It might also have been the unspoken feeling that a magic powerful enough to break the strings of time was best kept secret. Time traveling was no ordinary thing. Adam was smart enough to know that if too many people found out about the snow globe, total chaos would ensue.
Then there was a third, deeper reason, which he didn’t want to admit to himself. It was the idea that if the snow globe could really get him to travel back in time regularly, maybe he could somehow travel back to before his parents died and warn them not to get on the plane that fateful day. He didn’t dare to bring his hopes up. But hope is a funny thing, springing forth despite our best efforts to squelch it, like a bag of popcorn kernels bursting in the microwave.
Meanwhile, Halloween was fast approaching. This year, the ingenious holiday where kids dress up as monsters and ghosts in exchange for free candy fell on a weekend, which meant extra time for everyone to ramp up the festivities. Haunted house tours, discounted costumes, and candy sales exploded up and down the streets. The Biscuit Basket also prepared for the event by advertising special jack-o’-lantern cakes and bat-shaped chocolate cookies.
The bakery attracted more customers than usual, due to the bright array of candles displayed there each night. Adam’s uncle had helped him set up the candles from Francine, which Adam simply said he’d found in the attic. Every evening, the bakery was aglow with a dozen flickering orange lights and the soothing scent of flowers—“like lavender and something tangy,” Uncle Henry had said after sniffing with his powerful baker’s nose. Multiple people stopped by to gawk at the display.
“These candles were a brilliant idea, just brilliant,” Uncle Henry told Adam after they sold another box of bat-shaped cookies. “Candlelight really gives the place a special feeling, doesn’t it?”
Adam agreed. How strange it was that candles were one of the only things appropriate for display at both happy events and sad events—ideal whether it was a birthday, a holiday, or a funeral.
As he helped serve the stream of new customers over the next few days, he began to notice a repeated face in the crowd. There was a tall, thin man in a black suit situated outside the bakery each day. The man had dark hair that matched his suit, and a distinct, pointy chin, above which sat a permanent scowl. He stood just outside the window, peering inside, always in the same spot, and was gone after a few moments.
On one of the evenings, after Adam delivered leftovers to the Hole, he glimpsed the same man skulking in the shadows of the alley, watching him. When the man saw Adam staring back, he vanished into the alley.
On Friday, Adam told his uncle about his suspicions.
“A stranger who follows you?” repeated Uncle Henry.
Adam nodded. “He hangs outside the bakery. Mostly in the evenings.” He thought he might’ve seen the stranger once before heading to school in the morning, too, but he couldn’t be sure.
His uncle stopped mixing a bowl of cream to give him a look of concern. “Has this man ever spoken to you?”
“No.”
“Hm, I’ll keep an eye out. Meanwhile, be sure to stay in plain sight of other people.” Uncle Henry went back to mixing the cream and said, mostly to himself, “Probably just a competitor trying to case out the place, now that we’re doing well. We’ll show them!”
On Saturday evening, the day before Halloween, something strange happened. It didn’t have to do with the stranger in the black suit, nor did it have to do with the teenagers dressed up as mummies who littered the sidewalks with toilet paper, infuriating every neighbor on the block.
But it did have to do with—yes, you guessed it—the snow globe.
When Adam went to bed, his eyes widened. His heart nearly jumped out of his chest.
The snow globe on the dresser had changed. Inside the glass was a miniature town on a hilly, grassy countryside.
Adam examined the tiny piece of scenery for several long moments. Then he went downstairs—“I forgot something,” he responded to Uncle Henry’s questioning gaze in the living room. Downstairs in the bakery, Adam snatched four leftover pastries (he had a feeling Francine might like the ones filled with cheese) and hurried back upstairs. In his room, he threw on his winter jacket and scarf just in case. Then he put the pastries in a paper bag and picked up the snow globe with his free hand.
He gave it a shake.
As expected, he found himself on a grassy hill, the same hill that was inside the snow globe. The sky was a deep lavender, and the air felt like late summer. It was much too warm for winter clothing. Adam unzipped his jacket and folded his scarf under his arm.
The hill overlooked several more hilltops. A small town was sprawled across the last of them, its houses like miniature red-and-white toy blocks glued together. Behind them loomed an ominous gray building, its smokestacks spewing matching gray clouds into the sky.
The only logical thing to do was to walk toward the town, and that’s what Adam did.
As the sky darkened, the streetlights in town flickered on one by one. When Adam reached the outskirts, he realized these were no ordinary streetlights. They were shaped in the style of old-fashioned lanterns. A wrought-iron lamp dangled from a spiraling pole at the top of each post, and they used candles instead of lightbulbs. He inspected the closest streetlamp, where yellow flames flickered above a chunky candle sitting within the glass cage.
For a moment, Adam wondered if he had traveled way back in time, to an era without electricity. But as he made his
