Horne and Elphinstone are two middle aged and unmarried women living together in a New York City apartment. One day, Horne bursts into Elphinstone’s room rousing her from her already chronic insomnia screaming "Happy August the tenth." Elphinstone glibly asks Horne why she woke her up, and Horne reminds her that she asked Horne to wake her up for an early appointment with her psychotherapist. While watching the news about the polio epidemic, Horne asks a curt Elphinstone if she’d be getting her vaccination, to which Elphinstone responds no. Their conversation digresses into a quarrel over Elphinstone’s mother and unremarkable, elitist friends, Horne’s lallocropia and rowdy friend group of “Village hippies.” Elphinstone pointedly remarks that her therapist encouraged her to distance herself from Horne and Horne’s dysfunction. An injured Horne responds that her and Elphinstone’s living situation is untenable, and packs some bags for a weekend at a hotel after work. Elphinstone later calls Horne at work and the two cry on the phone, Elphinstone agreeing to the polio vaccine.  Later in the afternoon, Elphinstone visits her psychotherapist where she recounts the morning’s fight with Horne, to which he responds that Elphinstone should abandon a thing that “is washed up.” After her session, she returns to the apartment and finishes packing Hornes bags. She similarly packs herself a bag and takes a train to her mother’s summer house in Shadow Glade. Elphinstone arrives at her mother’s summer home as just she, her mother, is suffering from a rough bout of cardiac asthma and cyanosis. After her mother is stabilized, Eliphinstone and her mother talk shortly. Later, and after reflecting on her mother’s care taker, how she’d likely be dead before her mother, Elphistone returns to New York City by taxi, expecting Horne to react poorly to her absence. Back at her apartment, Elphinstone arrives to Horne sleeping on the couch, softly cooing and snoring. Elphinstone sits underneath Horne, resting her head on Horne’s lap, looking out as the sunlight creeps over and through the city. She wakes Horne up the next morning with “Happy August the eleventh.”