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Constance Blackwood is not the first person that Misha talks to in Canada, but she is the first person who listens. He has spoken to many people already: his adoptive parents, the school's secretary, the principal, and every single one of them seems to have made up their minds about him. He speaks with an accent and clearly doesn't want to be here, so of course he must be an angry troublemaker. Who cares that any one of them would react the same way as him if they were in his position? He's not angry, just scared and alone. But he watches as every person that he speaks to makes the same face of faint disgust and judgement and fear, and suddenly he is angry.
Constance is the girl who is chosen to show him around the school. The principal can't wait to get Misha out of his office, and so he is thrown to the nicest girl in town. Constance doesn't look at him with fear, just curiosity. "My parents own the Blackwood Café," she tells him. "You're from Ukraine, right? That's totally rad. I've never even left Saskatchewan. How long have you been here? Why did you leave Ukraine? How many languages do you speak?"
Her soft, quick-spoken English grates on Misha's ears. He didn't want to leave Ukraine in the first place, and he certainly doesn't want to spend the day being grilled about it in a language he hates. "Leave me alone," he snaps, forcing the words out clumsily, and Constance listens. He walks right out of school and sits on a rock to smoke.
The next day he is escorted to school by his adoptive father. The man spent his entire evening screaming at Misha for embarrassing the family, and now he's spending his morning making sure that the son he didn't want is actually attending school. Misha knows that his new parents hate him, and he lets that fuel his newfound anger. It's comforting to know that however much the world hates him, he hates the world more.
Constance tries to talk to him again when she sees him, and Misha figures that now is as good a time as ever to start building his new persona. So when she comes over with a huge smile crinkling her eyes, he dredges up every ounce of malice inside him. "I don't want you to talk to me," he spits, and her poor face drops. "I don't want to be here, and I especially don't want any more of your stupid fucking questions."
He pushes down the sick feeling in his stomach as Constance's big brown eyes fill with tears. "Sorry," she whispers, and then turns tail and flees.
The next time she talks to him is several months later, after another lengthy conversation with the principal, his adoptive parents, a police officer and the school guidance counsellor. Just another host of adults who already hated him. He takes one look at the stupid choir room and knows that he's in for an even more miserable year.
He spots Constance sitting amongst the other kids whose names he can't be bothered to recall. She smiles at him, but it falters when he refuses to acknowledge her. By now, the sick feeling he gets from being cruel is just another part of his day. He sits as far away from the group as he can manage and doesn't bother to hold back his sigh of frustration when the little ginger one comes over to talk to him.
"I don't know how it is in your culture," she says with a saccharine smile, "but in ours, you are expected to take part in extracurricular activities, especially if it's a punishment." Misha stays silent, and relishes in the fact that her face gets more and more red the longer she gets ignored. "I hope you know that I will be reporting this to Father Marcus, the choir conductor. And nobody here is going to stick up for you, especially after what you did to poor Constance last year." Oh, he remembers her now. Ocean, the little creep in his homeroom who sits right at the front of the class.
Misha's eyes flicker briefly to Constance, who is sitting there with her head bowed as though she wishes she could be anywhere else. He's forced to look back at Ocean when she continues talking, confident in the fact that she's being listened to now. "You do realise that here in Canada, most of the things that you do are considered bullying, and there's a no tolerance policy in this school. So, I'd suggest that-"
"Actually, it's only bullying if it happens repeatedly," Constance interrupts. Her face is bright red with shame as every member of the choir whips their heads around to face her. "Um. Misha only said mean things once... not that it was really that mean. It was fine, I totally deserved it anyway..." She falters and trails off, blushing a fantastic magenta colour.
"Constance, sweetie, you're being too nice," Ocean says in a slow, gentle voice. "We all know what kind of person Misha is. You don't need to stick up for him, he's not going to hurt you for telling the truth." She turns back to Misha and gives him another little smirk. "Right, Misha? I think we all know what would happen if I told the teachers what you did to Constance here."
Misha frowns but manages to stay silent. For once, the rage boiling inside him isn't forced. This stupid ginger bitch seems to be able to dredge it up all by herself.
