“We don’t have to do this right now.”

“It’s a masquerade. We need costumes.” Zora cleared her throat and stood up a little straighter. “Let’s take them all.”

They dug the boxes out of the closet and then carried them into the kitchen, where Willis and Chandra were waiting.

Chandra was blinking very quickly. Willis ran his fingers over Natasha’s faded handwriting but said nothing.

Ash’s throat felt tight as he dug through the old clothes. The last time they’d played dress-up like this had been the morning of the earthquake. The Professor had laughed as they’d all tried on loose-fitting T-shirts and faded denim. Roman had pulled on a pair of bell-bottoms and asked Ash what he thought while, behind him, Zora had snorted into her fist. Natasha had joked that none of their hair was the right length to be in fashion.

“Sideburns!” she’d shouted. “No one will believe you’re children of the sixties without sideburns.”

The memory hurt to think about. Ash grabbed one of the Professor’s old suits without looking too closely at it and stalked from the room to get ready alone.

It wasn’t a bad suit, as far as suits went. It was charcoal-colored wool, and closer-fitting than anything he’d ever worn. It looked like it was from the turn of the century, early 2000s, but he’d never been an expert on fashion, so he couldn’t tell for sure. The tie was black silk, and it stubbornly refused his attempts to twist it into something resembling a knot.

Zora appeared behind him, head cocked to the side. “You look alarmingly like my father.”

“I don’t think I ever saw your dad wear anything except for that tweed jacket with the elbow patches.”

“He used to dress up to take my mother out.” Zora touched the sleeve of Ash’s jacket, her expression wistful. “Long time ago.”

Ash pulled the tie apart, again, starting over. His eyes drifted down. Zora wore a floor-length sequined cocktail gown with a plunging neckline. Strands of pearls dripped from her neck.

He whistled through his teeth.

She was holding a mask attached to a long, thin stick in one hand, and she lifted it, hiding her face behind peacock feathers and rhinestones. “You like?”

“I don’t see how you’re going to fix a motor in that getup.”

“It’s possible that the ladies of the 1920s weren’t terribly interested in fixing motors.”

Dorothy would have been twenty-three in 1920, Ash thought. He gritted his teeth, pulling the tie apart a little too violently.

“Stop, you’re going to strangle yourself.” Zora came up behind him and deftly tied the tie with just a few twists of her hands.

“How’d you learn to do that?” Ash asked.

“Hmm . . . Mom taught me.” Zora dug out a top hat and a pointed black mask from the open box beside Ash’s feet and handed them over. “Here. We wouldn’t want anyone recognizing you.”

Ash pulled the mask over his face, finding himself grateful when the black fabric hid his expression.