Synopsis

One young woman, one old lady. Their lives were poles apart but fate took a hand and threw them together. The only problem being they were more alike than anyone could begin to imagine. Both had battled adversities beyond comprehension. 

When Kylie starts community service at the respite home she is thrown into the path of Nora, an embittered and hardened woman, who has spent her whole life teaching others and avoiding relationships of any kind.

Nora lost her husband and only child in a boating accident many years ago and Kylie is the victim of an alcoholic and drug-addled mother. Nora and Kylie start off their relationship with mutual comic sarcasm and dislike, but as the story unfolds it becomes clear that although in different ways, they are both walking down the same path self-destruction.

This funny and poignant story follows the ups and downs of the two women, as mutual dislike and mistrust turns into an unusual and heart-warming friendship.

The characters talk unreservedly to Gladys, an old lady who has had a stroke and cannot speak. But Gladys can hear and she begins to learn the secrets of patients and staff alike. There’s Connie, the domestic, who has an acute addiction to gossip and is struggling with her bossy and unresponsive husband, and the two nurses who are in complete denial about their feelings for one another and refuse to capitulate to their mutual attraction.

When Gladys finally regains her speech the confidences are all revealed.  

Characters

•   Fern - middle aged, nurse, manager of the nursing home
•   Nora - 75-85, retired teacher, bitter about how life has turned out, recovering from a broken hip
•   Kylie - young woman, hard as nails with a soft centre
•   Connie - middle aged, domestic at a Nursing Home
•   Adam - roughly the same age as Fern, a senior night nurse 
•   Gladys - elderly woman, recovering from a recent stroke