Summary:

"Oh." Hollander has gone a little red, beneath his freckles. "I am from… French Canada? Québec? Do you know? Very… very small town there, no English, only French. I try to learn, but— is a bit hard."

Ilya feels mildly stupid. He knew, obviously, that they speak French in Canada, but he didn’t know it was, like— some people’s only language. He’d sort of assumed everyone was fluent in both.

"Huh. Cool."

"Your English is very good," Hollander offers.

Ilya laughs.

"I mean, yeah— I grew up in Minneapolis."

-

aka. the one where the language barrier is reversed. it changes everything.