Tenney

The Jamboree

The next week at school, Tenney’s best friend, Jaya, is drawing at her desk in the front row of their sixth-grade homeroom at Magnolia Hills Middle School, wearing bright green pants, a red top, and rainbow barrettes in her hair. She teases Tenney about a video she’d texted the day before, a piglet kissing a puppy, sent to cheer her up before the Tri-Stars rehearsal with Jesse. Tenney only manages an “Okay” and a sigh about how it went before the bell rings for homeroom. Ms. Carter collects permission slips for the sixth-grade field trip to the Ryman Auditorium, promising it will get everyone excited for this year’s Magnolia Hills Jamboree, the school’s annual fall carnival of games, food, and live music that raises money for a local charity.

Ms. Carter then announces that the Jamboree will partner with the Lillian Street Senior Center and take place there instead of at school. She needs two volunteers to join a Jamboree Steering Committee, planning food and stalls and helping involve the seniors. Jaya’s hand shoots up, and Tenney raises hers, too, so Ms. Carter picks them both and tells them to meet at lunch.

Fourteen kids show up for the first meeting. Holliday Hayes, a classmate who has been in Tenney’s class since fifth grade and seems more interested in being right than in being friends, settles in nearby wearing her usual purple plaid headband, giving Tenney an uneasy feeling. Ms. Carter announces this year’s theme, Southern Hospitality, and ideas fly: a sweet tea stall, a cupcake-decorating booth, fresh pralines from a classmate’s mother. Holliday offers to have her dad’s hot chicken cover a booth, and Jaya mentions that Tenney’s mom makes hot chicken, too. Holliday tops that by offering to pay for a cook from Bolton’s, Nashville’s most famous hot chicken restaurant. Ms. Carter protests that’s too expensive, but Holliday insists her dad wants to do it.

A sign-up sheet for performers will go up on Ms. Carter’s door after lunch, and Jaya nudges Tenney to add her name before the slots fill. When a classmate asks whether she could get the singer Belle Starr to perform, Holliday reveals that her dad is a vice president at Silver Sun Records, Belle Starr’s label, and offers to ask. Ms. Carter asks for a volunteer to chair the committee, and both Jaya and Holliday raise their hands. Jaya argues that connecting with the senior center matters and that teamwork works best, while Holliday touts her ideas and promises the biggest cupcake spread the Jamboree has ever seen.

The class votes with heads down and hands raised, and Ms. Carter announces Holliday as the winner. Jaya manages a brave smile despite her disappointment, and she mumbles, as they dump their lunch trash, that she wishes she’d said something about cupcakes, too.

Hoping to cheer her up, Tenney suggests Jaya volunteer to design the Jamboree posters instead, and the idea brightens her friend’s mood.

Jaya then reminds Tenney that her new song has a terrific melody, and if she can nail the lyrics, a solo spot on the sign-up sheet could be amazing. Tenney admits she’s only ever played with the Tri-Stars and worries about performing alone, but Jaya reassures her she’s a great singer with six weeks to practice. The idea sends an excited flutter through Tenney as she imagines performing as a singer-songwriter, but a nervous thought follows. What if nobody likes what she has written? Tenney decides to hold off on signing up until she finishes the song.