After leading a jury to wrongly sentence a man, Abigail enters her new teaching job at the law school with a newfound commitment to ethics. When she takes over her new class, it includes Vincent, an intensely ambitious student who will do anything for an A. When Abigail fails him for academic dishonesty, Vincent threatens that he will stop at nothing to get what he wants. As Vincent’s devious plot begins to unravel, she must take her life into her own hands, or Vincent will take it himself.

During the day, Lera studies humankind and its needs through opinion polls, which are an educational practice at the institute; at night, she dances under the pseudonym Gerda in a club to support herself and her mother. The people she meets are as unfortunate as her family. Her father has recently left for another woman, but he constantly returns home, unable to make his choice and thereby making the life of close people intolerable. The mother painfully endures the breakup and constantly sleeps, ignoring reality. Lera doesn’t know how to carry on, where to go and what to live for, and — most importantly — how to improve life. The adult world, invariable unfortunate, which Lera observes day and night, seems hopeless.

An ambitious teaching student’s finals studies are interrupted by a passionate affair with a jazz musician.