In the summer of 1971, when a family wedding brings the two McCormick sisters, Geneva and Lacey, together again, they find themselves really talking to one another for the first time since adolescence. With Lacey in New York and Geneva in Orlando, for years their only encounters have been brief family-filled reunions at the family farm during Lacey’s annual trip South, but when Geneva drives up early to help her mother with the family meal she is planning before the wedding, and Lacey flies down alone from New York, there is no other family around to buffer the sisters as old grievances are hashed over. They have always been opposites—Geneva the prim and proper good girl and Lacey the rebellious, adventurous tomboy. During childhood, it had been Geneva’s job to look after and protect Lacey, but when Lacey tattles on Geneva, spoiling her chance at romance with a suave pharmaceutical salesman at the local drugstore, Geneva holds a grudge that only deepens a few years later when Lacey leaves home for her own adventure and ends up pregnant by a sailor who has skipped out of the picture. Humiliated at the shame Lacey has brought upon the family, Geneva sees no way of ever repairing the rift.
Now in their forties with grown children of their own, it seems as if the two sisters will be forever at odds until Geneva learns about Lacey’s distress over her son Ben’s recent decision to track down the father he has never met. Seeing that her wise counsel and aid can be useful once more, Geneva jumps full-heartedly into the big-sister, take-control, dole-out-advice role, but will her help be appreciated or resented? Can the long contentious history of these sisters be brought to a point of reconciliation?