Jackie Waters is seventeen years old, an EMT - in - training (but not for long if she keeps flunking all her high school tests), and is generally convinced that life is and will be pretty damn awful. And she's proven right again and again, too. But when a smart, urbane, extremely beautiful girl from the city comes to visit her small rural town, Jackie is enamored from the very beginning -- although she's less than thrilled that now she has to deal with even more immensely complicated feelings. Can Jackie pull herself together and keep her life moving forward, or will relationship problems, family issues, and unexpected emergencies throw everything off the rails?