Catching a quick peak through the glass, she saw that his desk was almost completely cleared off. Maybe he did a deep clean over the weekend.
“Happy Monday, Father Marcus!” She greeted, setting down her backpack behind the risers and getting out her Chamber Choir Leader binder.
“Hello, Miss President.” A deep voice said, one that definitely didn’t belong to Father Marcus. A man in a turban and purple tracksuit came out of the office.
“Uh…” She froze.
“Coach?!” Noel screamed. He immediately walked out the door.
“Gruber, you get back in here.” The boy walked back in, tossed his backpack behind the risers and sat down on the top row.
“You’re not Father Marcus.” The anointed Choir Leader affirmed, snapping her head to Constance and shooting her a look as she walked in. Ocean’s nonverbal plea didn’t really faze her; she just shrugged.
“I’ll explain when class starts.” He said, putting down a packet on the piano that was perched in front of the office.
It was like Ocean was about to break a sweat over this. “Just— Please tell us now! Everyone’s here!”
Mischa walked in, eyes on his phone.
“You were saying?”
“That’s my bad.” She awkwardly laughed.
“Who the fucking guy is this guy?” Mischa said, turning his head to Noel, who started cackling.
“First of all: Mischa, language. And I will get to that if you would all sit down.”
“How does he know my name…” He threw his backpack over the riser with the force of a baseball pitcher (a thing that happened way too many times for Ocean to care anymore).
They only had one section of risers since the choir was so small. Mischa sat on the top riser next to Noel, while Ocean sat on the middle one. Constance was already sat on the very bottom.
Karnak squinted his eyes at the students. He stroked his bushy, flowing dark beard in thought. “Okay, surely there’s more than four kids in this class.”
“Oh, yeah. Ricky’s in this class, but he’s usually a few minutes late. I think he’s excused from tardies, by the way. He should be here today, though.” Ocean responded. Coach Karnak hummed.
“Alright then. We’ll wait for Ricky.” He sat on the piano bench and took out his phone. Mischa turned up the volume on his phone and started showing Noel his latest GarageBand track.
“I can’t believe he’s qualified for this…” Ocean muttered to her choir binder.
“I’ll have you know, Miss O’Connell Rosenberg, I studied choral music in college.” He said without looking up.
“I’m just… not good with change.” Ocean indirectly said to Constance, chewing on her inner lip.
“Oh, me neither!” She turned around to face her. “Why do you think Father Marcus is go—”
“I just don’t understand why Father would leave us! And not even with a goodbye. Did he not… does he not think I’m a good enough leader? That I’m not capable of running a successful—”
Noel groaned dramatically. “Can you stop thinking everything has to do with you and let me listen to Mischa’s song? My God.”
“What is your flipping problem, I wasn’t even talking to you!” Noel laughed incredulously (mostly at her usage of the word ‘flipping’).
“My flipping problem is—”
“Sorry, guys, but can we go one single day without you two trying to tear each other to pieces? Thank you.” Constance discreetly addressed them. Mischa nodded, clapping Noel on the back. “Yes, Noel, strongly agree with Constance. Even if Ocean getting on peoples’ nerves is inevitable.” Ocean gasped. “Take a deep breath and relax for once, old sport.” Noel gave him a look (He knew he picked up that nickname from reading The Great Gatsby in class). “You’re in a nice mood.” He realized.
“I heard a perfect song for a new track. The vision is clear in my mind.” Mischa tapped Noel’s temple. He raised a skeptical eyebrow.
Then, someone knocked on the door. “That’s probably Ricky now,” said Ocean.
Karnak went over and opened the door. A girl with platinum blonde hair stood in front of him.
“Mister Ricky, come on in. And…”
“Who is that?” Mischa asked Noel.
“Oh, Jane! Jane Lamb! It looks like she dyed her hair!” Ocean noisily remembered. She had only joined the choir a couple weeks ago, opposed to the rest of the teens who’d been in it for a year at the very minimum.
“Yes, that’s me.” Jane said with an impassive expression.
“It suits you, by the way, Jane.” Noel commented, grinning approvingly. She nodded with the smallest hint of a smile.
“My apologies, I can’t find the roster for attendance. But everyone is here now?” He glared to Ocean, who smiled and nodded with a thumbs-up.
