By a chance accident, Tom, a survivor of the late 80-s rock scene now firmly settled in the suburbia with his wife and daughter, meets 16-years old Josh, a popular school jock for the world and a soul in disarray in private. Cool and uncaring, Tom with his seemingly relaxed family is an affront to Josh's strict and stoic family: his father, a former military officer with a structured view of the world, his mother, a survivor of abuse who carries this abuse through her life like a banner, and his younger, smarter, manipulative sister. Tom appears to be the proverbial calm in the middle of the storm that seems to overwhelm Josh's life. Even though, his storm might be happening only in a teapot. Tom also becomes fond of the only person willing to hang around his sometimes quite unpleasant self. This relationship sends the man on the memory trip, as he sporadically recalls events and people of his distant and not so distant past, sharing those stories with the boy. He gives Josh, as well as the readers, a broader view of the not so brave new world, the North America of omnipresent software developers and corporate managers, lusty Russian immigrants and Iranian drunkards, pretentious rock star wanna-be's and confused white supremacists, sexual freedom and sexual frustration, the world where everything changes like the seasons, inevitably and unsympathetically. This new reality is not what it is supposed to be, this new friendship is wrong on so many levels, and the story culminates in a series of tense standoffs with unexpected consequences.