A lonely waitress with a tragic past, Agnes rooms in a run-down motel, living in fear of her abusive, recently paroled ex-husband. But when Agnes begins a tentative romance with Peter, an eccentric, nervous drifter, she starts to feel hopeful again - until the first bugs arrive...
Chris Anderson and his wife Pam live a fairly normal life until Chris loses his job on the police force and secretly turns to robbing banks to make his wife's dreams come true. Upon discovering his secret, she joins his deadly crime wave and together they terrorize an unsuspecting suburban town.
A female attorney learns that her husband is really a marine officer awol for fifteen years and accused of murdering fifteen civilians in El Salvador. Believing her husband when he tells her that he's being framed as part of a U.S. Military cover-up, the attorney defends him in a military court.
On the outside, Helen has it all – a loving family and a successful career – but when her suppressed mental illness resurfaces, the world crumbles around her. Crippled by depression, Helen finds solace through her friendship with Mathilda, a kindred spirit struggling with bipolar disorder.
After his father takes his two brothers and high tails it, Peel is forced to grow up in a state of arrested development. Once his mother dies, he must forge his own path and attempts to find his lost brethren.
An art instructor and an English teacher form a rivalry that ends up with a competition at their school in which students decide whether words or pictures are more important.
The police have three bookies under surveillance, but they escape and set up shop elsewhere. By chance, one of the police finds them; instead of turning them in, he demands money that his brother, now a suicide, had lost to them
In California, a group of women struggle with personal problems as their paths intertwine in unexpected ways. Dr. Elaine Keener, the sole caretaker for her aging mother, turns to tarot card reader Christine for spiritual aid. Christine grapples with her own angst due to her lover's debilitating illness. Meanwhile, a bank manager deals with an unwanted pregnancy, two sisters pursue romantic interests and a housewife gets back into the dating game.
With varying degrees of success, recently divorced friends Dave, Vic and Donny are trying to move on with their lives. Vic feels vilified by his ex-wife's parents, while Donny has a shaky bond with his teen daughter, Emma. Dave, meanwhile, has an enviable problem -- he has more dates than he can handle. As they confront their post-marital challenges, the men take solace in one another's plights.
Sick of her life, housewife Nancy just wants it to be over and done with, but rather than kill herself, she hires a stranger from the Internet to do the job for her. But fate takes a strange turn when she meets her killer and the two fall in love. Of course, Nancy realizes that love and murder do not naturally go hand in hand.
Cassett's Parisian solitude is disrupted by the unexpected arrival of her brother's three kids, but she soon finds herself inspired and uses the children as models. Meanwhile, Cassatt's teenage niece plays cupid between Cassatt and the great painter Degas. Romance does not blossom but Degas invites Cassatt to join the Impressionists.