"Ocean," Constance tries again, but Ocean shushes her. Actually puts a finger to her lips and goes shhhh. "Sorry," Constance mumbles, and shrinks a bit lower into her seat.
"Alright, I think that's sorted now. Misha, you can maybe sit this practice out, and the rest of us will go back over the basics."
He had been planning to do that anyway, but now that him sitting there in silence was him following Ocean's orders, he found that it was actually difficult to keep silent. To distract himself he pulled out his phone and started scrolling through YouTube, hoping to find some inspiration for the rap that he wants to start writing. It's new territory for him, but he's already chosen his name.
He remembers hearing the guidance counsellor talking to his adoptive mother some weeks ago. He's a bad egg, she had said. I really don't know if there's anything we can do for him. He's not really a bad egg, he knows. He's a regular egg in a bad situation. But the news had made his adoptive mother cry, and then he was being shoved back into the basement they kept him trapped in, lest she have some sort of a stroke from all of the non-stop sobbing.
It was fine by him. If they were going to treat him like a bad egg, then that's what he was going to be. So he wouldn't take part in the choir and he wouldn't do his school work, and maybe eventually people would get so sick of the bad egg that they'd ship him back to his country, where he really wanted to be.
One week later, Ocean is done coddling him, as she calls it. "You must have seen what we were doing last week," she says. "Just try and join in, and I'll be sure to give you feedback if you're doing it wrong."
Misha has yet to say a single word to any member of the choir bar Constance, and he doesn't plan to start now. Ocean's face goes red and she turns to Constance in a huff. "Does he even speak English?" she snaps, and Constance looks at him guiltily but doesn't respond. "Maybe he's mentally slow," Ocean continues, as though she's simply thinking out loud. "Do you think his mom might have been an alcoholic who drank during pregnancy? Maybe that's why they had to take him away from her."
Misha kicks his chair away and stands up in a rage, and Ocean spins around and leaps backwards with a little shriek. "Don't ever talk about my mother," he seethes, before grabbing his bag and storming out of the hall. Right before he leaves, he hears Constance speak. "Not cool, Ocean," she says quietly.
Fuck, he really is starting to feel bad for that girl. Not only is she the only person in Canada who seems to be genuinely nice, but she somehow manages to do it while being forced to deal with Ocean every single day.
He ends up sitting right outside the hall, eavesdropping. Ocean is complaining that she was just voicing a theory, and Misha had no reason to get so upset. One of the other boys, presumably Noel, is arguing that she was being a total bitch and needed to apologise, and Constance is trying to mediate while also voicing her own opinion, which is that Ocean could have been a bit nicer.
Misha leans his head against the wall and sighs. At least this is shoring up the walls of his persona, even if nobody else in the school likes the choir kids enough to listen to them about it. And it's not his fault that Ocean seems to bring out the anger in literally everybody. What gives her the right to talk about people as though they're not even in the room? It's disgusting. He wants to go back in and give her a piece of his mind, but when he gets angry his English gets clumsy, and he has a nasty suspicion that she would just laugh at him.
He snaps back to reality at the sound of the door opening, and sees Constance step out. For a moment she doesn't notice him, and he gets the privilege of watching her face darken and her hands bunch into fists. Then she spots him, and the nicest girl in town is right back. "Sorry," she squeaks, and he decides that maybe he doesn't need to be a bad egg around her. It looks like she might have some rage stored up inside her, the same way that he might have some kindness hidden inside him.
"Is okay," he replies hesitantly. The words feel stiff and wrong in his mouth, but he doesn't think that Constance will care. "I am sorry also. For how I treated you when school started."
Her eyes brighten a bit. "Oh, that's fine. I know I must have been a bit annoying, especially when you were totally new and I just walked up and started rambling. It's just so interesting whenever a new kid comes to town, and I've never met anyone like you before! Like, you're so cool and you have that whole dark and brooding thing going on, and I'm the total opposite of you, you know?" She falters and grinds to a halt when she sees the blank look on his face, and then she sighs. "Sorry, there I go again."
