“No, but I’d like to introduce you as Miss South Haven 1951. And I thought you might want to wear your sash so we could get a good picture.”
“You can introduce me, but I’m not sure about the sash. It’s not really my style anymore. My pageant days are far behind me.”
“Not anymore,” Piper said.
Out of the mouths of teens.
Later, Boop stepped onto the porch to watch the sunset and found Piper sitting alone, as teens were apt to do. Boop didn’t ask where Natalie was, lest Piper think her presence wasn’t enough. She didn’t ask if anything was wrong, or what was “up.” Boop just smiled and Piper smiled back.
They each sat in a chair without talking. Words weren’t necessary to keep someone company. That was a good thing, since words were clattering around in Boop’s brain. She had won a beauty pageant. What would a present-day audience think of that? There were no photos to show how she looked that day—would they believe it?
“Mrs. Peck,” Piper said. “Can I ask you a question?”
“I’d love it if you called me Boop; everyone does.”
Piper shrugged.
“Whenever you’re comfortable, you just switch to Boop, okay? And if you’re not, that’s fine. I’m sorry, me with my instructions. What were you going to ask?”
“Can I see your Miss South Haven sash? I’m really into vintage.”
Boop smiled at the trendy term for old. She hadn’t unwrapped the sash. The fabric had her lost dreams woven right into it. What could happen if she looked at it or even tried it on?
“Come upstairs.”
Boop handed Piper the sash, still wrapped in tissue. With the abandon of a child with a birthday gift, Piper opened the paper and lifted the end of the sash. It cascaded toward the floor.
Hannah had been right: it looked like new—iridescent pink with soft black lettering and white satin trim.
“Try it on,” Piper said.
Piper needn’t bear witness to Boop’s baggage. All the girl knew was that a long time ago, and not so far away, Boop had won a beauty pageant. This beauty pageant. She lowered her head and Piper placed the sash over it, resting the fabric on her right shoulder and over her chest, still as pliable as it was all those years ago, falling at and hugging her left hip.
Piper stepped back. “That must bring back a lot of good memories.”
Boop shoved aside that day’s aftermath. “I guess it should,” she said. “Do you know they read our measurements aloud?”
“No, they didn’t,” Piper said.
“They did. It was a beauty contest—a tradition in town.”
“Then why did they stop having it?”
“Because I ruined it.”
“How could one girl ruin a beauty pageant for an entire town?”
Boop had never considered the power Nannie and Zaide had wielded over a South Haven institution. They hadn’t just taken the pageant from her, but from everyone.
“My grandparents didn’t want a reminder of how I’d embarrassed them. I kind of made a mess of things that day. I ran out and got sick.”
“No offense,” Piper said. “Sounds kind of selfish of them. I bet it was worse for you than for them, right?”
Boop smiled at Piper’s kind and easy insight. “Has anyone told you you’re very wise?”
“I keep trying to tell my mom that.”
Boop guffawed as she smoothed the sash and the embroidered letters tickled beneath her fingers. She had never seen herself as Miss South Haven. Not in a mirror, nor in a photograph, until the one Natalie had shown her. She walked to the corner of her room and looked into the cheval mirror.
An old lady with a beauty queen’s sash. That’s what Boop saw. Then she startled at a glimpse of Betty behind her, toffee-colored curls, red lips, bright eyes, and a smile revealing hopes and dreams unmarred by disappointment, heartache, or grief. Boop swirled around to get a closer look—but Betty was gone.
Though maybe she didn’t have to be.
Chapter 27
BOOP
Boop stared into the audience. What had she been thinking? How could she have allowed Natalie to talk her into this? The auditorium was filled with pageant parents who wanted to see their daughters win a trophy, a tiara, and a check. Who the heck was she to be sitting on the stage, let alone thinking she should be wearing her ancient, short-lived title across her chest? Who cared that she had been Miss South Haven?
Then she saw them. Natalie, Piper, Georgia, Charlotte, Poppy, Hannah—and Clark. Hannah and Clark. Boop didn’t need to know how or what, though she reasoned Hannah would tell her. Even without details, relief flooded through her. Hannah would get her chance.
Piper had helped Boop choose her robin’s-egg-colored suit with the tulip sleeves she’d last worn for High Holidays three years ago. Natalie and Georgia had had coffee and warm blueberry muffins waiting on the kitchen table when she’d walked downstairs at seven o’clock this morning. Sitting on this stage, reclaiming a piece of herself, was the kind of thing Betty would have done—if she could have.
Natalie stepped to the microphone. Boop closed and opened her eyes, an attempt to remain present. She didn’t want to remember Mrs. Bookbinder tapping on the microphone, but the sound resonated in her ears.
Boop focused on Natalie, and the past faded—dear Natalie, who’d followed her dream to own a nail salon and her heart to raise her daughter in a place they both loved. Boop believed it was a privilege to help her and Piper have a home and fewer worries, like she believed it had been her duty to tell Hannah her story.
“I’d like to introduce Boop Peck,” Natalie said after welcoming everyone to the pageant. “She will be crowning our new Miss South Haven because she was the last Miss South Haven in 1951.”
Applause rumbled through the auditorium as Boop leaned into her cane and rose. Some people slow-clapped, some fast-clapped. Her friends and family stood, followed by everyone in the room.
Boop clasped her hands and bowed her head. Her throat tightened in a way it hadn’t
