Anson and Faye Hempkin are a Christian couple living in Cheyenne, Wyoming. Anson prays every night for his family's safety, his wife to lose weight, and for his roofing business, where he sometimes takes "questionable tax writeoffs." He likes to think of himself as "a semi-outlaw."

One Wednesday night his son, Gary, can't sleep because he's worried about bears breaking into the house. There have been more and more bears coming into town, due to a food shortage, and Anson has put the lid on the trash can but the plum tree in their yard could potentially be a target. Anson reassures his son. Then he tells his wife he's going to his friend Imre's to shoot pool. His wife warns him to be home early; she needs him to get the kids ready for school the next morning since she has work early.

Anson drives past Imre's trailer home, knowing he isn't home. He drives down the road past a few bars, feeling free, looking for one of his friends' cars.

Faye wakes late at night. Anson still isn't home. She calls Imre to ask where he is, and Imre says he got rid of his pool table months ago and doesn't know where he is. She grabs a gun and checks outside, where racoons are on the plum tree. She worries about Anson's absence and the logistics of the next morning.

Faye had been the one who wanted to get married, not Anson, and now she feels she has what she wanted--a house, some kids, a garden.

The Sherriff's office calls and tells Faye Anson is in jail for "soliciting," something to do with a glory hole. Faye, angered, refuses to post his bail. She thinks she and the kids will have to move, maybe to Tuscon.

Anson spends the night in jail, calling a bondsman in the morning. He had gone to The Golden Triangle, a strip bar, and unwisely spent money on drinks, then driven aimlessly and pulled in at a porn shop, where he impulsively agreed to pay a girl in a booth in the back for a blowjob out of his emergency $50 he kept in his wallet. It was then that he had been arrested.

The kids wake and are asking about their father. Then, Faye and the kids see a bear cub on the grass. It eats from the plum tree. A mother bear follows it, breaking through their fence. Then, the mother bear starts to dig up Faye's garden. Faye, already outraged by Anson's actions, feels protective of her garden and runs into the yard waving the pistol and screaming. She shoots the bear.

The next day, the bondsman takes Anson back to his car then he goes straight to a roofing job. One of his employees is late and one doesn't show. The one who comes tells him about bears in the neighborhood last night, crashing into a house. When Anson gets home, a repairman is fixing the fence. Faye shouts at him to go away from inside the house. They argue; she comes into the yard with the gun in her hand. She picks up a branch from the plumb tree. They stand like "intimate strangers."