“Thank you.” Like I made them. This was awkward.

“Haven’t seen you in the church lately. Your mother either.”

“Didn’t go so well the last time I was there.”

“For either of us.”

Then you shouldn’t have snitched!

That . . . was not the proper response. I bit it back. She bit into her sandwich. Took her time chewing. The silence got to me. “How are they?” I asked.

Sister Vanessa dabbed crumbs from the corner of her mouth with her napkin. “Ralph and Bobby joined the Ushers’ Board. They look very handsome in their dress clothes and those white gloves. Helena’s found her way into the choir stand with Mya. Shanice has been talking about starting a praise dancing team. My uncle’s not so enthusiastic about it, though.”

That last bit was flat. Monotonous. Lacking any of the inherent joy of most things out of Sister Vanessa’s mouth.

“I don’t mean to be rude, but I may not be able to sit here for long. I feel like you came here to say something to me.”

“I couldn’t just be curious about the cuisine?”

“Nobody, ever in the history of the world, was simply curious about the food here.”

She rested the half-eaten sandwich on her tray, and wouldn’t touch it again. “Kiera told me about things between you two.”

“Y’all talk like that?” Despite my anger over the way things went down, despite the confusion and disappointment and embarrassment I felt when my family confronted me about it, despite the foolishness of everything I did and tried to do, hope sparked like an ember in my chest.

Did Kiera feel more for me than she’d ever let on?

Was Sister Vanessa here to tell me Kiera had been as miserable as me over these last few weeks? Had I crossed her mind every time her head touched the pillow, or her feet crossed the threshold into Green Creek High? I waited.

Sister Vanessa said, “I know it hurts when someone you like doesn’t feel the same way, Del. I’m sorry your pain drove you to react badly.”

That ember was snuffed with a knife’s tip, the blade then twisted, scraping the soft things inside me.

“Despite that, I’d hoped you and your mother would return to First Missionary.”

“Sounds like you’d be the only one.”

“Not true. Believe it or not, you and your mother were good for the church. We need new blood, with new ideas.”

“I don’t think your uncle would agree.”

Sister Vanessa pushed back against her bench, taking her time, choosing her words. “Uncle Eldridge is an old man. He doesn’t always understand that times change, as do the needs of the congregation. He hasn’t adjusted well since my aunt passed. He really is a good person who does what he thinks is right. He’s lost his North Star.”

“I don’t think all that matters much when he’s forcing kids to shame themselves publicly.”

“You’re not wrong.”

“Why doesn’t anyone stand up to him, then? Why don’t you?”