Excerpt from The Guineveres by Sarah Domet, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

We eased up as we rolled farther away from the convent and toward the churchyard. Sister Fran surrendered the handle to Sister Monica, and we were gliding along the smooth pavement, which bumped every once in a while when we hit a crack or a rock. The hypnotic sound of the wheels on concrete nearly lulled us to sleep.

Soon the sounds from the crowd quieted, and we could feel the coolness of the shadows in the courtyard. Some Sisters giggled in hushed tones; wheels scraped and grated. We knew we'd almost made it, and tension rose up from our bodies like souls from the departed.

"Right over there," we heard Father James say. He'd changed out of his indecent swim trunks and wore his usual black outfit, slacks and a shirt. The Hand of Benediction turned one hundred and eighty degrees before coming to a quick stop. And just like that, we arrived.

We began to feel edgy with excitement, but we knew we couldn't risk moving. We'd wait until we heard no more voices, until long after we heard no more voices. We weren't allowed watches—we lived on God's Time at the convent—so we'd decided to say the rosary three times in our heads, since praying it three times, from start to finish, all fifty-nine beads, lasted about an hour.

We waited. We recited the Our Father. We'd learned patience while sitting through long sermons or tedious lectures given to us by Sister Fran during Morning Instruction. We waited. We recited the Hail Mary. We'd learned to be still while kneeling in rows during prayer time, our knees growing numb from the wood. We waited. We recited the Glory Be. We'd learned to be silent while single-filing through the convent, treading as gently as possible through the stone foyers that felt chilly even in the summer.

We heard some murmuring and muttering, idle chatter among the Sisters. We heard Sister Lucrecia's laugh, five high notes descending the scales. Sister Fran asked Sister Tabitha for the bullhorn back; Sister Tabitha hesitated to relinquish it. She sang into it—"La, la, laaaaaaaa!"—until she lost her breath and gasped for air. This aural display was followed by subdued snickers, a sound that unsettled us, for we'd never known the Sisters to be jovial. The Guineveres wondered what else we didn't know about them.

The band's happy cadence faded. We heard a running faucet in the distance. We heard some birds chirping somewhere beyond. Then we felt the lightest sprinkling of water—was it raining? It hadn't looked threatening. We hadn't noticed any clouds. The cool droplets would have been a welcome respite from the heat, if not for our next realization: Tissue paper dissolves in water.

It was like coming to from a dream, or maybe like Jonah when he first emerged from the belly of the whale. We were disoriented; we couldn't see clearly at first. The spray of water revealed the blue sky above us, bit by bit. Then the water came on heavier, the full force of it stinging our skin till we were crying out in pain. "Stop!" we screamed in unison, breaking our vow of silence. We couldn't open our eyes, only stand and wait for it to end.

And when it did, we opened our eyes slowly, one at a time. There stood Sister Fran, holding a hose like the staff of Joseph. "Where are the others?" she asked, then hunched down to peer inside the base of the float. She stood again, slowly, brushing her skirt with one hand to smooth out wrinkles. She was quiet for a moment, and the quiet was excruciating, so we just stood there, blinking slowly and waiting for the end.

"Get. Out," she said in two sentences.

Win looked like a wet, rabid rodent. Her hair clung to her forehead and cheeks, and her dark eyes were glossy, stunned. Beneath me I could hear Gwen and Ginny untangling their bodies from their hiding spots.

Sister Fran squeezed the nozzle again, and water pelted our skin. Then she dropped the hose, and it became a serpent in the grass. Water dripped down our faces. Or were they tears? I can't remember. The Guineveres stood paralyzed with fear, with disappointment.

Excerpted from The Guineveres by Sarah Domet. Copyright © 2016 by Sarah Domet. Excerpted by permission of Flatiron Books. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.