There were a thousand tiny cracks in her protective coating, but it only took the right one for the entire shell to fall away... Stella Maddox is approaching forty. After sacrificing her career to become a stay-at-home mom, her marriage and life disintegrate. Birthdays don't bother her, but screaming kids, superficial friends, and grey hairs do. She compromises her spirit over and over, and finds herself slipping through the cracks as her family's lives take priority over her own. She strikes up a friendship with her neighbor's college-age son, Tad. Stella desires his company, but faces the possibility of destabilizing her marriage and family for an outlet to ease her loneliness. As the bond with her husband frays, she must decide when a connection becomes an affair, what actions she can live with, and which pieces inside she can still claim for herself. Stella is trapped in a cage that she worked most of her life to build.