Jane went ahead and sat on the bottom riser, while Ricky followed after.
“Wait, do you sit on the risers too?” He spoke to Ricky. He turned around little by little on his crutches, making sure to not twist on his feet.
“He sits on the risers or the floor.” Ocean answered for him.
“That’s not uncomfortable?”
“He’s never had a problem with it.”
Ricky shook his head. It usually hurt him pretty bad, and it was hard getting up and down on the low surfaces, but when did authority figures in this school actually care about his well-being? Roughly one out of three times they cared, but whatever. He’d probably tell his parents about it and have them complain to the school, if that would even do anything. Since the highest riser was already taken up by the two other guys, he started to sit down on the floor, when Karnak stopped him.
“No, here, let me get the chair.”
Level up, Ricky thought.
He got out the chair, a nice cushiony office chair, not a spinning one but 100 times better than the hellish risers. Ricky looked to his classmates on the risers as he took his crutches off and evil-laughed inside.
“Alright, class,” the man picked up the packet on the piano and read off it, “Father Marcus loves you all, but he is resigning from director of this choir for… future reasons.” He held the paper closer to his face.
“Future reasons?” Ocean asked. “As in reasons that may happen in the future or—”
“He’ll still be at the church all week round if you want to visit him again. Keep singing to the Lord, goodbye.”
“Not even a poetic last word.” Noel muttered in disappointment.
“So, I will obviously be substituting for Father Marcus until you all find another choir director. Although, I doubt that’ll happen, so you’ll probably just get stuck with me.” He sat on the bench behind the piano with a huff.
The choir members sat processing this.
“I guess it is an improvement.”
“How so?!” Ocean snapped at Noel defensively. “I liked Father Marcus.”
“Not sure what there was to like about him other than never opening his mouth to teach us anything. I will say, I appreciated that.” Constance nodded, failing to hold back a smile.
“Noel kinda has a point.” She agreed. It was true, he rarely taught them anything. He held Ocean responsible for teaching voice parts and working on songs he threw at them (that were probably chosen at random). But when he did ‘open his mouth’, it was to spew religious stuff in a grating monotone that didn’t really have anything to do with choir at all. Ocean looked at her best friend with betrayal. She shrugged, “Sorry.”
“Well, now that that’s established, let’s actually get class started, shall we?”
Coach Karnak played middle C on the piano. He demonstrated in a low, vibrato-y voice, “I love to sing.”
“Corny-ass warmup.” Mischa said a little too loudly. A couple giggles erupted from the choir (Constance and Noel).
Karnak stopped and breathed in. Before he could talk some sense into him, Mischa cut him off.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I take it back.”
The new director took a moment to give him a deadpan death stare before starting the warmup again. Guess he didn’t have the energy to take it up with a student this time.
He only played one key at a time when ascending and descending the notes. Definitely a change from Father Marcus, who could at least play the chords, but it got the job done.
After, he flipped the pages of the packet once again and read over it.
“There’s two options here, let’s see. So, this week you’ll be learning the body percussion for—”
“NO, NO, NO!” Half the choir groaned and cried out.
“What the heck, guys?”
“Second option, if you will?” Mischa pleaded.
Ocean frowned, she actually liked body percussion.
“I guess this is a more suitable assignment that spans a week. Okay. We’ll actually be doing an assignment that confirms your musicianship and ability to… just get work done, I guess, with a duet-song-performance that’ll be due on Friday. Sound good for everyone?”
Noel’s hand shot up. Karnak called on him.
“Can we dress up for it?”
“Um. I don’t care? Yes. Just make sure it’s St. Cassian appropriate.” The boy beamed and tapped his feet at that.
“Oh, and Ricky. I’m sure you can find some way to contribute, correct?”
Ricky nodded enthusiastically.
“Amazing. How about I put all of your names into this cool thing…” He trailed off, opening his laptop and typing.
“I’m using a random generating wheel of fortune. This will decide who you’re paired with.” Oh, hell no, all the kids thought to some extent.
Nothing but the sound of Coach Karnak typing and clicking his wireless mouse filled the room. Mischa cleared his throat. Constance sniffled.
