charity project // mischa bachinski (ride the cyclone)

12 - somehow

My next problem: Mischa's Christmas gift. I had no idea what to get him. Don't get me wrong, I know him well, but the only things I knew he liked was singing and me. And I was not about to get one of those cringy couple gifts. It's not that I hate it when there are happy couples who display it every five seconds as well as express it through gifts, but-

Scratch that. I do hate it. I will not be like that.

Either way, I had no clue what to get him. I also wanted to avoid asking Noel. He'd bother me to the ends of the earth about it, no doubt.

Maybe I would actually ask Noel. Not necessarily ask, really, but get hints by asking sneaky questions. That would probably work.

...

I sat down for my weekly coffee with Noel. Before I could ask any questions, he did first.

"You've heard of BadEgg on Youtube, right?"

I thought about it for a moment. "Yeah. Isn't he that shitty rapper who raps about money and people somehow enjoy it?"

Noel bit back a grin. "It's funny you should say that."

"...Why?"

"It's Mischa. He's BadEgg. He told me this morning." He began to laugh hysterically.

I sat there in silence.

"Don't worry," Noel paused between laughing fits. "I'll make sure to tell him what you think of his channel for you."

"No! I didn't mean any of that!" I panicked.

"Relax, relax! It's fine. I won't tell him."

I breathed a sigh of relief. "Why doesn't he sing on his channel? He's actually really good at singing."

"Exactly! He's not exactly the best at lyrics, though. Have you watched his song called Currency Flow?"

"No. I told you I don't like his stuff. I do like his singing, though. Wait. That's it!" I sat bolt upright.
"What's it? Should I be worried?"

"I'm bad at talking words, right? But what am I good at? Writing words! And singing! I'll write him a song!" I exclaimed.

"So he can finally have some good content on his channel?"

"No, no. I'm going to perform it for him. It can't be that hard to write a song, can it?"

....

Turns out, it can. While the words came naturally when writing, the music structure did not. I struggled to come up with a good chord structure. I spent hours by the piano, playing out chords in different orders, but nothing worked.

Until it did. A B-flat major followed by an E-flat minor, switching back to B-flat major and then to E-flat minor again. This was succeeded by an A-flat major, D-flat major, A-flat seventh, D-flat major, and finally and F major.

It was all well and good, except for the fact that this was only the chorus.

It was also the day of the gift exchange, so it's not like I had much time to come up with something new. I guess I'd just have to perform all I have.

...

I walked to the Chorus room after school alongside Mischa, who was holding a gift bag for whoever he drew.

"What did you get your person?" I asked him.

"Something really, really good. They're guaranteed to love it, I'm sure."

"Whoever gets your present sounds pretty lucky."

Mischa nodded vigorously. "Very."

We got to the door of the room.