Billy Ridley's story provides some insight into what it was like to come of age during the war years - when Roosevelt was in the White House, when brothers were off fighting in Europe and on the islands of the Pacific. Among the branches of an old maple tree, a young boy finds comfort in the sounds and voices unheard in the world below. A framed cross-stitch on the wall of Grandpa's upstairs room warns: "Beware the Werewolf and the Heart's Desire," a theme played out with varying degrees of failure by the contentious members of three generations of a dysfunctional family. We meet those who nurture Billy's growing: a kindly aunt who harbors a secret buried in her past; a young man who says he was adopted -- a present from Santa Claus -- who provides a friendship and a trust Billy does not find elsewhere. Charlie, a neighbor, a year older, advances Billy's awareness of his sexuality, and Rose, a fellow thespian, confronts him with his first true test of manhood. A coming of age that climaxes amid the headlines of World War II.