Misha is still looking at her in slight confusion. "Well, I'd better head back in. You could probably come too, if you want. I think Noel and Ocean have probably calmed down. He got really heated about what she said. Honestly, I agree. I love Ocean, of course, she's my best friend, but sometimes she doesn't think before she speaks. She's really smart, but sometimes I think that she used up all her intelligence on book smarts and she didn't leave anything for people smarts!" Constance looks at him with a smile, and Misha forces himself not to smile back. He can't ruin his entire reputation that he worked so hard to build by going around smiling. "Oh well," Constance continues, a bit quieter now. "If you're not coming back I guess I'll see you later?"
This he can answer. He doesn't mind being nice to Constance. She deserves it, after everything she goes through. "Yes. Tomorrow, in math."
She smiles again, brightly. Misha doesn't know how she does it.
Constance has sat next to Misha in math since the very first day of the school year. She'll spend the class working while he sits back in his chair and stares at the wall directly above the teacher's head, and if he gets called on then she'll subtly tilt her book towards him and let her finger rest next to the relevant answer. For months he's taken this dynamic for granted, just another way that Constance Blackwood earns her title as the nicest girl in town.
Today when Misha slings his bag on the ground and slides into his chair, he turns to Constance and smiles. She looks a bit shocked but smiles back automatically. "Did you do homework?" Misha asks. He thinks it's a good way to ease into acknowledging her existence without tearing his gangster persona to shreds.
Constance frowns a bit and pulls out her copy. "Um, yeah. Did you need to copy my answers?"
Misha shakes his head. "No, I was making a conversation."
"Oh! Oh, sorry," she squeaks, and laughs a little bit. "I wasn't expecting that. You can have my answers if you want. I don't mind at all, my parents always used to say sharing is caring anyway. And I spent loads of time working on them in the library with Ocean, so I'm pretty sure they're all correct. Is math really different in Ukraine? I'm sure it is, obviously."
It's easy to hold a conversation with Constance. You just need to say one sentence and she's off. Every now and then you can answer a question, but she doesn't just talk about herself. She does seem genuinely interested in getting to know Misha, it's just that she's so excited that she can't decide what to talk about first.
"So how old were you when you came to Canada?" she asks. Misha wasn't planning to answer that, but she keeps talking anyway, which gives him an opportunity to stay silent without seeming overly rude. "I always wanted to go to Europe. Have you been to any other countries? It's so rad that you speak Ukrainian and English. We learn French in school, but I'm nowhere near as good as Ocean, and even Ocean's nowhere near as good as Noel. He wants to move to France when he's older, did you know that? Do you think you'll move back to Ukraine?"
Here she stops and looks at Misha, a tiny bit embarrassed. He can see a flush rising in her cheeks, but it's very sweet. "Yes, I think I will," he says. "Will you stay in Uranium?"
Apparently this was the wrong question to ask, because Constance's face drops. "Um," she says. At first it seems she is finally lost for words, but then she pulls herself together. "I don't actually know," she admits quietly, as though what she's saying is wrong. "My parents own the Blackwood Café, and it's been in our family for years. We've been "feeding Uranium since they open the mines". That's what it says on our sign. My parents really want me to stay here and take over when they retire, but I can't help but feel like this is such a lame place to be. Like, everyone else has such big dreams. Ocean's going to become the first female prime minister of Canada, Noel's going to move to France, Ricky..." she trails off here, not knowing what to say. Misha knows that Ricky isn't expected to live much longer, and even without knowing the kid, the thought makes him feel sad. "Anyway," Constance continues. "I just feel like maybe working in my family café for the rest of my life is a bit of a stupid plan."
She looks down at her hands and twists her fingers together. Misha frowns. He opens his mouth to say more, but then the teacher walks in and the conversation is brought to a premature halt.
The next choir practice is somehow even worse than the previous one. Ocean finally coerces Misha into singing, but he has hardly opened his mouth when she is stopping the arrangement to complain. "No, Misha! Can you not hear how awful you sound?"
