Amy, a young woman, feels pressure when her older brother calls in August, wanting to see her for Christmas. She tells her flat-mate Tish, who decides the two of them should do Christmas together in their apartment. Her brother calls again in October with news that their grandmother has died. The grandmother cared more about the wake than the funeral, so Amy heads to the designated pub.
At the pub, she speaks to one of her grandmother's friends, Mr. Nash, as well as his wife, who Amy reveals is actually dead and is a ghost. After the funeral, Amy tells Tish that she can speak to ghosts, and she promises Tish that there are no ghosts in their apartment. In November, Amy's brother calls again, and she cries afterwards. Tish asks why it gets to Amy so much, and Amy says that it is a long story, which she starts to explain.
Amy explains that her sister, Alice-Jane, died when she was five, and that it was murder. She told the shrink that it was her parents who did it, and then she went to live with her grandmother who recently died. Tish comforts Amy, and they go to bed. The girls spend Christmas with each other, watching movies and drinking. Then Amy tells Tish to go into her room because she needs to have a conversation; Alice-Jane is there. Tish runs into her room.
The next day, Tish is crying and scared. She wants Amy to finish her story. Amy tells her that her parents did not kill her sister, but they went to jail for it and committed suicide there. Tish asks Amy if she killed her sister, and she says no. When Tish asks who did kill her, Amy gets confused and cannot speak; she passes out and Tish calls an ambulance. 
Tish comes to visit Amy in the hospital and brings a teddy bear. Tish reveals that she spoke to Amy's parents, who are alive, as well as her sister Alice-Jane, who is also alive and is very rude. Amy says that Alice-Jane was nicer when she was five, which is why she is always five to her, and that she gets mixed up. Tish tells her that her brother called and she told him what happened to Amy, and he said to tell Amy the fishing was great. 
When Tish leaves, Amy talks to the teddy bear and reveals that her brother was pushed into the river when fishing when he was nine, and it was Alice-Jane who pushed him. Amy saw and never told anyone, and because of what Alice-Jane did she died in Amy's mind, as well as her parents because she could not tell them. Amy tells the bear that the only one who is really a ghost is her brother, which is fine except he calls sometimes. Amy tells the bear that Tish cannot know she has spoken to a dead person because she would leave. Amy jumps every time the phone rings at the hospital, and her brother calls saying Amy should come for Christmas, and it sounds cold and far-away where he lives. Amy tells the bear she will try not to go, but the river is rising and Christmas is coming and she should.