drummed her fingers on the steering wheel as the traffic inched forward. Forget changing her clothes. At this rate, the best she could hope for was getting to the meeting on time. If she didn’t, everyone in town would think she’d lost her courage.
* * *
They arrived at the Broken Chimney three minutes after eight. Tess’s hopes that no one would attend were squashed when she saw that all the parking spaces in front were taken. She pulled up and got out, leaving Savannah to fend for herself.
The place was packed, with the overflow standing wherever there was floor space. She recognized many of the coffee shop regulars, along with the parents of a few of the high school kids. Not unexpectedly, Brad and Kelly had taken over a table toward the middle of the room. Imani’s and Jordan’s families were there. Old Mr. Felder had shown up. So had Artie. Courtney was pouting into her phone’s camera, looking for the best angle, and Phish was behind the counter, dishing up ice cream and pie as fast as he could manage. Tess spotted some of the retirees in the crowd, all of whom should be long past worrying about teenagers getting pregnant. This had turned into a circus, and she was the primary exhibit.
The crowd gradually quieted as they spotted her. Instead of feeling professional and authoritative, she was out of breath, disheveled, and rattled in her oldest jeans and a coffee-stained T-shirt. The brush of makeup she’d applied that morning had worn off, and her hair was a rat’s nest. She looked around for Ian but didn’t see him anywhere. She swallowed her disappointment.
Phish jerked his head toward the scarred wooden barstool he’d retrieved from the backroom. As she edged toward it, she remembered the information sheets still sitting on the kitchen table in the cabin.
Savannah came in through the front door, along with Quincy, the bartender at The Rooster. Tess cleared her throat. No matter how unnerved she was, she had to project confidence. But her voice wouldn’t cooperate. “Th-Thank you all for showing up.”
“Can’t hear you!” somebody shouted.
She spoke louder. “Let me . . . Let me start with a question. Does anybody here . . . Do any of you think it’s a good idea for young teens to be parents?” Fortunately, no one raised a hand. “Great. We’re all in agreement so far.”
“Doubt that’ll last long,” Phish called out from behind the counter.
The general laughter that followed eased a few of the knots in her stomach. She took a deep breath. “Parents have a big role in making these years healthy ones for their kids.”
“Tell your girls to keep their legs crossed,” Mr. Felder called out.
“How about telling the boys to keep their damn pants zipped?” Mrs. Watkins countered.
Tess raised her voice to speak above them. “I hope we all know it’s not so simple.”
Reverend Peoples stepped forward, full of disapproval. She hurried on before he could speak. “Let’s go back to Biology 101.” They mercifully quieted enough for her to offer a brief lecture on the physiology of puberty and development of the teenage brain. “Our brains don’t fully develop until late teens or even early twenties. This means teens have an immature prefrontal cortex—the exact part of the brain that assesses risk.” She slid off the stool. “This is the part of the brain that goes missing in action when a kid decides it’d be super fun to steal a six-pack and go joyriding. It’s also the part of the brain that’s likely to ignore sex education lectures that begin and end with abstinence.”
“Go ahead and tell the kids how to screw around instead!” A fierce-looking woman with a big blond bouffant rose from her chair.
Tess fought against losing her temper. “You can talk to your teens about the emotional consequences of having sex before they’re ready and give them the information they need to stay safe.”
“That’s what I did.” Mrs. Watkins fingered the crucifix at her neck. “Y’all need to listen to her.”
Emboldened by this small show of support, Tess said, “Some of your teens are struggling in ways you may not realize. Gay and transgender kids, for example—”
“We don’t have those kinds here!” a man she didn’t know shouted.
“Shut up, Frank,” Phish called out.
“I don’t know what world you’re living in,” Jordan’s mother said to Tess, “but the last thing my daughter wants to talk to me about is sex.”
“That’s why they need another trustworthy source of information.”
“Now she gets to