The Happy Hour Choir Read Online Free Page A

Reverend Daniels to talk about how you’re taking my place.”
    â€œThis couldn’t wait?”
    â€œDoc says I could drop dead at any minute, so no. Time is of the essence.”
    At least I knew she was feeling chipper since she’d used “Lou,” her made-up middle name for me. As if being named Beulah Land wasn’t bad enough, I also bore my maternal grandmother’s name: Gertrude. When she took me in, Ginger quickly decided Beulah Gertrude didn’t roll off the tongue.
    I went through my morning routine in record time, even putting on makeup minus the eyeliner. I hopped down the steps in a sundress and sandals with barely enough time left to get out the door and to our appointment on time.
    Ginger did something she hadn’t done since I was a teenager. She assessed my ensemble with a long head-to-toe look and pointed upstairs. “Try again.”
    â€œWhat?” I looked down at my sundress. So, yes, it was cut a little low, but it wasn’t that bad.
    â€œGo, or I’ll wrap one of my shawls around you.” She crossed her arms over her chest and tried to raise her eyebrow. That’s when I noticed she hadn’t penciled in her eyebrows, which she only neglected to do when her fingers shook their worst. I took a deep breath and swallowed any more arguments before I raced upstairs.
    I pawed through my closet until I found a more modest sundress and exchanged outfits with a minimal amount of cursing. I stopped at the foot of the stairs to give a twirl and a mock curtsy.
    â€œMuch better.” Her frown didn’t match her words, but, before I could question her, she added, “You’re driving.”
    She placed the keys in my hand, and my mouth fell open. I had never been allowed to drive the Caddy. Even when Ginger had gone through chemo, she had ridden in my antique Toyota hatchback rather than let me drive her Cadillac.
    â€œC’mon,” she said from where she stood at the front door. “And close your mouth before you swallow a fly.”
    Walking out into the hazy heat was like walking into an invisible wall of humidity. Ginger shuffled around the Caddy, and I had no choice but to move forward.
    After helping her inside, I rounded the car and slid over the slick worn-leather interior of the Caddy. I couldn’t help but marvel at the reversal of fortune. At sixteen, I had been newly homeless and pregnant when I crawled in the passenger seat of the Caddy, concentrating on keeping my lunch down. Back then Ginger had been in the driver’s seat. She had worn her hair high, never letting the gray show.
    â€œFor Pete’s sake, start this car and get the AC going!” Ginger jarred me back to the present, and I looked at where she sat in the passenger seat, slumped and with her hair cut short. She had attempted lipstick, but the burgundy color had escaped the natural boundaries of her lips, further betraying her shaky hands.
    â€œGet your head out of the clouds,” she harrumphed. “Most people have the good sense not to leave a dog closed up in a car on a day like this, much less a person.”
    I turned the key, and the engine rolled over with a solid, satisfying rumble. Was driving the Caddy some sort of consolation prize for agreeing to take her place at the County Line piano, or was this the first in a long line of things and traditions that would come to me and only me?
    We eased through town and out into the country, the Caddy’s V-8 purring. After the anemic engine in my Toyota, I felt I could conquer the world with Ginger’s classic Cadillac.
    â€œFor heaven’s sake, Beulah, air her out.”
    I grinned and pressed the accelerator almost to the floor.
    â€œOh, but watch out for that Barney Fife sheriff of ours. He likes to sit there by the pond at the beginning of the swamp. Thinks he’s running a regular sting operation.”
    I practically stomped on the brakes. We crawled past the pond and into