Misha frowns. He really doesn't think he's the problem here, but he doesn't care enough to start a fight over it. Ocean is talking at length about how the baritone is like the bass in a music band. He needs to be quiet and steady; lay down the beat, as it were. He was doing that already, he thinks. It's not his fault that Ocean (the soprano) has a high, reedy voice that's too thin to be heard above anyone else. Constance for example (the alto) is barely whispering her two-note tune, and still she can be heard above the melody.
"Gosh, I don't even know why the rest of us had to be punished because you decided to try and poison your cousin," Ocean says with an exasperated sigh.
Misha can feel his blood beginning to boil. Anything else he could put up with, but that was just unfair. "I did not try to poison him," he snaps, and Ocean lets out a high pitched little giggle.
"Misha, your cousin was in grade four, and you forced him to drink three boxes of communion wine. He had to get his freaking stomach pumped!"
"Is not my fault!" Misha argued. "In my country it is sacred tradition to take drink on birthday. I only wanted him to take small drink, but I left the room and he drank more than I expected. I did not try to poison him! I even called the ambulance!"
Ocean just laughs again. "Right, because you'd rather be charged with child endangerment than outright murder. Come on, Misha. Nobody in their right mind would leave a child alone with that much alcohol." Suddenly her gaze softens, and Misha's stomach drops. He knows exactly what she's thinking, and his hands twitch into fists pre-emptively. "Is that how you grew up?" Ocean says sweetly. "You know, you could tell that to the police. It's not your fault if you grew up in an abusive situation. No halfway decent parent would ever let their child grow up around substances. Is that why you got taken away?"
Ocean talks a bit like Constance, Misha thinks dimly. It's hard to focus through the ringing in his ears. But Ocean doesn't just talk because she's excited, she talks because she thinks she's always completely right about everything.
"I tell you before not to talk about my mother like that," Misha warns. "You don't know what you are saying."
Ocean lets out a stupid little heartfelt sigh. "Oh, Misha. You're obviously confused. Have you ever heard of Stockholm syndrome? I think you should look it up. I could get you some-"
At this point she is cut off by Noel Gruber, who is apparently just as fed up as Misha. "Ocean, will you actually just fucking shut up?" the other boy snaps. "You always act so high and mighty, when I know things that would knock you right off your stupid little high horse." He stops, and spins on his heel to go sit somewhere else. Misha notices that Ricky, who usually sits in the corner in his wheelchair and stares blankly at a wall in the same way that Misha does in class, is more tuned in than ever before and nodding appreciatively at Noel.
Ocean blanches. "Noel, that is completely out of order," she says shakily. "I could report you for blackmail, do you know that?"
"That's so not what blackmail is," Noel spits. "I'm not trying to force you to do anything, unless you count keeping it in your pants for one second, you horrible succubus."
Ricky is grinning now, and even Constance can't hold back a giggle. Ocean spins around and gasps. "Constance!"
"Sorry," Constance manages to get out, clapping a hand over her mouth and running to sit down. Now Misha and Ocean are the only ones left standing, and Ocean rounds on him with vitriol burning in her eyes.
"This is all your fault, you know," she snips. "Before you got here everything was going perfectly. And now look what you've turned the choir into."
"Is not my fault you are bad leader," Misha replies honestly, and Ocean's face turns beet red.
"I have been nothing but nice to you," she says, as evenly as she can. "I made exceptions for you on the first week and I let you have your little tantrum last week, but now I expect you to step up and take part in the choir like you're supposed to."
Misha stays silent for a second as though he's considering. "No."
It's almost funny to see Ocean standing there, shaking with anger. "Then I hope you enjoy suspension," she says, and starts to make her way towards the door.
Misha's stomach drops. His adoptive parents already hate him so much. What would they do to him if they knew how little he cares about the stupid punishment that they made such a big deal out of him getting?
"Wait," he blurts out, but Ocean ignores him. "Ocean, no, please."
He's sure that everyone can hear the desperation in his voice, and his cheeks would be burning with embarrassment if he wasn't so afraid.
