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Plot Summary
Imogen Scott is an eighteen-year-old high school senior from Penn Yan, a small town in upstate New York. She identifies as straight and prides herself on being an ally to her queer friends and family. A chronic people pleaser prone to overthinking, she has two best friends: Gretchen Patterson, a pink-haired bisexual classmate who often positions herself as Imogen's authority on queer issues, and Lili Cardoso, who came out the previous summer and now thrives at nearby Blackwell College. Imogen has accepted admission to Blackwell for the fall but has avoided visiting Lili on campus for months, anxious about fitting into Lili's new queer world.
Gretchen drives Imogen to campus, accompanied by Imogen's sixteen-year-old queer sister, Edith, and Lili's younger brother, Otávio Cardoso. Lili gives Imogen a tour and introduces her to close friends: Declan, a fashionable bisexual boy; Mika, a Japanese American nonbinary student; and Kayla, a confident bisexual girl. In her dorm room, Lili confesses that during orientation, feeling insecure as a newly out "baby queer," she told her college friends that she and Imogen had dated and that Imogen is bisexual. Everyone believes this, including Tessa Minsky, a Jewish lesbian from suburban Philadelphia. Imogen reassures Lili that the lie is harmless and agrees to play along.
Over the first evening, Imogen bonds with the group at dinner and trivia night, where her quick thinking helps win the team its first-ever victory. She and Tessa fall into an easy, bantering rhythm. Throughout, Imogen polices her own reactions around queer women, shaped by corrections from Gretchen, who once explained that straight women casually claiming queer attraction causes real harm. Imogen absorbed these lessons as absolute rules.
The next morning, Tessa invites Imogen to breakfast. They wander the quad, encounter a puppy named Daisy, and share family stories. Later, during a group prank, Imogen and Tessa hide together in Declan's closet. Tessa covers Imogen's mouth to stifle her laughter, and the sensation makes something twist inside Imogen. Afterward, her thoughts keep returning to Tessa's smile and the impulse to kiss Tessa's hand.
On Sunday evening, Tessa organizes a tunnel picnic beneath the dorms. When Tessa asks whether Imogen's parents accept her queerness, Imogen panics and steals Edith's real childhood experience of dressing as "Lesbian Elsa" for Halloween, passing it off as her own coming-out story. She feels sick about the lie but cannot correct it. The next morning, Imogen constructs vivid romantic scenarios involving Tessa and is disturbed by their intensity. She recalls past attractions to girls she dismissed: a track teammate, a queer customer at her summer job, a girl who handed out felt-rainbow pins at a Girl Scout exchange. She acknowledges these moments felt like more than friendship but insists they could not have been crushes.
Back home, Imogen and Tessa text near-constantly, exchanging childhood photos and playful banter. A "shooting-star feeling" catches Imogen off guard, and she asks herself plainly whether this is a crush. She opens a private browser and searches for sexuality quizzes but cannot determine what counts as attraction to girls or how many exceptions to straightness are needed before they stop being exceptions.
Midweek, when actress Kara Clapstone comes out as bisexual, Gretchen and Edith argue about whether earlier criticism of Clapstone amounted to pressuring her out of the closet. Imogen is privately shaken by the parallels to her own situation. Her father uses a genuine storage-sorting task to give Imogen space from Gretchen. While sorting boxes with Edith, Imogen handles Edith's preserved Elsa dress and feels a wave of guilt for having stolen that story.
On Thursday, Tessa FaceTimes Imogen and invites her back for a costume party at Rainbow Manor, a queer social house on campus. Imogen says she will think about it, then contacts Lili to arrange the visit. When Imogen tentatively tells Gretchen she might not be "fully straight," Gretchen dismisses her feelings as a "Ruby Rose effect," a supposed phenomenon in which certain queer women attract straight girls. When Imogen cannot definitively say she wants to have sex with Tessa, Gretchen tells her she is "safe" and "already enough." Imogen is left tearful and deflated.
On Friday, Lili drives Imogen back to campus and confronts her about months of avoidance. Imogen admits she felt intimidated by Lili's happiness and unsure of her place in Lili's queer world. They reconcile, and Lili reveals that Imogen was the first person she came out to. At a pregame gathering, during a round of sharing first queer crushes, Imogen recounts stories about the felt-rainbow girl and a childhood fixation named Ilana, hinting she now understands them as formative. In the bathroom at Rainbow Manor, Lili asks directly whether what is happening with Tessa is real. Imogen nods.
