Southern California in the 1950s. Polly Winter has left the Midwest and her strict Christian Scientist upbringing to raise her daughter Cory differently, with the warmth and tenderness she never received. But by the time Cory is ten, Polly has disappeared from her life, leaving Cory, her brother and her father to navigate their lives alone.

Twenty-five years later, accountant and amateur watercolorist Cory struggles to come to terms with memories of the childhood she has carefully locked away. A slowly developing relationship with a woman she meets in her painting class, Rosemary Reardon, helps Cory rediscover the joy of her past as well as its sorrows. As her memories bring new light to her life, Cory finds both a passage through her losses and a greater understanding of what family is and can be.