"You've made your decision," she says primly, and now her hand is on the doorknob.
"Fuck," Misha gasps out. Tears are stinging his eyes and making their way down his cheeks, but he doesn't even care anymore. "Ocean, please." His breath is coming short and fast, and the room is almost spinning around him. He can feel the ground falling away beneath his feet, and he slides to the ground.
"Oh my God," he hears someone say, and all of a sudden there are hands grasping his and a face swimming in and out of his watery gaze. He can hear two other people arguing in the background, but now he's focusing on the person in front of him. "It's okay," they say, gripping his hands tightly in theirs. "Ocean's not going to tell anyone."
His vision clears a bit and he sees that the person in front of him is Noel. The boy looks deeply concerned, and behind him Misha can see that Ricky has moved in front of the door to block it while Constance screams at Ocean for what is probably the first time ever. Misha feels a strange sense of pride cutting through the panic as he watches Constance shout. Ocean looks beyond shocked, and Constance has tears in her eyes and blotchy cheeks, but she has never looked so self-assured.
"Misha?" Noel says again, and his focus flickers back to the boy in front of him. Misha pulls his hands away self-consciously and wipes at his wet cheeks. "Are you okay?" Noel asks gently.
Misha just shrugs and looks down at where they're both kneeling on the floor.
"You can talk to us," Noel says. "I know we've never really spoken, but you're part of the choir now. We're never going to judge you." Misha shakes his head a bit, and he hears Noel sigh. "Okay," the boy continues. "Well, if it helps, I get panic attacks too. Has it happened before for you?"
Misha frowns and pulls back a bit. "That was not panic attack. I don't get panic attacks."
Noel is looking at him softly. "Misha..."
Misha tries to stand up. It takes him a second, but then he's back on his feet and walking towards the door. Ricky manoeuvres himself out of the way, looking at Misha with concern, and Misha hates it. Now they all think he's some kind of fucking loser, and they're probably going to go tell absolutely everyone that they just saw Misha Bachynskyi fall to the ground and cry like a fucking child. He takes some comfort in the fact that nobody would listen to the choir anyway, and now he's outside the school and sitting down on a rock. He fumbles in his pocket for a cigarette and a lighter, and brings both of them to his lips.
Before taking a drag, he closes his eyes and breathes in the cold air, relishing in the sharp feel of it in his lungs. He holds the cigarette loosely in his lips as he relaxes. Then, he hears someone coming up behind him. Before he has a chance to get up and leave, Constance is sitting down next to him.
"Hi," she says with a sheepish little grin. "Sorry about in there. It looked like you were having a really tough time."
Misha doesn't react, just takes another drag.
"I'm not going to try and ask you what's going on, don't worry," Constance says with a little chuckle. "I honestly just wanted to say thanks."
Misha actually can't help but turn his head towards her in surprise. "Thanks?" he repeats, confused. Surely he hadn't misheard such a simple sentence.
"Yeah," Constance confirms. "I've never stood up to Ocean before like I did just there. God, I can just see her face." Constance laughs a bit, closing her eyes to picture it more clearly. "I know she's my best friend, and I shouldn't be thinking these things about her, but Ocean really did need taking down a peg. She was always saying such mean things about you, like how you're basically going to jail guaranteed and stuff. I really don't think that's fair. And, Jeez, you should hear some of the stuff she says about Ricky and Noel. It's really gross. I'm glad that I was able to tell her how awful she can be sometimes." She looks at Misha with a strange little look of pride on her face, and he can't help but grin.
"I think you did good, Constance," he admits. "You deserve better friend than Ocean."
She looks away for a second, frowning. "I don't know about that. I mean, we've been friends since we were tiny. I don't know what I'd do without her. But now I have other friends too, right?"
She smiles at Misha again, almost bashfully, and Misha finds himself smiling back. "Yes," he agrees. "And I have friend as well."
He offers Constance a pull from his cigarette, which she takes with a bit of coughing. "Friends?" she asks, as she hands it back.
"Friends," Misha confirms.