Delores "Lawrence" Franklin is a failed capitalist and a runaway headcase. Following a corporate meltdown, she decides to start fresh in Mistaken Point, a small town known for two things — Mistaken Point University, where she and her best friend, Anastasia Lanes, are now enrolled, and the grisly murders of countless young women.

At her new part-time arcade job, Lawrence meets Francesca "Franky" Delores — gritty, off-putting, and chronically serious, as opposite to Lawrence as her name would suggest. Soon, Lawrence discovers Franky is convinced there is a monster on the loose, a patchwork creature born of hatred and responsible for the supposedly solved string of violence haunting the town.

Against the advice of Franky's closest friend, Pippa, Lawrence, and Stasia join Franky in a sticky, summertime search for a yellow-eyed monster between classes, shifts at the arcade, and eating popsicles by the pool. Motivated mostly by her unquenchable attraction to Franky, Lawrence allows herself to be pulled in strange directions, trying to appease Franky's mania. Through the trials of hunting a monster only some of them believe in, Pippa, Lawrence, Stasia, and Franky discover truths about womanhood, relationships, and the reliability of urban legends.