When Kira's father enters rehab, she is forced to leave everything behind and spend a year in Oregon. Now her father is supposedly sober, and Kira returns to Texas only to find three of her father's rehab friends staying at her home. Although her own friends seem distant, Kira is determined to piece back together her once-normal life.

Maverick Falconer is just starting middle school and he wishes he were a hero like his father because maybe then he could deal with his mother's drinking and series of abusive boyfriends, not to mention the kids who bully him in middle school (pretty much the same ones who bullied him in elementary school)--but as the year passes he begins to realize that other kids have problems too, and maybe if they can all survive sixth-grade things will get better....

Lou and her family don't have much, but for Lou, it's enough. Mom. Her sister, Casey. Their apartment in the city. Her best friend, Beth. It would be better if Dad could stop drinking and be there for her and Casey, and if they didn't have to worry about money all the time. But Lou doesn't need better--she only needs enough. What's enough for Lou, however, is not enough for Mom. Steve, Mom's boyfriend, isn't a bad guy, he's just ... not what Lou is...

Grace, tough and wise, has nearly given up on wishes, thanks to a childhood spent with her unpredictable, drinks-too-much mother Maggie. Then Grace meets Eva, a girl who believes in dreams despite her own difficult circumstances. When Grace must choose between Maggie and Eva, will she give up the future for the life she has?