The tragic loss of his childhood friend puts a boy on the path of religion - but his inner feelings remain as repressed and turbulent as they always were.

While they were originally set on different paths after graduation, a young boy and girl get engaged. They decide to have their teacher as their witness, but once they discover their teacher had killed herself, they break their engagement.

In a small town, Rhea and Rhoda, two vivacious, inseparable twins, are found brutally murdered and raped by a developmentally disabled man.

A young boy vows to do anything he must to stop his father from slaughtering his best friend, their pig.

After his father abandons him and his mother, leaving them with two hunting dogs, a teenage boy tries to save them from ending up in the shelter.

A boy in Pennsylvania watches his dad slowly come to the realization that his pre-fatherhood dream of being in the circus will never happen.

A young girl must choose between the mutilating her pet pony and fitting in with the other girls.

A young boy working in his mother's mannequin shop leaves school early one day and witnesses a strange encounter that stays with him well into adulthood.

In discussing the altercations witnessed over the course of the day, Stephen Elwin and his family grapple with question of whether the downtrodden and those burdened by prejudice are nonetheless responsible for their own breeding and behavior. Elwin’s earnest and idealistic daughter Margaret valiantly defends their maid, who happens to be Black and also named Margaret, until she witnesses 'the other Margaret' breaking a piece of artwork.

As his older sister passes into adolescence, a boy grieves the loss of their blissful childhood friendship. He finds reprisal in her sudden frailty and fits of passion, culminating in a disastrous piano recital.