: First love makes a thirteen-year-old boy take a fresh look at the people around him. He is trying to protect a friend from a bully, and his "lover" pays attention to another.

Reading Pushkin, the thirteen-year-old Dyushka Tyagunov makes a discovery: Rimka Brateneva, who is a class older than a boy, looks like Natalia Goncharova. He decides to check it: he runs out into the street, sees Rimka, and something happens in his soul.

In the swamp, Dyushka meets Sanka and Lyovka, teenagers two years older than him. Sanka loves to mock animals, and now he has caught a frog and makes the guys take turns to beat her against the wall. The weakest of the guys, Minka, refuses. Dyushka protects Minka from Sanka by trying to take him away, but Minka resists, he is afraid of Sanka. In one day, love for Rimka, hatred of Sanka and loneliness from Minka’s betrayal, fall on Dyushka.

How does the boy know that hatred comes with love, along with the frantic desire for brotherhood - a bitter feeling of loneliness.

At home, parents are busy with their own affairs: father talks about production problems, and mother talks about serious patients. Father even forgot that they have a wedding anniversary today, and their parents did not notice that their son came home.

To protect herself from Sanka, Dyushka puts a brick in her briefcase. Preoccupied with thoughts about Rimka, the boy receives a deuce in mathematics. He turns to Levka for help, so that he will teach him the methods of struggle, but he refuses. Dyushka can only hope for a brick.

It turns out how simple it is: in order to live without fear, you just need a good brick.

A math teacher complains to Dyushkin’s parents, but they justify themselves by being too busy at work and unable to take care of their son. The teacher believes that Dyushka’s father should be an example for his son, but he would protect the child from the influence of such a father as Minka’s. Dyushka is offended by his friend; he knows that Minka is unhappy. They don’t like Minkin’s father in the village, Minka’s mother complains all the time that her husband doesn’t earn money, doesn’t care about his family, and Minka walks in ragged boots.

Dyushka's father agrees with Levkin's father: Levka will help his son in his studies.

Minka complains to Dyushka. His father is a kind and non-drinker, but they need. Mother cries that her husband ruined her life, despite the fact that he loves her. Mother’s tears make Minka hate his father.

Once Sanka pounced on Dyushka. He is protected by his father passing by Minkin. Having learned a lot from Lyovka about Pushkin, Dyushka imagines that Rimka is the revived Natalya Goncharova. He shares his observation with Minka, who invites him to his birthday.

At Minka’s birthday, Dyushka gets to know his father closer. For this person, the joy lies in doing something useful, things, food for him do not matter.Minka’s mother holds opposing views. The father is unhappy because of unrequited love, and for the mother, the husband and son are a burden.

Dyushka corrects deuce in mathematics. He is happy: it seems to him that Rimka is about to invite him to be friends, and he can persuade Minkin to love her husband's mother. But soon Dyushkin’s world turns upside down - he sees Rimka walking next to Lyovka.

A math teacher finds a brick in Dyushkin’s briefcase and brings it to the teacher’s room. Upon learning that the boy is now unarmed, one of the Sankin’s friends threatens Dyushka - reports that Sanka has a knife. Overwhelmed with hatred, Dyushka is the first to attack Sanka. Trying to intervene, Levka also gets it. Roman shies from Dyushka to the side.

At home, the mother indifferently bandages Dushka’s swollen nose, and the father talks about Minkin’s father as a “skewed man,” and asks Dyushka if he wants to become the same. And what son cares about Sanka, who loves to torment animals? Bringing his son to hysteria, his parents calmly put him to bed.

Dyushka is called to the teacher's. There he explains why there was a brick in his briefcase. Teachers do not believe that Sanka is dangerous. Minka decides to protect a friend. He carries a knife with him, but Sanka takes away the weapon and wounds Minka with it. Despite the fact that the knife was Minkin, and Sanka was only defending himself, Dyushka believes that Sanka is to blame. Father agrees with him. Dyushka’s mother gives Minka her blood.

Unable to bear the misfortune, Minkin's father decides to drop everything and leave, but Dyushkin's father undertakes to make a man out of him.

The danger has passed, and Minka is recovering.Dyushkina’s mother wants to be praised as a little one, and her father brings her daffodils. In their village daffodils did not grow, and Dyushkin’s father rode into the city on a boat at night and cut off a city flowerbed.

Dyushka apologizes to Levka and shares with him her discovery about Rimka, but for Levka she is an ordinary girl, and not Pushkin's wife. Dyushka confesses love to Rimka, but the girl loves Lyovka, and he only loves his books. The world is turning over again.