In 1848, a woman living alone on the frontier receives an unexpected visitor, a preacher's wife from Kansas stranded on Christmas Eve in the snow. Meanwhile, in the present day, a single mother, Sherri, tries to get her life back on track, scared that her daughter Annette will repeat her mistakes When Sherri goes looking for love and community at a charismatic Pentecostal church, both she and Annette unexpectedly find soulmates: Sherri in the mysterious and charismatic Leon, Annette in the troubled but pious Hannah, who is struggling against her planned engagement to the future youth pastor, Charlie. Grasping toward love, faith, and hope, each of the characters in the play fights against the sense that life is a great and abiding emptiness, while surrounded by strange and magical birds.