Faith, Hope, and Ivy June by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor Page A

June Mosley

CHAPTER FOURTEEN
    It seemed to Ivy June that somebody had gotten the exchange program backward. The first week should have been spring vacation—all the fun stuff—and the second week school. Then she would’ve had a good taste in her mouth for Lexington right off the bat.
    As it was, she and Catherine were going to have to spend every evening doing homework. But right after school on Monday, they had changed out of their uniforms and gone to the clubhouse—sort of a fancy community center, Ivy June decided. This time they shot baskets, and it felt good to Ivy June.
    What felt weird, though, was the way the Academy girls had come up to her that day at school, offering compliments as though they were second helpings.
    “You’ve got beautiful teeth, Ivy June.”
    “I love your handwriting.”
    “Your back’s so straight, like a ballet dancer’s, almost.”
    “They sure must feel I need the praise,” Ivy June had told Catherine at lunchtime.
    “The closer we get to Friday, the more they’ll forget you’re here,” Catherine had assured her. “I’ve got assignments due in every class except music, and I’ll bet if Mr. Kirby could think of one to give us, he would.”
    She was right about that, Ivy June discovered. By Tuesday, the compliments had turned to questions—polite questions, of course: “Are there a lot of kids in your family?” and “How many grades in your school?” But by afternoon some of the girls passed Ivy June in the halls with only a smile, and Ivy June began to relax. She even began to feel less cold in the green and white pleated skirt.
    Mr. Kirby’s music class met twice a week, on Tuesdays and Thursdays. At Tuesday’s session, he was teaching the girls a new song to be sung as a round: Annie, Annie was the miller’s daughter. Far she wandered, by the singing water…. And at the end, the haunting five notes: Bring your white sheep home.
    As the first group finished, then grew silent, Ivy June’s voice stood out clear and sweet along with the second group, who repeated the concluding line: “Bring your white sheep home.” Mr. Kirby smiled at her.
    Because Buckner Academy for Girls had started out as an Episcopal school, tradition had it that each choral session end with a hymn. Every fall, during the first assembly, the school voted on the hymn of the year, Mr. Kirby explained. Last year it had been “Rock of Ages” and this year it was “Amazing Grace.”
    “Each week, I choose one girl to sing the third verse alone while the others hum,” he said. “Would you sing it for us this time, Ivy June?”
    Catherine smiled at her, but Ivy June’s face flushed. Where she had sung out eagerly before, she shrank back now. “I don’t remember all the words,” she said.
    “Here,” Catherine said quickly, handing her a song sheet that the others had memorized.
    Mr. Kirby smiled again and gave the pitch. The sopranos and altos hummed the first note together, then sang the rest of the verse in harmony. By the time they reached the third verse, Ivy June had regained her confidence, and sang with her eyes toward the window and the sky beyond. “Through many dangers, toils, and snares I have already come….”
    After all the girls joined in on the fourth verse and the song ended, Mr. Kirby smiled again and said, “Beautiful. Thank you, Ivy June.”
    “That was terrific!” Catherine told her later when they left the room.
    “It sure was,” Mackenzie agreed. “With you, it’s a real song. With some of the girls, it’s a competition.”
    “Why?” Ivy June asked.
    “At the end of each year, Mr. Kirby picks the best singer to sing it again, and he records it to play for future classes. Up to now, it’s been a toss-up between Jennifer Paine and Megan Murkoff. But that was before you came along.”
    “Well, I’m going to leave as sudden as I came, so no use in their worrying about it,” said Ivy June.

    Mrs. Combs had felt good enough to make part of the dinner