High school senior and pest control technician Hallie Mayhew is desperate to trade her home in Santa Barbara for any east coast college that will take her away from her divorced, bickering parents and her dad's extermination business, but she fears that a rigged scholarship competition, wily thieves, and the handsome boy next door will contrive to keep her in California.

Evie's family runs a Jewish funeral home and she enjoys helping out. She doesn't normally interact with the grieving family, but one day she befriends Oren, a boy overwhelmed by grief after an awful accident. Oren hasn't spoken a word since, but Evie is set on helping him deal with his loss and discover his voice again.