The story opens with David, a high school senior, standing at his bedroom window, looking out at the sunrise over Fort Sumter. Since his father died a year ago, David has pushed back from life and, to make matters worse, is scheduled to pitch today in a baseball game at his school, in which his bigoted coach has asked him to throw at another player, an African American young man who is new to the school. Things are not as they should be.

That day, David's mother discusses David's emotional alienation with his history teacher (an African American woman with special abilities and a magical cat, Halloween) and wishes that he would go back to being the loving, giving boy he once was. She makes that wish come true using a wooden button ring (a wishing ring) and Halloween. That afternoon during the ball game, David gets knocked out. He wakes up in the powder magazine at Fort Sumter and learns the year is now 1861. He's been wished back in time. Thus begins his two week (a fort night) odyssey where he meets Abner Doubleday, pitches a winning baseball game, and enlists the help of a young black man (the new black ballplayer whom he threw at) to help him find the person whom he has been told can help him get home, a scary local conjuring woman, Mother Mary (David's history teacher). While in Charlestown David adds a young woman (his estranged girlfriend from home) to his band of recruits, which now includes a savvy slave named Jefferson (the young black man's grandfather). In the process, he falls back in love with his girlfriend and Jefferson and the two young men locate Mother Mary who tells David what he needs to know to get home - to be in the powder room right at sunset, two weeks to the day from when he arrived. Meanwhile, the civil war begins. David is captured by a slave trader (his baseball coach) but, with the help of his young black friend, escapes in time to return to Fort Sumter. With the battle still raging, the young black man saves David's life and David gives his ring (his ticket home) to his new black friend, so that he, his girlfriend, and Jefferson can fulfill their own wish - to make it to freedom. Resigned to his fate, David returns to the powder magazine, where he's attacked by the resilient slave trader (thought to be dead) but is saved at the last second by an appearance by Mother Mary.

And boom - David finds himself back on the pitcher's mound and decides to finish the game, by allowing a third time senior tryout (his history class friend) to hit the game winning home run. After the game, he asks his history teacher (Mother Mary) how he was able to get back, since he had lost the ring. She explains he hadn't lost it but rather had given it away -and thereby he had fulfilled his mother's wish - to once again be the loving, giving boy he once was. David reconciles with his family and walks toward home plate where his old girlfriend waits for him. As the field lights go out, they kiss the kiss that has taken them two lifetimes to accomplish. The four seniors, David, his girlfriend, the black ballplayer, and his girlfriend drive home together with the boys in back arguing with the girls in front. Things are as they should be.