Imogen and Tessa slow dance at the party. In a moment of clarity, Imogen recognizes her feelings are not a fluke, comparing the realization to finding Waldo and discovering he was never really hiding. Walking home, Imogen impulsively kisses Tessa. Before they can process it, Lili warns that Gretchen, Edith, and Otávio have arrived unannounced. At a late-night diner, Gretchen steers conversation toward straight girls faking bisexuality. Imogen confesses the truth: She and Lili never dated, and the backstory was a lie. Lili takes full responsibility. When Tessa asks if Imogen is straight, Gretchen declares that she is. Imogen pushes back. Gretchen erupts, recounting her own painful experiences with homophobia and accusing Imogen of appropriating queerness. Overwhelmed, Imogen leaves the table. Edith follows and affirms her bisexuality without hesitation.
Outside, Tessa tells Imogen she is not skeptical of her identity and never would be. They spend the night in Tessa's room, kissing but not having sex. Imogen wakes anxious and slips out; when she returns, Tessa has retreated to her brother's room, afraid Imogen has had second thoughts. Lili drives Imogen home. Passing through Penn Yan, Imogen stops at the town's landmark, the world's largest pancake griddle, and posts a photo with a kiss emoji, hoping Tessa will see it.
On the Cardosos' porch, Lili shares that she may be panromantic asexual, meaning she experiences romantic attraction regardless of gender but little or no sexual attraction, or demisexual, meaning she feels sexual attraction only after forming a strong emotional bond. They discuss the harm of gatekeeping within queer communities. Imogen articulates that Lili's fabricated backstory paradoxically helped her: Having people accept her as bi without interrogation allowed her to see herself clearly. Via text, Gretchen offers a vague apology, then continues questioning whether Imogen was ever truly examining her sexuality. The exchange ends without resolution.
Tessa, having seen the griddle post, drives thirty minutes to Penn Yan. Both confess they feared the other had lost interest. They kiss in the rain on Main Street. Tessa mentions she is "known to be an excellent girlfriend." Imogen tells Tessa she wants to be her girlfriend, and Tessa responds with an emphatic yes. Tessa tells Imogen she wants her to control when she comes out to her parents, since the diner took that choice away. Back home, Imogen places the pink Vassar teddy bear Gretchen gave her into a storage box, considering with quiet finality that Gretchen may be her backstory: the friendship's future left open but its limits acknowledged.
Gretchen drives Imogen to campus, accompanied by Imogen's sixteen-year-old queer sister, Edith, and Lili's younger brother, Otávio Cardoso. Lili gives Imogen a tour and introduces her to close friends: Declan, a fashionable bisexual boy; Mika, a Japanese American nonbinary student; and Kayla, a confident bisexual girl. In her dorm room, Lili confesses that during orientation, feeling insecure as a newly out "baby queer," she told her college friends that she and Imogen had dated and that Imogen is bisexual. Everyone believes this, including Tessa Minsky, a Jewish lesbian from suburban Philadelphia. Imogen reassures Lili that the lie is harmless and agrees to play along.
Over the first evening, Imogen bonds with the group at dinner and trivia night, where her quick thinking helps win the team its first-ever victory. She and Tessa fall into an easy, bantering rhythm. Throughout, Imogen polices her own reactions around queer women, shaped by corrections from Gretchen, who once explained that straight women casually claiming queer attraction causes real harm. Imogen absorbed these lessons as absolute rules.
The next morning, Tessa invites Imogen to breakfast. They wander the quad, encounter a puppy named Daisy, and share family stories. Later, during a group prank, Imogen and Tessa hide together in Declan's closet. Tessa covers Imogen's mouth to stifle her laughter, and the sensation makes something twist inside Imogen. Afterward, her thoughts keep returning to Tessa's smile and the impulse to kiss Tessa's hand.
On Sunday evening, Tessa organizes a tunnel picnic beneath the dorms. When Tessa asks whether Imogen's parents accept her queerness, Imogen panics and steals Edith's real childhood experience of dressing as "Lesbian Elsa" for Halloween, passing it off as her own coming-out story. She feels sick about the lie but cannot correct it. The next morning, Imogen constructs vivid romantic scenarios involving Tessa and is disturbed by their intensity. She recalls past attractions to girls she dismissed: a track teammate, a queer customer at her summer job, a girl who handed out felt-rainbow pins at a Girl Scout exchange. She acknowledges these moments felt like more than friendship but insists they could not have been crushes.
