To satisfy the requirements for her graduate degree in fine art photography, and in turn secure her young daughter's future, Amy Millington is determined to photograph Charles Harding's boarded-up mansion. The reclusive architect allows no one to enter his former Mission Hills home, the traumatic scene of tragedy when he was four. Charles denies the gutsy widow's request, but Amy is nothing if not persistent. Amy and Marta's plan to teach Charles to have fun and smile again succeeds, and once he learns to appreciate landscape photography as fine art, he opens his house for Amy to photograph. Even though he has no intention of entering it himself. Then during a photo session, Marta disappears somewhere among the secrets hidden in the old home. In desperation, Charles enters his house for the first time in over thirty years to help Amy search. He finds Marta holding his mother's long-lost suicide note. The note shatters his memories and reveals truths he'd long forgotten, opening fresh wounds. Charles must choose between letting those wounds continue to fester, or finally allowing them to heal and building a new life with Amy and Marta.