During a violent snowstorm in Iowa, a train carrying a traveling salesman, a railroad worker, and a family of five takes a desperate detour to Carthage. When the passengers arrive, the station is a mess and the agent is dead, but they must work together to welcome a new life amidst the deathly circumstances.

Even as he roams as a ghost, a former slave owner rejects the reality of his afterlife, but cannot hide his immense gratitude for his fiercely loyal servant, Sam, who is also undead.

A young boy stays with his mother and their slaves at a farm in the Deep South, while his father and brother fight as Confederate soldiers. When Union soliders show up for a meal, the boy confronts the humanity of the enemy.

A middle-aged, single, hairdresser spends the day spreading gossip from client to client. She ends her busy day with an ultimate act of meddling.

A child with an intellectual disability is endlessly abused by his stepmother, but takes refuge in his grandmother’s kindness. However, when his grandmother dies mysteriously in a fire, he finds a different way to cope.

In an unlikely encounter, a homeless teenage boy recounts harsh events of his life to a writer. He nonchalantly tells of an employer whose assignments caused him to have permanent physical and mental damage.

A sailor on the Atlantic Ocean attempts to cure his loneliness at sea by writing about his travels. When he tries to befriend his fellow crewmates, only one man reciprocates — but even their friendship is tenuous.

When a night load dispatcher's son commits murder, he must choose whether or not to save his boy from the electric chair - at a terrible cost.

As a bus travels from Ohio to New York, a man entertains himself by conversing with the passengers he calls "hillbillies" riding along.

A preacher is welcomed into a farming couple's cabin and performs an exorcism on their son.