Back home, Imogen and Tessa text near-constantly, exchanging childhood photos and playful banter. A "shooting-star feeling" catches Imogen off guard, and she asks herself plainly whether this is a crush. She opens a private browser and searches for sexuality quizzes but cannot determine what counts as attraction to girls or how many exceptions to straightness are needed before they stop being exceptions.
Midweek, when actress Kara Clapstone comes out as bisexual, Gretchen and Edith argue about whether earlier criticism of Clapstone amounted to pressuring her out of the closet. Imogen is privately shaken by the parallels to her own situation. Her father uses a genuine storage-sorting task to give Imogen space from Gretchen. While sorting boxes with Edith, Imogen handles Edith's preserved Elsa dress and feels a wave of guilt for having stolen that story.
On Thursday, Tessa FaceTimes Imogen and invites her back for a costume party at Rainbow Manor, a queer social house on campus. Imogen says she will think about it, then contacts Lili to arrange the visit. When Imogen tentatively tells Gretchen she might not be "fully straight," Gretchen dismisses her feelings as a "Ruby Rose effect," a supposed phenomenon in which certain queer women attract straight girls. When Imogen cannot definitively say she wants to have sex with Tessa, Gretchen tells her she is "safe" and "already enough." Imogen is left tearful and deflated.
On Friday, Lili drives Imogen back to campus and confronts her about months of avoidance. Imogen admits she felt intimidated by Lili's happiness and unsure of her place in Lili's queer world. They reconcile, and Lili reveals that Imogen was the first person she came out to. At a pregame gathering, during a round of sharing first queer crushes, Imogen recounts stories about the felt-rainbow girl and a childhood fixation named Ilana, hinting she now understands them as formative. In the bathroom at Rainbow Manor, Lili asks directly whether what is happening with Tessa is real. Imogen nods.
Imogen and Tessa slow dance at the party. In a moment of clarity, Imogen recognizes her feelings are not a fluke, comparing the realization to finding Waldo and discovering he was never really hiding. Walking home, Imogen impulsively kisses Tessa. Before they can process it, Lili warns that Gretchen, Edith, and Otávio have arrived unannounced. At a late-night diner, Gretchen steers conversation toward straight girls faking bisexuality. Imogen confesses the truth: She and Lili never dated, and the backstory was a lie. Lili takes full responsibility. When Tessa asks if Imogen is straight, Gretchen declares that she is. Imogen pushes back. Gretchen erupts, recounting her own painful experiences with homophobia and accusing Imogen of appropriating queerness. Overwhelmed, Imogen leaves the table. Edith follows and affirms her bisexuality without hesitation.
Outside, Tessa tells Imogen she is not skeptical of her identity and never would be. They spend the night in Tessa's room, kissing but not having sex. Imogen wakes anxious and slips out; when she returns, Tessa has retreated to her brother's room, afraid Imogen has had second thoughts. Lili drives Imogen home. Passing through Penn Yan, Imogen stops at the town's landmark, the world's largest pancake griddle, and posts a photo with a kiss emoji, hoping Tessa will see it.
On the Cardosos' porch, Lili shares that she may be panromantic asexual, meaning she experiences romantic attraction regardless of gender but little or no sexual attraction, or demisexual, meaning she feels sexual attraction only after forming a strong emotional bond. They discuss the harm of gatekeeping within queer communities. Imogen articulates that Lili's fabricated backstory paradoxically helped her: Having people accept her as bi without interrogation allowed her to see herself clearly. Via text, Gretchen offers a vague apology, then continues questioning whether Imogen was ever truly examining her sexuality. The exchange ends without resolution.
Tessa, having seen the griddle post, drives thirty minutes to Penn Yan. Both confess they feared the other had lost interest. They kiss in the rain on Main Street. Tessa mentions she is "known to be an excellent girlfriend." Imogen tells Tessa she wants to be her girlfriend, and Tessa responds with an emphatic yes. Tessa tells Imogen she wants her to control when she comes out to her parents, since the diner took that choice away. Back home, Imogen places the pink Vassar teddy bear Gretchen gave her into a storage box, considering with quiet finality that Gretchen may be her backstory: the friendship's future left open but its limits acknowledged.
