Since his mother’s death two years earlier, 17-year-old Cash Pruitt lives with his grandparents in the small east Tennessee town of Sawyer. His Papaw, once a vigorous man who showed Cash the wonders of the woods along the Pigeon River, now fights for every breath because of his emphysema. As the novel vividly states, “His breathing has the keening note of the wind blowing over something sharp” (3).

Cash’s best friend is Delaney Dell, a specialist in arcane bits of trivia whose fascination with the world makes her something of a prodigy in science. She works at the Dairy Queen while Cash cuts lawns. Cash is drawn to Delaney the way “people just want to stand near a comforting fire” (21). He cannot imagine a day without Delaney but hesitates to call their relationship anything other than friendship.

Both friends’ mothers frequently experience with drug addiction, and Cash recalls meeting Delaney almost three years earlier when they both attended meetings organized by Narateen, a support group designed for adolescents whose families have experiences with drug addiction. Cash’s mother has since died from an overdose on a mix of heroin, fentanyl, and Valium.