Rebecca's mother Harriet has been sick for fifteen years, starting with stage four colon cancer and persisting in recurrent UTIs, fevers and cases of pneumonia. Rebecca comes down from Boston to Harriet's nursing home in Connecticut as often as she can to keep her mother company. During the cancer scare, when it seemed like death was around the corner, she came in every day. She read to Harriet, the two of them cracked each other up, and they realized just as their time was dwindling how much they enjoyed being together.

Rebecca's lover Peter, and kind and gentle professor, advises her to take time for herself, but instead she crams in as much time with her mother as possible. As a result, when Harriet beats the cancer and progresses to a constant state of illnesses and surgeries, Rebecca starts feeling burnt out and guilty for not wanting to spend as much time with Harriet. Harriet feels the times she does visit, in emergencies, don't count.

Rebecca and Peter keep their expectations for one another and their relationship low, which initially works for both of them. But the cordiality and lack of commitment eventually wears on Rebecca, and she falls into a passionate, all-consuming affair with a wealthy man who'd been visiting her bookstore for ages. Her drunken love lasts a little over a year, and then her lover tires of the sadness she brings home whenever Harriet gets sick. Left cold and alone, Rebecca is finally faced with Harriet's death. Guilt swells in her for her absence in the final moments, but she resists blaming herself, she knows how much she did.