Tony Dodge hires Rikki from a massage agency to help him celebrate a child's birthday tea. The absent child in question — for whom Dodge has more than a tender affection — is Simon, twelve-year-old son of Dodge's former girlfriend Jane. Rikki, though a rent boy, is heterosexual with his own childhood memories of sexual abuse. Gradually, under his sharp questioning, the complex nature of Dodge's dilemma is revealed: what began as innocent paternal frien'ship for a child has developed into a great deal more.