What's it About?

Kenzie is a savvy third-year associate at a law firm. Grueling hours and a tough case motivate her to organize a team retreat at a Pacific Northwest lodge. There, she meets Cole, a fishing guide who walked away from his doctorate the day mathematics stopped making sense. They fall in love, opposites in the best possible way: he knows the gorge and how to read water; she makes decisions in the face of uncertainty, something he struggles to do. The women around them are far from supportive: Kenzie's best friend, Rabbit, argues her pet theory that love is a fraud perpetuated by the limbic system and brings nothing but pain, and Cole's oldest friend Sandy, a river guide who wears her identity on a sleeve-length tattoo that signals she still holds feelings for Cole. Still, Kenzie and Cole build a new life and buy and run the lodge where they met. These are joyous days filled with renovations, integrating into the rural community, and reveling in the gorge's natural beauty. Then the recession hits, reservations dry up, and cash gets tight. When the bank freezes their line of credit, they argue; Kenzie insists Cole acknowledge their dream is over, blocking his escape; Cole is engulfed by a sense of entrapment, like his father would do to him prior to a beating; he punches his fist through the wall. Ashamed and contrite, Cole struggles to understand his behavior. Wary and cautious, Kenzie grapples with what happened. Cole names his fear, captured in a proof written in set notation, revealing the absurdity of Kenzie harming him as his father had. With time, patience, and love, Kenzie comes to trust Cole, and they reconcile on the day the lodge is foreclosed.

Kenzie must return to her firm to pay back their debts and quickly gains stature and respect. On the night of a successful pitch, her mentor, Brian, assaults her; there are no witnesses, no bruises, and every email between them is carefully lawyerly. Ruth Cohen, the firm’s only female senior partner and author of the harassment policy, explains that using the firm’s policy will destroy Kenzie’s career while leaving Brian no worse off. She proposes a bargain, one she once crafted for herself. Kenzie accepts the proposal. Cole cannot. Years pass. Both build full lives, without the other. No rescue. No reunion. Two people who love one another and make defensible choices but must say goodbye.