When her mother was young, she got very close to the Grieves family in Ottowa. Though dead of cancer now, her mother told her all the gossip of those eventful times. Ellie and Flora Grieves are inseparable sisters and it is well-known to everyone in the town that they come in a pair. So, when a man named Robert moves into town, doing some work for their family, it is clear that any relationship would include both of them, since they were joined at the arm. Eventually, he becomes enamored with Flora, asking her to marry him. Because of the dire state of Flora's father's health, they agree to put the wedding off for a year. After their father's passing, the girls split their family home up equally, deciding each would fix up their respective side. With the wedding fast approaching, Flora, Ellie, and Robert all get much closer; Ellie and Robert grow a particularly special bond, with her teasing him in small, loving ways. Then, when Ellie develops cancer, Flora begins looking after her—and through a series of events that the mother's gossip leaves unclear—it became who Ellie would marry Robert. So, as newlyweds, they begin trying to make a family to raise in their home. After several miscarriages and stillborns, Ellie is heartbroken to realize that the child will never come. Though they hire a nurse named Audrey to care for Ellie, she dies shortly after. Shamelessly, Robert begins a relationship with Audrey and within no time, the two are married and moving into the half of the house that Robert inherited after Ellie's death. Audrey is constantly crude towards Flora, insisting that maybe in her old age she'll still be able to find happiness. Eventually, the couple squeezes the other half of the house out of Flora's hands, agreeing to care for her now that she is elderly. The daughter one day opens a letter from Flora addressed to her old friend—the daughter's mother—not knowing that she died some time ago. Reflecting on the gossip of the Grieves family, the daughter mourns both her mother and Flora, imagining the lives they could've lived if circumstances hadn't been so cruel to them.