Val and Marian, two teenage school girls growing up in New York City, are misfits. Val, virtually ignored by her wealthy parents, lives at a boarding house where she is watched over by an arty but childless couple. Marian lives with her divorced mother and her mother's friend and rarely sees her father. Marian spends her afternoons eating sundaes at a local drugstore; Val disappears mysteriously each afternoon before school is let out. They don't seem to have much in common with the other girls at their school nor even with each other. Yet together they find friendship and adventure in this poignant and witty novel, as they follow the life of one mediocre pianist, and learn what it means to grow up.