As children, Tam and her older brother were swimming when she suffered her first epileptic seizure. He pulled her from the water and was crowned a hero. Tam was labelled disabled' and never swam again. Thus begins 30 years of vigilance, never allowing her body to betray her, never allowing her family to influence her path. Now, in middle age, a lifetime's worth of control has taken its toll. Exhausted, she heads to Maine where she falls under the spell of two dead women. Through their cloistered, tragic lives Tam relives her own life over and over.'