By now, many of the houses had turned on their lights, and Adam could see the activities going on behind the windows. In one house, a woman spoke on the telephone while a teenage boy and toddler sat in front of a thick TV, their eyes glued to a black-and-white cartoon show. In the adjacent house, an elderly woman chopped vegetables in the kitchen. One street over, two boys were playing basketball in their driveway. Somewhere, a dog barked.
None of these houses attracted Adam. No, what specifically caught his attention was the fifth house on Oak Street. Soft, eerie music floated through an open window on the first floor of the square, redbrick house. It was the kind of melody that made Adam think of graveyards and starless nights.
The music drew Adam closer to the window. Inside, he saw a boy in an aviator helmet fiddling with a wooden music box on his bed, looking frustrated. When the last note faded, the boy in the room looked up. Straight at Adam.
“Who are you?”
Adam stumbled backward.
The boy came to the window. He looked to be about Adam’s age, athletic with skeptical blue eyes. “Who are you?” the boy repeated. “Why are you spying on me?”
“I-I wasn’t,” Adam stammered. But he was caught red-handed. He confessed, “I was just listening to your music box.”
He quickly turned to leave, but the boy in the aviator helmet shouted, “Wait!”
The boy opened the window wider and motioned for Adam to return. “Don’t go yet,” he said with a glance down the street. “Stay for a while, I won’t bite. Are you new in town? My name’s Jack, by the way.” The boy offered a smile.
Adam could tell Jack was one of those popular boys in school, the kind who had no trouble making friends.
“I’m Adam,” he said hesitantly. “I’m from New York City.”
“Really? My dad and I go there sometimes on the train, so we can see movies. The theaters there are fantastic. Did your family just move out here?”
“No. I’m only visiting.”
“Who are you visiting? I know pretty much everyone in town.”
Adam hid the snow globe behind his back, along with the bag of pastries. Francine had to be around somewhere. “Just—a friend. I should go.”
“Come on, what are you in a hurry for?” said Jack. “You were practically spying on me a minute ago. It’s not my aviator helmet that’s scaring you, is it?”
Nobody had ever warmed up to Adam so quickly, much less joked with him. He flushed and didn’t know how to respond. He changed the subject. “Can I see your music box?”
Jack pressed his lips into a tight line. “I don’t know.…”
But the boy must’ve thought Adam would leave otherwise, because he went to retrieve it. He returned, holding the music box stiffly, with his arms outstretched, like the box was a bomb that might go off any second. “There, see it?”
It was a nice music box—handsome chestnut wood with a golden crest. Strangely, it didn’t seem to have a windup key anywhere. Adam reached across the windowsill for the device to take a closer look, but Jack jerked it away.
“Where’d you get it?” asked Adam, thinking again of the haunting music it made.
“My dad gave it to me a few months ago for my eleventh birthday. It used to belong to his dad. My grandpa.”
“Oh,” said Adam. That must be why Jack was being so careful with it. “Its music is…interesting.”
“Yeah,” Jack said shortly. He carefully placed the music box on his desk. Next to the box lay a half-finished model airplane and an empty pewter candlestick.
The rest of Jack’s room was simple but neat. Along the wall near the window stood a bookshelf filled with rows of aviation magazines and completed model airplanes. The same magazines were piled on the dresser and on the nightstand in the corner. Above the nightstand was a calendar, open to August 1967.
Adam had traveled thirty-two years into the past.
Jack saw Adam eyeing the airplanes. “My dad got those for me,” Jack said. “The Boeing 707 is my favorite. Only took us two hours to put together.” He let slip a proud smile. “I want to be a pilot one day. What about you? Do you like airplanes?”
“No,” Adam answered immediately, a bit too loudly.
Jack’s smile flickered. “Not everyone has to like the same things,” he said, sounding slightly hurt.
“I know, I…” Embarrassed, Adam’s voice trailed off. There was a moment of silence, before it was broken by Jack again.
“I have a question,” Jack said, studying Adam for a moment. “Are you from Asia?”
Adam was used to questions about his appearance. “I was born here,” he answered. “My mom was originally from China and my dad was American, though his ancestors came from Germany. My parents met doing charity work in Europe. Opposite sides of the world—I contain half the world in me,” he added jokingly, hoping to impress Jack.
Jack gawked at Adam. “That’s neat. You know the Supreme Court’s only just overturned that marriage law, don’t you?”
“What marriage law?”
“The law that bans people with different skin colors from marrying each other.”
Adam bit his lip. It was definitely a weird thought that if his parents had lived thirty years earlier, they might not have been allowed to marry.
“I think the rule was silly,” Jack went on. “It’s like saying people with yellow hair can only marry other blonds. Or people with freckles can only marry other freckled folks. That’s what it boils down to, really.”
“Yes,” Adam agreed. “So…where are your parents?”
“I live with my dad. He’s at
