A young Bahamian girl, Rain, boards a local mail boat from Ragged Island and sets sail for Nassau. Stranded in an unfamiliar environment that fills her with dread and confronted by a mother she has never known, Rain searches desperately to find her own place in the world.
When Rain’s beloved grandmother dies she is forced to trade her simple but happy life on Ragged Island for the uncertainties of living in the capital with her mother, Glory, who abandoned her while a baby. Home becomes a two-room Nassau shack and Glory proves unfit for parental duties, being a drug addict, a prostitute, and quite possibly HIV positive. Rain seems destined for a bleak future, but for one thing: she is a promising sprinter. Her school’s track teacher, Trinidadian Ms Adams, becomes coach and mother figure to Rain, who is determined, almost literally, to outrun her fate.