“Okay. Here we are. First name is…”
Five seconds passed. “Oh my God, this is gonna take years.” Noel whispered.
“Noel. You are paired with…”
“Mischa?” The boy himself suggested.
“Ocean.”
“Immediately no. Immediately no.” Noel knew he couldn’t work with her under any circumstance.
“Quiet, Grube.” The coach pointed his finger. “Now…” Another click.
“Yeah, Grube.” Ocean chuckled. He felt himself fill up with fire. To the absolute brim. Flames. It’d been a long day.
“Oh, you can speed it up with another click. Huh.” Karnak started supersonically clicking. Mischa coughed.
“Mischa. You will be paired with… Ricky. And Constance… that actually just leaves Jane. Good. You all understand the assignment?”
No one said anything.
“Great. Okay, ask me questions if you have any. Get to work. With the time we have left.” He took the bench and computer with him and disappeared into the office.
“I’m not working with that demon. Mischa, let’s go.” He snapped his fingers and the two went behind the risers.
“Constance! Let’s just be partners! Please?!” Ocean grabbed her arm. “Uh…”
“It’s okay, Jane can go with Ricky! Yay! We’ll be partners! Okay.” She went over to get her issued school laptop out of her bag. However, Jane had already approached Constance, expecting them to work together like they were supposed to.
“I would love to be your partner, but…” She cocked her head, gesturing over to the one in question. Jane raised her eyebrows.
“Sorry. Your hair’s super cool by the way. Alright, bye. Sorry!” She ran over to Ocean, who was sitting against the wall, seemingly already looking for a song. The girl looked over to Ricky, who was also on his laptop. He looked up and smiled. “That leaves you and me.” She stated, sitting on the middle row on the risers. She bobbed her head, folding her hands on her knees. Then, a robotic voice emitted from the computer.
“Give me your number.”
“What?” Jane was startled at the sudden noise.
Ricky typed more. He looked to her when he pressed the enter key and it spoke.
“If you have one. For the choir group chat. You’re not in it yet. Also to communicate for the assignment.” He turned the laptop to her.
“Okay. I do have one.” She carefully took it from him. The computer’s screen was taken up by the iMessage app and a default wallpaper picture of a rollercoaster. She slowly typed in her phone number, reciting it in her head. It was a fairly new number, but she learned it quickly. Ricky took the laptop from her with a nod. Although Jane didn’t have her phone on her, he went ahead and added her to the group chat and directly messaged her.
You can text me some songs you know/want to sing and we can work something out
i remix songs sometimes
do you know what 8-bit is?
He showed her what he texted. She responded after a moment, “No, I’ve never heard of that.”
He smiled and typed away.
Fifteen minutes went by, and class was nearly over. All the pairs worked on… something. There was only five minutes left of class when Mischa finally finished executing his perfect vision for the new upcoming “Bad Egg banger”.
“Okay, producer. Let’s finally hear it.” Noel looked at the GarageBand workstation and honestly had faith in Mischa.
“I’m turning it up full blast. LET’S GOOO!” He placed the computer on the floor in front of them and pressed play.
The whole class did a double take when they heard the monstrosity that played before them. It took about 850 milliseconds for Noel to recognize the song he sampled.
What played was the beat from Shape of You by Ed Sheeran, slow and reverbed with a generic, free rap track over it. Noel’s mouth went agape as Mischa started dancing to it. “There’s no way. Oh my fucking…”
“This song is exceptional, but the beat? Too brilliant not to use. I have money to my knees, I got dollars that grow on trees, say bless you when I sneeze…” He started freestyling. The beat started to built up to the beat drop. “How am I expected to work in this environment, Constance?” Ocean could be heard from their area at the wall.
“Is that Ed Sheeran?” Constance blurted out to them. “Sadly, yes…” Noel was almost brought to tears.
“Noel, will you help me with the chorus?” Mischa asked without looking away from the screen.
“I.” He shook his head, exhaling. “Fine, I’ll help you with your Shape of You sample track, Mischa. Why not?” He laughed.
Coach Karnak came out of his office. “Okay, everyone can pack up, you have two minutes till the bell. See you all tomorrow.”
Everyone packed up, and yet another deadline weighed on their shoulders. Maybe it would be fun for a change, though. We’ll see.