I turned back to the stage, where a girl was practicing what might have been a modern dance routine. There were a lot of jazz hands happening, and a costume that was way too short. She’d probably learned to dance at the Pine Grove School of Dance over by the highway. Mom had sent me and Leigh-Anne to the Pine Grove Performing Arts School for our dance classes, since, according to her, the performances at PGSOD were too risqué.

As I watched the girl onstage stick her leg up behind her ear, I had to acknowledge Mom might have been right.

Then I tried to picture myself in that girl’s place. Me. Onstage, in front of the whole town, doing a “talent,” twirling that stupid baton. Taking a deep breath, I pushed my shoulders back and made my way down the slight incline to the stage. There was a long table set up just in front of the first row of seats, and a woman sat behind it, stacks of paper in front of her.

“Miss Plumley?” I asked, Bee trailing beside me. The woman turned around, pushing her glossy dark hair out of her eyes with manicured nails. A ridiculously huge diamond sparkled on her left hand, nearly blinding me as it caught the lights from the stage, and I remembered hearing that Sara was engaged to Dr. Bennett, a new dentist in town.

Sara Plumley had been friends with Leigh-Anne when we were growing up, even though she’d been a few years older than my sister. Still, she’d gone to our church, and when Leigh-Anne had been on the cheerleading squad her freshman year, Sara had been a senior.

She’d also won Miss Pine Grove several years back, and now she seemed to be the main force keeping the pageant going.

When she saw me and Bee, Sara gave a good-natured eye roll. “Oh, for heaven’s saaaake, Harper,” she drawled. “Do not call me ‘Miss Plumley,’ please, not when I’m only a few years older than you. It’s always Sara.”

Her accent was so thick that it came out “Say-ra,” and I smiled, hugging her when she stood up.

“Okay, fine, Sara, then.”

“That’s better,” she said with a wink. Then she looked up at Bee.

“Beeee, darlin’, how are you? Didn’t your mama say you were at some sort of...” Her face clouded for a second. “What was it again? A camp?”

“Cheerleading camp,” Bee said quickly, and I hurried on before Sara could ask any more questions.

“So how is all of this going?” I nodded up at the stage, where a handful of girls were milling around.

Sara gave a wave of her hand. “The Lord is testing me, as usual. I swear, I would rather wrangle kittens than try to get a bunch of teenage girls to follow instructions, but what can you do?”