While in New York City, right after graduating college, the woman throws out her back as she tries to lift up a mini-fridge. She then calls her brother, who keeps her company as she remains bed-ridden. She gets frustrated by her body failing her, especially as she has an interview with a newsweekly in a few days. By then, however, enough pain goes away for her to take her interview.

For a few years from then on, she hardly sees her brother, mostly during holidays. Her brother works in tech in the Bay, while she works at the newsweekly and later moves on to a website covering politics. Her back gets better. She meets her girlfriend. Even though she doesn’t spend much time with her brother, she still remains close to him. After her work at the website wraps up, she flies to visit him. Now, he seems distracted and unfocused, and his apartment is a mess, even for a nerd. He briefly mentions his girlfriend, a woman he has never met in real life.

The woman then breaks a huge story about a politician. She starts to think about technology more, the impact it has on everyday life. Eventually, she is hired as a feature writer by a nationally renowned magazine. She has philosophical debates with her brother about internet life and why people seek community digitally rather than in person. Her brother thinks it’s great that people can escape and find home online. She, on the other hand, thinks that’s only necessary if the real world itself is failing people. He thinks that everyone, no matter what, needs some kind of escape.

At the nationally renowned magazine, the woman is put on environmental coverage. Around the same time, she breaks up with her girlfriend after six years. She falls into a depression and also has back problems again. She talks less to her brother. One day, however, her brother publishes an article about pain, largely thanks to her help. Her back then gets better, and she becomes a feature writer on women. Both she and her brother dive into their life’s work, and she feels better about everything. She even gets back with her girlfriend and gets engaged to her in a year.

Over time, the woman grows distant from her brother due to their diverging lives. He can’t go to her wedding because he has a conference to lead. He secures 10 billion dollars for a project to use VR as a PTSD treatment. The woman, however, starts to have trouble in her married life, after which they agree to briefly separate and, after failure to reconcile, divorce.

One day, both the woman and her brother go back to Nevada to visit their parents for the holidays. There, they talk about their work lives and what they’re doing. After their parents go to bed, she and her brother stay up talking, mostly her talking about her recent difficulties. He then shares that his company has been in trouble too. They leave days later.

From then on, the woman doesn’t hear much from her brother. Her back worsens again, and she can no longer reach her ex-wife. She spends days in bed when her back troubles her. She decides to take a trip out to Guatemala for an assignment and falls into bed when she arrives. She can’t fall asleep, and she’s worried about being in a foreign country. She calls her brother, leaves him a voicemail, and gets a call from him later. They talk on the phone, and she says that she’s in trouble. With him listening, she already feels calmer.